Non-challenge: A Policeman's Tale (Day 44)
Title: A Policeman's Tale (Day 44)
Author: ytak
Word count: 1014
Rating (chapter): K (G)
Rating (whole story): T (PG-13)
Comments: Ug. I want to finish this story (as it is) sooner than October (which is when I'll finish it up at the current rate). But, I'm lacking the drive to write two chapters a week. Any recs on how to get past the lack of drive?
Other chapters can be read through here or here.
Day 44
A harsh beeping cut through the warm dream world that embraced Takagi. Groggily, he peeled his eyes open and turned over and looked at the alarm clock. He reached over and turned off the noise. Rolling over, he dozed for a few more minutes until that one sliver of light that somehow always got past the blinds hit him in the eye. Then he remembered what he had to do that day and nearly groaned.
Okay. Time to get up. I have to meet with the landlord today. He sighed at the thought. He could not help but expect the worst. More than a few of his thoughts before falling asleep revolved around what the cost to fix the apartment would be despite the apartment airing out very nicely. Dredging up his memory, he found that he could not recall much of the landlord other than the brief meeting every month to pay rent.
Reluctantly, he dragged his body out of bed. “Better sooner than later,” he muttered. The issue of the apartment hung over his head like a cloud. Focusing on work and the cases the work brought was more welcome than dealing with the aftermath of an attempted romantic date. He still felt guilty about ruining a night he wanted to be special.
After a quick shower, he grabbed a light breakfast. His stomach churned too much for him to eat more than a bit. Idly, he wondered why it had not botherd him so much last night. In fact, I had a really good night's sleep. Maybe I didn't do enough worrying? He tried to shrugged off the guilt. What was done, was done.
That did not make him feel any better. The guilt was still there.
He straightened up the apartment a little. It was not too bad, considering that he was a bachelor. Having a girlfriend, of sorts, does help the place stay cleaner. It looks a lot better than it did a year ago, he thought, thinking back to the way it was when Miwako was an untouchable dream.
Steeling himself, he watched the clock, waiting for the landlord to come. On the phone, shortly after the... incident, the landlord agreed to wait until Takagi had a day off to come over and inspect the place.
Almost right on the dot, there was a knock on the door and Takagi answered to door. The landlord stood there, looking way too much like a morning person for Takagi's comfort. “Good morning, Takagi-san!” he said, a grin stretching from ear to ear. “Let's see how the apartment is doing.” The landlord took a deep breath as he walked in and hummed thoughtfully to himself. Takagi could hear him sniff the air experimentally but the contemplative expression on the landlord's face did not change.
Takagi watched nervously as the landlord walked through his apartment, closely inspecting it and sniffing the air once in a while. After fifteen minutes, he turned to Takagi, “Well, it doesn't really seem that bad. It's even aired out nicely. From what I can tell, the damage looks like nothing more than some point or soap and water will take care of. How about this, you paint and scrub the place down and I'll come back for a second inspection? If it looks like anything needs to be replaced then, we'll talk about the cost.”
Takagi thanked him profusely for his consideration. It was more than he had hoped for. There is a chance I won't have to pay for any damages! he thought, making a list of supplies he would need to clean the place up.
Cleaning his apartment was not how he wanted to spend the day off but he knew that the landlord was being very generous and that generosity was not to be wasted sitting around all day.
The landlord accepted Takagi's thanks and strolled out of the apartment with a light step. He was worried that it would be worse than what the fire department told him, Takagi realized, reading his landlord's body language. This was a good time to have expectations disappointed.
Quickly, he realized that he did not know where he could buy paint. Or, for that matter, he had no idea what sort of paint to buy. Uh, I think I'll settle for washing the place down today. I know how to do that and where to get supplies easily enough. Then off to an Internet cafe to learn about paint. Knowing my luck, it'll be a lot more complicated than I think it should be. Whistfully, he thought back to the days as a child when he went with his father to buy paint supplies. His father never seemed to have any sort of trouble when it came to picking out the correct paint.
But, then again, we did end up repainting the house every other year, he thought ruefully. He could vaguely recall the look his mother gave his face every time he had to paint the house again. On second though, dad didn't know what he was doing, either. Thank goodness for the Internet.
He ran around the apartment, rounding up the supplies he needed to begin washing down the place. Much to his chagrin, he realized that he was missing far more than he thought. He sighed, “It looks like I'll have to run out for supplies first,” he muttered to himself, pulling on his coat and gloves. I wonder what happened to all my supplies? Oh, I cleaned the apartment not too long ago, he recalled, remembering that he used up most of his supplies then.
He moved through the walkway quickly to the relatively warmer parking garage and climbed into his car. As he put the keys in the ignition, he remembered that he left the list of supplies on the kitchen. Taking a moment to face palm, he locked the car back up and returned to the apartment to collect the errant list.
Glad no one was around to aggravate his embarrassment, he hurried back to the car and headed out.