Crossover Fan Fiction ❯ My Unfortunate Whale Vision ❯ EIGHT ( Chapter 8 )

[ T - Teen: Not suitable for readers under 13 ]

 

Chapter 8

 

 

The music obsession, like many teenage obsessions, petered out over a couple weeks and we were back to our normal selves again. I made a point to avoid listening to The Cure because it was just too addictive and distracting. The girls got their channel popular briefly, then the copyright lawyers contacted them about use of music by another artist and most of the money made on their channel went to the original artist, so they closed the channel and quit singing. It was a lesson in modern globalism. Note to self: globalism sucks.

 

I got back to studying mathematics and considering getting more educated on contract law and reading up on the complaints against the various potential employers, especially for keywords like breach, safety hazard, deathtrap, bribes, toxic, blame shifting, violation, default, crooked, black company, and various other words to indicate the employer would either get me killed or refused to pay after the work was done. Contractors have a vested interest in blackballing the crooks, and the blackball list was pretty long.

 

My phone got a text. My phone got another text. I kept studying. I got another text. Then another and another.

 

“Bro, your phone is about to vibrate of the coffee table,” Komachi said, looking over from her fashion magazine. She’s been dating Taishi almost daily this summer. A summer fling. I hope there’s no children, but at least she’ll be a good mother. Just not yet, please. She was right about my phone, though. I picked it up. I looked at the messages. Increasingly frantic demands for attention from Sensei, apparently.

 

“When you are 27 years old, please don’t have panic attacks on your phone while demanding attention,” I warned Komachi.

 

“Its your sensei, isn’t it?” Komachi correctly assumed. I nodded in resignation. My phone started to ring. I sighed, then answered.

 

“Hello, Hiratsuka sensei. How are you today? Has your summer been a fun and relaxing time?” I asked before she could start making demands or insults, as she often did. I think it is possible I am the only male willing to challenge her more than once, and is also unable to run away from her obvious mental health issues and red flags.

 

“I need you,” she breathed hard into the phone.

 

“Uhhh. I am flattered that you like me that way, sensei, but it would never work between us. For various reasons I prefer to focus on my studies rather than get involved in romance while attending high school.”

 

“I know you met Haruno already. She bragged all about what a laugh riot you are. I took that to mean you were just this side of insulting. But that isn’t why I’m calling. I need you to come to Chiba and be a camp counselor for elementary school kids. Bring your sister,” she finished, getting her breathing under control. She’d managed not to snipe about my rejection, too. So she was desperate.

 

“When? How many days?”

 

“Tomorrow morning, 8 AM at Chiba Station parking pickup. Bring clothes for three days, including a swim suit and towel, and probably sunscreen and maybe soap. Not sure if they have soap,” she answered.

 

“Okay. We’ll be there,” I said, then said goodbye.

 

“So?” Komachi asked.

 

“We’re going camping. They’ve got cabins and blankets, and somewhere to justify a swim suit. There’s going to be elementary school kids there. We’re going to be camp counselors for three days. Or two days and nights, anyway. We leave tomorrow morning, around 7:15.”

 

Komachi considered this, considered her magazine, and dropped it on the table.

 

“Fine. I’ll go pack,” she announced, leaping to her feet and pelting up the stairs to her room. There was a yelp about needing to do laundry, and she pelted down the stairs with some clothing filling her arms. She vanished into the laundry room and started a load. I put my bookmark into my textbook and slowly rose, grasping my cane for help, and climbed the stairs, one at a time, to assemble likely clothing needed for this short working vacation.

 

The following morning was a cup of coffee and good breakfast suitable for a long ride in a car driven by a woman who only rented them, not generally qualified by daily practice. I was careful not to get Komachi too excited, so we wouldn’t contribute to any moods sensei would be going through.

