Entanglement: A Day With Rin
Posted: Sat Jun 02, 2012 5:44 pm
Hi everyone, I've just discovered KS and spent a highly rewarding few days playing the game. I've been reading everything I can about the characters and especially my favourite girl Rin. This fic takes place after Hisao and Rin have graduated and they are attending university together. Any kind of feedback is welcome and appreciated. Thanks for reading!
Entanglement: A Day With Rin
If you ask me, the phrase 'opposites attract' is highly overrated.
Oh sure, sometimes it was relevant. Like when you see a huge hulking bodybuilder walk down a street hand in hand with a wee little slip of a girl. Or when you walk into a sushi bar and see a beautiful blonde supermodel laughing and chatting with a nerdy guy. But people should know by now that two people with absolutely nothing in common won't get along very well.
Girl hooks up with guy after a particularly wild party, find they have no attraction beyond the physical, and they break up. It happens all the time. For a relationship to work, there has to be some common ground at least. Opposites attract was a concept out of a book or a romantic comedy, and therefore had no relevance to real life.
Which was why it was completely baffling that it perfectly described my girlfriend and I.
By all logical sense, we were completely wrong for each other. At my heart (heh, heart), I liked to think of myself as a proper scientist. Logical, precise and rational. An effect preceded by a cause. What you observed was what you get, and so forth. It was nice to think that there was some kind of order to the universe, and that you were doing something to contribute to that sense of order. Making sense out of chaos and confusion. That's what scientists did.
She on the other hand...
She was what popped into mind when you thought of a scatter-brained, whimsical artist with only the most tenuous of connections to reality. The perfect caricature of a person so absorbed in abstractions and different shades of reality. Someone who could interpret a simple question like 'How are you?' as a deep philosophical statement on the fundamental reality of man. Coming up with questions no one had an answer for and asking why. That's what artists did.
We were fundamentally different. We might never understand each other fully. All our friends had no clue what we saw in each other. But despite all that, I still loved her. And I'm pretty sure she loved me too.
I switched the bag I was carrying from one hand to the other, feeling the fruit shift slightly inside. The pleasant scent of oranges would follow me around for the rest of the day, but I liked it. They cost a bunch, and I had to pinch every penny I could nowadays, but they were for her. And that's all that mattered, really.
I liked wandering through the city during this hour. Usually I would be in a lecture at this time, or deep within a laboratory. It gave me the chance to see what things were like under the bright sunshine, for one thing. It was mostly quiet, with almost everyone either in their offices or their schools. Here and there a few elderly folk were about, enjoying the sun. A couple of well-dressed ladies were window-shopping, chatting away happily to themselves.
My professor scheduled just a couple of classes today, which let me out early so I could meet her. I would have skipped it entirely, if not for the fact that they were about Quantum Mechanics, in which I was lagging behind a little. So I woke up early, made breakfast for two, helped her get dressed, gave her a kiss and promised to meet her later at our usual place.
“Today we'll be covering quantum entanglement,” began Professor Ono. “Now, please pay close attention because it's a little tricky for beginners.”
He rambled on, and at first I diligently copied down notes. Then something struck me, and I lay my pen down in wonderment. Pretty soon a big grin had spread across my face, and I had to fight to keep from chuckling out loud.
Professor Ono noticed, of course. The Physics cohort at the university was small, and the module on Quantum Mechanics was smaller still. There were only about eight people in the lecture hall. Stopping his lecture in mid-sentence, he aimed the pointer at me.
“Nakai, you seem rather pleased with yourself.”
“Sorry sir.”
“What is it that you're so pleased about?”
“Nothing much, sir.”
“Oh? Then in that case would you mind giving us a brief summary on how quantum entanglement works?”
I couldn't help it, I let out a real laugh this time. But before Professor Ono could blow his top, I quickly recited off the top of my head.
“When two particles interact, they can become linked such that the alteration of one causes a mirrored response in the other, despite a separation by arbitrarily large distances. The particles are therefore inextricably linked, or entangled.”
Professor Ono stared at me, his mouth open. Before I could say anything else he coughed to cover up his embarrassment.
“Well it looks like you were paying attention after all.”
I avoided the questioning glances from my classmates. I had given the definition without looking at my notes, because it all made perfect sense to me.
Two particles (people), separated by huge distances (tell me about it), can become so irreversibly linked that a change in one provokes a response in another.
That was it. That was the perfect way to describe Rin and I.
xxxx
I waited by the traffic light, humming tunelessly to myself as I looked up and down the road. There were no cars in sight, and I briefly considered just dashing across. But something held me back, and after a while I realised what it was. I was used to restraining my carefree impulses around Rin. After all, someone had to make sure that while her head was in the clouds there weren't any airplanes in the way. I was the tether anchoring her to earth, while she was free to pinwheel in the breeze.
Don't do it, Hisao.
Do it, Hisao.
What if you get knocked down? You could die.
Yeah but you could die any day. Life's short. Just go ahead and do it. Every moment wasted is a moment not seeing her.
I dithered for a moment, and quickly crossed over to the other side before the light turned green. The whole internal debate seemed a little silly now. Yet I thought it was something Rin would have understood. Making sure I had my bag of oranges, I headed towards the park.
After graduating from Yamaku Academy, my grades were good enough to get into a university physics course. I liked physics. It seemed to me that despite my lofty views of the subject, the more physicists probed and experimented and discussed, the more they realised there was so much they didn't know. A long time ago, scientists were indeed men trying to make sense out of an unknown universe. Today, scientists were people who would cheerfully admit that they had no clue what they were discovering, but they loved it anyway.
I liked it. Seemed appropriate.
My parents were a little reluctant to let me attend a university far from home, but they relented after I demonstrated that I had become more independent after my stint at Yamaku. They were most concerned about my medications, and to be honest that was not something I could sweep under the carpet. My mum would send text messages in the morning and night, reminding me to take the seventeen different pills that alleviated my condition. Arrhythmia, or Long QT Syndrome if you wanted to get technical. Physical exertion strained my heart. A baseball thumping me on the chest could basically kill me. It wasn't pleasant, but I had learned to live with it.
Rin had received an art scholarship upon graduation. Although Yamaku's art teacher Shinichi Nomiya had been callous and cruel, the recommendation for his 'star pupil' had paid off. She would attend classes at the university without having to pay tuition, which was helpful because we'd decided to rent a small place together.
It wasn't easy, convincing both sets of parents that it was what we wanted. In the end, Mr and Mrs Tezuka accepted that having someone around to look after Rin was probably for the best, and who better than her boyfriend? For my part, I had to persuade my parents that I was an honourable young man who wouldn't take advantage of the fact that I would be living with my girlfriend.
“For the love of God, use protection.”
“Dad!”
“I'm serious. I know it's useless to pretend that you're not going to have sex. So all I can say is, use protection. I mean it. Promise me or I won't agree.”
I stared at my father. He was the old-fashioned type, a real man's man who hardly ever talked to his son, let alone talk about sex. I don't think we ever discussed the topic before. But he looked very serious indeed, so I had no choice but to promise and put an end to the conversation. My mother was an entirely different kettle of fish though.
“Hisao dear, are you sure this is what you want?”
“Sure I'm sure mum.”
“It's just that...Rin...”
“What's wrong? Don't you like her?”
“I do, I do,” said my mum quickly. “But Hisao, you have to admit that she's not the most stable person around.”
“Mum, I know that. That's why I need to stay with her.”
“Are you really serious about this? Do you really see yourself settling down with that girl?”
I fought down my first reply and managed to sound calm.
“Of course I do. I love her.”
My mother didn't have anything to say after that. After a while I was glad I hadn't snapped at her. She meant well, after all. And I could see her point. Dating someone like Rin was a big risk. If there was an emergency (like say a sudden heart attack), would she know what to do? But all relationships were a risk. And I was determined to make this one work.
So we rented this tiny little apartment with only one bedroom, a small kitchen and a living space. Even my dorm room at Yamaku seemed bigger, but Rin had wandered around the place with every sign of enjoyment and pronounced it habitable. There was even a little balcony that overlooked the city, and I knew she would want to sit there and paint what she saw, high in the sky and down below.
I saved space and money by getting creative. No need for a TV, for one thing. Ever since meeting Rin I had the feeling that no hack TV writer could come up with something half as entertaining as the random thoughts she sometimes expressed. Instead I brought in a small three-seater sofa and set up a little table where I could use my laptop. The screen was big enough to watch movies on, if we wanted.
It took a lot of work, but after a while the place really did come to feel like a home away from home to me. After my long hospital stay, I had become averse to bare walls and neatness. Rin quickly remedied that, laying out her art supplies willy-nilly and painting so many pictures they soon began to stack up. I hung the ones I liked on the walls. Although they weren't exactly soothing landscapes, Rin's art always made me think deep thoughts, and the bright colours did make the place more lively.
