Jin's never paid this much attention to his surroundings in the car before. Usually when he's in the car this early in the morning, he's dozing in the back of a car that's taking him to some filming location, trying simultaneously to nap and drink a cup of coffee. Now, though, he's taking in every detail of the buildings he passes. Closer to the center of the city they're mostly the same, all multi-story with signs that would surely be lit up neon in the night, but in the early morning light just look uniformly beige and boring. At each intersection, he tries to picture the places around him as they would be in the dark, seen through the blurry windshield of a car during a rainstorm.
As he nears Kichijoji, Jin finds himself on a narrow street where the scenery begins to vary a bit; houses and apartments tucked snugly between buildings, tiny restaurants and shops all shut up against the outside. The traffic dissipates, too, and Jin gets this eerie feeling like he's the protagonist in a zombie movie, just about to discover that he is one of the last men on earth.
Shaking his head to clear it of that thought, Jin tries to concentrate on everything he can remember about the park they'd visited years ago. It was pretty big, reasonably crowded for an afternoon in the middle of the week. They had walked for a while on a winding path before finding a bench under a tree, in a spot that wasn't too crowded. He remembers the way the sun kept glinting off of one of Kame's rings, so much that Jin had asked him to take it off.
"I'm going to go blind and I won't be able to dance and I'll have to quit Johnny's," he'd insisted; then, after some thought: "It might be cool to be blind, though. I could dance with, what's it called...echolocation!"
It's hard, though, to remember what their surroundings looked like. There was a grove of trees to one side, Jin was pretty sure. And there was...a pond, maybe? No, there was definitely a pond. He'd picked up a few rocks and tried to skip them, then gotten distracted trying to convince Kame to throw one at a couple rowing a boat near a fountain.
Jin's so distracted trying to remember the park that he almost misses the sign, Inokashira Park, West Entrance. He parks his car on the street, grabbing a hat and sunglasses from the passenger seat because it's habit, and takes off down the first path he sees.
After a minute or so of running, Jin comes to a sign that looks like it might have some kind of directions. He stops, panting (he really does need to stick with that exercise plan), and looks for anything that might be familiar. There's an arrow pointing to the boat rental, but Jin remembers that was far from where they were sitting. Something about a petting zoo goes in another direction, but that's not right, they weren't there. The final arrow points toward a temple. After racking his brain, Jin comes up with the image of a red gate just across the lake. That must be it.
As he gets closer to the lake, Jin sees the skeletal form of an old bridge, flanked by some trees growing out over the water. To one side of the trees is a bench, overlooking the lake. It was that bench, Jin thinks. Definitely that bench. He approaches it cautiously, not sure what he's looking for, but wary all the same, but nothing seems out of place when he reaches the bench. The early morning sun is shining off the water, the trees are rustling in the breeze. Birds are chirping.
spreading to: yamapea
Jin's never paid this much attention to his surroundings in the car before. Usually when he's in the car this early in the morning, he's dozing in the back of a car that's taking him to some filming location, trying simultaneously to nap and drink a cup of coffee. Now, though, he's taking in every detail of the buildings he passes. Closer to the center of the city they're mostly the same, all multi-story with signs that would surely be lit up neon in the night, but in the early morning light just look uniformly beige and boring. At each intersection, he tries to picture the places around him as they would be in the dark, seen through the blurry windshield of a car during a rainstorm.
As he nears Kichijoji, Jin finds himself on a narrow street where the scenery begins to vary a bit; houses and apartments tucked snugly between buildings, tiny restaurants and shops all shut up against the outside. The traffic dissipates, too, and Jin gets this eerie feeling like he's the protagonist in a zombie movie, just about to discover that he is one of the last men on earth.
Shaking his head to clear it of that thought, Jin tries to concentrate on everything he can remember about the park they'd visited years ago. It was pretty big, reasonably crowded for an afternoon in the middle of the week. They had walked for a while on a winding path before finding a bench under a tree, in a spot that wasn't too crowded. He remembers the way the sun kept glinting off of one of Kame's rings, so much that Jin had asked him to take it off.
"I'm going to go blind and I won't be able to dance and I'll have to quit Johnny's," he'd insisted; then, after some thought: "It might be cool to be blind, though. I could dance with, what's it called...echolocation!"
It's hard, though, to remember what their surroundings looked like. There was a grove of trees to one side, Jin was pretty sure. And there was...a pond, maybe? No, there was definitely a pond. He'd picked up a few rocks and tried to skip them, then gotten distracted trying to convince Kame to throw one at a couple rowing a boat near a fountain.
Jin's so distracted trying to remember the park that he almost misses the sign, Inokashira Park, West Entrance. He parks his car on the street, grabbing a hat and sunglasses from the passenger seat because it's habit, and takes off down the first path he sees.
After a minute or so of running, Jin comes to a sign that looks like it might have some kind of directions. He stops, panting (he really does need to stick with that exercise plan), and looks for anything that might be familiar. There's an arrow pointing to the boat rental, but Jin remembers that was far from where they were sitting. Something about a petting zoo goes in another direction, but that's not right, they weren't there. The final arrow points toward a temple. After racking his brain, Jin comes up with the image of a red gate just across the lake. That must be it.
As he gets closer to the lake, Jin sees the skeletal form of an old bridge, flanked by some trees growing out over the water. To one side of the trees is a bench, overlooking the lake. It was that bench, Jin thinks. Definitely that bench. He approaches it cautiously, not sure what he's looking for, but wary all the same, but nothing seems out of place when he reaches the bench. The early morning sun is shining off the water, the trees are rustling in the breeze. Birds are chirping.
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