 

My journey by bus with Komachi at my side, downtown to the station, required a transfer and a ten minute wait with others also heading that way. Chiba is not a small city. It has a million people, several high schools, and four universities, though CIT is actually north of the city, up by Narita airport, around 30 kilometers away. What Chiba City is better known for is its golf courses. We have 35 of them. All carefully maintained for the highest possible membership fees, and the rich of Tokyo, including members of the Diet, union bosses, and CEOs of the various zaibatsus, all played golf at the different courses, meeting people. Making deals. Shaping the nation of Japan for the next few years. Most of the courses started on the eastern side of Chiba City, off towards the pear orchards, pea fields, and the Pacific Ocean, eventually. Toward the rising sun. The wealthy golfers do not take the trains to Chiba station. They don’t wait in the growing heat of summer for sensei to show up with a minivan, sunglasses and a pink baseball cap that just says ‘tryhard’ on it in English, something I found very ironic. Japanese branding using English worked best with fewer words. The Google-translate effect on longer pieces, such as you found on printed items, those could be best described as notoriously appalling.

 

There were people here, tired, old people, and some kids too young to set off my vision problem. Most were dressed in sweaty clothing, wheezing with chain smoker’s emphysema, and mottled with skin lesions caused by what is probably skin cancer scar tissue. Many women wore flower dress pattern tropical clothes, which did not suit them. Exposure to too much flesh has hardened my heart, so I did not throw up. There were also men in shorts, pale knees exposed to the sun yet to gain any kind of tan, and suspenders for some reason. I saw lots of people slowly moving back and forth on the Friday morning commute to somewhere. Too late for Tokyo, but just in time for the local shops and banks to start opening. Everyone was fat, wrinkled, old. I sighed. After years of this vision I am gradually coming to accept I will just have to live with it for the rest of my days. I am not going to get better or suddenly be cured.

 

Yui and Yukino arrived from somewhere, chatting together. They were fat again, probably having eaten cakes together or something, and wobbled uneasily towards us in the bright sunlight. They greeted Komachi and wanted to get up to date information on her summer, since she was likely to answer with more syllables than my preference. The girls were fully ungothed, wearing bright cheerful clothes and big sun hats and tinted glasses. The sort of thing you’d expect for girls going to the beach or something during the summer. We were waiting for Zaimokuza and Totsuka.

 

By now I was sweating, so once our last two arrived, we packed up the van and headed out, A/C blasting, and sensei using the carefully highlighted roadmap to get to the right freeway and then headed for Chiba Mountain Village. It was a three hour drive, and the girls chatted quietly, Komachi joining in until she got tired and drifted to sleep, and sensei left the radio off, concentrating on driving safely in the very middle of the lane, never breaking the speed limit and showing significant tension in her bony grip on the steering wheel. I was sitting in the passenger seat opposite sensei, and I wondered, idly, if I’d be able to grip the steering wheel in time if her obvious panic made her miss a turn and plunge us off the road to our fiery flaming deaths. If I was too slow, if I was too late, well, I hope I’m reincarnated somewhere without this Whale Vision problem. Where I can be fooled by the temporary appearance of young women and not know how they’ll look at thirty-five.

 

Consequently, I did not rest on the drive up and arrived exhausted and needing a nap when the van finally rolled to a stop. A moment later another van arrived, and Miura, Ebina, Smiley, and his two idiot friends emerged from it. Totsuka quickly joined Miura and they gazed longingly into each others’ eyes, the others in the group giving them a little space automatically. It looks like they had all summer to get used to this romance so the nervous tension was missing.

 

We extracted luggage and headed for the nearby counselor cabins to drop things off. A short time later the noise of school buses groaned into the camp parking lot and then the cheers of smaller voices began to rise. The kids looked like fourth graders? Maybe fifth. The gathered in front of a fat man who looked the same whether I opened my eyes or kept them the usual slits, meaning my vision prediction ability remained pretty accurate, and he gave a speech via a megaphone about fun, learning, summer, fun, and friendship. The stuff that adults think kids care about. When what they actually care about is hunting for beetles, playing in the nearby river, and eventually marshmallows burned black over a campfire but eaten anyway because that’s what you do. I hope someone thought to bring lots of marshmallows.

