Map of the Sounds of Tokyo
Disclaimer: I do not own anything!
AN: Wow, got caught up by the Gravitation muse again today. Instead of STUDYING as I should have been, I spent some four hours typing this up. It's the longest thing I've ever written and worst of all, it contains MY OWN CHARACTER! I know, sacrilege! But I assure you, I'm not try to pair anyone up with a non-Gravitation character. This is simply an effort to describe grief through the eyes of an outsider. So while it's an outside character narrating the entire thing, he doesn't play a crucial role and the entire story is really more Yuki-Shuichi focused. Please bear with me. Critique and comments much appreciated! I was listening to "La Vie en Rose" (the Japanese version) as I wrote this, so the ending lyrics are from that song, which really captures the sadness that I wanted to evoke in this piece. As for the title of the piece, there's this movie coming out called Map of the Sounds of Tokyo, and I thought it oddly fitting.
Map of the Sounds of Tokyo
Hello there. Nice to meet you. Please, come on in. You're that journalist, aren't you, the one from The Tokyo Bang? Ugh, sorry about the mess. Bit of an embarrassment, this apartment. With my kind of profession, you really don't get enough dough to buy one of those up-scale luxury complexes, you know? Gotta settle with what you've got.
Anyway, please, sit down. Ha, I know what you're thinking; don't worry, the couch is perfectly clean. I don't bring clients here. Personal policy. You got to have some place to call your own, some place that you can call a sanctuary. Would you like some tea? Oh, only coffee? I see.
So I'm guessing this is for that article you mentioned, huh? Well, you've struck gold if you're trying to make the headlines…And when I say this is big, boy do I mean it. I don't mean to spoil the mood or anything, but there'll be a paycheck for this, right? Sorry, but I've got a couple of loans I have to pay off, and in these days, I haven't make making nearly enough--you know, with the economy and all. Business goes slow, is all I have to say.
Alright. I've babbled enough. Feel free to start asking questions. What was that? You want me to what? Just tell it all? Oh, so that's what the tape recorder is for. Ha ha, well I'm not sure where to start…I usually don't give interviews, if you really must know. Let's see…How did it all start?
Well first, the one thing I have to get straight before I say anything else. I've never seen my current…profession as anything permanent. I still don't. One day, I wanna move onto bigger, better things. I sure didn't come from some high end, fancy Tokyo family, but I wasn't raised to live life…well, you know. As some male prostitute. My parents were pretty respectable people and, well, I'd like to follow in their footsteps someday. Get out of this business once I find something better out there. I mean, it sure isn't an easy or, heck, pleasant job. Sometimes I really loathe it, you know. Hate it. You get to feeling pretty damn disgusting sometimes, like someone's used ass-wipe or something. So maybe this interview will be my entry ticket outta this life, huh? Well, a guy can dream, can't he?
So, now that all that's been established, on to the actual story. You sure you don't want that cup of tea? It's a long story I've got to tell. No? Alright then.
I can't tell you just how many times in my profession--or even outside of work--that people have walked up to me and told me, just right off the bat, that I look like that singer from Bad Luck. I'm not an avid listener of that band's stuff or anything, but I mean, I've seen them a couple of times on the covers of magazines and newspapers. And when people are always coming up to you, telling you how much you resemble some guy, you kind of start looking out for those magazine covers with his face on it. You get to start wanting to know if, well, you actually look like the kid. I guess I kind of do. Oh, sorry, my bad. How tactless of me. I mean that I did. We've both got that innocent, happy look down. The big, round eyes. Skinny, kinda girly body structure. And, pardon me, the cute button nose. Works well for me in my profession, and I guess it must have helped him round up those fan girls. I mean, I've got maybe four or five years over the kid. But there's definitely something there. Some similarity. And in my profession, I guess it's not a bad thing. Some of my women clients, even a handful of guys, go crazy over that kind of thing. Got some secret fancies and kinks revolving around that Bad Luck guy. If anything, I guess my resemblance to him kind of helps to bring in the dough.
