Weiss Kreuz Fan Fiction ❯ This is Not My Life ❯ Step right up and take a nowhere ride ( Chapter 4 )

“Step right up and take a nowhere ride”


-YOHJI-



Oh. My. God.

What the hell did I just do?
I kidnapped Aya!
Aya! Aya freakin' Fujimiya!!
What was I thinking?!
I wasn't thinking! I just….did it.
Er…actually I didn't `just do it'…it was sort of premeditated…but I still wasn't thinking!

Oh my god.

Why am I still alive right now? What I just did was suicide!
He should have killed me…why didn't he kill me?

I can't believe I just did that.

And…the world must be about to end or something, because he's actually letting me.
Well sort of…he's letting me for now.
Never in a million years would I have expected him to even last these past twenty minutes. Dang.
I still can't believe I just did that!

Oh, and it gets better! Now he's talking to me!
He wants to know why I chose him…that's a good question, actually.
Why did I?
I'm not entirely sure…he just seemed…the obvious choice.
No wait—Ken would have been the obvious choice. Ken already tried to leave once; it would have made the most sense to include him in my escape.
But I'm the one who stopped him…I think….Ken would be indignant about that. He would probably refuse just on principle. And he's stubborn…once he decided not to come he wouldn't have backed down. No, Ken certainly would not have stayed.

Then there's Omi--Omi would have felt too guilty about leaving.
He worries about responsibilities…not to mention he has school to deal with.
Omi would not have come, even if he wanted to. He's too responsible.

But Aya…Aya's pretty selfish. He only seems to care about Weiß because it serves him a purpose. I'm sure that he would disregard `responsibility' if he felt that doing so would benefit him.
So Aya staying actually means something.
He cares. Just sticking around for even twenty minutes means that on some level, even if only a deep subconscious one, Aya cares.

I wanted to find out if I had any sort of real friends.
Well, Aya was the ultimate test.
And he just passed the first level!
I'm feeling pretty frickin' good right now. Maybe this scheme of mine is not so crazy as I thought.

A glance in his direction reveals that Aya's looking fairly irked. He's always so unhappy.... He doesn't even attempt with the cheerful front the rest of us use. He needs to get away more than I do.
Maybe I can help him. I'd like to get him to loosen up a bit.

The speedometer's needle is steadily climbing. I'm a good thirty km over the speed limit already, but I can't help it. I feel more carefree than I have in years. Like nothing can touch me. It's like a throwback to my `cowboy stage.'
I just want to ride and ride off into the sunset. Never really going anywhere in particular....
I wish I'd brought my cowboy hat.
Heh. I feel like singing.
Without really considering the consequences, I dive right into the second verse of `Don't Fence Me In.' Yeah, I know that this is just asking to annoy Aya and make him rethink his silent decision to stay...but I can't help it!
I feel like a hyperactive little kid again. I already discarded my self control when I started this, might as well go all out, eh? Besides the silence between us is getting creepy. Aside from his brief question, Aya hasn't said a word. Nothing! Isn't he even curious about where we're going?! I wish I knew what was going on in that head of his! That's something I'll probably never figure out, though. I can't help feeling a bit sad about that, too. I mean, he's always so depressed! I can't help but feel empathetic towards the guy, but you can't help someone who won't tell you what's wrong! Grr, he has such a frustrating personality.... Ah jeeze, I'm already starting to drag down my good mood just thinking about Aya. Better do something to remedy that.

Aya's still looking grim, no real reaction to the singing.
I think I'll push my luck a little farther....
I give him a nudge in the arm.

“C'mon Aya, sing along!”

I'm not actually expecting him to comply, but I can't resist teasing him. Old habits die hard.
He responds with the expected glower of resentment, but for the briefest moment, another emotion flashes across his face. It looked like...fear?
Aya finds the concept of cutting loose and singing scary?
Sure, I expected he'd regard it as beneath him, but frightening?
This guy needs my help more than I thought!

I nudge him again

“Come on Aya, it's the perfect road song! Just turn me loose! Let me straddle my old saddle underneath the western skyyyyy--. On my cay—use! Let me--”

The glowering look deepens.
“I don't know the words.”

“Oh, okay then,” I continue to egg him on, “how about `Rawhide' then? Everyone knows `Rawhide,' right? Rolling roll--”

“I don't know that one either,” he interjects.

Okay, I'm going for broke!
“`The Good the Bad, and the Ugly?'” I ask hopefully, “No words to that one! Just whistle! Here, I'll teach you!”

Aya doesn't even bother with a verbal refute. He just grimly shakes his head.

“Ah, geeze” I pout, “didn't you watch any cowboy movies as a kid?!”

“No.”

“Really? None at all?”

He just shakes his head again.

“Well then,” I ask, with genuine curiosity, “what did you watch?”

“Nothing.”

“What? What do you mean `nothing'?”

“We didn't have a TV,” he states, not betraying the slightest hint that this might be even remotely out of the ordinary.