 

“Hachiman. I have a job for you to do,” Hiratsuka sensei ordered. She pointed to a girl.

 

“See that girl?” she asked me. I looked, nodded. “She’s my friend’s kid. She’s having trouble at school, some kind of kids thing. Find out what is going on and see if you can fix it.” She started to walk away, reaching into her pocket for the long delayed cigarette. She was a chain smoker, after all, and the nicotine patches during the drive were wearing off.

 

“Right. How do I do that?” I asked her.

 

“You’ve got a sister. I’m sure you can figure it out,” she waved to me without turning. There was a scritch noise, a brief flare of light, a long indrawn breath, and sensei held the pose a moment, then the stress dropped out of her body like she’d gotten a big hit of hard drugs.

 

Note to self: don’t smoke. Anything that can drive you that needy has got to be bad for you.

 

I turned to regard the girl, memorizing her, before the head counselor gestured us to follow a couple henchmen types into the woods, ahead of the children starting their first activity, orienteering. Nobody likes orienteering. Map reading? Sure. WeMaps has satellite photos of the whole world. And they update every few years. But this is what they’re doing, and it gives kids something educational to do in small groups. I got placed on one of the junction points and eventually kids reached me and I worked with them to get them to read and do basic math to figure out where they need to go next from the instructions. They eventually did this and another group arrived, doing the same thing, or just followed the last group while pretending. With this many groups that was kind of inevitable. A failure due to crowding. Then a group arrived, with one girl standing apart from the others, who sneered in her direction. It was the girl sensei tasked me with.

 

I observed, and quickly understood. It was a shunning. She was pushed out of the group, a pariah. Might find out why when I talk to her later.

 

I watched the go onwards shortly and eventually this asked ended. We collected up and joined the kids prepping curry for dinner. We helped with the instructions. Most were either scared of the knife or utterly competent with it, but nothing in between. It tells you whose parents work the most and who has a stay at home mom. Kids who can cook do so because mom is working full time. There were carrots spilling rolling pieces onto the ground, getting washed off again and inspected before being allowed back into the food. The place was pretty clean, no weird smells other than the faint scent of wood smoke near the bbq pits, currently hosting pots with hot oil getting roux heated, veggies stir fried and then more ingredients added and finally the coconut milk, well shaken in their cans. The fires were knocked down to coals to allow a slow simmer for forty minutes, kids setting timers on their phones or writing down the time it would finish. The methods all worked.

 

I found the little girl on top of a birm above the cooking area, looking dejected and defiant at being excluded from this group activity. I climbed up and joined her.

 

“I’m Hachiman,” I said.

 

“Good for you,” she answered with unexpected snark. I snorted with laughter.

 

“So I noticed you have chosen the loner’s path. You are wise to have learned this before your peers. Many will eventually join you. Cat ladies with box wine will eventually follow in your footsteps, a decade or two from now,” I gestured grandly. “Because the path of the loner is the truth and the light.”

 

“Are you with a cult?” she asked with hostility, “Because I don’t DO cults. We’ve got enough problems in our government following those Moonies.”

 

“No. Just a philosopher. Thank you for that. Moonies. Heh,” I laughed again. “I don’t actually know your name.”

 

“I’m Tsurumi Rumi,” she answered.

 

“Oh. I am in your mom’s home economics class.” I realized. She didn’t look much like her mother, being a kid younger than Komachi.

 

“A Soubu student then. I figured that, even without the uniforms. I notice that YOU aren’t associating with those popular idiots either,” she pointed out with her eleven year old finger.

 

“I like being alone, but I got drafted into the service club and this was our summer project,” I explained. “I wasn’t joking about the path of the loner. It really is the one many people arrive upon, planned or otherwise.”

 

“What, so you just find yourself an outcast permanently?” she asked, showing a bit of panic.

 

“Well, eventually you stop trying to excuse other people’s behavior and actually notice that they treath you badly and stop forgiving them, then stop hanging out, and then you just make excuses to avoid them rather than get the same bad experiences over and over again. Everybody gets here eventually. It is why Japan is so polite. Its to keep from stabbing people. You really want to, but you smile and back away and watch them to make sure they don’t steal anything. Adult life is… well, it is pretty different from anime and books.”