With a pot of tea always on the boil and a few beanbag chairs and rugs thrown about, it was what I always wanted in my own place. Somewhere comfortable where I could relax and spend time with my girlfriend.
Despite both sets of parents chipping in, I still had to get a part-time job. I found one as a clerk at a bookstore, with reasonable hours. Remembering Lilly Satou's fondness for English-language books back at school, I tried hard to improve my English, which helped a lot with the customers.
Rin didn't seem able to grasp the concept of a job, but I didn't mind. All her free time was needed to keep up with her art assignments anyway. She sometimes mentioned that it would be ok to sell a couple of pieces if anyone wanted them, but I told her not to. Rin's art was special, just as she was. Selling them would mean giving away a part of Rin herself.
xxxx
I headed up the path leading to the park. Rin had found the place, when we were exploring the city after first getting here. I had queued up to buy ice cream and when I turned around, she wasn't there any more.
I walked up and down the street, calling for her. The ice-cream was melting and I was getting a little bit frightened when I saw her. She had wandered off into the park, and was standing in a shady spot beside a pond. A large, flat rock lay close by, and as I got closer Rin clumsily climbed up onto the rock and turned this way and that, before finally tilting her head back and looking up at the sky.
I could see why she liked it. The trees provided shade, and from that spot you could see almost all of the park, and everyone in it. The pond was interesting as well, with murky green water (like her eyes) and lilypads floating about. Loud croaking indicated the presence of a few frogs, who dived off the pads and into the water and swum about like an Olympic synchronised diving team. Rin watched them closely, eyes narrowed in concentration. She didn't turn around when I came up to her, and eventually I just sat down and held out her ice-cream for her to lick while she observed the frogs.
Since then it had become her favourite spot in the city when the weather was nice, and as it wasn't too far from the university we usually went there when we could. Today the sky was a brilliant blue, dotted with the fluffy white clouds she loved so much. As far as I knew, she had been there since morning. I couldn't wait to see what she had painted so far.
I was breathing heavily, my heart pounding away a little faster than normal. Immediately I slowed down my pace and thought about putting down the bags I was carrying for a little rest. I usually didn't take any risks when it came to my heart, but I was almost there anyway. Still, I waited for a little while for my heart to get back to normal, then continued walking through the park.
I went around a bush and there she was. My girlfriend Rin, sitting in the sun by the water and painting a lovely picture.
She was wearing simple clothes, just a green and white striped top and khaki pants. Her denim jacket lay on the grass, with the temperature high enough that my walk here had worked up a little sweat. But if Rin's fashion sense didn't make my heart beat faster for an entirely different reason than walking fast, just looking at her was enough to do the trick.
Her messy red hair fell to just below her chin, her bangs cut short so they wouldn't obscure her eyes. Rin was slim, leaning towards skinny even, although ever since we moved in together I made sure she was eating regularly. She sometimes forgot if she was working on a painting. If she stood up, she would just be a little bit shorter than me.
If pressed at gunpoint, I would have to admit that Rin wasn't exactly a babe that would turn heads. She looked a little boyish, and her figure wasn't as full as other girls I'd known. But somehow all that didn't matter to me. Her dark green eyes, thoughtful expression and long, lithe, coltish legs all combined to form the woman I had fallen in love with.
Although her looks wouldn't turn heads, something else would. Rin was sitting on a little chair and painting, but she was gripping the brush between her toes instead of her hands. Rin had no hands. Her arms ended in stumps just past her shoulders. She had been born with a severe birth defect that necessitated the amputation of both her arms. When she walked around campus, more often than not people would nudge and point at her empty sleeves.
She never let it bother her, however. She could do with her feet almost everything that someone else could do with hands, and she had been painting with her feet for so long it was second nature to her. Even as I watched, she dipped her brush in a blob of green and carefully added a touch of it to one corner of the painting.
I stood there with my hands on my hips for a while, looking at the picture. To anyone else it would have looked like a random collection of images, all jumbled up without making any sense. But I knew Rin. I knew her art was the key to understanding her thoughts, so I stared hard at the picture, letting my vision unfocus a little, no longer emphasising the details but what it looked like as a whole...and then it was like a lightbulb flicking on in my head.
“That's the pond, isn't it? Except you've made the lillies freakishly tall for some reason and that frog looks more like an ogre, but that's the pond. I'm not sure why everything is so monstrous though. Unless, wait, don't tell me...you think the pond is scarier than it first appears? It harbours hidden dangers?”
Rin ceased her brush-strokes and looked up at me. A smile was on her face as she nodded once, deliberately.
“Hello Hisao.” Her voice was low-key and not prone to much inflection, but always retained a dreamy air. She paused, as if concentrating hard on what to say next. “It's nice to see you. I missed you.”
I didn't answer. Instead I bent down and give her a long, loving kiss on the lips, letting her know exactly how I felt. When I was done she pulled away and gave me an enigmatic smile. And without a word she returned to her painting.
I was used to her long silences, however. Rin didn't like words very much. She found it difficult to express just exactly how she felt in words that had originally been designed to let other monkeys to know just where the ripest fruit was. It bothered me a little at the start of our relationship, but I had come to terms with it. For Rin, silences were natural. If she didn't have something to say, she didn't see the point in wasting a perfectly good silence with endless chatter.
We spent a lot of time not talking, just Rin with her paints and her easel, and me leafing through a good book. Sometimes I put the book down and just observed her, noting the slight droop of her head as she pored over her paints, the way her toes moved as dexterously as any hand, the way her hair would ruffle in the breeze. For someone else that kind of staring would be uncomfortable, but Rin didn't seem to mind.
I sat down on the grass and pulled out the things I brought. A science-fiction book that I checked out of the library. A spare box of paints for Rin. And of course, my bag of oranges. I held one and began peeling it slowly. The sudden spray of juice and the smell of a fresh cut orange drew Rin's attention. I pulled out a slice and offered it to her.
“Want one?”
She nodded. I fed it to her as she ate it up delicately and finished by giving her a little kiss on the nose. She blinked in surprise, then went back to her painting.
“I brought the paints, like you asked. They're here if you want them. Do you need anything else?”
Rin considered. “No. Just be here.”
“I can do that.”
“I'd like a few more orange slices, if you have them.”
“Coming right up.”
xxxx
I lay down on the grass and read my book, occasionally peeling an orange and feeding the slices to Rin. I ate a few myself, and there was a certain childish glee in spitting the pips to see how far they would go. Rin watched me but didn't seem inclined to join in.
Now and then she would speak to me and I'd reply. There was a pattern to talking to Rin, she could clam up for hours and not say a word and then come up with something completely out of the blue. I took pride in the fact that she hadn't wrong-footed me once yet.
“This isn't the right shade of green.”
“It looks right to me.”
“No, I mean it's not the shade of green that I see.”
Comfortable silence while Rin pondered the exact mix of paints needed to capture the shade of green she sees in her mind. I turned a page and idly speculated what the landscape of Rin's mind would look like, if I ever had the chance to visit. Something tells me that it would resemble the tripped-out world of the Beatles in their Yellow Submarine movie, and this made me laugh.
Rin was looking at me. “Is there something funny, Hisao?”
“Nah, just something I thought of.”
“What is it?”
“Never mind, Sergeant Pepper.”
To my amazement, Rin gets the reference. “I am he as you are he as you are me and we are altogether,” she sang suddenly, and she so rarely sings I drop my book in surprise.
“Rin, I never knew you liked them.”
“Well I do. Some of it. Especially that bit that I just sang.”
“I never understood it.”
“Makes perfect sense to me.”
Another comfortable silence settled on us as she finished mixing her paint and dabbed the nose of the frog-ogre with it. I went back to my book. I reflected on how important these comfortable silences were to our relationship. Of course most couples enjoyed the feeling of just being in each other's presence, while they each did their own thing. But Rin needed it a little more than most. Her being quiet didn't mean that she was being withdrawn and negative. She hated being distracted while she worked and until the task at hand was done, she wouldn't respond to anything else.
A little girl had raced away from her mother, laughing and shrieking with pure joy. She came running up to where the two of us were sitting and stopped short, apparently in awe of the artist working at her easel.
She was wearing a blue romper and her hair was made up in twin ponytails that reminded me forcibly of Emi Ibarazaki, one of the few friends that Rin had. She couldn't have been more than six years old.
The girl got up closer to Rin and asked shyly, “What are you painting?”
Rin looked down at her, incredulous. She had a brush in her mouth, and if she wanted to reply she would have to let the brush fall. A look of faint irritation crossed her face, but she let the brush drop anyway.
“Who are you?”
“Mummy says I'm not supposed to talk to strangers.”
Rin looked bewildered. “So...why are you talking to me?”
