I grabbed my bags and walked off the plane to the terminal. The airport was just as crowded as I imagined it would be. None of the signs were in Japanese; Barely any of them had languages other than English on them. If I hadn’t grown up learning English in school, this would’ve been the end of the line. I felt like a walking corpse. The only problem I’d have at that point would be whether or not Hiro could convert my coffin measurements into Imperial units so we wouldn’t have to import it for my impending funeral.
Somehow, I managed to completely fall asleep while standing up while waiting at baggage claim for our suitcases. Hiro actually had to catch me so I wouldn’t bust my head open on the floor. My first priority when we get to campus should probably be to take a nap. I was amazed at the sheer size of Hiro’s suitcases that he picked up from the conveyor belt. Did he pack an entire supercomputer in there??
American customs were pretty strict, especially compared to the security back home. We briefly learned about 9/11 in school, so I understand why. While Hiro and I were waiting for the campus shuttle to arrive, I decided to unzip my suitcase just to make sure nothing was missing and that anything important was still intact. When I opened the plastic case containing my photographs, I was relieved to find practically zero damage… except my wall tacks were missing. I mean, I totally understand taking security seriously, but that’s just petty.
The wait for the shuttle was so boring that I teetered the line between consciousness and lack thereof for about 20 straight minutes. Props to the school for even bothering to book us all a free ride to campus, but with all that money you’d think they’d hire a faster driver. I could feel my eyes getting heavier and heavier with each passing second. Hiro started looking right into my eyes with a puzzled expression. “Dude. Your right eye is drooping.” He then stuck his finger out and delicately dragged my eyelid open. I was so tired I didn’t even have the energy to flinch.
My patience started to wear as thin as a carbon nanotube. I swear that I’m normally not this impatient. I just couldn’t wait to get to my new bed already, even though it’s probably not gonna be as comfortable as I’m hoping it’ll be. I felt really bad for the guy who had to hold up the sign reading ‘S.S.S.S. Shuttle Service’, which likely has the world’s longest and most repetitive acronym. The sign guy wasn’t even smiling anymore. I bet his arms were starting to hurt from standing still for so long. Is this his entire job? He probably can’t wait to go home after this bus arrives. I wonder what’s waiting back at home for him. Maybe he’s got a girlfriend, or a boyfriend, or he just lives on his own. I’ll bet that even if he lives alone, someone definitely cares about him. It’s kind of fun to imagine what’s going on in the mind of a stranger. But it’s also kind of nerve-wracking. I wouldn’t want my guesses to become assumptions. Getting the right read on someone is hard sometimes. For the sign guy’s sake, this bus had better get here soon.
For just a split second, I closed my eyes. When they opened back up, there was a navy blue charter bus waiting right along the curb. I felt Hiro grab me by the arm and drag me onto the shuttle, but every event in between reaching for my suitcase and finding myself seated in the back row of the bus was a complete and total blur. At least the seats were wide, mildly comfortable, and relatively stain free. The window to my right was much larger than the one on the plane. Rays of sunshine were assaulting me in the face, but I could still make out a mountain range spanning the horizon and towering over the buildings and trees. They looked so much more vibrant than any picture could capture. That being said, I couldn’t wait to at least try to. If my suitcase wasn’t already in the upper compartment, I’d probably ask Hiro to fumble through it for my camera right now. Instead, I just closed my eyes and hoped they’d take me farther forward in time.
My wish was granted sooner than I expected when the bus slammed on the brakes, hurtling me into the seat in front of me. The heavy cushioning on the seatbacks kept me from suffering any intensive damage, but I was still shaken up. I tried to brush it off and go back to sleep, this time buckling my seatbelt in. I closed my eyes again, fully prepared for the weavers of fate to decide that they weren’t quite done messing around with my thread yet. To my surprise, I wasn’t greeted with another taste of whiplash, but instead by a weird itch in my right eye. I took another look in the window, this time looking at my own reflection rather than the much more beautiful landscape beyond it. My eye didn’t seem like there was anything wrong; it was still the same green eye that I remembered. There weren’t any scratches or bruises. Probably just some dust that got stuck in there. I rubbed the hell out of my eye and promptly went back to trying to sleep. That itchiness never really went away though.
