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kosherbacon wrote:

Leotrak wrote: By the way... How many puns did you hide in Cornelio's name?

Actually, none. Not intentionally, anyway. I just threw a buttload of Spanish names together.

Pfft, you totally should have made some puns with that name -_-"

By the way, no, you're never going to live Madame Lillian's down

Juno wrote:A buttload doesn't even begin to describe it.
Not even a person who has composed surnames and from back when the Catholics were given three names in baptism would have a full name that long.

Picasso's full name was Pablo Diego José Francisco de Paula Juan Nepomuceno María de los Remedios Cipriano de la Santísima Trinidad Clito Ruiz y Picasso Ruiz Picasso. It's not as far-fetched as you think.

Late 19th century son of an Andalusian bourgeois couple (so posh!) had a metric fuckton of given names bestowed upon him. And?
I am just saying it is not representative of the spanish or hispanic customs, much less of the contemporary ones.

I was actually going to make his name longer, lol.

Today, we focus on Hisao Kouta and Misha Aimi. Anyone figure out what Aimi's disability is yet?

Have a character who is having trouble getting the girl plausibly? Have him protect her in a street fight. Works every time...

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Harmony and Abundance
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Aimi got up from the picnic blanket, her expression stunned and her lips quivering. With trembling hands, she opened Kouta's letter and read it to herself quietly as her eyes started to water.

“Kokou,” she asked, shaking, “is this how you really feel about me?”

“Y-Yes.”

“Do you want my answer now?”

“Please.”

Aimi dropped down to Kouta's level, looked him tenderly in the eyes and gave him a full handed slap across the face.

“FUCK NO I WON'T GO OUT WITH YOU, FREAK!”

Kouta was crushed. Aimi didn't just reject him, she insulted him. He would've been fine if she just turned him down but to call him a freak? She was supposed to be his friend. Friends don't hurt each other like that. His mind wanted to run away and cry, but his hands trembled, wanting to shake some sense into the girl. Maybe if Aimi knew how much he really cared for her...

“S-Stop it, Kouta, you're hurting me!” she yelped, his hands clutching her shoulders tightly.

“Please, Aimi, I-I love y...”

“No! Stop it! I can never love someone like you back, you retard!”

Things went silent in Kouta's head. Feeling some dark sensation pull himself away from his body, he saw his field of vision withdraw until the scene of his and Aimi's picnic looked like they were being seen through a red tinted telescope.

Aimi was still looking at him, her eyes bulging. Kouta's hands drifted up from her shoulders up to her neck. Even though he no longer had a sensation of what his body was doing, he could feel something crack in his palms just as his hands appeared to crush her windpipe.

No, it wasn't supposed to end this way. Where the hell was Kouta's happy ending? It was her fault, all her fault. Kouta returned to his body just as he was in the middle of punching Aimi's lifeless face.

Over.

And over.

And over.

And over again.

...

“Hey, Kokou! Are you still alive?”

Kouta woke up on the floor of his room in a cold sweat. Still half-believing that his dream really happened, he continued to weep for what he did to Aimi, even though she was just outside of his door, alive and well.

“Sorry to make you wait,” he apologized after getting ready and meeting her in the hall, avoiding eye contact with the girl he just brutally murdered. “I must have overslept.”

“Don't worry about it. We're actually early for your appointment.”

“Why are you doing this for me, Aimi?”

Aimi smiled and latched onto his arm as they walked to his counselor's office. If only she wasn't so nice to only him, then he wouldn't be thinking about her so much. She wouldn't be so affectionate if she knew what he was really like.

“As student body president, It's my duty to attend to the mental well-being of my classmates.”

She gave a straightforward, impersonal answer that partially put Kouta's mind at ease.

“...And you're my friend.”

Or not. He knew that what they had was friendship, but it always felt off-balance, like he couldn't bring himself to truly confide in her. Real friendships don't require people to exercise constant restraint and hold each other off at arm's length. Kouta always felt like he should be apologizing to Aimi for everything.

“Thanks for the escort.”

“No prob, I'll see you in the cafeteria around dinner time.”

Aimi dropped Kouta off at the office and he drifted onto the chair to face his therapist. As if he was in a confessional booth, he spilled his guts to the psychologist and described his nightmare in detail.

“Kouta, bro,” the “hip, young” middle aged therapist reassuringly said, “relax. Sometimes a dream is just a dream. Since your surgery, have you had any incidents like the one from before you came here?”

“No.”

“And you've been taking your medication?”

“Yeah.”

“And practicing those stress management exercises we discussed?”

“Yes.”

“And at any time since you've come to this school, have you ever been angry to the point where you'd feel like you'd lose control?”

“No.”

“Then chill out, buddy. Now tell me more about this girl from your dreams. You're interested in her, right? What's she like?”

“Yeah, I like her. Well, um, she's a bit hard for others to get along with but she's really nice to me. Weird thing is, she doesn't look like the kind of girl I'm normally attracted to. Maybe if she gained about 20 or 30 kilos, maybe more...”

“Uhuh, uhuh,” the counselor responded back, taking notes. “So why don't you ask her out already? I'm sure things will be fine. If she's really your friend, she won't tear your heart into shreds even if she rejects you. It's not like she's that girl you came in with...”

“She is.”

“Oh, my God,” the therapist worriedly jumped back in his chair. “Her?! You're infatuated with Miss Kondou?! Yeah, I'm sorry Kouta, but I don't think now is a good time to start a relationship with her. She's so... how do I say it... honestly, even I want to choke that little tramp sometimes.”

