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solongsun 6
When Ruki woke up the next morning, he felt panicky before he even had his eyes fully open. It was the smell of the place, the smell of medicine and of locked doors, of radiator dust with the eye-watering undercurrent of disinfectant; of ammonia and acid-based scourers, powdery as pills.
Kai was sitting cross-legged on his bed, his pocket radio in his hands, and he was watching it like a television and singing along to Like a Rolling Stone.
'How does it feeeeel,' he warbled, blissfully off key, 'To be without a home...like a complete unknown...you've been asleep for ages, Ruki. It'll be breakfast soon.'
Ruki rubbed his sticky eyes clumsily. 'Yeah?' he said thickly.
'Uh huh. It's seven thirty-two. Breakfast is at eight.'
'What time do you normally wake up?' Ruki mumbled. He wasn't a morning person. Every day when he woke up he felt he could feel sleep trying to suck him back down, as if he was trying to wade his way out of quicksand.
'Five,' Kai answered nonchalantly. He glanced up from his radio and grinned. 'You should have come to our dance party last night. We had so much fun!'
'Uh huh,' Ruki said groggily.
'We listened to Magical Mystery Tour and then we had Pet Sounds and then Aretha Now. Die has so many records!'
'Die has Aretha Franklin records?'
'Die has every record,' Kai said, his eyes wide with good-natured envy. Wearily, Ruki pulled himself upright. The light coming in from the window was gloomy, and small hard raindrops were beginning to peck at the glass. He rubbed a hand over his face roughly.
'I don't really eat breakfast, normally,' he said.
'Well, you have to eat breakfast here.'
Instead of answering, Ruki slid carefully out of bed. The floor was cool against his bare feet.
'Hey, Ruki,' Kai said, bouncing to his own feet, 'You know why Die has so many records?'
The door opened with a polite click; a nurse popped her head around the door and noted that both men were awake. She gave them a small smile.
'Breakfast in half an hour. Ruki, your doctor has lifted your one-to-one for now; he's worried it's stopping you from mingling with our therapeutic community.'
'Who is my doc—'
'Don't forget to get dressed before breakfast,' she said lightly over the top of him, and shut the door with a snap behind her.
'It's because his parents think that if they buy him a lot of records, he'll be happy, and he'll stop making himself throw up,' Kai said matter-of-factly, as if they'd never been interrupted.
'Uh huh,' Ruki said weakly. 'Does it work?'
Kai smiled and gave an energetic shake of his head.
Breakfast was reasonably uneventful that morning; the atmosphere wasn't quite as raucous as it had been at other meals. Ruki found himself sat next to Uruha again, who ate in a fraught and jumpy sort of silence and made a lot of light, twitchy motions, a small frown on his face and his eyes very focussed. Kai hummed Like a Rolling Stone under his breath. Die alternated between joking with Aoi and dissecting his meal, removing the fried egg from on top of the rice and pushing the natto to the outer edges of his bowl, taking wincing little mouthfuls only when his nurse – a fattish young man, today – prompted him to. Ruki watched Die as Die watched the nurse; although the redhead gave the impression of nonchalance, his observation was sharp as razor wire; as soon as his nurse's attention lapsed – say he got distracted by another nurse saying something, or by something out of the window – whole fistfuls of Die's food would disappear under the table. It made Ruki feel edgy and tired just to watch, and he found himself almost deflating with relief when Aoi stepped in.
'Excuse me,' he said in an acid voice, 'Die's got half his breakfast in his pockets, just so you know.'
Die rounded on him, but Aoi just shook his head tiredly. 'I'm not going to let you kill yourself,' he said in a toneless voice, 'I don't care if it makes me a nark.'
The redhead lapsed into a frosty silence, twiglike arms folded over his chest, but he didn't force the issue: Ruki guessed this might have been an argument that had occurred many times before. Nobody around the table appeared particularly moved by it. Uruha gave a great flinch and knocked rhythmically on his forehead with his fingers, whispering inaudibly. Kai mashed stray crystals of salt together with his thumb and hummed Night Time is the Right Time as he swayed gently side-to-side in his chair.