Anyway, it's not like I ever met the guy or anything. Never went to any of his concerts (as if I'd have that sort of money), though I heard his songs a couple of times over the radio. Pretty catchy, I'll admit. Listened to them when I had the chance. And when people always tell you how much you look like somebody, hard as it sounds, you get to sort of feeling like there's a bond between the two of you. I mean, the Bad Luck kid probably never knew I existed, not as if we'd meet in a thousand years. But you get to feeling this..this invisible link or something. You start feeling--and I know this sounds like a bunch of bull--that he's like your other half from another dimension. Stupid things like that. Anyway, that's why it kind of hit me hard when I woke up one morning, all tired out from the night before, went out to buy some groceries, and read on the front cover of some big news magazine that the Bad Luck guy had…well, died. It hit hard. I mean, he was famous and all, but he was still only a kid. You could tell he had a lot of promise, a lot of big things ahead of him. From his songs, you could just tell--he had a lot of soul. And boy, what a horrible way to die. Sometimes, I think about it, and maybe it was the fame that killed him. I mean, you can't play around with fate or anything, but if he hadn't been famous, he wouldn't have…well, he wouldn't have been shot. That's the thing. That ass that shot him probably wouldn't have known who he was, probably would never have gotten obsessed enough with him to just…shoot him with a damn Browning 9 after that big concert. Anyway, I was pretty down about the kid for a while after I heard the news. I mean, like I said, it's not like I knew him or anything, but it's just tragic, you know? Some talented hot shot like him getting gunned down on the cold, hard concrete. He hadn't even hit twenty five yet. Just a damn kid. Even the life I've got now is better than that. It's been two years since, huh? I guess it's been a while, but even so, I still get a little blue thinking about it. Damn tragic. And boy did his death mess some people up. I remember watching the news channel and seeing all these headlines about it, people visiting his grave in masses, sending flowers and stuff to his family. And man, they played those Bad Luck songs over and over for practically months afterward. It was almost cruel, as if the radio stations were trying to remind people that he was gone. That the singer from Bad Luck was dead and cold in his grave. Decomposing, probably. You heard one of their songs, you heard the kid's voice over the radio, and it just reminded you that there was no future left for the guy, that you'd never hear that voice again. And let me tell you, when I used to listen to Bad Luck songs, they kind of filled me up with hope. I know they were probably geared for teenage girls and stuff, but you could hear the passion in the guy's voice. He had a really beautiful voice, I'll say. And those songs...Filled you up to the brim with damn exhilaration, like everything was gonna turn out alright. The band broke up pretty soon after, I remember. I mean, you can't have a band without a singer after all. Real sad. Real depressing. I couldn't work for an entire day. It just felt as if all the damn happiness, the freaking innocence in the world, had been sucked out.
But yeah. Anyway, the news hit me hard. Pretty damn hard. And it just didn't feel right to do my job at that time. I mean, here I was, some guy that apparently looked like the kid's brother. Or some cheap cosplayer. I felt like I was mocking him or something every time I went out at night in my, you know, get up. It felt like an insult to both him an' his family going around like that. Before, I used to dye my hair pink sometimes, just to attract more customers. Afterward, I just stopped. Couldn't do it. But I had to live. So I went on with my job. And boy, you're going to think of me as pretty twisted, but I actually got more requests, got more clients, after the Bad Luck kid passed away. It sounds awful, I know. But I suppose some people are pretty twisted themselves. I guess the fact that the kid was gone just kind of magnified their kinks and secret perversions. At any rate, I didn't go hungry those days. Business was, I got to admit, pretty darn good.