“Hey, she's one of my best friends...”

“...Sorry.”

...

After his counseling session, Kouta went to the gym to work out furiously. Even though he didn't feel like he had excess rage to deal with, he was going to see Aimi later that day and couldn't take any chances. With every repetition on the weight bench, every sparring partner thrown across the room, Kouta drained his anger reservoir until it was empty.

In the locker room, he gathered his thoughts while drying himself off after his shower. The sudden hooting and whistling from the other guys in the room kept interrupting his train of thought.

Ignoring the others, he thought about Aimi. She was meticulous about her appearance. Her makeup was always flawless, her eyebrows always neatly groomed, her teeth remarkably white and straight, and her hair always sweet smelling and bouncy. Whenever she spoke to Kouta, her voice always lost its arrogant tinge and became soft and melodic.

“Yo, Kokou!” the soft and melodic voice screeched out from behind, slapping Kouta's back and making him drop his towel.

“Aimi? What are you doing here?” He asked, trying not to bring attention to the fact that he was naked.

“Official student council business. And hey, I see you work out. You really ought to wear short sleeves more often.”

“Uh, thanks. So what kind of official business do you have here?”

“I cannot make it to dinner tonight so I'm asking you out.”

“You... what?”

“I like you, Kouta. Let's go on a date. I'll pick you up at your room tomorrow at five-thirty.”

“Well, I, uh... Aimi...”

Kouta's brain started to short circuit with excitement. His worst fears were now moot. Aimi did all the work for him. Suddenly, he wondered just how aggressive she really is...

“Ah, good, you accept,” she said, looking down.

“I-I-I did?”

“Not in so many words,” she replied, dropping Kouta's towel in front of him, where it snagged on his newly made hanger.

“See you tomorrow, loverboy.” she dismissed herself, strutting out of the locker room with Kouta's classmates cheering him on and laughing at his visible excitement.

...

“So, Kouta,” Aimi asked while lazily stirring her rice porridge, “um...”

Kouta saw his date's bored eyes and understood the problem. At the moment, they were just hanging out as friends. Aimi was trying to stir up that “date atmosphere” required to make things more than that. Unfortunately, Kouta wasn't opening up any more than he already had before.

“Hey, what kind of girls do you usually date?”

That question normally asks for trouble, but Aimi was getting desperate to pry something new out of him.

“I... I've never dated before.”

“Oh,” she frustratedly sighed, figuring out the possible source of Kouta's distance, “so you've never had a girlfriend before, huh? Have you ever asked a girl out before or have you always just waited for us to throw ourselves at you? Sorry... that sounded bad... I mean...”

“It's fine,” he solemnly said, cutting her plenty of slack considering his own boring aloofness. “There was this one time when... ah...”

Aimi considered prodding him on but dropped it after seeing how uncomfortable he was with the subject.

“What about you? How many boyfriends have you had?”

“How many, um...” Aimi started counting on one set of fingers, keeping tally of every group of five with the other hand.

“Um, I've lost count, sorry,” she laughed.

That certainly didn't comfort Kouta at all. Aimi apparently had dated several dozen guys in the past. He would have a lot to live up to if he pursues her.

“What about girls?” he asked, not expecting a serious answer.

“Well, I've been with a couple girls but never just with them. Only like in threes... why? What'd Izzy tell you?”

“Izumi?”

“Nothing.”

“So,” Aimi asked Kouta, with her eyes dodging around the restaurant, “you're a virgin, huh?”

“...Yeah. I don't suppose you are, are you?”

“Oh boy,” she wheezed, rubbing her temples. “My friend, that ship has sailed, cruised around the world a couple times, ... and sunk.”

“Hey, hey. It's okay. It doesn't bother me at all.”

“Ya sure? Cuz there's a lot of pressure involved with taking someone's virginity. Part of me feels like you deserve someone who's unspoiled for your first, you know?”

“Wait. We're going to have sex?”

“You.... don't want to? Because it's been forever since I've gotten it. Like, not since a couple months before I started school here.”

“You've only been going here five months!”

“That's a really long time...”

Despite the suddenly awkward change in conversation, Aimi managed to relax some of the tension between her and Kouta. They left the restaurant and headed back to the school, arm in arm.

“Hey, Kouta.”

“Yeah?”

“Sorry about bringing up sex and stuff. It's just that sort of thing isn't as big a deal for me anymore in a relationship, you know? If you're not ready or if you just don't want to, then I can wait.”

“Hey, it's okay. Let's just figure this out as we go along, okay?”

“Okay,” she answered uneasily. “But Kokou, what's really bothering you?”

“I... don't really want to talk about it.”

“Fine.”

Aimi worriedly looked up at Kouta. Dating or not, one of her only real friends was hurting and she wanted to help, whether he'd let her or not.

“Aimi,” he said with a deep breath, shaking himself loose from her grip, “I'm sorry. I don't think it's going to work out between us.”

“Oh. I-I... okay. Please tell me why. And don't give me no crap about not you liking me like that. Everyone knows you do.”

“I'm no good for you, Aimi. I've got a lot of bad things going on with me and I don't want you to get hurt in the process.”

“No. I reject your rejection. NOBODY turns me down.”

“I'm serious, Aimi. I can't put you through this.”

“I am serious too. I'm your friend, right? Friends help each other with these things. Now what the fuck is going on with you?”

“AAAIIIMIIII!!!” A desperate voice from across the street wailed out.

“Aw, shit. We gotta go.”

“Who's that?”

“One of my ex-boyfriends.”