Woah. Aya is more repressed then I'd ever suspected!

“Seriously?” I've never met anyone who grew up without a TV before, “Were you poor?”

“Of course not!” he snaps indignantly, “We didn't want one. We had better things to do.”

“Like what?”

“We read. Books.”

“Well yeah, so did I...but still. You can't just read books all the time. What else did you do?”

Oi. I guess I pushed him too far with that question. His eyes narrow slightly, but not in anger. He looks pained. He turns away from me and feigns interest in the passing telephone poles. Christ. He's probably counting them to keep from betraying his emotions any further. Damn him.

looooong uncomfortable silence....

Well, at least I didn't scare him out of the car yet. Maybe I can cheer him up a bit by getting him to talk about something else.

“Soooo…do you wanna know where we're going?”

Aya gives a halfhearted shrug and makes one of his non-committal `hn' noises. I can't for the life of me tell if that was a grunt of affirmation, or an `I don't give a shit' noise. Well tough luck if that's the case cause I'm gonna tell him whether he cares or not.

“I want to see as much of the country as I can.” I start, “I figured we'd start by heading south. Kyoto is my main goal, but I want to make some stops at small towns along the way. I figure, if you want to get the feel for the country, Kyoto's the place to go, you know? So we'll hit that first…. Then spend some time in Osaka…keep going south, stopping anywhere interesting we can think of—like Beppu—always wanted to see the `boiling hells' you know….Anyway, no looking back until there's nothing ahead but water—to the very tip of Kyushu. Maybe--maybe I won't even stop then. We could even take a ferry to Okinawa if we wanted….”

Woah. That sure got his attention. Aya snaps his head around and glares at me.

“Not Okinawa,” he growls, “not…that I'll stay that long anyway…but…I won't go to Okinawa.”

I know the tone in Aya's voice better than to ask him what he's got against Okinawa. I'm sure tempted though. But my mission here is to cheer Aya up, not chase him out of the car.

“No problem, we'll skip Okinawa. I burn too easily anyway.”

Well, it's a given to say that I was hardly expecting a response of, “Thanks Yohji! That's really considerate of you to change your plan for me!” but, come on, couldn't he at least acknowledge that he heard me?!

Maybe I should have at least tried to get Ken to come. At least with Ken I wouldn't be feeling like I was talking to myself right now.

Sigh.

“Okay, okay—so we'll turn around in Kyushu, and go back north. But we'll go all the way north, not just back to Tokyo, alright? I want to see Hokkaido too.”

Nothing. I'm starting to wonder if Aya fell asleep with his eyes open….

“So…er, yeah…It'll be really fun! We can even stop and…have a Sapporo in Sapporo!”

Yeah, yeah, I know that was really lame. But cut me some slack here! Do you have any idea how hard it is to be funny when your only audience is a guy like Aya?! I swear, I bet he can break glass with that stare of his….

Never let it be said that Yohji Kudoh was a quitter though. I'm not giving up till he talks to me.

“Hey! I've got an idea! We'll have to make sure to try the local specialties as we go, right? We'll have Okonomiyaki in Kyoto, and Osaka's famous for takoyaki—why don't we go to all the places that specialize in yaki foods! It'll be like a scavenger hunt, no?”

Silence.

“Do you know where to go for the best teriyaki?”

Ha. Like I was expecting an answer.

“Or sukiyaki? We'll have to make sure to get some sukiyaki.”

Oh, he's so asking for it.

“And yakitori too!”

“….”

“And yakisoba!”

“….”

“Yakiniku!& #8221;

“….”

“Yakidofu!”

“….”

“Nabeyaki udon!”

“….”

“Teppanyaki! 221;

“….”

“Yakimeishi!”

“….”

“Tamago yaki!”

“….”

“Shioyaki!̶ 1;

“….”

“Yaki—er, yaki—”

Damn! I can't think of any more. Oh wait! There's still—

“Yaki onigiri!” I conclude with some satisfaction. Well, I would have been more satisfied if I had gotten Aya to actually respond. But hey, you win some you lose some.

“I always liked yakiimo.”

Barely spoken above a whisper, and yet the car actually swerves because I'm so surprised to hear Aya's voice.

“Yakiimo!! How could I forget?! I wasn't even thinking about dessert foods!” I cry in mock dismay, “Got me there, Aya. We'll make sure to stop, and I'll buy you a whole plate of yakiimo!”

If Aya were a normal person, he would have been smiling.
But Aya's not a normal person, and so the expression on his face could only be described as…well, less depressed.

But for Aya, that's worlds of a difference.

 

 

 

A/N: “Yaki” simply means `grilled'. So Yohji was just rambling off a long list of various foods with grilled components. yakisoba is grilled soba noodles, yakiniku, grilled meat, etc. yakiimo is a cinnamon flavored sweet potato cake.

Sapporo is a city in Hokkaido, as well as a brand of beer (made in that city)