“I like your painting. What's your name? If you tell me then I'll know you and then you won't be a stranger anymore and then I can talk to you.”
“Aren't you talking to me now?”
I decided to help out a bit. “Hey there. Her name's Tezuka Rin, the world-famous artist. You can call her Rin.”
“She can?”
“Rin,” said the little girl. “Rin Rin Rinny Rinny Rin in a tin bin. Yay!”
Rin had that expression that indicated she was patiently waiting for the world to make sense.
“My name's Akiko. Now you know my name and I know yours.”
“That's good?” Rin glanced at me, and I quickly nodded confirmation. “Yes, that's good. To answer your first question, I am painting the pond.”
“But that looks nothing like the pond!”
“The pond you see isn't the pond I see, you see.”
The tables had been turned. Instead of admitting her own confusion, the little girl picked up the brush and handed it to Rin. Or tried to. Rin deftly plucked it out of her hands with her toes.
“You've got no arms!”
“So I noticed.”
“Why have you got no arms? Did you lose them?”
Rin appeared to give this question some thought. After a while she said, “No. I don't think so. It's more like they lost me. Although I'm not sure where they are right now.”
At this moment the girl's mother, a tall, dignified lady caught up with us. “Akiko, there you are! I'm so sorry, I do hope she hasn't been bothering you.”
Akiko ran to her mother and clutched at her arm. “Mommy, mommy, look! That artist lady has no arms!”
The lady's eyes performed the familiar flick to Rin's empty shirt sleeves, then a hasty look to one side. She bent down and said loudly to her daughter, “Akiko! That's not polite!”
“It's not?” said Rin suddenly. “She's telling the truth. I am an artist, Hisao tells me I'm a lady even if I do forget it sometimes, and as you can see I don't have any arms.”
Akiko's mother looked as though she would have been anywhere rather than at that spot at that moment. Apologising profusely, she dragged her daughter away and peace reigned once more.
“Hisao?”
“Yes?”
“Why did you do that?”
“I didn't do anything.”
“That's what I meant. Why didn't you say anything to that woman? You usually do when people make a big fuss.” Damn, she can be scarily perceptive when you least expected it.
“Oh I don't know. Maybe it's because it's nice to see someone else flummoxed by you once in a while.”
“Flummoxed? Flummoxed. What does it mean?”
“It means to confuse someone.”
Rin repeated the word a few times, evidently liking it. And then she finished the final stroke of the painting and sat back to critically inspect her work.
“I think I'm done.”
I sat up and look at it. It was green and weird and slightly unsettling, but it was the pond alright.
“I like it.”
“You do?”
“Yes. I'm going to hang this one in the kitchen.”
“The kitchen doesn't have walls.”
“Fine then I'll hang this one near the kitchen.”
Rin didn't say anything to this, but I knew it was because she was waiting to see whether I would really hang it up or not. She responded to the deed, not the word.
The sun was lower in the sky, and the shadows were lengthening. There was a general rise in the noise around us, as people put away their work and got ready to enjoy themselves. There weren't many people left in the park, save a few couples. In my mind's eye I could see restaurants and bars and clubs opening their doors, awaiting the rush of patrons eager to unwind after a long day. The city didn't sleep, it just turned on its lights.
As Rin enjoyed the last of the oranges, I helped pack away her art supplies and canvas into her bag. I would carry the easel under my arm, while we would leave the chair where it stood. It hadn't been stolen all this time, and it was a pretty old one anyway. I picked up her jacket and helped her put it on. Her hair swished beguilingly in front of my face, and it was all I could do not to bury myself in it and just hold her for a while.
“Are we going home?” she asked.
“For a while. And then we're going out.”
“Where?”
“You'll see. Are you hungry?”
“Yes, a little.”
“Good.”
Rin waited expectantly for clarification, but when she saw I was going to keep mum she started off down the path. I went after her and curled one arm around her waist.
“Why are you holding me? I'm not going to run away. I promised, remember?”
“Don't you like it? You can lean your head on my shoulder and look at the sky while we walk back home.”
Rin did as I suggested. The people on the sidewalks were staring, but if she didn't care then neither should I. We walked down the brightly-lit streets, and Rin stopped looking at the sky to take in everything around her. She had an amazing eye for detail, and I knew she was filing everything away like a human camera, to be brought out on canvas in the future.
“This is nice,” she said, apropos of nothing.
“I think so too.”
“Really? Why?” she said, sounding genuinely curious.
“Lots of things really, but the main reason is because you're here with me.”
Rin decided she liked that, and gave me a little kiss on the cheek.
xxxx
We climbed up the stairs to our apartment, and while I fished around in my pockets for the key Rin peered into the corners, apparently highly interested in cobwebs. I opened the door and flicked on the lights.
I firmly believed that a place can only become a home if you put enough care and hard work into it. We'd worked out a system, Rin and I. I did the laundry and most of the cooking, while she did the cleaning. The small space actually helped in that regard, as there wasn't much to mess up. Still we had so many paints and canvases and other art supplies lying about an inspector could probably have deemed it a fire hazard. I compensated by quitting smoking and persuading Rin that it wasn't necessary for her to gain inspiration. Sitting on the balcony and watching the stars on most nights, she thankfully agreed with me.
We set our stuff down, and I carefully set up her easel in a corner. Rin sat down on the couch, grateful for the chance to rest her feet.
“What are having for dinner?” she asked.
“I'm not cooking tonight.”
“Does this mean I'll have to cook? I didn't have anything planned.”
“No, no. Tonight I'm taking you out to dinner. I found this lovely little restaurant and I think you'll like it.”
“Can you tell me where it is?”
“Not yet, it's a surprise.”
“I like surprises. Except some surprises, you know, like an unexpected bill or a rhino crashing through your bedroom window or something. Except we're three stories up and there are no zoos around and I saw you pay all our bills the last time, so we're probably ok.”
“Yup. Go have a shower, then we can get ready.”
Rin headed in the direction of our bathroom, then she looked over her shoulder at me. There was a sly smile playing on her lips.
“You know Hisao, if only there was some way in which we could shower at the same time, we could save both water and money. And time too, I suppose.”
“I was just thinking that too,” I said. But there's no way I could build another bathroom in this place.”
Rin raised an eyebrow, and I laughed.
“Or we could do something simpler, and shower at the same time.”
“Hurry up,” said Rin. And she was gone in a swish of red hair and long legs. I took off my clothes, tossed them into the laundry basket, and followed her inside.
Rin stood in the middle of our very small bathroom, looking expectantly at me. She wasn't making any come-hither-gestures (that would be difficult for her, come to think of it) but the fact that she wasn't trying to be sexy was incredibly sexy in itself. Rin glanced down and her sly smile grew wider.
“I see there's nothing wrong with your tackle tonight.”
“No ma'am,” I said, and stepped in close. We kissed, long and deep, with the care and attention to detail as expected of an artist and a scientist, with the passion of two people who have discovered that they can't go through life without each other.
We finally break apart. Rin's breathing a little more heavily than usual.
“That was good. You're a good kisser, Hisao.”
“Why thank you.”
“I'm feeling a little hot though. Please take off all my clothes.”
That was one command I'd never fail to obey. Rin raised her arms and I slipped her top over her head and let it drop on the floor. I undid the front of her jeans, and slid it down her hips. Rin wiggled her chest a little, the implication clear. I reached around her back and undid her bra, letting that fall to the floor too.
She was wearing adorable red panties, darker than the auburn of her hair. I brushed my hand against the front and felt her stiffen up at my touch. That wouldn't do. I reached my other hand and let it rest on her butt. As we kissed again I hooked one thumb in the hem of her panties and dropped that to the floor to join the puddle of the rest of Rin's clothes.
Rin stood naked before me, my Rin. Despite my attempts at cooking she still looked a bit too skinny for her own good. Rin was all angles, all long lines, except when it came to her adorably heart-shaped face. But I loved it. I loved every inch of her. And from the way she was staring into my eyes, those big dark green pools of hers, she felt the same way about me. She took a step back into the shower, her intent clear. I went in too, and turned on the spray.
The sensation of holding Rin in my arms while the water rushed over our bodies was amazing. Rin gasped a little as I reached between her legs, feeling the small tuft of hair there as light and fine as down, and ran a finger over her lips.
I felt my heart beat faster and it took an enormous effort of will not to go further and calm myself down. Then Rin made a small noise of discontent and thrust her hips against my hand, and I lost it. We stayed like that for quite a while, my other hand reaching up to her chest where I squeezed and gently fondled her breasts and felt her nipples grow hard under my fingers. She tensed up all of a sudden, and a soft moan of pleasure escaped her lips as her body relaxed and went a little limp.
“What about you?” she managed to say.
“I can wait,” I said, my mouth by her ear. “I have something special planned.”
“More special than this?”
“Yeah.”