Aimi and Kouta rejoined their arms and walked briskly back towards the school. Their guest was not giving up his pursuit.

“Hey! Ey! Ey! Don't ignore me, Aimi.”

“Fuck off, Masaru,” Aimi shouted, turning around to try confronting him.

“Don't be like that, babe,” the scruffy young man with the goatee pleaded. “I came all this way for you. I'll take you back home.”

“Hah! You're late. I like it here now. I have friends, a boyfriend...”

“Um, Aimi...”

“Not now, Kouta.”

“Whaat? This big 'tard?” Masaru turned to Kouta and lumbered at him mockingly, “Durr, what are we gonna do today, George? Duurrrr? Let's go, babe, I know you're not one of those people.”

Aimi grabbed her crotch and flipped off Masaru.

“I am one of 'these people.' And this 'tard is staying where she is. Go choke on a dick. Come on, Kouta, let's go.”

“Woah woah, big Charly,” Masaru threatened, grabbing Kouta by the shoulder to take a swing at him. “I ain't done with you yet.”

“Kouta! Watch out!”

Kouta could have dodged the hit. He also could have taken it right to the jaw and remained standing. And he could've retaliated and beaten Masaru to within an inch of his life. He might have even killed him.

However, he didn't. Kouta allowed himself to be felled by Masaru. With every kick to the face and stomach, Kouta struggled inside, fearing that if he even raised a single finger against his attacker, he would lose control, killing him and possibly Aimi in the process. Soberly feeling every twang of pain in his system, he was thankful that he was still in control of his faculties.

“Ha-HA! How 'bout that, Forrest! Not so tough no-OW! OW!”

From where he lay, Kouta could see Masaru get chased off by Aimi, who was stabbing at him with a switchblade in a circular motion, slicing into his forearm several times.

“DON'T YOU FUCKING EVER COME BACK YOU LITTLE FAGGOT OR ELSE I'LL GO HUNT YOU DOWN AND CUT YOUR THROAT OUT WHEN YOU SLEEP! ...Kouta! Kouta, are you okay?! Can you hear me?”

...

Back in her room, Aimi nursed Kouta's scrapes and bruises with hydrogen peroxide and ice packs. The nursing staff was busy dealing with a group overdose in the library.

“What the fuck was that, Kouta?” she asked, dabbing on antiseptic onto Kouta's lip with a cotton swab. “I've seen you work out and practice judo. You could've ripped him in half!”

“I... can't say.”

“Well what CAN you say? You're lucky I can take care of myself. Otherwise, who knows what could've happened to ME while you were knocked the fuck out? What if he was a serial killing cannibal rapist? Hmm?”

“I'm sorry, Aimi! I'm ashamed. I'm sorry to put you in that position.”

“Hey, sorry.” Aimi laughed at herself for losing her cool. “I'm the one who really is to blame, since that guy followed me here.”

She sighed at her own crude bedside manner and ducked behind a privacy screen.

“Here, let me show you something.”

Aimi emerged from behind the divider, completely nude.

“So you're ashamed of something, huh?” she confessed, avoiding eye contact with Kouta, outlining a frame around her body with her hands. “This is what I'm embarrassed of. Even all those guys I've been with before have never seen me like this. I always do it in the dark.”

“What... I don't understand? You look bea...”

“Don't give me that 'you look beautiful' bullshit. I've had literally EVERYBODY tell me that since I got out of the hospital to try making me feel better. Tell me what you think of my body.”

“What do you want me to say?”

“Say the brutal, honest truth. Think of the kind of girl you spank it to every night and tell me how I measure up. I promise I won't go berserk if you give me an unpleasant answer.”

“Honestly,” Kouta quietly said while dropping his head, “you're way too skinny. I mean, you look good and all when you're clothed, like a model, but seeing you like this I'm seriously scared for you.”

“And that, friend, is probably the truth. Thank you. You might find this shocking, but this is the biggest I've been in years. I weigh a little less than forty kilos now. Last year I was down to thirty four.”

“Oh my God! Why?”

“BECAUSE I'M A FAT FUCKING PIG, THAT'S WHY!” Aimi screamed. “Or at least that's how I feel. Sometimes, when I even eat rice porridge, I could taste fat in it. I could feel grease coating my tongue, going straight to my ass, with all that food stretching my gut out. I mean really, fucking soft boiled rice?! I KNOW there's no fat in it but sometimes I swear that whoever cooked it added some in.”

“Is... this why you're at this school?”

“Yes.”

Aimi sat on the bed next to Kouta, who put his arm around her, all of her, which was terrifyingly easy to do.

“When did you start doing this to yourself?”

“I dunno, like... three or four years ago. I used to be pretty chunky and... I was okay with that. Then when I got braces, I lost a lot of weight because it hurt to eat. It sucked at first but I realized how great I looked without the baby-fat. Once the hardware came off, I decided inside to never be a big fat ball of lard again.”

“Do you make yourself throw up?”

“I did at first, but it's really bad for your teeth and throat. Well, I didn't care about those things, I just didn't want to get caught by my dentist. So I just... stopped eating so much. After a while, if I'd eat anything at all, I'd just feel so grossed out, like I ate poison that I HAD to get out of me. They say I'm getting better and that soon I'll be able to eat more real food again but... I wish I didn't have to look so gross.”

“Have you told anyone about this?”

Aimi fell out of Kouta's embrace and sprawled out onto her bed, looking eerily like an emaciated corpse.

“No. I mean, you can kind of tell by looking at me, but the only ones who really know that this IS my problem are my family, doctors, and school staff.”