The beaches faded out of view and were soon replaced by a massive university campus. Some of the buildings looked familiar. They must be the buildings from the acceptance booklet, just with some new coats of paint. Other buildings didn’t look so familiar. They were either so brand new that I could see sparkles emanating from their entryways, or so old that I don’t think any classes have been taught in their halls since Dad was born. Regardless, I wanted to go into all of them (with permission, of course). The banner propped up on the marble S.S.S.S. sign read ‘Welcome Class of 2027!!’ alongside some obvious clip art and stock images with their watermarks still present. For the school’s sake, I hope they managed to enroll a student who specialized in Graphic Design.
The rest of the signs spread around campus looked much nicer than the one out front. In fact, the entire campus was beautiful. Even the most ancient buildings were captivating. I guess that shitty banner at the entrance was meant to be a motivator of sorts. The bus started dropping people off at their respective dorms, and Hiro and I placed bets on who would have to get off first. (My guess? Hiro. His guess? Also Hiro.) The first people to get off were the South Dorm residents, followed by those belonging to East Dorm. Now I know I haven’t started my Exploration courses yet, but my knowledge of basic cardinal directions suggested that North Dorm was next. Then the loudspeaker crackled to announce the victor of our inconsequential yet oddly exciting bet. “All students at West Dorm, please get off now.”
Hiro’s fists pumped out in excitement. “LET’S GO!!!! I expect you to fulfill your end of the deal by the end of the night.” He lounged out and laid down in my chair as I stood up.
I began to reach up and grab my bags from the overhead compartment. “Um, Hiro… we never actually decided what we’d have to do when we lost.”
He scratched the brim of his baseball cap, as he had no visible head to scratch instead. “Weird. I thought I said the loser had to pay for our dinner later.”
I swung my bag over my shoulder and extended the handle on my suitcase. “Well, even if you had, we both lost, remember?”
Hiro looked even more confused than before. “Does that mean we’ll just… pay for each other’s dinner instead?” He started frantically scribbling on a notepad that he kept in his shirt pocket. “Well, you’ll need my number either way!” Hiro handed me the note. It was covered in illegible chicken scratch. How do his teachers even read his work?
“How about you just text me instead?” I grabbed his notebook and wrote my own number on it. “I promise I’ll answer as soon as I can, if I’m even awake by then.”
He immediately started typing my number into his contacts list. “Sure! I’ll text you when I’m done unpacking. I have a lot of wires and cables to organize, so sorry if it might be a while!”
I waved my hand to say goodbye as I walked down the aisle to the front of the bus and stepped out to see the West Dorm towering over me. Alright, so it was actually only a couple stories tall, but I’m not even one story tall, so think about that next time you think about calling somebody’s house small. It was a gorgeous building, one that I wouldn’t have even expected to call a dormitory. The dorm looked more like a magnificent ballroom that hosted formal parties on weeknights and housed students as a side hustle. I was worried that when I walked into the 1st floor foyer there would be a grand piano instead of a front desk.
When I finally stepped through the front door, I was greeted by a lobby that looked just as pristine as the outside. There were brand new couches near the entrance and even a fancy water fountain. I saw a man in a brown plaid sweater sitting at the front desk. He was sipping on a bottle of water that looked like it came out of one of the vending machines along the wall. I considered walking up to the desk to ask him what I should do now that I’m here. Nobody else had gotten off the bus with me at the dorm, so there was no line to follow. I honestly expected more people to arrive this early, but I guess Hiro and I were just itching to get here faster than anyone. There were a couple others on the bus, but I never got a good look at any of them.
Eventually, the man in the sweater noticed me standing awkwardly in the door frame and waved me over to the desk. “I’d wager you live here now. Unless those bags are just for show.” His voice was deep, but there was still a bit of softness to it. He sounds like he’d make a really good doctor.
I ran over to the desk in a slight panic. My body was so devoid of energy that I nearly tripped twice on the way there. My breath had gotten a little bit heavy just from running across the room. In between gasps for air, I managed to greet the man with a typical “Nice… to meet you…” while trying to catch my breath in any way possible.