After breakfast was a block of time Ruki was sincerely dreading: group therapy. Since he'd managed to be absent, sleeping off his sedation during the last session, he felt very lost and uncertain as he was herded along with the rest of the men into the TV room, and he stood uncomfortably to one side as everybody else started moving the furniture around, shoving the sofa and chairs into a roughly circular arrangement. The TV was switched off, for once – it usually remained on whether anybody was watching it or not – and Kai was sent to put his pocket radio back in his bedroom.
I wish you were here, E. O., Ruki thought wildly, but curled himself up on a corner of the sofa, huddled right up against the arm. Die draped his skinny frame over an armchair and rolled his shadowed eyes when Aoi chose a seat clear across the room, next to Uruha, who crossed his legs and uncrossed them, crossed his legs and uncrossed them. Shinya trickled into a chair like a thin current of water. For some reason Ruki couldn't explain, Kyo sat down next to him on the sofa. It was a wide sofa, a three-seater, but Kyo had plopped himself straight down in the middle. Ruki wondered if that was his normal seat, a sort of unwritten rule, and if he was maybe annoyed that Ruki was sitting there too. They weren't touching, but Ruki could feel the difference in him being there; it was as if they made a different kind of air between them, thinner than normal air.
When at last they were all assembled, there was a synchronised flurry of cigarette packets and lighters clicking. Ruki had left his in his bedroom; he felt too diseased to smoke. He could easily imagine that he was a great grey rotting lung already. He felt faintly sick.
'Well, gentlemen.'
The group therapist was an angular, unluxurious looking woman in her early fifties who wore earrings that looked as though they might have been crafted by children out of clay. Her body was lean and full of knobs of collarbone and elbow; no way she folded herself into her chair – the one blocking the view of the dead TV from the room – looked right. Her voice was good, though: smooth and melodic. 'As I'm sure you've noticed,' she said, 'Our newest inmate is joining us for the first time today, and so I thought this would be a good opportunity to revisit some of the ground rules of our group therapy discussions. Yes?' Her gaze travelled around the room, landing on Ruki. 'Briefly,' she explained, apparently addressing him, 'This circle is to be a safe place for all of us. That means no bullying behaviour, accusatory or inflammatory comments, or vulgarity. I would ask you to use your own common sense when deciding what might be considered vulgarity.' She eyed him beadily. 'Secondly, we ask everybody in this circle to refrain from interrupting each other. It is my job to mediate the group if it seems one participant is monopolising the discussing. Additionally, we try to steer clear from offering overt advice, as such, in these sessions, or from condemning the actions of others. If you feel unsure, try to stick to “I feel” statements. Finally, I needn't remind any of you of the importance of honesty in our talks. You do not need to participate if you don't want to – though we very much encourage you to do so – but
when you do participate, it must be honest. Otherwise, you are cheating not only yourselves, but your friends as well.'
She sat back then and offered the group an unlipsticked smile; her lips were a dry beige colour. 'Would anybody like to start us off?' she added decorously.
There was something of an awkward silence. Cigarettes were puffed on; ash was tapped into ashtrays or straight onto the floor. Shinya and Ruki were the only ones not smoking, and although he still felt sick Ruki began to regret it. He wanted a cigarette just to have something to do with his hands, which felt lifeless as two limp fish, clasped on top of his knees. His gaze found the window. The clouds were beginning to clear; the sky showed chips of blue, so bright they made his eyes water.
What would he be doing right now, if nothing had changed – if he hadn't been kicked out of school and if E. O. had never broken things off with him?
He might not even have been awake at nine o'clock in the morning. If he was, it would be because he'd been up all night, and he would be wrapped up in a bed sheet beside his mentor, smoking idly and looking out at the white sky beyond the tops of the buildings; from E. O.'s place the sky always seemed to look white. Greyish skeins of clouds would scud along it inconsequentially, like rolling scenery in an old film. He would be naked from the waist down but wearing a jumper on top, because E. O. kept the place cold; just one of his little eccentricities. E. O. would be awake and clutching a cup of black coffee, and depending on his mood and on how recently they'd fucked, he would be ranting about how the young love he got from Ruki was injecting some fucking sex into his work; how it made him want to paint spread legs and parted lips into his sedate landscapes. He would be wearing one of his black sweaters and the little round tortoiseshell glasses that might or might not have been prescription, and his shoulder-length hair would be windblown and messy, as usual. And Ruki would be huddled on the bed, maybe nursing a hangover or maybe not, starving hungry but unwilling to say anything to remind his mentor that he did such uncouth things as eating.
