'We can never fully understand each other.'
Tomoyuki sat by himself at home and ate his dinner. When he finished, he washed his plate and the glass with the previously poured tea in the sink. His daily routine in the house was no different, and he always lay on the couch when he finished his chores. His grandmother, because of her old age, could no longer take care of the house herself, so Tomoyuki took care of all the work.
Lying on the couch, he thought about Takashi. With a little forethought, one-third of Takashi's time was spent hanging out in the clubs and bars he was allowed to go to; the rest was spent with Jiahao and Makoto, or hanging out with other acquaintances.
Their way of life was uncharacteristic of Tomoyuki, which created a social shock between them. Experiencing contradictions with himself, he succumbed to his willful emotions and hit the fabric sofa mechanically, on reflexes, and a reflection of disappointment flashed across his face. Denying his affection for what Takashi had said in their last encounter, he struck the soft area of the couch a second time. The couch met the fate of receiving both a third and a fourth blow, and Tomoyuki's teeth gritted with anger at his impotence, torturing his spirit.
'What shall I do?' he spoke mentally to himself, his only friendly interlocutor. 'My mind is all mushy, my thoughts flowing out. My ears… are ringing.'
***
A sunny day descended from the windows of the apartments and houses, condemning the busy to work and the free to gain employment, and Tomoyuki, awakened by his alarm clock, soon stepped out onto the bright street to get some air. As soon as he opened the door, a warm July breeze blew through his ears, like the ghostly horses of legends in the moonlight. He began his new day by jogging up the unfinished block straight to the building that was the meeting place. Running, according to Jiahao, helps people get away from unnecessary trepidation, and Tomoyuki, remembering his words, began jogging when he felt uncomfortable — in any weather he ran without a glance, just to get rid of the tension.
When he reached the abandoned building, he climbed its stairs and reached the top floor, where the surprised look of haggard brown eyes reacted to his arrival. Their eyes met and goosebumps ran through Tomoyuki's body as he stepped closer to the man. The only brown-eyed man in Tomoyuki's entourage was Takashi, and as soon as he approached, the older man regained his haughty look.
"I'm not going to apologize for what I said," Takashi began awkwardly, and received a slight nod from Tomoyuki.
"It is by no means your fault. Yesterday I succumbed to insatiability and committed an unredeemable sin. But I am also not going to retract my words, because at the time I thought it right to speak them."
"You shouldn't take your example from sinners," Takashi sat down to lean on the edge. "Those negative traits of ours should stay with us, just as the lessons of beating up weak people are the first step to becoming the man you hate. You have a bright life — I can see from your mannerisms that you hold a ton of emotion. Answer me honestly: you're not at all inclined to die by a shot from the Redemption Revolver, are you? If so, then why are you keeping our secret a secret? You could tell everything to third parties and lay low, and then you could get away with it."
Tomoyuki crouched closer to him. "As if you left me a choice," he said, grinning at his bashfulness. "I remain as unprepared as ever to accept serious consequences, and you know that in my position I have long since dropped my hands. I don't regret taking the oath, though, for it brought us closer and gave us some understanding. I considered that I would choose you for my circle of companionship, so please do not be angry…!"
Tomoyuki spoke with a comforting tone so as not to infuriate Takashi with his ambiguous remarks: he was afraid for Takashi not to take it to heart and leave him to live alone in a mortal world where Tomoyuki had no contact other than them.
"I wasn't going to be mad at you at all," Takashi's lowly brown eyes confused him. "Tomoyuki-kun, I think so too, in some ways our thoughts began to converge in the same direction. But should you have surrendered your freedom to us, to the usual bully boys? Don't you want to be independent of other people's opinions?"
Tomoyuki, slumping his shoulders slightly, added: "I don't want to die early, maybe I have my whole life ahead of me? Before I die, I thought of doing so many things that I will not regret, for now I have not achieved anything to say goodbye easily. I want… to see the true pleasure of life, however cruel. However, if you put a muzzle to my forehead beforehand, I think I will accept my burden."
"What do you think we are?"
"It will be scary, of course… but I can handle it!"
"Anyway," Takashi scratched his head, "from now on try to think with your head, and if it doesn't help, ask for help. I can find time to answer."
Tomoyuki found it difficult to ask for help, for he had never asked anyone for help before, indicating his reluctance to take the easy way out. This was what he was free to do 1 to help himself. After yesterday's reflection on his resilience, he moved up a notch on the path of self-development, for with each acceptance of his mistakes, he gained life experience he had previously lacked.