“I don't believe you.”
I chuckled and we finished our shower together. As we went to our bedroom to towel off, I couldn't help but wonder how she did it before I came along. Did Emi do it for her? And with that I felt the familiar thump against my ribcage as my blood pressure rose. More to distract myself than expecting a real answer, I asked her about it.
“I laid the towel on my bed and I rolled around on top of it until I was dry,” she answered, as if it was the most natural thing in the world. Before I could say anything she spread the towel out with her foot and gave me a demonstration.
I couldn't help it, she looked so silly I had to laugh. Rin gave me one of her patented mini-smirks, the only hint that she was amused.
I dressed up quickly, throwing on a nice long-sleeved button down shirt, pressed pants and a suit jacket. Then I helped Rin put on a dark green halter top, tight blue jeans and put her denim jacket on again. It was slightly rumpled by now, but I liked it. It seemed to fit my Rin.
“Are we going somewhere nice, Hisao?”
“You could say that.”
“I just said it.”
“I mean yes, you could consider it nice.”
“Then help me put on my earrings, please.”
“Are you sure? You don't have to.”
Rin's eyes widened. “But you just said we're going somewhere nice. And I want to look nice.”
“You already look beautiful. You always do.”
“Always?”
“Always.”
“Even when I wake up in the morning and haven't brushed my hair or wiped the gunk out of my eyes?”
“Especially then.”
Rin looked thoughtful, until I hastily added “That was meant to be an exaggeration. You don't have to go around like that all the time.”
Her face cleared. “Oh, I see now. Thank you Hisao. But I would like to wear my earrings.”
I opened the little nightstand on her side of the bed and took out a small velvet box. Rin didn't usually wear them, but they were a gift from her parents after she received her scholarship. They were genuine emeralds, if a little small. Rin liked green because it complemented her hair nicely, and I agreed with her. When I was done she looked at herself in the mirror critically. I went and stood beside her.
“Tezuka and Nakai, ready for a night out on the town.” I said, striking a pose.
“I sort of feel we need more equipment than what we have now for a night out on the town.”
“Equipment? What are you talking about?”
“I'm not sure. What if we're attacked by gangsters? We need a gun.”
“A gun?”
“Yes. Although I can't shoot one. Maybe you can invent a shoulder cannon that I can fire by hitting it with the side of my head. You're a scientist, aren't you?”
“I'm a physicist, honey. We try to make sense of the universe, not blow people up.”
“Huh. I thought that was what I did.”
“That's what we both do. And that's why I love you. Come on, let's go.”
Before we left, I hung Rin's newest painting on a spot beside the mini-fridge. She looked pleased.
xxxx
I passed by the fancy French style restaurants, the Chinese restaurants, and even that little Turkish place where I dropped in to get a doner kebab sometimes. Rin followed me, shuffling along in her sandals. I kept a look out for a distinctive sign, and then I spotted it.
“Here we are!”
Our dinner destination was a combination restaurant and jazz club. But the really cool thing about the place was its little garden area, lit up by candles and torches. Instead of tables and chairs they had couches and low lying benches, where people could stretch out and chill. Eating at a normal restaurant would be difficult for Rin, unless I fed her every bite and she'd made it clear in her subtle but definite way that she didn't like it. So I hunted all over the city until I found this place. Sitting at a couch, she would be able to eat by herself.
Rin was swaying gently on the spot, in time to the music. “That's jazz, isn't it?”
The maitre'd showed us to our 'table' at the al fresco dining area. Fortunately it had been a dry couple of weeks. Rin sat down on a couch and opened a menu. In no time she decided it was more comfortable to lie flat on her back and hold the menu above her face. I decided to do the same.
“What kind of food do they serve here?”
“They have some nice Western style food. Some good Thai stuff too.”
“I like Thai. It's spicy.”
The waiter comes over, and doesn't mention Rin's lack of arms. He didn't even look surprised either, which I thought was impressive. Either he's jaded or it's been a long shift for him.
“Pad Thai, please.”
“Very good, miss. Something to drink?”
“Yes.”
He waits a little while, then prompts Rin.
“Mind telling me what you would like?”
“I'm not sure.”
“How about the papaya juice?”
“Papayas have juice?” Rin whispers to me in an aside. I nod, not daring to look at the waiter's face.
“Alright, one of those please. In a glass. With a straw.”
“Yes, miss. And you, sir?”
“I'll have the chicken Caesar salad and a side of haloumi cheese please. Extra olives.”
“Very good, sir. If there's anything you need, don't hesitate to ask.”
Rin considers this. “Do you have a hat? The wind is a little chilly out here and I would like a hat.”
The waiter recovers and manages to say he'll check with the staff before disappearing with our menus. I lie back on my couch and enjoy the atmosphere. The jazz music can be heard clearly from where we're sitting. Louis Armstrong's Mack the Knife, I think to myself, recognising the tune. The lanterns and candles glow like little fireflies. Up in the sky the moon is big and round and bright.
I glance to my right and see that Rin is doing the same thing. “It's rather pretty.”
“Yup, it is.”
“You know, I think I can see the Lunar Module.”
“Rin, that's impossible.”
“I can. Just there. On the tip of the bunny ear.”
“What bunny ear?”
“Doesn't the dark spot look like a bunny to you?”
I squint my eyes, then realise she's right.
“You know Hisao, it reminds me of you.”
“The bunny?”
“The moon.”
“Why? Am I that big and round?”
“Not really. I mean, you don't have craters all over your face either.”
“I should hope not.”
“What I mean is...the way it hangs in the sky, so bright, even though the rest of the sky is all dark now, except for the stars I guess but it's still mostly dark? I just feel like you're the moon, Hisao. Like no matter where I go or how dark it gets, I can look up and you're there. Looking down on me. Helping me find a way. Even if you flummox me sometimes. I always know where I'm going.”
I get off my couch and lie down on Rin's, next to her. I kiss her softly on the cheek and sit there while she idly slides a foot up and down my leg. I don't have to say anything. What she said was perfect enough on its own.
The food comes after a while, and it's really good. They're out of hats though. I help myself to my salad, while Rin industriously devours her spicy Pad Thai. Although she doesn't eat much, she does like spicy stuff. Every now and then she'd sip at her juice.
“What did you do in class today, Hisao?”
That was so unexpected I almost spill my glass of iced tea. Rin hardly ever bothered asking me about my day, although if I wanted to talk about it she'd reply readily enough. I racked my brains, trying to think of something of interest to her. And then it came to me.
“Actually Rin, I found out something in class today that helped me to understand you better.”
“Does Professor Ono spy on me or something? Is he aware of all my bad habits?” she asked as if it was the most natural thing to ask. It's telling that I'm not surprised that she would ask that, but I am surprised that she remembered the name of my professor.
“No, nothing like that at all.”
“Good.”
“It's about quantum mechanics.”
“Not good.”
I plough on. “No really, this is quite interesting.” I then explain to her the theory of quantum entanglement. And to my pleasant surprise, Rin's face lights up in understanding.
“That's us. That's the two of us. We're like those quantum thingies.”
“Yup I thought so too.”
“Doesn't it scare you?”
“Why would it?”
“I mean, I met you and you met me and now we're suddenly linked. We're linked in ways that no one can understand, not even really smart professor types. What happens if we change?”
I shrug. “Doesn't matter. If you change, I'm changed as well. That's what it means to be linked. But it doesn't matter because no matter what happens I love you and you love me and that will never change.”
Rin thinks about this. “You're right.”
“Aren't I always?”
“No.”
“...ok yeah, but I'm right about this one.”
“That's right too.”
We finish our food and order more drinks, deciding to linger a little and enjoy the music. Rin snuggles closer to me and I oblige my resting my own head on top of hers. It's a perfect moment, as the philosophers like to say. In that one moment time feels like forever and you feel that the universe isn't big enough to contain everything that you're feeling at that point in time.
Later as we were walking home, I nudge Rin and ask her something.
“Did you enjoy dinner?”
“Yes, it was very nice. We should go there more often.”
“We will. Did you even remember what day it is?”
“Wednesday?”
“Yes, but what's special about it?”
“I haven't been watching the news lately, Hisao. Did aliens land in South Africa or was the Queen of England revealed to be a giant lizard?”
“What? No, that's not it. It's the anniversary of the day we first met, silly.”
“Really? I had no idea.”
“It is. Couple of years ago I happened to walk into an empty art class room to look for plywood and instead found a beautiful girl sitting on a table, eating her not-quite-lunch-but-not-yet-dinner with a fork between her toes.”
“I remember that. I was having curry.”
“So you were.”
“I'm glad I decided to eat my lunch there that day, Hisao.”
“Me too.”
“What would have happened if we never met?”
“I don't know. But I know I couldn't be as happy as I am now.”
“Are you happy? Here with me?”