“Hey, Aimi,” Kouta said as he gingerly laid himself down next to her, still in pain, “you don't have to endure this alone. Even if you don't want to talk to Izumi about this, I'm here for you.”

Aimi jabbed a spindly finger against Kouta's swollen lips to shut him up and made a whiny face.

“Yeah, funny you should mention not going at things alone, Mister 'I don't wanna talk about it I'll only hurt you waah, waaah, waaaah!'”

“Please, Aimi. Don't make me...”

“Oh for fuck's sake, Kouta. You got the most popular girl in school to get naked in front of you and admit for the first time ever to anyone that she's anorexic. Now spill it!”

Kouta squirmed uncomfortably and took several deep breaths, mentally preparing himself for when Aimi inevitably kicks him out of her room and out of her life.

“You know how I keep saying I'm afraid of hurting people? That's because I've hurt people before. I had a really bad temper. Whenever people would piss me off, I'd just... completely lose my shit and black out. I've always been pretty big and tough. Usually, by the time I snapped out of it, I'd have already beaten the shit out of whoever I was fighting with to a bloody pulp. Even if I was outnumbered, I'd usually win.”

“So? That actually sounds kinda bad-ass to me.”

“It's not. It scares me to death. If I could fight off several guys who were bigger than myself, what would keep me from straight up KILLING guys who were smaller and by themselves? I got scared of what I could do and I swore off getting into confrontations. I did pretty good at staying out of trouble but then...”

Kouta put his palms over his eyes to hide the tears and scooted away from Aimi.

“I hurt a girl, Aimi! A girl I LIKED. And she was my friend! I... I asked her out, and she turned me down... and then she called me names and I... I pushed her over and hit her. And then I kept hitting her and hitting her trying to make her shut up and take back what she said. The next thing I knew, like twelve guys were holding me down while the ambulance took her to the emergency room.”

“Kouta... hey,” Aimi reached out to try comforting him.

“I almost killed her, Aimi. I almost killed one of my FRIENDS!”

“So what happened after that?”

“I spent some time in an institution. Some doctors found a tumor in my brain that was making me more aggressive or something and they took it out. I'm supposed to be all better, plus they put me on drugs just in case. But I don't believe it's that easy. You can't just snip a bean sized piece of flesh away and suddenly fix a monster and act like nothing happened. I can never return back to my hometown after what I did and even now, I still have dreams where I just lose control and kill someone. The other night, I... I killed you, Aimi. I killed you!”

Aimi shushed Kouta and slid over to his side of the bed to give him a kiss.

“Kouta, I'm proud of you for not killing Masaru. In fact, I've never been so proud of any boy for losing a fight over me.”

“And you know what else?” she added, “I know you're not like that anymore. You've put up with the biggest bitch in the whole school for this long and you still haven't lost your head.”

“But what if something like this happens again, even if it doesn't involve you?”

“Then I'll protect you,” Aimi said, wrapping her scrawny arm around Kouta's torso. “I'll get healthy and big and strong so you won't have to fight anymore.”

“Hey, Aimi,” Kouta said, taking Aimi back in his arms when he noticed her shivering, “about what I said... about how you look. No matter what shape you're in, you're beautiful to me.”

“You know, I never fall for this 'inner beauty' crap. Until now. What kind of figure do you find attractive anyway?”

“I like big girls. The curvier the better.”

“What?”

...

“Oh, my God, this is so good,” Aimi squealed, taking a big enthusiastic bite out of her ice cream cone.

“Hey, are you sure you can eat that?”

“Probably not, but fuck it, I haven't had ice cream in over a year. It sure beats canned vomit shakes.”

“Well, slow down, okay?”

“Yes, Dad. I promise to keep it down.”

Aimi grabbed Kouta by the hand and dragged him down the street to the theater.

“Now doesn't it feel better to actually be a couple than to do this as friends?”

“Heh, yeah.”

“AAAAIMI!!!”

“Ugh, not this, again.” Aimi gestured to hand her purse and ice cream over to Kouta. “Hold my shit.”

“No,” Kouta stepped in front of her and held her back with his outstretched arm. “I have to do this.”

“Are you sure?”

“Something like this was going to happen sooner or later. I can't hide from myself forever.”

“Sup, Timmay? Ready for another one?”

Before he knew it, Masaru's wide swing at Kouta was deflected, leaving him wide open.

“Ack, Help me, Aimi!” He choked out, trapped in a headlock.

“You're on your own, buddy,” Aimi shrugged, casually licking her ice cream. “My new boyfriend is like that big green dude from the comic books. Piss him off and he kills ya.”

“Well then, fuck you, Aimi. Fuck you and your big fat jiggly stretch marked ass.”

Aimi's ice cream cone fractured in her grip. Shivers traveled up her spine and filled her eyes with rage.

“Did. You. Just. Call. Me. Fat?”

Aimi clenched her teeth and closed her eyes, struggling to remember the importance of controlling one's temper. Instead of turning the other cheek, she decided to pass the problem on to someone else.

“Eh, I guess I have put on some weight,” she sighed, feigning embarrassment. Aimi took her ice cream and mashed it into Masaru's eye, crumbling the cone and smearing the contents all over his face. “Here, finish it for me.”

“Kouta, be a dear and protect my honor, will ya? Holler if you need me to help you out.”

“Sorry, bro,” Kouta calmly said to his prisoner before letting him go to take him on face-to-face, “you heard the lady.”

...

“So, did ya kill him?” Aimi asked, rinsing her sticky hands off with bottled water while in line to buy another ice cream cone.

