Beyblade Fan Fiction ❯ Scattered Heart ❯ Beach ( Chapter 5 )

Scattered Heart Ch.5: Beach

 

Rukiabi: I truly wish to finish my Syndicate Ch.4 but I can't seem to write it right now. That and I'm having an easier time with Scattered Heart so here is another chapter. This one resembles more closely to the style of my first chapter, not only that it's about twice as long as my last chapter woo!

 

Disclaimer: All characters of Beyblade are © of Aoki Takao.

 

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Waves bark and lap playfully at the sand. The sands are the masters and the waves are the dogs, always moving back and forth for the master, only for them.

 

I watched all of those young girls and boys my age scream with glee, jumping into the shallow pools, splashing each other with accumulated tears from age-old mountain sides. They all played together under the sun far from the pale scrawny little worm that was me, I, who hid myself from all of the radiating smiles that threatened to burn a hole into the day permanently.

 

(“The sands are grains of memory that slip past the grasping fingers and are lost forever.”)

 

“Why aren't you out there playing with the other kids?”

 

“Because the sun's too hot. My skin will burn.”

 

“Well, that's no excuse. Didn't you bring any suntan lotion?”

 

“No.”

 

“Well then you only have yourself to blame don't you?”

 

“But—”

 

“No buts.”

 

And the teacher took his foot out from the shade of my umbrella and chased the sun into the sea. He let the self-luminous heavenly body with its hot voluptuous hands rub rays of zeal and complacency all over his body. He wasn't afraid of the burns.

 

But—

 

And I watched them play in the distance. Even the adults laughed. They all left for the warmth. I am the cold; I am the rock that will sit under the dirt darkness sent from the umbrella. It doesn't shield me from light but creates a space of darkness.

 

But—my father refused to buy suntan lotion saying that it was a waste of money.

 

He told me, “Boy why don't you get out in the sun more? It'll do that pale skin of yours good.”

 

“But father, I need suntan lotion in order to go out in the sun.”

 

“Who said youthatneed that crap? You'll tan faster without all the chemicals on your skin.”

 

But I only wished he said that. What he truly spoke of was how I could “continue to haunt the house” because I wasn't “going anywhere.”

 

“I'm not paying for field trips to happy homes.”

 

“Father, my class is just going to a Marine Museum and the beach. We're going to have a test on what we've seen the next day. I have to go—”

 

“You stupid kid!”

 

He slammed down the half empty bottle of scotch. He was so drunk.

 

Its okay, I didn't really want to go anyway. I knew that if I were to go, I'd be stuck here in the hole. But mother, she smiled at me through her red eyes and cried to me through her dry lips, “Honey I love you, I love you, I just want you to do your best, don't let school get you down. Please, please… baby I love you.”

 

And she hugged me tightly into her warm bosom. Yet I felt so cold there. I'm her baby. I was eight years old and her only memory of a first love, of a deep love, of a love gone wrong.

 

“You look so much like him, like the one I loved. It must have left him when we were together and all those feelings were passed onto you.”

 

Now the one you love is no longer and I was the one who took it all away.

 

“Bitch, where the hell were you?”

 

“I was out. Is it not alright to be out of the house every now and then?”

 

“No. You can't leave the house just as you please like as if you own it,and with my car--”

 

“Your car?? That's our car!”

 

Father would blow a dark smoky trail of cigarette ash and death.

 

“This is why… this is why...”

 

And mother would coke on her own tears.

 

It was entirely my fault. Because I was born, their happiness was shattered. I took away the affection in my father's eyes and gave distressfulness in my mother's. Maybe in the beginning it would have been all fine but it was me—I did it.

 

“I love you, I love you, I do…”

 

But if you do then why do you cry? I make you cry. I make all those around me unhappy.

 

The truth must be that she never loved me at all. She was forced to love me from the augmenting pressures of a mother. She really is a very kind mother but I claimed her sense of responsibility and ruined her. She must love me, her dilapidated child.