“There's nothing on this Earth that could make me happier.”
Rin looked up at the moon, its pale light illuminating her face. Then she leaned over and gave me another kiss.
“You make me happy too, Hisao.”
Entanglement: A Day With Rin
If you ask me, the phrase 'opposites attract' is highly overrated.
Oh sure, sometimes it was relevant. Like when you see a huge hulking bodybuilder walk down a street hand in hand with a wee little slip of a girl. Or when you walk into a sushi bar and see a beautiful blonde supermodel laughing and chatting with a nerdy guy. But people should know by now that two people with absolutely nothing in common won't get along very well.
Girl hooks up with guy after a particularly wild party, find they have no attraction beyond the physical, and they break up. It happens all the time. For a relationship to work, there has to be some common ground at least. Opposites attract was a concept out of a book or a romantic comedy, and therefore had no relevance to real life.
Which was why it was completely baffling that it perfectly described my girlfriend and I.
By all logical sense, we were completely wrong for each other. At my heart (heh, heart), I liked to think of myself as a proper scientist. Logical, precise and rational. An effect preceded by a cause. What you observed was what you get, and so forth. It was nice to think that there was some kind of order to the universe, and that you were doing something to contribute to that sense of order. Making sense out of chaos and confusion. That's what scientists did.
She on the other hand...
She was what popped into mind when you thought of a scatter-brained, whimsical artist with only the most tenuous of connections to reality. The perfect caricature of a person so absorbed in abstractions and different shades of reality. Someone who could interpret a simple question like 'How are you?' as a deep philosophical statement on the fundamental reality of man. Coming up with questions no one had an answer for and asking why. That's what artists did.
We were fundamentally different. We might never understand each other fully. All our friends had no clue what we saw in each other. But despite all that, I still loved her. And I'm pretty sure she loved me too.
I switched the bag I was carrying from one hand to the other, feeling the fruit shift slightly inside. The pleasant scent of oranges would follow me around for the rest of the day, but I liked it. They cost a bunch, and I had to pinch every penny I could nowadays, but they were for her. And that's all that mattered, really.
I liked wandering through the city during this hour. Usually I would be in a lecture at this time, or deep within a laboratory. It gave me the chance to see what things were like under the bright sunshine, for one thing. It was mostly quiet, with almost everyone either in their offices or their schools. Here and there a few elderly folk were about, enjoying the sun. A couple of well-dressed ladies were window-shopping, chatting away happily to themselves.
My professor scheduled just a couple of classes today, which let me out early so I could meet her. I would have skipped it entirely, if not for the fact that they were about Quantum Mechanics, in which I was lagging behind a little. So I woke up early, made breakfast for two, helped her get dressed, gave her a kiss and promised to meet her later at our usual place.
“Today we'll be covering quantum entanglement,” began Professor Ono. “Now, please pay close attention because it's a little tricky for beginners.”
He rambled on, and at first I diligently copied down notes. Then something struck me, and I lay my pen down in wonderment. Pretty soon a big grin had spread across my face, and I had to fight to keep from chuckling out loud.
Professor Ono noticed, of course. The Physics cohort at the university was small, and the module on Quantum Mechanics was smaller still. There were only about eight people in the lecture hall. Stopping his lecture in mid-sentence, he aimed the pointer at me.
“Nakai, you seem rather pleased with yourself.”
“Sorry sir.”
“What is it that you're so pleased about?”
“Nothing much, sir.”
“Oh? Then in that case would you mind giving us a brief summary on how quantum entanglement works?”
I couldn't help it, I let out a real laugh this time. But before Professor Ono could blow his top, I quickly recited off the top of my head.
“When two particles interact, they can become linked such that the alteration of one causes a mirrored response in the other, despite a separation by arbitrarily large distances. The particles are therefore inextricably linked, or entangled.”
Professor Ono stared at me, his mouth open. Before I could say anything else he coughed to cover up his embarrassment.
“Well it looks like you were paying attention after all.”
I avoided the questioning glances from my classmates. I had given the definition without looking at my notes, because it all made perfect sense to me.
Two particles (people), separated by huge distances (tell me about it), can become so irreversibly linked that a change in one provokes a response in another.
That was it. That was the perfect way to describe Rin and I.
xxxx
I waited by the traffic light, humming tunelessly to myself as I looked up and down the road. There were no cars in sight, and I briefly considered just dashing across. But something held me back, and after a while I realised what it was. I was used to restraining my carefree impulses around Rin. After all, someone had to make sure that while her head was in the clouds there weren't any airplanes in the way. I was the tether anchoring her to earth, while she was free to pinwheel in the breeze.
Don't do it, Hisao.
Do it, Hisao.
What if you get knocked down? You could die.
Yeah but you could die any day. Life's short. Just go ahead and do it. Every moment wasted is a moment not seeing her.
I dithered for a moment, and quickly crossed over to the other side before the light turned green. The whole internal debate seemed a little silly now. Yet I thought it was something Rin would have understood. Making sure I had my bag of oranges, I headed towards the park.
After graduating from Yamaku Academy, my grades were good enough to get into a university physics course. I liked physics. It seemed to me that despite my lofty views of the subject, the more physicists probed and experimented and discussed, the more they realised there was so much they didn't know. A long time ago, scientists were indeed men trying to make sense out of an unknown universe. Today, scientists were people who would cheerfully admit that they had no clue what they were discovering, but they loved it anyway.
I liked it. Seemed appropriate.
My parents were a little reluctant to let me attend a university far from home, but they relented after I demonstrated that I had become more independent after my stint at Yamaku. They were most concerned about my medications, and to be honest that was not something I could sweep under the carpet. My mum would send text messages in the morning and night, reminding me to take the seventeen different pills that alleviated my condition. Arrhythmia, or Long QT Syndrome if you wanted to get technical. Physical exertion strained my heart. A baseball thumping me on the chest could basically kill me. It wasn't pleasant, but I had learned to live with it.
Rin had received an art scholarship upon graduation. Although Yamaku's art teacher Shinichi Nomiya had been callous and cruel, the recommendation for his 'star pupil' had paid off. She would attend classes at the university without having to pay tuition, which was helpful because we'd decided to rent a small place together.
It wasn't easy, convincing both sets of parents that it was what we wanted. In the end, Mr and Mrs Tezuka accepted that having someone around to look after Rin was probably for the best, and who better than her boyfriend? For my part, I had to persuade my parents that I was an honourable young man who wouldn't take advantage of the fact that I would be living with my girlfriend.
“For the love of God, use protection.”
“Dad!”
“I'm serious. I know it's useless to pretend that you're not going to have sex. So all I can say is, use protection. I mean it. Promise me or I won't agree.”
I stared at my father. He was the old-fashioned type, a real man's man who hardly ever talked to his son, let alone talk about sex. I don't think we ever discussed the topic before. But he looked very serious indeed, so I had no choice but to promise and put an end to the conversation. My mother was an entirely different kettle of fish though.
“Hisao dear, are you sure this is what you want?”
“Sure I'm sure mum.”
“It's just that...Rin...”
“What's wrong? Don't you like her?”
“I do, I do,” said my mum quickly. “But Hisao, you have to admit that she's not the most stable person around.”
“Mum, I know that. That's why I need to stay with her.”
“Are you really serious about this? Do you really see yourself settling down with that girl?”
I fought down my first reply and managed to sound calm.
“Of course I do. I love her.”
My mother didn't have anything to say after that. After a while I was glad I hadn't snapped at her. She meant well, after all. And I could see her point. Dating someone like Rin was a big risk. If there was an emergency (like say a sudden heart attack), would she know what to do? But all relationships were a risk. And I was determined to make this one work.
So we rented this tiny little apartment with only one bedroom, a small kitchen and a living space. Even my dorm room at Yamaku seemed bigger, but Rin had wandered around the place with every sign of enjoyment and pronounced it habitable. There was even a little balcony that overlooked the city, and I knew she would want to sit there and paint what she saw, high in the sky and down below.
I saved space and money by getting creative. No need for a TV, for one thing. Ever since meeting Rin I had the feeling that no hack TV writer could come up with something half as entertaining as the random thoughts she sometimes expressed. Instead I brought in a small three-seater sofa and set up a little table where I could use my laptop. The screen was big enough to watch movies on, if we wanted.
It took a lot of work, but after a while the place really did come to feel like a home away from home to me. After my long hospital stay, I had become averse to bare walls and neatness. Rin quickly remedied that, laying out her art supplies willy-nilly and painting so many pictures they soon began to stack up. I hung the ones I liked on the walls. Although they weren't exactly soothing landscapes, Rin's art always made me think deep thoughts, and the bright colours did make the place more lively.
With a pot of tea always on the boil and a few beanbag chairs and rugs thrown about, it was what I always wanted in my own place. Somewhere comfortable where I could relax and spend time with my girlfriend.