“Nah. I guess you're right, I'm not like that anymore. I was able to show some restraint, pull some punches, and I merely taught him a lesson instead of murdering him.”

“That's too bad. Because nobody calls me fat. Nobody.”

-End-

Aimi is about 5'2/157cm. She weighs 40kg/88.18lbs during the story and was 34kg/74.96lbs when hospitalized(!!)

What an epic fight, too bad she didn't stick it with the sharp end of the cone.

... Did she?

Xuan wrote:too bad she didn't stick it with the sharp end of the cone.

... Did she?

Due to fears that the students would hurt themselves, the ice cream shops surrounding St. Pfil's use injection-molded wafer cones without pointy ends.

My Hisao doesn't HNNG, he RAEG instead.

Guys who like curvy girls, represent!

*cough* Anyway. Good stuff, Baconbits!

Excellent work Kosher. and nice to see you changed your signature with a new link, I think that just defeats the purpose of you wanting to live it down; or don't you.

Glad you guys have enjoyed this so far. You may have noticed an uncharacteristic lack of lesbian here, Aimi may have kissed Izumi and has been with girls in the context of group sex, but she's otherwise totally straight.

This will be remedied in the future, within the next three chapters. Do not worry.

Hanaklone

kosherbacon wrote:Glad you guys have enjoyed this so far. You may have noticed an uncharacteristic lack of lesbian here, Aimi may have kissed Izumi and has been with girls in the context of group sex, but she's otherwise totally straight.

This will be remedied in the future, within the next three chapters. Do not worry.

Hanaklone

Oh yeah, he will not disappoint. Back to the World Cup .

So, while I'm stuck trying to make Izumi seem more interesting than a table lamp(Who would've thought that writing a girl who swears randomly would be so hard?!), I present to you Not-Hanako and Not-Lilly.

This was especially challenging to write due to the Yasu's ever-changing mindset and the continuity issues inherent to Michi's disability.

Here's the first half. Enjoy!

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Days of Innocence
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-The day before I met her.-

I got out of bed only five minutes before my alarm goes off. I was late! I yanked the curtains open so my room could greet the sunrise. By four thirty, I was fully dressed and able to attack the day. So much to do, so much to do. What's next, what's next? Bathroom!

Silly me, I was already dressed for the day when I was supposed to take a shower first. Okay, so I got undressed and rushed to the bathroom to bathe. Shaved everything below the neck. I was going to do three passes but things started to bleed after the second. Thirty six scrubs for each armpit. Forty for the crotch and buttcrack. Everything else below the neck gets four soap-and-rinse cycles. Face, the most important part, gets fifty four rubs of a my soapy hands before I could call myself clean.

Now for the hair. Crap! I forgot to wash my hair. And it was a tangled mess. Crap, crap, crap! The hair kept getting stuck in the bristles, snapping and breaking. My hair was hopeless. I'd never be able to get it just right at that rate. Where were my scissors?

Oh yeah, the dorm mom had them. I'm not allowed to use them on my own. Clippers! I had clippers and a safety razor!

There we go, all better. Bald is beautiful. Buddhist monks are on to something. My head was now smooth, elegant, simple, and low maintenance. What's next?

Okay, clothes: check, makeup: check, brushed teeth: check. Next up, schoolwork. Middle Eastern and African History: done, Geometry: done, Chinese Literature: Done, Nineteenth Century Art: Done. Now if only Gym class had work for me to do. This was bad, two hours and eighteen minutes left before class. So much to do but I didn't know what. I started pacing around looking things over. My room was clean, I was groomed and dressed, and I... breakfast! I haven't eaten breakfast yet. But the school cafeteria was still closed. What do I do? I needed something, I...

My hands started to shake from pent up idleness. I needed release. I lifted up the mattress and pried a sandwich bag containing razorblades from inside the box spring. I picked out one that looked clean enough and dug the tip into my left forearm, 2.75 centimeters down from the crease of my elbow, three millimeters away from the last line. My hands started to twitch again. I had to let go, so I drew the blade to the right and....

...breathed. Sweet, blissful release.

...

-The day I met her.-

“Yasu, Yasu... come on. It's time to wake up. You've been in bed all day.”

What the hell? Oh. The old lady was there to wake me up. Well, I woke up earlier, when I was supposed to but frankly... I couldn't give a crap about the day, so I stayed in bed. Then I woke up when school started. Fuck that. Then I woke up when I heard the bell ring after second period. Then again for lunch. Finally, I got the resident dorm mom yanking me out of bed. It was only like two or something.

Practically at gunpoint, I slithered my way to the bathroom. Toothbrush in mouth... let's see. One, two, three, four. Four strokes and I'm finished. Good enough. Ugh, goddammit, why the fuck did I chop my hair off the previous day? What the fuck was I thinking? I looked like a dyke. Oh wait. I am a dyke. Hah.

I dabbed some iodine onto my arm where it was getting all red and infested looking from when I was hacking at myself, freeing me up to bitch and moan about having the mother of all razor burn where my pubes used to be. Why did I even bother? It's not like anyone's seen my snatch in years anyway. Anyone going down on me might as well choke on a furball the size of those tumbleweed things you see on TV for all I care.

Oh well, I guess I was supposed to go hit up my homeroom teacher's office to pick up my homework. Should I have put on makeup...? Screw it. Satisfied that my eye-crust was at acceptable levels, I lurched down the halls like a bald headed hobo.

“Excuse me,” the a mousey voice squeaked out from behind me, “you dropped this.”