The man looked concerned, to put it lightly. He reached out to check my pulse, probably assuming I was about to collapse on the ground in front of him. “Do I need to get you a room early? Some rest would really do you wonders.” He pulled open the drawer behind the desk and pulled out a blank white card. “Move in doesn’t start until this evening, but I don’t think I’ll get fired just for giving you a room to stay in for now.” He placed the card in my hand. “This is a temporary ID. It’ll get you into your room until you get your actual ID card later this week. You can hold onto it until then.”
The man in the sweater assisted my walk towards the elevator as he guided me and my bags towards the room that I’d probably end up staying in for the next few years. I would’ve wished for a more momentous introduction, but life isn’t always picture perfect. Hell, if anything exciting at all happens tomorrow, I’d be a little surprised. People always think that their first day of college will be like a movie of sorts, but I think mine is turning out to be more of a ‘school play opening night gone wrong’. As I spread out on the bare mattress, I leaned up to see the man walking out to let me rest in silence. “Thank you for letting me up here, even if you weren’t supposed to,” I quietly muttered to him from across the room.
The man turned around and smiled. “I’d have to check the rulebook.” The door gently closed as he returned to his desk downstairs. I glanced around the room to get a feel for the layout of my new place of residence. There was a bed on the opposite wall from mine, with a healthy enough distance between them. The room was surprisingly large, containing a few desks, a refrigerator, two sinks, an entire bathroom, and still plenty of space for multiple people to set up chairs and hang out. I probably won’t be doing that all too much. Maybe my roommate will be more social and have other people over a lot. I hope he doesn’t do it too often. I’m afraid such a high level of energy all the time might become exhausting.
I remembered that I didn’t check which floor I was on or which room I was in. What if I forget to check on my way out? I sure hope the man working the desk at least wrote it down somewhere just in case. Otherwise, I’ll be the laughingstock of West Dorm before classes even begin. Move-in and roommate selection formally begin at around 10 p.m., which gives me plenty of time to catch up on sleep. At least we have a few days before class to get ourselves adjusted to Pacific time. I set an alarm on my phone for 9:30 just to be safe. The moment after I hit “Save” on the alarm, I was out cold.
The alarm went off sooner than felt appropriate.
I rolled over to look at the table that I had set my phone down on. 4:30 p.m. Now I’ve made plenty of mistakes in my life, many of which while running on very little sleep, but I don’t think there’s any excuse or explanation for setting the time this incorrectly. I opened the alarm app to figure out what went wrong. The alarm clearly read ‘4:30 p.m.’, so it didn’t go off by mistake. But then I noticed that all of my other saved alarms seemed strange as well. And I mean really strange. ‘Sui’s Concert: 3:00 a.m.’ What the hell kind of concert starts at 3 in the morning? ‘School Alarm: 2:00 p.m.’ Someone couldn’t have manually changed my alarms, so what the hell is going on here??
Then it hit me. There’s a 17 hour difference between home and the university. I looked back at those saved alarms again, this time subtracting 17 hours from each one. Sui’s violin concert? It was actually at 8:00 p.m. That’s when they always started, rain or shine. The school alarm? 7:00 a.m. And that’s when I figured it out. I never checked to see if my phone had automatically updated to Pacific time when we arrived. In fact, I didn’t even think to make sure it had changed when I was setting the alarm. But that still doesn't explain what happened to this alarm. The one labeled ‘Roommate selection’. I set it for 9:30 p.m. If it had been changed with the time zone update, then that would’ve rang at 4:30 a.m. instead -
Now wait just a goddamn second.
I never set it to the right time in the first place. That alarm was set for 9:30 TOMORROW MORNING. I suppose that’s a more forgivable mistake than just clicking the wrong hour entirely, but wow, that could’ve ended poorly.
Solving that conundrum didn’t make me any less tired, though.
Assuming any further attempts to get rest would end similarly, I flopped back onto my mattress and started mindlessly scrolling through my phone. Hiro still hadn’t texted me about anything related to dinner. I hope he hasn’t forgotten about me already. People usually do, so I wasn’t expecting anything different here. But he really does seem like a great guy. A tad absent minded, but a great person nonetheless. I can’t stand the sensation of being restless even though you have no energy. I wish I had some way to occupy myself until I move in. I would spend this time unpacking, but I’m still not certain if this is my actual permanent room. I’d rather keep everything in my bags for now so I can pretend I haven’t been here the entire time when other students arrive. But what am I supposed to do without opening my bags?