Despite both sets of parents chipping in, I still had to get a part-time job. I found one as a clerk at a bookstore, with reasonable hours. Remembering Lilly Satou's fondness for English-language books back at school, I tried hard to improve my English, which helped a lot with the customers.
Rin didn't seem able to grasp the concept of a job, but I didn't mind. All her free time was needed to keep up with her art assignments anyway. She sometimes mentioned that it would be ok to sell a couple of pieces if anyone wanted them, but I told her not to. Rin's art was special, just as she was. Selling them would mean giving away a part of Rin herself.
xxxx
I headed up the path leading to the park. Rin had found the place, when we were exploring the city after first getting here. I had queued up to buy ice cream and when I turned around, she wasn't there any more.
I walked up and down the street, calling for her. The ice-cream was melting and I was getting a little bit frightened when I saw her. She had wandered off into the park, and was standing in a shady spot beside a pond. A large, flat rock lay close by, and as I got closer Rin clumsily climbed up onto the rock and turned this way and that, before finally tilting her head back and looking up at the sky.
I could see why she liked it. The trees provided shade, and from that spot you could see almost all of the park, and everyone in it. The pond was interesting as well, with murky green water (like her eyes) and lilypads floating about. Loud croaking indicated the presence of a few frogs, who dived off the pads and into the water and swum about like an Olympic synchronised diving team. Rin watched them closely, eyes narrowed in concentration. She didn't turn around when I came up to her, and eventually I just sat down and held out her ice-cream for her to lick while she observed the frogs.
Since then it had become her favourite spot in the city when the weather was nice, and as it wasn't too far from the university we usually went there when we could. Today the sky was a brilliant blue, dotted with the fluffy white clouds she loved so much. As far as I knew, she had been there since morning. I couldn't wait to see what she had painted so far.
I was breathing heavily, my heart pounding away a little faster than normal. Immediately I slowed down my pace and thought about putting down the bags I was carrying for a little rest. I usually didn't take any risks when it came to my heart, but I was almost there anyway. Still, I waited for a little while for my heart to get back to normal, then continued walking through the park.
I went around a bush and there she was. My girlfriend Rin, sitting in the sun by the water and painting a lovely picture.
She was wearing simple clothes, just a green and white striped top and khaki pants. Her denim jacket lay on the grass, with the temperature high enough that my walk here had worked up a little sweat. But if Rin's fashion sense didn't make my heart beat faster for an entirely different reason than walking fast, just looking at her was enough to do the trick.
Her messy red hair fell to just below her chin, her bangs cut short so they wouldn't obscure her eyes. Rin was slim, leaning towards skinny even, although ever since we moved in together I made sure she was eating regularly. She sometimes forgot if she was working on a painting. If she stood up, she would just be a little bit shorter than me.
If pressed at gunpoint, I would have to admit that Rin wasn't exactly a babe that would turn heads. She looked a little boyish, and her figure wasn't as full as other girls I'd known. But somehow all that didn't matter to me. Her dark green eyes, thoughtful expression and long, lithe, coltish legs all combined to form the woman I had fallen in love with.
Although her looks wouldn't turn heads, something else would. Rin was sitting on a little chair and painting, but she was gripping the brush between her toes instead of her hands. Rin had no hands. Her arms ended in stumps just past her shoulders. She had been born with a severe birth defect that necessitated the amputation of both her arms. When she walked around campus, more often than not people would nudge and point at her empty sleeves.
She never let it bother her, however. She could do with her feet almost everything that someone else could do with hands, and she had been painting with her feet for so long it was second nature to her. Even as I watched, she dipped her brush in a blob of green and carefully added a touch of it to one corner of the painting.
I stood there with my hands on my hips for a while, looking at the picture. To anyone else it would have looked like a random collection of images, all jumbled up without making any sense. But I knew Rin. I knew her art was the key to understanding her thoughts, so I stared hard at the picture, letting my vision unfocus a little, no longer emphasising the details but what it looked like as a whole...and then it was like a lightbulb flicking on in my head.
“That's the pond, isn't it? Except you've made the lillies freakishly tall for some reason and that frog looks more like an ogre, but that's the pond. I'm not sure why everything is so monstrous though. Unless, wait, don't tell me...you think the pond is scarier than it first appears? It harbours hidden dangers?”
Rin ceased her brush-strokes and looked up at me. A smile was on her face as she nodded once, deliberately.
“Hello Hisao.” Her voice was low-key and not prone to much inflection, but always retained a dreamy air. She paused, as if concentrating hard on what to say next. “It's nice to see you. I missed you.”
I didn't answer. Instead I bent down and give her a long, loving kiss on the lips, letting her know exactly how I felt. When I was done she pulled away and gave me an enigmatic smile. And without a word she returned to her painting.
I was used to her long silences, however. Rin didn't like words very much. She found it difficult to express just exactly how she felt in words that had originally been designed to let other monkeys to know just where the ripest fruit was. It bothered me a little at the start of our relationship, but I had come to terms with it. For Rin, silences were natural. If she didn't have something to say, she didn't see the point in wasting a perfectly good silence with endless chatter.
We spent a lot of time not talking, just Rin with her paints and her easel, and me leafing through a good book. Sometimes I put the book down and just observed her, noting the slight droop of her head as she pored over her paints, the way her toes moved as dexterously as any hand, the way her hair would ruffle in the breeze. For someone else that kind of staring would be uncomfortable, but Rin didn't seem to mind.
I sat down on the grass and pulled out the things I brought. A science-fiction book that I checked out of the library. A spare box of paints for Rin. And of course, my bag of oranges. I held one and began peeling it slowly. The sudden spray of juice and the smell of a fresh cut orange drew Rin's attention. I pulled out a slice and offered it to her.
“Want one?”
She nodded. I fed it to her as she ate it up delicately and finished by giving her a little kiss on the nose. She blinked in surprise, then went back to her painting.
“I brought the paints, like you asked. They're here if you want them. Do you need anything else?”
Rin considered. “No. Just be here.”
“I can do that.”
“I'd like a few more orange slices, if you have them.”
“Coming right up.”
xxxx
I lay down on the grass and read my book, occasionally peeling an orange and feeding the slices to Rin. I ate a few myself, and there was a certain childish glee in spitting the pips to see how far they would go. Rin watched me but didn't seem inclined to join in.
Now and then she would speak to me and I'd reply. There was a pattern to talking to Rin, she could clam up for hours and not say a word and then come up with something completely out of the blue. I took pride in the fact that she hadn't wrong-footed me once yet.
“This isn't the right shade of green.”
“It looks right to me.”
“No, I mean it's not the shade of green that I see.”
Comfortable silence while Rin pondered the exact mix of paints needed to capture the shade of green she sees in her mind. I turned a page and idly speculated what the landscape of Rin's mind would look like, if I ever had the chance to visit. Something tells me that it would resemble the tripped-out world of the Beatles in their Yellow Submarine movie, and this made me laugh.
Rin was looking at me. “Is there something funny, Hisao?”
“Nah, just something I thought of.”
“What is it?”
“Never mind, Sergeant Pepper.”
To my amazement, Rin gets the reference. “I am he as you are he as you are me and we are altogether,” she sang suddenly, and she so rarely sings I drop my book in surprise.
“Rin, I never knew you liked them.”
“Well I do. Some of it. Especially that bit that I just sang.”
“I never understood it.”
“Makes perfect sense to me.”
Another comfortable silence settled on us as she finished mixing her paint and dabbed the nose of the frog-ogre with it. I went back to my book. I reflected on how important these comfortable silences were to our relationship. Of course most couples enjoyed the feeling of just being in each other's presence, while they each did their own thing. But Rin needed it a little more than most. Her being quiet didn't mean that she was being withdrawn and negative. She hated being distracted while she worked and until the task at hand was done, she wouldn't respond to anything else.
A little girl had raced away from her mother, laughing and shrieking with pure joy. She came running up to where the two of us were sitting and stopped short, apparently in awe of the artist working at her easel.
She was wearing a blue romper and her hair was made up in twin ponytails that reminded me forcibly of Emi Ibarazaki, one of the few friends that Rin had. She couldn't have been more than six years old.
The girl got up closer to Rin and asked shyly, “What are you painting?”
Rin looked down at her, incredulous. She had a brush in her mouth, and if she wanted to reply she would have to let the brush fall. A look of faint irritation crossed her face, but she let the brush drop anyway.
“Who are you?”
“Mummy says I'm not supposed to talk to strangers.”
Rin looked bewildered. “So...why are you talking to me?”
“I like your painting. What's your name? If you tell me then I'll know you and then you won't be a stranger anymore and then I can talk to you.”
“Aren't you talking to me now?”
I decided to help out a bit. “Hey there. Her name's Tezuka Rin, the world-famous artist. You can call her Rin.”