“Oh. Thanks,” I replied to the four-eyes crouching down on the floor. She was a soft looking girl who had glasses and wore her hair in a braid. She stood up to hand me the papers I dropped and I saw that she was actually quite a bit taller than me. Flat as a board, though. If our tits were swapped, I'd totally pass off as a young boy.

“I'm Michi Mizuno. What's your name?”

“Yasu Arima,” I answered, giving her my actual name, as opposed to my usual alias, “Piss Off.”

“Yasu, Yasu, Yasu...” she mumbled to herself, as if my name was hard to remember. “Hey Yasu, I haven't had lunch yet, would you like to go to the cafeteria with me?”

“I guess,” I accepted, with all the enthusiasm of a crushed snail. I already had plans, really. I had a pressing appointment with the ceiling. It can't stare at itself, you know.

At the cafeteria, Michi blabbered on about... something while I diligently made sure my tapioca didn't turn to dust. On a good day, I'd be able to pay attention, but today wasn't one of those days. I couldn't bear to tell her to shut up, though. She has a pretty mouth, even with that goofy fang of hers.

“Nice meeting you, Yasu,” she said, waving goodbye at the end of the day. Finally, I was able to get back to work, counting the popcorn granules in the ceiling or at least working up the initiative to even look at the ceiling.

...

-The day after I met her.-

“Hello!”

“Hi!”

“Hiyee!”

“How do you do?”

Goddamn, what a good day. A few setbacks but no big deal. It takes more than a few new pimples and a crappy quiz score to ruin a day like that. Yeah, the sun was as bright as it usually is on this time of day but it was extra warm and inviting then. Between the last class of the day and heading the dorms, I happily floated down the hall, greeting and occasionally hugging everyone in my way. I needed someone to share an AWESOME day with.

“Michi!” I call out to my new best buddy in the world.

“Excuse me?”

“Wacha doin today? Wanna go shopping? Or go see a movie? Or get some cake? Would you like to...”

“I'm sorry, who are you?”

What the fuck? Oh hell no. After all we went through the previous day, she was going to go off and act like she doesn't know me? Well fuck her. Fuck her right in the eye.

“What do yo mean 'Who are you?' It's me, Yasu!”

“Yasu, Yasu...” After ruining my day forever, the ironing board went on mumbling my name again. Was that like some symptom of whatever flavor of retarded she has? It was cute yesterday but that shit just got on my nerves.

“Yes, Yasu, you dumb blind bitch. What, you're too good to remember me? Un-fucking-believable. All I wanted to be was your friend but you can't even get your shit straight.”

“I-I-I'm sorry,” the skank stuttered, reaching her hand out to my chest. “It's just that I...”

“Whatever, whatever,” I coolly dismissed, brushing her clammy hand off me. “You can go off and get fucked in the ass then the mouth in that order for all I care. I'm done with you.”

“Please, you don't understand, I...”

She's not getting it? Well shit, I hoped it wouldn't come to this...

“DON'T YOU FUCKING TOUCH ME AGAIN!” I screamed, standing my ground and putting a halt to her disrespect with a nice, healthy slap to the face. Her glasses went flying off. Man, it would've been so cool if they shattered.

That showed her.

...

-Two days after I met her.-

Oh. My. God. I can't believe I did that. I actually hit Michi just because she forgot who I was. Sure, I am fairly distinctive looking at the moment, but it's not like we really did anything big together the other day. All we did was share a snack. It's not like we were married. Ugh, another chance at friendship gone.

After asking around, I dismissed myself from class to go see Michi in her homeroom. There's no way we could be friends after I became bitch-o-tron yesterday. At the very least, she deserved an apology and an explanation.

I got uneasy when I approached the room's open door. I've passed by this place before. Every time I do, I do my best to look away. That day, I had to go inside.

I was immediately greeted with some kid drooling right in front of me. He stank of a combination of body odor, bad breath, and food residue. He stared blankly at me, then grunted to go back to whatever schoolwork he was being coached through. Well, he must be able to do it somewhat on his own, this campus is in theory meant for those who are capable of operating at a high school level. Maybe that retard was a genuine genius inside.

Carefully, I weaved through the short tables, populated by inhuman sounds from inhuman looking people. Don't look at me like that. Even the most “sensitive” and “open minded” people give them wide berth.

Michi was all alone at the only normal desk in the room, hurriedly leafing through volumes of handwritten notes, mumbling to herself just like she did with my name. Her class is one for severe learning disabilities. How could a normal girl like Michi be in the same league as the slobber squad?

“Michi... hello,” I meekly announced when I saw that she was taking a short break from reciting to herself.

“Hello, what's your name?”

Again, she doesn't know my name. Don't worry, I didn't explode on her this time.

“I'm Yasu. What are you doing there?”

“I'm trying to memorize all the notes I've taken this semester.”

“All of them? At once?” I tried squeezing in a joke awkwardly, “Maybe you should've studied instead of putting it off till today.”

“I...” she dropped her head and rested her forehead in her palms. “I can't. Well, I try but... I don't remember things.”

“Like how?”

“My memory is screwed up. It's been that way since I was twelve. I remember things from before but I forget everything since then after a day or so.”

“Really? How did you make it into high school?”

“This way,” she explained, pointing at her mountain of notes. “If I keep studying and reading to myself over and over and over again, sometimes I'll remember it for good. Every year, it gets harder, though. More and more things keep getting piled on before I get a chance to memorize what I had before. Schoolwork is just about all my mind can hold onto now.”

“I'm sorry. Should I leave you alone?”