He remembered E. O. taking him by the hair and saying very seriously into his face, you're so beautiful I could eat you. He shifted uncomfortably in his seat, feeling a little hint of arousal flicker and die in his belly.
They would have spent the morning together, and then E. O. would have gone to his studio. Depending on the day he would either have insisted Ruki come with him, or else cut the younger man loose. On the loose days, Ruki felt like he stumbled around the city in a daze, counting his steps and the number of seconds it took him to walk between buildings. And he would feel purged and empty, hungry still, cold in the wind, scarf flying around his face...and he would feel thirsty and clean and dry-mouthed, and maybe he would wander around until nightfall and then show up at the studio uninvited, something E. O. hated. Get down on his knees in front of his mentor, say fuck me, please, please fuck me.
It was humiliating – at times it had been so humiliating that Ruki had thought he wouldn't be able to stand it any more; he had felt like he was watching himself from the outside, doing and saying all these things, and thought what are you doing, how can you be so shameless?
But those times had still been the best times. And Ruki missed them.
'I feel,' Uruha was saying edgily, 'A lot of hostility on visiting days. Against me and my parents.'
The doctor was making notes as he spoke. Ruki wondered how Uruha could stand that.
'Why do you think that is?' she asked.
'I think people are jealous because their parents can't or won't visit them,' said Uruha delicately, 'And they take it out on me.'
'Would anybody like to comment on that?' the doctor asked, but Aoi's hand had shot into the air before she could even get the words out.
'Well, I'm not jealous,' he said bluntly. 'I just think your dad is a creep.'
'My dad is not a creep!' Uruha flared back, tapping his index and middle fingers agitatedly against his jaw, rocking quickly and shortly back-and-forth from the waist, 'And you are jealous, because my parents love me and yours can't stand you.'
Aoi opened his mouth as if he was about to shoot something vitriolic back, but seemed to catch himself and contented himself with an expressive eyeroll. 'Whatever,' he said simply.
'Aoi,' the doctor said patiently, 'Do you also feel that your parents aren't fond of you?'
'They dumped me here, didn't they?'
'Do you think that you'd find Uruha's relationship with his parents less of a distraction if you had a better relationship with your own family?'
Aoi exhaled noisily through his nose. 'No,' he said flatly, 'I don't. And I don't have any problem with Uruha's mother. I just think his father...' Aoi leant forward in his seat, taking a deep drag of his cigarette so his next, carefully-chosen words were delivered in amongst clouds of bluish smoke, 'Is very probably a kiddie-fiddler.'
'Aoi—!' the doctor started as Uruha started out of his chair, 'Uruha, sit down. Aoi, I think if you calm down and think about it, you'll see that you want to apologise to Uruha for that remark, and to the group for breaking our vulgarity rule.'
Aoi threw himself back in his chair, puffing on his cigarette irritably. 'Sorry', he said roughly.
'Properly.'
A muscle twitched in Aoi's jaw. 'Sorry,' he said in a softer voice.
'Will you accept Aoi's apology?'
'Whatever,' Uruha said angrily, 'I know he's just jealous.'
'Thank you, gentlemen. I know this is something you might want to discuss more civilly later, but I do think you should feel proud of yourselves for reaching a temporary resolution amicably.' She made a small note in her pad. 'Now, Uruha. Is there anybody else who you feel is reacting negatively to your parents' visits?'
'I don't like Uruha's dad,' Kai piped up happily, and Uruha shot him a withering glance.
'You've never even met my parents. You don't even know what day it is. You'd eat shit if somebody told you it was chocolate.'
'So everyone who hates your dad is jealous or stupid, right?' Aoi said sardonically.
'I'm not stupid!'
'No, you're not stupid. You're crazy. You're a fucking nutcase.'
'Kai isn't crazy,' interjected Die fairly, 'He's just...' he faltered. Kai bounced a little in his seat as he turned to face Die, politely curious to hear what he was.
'I think,' the doctor interrupted in her musical voice, 'we're getting a little off this topic, and I must say that I'm disappointed in you all for resorting to personal attacks. Let's stop our discussion for a few minutes, and just do a little deep breathing together, shall we? Gentlemen? Deep breath in, and hold for one...two...three...'