Now, here comes the part I bet you've been waiting for this entire time. It was, I don't know, a December night I think. Cold, with snow blowing all over the goddamn place. You know how Tokyo is. Anyway, I didn't have any appointments or anything, so I was thinking about just staying indoors. Wrapping up in a blanket and relaxing. 'Cept I was running kind of low on food, so I decided to go out for a quick run, buy some groceries, you know. And while I was out, I guess I was seized by some crazy urge, because instead of going straight to the super market, I made a detour and went to the park instead. It's only a couple blocks down from my apartment, not too far away. Thought maybe I'd go look at the ducks or something. Crazy, huh.
So here I was, at the park. Hadn't changed my clothes or anything, so under my jacket, I guess I still looked kind of skanky. Boy was it cold that night. Couldn't stop shivering and shit and I was starting to regret leavin' my apartment, especially since I guess all the ducks had frickin' migrated south, some shit like that. There weren't any people out, probably because of the damn cold, and I thought I was all alone in the park until I saw him.
Him? Yeah, I can tell you're getting all excited now, aren't you? Well hold up, I haven't even begun telling the good part yet.
Anyway, I was standing there, freezing my ass off and regretting the whole excursion, when I heard this kind of rustling behind me and whipped right around. It was kind of dark, it being night and all, but I could make out this tall guy some distance from me. It was real cold, but all he wasn't even wearing a jacket. Just standing there, with this cigarette peeping from the corner of his mouth, all poised and elegant. Kind of looking off into the distance. I don't know, I thought he looked kind of familiar. Maybe some television persona? I'm no good with recognizing people--just not really my expertise. Anyway, I kind of strained my eyes to take a better look at him. He was well off, that sort of thing I can tell right off the bat. Like some kind of upper-end ass, except instead of looking pompous and haughty, he just looked kind of…I don't know how to explain it. Empty. If you'd seen him, you probably would have noticed the color of his eyes--this golden, molten color--but at that moment, all I really saw was the look in the guy's eyes. It kind of scared me, really. I don't mean to be morbid, but he looked kind of dead. Hollow.
I was gonna leave, I mean that guy kind of creeped me out. What sort of rational, sane person just stands there in the cold, in thirty degree weather, staring off into space, with a goddamn zombie look in his eyes? Like something that crawled out of The Ring, for Pete's sake. Like, I dunno, some sort of wax figurine. It scared the heck out of me. And that look in his eye, I just couldn't get it out of my head. It was frickin' haunting, I swear. I was just about to leave and get the shit out of that park, but then the guy turned around. I guess he saw me, because here's where the weird part comes in. He saw me, and I saw those eyes of his--those weird, ochre eyes--kind of go wide, as if in surprise or something. I mean, they didn't stay like that for long, because soon they were back to looking just kind of flat and empty, but for a minute, it looked like he recognized me. You've got to understand. It wasn't that long ago that the Bad Luck kid had died, so it's not like I had dyed my hair pink or anything. In fact, it was just a normal, kind of mousy brown. But I guess that guy saw me and thought he recognized something, or someone, in me. Because he started walking up to me, slowly and kind of with this lazy elegance. I mean, his eyes still looked hella empty, but I guess some people are just born with innate grace. Even if they're real down about something, they can't help but glide around as if they were born to be movie stars. Anyway, the guy really freaked me out. Even more than before. I mean, he was approaching fast. And even if he was just coming up to ask for directions, that look in his eyes really got to me. It was almost a dangerous look, that was how dead and flat his eyes were. I thought about running the hell out of there, but I guess I was just kind of frozen in place. Scared shitless.
So I was just standing there, just kind of thinking how screwed I was. And maybe I was starting to get a little delusional, but you know, the closer the guy got, the more and more he started to resemble some sort of fallen angel. Yeah, okay, I know. Super cheesy. But it's true. He had this tousled gold-brown hair, those machine eyes framed by these incredibly long eyelashes. Everything about him radiated grace and this kind of masculine beauty, but there was also this sort of melancholy rolling off of him. A sort of nothingness. Just looking at him made me feel pretty darn hollow myself. So he comes up to me. Cigarette still hanging from the corner of his mouth, all this smoke billowing in the air. All the while, with his eyes just kind of staring at me. As if he's trying to find someone, something, that he's lost. Comes up to me and says in this flat, quiet voice, without even a greeting:
"How much for an hour?"