 

“I love youhoney.”

 

She will love me until she dies,

 

“I hate you bastard kid!”

 

“Oh my god, what have you done to your own son?”

 

“That's no son of mine. That's an alien product of a whore!”

 

“Do you not know what your own reflection looks like?!?!”

 

My reflection looked like that of a boy with a large purple bruise on his right cheek. The boy with the clean left cheek had gone up to the nice male teacher his mother was fond of and said hello.

 

That nice teacher had turned his back on him and said goodbye. He left for the other, more deserving children in the sun. Leave the outcast behind.

 

Father, my not-so-loving father,

 

I want suntan lotion. Can I have some please? Of course he answered no with a fist.

 

So I sat under the umbrella with my head in my arms, attempting to shield my eyes from the glowing light of a thousand smiles. I just wanted to be protected. I just wanted suntan lotion to shield me from the warmth of my mother's embrace and from the scintillations of happier sons around me.

 

Please.

 

Kai?

 

I looked up from my arms but nobody was there. All the other eight year olds were in the water splashing each other with laughter.

 

Can I borrow some suntan lotion?

 

No, I never asked convincing myself that I needed to protect myself from those others. But behind the curtains told a tale of how they never would have lent suntan lotion to me in the first place. They never even knew my name.

 

“Kai?”

 

The waves lap towards my feet, tickling the rubber tips of my shoes. Will I continue to sit here as immobile as a beached whale waiting for the sands of time to bury me in death? I'm not a little boy anymore but I'm still weak. I'm still trying very hard to protect what little of myself I can stand.

 

I wanted to take off my shoes and feel the heated grainy sand between my toes but I can't trust it. The sand that slips between my fingers like the memories of years gone by, how am I to know that it won't slip straight from underneath my unprotected feet so that I will fall into nothingness?

 

Oh wait, I'm already—“Kai!”

 

“What is it?!”

 

“Oh.” Takao had a look of surprise, but it was accompanied with an open smile of joy and relief. Apparently my snapping at him had a reverse effect.

 

“You responded to me.”

 

I turned back towards the oceanic view in front of me, determined more than ever now to cast out the white shadow from behind me.

 

His body levitated over my head. “What are you doing?”

 

I'm waiting for the sea to swallow me whole.

 

“Hey!” Rei called from over a sand dune.

 

“It looks like Rei's found a way across the sea.” He held out a hand, “Let's go.”

 

“Hmm.” I got up without accepting his offer.

 

After trudging over remnants of weathered rocks, we found Rei squatting over rows of washed up seaweed.

 

“I have an idea. Since I have the ability to speak with all plantae life, I can create a bridge of sea grass for us to cross to the other side by asking for their assistance.”

 

“Are you coming with us Rei?”

 

There was a silence that seemed to accompany a knowing, melancholy smile on the tiniest upturn of his lips.

 

“I have an old friend on the other side of the sea. One night when the Western wind was blowing strong, the tide had fallen so low that it revealed a bridge of stone one could cross to the other side. He was a fool to have fallen victim to his curiosity and since the tides fell back in place, I havn't seen him since.”

 

“Even though we're already at the edge of the woods, you're still going to help us. That's great Rei, thanks!” Takao turned to me, “Isn't that great Kai?”

 

Scoff. I could care less. I could care less for this world; I could care less for the people because in the end it must be a dream so why am I bothering to go anywhere in the first place?

 

“It's fun to travel with friends. When one travels, they can learn so much from the environment but when one also travels with friends, you can travel for ever because you'd never be alone.”

 

Alone… I'm destined to be alone.

 

“Okay guys,” Rei kneeled on one leg and raised his arms out on either side of him, “stand back.”

 

A few minutes passed as the air around the tiger tensed to electrifying waves. Unseen energy seemed to be building up in his arms and in one moment, his eyes lit up in a fiery release and his arms shot into the ground clawing deep into wet sand.