Fuck, thought Ruki. I've got to get out of here.
After group therapy, the men split up again and drifted apart in their small groups. Kai grew morose and clambered back into bed in his jeans and sweatshirt, ignoring or else not hearing conversation and clutching tightly to his pocket radio. It was playing Play With Fire by The Rolling Stones, and the melancholy sound followed Ruki out into the corridor even after he closed the door behind him, meandering and sweet. Uruha's door was closed, too, an almost visible frost of anger emanating from it, and Die and Aoi's room seemed to be a no-go area too: only Aoi was in there, smoking moodily and reading a magazine. Die was missing, but Ruki could hear noise from the music room down the corridor – Morrison Hotel, Die's newest album – so he assumed the other man was in there. The air seemed vaguely blue from smoke, and Ruki stuck a cigarette between his own lips as he inserted himself carefully into one of the three wood and glass phone booths that lined the hallway just in front of the nurses' station – quiet at this time of day, since medications wouldn't be doled out until after dinner. Only one woman was on duty; Ruki recognised her as the one with the perm.
'Can I...?' he gestured awkwardly towards the phones, and she gave a single nod.
'Local call?'
Ruki bit his lip. 'No. Osaka.'
'Your parents?'
'A friend.'
'Try to call your parents sometimes. They'll be missing you. Head on in, dial your number and I'll connect you.'
Ruki gave her a stiff nod and shut the glass door of the booth behind him. It wasn't fooling a soul – he could still hear Die's music just as clearly, and he imagined his voice would be equally as audible outside of the booth as it was inside – but it felt like something; like a small and comforting place to curl up, a door he could shut and be alone behind. Propping the phone between his shoulder and ear, he shook another cigarette out of his pack to have it ready and, before he could lose his nerve, started to dial, taking comfort from the familiar sound of the rotary piece whirring back into place; how many times had he dialled this number? He knew the sound of it by heart. There was a pause then – a kind of dim switchboard buzzing – and then the connection was made, and after a loaded pause Ruki heard ringing. Two rings, then three. Four. Five. Six. Ruki bit down on the filter of his cigarette anxiously. Seven rings. Eight—
'Yes?'
The voice on the other end was clipped and impatient, and Ruki's mind immediately went entirely blank.
'Yes? Hello? Yes? Can you hear me?'
Ruki heard the snap of a lighter on the other end, and a vigorous exhale of smoke.
'Is that you, Kaito?' the voice said next, lower now and more gentle, 'Because you know you can't call me here.'
'It's me,' Ruki blurted out, feeling his tongue suddenly unstick itself from the roof of his dry mouth. There was an awful pause, and he lit his second cigarette.
'Ruki,' the voice on the other end said, as if trying it out. 'Well. Well, hi. What do you want?'
'Who's Kaito?' Ruki asked. His voice was calm, but he noticed that his teeth were chattering, and there was a feeling in his chest like a huge scream was lodged there, inflating slowly like a balloon.
'Ruki, come on. Let's not get into that. You're only going to get upset.'
'Is he another student?' Ruki asked.
'Ruki. Calm down, or I'm going to hang up. We're not going to talk about this.'
Slowly, carefully, Ruki leant back against the wall. His vision was blurry, and he didn't trust his voice not to waver out of control when he spoke; his throat felt horribly tight.
'Okay,' he whispered.
'Okay. Good. So. I haven't seen you around campus recently. Are you avoiding me?'
'I got kicked out,' Ruki mumbled. There was a painful pause.
'Oh.' Another pause. 'Did you – I mean – did you say anything? About us?'
'Don't worry. You're safe.'
'You didn't say anything?'
'No,' Ruki sighed, 'No, I didn't.' He blotted his cheeks with the back of his hand, feeling weak and trembly.
'Okay, good. I mean, good. You know it would be worse for you than for me anyway.' There was a rattly sigh from the other end of the phone, 'I mean, shit, I don't want to be like this. I don't want to say shit like this. But you know, if you did tell – it could ruin your life, you know that.'
'Right. I know.'
'Okay. I mean, I'm not saying I would ruin your – you know, or anything. I just don't want you to get yourself into something that you can't get yourself out of. You're very young, Ruki, okay? Sometimes you don't exactly know how the world works.'