“It's okay. I need to take a break now anyway. I'm sorry about forgetting you. What business do we have together?”

“Michi, I'm your friend.”

And with that, I found a way to avoid apologizing forever. In Michi, I found the perfect friend. She could be someone to share my good days with, yet someone who can easily overlook my bad ones. Every day would bring a new start.

...

-A week after I met her.-

Have you ever just had one of those days where all you could do was run? No, I don't mean running away from something. I mean to just run, frolic, jump, and twirl around until you throw up. You haven't? Well fuck you. You've never been a kid before. I get those days sometimes, and I learned that they're awesome when you've got someone who can keep up with you.

Eventually, Michi and I ran out of juice and collapsed on the grass. It must have been about nine at night. I could've sworn that it was lunch time only five minutes before. Michi and I stared into the sky and pretended we could see stars and constellations beyond the city lights, which turned the night sky a dark shade of amber.

“So Michi, you forget things at night?”

“Yes, pretty much everything that happens during the day gets wiped clean when I fall into a deep sleep.”

“Have you ever tried not sleeping?”

“I did but it's really scary. They say I once tried staying awake for three days. I would get confused during the middle of the day and start freaking out and crying, getting lost just walking down from my room to the bathroom. When I'd talk to people, I'd forget who they were mid-sentence.”

“Are you sure that really happened?”

“Actually, no,” she laughed, “but if I dig back really far, I can remember just the scary feelings of my mind falling apart just trying to hold on. I'm sure these feelings are from back then.”

“So you go blank when you sleep, huh. Do you dream?”

“Sometimes. But sometimes I wake up thinking my dreams are actually memories from the day before. I've learned not to assume that they are, though.”

“Yeah, it'd be pretty funny if you dreamt about showing up to class naked and getting away with it, then tried to do it again when you're awake.”

“Yeah,” she laughed.

Michi was interrupted by the growling of her stomach. I guess in the five minutes that passed since lunch, we both forgot dinner.

We left the park, and by left I mean we got chased out by a security guard and headed off to get dinner at a nearby diner. We unlocked each other's mysteries and spilled the dark secrets of our pasts over fried chicken, the perfect food for an empty stomach.

I learned that Michi had a benign tumor removed from her brain when she was twelve. Although the tumor itself wasn't cancer, it grew to the point where it gave her horrible seizures that lasted for hours. In the process of cutting it out, the parts of her brain that did short term memory were damaged.

The fact that she had a hard time changing upstairs since she was twelve went a long way towards explaining Michi's naivete. I wondered how much maturing she did since then and whether it was through biology or some trace of each day lingering with her, along with the lessons she force fed herself to stay in school.

Whatever the reason, I'm glad she's not a complete tween in the head, because preteens piss me off. And I'd feel weird for checking her out whenever she wasn't looking. It'd be all gross and molester-ey.

In return, I told Michi all about my life, how I was one of them “hyperactive” kids my whole life but otherwise okay. Then I told her about how the whole world turned to shit after my mom left when I was ten, which made me lose whatever grip on sanity I still had. I idolized that woman and considered her to be my best friend... and yet she left as soon as she came across a rich jet setter with grown children who wouldn't inconvenience her with their issues.

I even admitted to her that my father is one of the few people I don't absolutely hate, aside from herself. I was always a bit of a daddy's girl, even after he sent me away to this school. I never resented him for that. I know I put him through total hell in the years after Mom left, and I know I'm too much for any single working parent to handle on their own.

And I know she left because of me. Don't tell me it's not true. Everyone says that to make me feel better. It doesn't work.

My voice started to crack towards the end of my self-presentation. By the next morning, it would have all been for nothing. All my soul baring with Michi would be gone.

She could tell I was bothered and on the way back to school, she held my hand and kept me close. I was on the downswing and falling fast. I probably won't voluntarily get out of bed tomorrow. But that time, I had someone to slow me down for the moment at least. It felt good to have someone, anyone. As soon as I stop being so fucking nuts, I'm going to go find me friends, lots of them, so that way I could feel this happy all the time.

At the front gate, I gave the dorm mom a call on her cell phone and was briefly chewed out. Trying to keep Michi out of this, I implied that I was by myself and got deeper into it. I'm not allowed to leave campus by myself, you see. Plus we were showing up an hour after curfew. Apparently she had my dad on the other line and was about to call the local police.

All that for one crazy little girl? I couldn't help but feel proud of myself.

The old lady gave us a tense smile when she let us in, she was probably quite relieved that I wasn't under an overpass with a bag over my head getting sodomized by hobos. Having Michi with me seemed to help. The dorm mom gave her a brief but deeply concerned sounding scolding, but we still got off without any actual disciplinary action taken.

“What's this you're going to show me, Michi?

“You'll see.”

Back in her room, Michi started up her computer and logged onto the school's website. She dug through the student profiles and pulled up mine, then printed out my photo. My hair was long back then, but I had the same butthurt self-pitying face I usually have. She trimmed the excess paper with a pair of scissors- she's allowed to use them- and stuck my photo into the frame of her dresser's mirror, along with labeled pictures of school staff and study partners from various classes. Below my scowling mug, she wrote out who I was.

“Yasu Arima, My Friend.”

Nobody else was labeled that. It seemed that I really was her only friend.

I hated it. For the first time since I started my sick game, I felt guilt for what I did to her. The only thing Michi had to cling on to from a day-to-day basis was me, a manipulative cunt who just molded her to fit my own needs without her permission.