I was kind of speechless. Yeah, I guess he kind of figured out what I did for a living, not that it was all that hard, with the kind of stuff I was wearing under my jacket. But still, it kind of surprised me. I mean, most people aren't that blatant. Well, I guess it's not as if there were any other people walking around the park, nobody that would have witnessed our exchange. Still, I just didn't expect this guy, this (I have to admit) ethereal, really kind of beautiful person who could have walked out of a goddamn fairy tale book, to walk up to me only to ask me for my rates.
I guess I was kind of flabbergasted for a while. He didn't repeat the question, just kind of looked at me hard for a while. With those robot eyes. Man, it was like my mind got wiped clean or something. It took me a while before I finally got over the shock. Before I was finally able to just kind of get a hold of myself again. Boy did I feel unprofessional. But anyway, I finally calmed the heck down, enough to kind of stammer out my usual rate. I wasn't all that expensive, only about 4000 yen for half an hour, but I guess it's more than some of the others in my trade. Anyway, he didn't even raise an eyebrow. Just plucked a bunch of bills from his pocket (like I said, I could tell he was pretty darn loaded), shook out a couple, and handed them to me. I guess I was still kind of in shock, or aftershock, because all I did was take his money. Couldn't speak a word. Didn't even count to see if he'd given me the correct amount. Just took the money, stuck it in my pocket, and kind of followed him out of the park. Like I said, I sure was being pretty unprofessional. But the whole experience was just kind of unnerving, kind of out of the blue.
We got into his car. I've said a couple of times that I could tell he was a pretty loaded guy. I mean that stance of his, that understated elegance. You could just tell. But boy, you should have seen his car. That was one freaking hell of a ride. Must have cost a couple million yen. And boy was I green with envy. I'll probably never get to ride in another car like that, but that one time I did, it was some experience. Sorry, babbling, aren't I? I'll get back to the story. Anyway, at this point, I'd finally gotten out of my daze, enough to try to be more professional. Try to, you know, make some conversation. It was still damn cold out, but the guy had the window on his side all rolled down. I guess he just didn't feel the cold. Immune to it or something. Or maybe he just didn't care.
"Hey, mister," I was still kind of nervous, and you could tell by the way my voice shook. You probably wouldn't have guessed from my voice in a hundred years that I'd been in the business for practically half a decade. "Where are we going?"
He just kind of ignored me, or maybe he didn't hear. Kind of hard to tell with people like that. He kept his eyes on the road ahead of him, didn't budge a millimeter or nothing. It didn't bother me really; some clients just don't like to talk. I guess maybe they feel like it ruins the moment, who knows. We were just kind of driving for a while and everything was real still, real quiet. It was snowing, so I guess everyone were probably huddled somewhere in their houses, since there sure weren't any pedestrians walking around Tokyo. I was starting to feel kind of awkward, like maybe I wasn't making enough of an effort to initiate a conversation or something. I didn't think he'd care, so I just kind of reached over, turned on the radio. I thought maybe it'd kind of relieve the mood, relieve the tension, you know?