 

She looked at me with disbelief and a bit of horror in her expression.

 

“Is it like that for everyone?” she asked.

 

“I guess? I’m only me. And I pay attention. I think I’m just aware of reality before other people are, but they will get here eventually. All the people I know over 20 are pretty seriously miserable, bitter, cynical, and broken down. All that stuff they talk about chasing your dreams? It is a con. A scam. That cult you were worrying about is Optimism. Chasing dreams is an idiot test. Anyone who tries goes broke or dies.”

 

“Anyone ever tell you that you’re bad at talking to kids?” Rumi asked me sarcastically.

 

“Haha. I was chosen because I have a genki little sister. They figured I was the best at talking to little kids,” I countered.

 

“Well, they were wrong.”

 

“Do you still feel depressed about your crappy friends shunning you?” I asked her.

 

“No. I feel crappy about the life I’m going to lead. Did you say cats and box wine? That sounds like mom after work,” she commented.

 

“Most Japanese people marry several times, until they can’t. Most of the boys you see down there are going to stay single their whole lives around 80 percent, and the handsome ones, around five percent, will end up with several alimony payments every month for their ex-wives and a sense of misery I won’t even try to describe. It is worse for them than your cat lady future. Unless you’re smoking hot at 18 and get into serial monogamy and get alimony payments every time you divorce.” I laughed again.

 

“You realize I’m eleven, right?” Rumi reminded me.

 

“You’re mature for your age.”

 

“I don’t want to know what adults think is normal when it comes to love,” Rumi complained.

 

“You’re going to find out sooner or later. You already learned that friends aren’t real. You graduated from the biggest delusion. The next one is the essential lie of marriage. Isn’t that great? You’ll never worry about friends again,” I laughed.

 

She glared at me, jumped to her feet, and stormed off.

 

“Was it something I said?” I asked the sky.

 

“Yes. Yes it was,” answered Yukino, who stepped out of the gloom. The sun was down and kids were eating curry. She handed me a bowl and a spoon, then settled down with her own.

 

“Thanks for the food,” said courteously, meaning it for once. Komachi was sitting with some kids cheerfully chatting and laughing loudly. She must have been super popular for these kids, with stories of middle school.

 

“I never realized your viewpoint of people was so cynical, so grim, Hachiman,” Yukino said after eating a bit of the curry. I paused in shovelling the cooling spicy stew into my mouth and chewed and swallowed politely before answering.

 

“The entire point of science is to make a hypothesis, test it, observe the results, and determine if the hypothesis is correct or not. You use the same method to build up a model of the universe. I have spent my days since junior high doing just that on the true nature of people, including my reading of other’s research, peer reviewed and confirmed research. And my theorem of people is based on science. Proven science. Most of our public school education is merely compliance training to get humans to act a predictable way, to get us to obey, to fall into line, to march to another’s orders, to play along with a society which does not want or need us, beyond getting work done others don’t want to do. That’s the reality of civilizations. In exchange we used to get the benefits of monogamy and the comforts of technology, but technology also removes income, and standards of living are dropping for many, and monogamy has been disproven by genetic testing. If you think that’s depressing, it is time to wake up and smell the curry,” I said, and got back to eating. A few minutes later I was scraping the bottom of my bowl and wishing I had a cold drink of water.

 

“I am glad we are not romantically involved, Hachiman. I think you attitude would infuriate my family and probably get you beaten and thrown in front of a speeding truck.”

 

“I shall make it a personal point not to meet your family, Miss Yukinoshita. Your sister was quite enough.” I responded.

 

“Hey, there you are. What are you talking about?” Yui said, appearing with a peach she was eating, getting juice all over her fingers.

 

“Hey Yui. Boy, am I thirsty. Good talk, by the way,” I said and headed off towards a water spigot. I turned the handle and drank inverted beneath it, washing off my face in the evening gloom as well as consuming the rusty water.