My alarm rang again. I guess I accidentally clicked snooze earlier. I let the song play for a little while this time. Picking a catchy song for your alarm might not be an amazing strategy for actually getting up in the morning, but I think it makes every day start out on a good note. The song’s pretty short, anyway, so even if I feel like listening to the whole thing before shutting it off, it’ll only delay me for two minutes or so. My roommate might get annoyed if he hears me humming ‘I don’t care about that!’ every morning though, so I’ll have to keep that in mind.
When the song ended just as abruptly as it started, I clicked ‘Stop’ to keep myself from falling into the loop again. To my surprise, while my alarm was ringing, there had been a message waiting for me the entire time. It wasn’t from Taisuke, who I suppose kept his promise about not spamming me quite so often. It wasn’t from my parents, even though I probably should’ve called and told them that I arrived safely. It wasn’t from Fumio either. It wasn’t a junk text about paying bills that I don’t owe. It wasn’t even from Hiro.
It was from her.
[Text Message: Chika Dokuro]
“Heyy, I’m already here. I’m kinda bored”
“Wanna hang out or something?”
I was hit with a surge of joy and intense fear.
The first major flag that was raised in my head was “how does she already know that I’m here too? Or is she just guessing?” The second one was “am I even awake enough to do anything?” I’d hate to flake out after talking to her on and off for the entire break, but I really do need to rest. Would it be rude to just not respond? I could just say I was asleep when she texted me. That’s technically somewhat true. I just don’t want to seem like I’d rather take a nap than talk to -
Unauthorized tale usage: if you spot this story on Amazon, report the violation.
“What ‘cha up to right now??”
Uh oh. The double text. I need to answer now. From what little experience I have with this sort of thing, I at least know that you do not, under any circumstance, make a girl triple text you. The world’s thinnest ice is below my feet right now and any wrong move is going to make me slip and crash right through it. I panicked and typed:
“Just exploring around the campus… where are you at rn?”
“I dropped my bag off at my dorm”
“I’m wandering around too”
“Maybe i could meet you somewhere??”
“Yeah, that’d be great! How does a late lunch sound?”
“Omg i’m right by the food court”
“You can meet me there”
“Sure!”
“I’ll be right there”
“Don’t wait for me, ok?”
“Don’t worry, I will lol”
The craziest part about this whole trip is how surprisingly well this conversation is going. I started to roll out of my soon-to-be bed until I realized a bit too late that I didn’t have enough energy left to halt my own momentum, and I tumbled to the floor. If not for my bags that were conveniently placed to the side of the bed breaking my fall, I would’ve had a lot of bruises to explain to a lot of people. On my way out of the room, I made sure to grab my phone, my backpack, an energy drink, the temporary ID and, of course, my MP3 player. I stopped to check myself in the mirror just to make sure I didn’t get any severe bedhead from my 20 minute nap. My hair looked… serviceable.
One of the downsides of being half asleep while moving into your new room for the first time is that making your way to the outside is like walking through a labyrinth. The only clue I had to my position relative to the stairs was my room number: 319. It was at the end of the hallway, which seemed like an easy hint to simply turn around, but at the other end there wasn’t just an elevator and a stairwell; There was another hallway opposite mine, presumably for the girl’s rooms. Around me were various lounges for studying, leisure, and TV. After slowly creating a mental map of what every single room was supposed to be, I eventually ruled out every remaining door and hallway except for one, which was thankfully the one that led to the stairwell and elevator. This feels less like a dorm and more like a shopping mall.
When the elevator door opened, I peeked my head out ever so slightly to check and see if the man in the sweater was at the desk. His seat was empty, but I recognized his water bottle from earlier, which was still sitting on the desk. Wherever he is, he’s probably not going to stay gone for long. I began the motion to throw my empty energy drink can away, but stopped myself right before letting go. If he came back and saw my can in the trash, my cover would be blown. I gotta get out of here. I quietly snuck out of the open door to the outside, pulled the campus map out from the acceptance booklet, and started frantically scanning it for the food court.