“She can?”
“Rin,” said the little girl. “Rin Rin Rinny Rinny Rin in a tin bin. Yay!”
Rin had that expression that indicated she was patiently waiting for the world to make sense.
“My name's Akiko. Now you know my name and I know yours.”
“That's good?” Rin glanced at me, and I quickly nodded confirmation. “Yes, that's good. To answer your first question, I am painting the pond.”
“But that looks nothing like the pond!”
“The pond you see isn't the pond I see, you see.”
The tables had been turned. Instead of admitting her own confusion, the little girl picked up the brush and handed it to Rin. Or tried to. Rin deftly plucked it out of her hands with her toes.
“You've got no arms!”
“So I noticed.”
“Why have you got no arms? Did you lose them?”
Rin appeared to give this question some thought. After a while she said, “No. I don't think so. It's more like they lost me. Although I'm not sure where they are right now.”
At this moment the girl's mother, a tall, dignified lady caught up with us. “Akiko, there you are! I'm so sorry, I do hope she hasn't been bothering you.”
Akiko ran to her mother and clutched at her arm. “Mommy, mommy, look! That artist lady has no arms!”
The lady's eyes performed the familiar flick to Rin's empty shirt sleeves, then a hasty look to one side. She bent down and said loudly to her daughter, “Akiko! That's not polite!”
“It's not?” said Rin suddenly. “She's telling the truth. I am an artist, Hisao tells me I'm a lady even if I do forget it sometimes, and as you can see I don't have any arms.”
Akiko's mother looked as though she would have been anywhere rather than at that spot at that moment. Apologising profusely, she dragged her daughter away and peace reigned once more.
“Hisao?”
“Yes?”
“Why did you do that?”
“I didn't do anything.”
“That's what I meant. Why didn't you say anything to that woman? You usually do when people make a big fuss.” Damn, she can be scarily perceptive when you least expected it.
“Oh I don't know. Maybe it's because it's nice to see someone else flummoxed by you once in a while.”
“Flummoxed? Flummoxed. What does it mean?”
“It means to confuse someone.”
Rin repeated the word a few times, evidently liking it. And then she finished the final stroke of the painting and sat back to critically inspect her work.
“I think I'm done.”
I sat up and look at it. It was green and weird and slightly unsettling, but it was the pond alright.
“I like it.”
“You do?”
“Yes. I'm going to hang this one in the kitchen.”
“The kitchen doesn't have walls.”
“Fine then I'll hang this one near the kitchen.”
Rin didn't say anything to this, but I knew it was because she was waiting to see whether I would really hang it up or not. She responded to the deed, not the word.
The sun was lower in the sky, and the shadows were lengthening. There was a general rise in the noise around us, as people put away their work and got ready to enjoy themselves. There weren't many people left in the park, save a few couples. In my mind's eye I could see restaurants and bars and clubs opening their doors, awaiting the rush of patrons eager to unwind after a long day. The city didn't sleep, it just turned on its lights.
As Rin enjoyed the last of the oranges, I helped pack away her art supplies and canvas into her bag. I would carry the easel under my arm, while we would leave the chair where it stood. It hadn't been stolen all this time, and it was a pretty old one anyway. I picked up her jacket and helped her put it on. Her hair swished beguilingly in front of my face, and it was all I could do not to bury myself in it and just hold her for a while.
“Are we going home?” she asked.
“For a while. And then we're going out.”
“Where?”
“You'll see. Are you hungry?”
“Yes, a little.”
“Good.”
Rin waited expectantly for clarification, but when she saw I was going to keep mum she started off down the path. I went after her and curled one arm around her waist.
“Why are you holding me? I'm not going to run away. I promised, remember?”
“Don't you like it? You can lean your head on my shoulder and look at the sky while we walk back home.”
Rin did as I suggested. The people on the sidewalks were staring, but if she didn't care then neither should I. We walked down the brightly-lit streets, and Rin stopped looking at the sky to take in everything around her. She had an amazing eye for detail, and I knew she was filing everything away like a human camera, to be brought out on canvas in the future.
“This is nice,” she said, apropos of nothing.
“I think so too.”
“Really? Why?” she said, sounding genuinely curious.
“Lots of things really, but the main reason is because you're here with me.”
Rin decided she liked that, and gave me a little kiss on the cheek.
xxxx
We climbed up the stairs to our apartment, and while I fished around in my pockets for the key Rin peered into the corners, apparently highly interested in cobwebs. I opened the door and flicked on the lights.
I firmly believed that a place can only become a home if you put enough care and hard work into it. We'd worked out a system, Rin and I. I did the laundry and most of the cooking, while she did the cleaning. The small space actually helped in that regard, as there wasn't much to mess up. Still we had so many paints and canvases and other art supplies lying about an inspector could probably have deemed it a fire hazard. I compensated by quitting smoking and persuading Rin that it wasn't necessary for her to gain inspiration. Sitting on the balcony and watching the stars on most nights, she thankfully agreed with me.
We set our stuff down, and I carefully set up her easel in a corner. Rin sat down on the couch, grateful for the chance to rest her feet.
“What are having for dinner?” she asked.
“I'm not cooking tonight.”
“Does this mean I'll have to cook? I didn't have anything planned.”
“No, no. Tonight I'm taking you out to dinner. I found this lovely little restaurant and I think you'll like it.”
“Can you tell me where it is?”
“Not yet, it's a surprise.”
“I like surprises. Except some surprises, you know, like an unexpected bill or a rhino crashing through your bedroom window or something. Except we're three stories up and there are no zoos around and I saw you pay all our bills the last time, so we're probably ok.”
“Yup. Go have a shower, then we can get ready.”
Rin headed in the direction of our bathroom, then she looked over her shoulder at me. There was a sly smile playing on her lips.
“You know Hisao, if only there was some way in which we could shower at the same time, we could save both water and money. And time too, I suppose.”
“I was just thinking that too,” I said. But there's no way I could build another bathroom in this place.”
Rin raised an eyebrow, and I laughed.
“Or we could do something simpler, and shower at the same time.”
“Hurry up,” said Rin. And she was gone in a swish of red hair and long legs. I took off my clothes, tossed them into the laundry basket, and followed her inside.
Rin stood in the middle of our very small bathroom, looking expectantly at me. She wasn't making any come-hither-gestures (that would be difficult for her, come to think of it) but the fact that she wasn't trying to be sexy was incredibly sexy in itself. Rin glanced down and her sly smile grew wider.
“I see there's nothing wrong with your tackle tonight.”
“No ma'am,” I said, and stepped in close. We kissed, long and deep, with the care and attention to detail as expected of an artist and a scientist, with the passion of two people who have discovered that they can't go through life without each other.
We finally break apart. Rin's breathing a little more heavily than usual.
“That was good. You're a good kisser, Hisao.”
“Why thank you.”
“I'm feeling a little hot though. Please take off all my clothes.”
That was one command I'd never fail to obey. Rin raised her arms and I slipped her top over her head and let it drop on the floor. I undid the front of her jeans, and slid it down her hips. Rin wiggled her chest a little, the implication clear. I reached around her back and undid her bra, letting that fall to the floor too.
She was wearing adorable red panties, darker than the auburn of her hair. I brushed my hand against the front and felt her stiffen up at my touch. That wouldn't do. I reached my other hand and let it rest on her butt. As we kissed again I hooked one thumb in the hem of her panties and dropped that to the floor to join the puddle of the rest of Rin's clothes.
Rin stood naked before me, my Rin. Despite my attempts at cooking she still looked a bit too skinny for her own good. Rin was all angles, all long lines, except when it came to her adorably heart-shaped face. But I loved it. I loved every inch of her. And from the way she was staring into my eyes, those big dark green pools of hers, she felt the same way about me. She took a step back into the shower, her intent clear. I went in too, and turned on the spray.
The sensation of holding Rin in my arms while the water rushed over our bodies was amazing. Rin gasped a little as I reached between her legs, feeling the small tuft of hair there as light and fine as down, and ran a finger over her lips.
I felt my heart beat faster and it took an enormous effort of will not to go further and calm myself down. Then Rin made a small noise of discontent and thrust her hips against my hand, and I lost it. We stayed like that for quite a while, my other hand reaching up to her chest where I squeezed and gently fondled her breasts and felt her nipples grow hard under my fingers. She tensed up all of a sudden, and a soft moan of pleasure escaped her lips as her body relaxed and went a little limp.
“What about you?” she managed to say.
“I can wait,” I said, my mouth by her ear. “I have something special planned.”
“More special than this?”
“Yeah.”
“I don't believe you.”
I chuckled and we finished our shower together. As we went to our bedroom to towel off, I couldn't help but wonder how she did it before I came along. Did Emi do it for her? And with that I felt the familiar thump against my ribcage as my blood pressure rose. More to distract myself than expecting a real answer, I asked her about it.