 

Waves pulsed underneath our feet and the washed up seaweed became alive. They wriggled through the sand, threading through one weed and another, entangling into the waters and tying into the seaweed on the seafloor. Before our eyes, a bridge of wet slimy sea grass emerged from the waters.

 

Rei exhaled in satisfaction. “There. Now we can finally move forward.”

 

I took a step onto the newly formed bridge.

 

“Be careful, the grass is still wet so it's slippery.” Rei moved past me. “And I should take the lead since the bridge is still in the making. As we continue to move forward, more of the bridge will be built in front of us.”

 

I couldn't hold Rei's golden gaze so I turned away. “Yeah…” I don't even want to try with the stalker.

 

So we left our tracks in the sand for the crossing ahead of us. With Rei in the lead, me in the middle and the ghost behind me again, we walked.

 

With each foreign step I wonder, what am I attempting to achieve. I can't possibly believe that finding those feathers will actually solve the mystery as to what I'm here for. But I could feel the pinch, the needle-like woodchips, and the sandpaper trunks of the trees. I even became tired and slept in the forest. Why? If this were a dream, I wouldn't or shouldn't have felt the pain, felt the strength leave my body and mind. But (staring at my hands) I am weak that way.

 

[“…A physical pain. It shows that you're alive.”]

 

“You don't have to add to the pain, Kai.”

 

[“…same as the pain on the inside?”]

 

I almost tripped when I heard his words. Why does he…? How come he always affects me in this way? It's the words that can chill me and yet bring radiance at the same time. It's all I can do to avoid it. I can't face it.

 

Pretending to take in my surroundings, I made a quick glance at Takao. Who is he? And… why do I want to know?

 

Rei stopped in his tracks and the bridge ceased forming. “Let's take a break. We've been walking for a while.”

 

We had trekked for about what seemed to be an hour and the beach that we left was but an inlet to a giant green croissant, extending along the horizon with no end. The waters out in the middle of the sea were as calm and still as glass. It was creepy.

 

Kneeling down on the green path, I could see between the flat vines and past the shadowed surface of the water onto tiny schools of fish swimming past. There was life behind the stilled boundary where air met water.

 

“I've only ever seen the sea from above the clouds but it truly is very different when looked up close, wow…”

 

Plop.

 

“Hnn?” Takao did an about face in mid-air. “Is someone there?”

 

He floated close to the surface of the water so that his nose barely touched it.

 

“There's no one there. It's just your imagination.” Rei, who didn't even have to see to know what Takao was doing, called from his cross-legged position a little ways in front of me. He seemed to be meditating.

 

“Yeah but, I just have this feeling…”

 

I turned onto the reflection of myself. A dual tone haired boy with crimson red eyes and pale white skin stared back at me. I'm so ugly. I waved the image away with my hands and brought them back up cupping water. I can even feel the cool wetness of the sea. This water feels very different from normal water. When releasing the clear blue entity, it runs between my fingers like liquid pearls, slow and smooth. And then from under the shadow of my hands, I noticed a yellow…?

 

Yellow grass slowly grew out of the water, not disturbing the surface at the least.

 

And then a head popped up.

 

“Wha…?”

 

I found myself staring into a set of aquamarine eyes.

 

“Hey. You look interesting. Wanna have some fun?”

 

The freckled boy then took both my hands and pulled me into the water.

 

“Wha--grghhh!!”

 

Gasp! “Kai!” Takao turned towards me but it was too late.

 

I could only scream out bubbles as I was being pulled deeper and deeper into the water by a chain on one of my hands. With my other I reached for the light beyond the sea blue surface. Within the light was a figure, calling out to me.

 

Kai!! Kaiiii!!!

 

I can't hear him but…

 

And the light began to fade, everything began to fade into darkness.

 

…but I'm still reaching!!

 

Save me…Save me,

 

Takao!!