I'm probably never gonna forget what happened next. See, the song playing on the radio was one of the old Bad Luck songs…Glaring Dream, I think it was called. It used to be one of my favorites; I mean the emotions and passion in that song were practically tangible, you know? Like you could reach out your hand and just kind of grab ahold of all the feelings swirling around in that song. That was why Bad Luck had been so successful. Their songs just kind of made you feel things, really feel things. Anyway, so I turned on the radio, and immediately you could hear the voice of the Bad Luck guy, his voice just kind of like this lullaby that was floating out. Real slow, real pretty. It was kind of soothing and I was just starting to kind of relax into it, but then all of a sudden, before I even knew what had happened, that guy next to me, he just kind of shot out his hand. Slammed his fist into the radio. I guess he broke it, because it went dead silent afterward. I just stared at him, man was I shocked. I mean, who does that? Yeah, you might not like a song that's playing, but that's no reason to just break the goddamn radio. I was kind of afraid to move, since I figured the guy might blame me for turning on the radio in the first place. He had on this sort of pained look on his face, which was weird, since up to now, that empty look on his face, the one I've described a dozen times, hadn't changed a bit. It looked like someone had just punched him in the guts, real hard. I was kind of embarrassed (I mean, I had been the one to turn on the radio), but I didn't really want to rile him up more, you know. Besides, he looked kind of caught up in a private moment, especially with that flickering agony in his eyes. Really looked like he was in pain. I couldn't really determine what had gotten him so emotional. Knowing now, I must sound like a complete idiot, but I seriously figured he had just been a really big Bad Luck fan. Guessed that maybe the death of the lead singer had messed him up good. And I guess, in a way, I was kind of right. Though, now that I think of it, I really wish I hadn't been.
So yeah. We drove on for a little bit more. Me, kind of looking down abashed at that damn immaculate car floor. Him, just driving, his eyes glazed and back to being empty again. We finally reached this huge-ass building--some really high-end apartment complex, I guess. Probably one of the better ones in Tokyo. He didn't even look at me when we got out of the car; I just kind of followed him. Up the elevator, down this hallway, that corridor, till we got to his apartment. When he opened the door, I guess I was kind of surprised. But at the same time, kind of not. Okay. Yeah, that doesn't make much sense, does it? Just listen. See, with him being obviously a pretty well off guy, you'd think his apartment would be pretty furnished--with big screen television, maybe some of that wacky but hella expensive modern art hanging on the walls. But it wasn't. It was just kind of empty. The lights switched off. Kind of just…big..and blank. Nothing on the walls, everything just kind of white and ghostly even. There were even bits of tape stuck on the wall, where I guess posters had hung before that had been torn down later. Overall, just a feeling of…decomposition, I guess. And that made sense too. I kind of figured by now that this guy had some issues. Deep issues. It wasn't my business to ask about them (now that would be unprofessional) but I could tell that he wasn't probably dealing with some inner demons. I mean, the little radio fiasco had shown me that much.
He led me to his bedroom. Like the rest of the apartment, it wasn't much. Big room, alright, with a king sized bed, but there was a sense of loneliness kind of pervading the whole place. These plain white sheets on the bed, nothing on the walls, this lone desk in the corner. Bunch of cigarette butts lying around the place...He started to unbutton his shirt, so I figured I should do the same. He hadn't switched on the big overhead light, only the small bedside light. There are some people that like to do it in the dark for romantic reasons; I kind of doubted that this was the case with this guy. Anyway, after I'd stripped, I just kind of sat on the bed, feeling really, really awkward while I waited for him. I didn't usually feel like this around customers (I mean, I'd been doing this for a pretty damn long time), I guess that night had just turned out to be really odd, even for me. And boy is that saying something. Soon, he had finished depositing his clothes somewhere too. I figured he'd probably want to get started soon but I guess not. He was just kind of standing there, still smoking, looking out the window. It's not like I meant to stare or anything, but naked, that guy looked more than ever like some kind of angel. You know, those marble statues in the museums, taken from ancient Greece or someplace far away? That's what he looked like. I started thinking that he must have been through some pretty bad shit. I mean this guy had it all: the looks, the house, obviously the money. I couldn't understand it--why someone like him would need to hire someone like me. How someone like him could look so goddamn miserable. As if there was nothing left in his life worth fighting for. Anyway, the entire time I'd been with him that night, I kept on thinking that I'd seen him somewhere. He looked pretty darn familiar--I just couldn't pinpoint where exactly I'd seen that face.
You still listening? Well, I told you before that it was going to be a long winded story.
