Time to say goodbye
I needed to get away. It didn’t matter where… Just anywhere!
I run down my apartment stairs to my car, start the engine and drive off towards the highway. I am not really concerned with where I am going. I just didn’t want to be at my apartment anymore. That place just holds too many memories for me.
There is no music playing. It’s silent. I roll the window down and just let the wind blow through my hair and busied mind. The lights on the highway illuminate the inside of my car for the brief moment I pass it and it continues as I pass the one after that and the one after that and so on. The papers in the back of my car rustle. I don’t care if they fly out the window at this point. I’m too overwhelmed to think. I’m upset. I just want everything to stop aching in my chest. I sigh and hit the steering wheel out of frustration. God damn it! How could I have been so blind?!
I don’t bother to look at the clock until it catches my attention and I read the time. 1:45 a.m.. I’ve be driving for almost two hours now. I pull over to a stop and throw my head into the headrest after putting the car in park and shutting the engine. I hit the steering wheel again and then I place a hand over my chest and just start to cry. I don’t know why I’m crying. I should be happy for her, shouldn’t I?
It was a horrible thing to do though… That’s it. I’ll make the decision to never fall in love! At least for the time being… No. The word “never” seems pretty feasible at the moment.
I wipe my tears after I’ve had enough crying. My throat hurt from sobbing, my eyes hurt from leaking these stupid tears. I’m ready to just go home, maybe sleep off this miserable pain. I can get through it. Somehow, I’ll get through it.
I start the engine again and turn on the headlights. Something moving catches my eyes. They dart up to catch whatever just ran by. Whatever it was, I saw the last of it run into the trees on my side of the road and it looked human.
I turn the engine off again and get out, my eyes following whatever it was. I grip the keys in my hand tightly. I’m curious to follow it but the pang in my heart stops me from moving.
‘This is how people get killed. You’re better off in the car, driving off,’ my conscious argued.
But what if it was a man? What if he was in trouble? What if he needed help? It wasn’t in my nature to just abandon someone or something in need to help. I slam the door closed and stuff my keys into my pocket and begin taking slow running steps towards the wooded area.
I hear branches being snapped and leaves crunching. I know some of the noise is from me but it’s not only me, not completely. I can distinguish this factor. There was something in front of me. I hear a surprised yelp and I shout in surprise and retract my arms closer to my body. With a sigh, I calm down and a stroke of confidence strikes me. I walk closer to the noise. I really don’t know why I’m doing this. I should just let this person deal with their own problems. I shouldn’t be involved in this. This is stupid!
I stop walking. I lost the trail. I can’t see anything anymore, I don’t hear anything anymore. There’s no light around me (it’s a new moon), and I don’t have a flashlight. Perfect planning… I roll my eyes. I’m lost in the middle of the woods, alone, without a flashlight or any other provision. The only thing that can be of service and use to me is my phone. I pull that from my pocket. I open the phone up only to find that I have no service. Damn it!
Today was one of the worst days of my life. I wouldn’t say that it was something I would die from, but I definitely wanted it to be morning. I definitely wanted to get to that point where I’d move on and forget about it because it was just too much for me right now.
I shine the light from my phone on the ground. Well, that’s one way to have a make-shift flashlight. I am careful with my steps and walk back to my car. I hope I’d find it soon enough. Sleep would probably do me good.
I hear crunching behind me and I turn around, phone out first, towards the sound. I press a button to renew the light. There’s someone hiding behind a tree, staring at me. I take a defensive stance to run like hell if he comes near me.
“Who are you?” I say.
“I-I don’t know…” I hear a male voice say. Someone takes a step out from behind the tree. I look at him and then divert my attention. He’s stark naked.
“Where are your clothes?” I ask embarrassed. It was probably the first time I’d seen a naked man other than myself and that was enough for me.
“I don’t know…”
How doesn’t he know? That would be cue number one to run from him, but I stay put.
“Are you running from something?”
“I don’t know… Do you know me?” he asks.
“Uh, I’m sorry… No, I don’t know you…”
Two things alerted my awareness. This man didn’t know who he was or where he was. This made me nervous. But there was one more thing that caught my attention: I didn’t feel the need to run.
“Where am I?”
“I don’t know… I only drove out here to-“ I stop myself. This is how people get killed! Don’t reveal anything! It’s suspicious enough that he is naked, in the woods without knowing a thing! He’s probably playing dumb. He’s probably a drunkard!
“Can you help me?” he says.
“With what?”
“I don’t know…”
This guy is pissing me off. “Listen, I have to get going. I’d love to talk to you but I really can’t associate myself with you, so good-bye!” I say. I run. I run as fast as I can away from the crazy man.
“Wait!”
Something grabs my arm and I whirl around to shove the man off and continue running but I end up in a clash with him.
