[dream 13] born into nixon, i was raised in hell [week 15, day 4]
(It’s starting again.)
Unlike the other times, you know this is a dream. It’s not like dreams you’ve had before, either, because you’re not in it. Merely watching. At a short distance, there is a young boy running down a dirt street with a bag of groceries tucked beneath his arm.
(But that isn’t true either, because at the same time, you are what you are watching. This dream is half viewed from aside, and half lived, because you have lived this. The young boy is you, and this happened to you, once. You can feel your younger self’s emotions like a lingering aftertaste; a sensation partially felt, partially remembered, and partially re-imagined.)
The young boy appears to be running from something, and the answer rounds the corner at that moment: several other boys about the same age as he. They taunt him from afar at first, testing to see if he will respond, hooting and catcalling. The other boys are all Japanese, unlike the boy with the groceries, who is no longer running but walking as fast as he can, keeping his expression stony. He refuses to respond to the other boys. They don’t like him. They call him things. They threaten him with violence. So far, despite this, they have been afraid to touch him.
Look at the little prince, they jeer. Look, the Britannian thinks he’s so much better than us, doesn’t he? Doesn’t even want to talk to us. He doesn’t want to say hello.
Let’s not be unkind, the ringleader says, his eyes bright with juvenile malice. The others hang on his every word. He probably just doesn’t know what we’re asking him, gentlemen! After all, he adds, as the other boys howl with laughter, you wouldn’t expect your family’s pig to understand Japanese, right? A dull flush climbs the young boy’s cheeks, but his expression remains unchanged.
The gang easily catches up to the young boy. The ringleader pushes his face near the boy, his mouth stretched into an exaggerated grimace. He drags out every word slowly, mockingly: So what is it, pig? Do~ you~ understaa-and~ Japanese?
The boy says nothing, doesn’t even flinch. He stares into the other boy’s face as if it is only mildly interesting.
The ringleader’s face twists suddenly, and he slams a fist into the other boy’s gut. Despite himself, the young boy lets out a single cry of shock, and the other children, smelling blood in the water, join in the brawl. You dirty Brit, you think you’re better than us? they shout, kicking him in the ribs and legs and any part of him they can reach. They shout names and obscenities, all in the hope he might react again, might give them the satisfaction of screaming or crying or begging or retaliating. Their hopes are in vain; the boy simply curls up around his abused grocery bag on the ground, making himself into as small a target as possible and riding out the storm of kicks, punches, stomps and slurs.
You can see, though the boy cannot yet, another young boy approaching, a Japanese boy with curly brown hair, dressed in his gi and hakama (looking fresh from kendo practice). He practically flies at the other boys, who shock and cower at his approach. Clear off! he snaps, shooing them off. Get out of here, it’s the prime minister’s son! the ringleader hisses to his charges, and the bullies almost vanish all at once, dashing off in different directions.
You watch at a distance.
Even when you had been that young, the world was never simple, never orderly and sane the way you’d been promised it should be.
(It's starting again.)
[ The dream doesn’t suddenly end, the way Lelouch’s dreams have so far; there is a sense of lingering, a strange soupy haze that slowly clears as he awakens. Even though it takes him several minutes to fully wake up after his dream, the Hitomi displays only a few seconds of confused darkness between the remnants of the dream and the video broadcast of Lelouch waking up on the floor of a house near Hisato.
Without even looking, he reaches over and clicks the Hitomi off. ]