Considering the dorms are named after the cardinal directions, it made sense for the food court to be in the center of campus, which is exactly why it wasn’t. Turns out there’s multiple food courts, and Chika never specified which one she was near. I’m just gonna take a gamble and guess she’s at the one in between South Dorm and East Dorm. It’s a farther walk, but knowing my luck, the farthest one will be the right one no matter how many there are. On the way, I saw lots of different districts of differing aesthetics. The Northwest quadrant had buildings that looked very historic, as if they had been built in early colonial America. In contrast, the Southwest quadrant looked slightly newer in its architecture, but without the whole ‘futuristic’ style that many new buildings liked to go for a few decades ago. Interestingly, the Southeast quadrant was a weird fusion between American and classical Japanese architecture, which went together surprisingly well. Finally, the Northeast quadrant had quite a contemporary style to it, as if it had just been added. It’s one of those styles that looks nice now, but only time will tell how it’ll age.
This range of varying landscapes all converged at the center of campus, which had a massive park full of lush green trees, well kept picnic tables, and wildlife that I had never been able to see outside of pictures and nature documentaries. Squirrels ran up and down the branches that spread out over my head like a canopy. I wanted to stop and watch the paths they took as they chased each other back and forth, seeing the twists and turns that they made as they did so. Unfortunately, I had places to be. I sent a silent promise to the squirrels that I would come back and watch them play later, hoping that they’d be able to read my mind.
Across the vast, green park, I saw a vague image of what looked like a food court in the distance. Below my feet was a sidewalk leading straight to the building, which looked like it was paved slightly more recently than the others. It seems that the university doesn’t mind paving desire paths. I followed the sidewalk that was so graciously laid down for people in predicaments like mine and quickly found myself at the Southeast food court with very little detours on the way. It was pretty large for a two story dining hall, especially considering its proximity to the buildings around it. On the entrance side there was a brick computer lab no more than 30 feet away. Whoever was thinking of students that forget about printing off lab worksheets until their classmates mention it at lunch, I’m eternally grateful to you.
Upon taking my first steps inside the dining hall, I was instantly met with dozens of conflicting scents, but it was more soothing than it was overwhelming. Reading all of the different styles of cuisines along the walls was almost stressful. I’ve never been one to experience choice paralysis, but I’m already concerned for the people who do. Speaking of people, there’s more food lines than there are people. In fact, there wasn’t anyone here. It was sorta eerie, seeing a place of communion so empty. I guess I went to the wrong one. Joke’s on me for not texting her first, I guess.
As I turned around to leave, I stopped to take one more look across the desolate hall to see if I was just going blind. It was a damn good thing I did, because it wasn’t long before I saw a girl with long, silver hair round a corner and take a seat in the middle of the hall, facing the wall away from where I stood. She didn’t seem to see me at all on her way to that table. All I could see from here was her hair; no facial features or clothing at all, but the longer I looked at it, the more familiar it became. I quickly walked over toward her table, being specifically careful to not start running. Right before opening my mouth to greet her, I took a moment to relax my nerves. I’m not entirely sure why I was this nervous. Whatever I’m afraid of, I’ll just have to pretend it isn’t there.
I walked around the table and sat down across from her.
“Umm… hi.” I slid my headphones down to rest around my neck. . “It’s… nice to finally meet you.” I nervously scratched the back of my head. “My name is Genjo Sazama.”
She let out a quiet laugh while covering her mouth with her hand, as if to hide it. “Well I already knew that, dork.” She put her elbow on the table so she could use her hand as a chin rest. “But if we’re doing this for the formality of it, then I don’t mind. I’m Chika Dokuro.” Chika took a sip from a glass of orange soda and gently set it back down. “You kinda kept me waiting for a bit.”
A jolt went through my heart for a short second. “Oh, I didn’t mean to waste your time. I think I just got a bit too caught up in the whole exploring thing.” In a combination of urgency and regret, I started nervously stepping away from the table. “I’ll, uh, go get some, uh, food! Yeah, that! I’ll be right back! Don’t wait up on me, gotcha?” I started briskly walking towards any nearby food line to keep her from waiting any further than earlier.
Chika yelled “Don’t worry, I will!” from across the hall. She seemed like the kind of person who would have only felt comfortable doing so with no one else present. I sort of admire that confidence, even if it was just there for a moment.