'Right,' Ruki said again, quietly.
'So, anyway. Why were you calling?'
'Oh. Just...' Ruki looked desperately around the phone booth, his eyes held very wide, 'Just – nothing really. I just...I miss you.'
'Ruki. That's sweet. Thanks.'
'Do you miss me?'
A pause. 'Sure.'
Ruki gave a sad snort of a laugh. 'No you don't.'
He waited for a denial that didn't come. Very gently, he hung up the phone.
He wasn't sure how long he sat in the phone booth, smoking; it might have been ten minutes or half an hour. The nurse with the perm looked up at him every now and again, but she seemed to just be marking his spot; she didn't tell him to come out or ask why he was just sitting in there. He smoked two more cigarettes, trying to get his breathing back to normal, and then waited until she turned around and busied herself with something before letting himself out and taking off down the hallway, hardly looking where he was going, or knowing where he was going, either; his own room was out, the TV room was out, the music room was out—
He was so preoccupied he didn't notice the two legs lying motionless in his path; he tripped over them and hit the ground, hard. It was the kind of jolt that knocked the thoughts momentarily out of his head and the air from his lungs; he lay sprawled, stunned, for a long moment before pulling himself up onto his knees.
'I didn't mean to trip you.'
Ruki turned, and found Kyo surveying him levelly, a paperback novel in his lap and a lit cigarette smouldering between his fingers.
'Why are you—?'
'Shinya wanted some space.' He shrugged. 'Everybody needs privacy.'
'You...' Ruki felt a stinging in his lip and realised he'd bitten it. A droplet of warm blood rolled halfway down his chin, and he wiped it away impatiently. 'You room with Shinya?'
'Yes. Are you all right?'
'It's fine. It'll stop bleeding in a minute.'
'Not that; you. You've been crying.'
Ruki didn't quite know what to say to that; he felt embarrassed. He shrugged disjointedly.
'Who was on the phone?'
'None of your business.'
Kyo shrugged. 'Correct.'
Ruki sat back on his heels, unsure what to do. Now that the shock of his fall was over, the shakes were back; he could feel some distant mountain winter rattling his bones and banging his teeth together. There was a tense burning in his throat again; he turned his head away angrily.
'What are you reading,' he said brusquely, not bothering to add a question mark. Kyo held up his book, but Ruki couldn't seem to pull the title from it; he felt too muddled, some relationship between his eyes and his brain had stopped working; the cover might as well have been a mush of oatmeal for all it meant to him.
'Any good?' he asked, swiping his hands vigorously over his cheeks.
'No. I've read it before.'
'Yeah?'
'Seventy-eight times.'
Ruki raised his eyebrows, and Kyo looked back at him flatly. 'There aren't many books here.'
'Can't your family send you some more?'
'Not an option.'
'You don't speak to your family?'
'It'd be a pretty one-sided conversation.'
Ruki nodded. His lip was still bleeding; he could taste blood and his chin felt sticky.
'You need to press it.'
'Press—?'
'Put pressure on it. It'll stop the bleeding.' Kyo sighed, leant forwards and took Ruki's face in his hand, pressing down firmly on his lower lip with his thumb.
Something like a minor electric current seemed to travel from Ruki's lip down into his stomach; he was aware of growing very still, and swallowed anxiously.
'It's okay—'
'Keep still,' Kyo said carelessly. He looked bored; he stifled a yawn. His eyes were resting steadily on Ruki's face, but not like he was gazing at it; it was more like that was where his eyes had happened to end up.
Ruki wondered if he was on some kind of medication. He supposed almost everybody was. He found it awkward sitting there, unable to talk and with Kyo in equal silence, but evidently the other man was comfortable with it.
A few long minutes past, and when Kyo finally removed his thumb, Ruki gave a twitchlike nod and clambered gauchely to his feet.
'Thanks,' he said, brushing himself off. His body hurt where it'd hit the floor; he still felt cold. Kyo shrugged acceptance.
'You know on the phone?' he said.
'Yeah? What?'
Kyo sighed and picked his book back up. 'Your boyfriend sounds like a real dick,' he said.
Ruki bit down on his lip, and it started bleeding again.
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Thanks again :)
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