“Please, I need your help!” he begs. I push him to the ground but he doesn’t get up. Did I kill him?
It really was turning into the worst day ever.
*~~~*
“What the fuck is wrong with you?” Nino yells at me through the phone.
I kept my eyes on the road but they also darted every which way. I stammer when I speak and I can’t concentrate. “Nino… I really don’t know who else to turn to. I don’t know what to do anymore!”
I look in my rear view mirror to see the naked man laying in the backseat with his eyes closed.
After I push him down, he faints. Upon getting a closer look at him, he is pale and shivering like he’d been dropped into a body of water, cold water, and left to fend for himself in the cool fall weather. It was like he was left out here to die. I look around me, nervous. Why me? I feel his forehead, so hot.
“Hey.” I shake him. “Hey, get up…”
He moans with a cough and falls quiet. I shake him again and get no response. I can’t just leave him. I grab his hands and sling him onto my back. He must weigh at least as much as me, maybe slightly more because of his muscle. I stumble trying to balance myself and walk to my car.
I can’t believe I’m doing this. At least I didn’t have to see him fully naked anymore. I gave him my jacket and a blanket that I had stowed away in my trunk. There must be something wrong with me. Seriously wrong.
“Jun, you don’t go around picking up random, naked strangers in the woods at 2 o’clock in the morning from a place that… you don’t even know where you are. Are you out of you’re mind?”
“At the moment, yes.” I earn a sigh from my friend. “What do I do?”
“First of all you should have left him in the woods.”
“Very funny, smart ass. What do I do with him?”
“Give him clothes for starters. Food, water… What else can you do? You have no I.D., you don’t have a name… His whole existence, at the moment, is a mystery! What else can you do for him?”
“You’re right,” I sigh. “Thanks.”
“I’m coming over. You shouldn’t be alone with a stranger.”
“I should be back in… another hour.” I glance at my car’s clock.
“Okay, see you then.”
I hung up and threw my phone in the passenger’s seat. I looked in the rear view mirror again. I don’t have any bad vibes about this man. He wasn’t vicious towards me, even when he grabbed my arm. I sigh. Why am I doing this? It shouldn’t even concern me. There is no use thinking about it. What happened happened and because of some twist of fate, I ended up with him in my care.
I turn on the radio, leaving it at a quiet level, just to break up the heavy silence of the ride home.
*~~~*
When I got to my apartment and parked, I shut the engine and take a deep breath. I get out and walk around to the man in the backseat. I configured him on my back again, careful of both him and the blankets, and trudge up the stairs. I don’t want to go back to this apartment… I don’t want to be hit with the heaviness that it now holds for me, but for now, I have to get over it for this man’s sake.
“Jun.”
I look up to see Nino squatting by my apartment’s door. “Nino…”
Nino ran over. “Right, front pocket,” I say. I thrust my hip out to the side for him and he searches my pocket for my keys. When he got them, they jingle and he opens the apartment door.
I walk in and head straight for the couch. I place the man down as smoothly as I can with Nino’s help.
Nino feels his forehead. “Do you have any washcloths?”
I quickly walk to my bathroom and come back with two different colored towels. “Let me go get some hot water.”
Nino quietly complained about seeing the man naked. I yelled at him to just get something from my room. I am preoccupied with breaking the man’s fever. I go into the kitchen and find my tea kettle. While I fill it with water from the sink, I watch Nino go into my bedroom. I sigh again and take a seat at my kitchen table, while waiting for the water to boil, and look over to the couch.
The man’s brows furrow in his sleep and then relax with a shiver. There are so many things I have to ask this man but from our conversation earlier, he doesn’t seem to know anything about… well anything.
Nino walks out of my room holding different clothing. “Help me get him dressed so that we can properly tend to him,” he yawns.
“I’m sorry to wake you up and keep you from sleeping,” I apologize.
“It’s okay. That’s what friends are for, right? They get mad at you, they support you, they scold you and they love you.”
“Ah, as poetic as ever…” I laugh slightly.
“Yeah, well it’s the truth.”
We changed the man into one of my button up shirts and start on his pants but Nino had to turn around.
“I can’t do it,” he says.
“Oh my god, Nino,” I groan. “You see Masaki naked all the time. Not to mention that fetish you have for walking around naked in your own apartment. What’s so different?” I complain.
“What’s different is I grew up in this body and I only do it in my own apartment. Not to mention the fact that Masaki is my boyfriend!” His voice rose. “This is a stranger!”
I slide the boxers on his legs, disgusted at Nino’s naivety and then I slide on the sweatpants Nino hands me. The tea kettle whistles and Nino runs to turn the gas off. I hear clanking in the kitchen and I look over to see what he’s doing but it seems like he has everything.