I got in the nearest empty line and ordered a basket containing a cheeseburger and some onion rings. Pretty cliche for the first meal in the States, but it was the first thing on the menu and I didn’t feel like wasting any more time reading than I had to. I paid for the meal with my white ID card and made my way back to the table. Walking away from the table and then heading back made me realize just how large this place was, as well as how our table was in the exact center of it all. I wonder if she did that on purpose.
I sat back down at the table across from where Chika sat, being very careful to not bump into the table and knock her cup over, and being even more careful to not look anywhere promiscuous. Once I finally sat down, my legs started shaking below the table at what felt like the speed of a jackhammer. My nerves felt like they were about to combust, so I took a drink from my water to soothe them, if only just for a moment. I guess I had forgotten how tense I get when I’m doing these sorts of things. If I had a US dollar for each day since I last went on a date, I’d definitely be able to take this girl out on a much fancier date. It’s just lunch at the dining hall. So why am I so uptight?
“Hey, do you typically order food and just… not eat it?” I snapped out my nervousness to see Chika sitting across from me with a furrowed brow. It never occurred to me how long it had been since I sat down.
“Oh, of course not,” I said as I grabbed an onion ring out of the basket in front of me. “I was just a bit spaced out. You know, lots of school prep and all that stuff.” I leaned back in my chair and popped another ring in my mouth nonchalantly to hide my stress. “After all, Monday’s closer than it seems.”
Her gaze unchanging, she took a sip from her other cup, which I could now see contained some form of tea. “School starts on Wednesday, though.”
I nearly choked on my food. “Right,” I managed to bark out while trying to send it down the right hatch.
Chika twirled a piece of mushroom pasta around her fork while quietly snickering to herself. “I get it. Jet lag can be kind of a pain, can’t it?” She stopped for a brief second, as if she had just remembered something important, but then quickly went back to pasta twirling. “Sort of unrelated, but how was your flight here?”
“It was pretty nice actually. Those seats are a lot less comfortable than they look once you’ve been in them for 10 hours without getting up.” I took another sip of water to hydrate my increasingly dry mouth. “I met someone on the plane, too. He’s pretty cool. A bit on the pushy side, but well intentioned.”
She spent the entire time I spoke contemplating whether or not to take a bite of the heap of noodles she had accumulated on her fork. “Sounds like you’re making friends already.” There was a glimpse of a smile on her face, but it wasn’t there for long. “I’ll bet that you’re amazing at that by the sound of it.”
I immediately started shaking my head. “No, no, no… That’s not true at all… I’ve never been all that great at meeting people.” I reached for my glass of water, but it was empty. “Hell, I don’t know if I’d even be here talking with you if the school hadn’t arranged it!”
Chika cocked her left eyebrow. “Oh?” The look on her face was stern. Oh shit, I didn’t mean it that way.
“God, that came out wrong. I just meant that I don’t think that I would’ve had the confidence to talk to you otherwise. Not that I didn’t want to talk to you at all.” My hand was getting jittery. I was definitely making it worse. I quickly stood up and grabbed my empty glass. “I’m gonna get some more water. I’ll be right back.” The instant I started walking away, I could feel the glass shaking in my hand. I didn’t look back to see the look on her face, mostly because I didn’t want to see what would stare back at me. Feeling like I couldn’t hold onto an open glass full of water without spilling it, I bought a bottle of soda and took it back to the table.
I quickly sat down and twisted the cap off the bottle. “They were all out of water.” Let’s just hope she takes that as a joke and ignores the obvious expression of dread on my face.
Her smile partially returned. “It’s fine, you just misspoke.” Chika swept a portion of her long, silver hair out of her face, not moving her other hand, which had been holding her cheek steady since I had arrived. “It wouldn’t be fair for me to judge you just for one slip up.”
I felt like I could breathe easy again. “Thanks. I’m really sorry about that, though.” I took a swift gulp from my drink and screwed the cap back on, just in case I somehow managed to spill it. “I wish I could’ve apologized to that girl at the airport, too,” I pondered out loud.
Chika’s eyes darted up from her pasta. “Who now?” That really seemed to grab her attention.