 

Heading for the toilets I used them, then found a seat on the front porch of the counselor’s cabin to think. Or stop thinking. Lately thinking is just getting me trapped in the mess our country has become. There is no way out of this trap. As a Japanese, my dating options are non-existent, being ugly. My employment options are paper pusher or hard labor, neither of which was profitable or enjoyable. Most Japanese hate their jobs, for good reason. All of them drink, probably too much. All of them are trapped by obligations and maintaining their position in society, starting with their workplace and what is probably a crappy apartment. What should be solutions are basically denied, due to poorer wages for farmers and failing villages dying of old age. Worse, they don’t welcome outsiders who might save the place with new blood, families, kids. They don’t want outsiders making the place too untidy, ruining their memories of the graveyard they are walking every day. In Japan, ghosts are just old people in farming villages, too old to give up and accept the place is dying because of them. Sitting here isn’t helping my mood. I think I understand why people who are over 20 drink so hard. I must avoid that fate, even if it takes away the pain for a night. Better to find a life where there is no pain so not need to escape from it. Does such a place exist?

 

I turned in early, ignoring the conversations from the aging bachelors and their fat bellies swollen from too many noodles and beers, not enough sit-ups. Most were also wearing stubble, or would in the future, and Smiley looked miserable and exhausted, like always. I bet he ends up with three alimony payments, and child support for all those kids he’ll have by accident. It’s a safe day! Right.

 

Hairband looked happy in his future. He keeps the hairband, gets a small beard, and probably a motorcycle. A life without women can be happy with a motorcycle instead. It isn’t sex, but it is joy and a motorcycle can’t steal your entire paycheck or complain at you about how it isn’t reaching its full potential because you didn’t get your promotion at work, and it can’t threaten to leave you and take half your stuff in the process. That’s what insurance is for. No, a motorcycle is superior to a woman. That’s why women always demand her husband gets rid of it after it was what drew her in the first place. She can’t have competition now that she’s falling apart. A motorcycle can be maintained, upgraded, given farkles, whatever those were. The Americans are always going on about farkles on motorcycles. I haven’t worked out what they are, but most the Americans consider them unnecessary.

 

Ooka looked like a union guy, probably a dockworker. His expression wasn’t changed much, just thick slabs of muscle and stoicism to defend him from a life of no questions asked. High school is his high point in life. Its just work and toil after this. And Totsuka continues as the hen-pecked husband working to death while Miura gets fatter. That hasn’t changed. Depressing.

 

I went to sleep and woke in the night, cabin dark and full of snores with a full bladder and need to relieve myself. I tugged on flip flops an stumbled out the door into full moonlight. It was bright away from Tokyo and cast shadows. I found the bathroom and solved my problem, then returned towards the bunkhouse before I noticed the soft singing voice of Yukinoshita. I stepped on a twig, of course.

 

“Who’s there?” she asked.

 

“It’s me,” I answered.

 

“Who is it?” she asked. I sighed.

 

“Hachiman,” I answered.

 

“Lurking in the dark again?” she accused. Her arm was covering her negligible breast. Or was trying. In the future she would resemble her sister, with D cups. She’d also gain an hourglass shape… or swell further and resemble most Japanese housewives. Chubby and sour faced.

 

“Again? Since when was there are first time?” I asked her.

 

“Well, you look the type,” she accused.

 

“Uh huh. So fighting with Miura or something?” I asked her.

 

“Your sister, actually. Miura is quite content with her current romance. I merely mentioned that Komachi has better social skills than you do and she blew up at me,” Yukino complained.

 

“Yeah, that sounds like her. It doesn’t matter if you’re right. Komachi sees me in ways you don’t,” I answered and refused to elaborate further.

 

“Well. I don’t suppose you could leave me to my private moment?” she said, gesturing to me to leave. I sighed and continued back to the cabin.

 

Sleep beckoned and I quietly dropped back off.