He walks back to the couch with a bowl of hot water and a washcloth. He wets it and places it on the man’s forehead after wringing it of excess water. The man shivers and curls into the couch further, searching for warmth.
“We’ll just have to see how he does when he wakes up,” he says. He checks his watch and sighs. “So why were you two hours away?”
“I’d rather not talk about it…”
“Fair enough. Was it something to do with Ki?”
I bite my lower lip and he turns his head.
“Sorry, I didn’t mean to pry.”
I stay silent. The only concern of mine right now is getting this man out of my apartment. I really just want to be alone but under the circumstances, it’s not possible. I want to be alone to sulk.
Light snoring came from next to me. Nino has his back and head resting on the couch with his mouth open. He never really was one for staying up late or getting up early. If he didn’t get enough sleep he turned into a monster, just like a child.
I lean my head against the cushion of the couch. My eyes become heavy and I slowly drift off to sleep. My dream is weird. There is no picture, just darkness. When I think words, they appear before me.
I don’t care if you don’t love me. Just let me be by your side. Let me be selfish.
“Jun? Jun?”
My body is shaken and I wake up a little lost. “Hm?” I groan. It’s so cold…
I follow Nino’s pointed finger to my balcony. The door is open and the curtain in front of it is blowing slightly. I look on the couch to see if the man is still there but he’s not. I stand up next to Nino and look at the balcony. “I woke up and he was already out there,” Nino said. I nod and walk toward the door.
The man is just standing there. A wind blows and he doesn’t move. His hair and light weight shirt are lifted by the wind ever so gracefully.
“It’s cold out here. Why don’t you come back inside…” I say to him with a gentle voice. He turns his head to look at me and I’m frozen. Those doe-like eyes of his make me feel like he’s looking into my soul. His stare pierces me and makes me think he isn’t of this world.
No matter what the case, I snap myself to reality and offer him my hand which he takes cautiously.
“Do you have a name?” I ask.
“I remember,” he says slowly. “My name…”
“What is it?”
“I don’t know…” So much for that…
I sigh. “Don’t force yourself to remember. But do you remember where you live?”
“Or how about what you were doing in the middle of the woods at some ungodly hour?” Nino said. I forgot he was there for a moment.
“No…” he replied lifelessly. He was like a walking corpse. He could speak, he could breathe, he could walk, respond and interact but he was lifeless in his actions.
I feel like I’m forgetting something. I check my watch out of habit only to notice the time. I forgot I had a class right now. I click my tongue, nothing I can do about it now. It might just be better to skip today’s classes. I need to figure out who this man is.
“Nino, I think I’ll be fine now. Thanks for coming over,” I say in mid-yawn.
“You’re welcome. I have to meet with Masaki in a few hours… If ANYTHING happens, call me. I’ll be over as fast as possible.”
Nino seems nervous. He probably doesn’t trust this man, not like I blame him. What I’m doing is a little suspicious and since we really know nothing about him, well it’s a dangerous situation. I’m still sort of confused as to why I am doing this for a stranger.
I try to take my mind off of things by reading a magazine. I had set up the man with a place to sleep. I have a second bedroom in my apartment for guests, if I ever have any. I also made him something to eat, all the while watching my back if he did anything suspicious. He was quite a suspicious character. While I made him food, he would stare at the ceiling and around the room, as if he’d never seen something like this before. Then he moved to stare at my fish tank and the lone fish I had in it.
He didn’t talk much but when he did he was polite. At least he had manners. And he obviously knew how to be a hospitable guest, which I was more or less thankful for.
I flip to the next page in my magazine and I can feel the man leaning over my shoulder from behind the couch. I’m weirded out.
“There!!” he says in my ear. He practically jumps over my shoulder to point out a name in my magazine.
I read what he points to. “Sakurai Yua.” I cock my head and then realize why he did that. “Is that your name?!”
“No… my family name is Sakurai.”
I nod. Now I have something I can call him by. Funny how a little picture can make him remember. Maybe… the pictures? “Here.” I close the book and hand it to him. “Why don’t you look through it and see if you can remember anything else.”
The phone in my pocket vibrates. “Excuse me.” I leave the room to go into my bedroom and I open the phone and read the message with a blank face.
From: Ki- ‘Can we meet? I need to talk to you.’
I don’t want to talk to her. I don’t want to meet her…
I close the phone and throw it on the bed. I wish I could throw hard enough against a wall that I could break it, but that wouldn’t be rational. I go back into the room with “Sakurai” and he’s sitting on the couch like a statue.
“I remember…”
I stop walking and cock my head.
“Sakurai Sho… That’s my name.”
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OOC: So, here's chapter 1. I've been working on this fic for some time now~ lol Just finished writing it the other day so there won't be much wait time between chapters~ Hopefully everyone will be/is satisfied with it~ ^-^