But anyway, after I had spent some time just kind of trying to figure out where I had seen him, I guess he finally wanted to get down to business. He walked over, flicked off the bedside table, and before I knew it, he was hovering over me on the bed. I could feel his breath on my face, his skin on mine.
I don't really want to get into the details of what happened. It's kind of confidential, and even I have some modesty left. I'm pretty sure you know already. He was a good kisser, I'll tell you that. And it's not like he was rough or anything, but he kind of acted as if he was trying to forget everything that had ever happened to him in his life, with each thrust and every kiss. Like he wanted to ram all his feelings out, erase all memories from his brain through fucking. Like his life had been some sort of giant mistake and all he wanted to do was get the heck out of it. And now that I was that close to him, I could kind of smell alcohol on him. Not that much, but still, the scent of beer hanging on him. Like he'd tried to drown out his sorrows or something, as cliché as that sounds.
Here's something else you might find interesting. This, like the entire night, is something I'll never forget. Because you see, as the sweat was cooling on our mingled skin, after we'd done the deed, he said something. For the second time that night. Or at least I thought I heard him speak. At any rate, his words are probably gonna haunt me for the rest of my life.
It was in this kind of shaky voice, almost hoarse, as if he'd been crying, though I knew he hadn't. This voice that was kind of cracking, just really, really pained. It was in a voice that was just raw with emotions, as if the floodgates controlling his feelings had suddenly opened and let in a flood of torment and grief.
"Shuichi…"
One word. One name. Whispered into the empty space between us. It was just one name, but it really hit me. Full throttle, just smacked me right in the face. The way he said it, it was as if the guy had lost everything he had ever held precious to him. As if he knew that what he had lost, he would never get back. As if…As if…I can't even begin to describe it. Words have never been my strong point, but I felt awful. This man had lost something, lost someone that he had obviously loved with his entire being. One word, but you could tell that he was being torn to shreds from inside out. Internal bleeding. No wonder he sounded like a goddamn machine.
(If you don't already think of me as an idiot, you probably do now. Because I didn't figure out immediately who he was talking about. But you have to understand. It's not like there's only one person in Tokyo with the name Shuichi. And it would make sense too, that he wouldn't want to listen to a song by Bad Luck because the singer of Bad Luck shared a name with his ex-lover. I'll admit, I should have figured it out, but I guess I just wasn't thinking it through clearly.)
At this point, we were still kind of lying on the bed and I must have dozed off a bit because when I woke up, the two hours the guy had paid for had already passed. He was still lying there (sleeping, probably), kind of close to me. I figured my time was up--I 'd probably get going. I started putting on my trousers, but then the guy spoke again. Wow, the third time that night--I have to say, it really shocked me. He was probably still half asleep, because his voice was muddled and kind of drowsy-sounding. Probably still a little drunk because he started to ramble. But more words than he had spoken that entire night.
"Shuichi…Don't you dare leave me. You idiot. You fucking idiot…Where do you think you're going? Where do you think you're leaving to? …If you're going to leave, then just get out. I never wanted you here..I never fucking wanted you in my life! Just leave, just go. You brat."
I heard this kind of ragged, half-sob. This kind of drunken growl, followed by a sort of frenzied breathing noise. Another heavy, ragged breath. When I kind of looked over at him, really subtly, his eyes were closed tight and his hands were just kind of bunched up in his hair. I still remember it, you know, like it happened yesterday. His whole face was kind of just...tormented…like he wanted to cry his guts out, but couldn't.
"You fucking brat. Who the hell do you think you are? Making damn promises you can't keep? You wanted me to say it, so where are you to fucking hear it? I fucking love you. Isn't that what you wanted to hear? You wanted to fucking hear me say it, didn't you? Well I'm saying it now. I FUCKING LOVE YOU. You fucking brat, you damn fucking brat. Don't just fucking leave me here. Goddamn you. Fuck you."