“I laid the towel on my bed and I rolled around on top of it until I was dry,” she answered, as if it was the most natural thing in the world. Before I could say anything she spread the towel out with her foot and gave me a demonstration.
I couldn't help it, she looked so silly I had to laugh. Rin gave me one of her patented mini-smirks, the only hint that she was amused.
I dressed up quickly, throwing on a nice long-sleeved button down shirt, pressed pants and a suit jacket. Then I helped Rin put on a dark green halter top, tight blue jeans and put her denim jacket on again. It was slightly rumpled by now, but I liked it. It seemed to fit my Rin.
“Are we going somewhere nice, Hisao?”
“You could say that.”
“I just said it.”
“I mean yes, you could consider it nice.”
“Then help me put on my earrings, please.”
“Are you sure? You don't have to.”
Rin's eyes widened. “But you just said we're going somewhere nice. And I want to look nice.”
“You already look beautiful. You always do.”
“Always?”
“Always.”
“Even when I wake up in the morning and haven't brushed my hair or wiped the gunk out of my eyes?”
“Especially then.”
Rin looked thoughtful, until I hastily added “That was meant to be an exaggeration. You don't have to go around like that all the time.”
Her face cleared. “Oh, I see now. Thank you Hisao. But I would like to wear my earrings.”
I opened the little nightstand on her side of the bed and took out a small velvet box. Rin didn't usually wear them, but they were a gift from her parents after she received her scholarship. They were genuine emeralds, if a little small. Rin liked green because it complemented her hair nicely, and I agreed with her. When I was done she looked at herself in the mirror critically. I went and stood beside her.
“Tezuka and Nakai, ready for a night out on the town.” I said, striking a pose.
“I sort of feel we need more equipment than what we have now for a night out on the town.”
“Equipment? What are you talking about?”
“I'm not sure. What if we're attacked by gangsters? We need a gun.”
“A gun?”
“Yes. Although I can't shoot one. Maybe you can invent a shoulder cannon that I can fire by hitting it with the side of my head. You're a scientist, aren't you?”
“I'm a physicist, honey. We try to make sense of the universe, not blow people up.”
“Huh. I thought that was what I did.”
“That's what we both do. And that's why I love you. Come on, let's go.”
Before we left, I hung Rin's newest painting on a spot beside the mini-fridge. She looked pleased.
xxxx
I passed by the fancy French style restaurants, the Chinese restaurants, and even that little Turkish place where I dropped in to get a doner kebab sometimes. Rin followed me, shuffling along in her sandals. I kept a look out for a distinctive sign, and then I spotted it.
“Here we are!”
Our dinner destination was a combination restaurant and jazz club. But the really cool thing about the place was its little garden area, lit up by candles and torches. Instead of tables and chairs they had couches and low lying benches, where people could stretch out and chill. Eating at a normal restaurant would be difficult for Rin, unless I fed her every bite and she'd made it clear in her subtle but definite way that she didn't like it. So I hunted all over the city until I found this place. Sitting at a couch, she would be able to eat by herself.
Rin was swaying gently on the spot, in time to the music. “That's jazz, isn't it?”
The maitre'd showed us to our 'table' at the al fresco dining area. Fortunately it had been a dry couple of weeks. Rin sat down on a couch and opened a menu. In no time she decided it was more comfortable to lie flat on her back and hold the menu above her face. I decided to do the same.
“What kind of food do they serve here?”
“They have some nice Western style food. Some good Thai stuff too.”
“I like Thai. It's spicy.”
The waiter comes over, and doesn't mention Rin's lack of arms. He didn't even look surprised either, which I thought was impressive. Either he's jaded or it's been a long shift for him.
“Pad Thai, please.”
“Very good, miss. Something to drink?”
“Yes.”
He waits a little while, then prompts Rin.
“Mind telling me what you would like?”
“I'm not sure.”
“How about the papaya juice?”
“Papayas have juice?” Rin whispers to me in an aside. I nod, not daring to look at the waiter's face.
“Alright, one of those please. In a glass. With a straw.”
“Yes, miss. And you, sir?”
“I'll have the chicken Caesar salad and a side of haloumi cheese please. Extra olives.”
“Very good, sir. If there's anything you need, don't hesitate to ask.”
Rin considers this. “Do you have a hat? The wind is a little chilly out here and I would like a hat.”
The waiter recovers and manages to say he'll check with the staff before disappearing with our menus. I lie back on my couch and enjoy the atmosphere. The jazz music can be heard clearly from where we're sitting. Louis Armstrong's Mack the Knife, I think to myself, recognising the tune. The lanterns and candles glow like little fireflies. Up in the sky the moon is big and round and bright.
I glance to my right and see that Rin is doing the same thing. “It's rather pretty.”
“Yup, it is.”
“You know, I think I can see the Lunar Module.”
“Rin, that's impossible.”
“I can. Just there. On the tip of the bunny ear.”
“What bunny ear?”
“Doesn't the dark spot look like a bunny to you?”
I squint my eyes, then realise she's right.
“You know Hisao, it reminds me of you.”
“The bunny?”
“The moon.”
“Why? Am I that big and round?”
“Not really. I mean, you don't have craters all over your face either.”
“I should hope not.”
“What I mean is...the way it hangs in the sky, so bright, even though the rest of the sky is all dark now, except for the stars I guess but it's still mostly dark? I just feel like you're the moon, Hisao. Like no matter where I go or how dark it gets, I can look up and you're there. Looking down on me. Helping me find a way. Even if you flummox me sometimes. I always know where I'm going.”
I get off my couch and lie down on Rin's, next to her. I kiss her softly on the cheek and sit there while she idly slides a foot up and down my leg. I don't have to say anything. What she said was perfect enough on its own.
The food comes after a while, and it's really good. They're out of hats though. I help myself to my salad, while Rin industriously devours her spicy Pad Thai. Although she doesn't eat much, she does like spicy stuff. Every now and then she'd sip at her juice.
“What did you do in class today, Hisao?”
That was so unexpected I almost spill my glass of iced tea. Rin hardly ever bothered asking me about my day, although if I wanted to talk about it she'd reply readily enough. I racked my brains, trying to think of something of interest to her. And then it came to me.
“Actually Rin, I found out something in class today that helped me to understand you better.”
“Does Professor Ono spy on me or something? Is he aware of all my bad habits?” she asked as if it was the most natural thing to ask. It's telling that I'm not surprised that she would ask that, but I am surprised that she remembered the name of my professor.
“No, nothing like that at all.”
“Good.”
“It's about quantum mechanics.”
“Not good.”
I plough on. “No really, this is quite interesting.” I then explain to her the theory of quantum entanglement. And to my pleasant surprise, Rin's face lights up in understanding.
“That's us. That's the two of us. We're like those quantum thingies.”
“Yup I thought so too.”
“Doesn't it scare you?”
“Why would it?”
“I mean, I met you and you met me and now we're suddenly linked. We're linked in ways that no one can understand, not even really smart professor types. What happens if we change?”
I shrug. “Doesn't matter. If you change, I'm changed as well. That's what it means to be linked. But it doesn't matter because no matter what happens I love you and you love me and that will never change.”
Rin thinks about this. “You're right.”
“Aren't I always?”
“No.”
“...ok yeah, but I'm right about this one.”
“That's right too.”
We finish our food and order more drinks, deciding to linger a little and enjoy the music. Rin snuggles closer to me and I oblige my resting my own head on top of hers. It's a perfect moment, as the philosophers like to say. In that one moment time feels like forever and you feel that the universe isn't big enough to contain everything that you're feeling at that point in time.
Later as we were walking home, I nudge Rin and ask her something.
“Did you enjoy dinner?”
“Yes, it was very nice. We should go there more often.”
“We will. Did you even remember what day it is?”
“Wednesday?”
“Yes, but what's special about it?”
“I haven't been watching the news lately, Hisao. Did aliens land in South Africa or was the Queen of England revealed to be a giant lizard?”
“What? No, that's not it. It's the anniversary of the day we first met, silly.”
“Really? I had no idea.”
“It is. Couple of years ago I happened to walk into an empty art class room to look for plywood and instead found a beautiful girl sitting on a table, eating her not-quite-lunch-but-not-yet-dinner with a fork between her toes.”
“I remember that. I was having curry.”
“So you were.”
“I'm glad I decided to eat my lunch there that day, Hisao.”
“Me too.”
“What would have happened if we never met?”
“I don't know. But I know I couldn't be as happy as I am now.”
“Are you happy? Here with me?”
“There's nothing on this Earth that could make me happier.”
Rin looked up at the moon, its pale light illuminating her face. Then she leaned over and gave me another kiss.
“You make me happy too, Hisao.”