 

 

The next day came too soon and the early morning light found us trying to teach kids how to make pancakes, the American style ones. There were morning activities we helped with. Then lunch, and afterwards free time. I put on my swim trunks and joined the girls at the river, though the stink of the water encouraged me out of it after a short time. I nodded to Rumi, sitting under a tree sulking, and headed for the showers to get this river stink off me. Besides, seeing fat women of middle age frolic in a stream wasn’t for me. So gross. If they still looked like teenagers, I might be fooled, but it hurts to hold your eyes open wide for more than a few seconds.

 

I grabbed clothes and got a good shower in, then changed into clean clothing. I afterward I found myself tired and opted for a short nap, waking before dinner. I helped with preparations, this time spaghetti sauce and noodles. Easy to portion out. I helped more this time, teaching kids to cut onions without smell, and why you need a sharp knife to cut through a tomato skin. It was good fun, and when things were simmering and I sat beside Komachi, drinking some kind of fruit punch, the kids weren’t swollen monsters of their future, but just kids. Being kids. The light dropped, noodles were boiled, and we got served platters of spaghetti. I hoisted a scoop onto my plate, and passed the tool to Komachi, who likewise did the same. I ate, she ate, the kids ate. I ignored my club and the glaring Rumi, talking to a few friend. I guess she doesn’t want the cat and box wine.

 

We had a final event after dinner. A test of courage. The counselors wore costumes that were not-really scary, and the kids pretended to be frightened in the forest, making good screams. I did my part, bored at this. I played a bored monster hobo, with a bag of cans and an upturned hat.

 

“Alms! Alms you backbiters!” I called out waving the hat for money, shaking my tin cans for the noise. They giggled and ran away. I guess this is fun.

 

Later out of makeup and back in my bed clothes the guys asked about crushes and I declined, though Smiley was still in love with H, Haruno if I’m any guess, and Tobe only smiled and said S.

 

“Would that be a Honda Shadow 750?” I asked him. He nodded with agreement and gave me the thumbs up. For once I can agree with him. It was a cool bike.

 

“How about you?” he asked me.

 

“CB450, if I can find one. Maybe a CB500F. Tuning those carburetors will be challenging, but it is part of the fun,” I answered dreamily. I had read some forums this summer. Most men advised that a life without women opens many doors, and behind the biggest one is motorcycles.

 

I drifted off after that, while Saika blushed from teasing about his relationship with Miura.

 

 

The next morning was some kind of packets of oatmeal, juice, coffee, and packing to leave. It was a three hour trip back to Chiba, after all. I remembered my towel, dry now, and my shoes and flip flops. I made sure that Komachi found and packed hers too, since she forgot them at first. She had a lot of LINES addresses to put on her phone and people to talk to. She was also falling asleep on her feet. Sensei was patched up with nicotine and we loaded up the van, heading south. This time she felt confident enough to use the radio, finding a Jpop Enka oldies station. For some reason that put Komachi straight to sleep, and everybody kinda dozed, which sensei just looked bemused with nostalgia.

 

We arrived at Chiba station and I got Komachi awake enough to walk and carry her bag. We waited for the bus, took it, transferred, and got off at our stop eventually, walking two blocks to our house. I got clothes into the laundry and Komachi hopped into the bath to soak. I let her, prepping lunch. She got out, we ate, and it was my turn while she dealt with hanging clothes.

 

The rest of the afternoon was settling into vegetative state, almost but not quite napping, and a light dinner with the parents, who were home finally.

 

“Oh, so you went to Chiba Mountain Village? Isn’t that nice, dear,” Mom said. Dad just grunted. He was from Toyama so had never heard of the place. Mom was the local girl.

 

“I’m turning in early. I want to catch up on my sleep,” volunteered. The parents tuned me out, like usual, with Komachi getting all the attention. It was always so. Parents had favorites. Komachi was theirs.

 

I slept four hours, woke at 11 PM and logged into this webnovel I’d heard about called Apothecary Diaries. Its sort of mystery story, but rather compelling. Whenever the heroine talked, I just heard Komachi’s voice for some reason. I don’t know why.