“Oh.” I jumped in surprise, not expecting that to be the detail that she would find interesting. “I was getting on the plane this morning, and I was running a little bit late. While I was rushing to my takeoff gate, I accidentally bumped into this girl without looking. I felt bad that I didn’t have time to help her up.” I took a slow, melancholy bite from a now lukewarm onion ring. “I really hope she wasn’t running late for her own flight.”
The sound of Chika’s fork hitting her plate echoed throughout the empty dining hall. “Well... let’s say you had the time to help her out and say something to her, what do you think you would’ve said? Would you have asked her if she needed help getting up?”
I thought about what Chika said for a good while. “I guess if I turned back time, I would probably try to avoid bumping into her in the first place. After all, it was really embarrassing for the both of us. It’d end up best for everyone if I had just been looking where I was going.”
She brushed her hair out of her face again. “Hm. I guess it would’ve been.”
There was a short period of silence. The only audible sounds were the chatter of the workers who were currently on break, and the quiet hum of music coming from my headphones. It seems I forgot to pause my music after taking them off. The repeating refrain of ‘Well he’s the genius of love!’ started to feel like it was taunting me.
I decided to break the silence. “Hey, I’ve noticed your hair keeps getting in your face.” I took another sip from my soda. “Have you tried tying it up? I know it gets annoying when my hair keeps getting in my face.”
Chika let out a short laugh. “I’m honestly surprised you even take care of your hair, you look like you just rolled out of bed.” Her eyes were clearly fixated on a long, curved hair that stuck up from the rest of my head.
“Oh, this old thing?” I flicked it down, and it instantly sprung back up. “No matter how much I try to comb it, it refuses to stay down.”
She analyzed my haircut for a moment. “Well, if the hair doesn’t want to give in, I’d recommend changing the rest of the hairs to accommodate it instead. With those long bangs of yours, it kinda makes you look a bit unorganized.”
I briefly considered combing my bangs from off my forehead. Maybe I’ll see if the stores here sell any hair gel that wouldn’t make me too itchy.
Chika slowly stood up from her chair. “Well, it certainly wasn’t a terrible time meeting you.” She reached down to grab her plate and her cup to bring them to the dish rack. “But I must be going. I have something important to attend to in a short while.”
“It was nice meeting you too, Chika!” I began to stand up as well before her voice interrupted me.
“Dokuro.” She slung a laptop shaped bag over her shoulder.
I froze momentarily. “What?”
“Dokuro. Just Dokuro is fine.” She dropped her dishes off and started to walk off before I stopped her.
“Hey!” Chika stopped walking. “Was it something I said? Because if it’s something I did wrong, I’d like to know.”
Chika turned her head to look back in my direction. “It’s nothing about you personally, Sazama. I just…” She took a deep breath. Whatever it was, it seemed like she really didn’t want to say it. “I just expected somebody different. Not necessarily somebody better. But somebody different.”
Her head turned back to face the doorway. “The truth is that the guy I talked to over the phone all break isn’t the same person sitting at that table. I looked for that person in you, but they weren’t home. And I’m not saying you do it intentionally but…” I could hear the hesitation in her voice. “You’re not as confident as you seemed over the phone. You were afraid of something. Was it me? Or was it yourself?”
I was confused about what she meant by that. I was afraid? Of course I was! But what the hell does she mean, “afraid of myself?”
Chika took another deep breath. “I’ll probably see you around at some point, and it’s not like I’ll flat out ignore you or anything like that, but…”
“You just aren’t the guy I thought I you’d be.”
With that, she walked out the door.
I was still sitting at the table in the center of the dining hall. A dead rose petal fell down onto my plate. I looked up and saw a massive network of plants growing above me. I’m not sure how I didn’t notice it when I walked in. Must’ve just been my shortsightedness at the time. Or maybe my fear. It felt like a Garden of Eden of sorts. It was just as lonely as that place, anyway.
I remembered that I hadn’t taken a single bite from my hamburger, and I didn’t really want to anymore. It had gotten really cold after just sitting there untouched. I took the basket to the dish rack and placed it up on one of the revolving platforms.
I sat back down at the same table, thinking about Chika’s final words before leaving. Her words stung. They stung like the crack of a whip on bare skin. I didn’t know any way to process those words.
So I slid my headphones back on. They already knew what song I was gonna play.
I don’t typically enjoy starting a song in the middle though, so I stood up, hit rewind, and walked out the door.