The smile on her face turned that night into the most painfully perfect moment I never deserved to have. If I wanted to, I could have probably pushed her over onto that big bed of hers and had my way with her, and she would be all too happy to see me the next morning. I couldn't do it, though. I decided to not cash in my get-out-of-jail free card.

...

-A week and a day after I met her.-

“Yasu?”

Michi's voice barely roused me out of my stupor. I gave her a muffled groan to acknowledge her presence.

“Are you okay? What's wrong?”

Well, aside from the fact that I was a mind-rapist whose only friend was a plaything I manipulated, everything was just peachy. I couldn't face her, so I just rolled over and pulled my sheets over my head.

“Your teacher called me over to his room and gave me your homework to give you and the dorm mom showed me the way here.”

“Okay.”

“Is there anything I could do for you? What's wrong?”

“No... nothing.”

“Do you want me to leave?”

“I don't care.”

Michi stayed in my room and did her own homework for... I don't know how long... while I continued to shut down while in bed. Around dinner time, the old lady went on her twice-daily “make sure Yasu Arima doesn't starve” patrol and dragged me out bed, then forced us to the cafeteria.

She waited for me. As far as Michi was concerned, that day was the first day we met and I was being a boring depressing wretch, yet she still waited for me.

We really were friends. Even if it was a con to start with, it had become real to us that day.

...

-A week and two days after I met her.-

The stray eyebrow hair stood there and taunted me. I couldn't believe I let that bastard survive my normally perfect grooming rituals. My eyelid fluttered in a hope that the damned thing would just fall off. Aside from that hideous tree trunk growing out of my face, I looked perfect.

The great thing about these uniforms are the the zippers. No button enclosures means no asymmetry. Well, no asymmetry unless you seriously screw up your eyebrows like I did. The anxiety started to eat me up, boiling over on my left forearm, making it itch. I scratched it and... CRAP! I had to scratch the other side to even things out. If only it was itchy...YES! It got itchy too. With that crisis resolved, I returned to stressing out over my eyebrow. Michi and I were due to meet here at the front gates any time now. Surely she wouldn't mind me quickly running to the housing staff's office to borrow my tweezers and take care of things.

“Hello Yasu. Are you ready?”

Dammit. I was too late. She was going to notice for sure how disfigured and scruffy I was after I promised during lunch that I'd make myself presentable. I drooped my head, hoping she wouldn't notice.

“Hey, you've got something here,” she said, seeing how uncomfortable I was, shivering and holding onto her arm. With fingernails longer than mine, she effortlessly plucked out my defect.

“Do you feel better now?”

“Much.”

That was an understatement. My heart suddenly felt lighter after she took care of me, as if I previously had weights dangling from fishhooks to my insides.

I squeezed Michi's arm and smelled her, rubbing my cheek on her shoulder. At that moment, I knew that if I fainted, she would catch me. If I went mad, she would slow me down. She was becoming my support in mind and body. Just knowing that she was going to be around for me every day made my life in the foreseeable future seem almost... predictable.

Waking up every day with a cute friend to look forward to? I could live with that.

-To Be Continued-

kosherbacon wrote:Who would've thought that writing a girl who swears randomly would be so hard?!

Dude, there's a lot more to Tourette's than the swearing thing. Ticks can be just about anything imaginable, from screaming to punching yourself in the face. Here's a resource you might find helpful: How to have Tourette's

vermithrx wrote:

kosherbacon wrote:Who would've thought that writing a girl who swears randomly would be so hard?!

Dude, there's a lot more to Tourette's than the swearing thing. Ticks can be just about anything imaginable, from screaming to punching yourself in the face. Here's a resource you might find helpful: How to have Tourette's

Yeah, I'm aware of that so I had her usually make hard K and CH sounds when she talks and tried to mention her having a facial twitch, but it was still tedious to write out and annoying to read. Thanks for the link anyway, I'll give it a read and see if I could glean anything useful out of it.

I think I'll downplay Izumi's condition next time she shows up. Throwing a tic into her speech all the time or mentioning her flinching and twitching really breaks up the flow

eat kosher bacon 4:36 pm
(4:36:29 PM): i just thought of a horrible way to deal with my difficulties in writing tourette's girl
(4:36:31 PM): i could...
eat kosher bacon 4:36 pm
(4:36:54 PM): try finding the most elegant way possible to make the reader be aware of her facial twitches and verbal tics all the time...
(4:37:02 PM): (which would be hard to write and annoying to read)
(4:37:33 PM): or i could downplay her condition, have it only come up during times of stress and say she's getting over it or some bs
(4:37:36 PM): or...
(4:37:42 PM): I could just kill her off
guardianwrendc 4:38 pm
(4:37:56 PM): option 2 makes more sense
eat kosher bacon 4:37 pm
(4:37:57 PM): have her get hit by a train on the way to the bathroom
guardianwrendc 4:38 pm
(4:38:19 PM): option 3 is the cop out, aka omake h
(4:38:40 PM): but stress induced tics is more reasonable to write

Okay, as of now, Izumi will either be less tic-ey by way of new drug cocktails and better therapy.

...or she will come down with an sudden case of dead.

*whacks with rolled-up magazine* No! Bad Kosher! No killing off difficult characters! If you killed everyone who gave you trouble, there'd be no-one left.

...anyway. Very interesting chapter. Very unique perspective, and well-captured at that.

GG Crono wrote:*whacks with rolled-up magazine* No! Bad Kosher! No killing off difficult characters! If you killed everyone who gave you trouble, there'd be no-one left.

Hm, I actually did consider killing off a couple other characters too Don't worry, everyone will live, at least in the foreseeable future.