I heard something like a sob..I don't know if it was, but I didn't really want to find out. Part of my personal philosophy. There are a few moments in every individual's life, moments of incredible tenderness, incredible sadness, or incredible happiness that should just stay private. Emotions, feelings that your heart stirs up that should belong to you, and you only.
It was the last part that really got to me. I think that by now, it was pretty obvious what was the cause of the guy's pretty erratic behavior; I mean, he was really, really messed up. I guess behind those blank, unfeeling eyes, there was just a heart--bruised and broken. Anyway, I felt like I had intruded into a private, kind of vulnerable piece of his life so I got out as quickly as I could. I didn't even want a ride back-- I just wanted to get home at that point. I guess I was pretty stirred up by all that had happened that night. Pretty damn agitated, you know? The moment I got home (I had to walk the whole damn way), I just couldn't help it. I'm not romantic, I'm not a sappy fellow, but I couldn't help it. I just broke down. I guess maybe the tears that man had been unable to express had somehow, mysteriously, been transferred to me. Because there they were, the tears, all salt and brine, pouring down my face. I can't remember ever feeling that melancholy before in my life. Feeling like some damn husk.
Anyhow, that was how it all happened.
I told you it'd be good, didn't I? Hey, come on, stop looking so down. Well, I guess now that I've recounted the whole thing, I'm feeling pretty blue myself.
I mean, no matter how many times you tell me, I still can't believe that the man was Yuki Eiri, the romance novelist. It makes sense, I guess, but when you tell me now, it just seems surreal. Makes sense, though. Yeah, it does. I never saw him again after that one time, but it kind of breaks me up to remember him. He really was…just a really tormented soul. I remember now that I read about him and the Bad Luck guy in a couple of magazines before…I'd always thought their love was kind of superficial but I guess I can't say that anymore. I guess maybe there was something more between them.
Yes, I've heard about the recent suicide attempt. In the bathroom, right, with the razor? He's in the hospital, isn't he? I don't know whether or not to be glad that he didn't succeed. I mean, he had his job left, his money left, but it must have seemed pretty insignificant in the face of what he had lost. I don't believe in romance but this…It's just tragic. I remember how people in the press were making such a big deal out of the fact that he was seen going around with other guys and girls, but I think he only searched out certain people, trying to find in them the essence of that which he lost. Yeah, I know--deep, huh? I mean, I sure didn't mean anything to him. I was just someone that happened to look like who he was looking for. He just happened to stumble upon me and used the opportunity to forget himself.
Are you really going to publish all of this? That's good to hear. I agree…I thought I'd be okay telling it all for money, but it just feels kind of wrong now. Haha, how horribly ironic, but I feel like I've sold out a part of myself. The press would have had a field-day with this though, I'm sure. You don't want your check back? It's better if you take it, though. I need the money, but all of a sudden, I'm feeling kind of ashamed of myself. Yeah. Thanks.
Anyway, good luck with your career. I guess maybe this story won't be making it into the press, but who knows--I'm sure there are bigger, fatter fish out there for you to fry. You'll make it big one day, I know it.
Did you hear that? Oh sorry, I thought I heard some music outside…Some sort of lullaby. I thought it sounded a bit like--No, must have been nothing. I guess I must be hearing things…I just hope that wherever he is right now, that Yuki Eiri, that someone is out there, watching over him.
Eyes that gaze into mine,
A smile that is lost on his lips-
That is the unretouched portrait
Of the man to whom I belong.
When he takes me in his arms
And speaks softly to me,
I see life in rosy hues.
He tells me words of love,
Words of every day,
And in them I become something.
He has entered my heart,
A part of happiness
In endless nights of love,
A great delight that comes about,
The pains and bothers are banished,
Happy, happy to die of love.
End.
Critique would be greatly appreciated! Hope that wasn't too dreadful of a read. I really wanted to have it come off as just an honest, simple guy telling his story of what he saw, what he experienced. And behind his story, I wanted to reveal my interpretation of sorrow and grief. :) Thanks for reading!