He knew that he could be wrong, for it is not for nothing that his elders say that sometimes one needs to hear the thoughts and opinions of those around him.
Takashi rose from his seat and shook the dust from his pants, "School starts at one o'clock, we should hurry up and change," and gave him a hand for Tomoyuki to get up. Taking his hand, Tomoyuki's eyebrows furrowed, and the young man rose from his feet.
Walking toward the stairs, Tomoyuki called out to him again for some obscure reason, and Takashi turned around and out of the corner of his eye saw a fist come flying into his face with incredible speed. It was Tomoyuki's fist, deliberately hitting him. Quickly coming to his senses, Takashi became furious, but tried to hear clarification from the schoolboy, who adopted his stance.
"Punch back," Tomoyuki said, causing the teenager to remember slamming him twice in the face yesterday.
"Ha, nice!" Takashi got a taste for it. "I'm just getting itchy hands."
So they began a short fight in which Tomoyuki seemed to stand no chance. As Takashi made mutual lunges and dodges time after time, he realized that Tomoyuki was amazingly deft with his sleight of hand and performed all the techniques he had been taught in training.
The blue-eyed young man's punches and lunges had a perfect combination of strength and stamina, so that even Takashi found it difficult to defend himself, but the technique sometimes revealed problems due to his lack of live experience.
Watching how fiercely he tried to fight, even taking several hard blows to the body, Takashi respected the teenager's determination and involuntarily thought about succumbing when suddenly a straight punch came flying into his face in an instant.
Takashi cross-punched time after time, for he had much more stamina. Captivated by Tomoyuki's moments of reaction, he watched his every move, forcing himself to forget about the most important thing of all — defending any places but the front. As he opened, he gave Tomoyuki the excuse to execute a circular kick with a speed Takashi had never seen before.
Takashi was stunned when he realized that there was no time to block, and the ferocious leg flying into his head did not dare to stop. Before he took the blow, Takashi remembered the painfully familiar fighting style, the Jiahao style that Tomoyuki had taught Tomoyuki about self-defense. He compared the youngster's movements to those of Jiahao and boasted of his sensitivity that he had not misjudged Tomoyuki.
In the end, Takashi put up a block, but a solid kick caused him to lean back — Tomoyuki's execution exceeded his expectations.
"It worked!" Tomoyuki's eyes sparkled brightly with surprise.
"First time you've managed to make a circular punch?" Takashi puzzled, receiving a puppyish nod in response. "You're pretty good at it."
"This is the first time I've ever done better than usual."
Takashi cringed indignantly, thinking that the teenager was just bragging since his technique was flawlessly executed.
"Hey, what are you sprawled out for?" shouted Takashi, tearing his opponent away from the surge of pleasure. "We're not done yet!"
After a short time, busy exchanging careless, tired blows, the teens finished their spontaneous duel, and at the call of Takashi's vigor, they entered the basement. Their clumsy body movements and gait betrayed their sluggish energy, making them both want to lie down somewhere.
"I want to ask you something," Takashi retorted as they made their way into the last room where the weapons lay.
Takashi, stroking a certain part of the brick wall, finally found the right brick and, pulling it, pulled a dusty silver revolver from the hole. Tomoyuki, who was sitting on the chair, was watching Takashi with tired eyes, wiping the dust from the muzzle with his sleeves.
Once finished, Takashi aimed straight for his head.
Tomoyuki was as puzzled as he could be, and his shoulders twitched at the thought of not wanting to die in this dank room. As he looked closer, he noticed that Takashi was just checking the integrity of the revolver, rotating its empty cylinder and pulling the trigger.
"It's starting to absorb more dust," the tall guy said thoughtfully. "At this rate it will soon rust," and pulled four cartridges from his pocket, the caliber of which was compatible with the revolver.
Placing all four rounds in his pocket, he held the revolver out to Tomoyuki, uttering: "Should we trust each other more?"
"What should I do with it?"
"Take it and clean it at home. My parents check on me all the time, so it's impractical for me to bring it home. Also, clean up any residue on the handle. You can probably sneak it home?"
"I think so. It's unlikely they'll decide to check my pockets just today."
Takashi, letting his words pass through his ears, heard only the last and thanked him for the favor. Closing his eyes with fatigue, he felt Tomoyuki's hands pick up his weapon. The brown-eyed teen had been drowsy since the morning due to insomnia, and given his overwork, he could well have dozed off at any moment.
Slowly opening his eyes, he looked at the revolver aimed at the top of his head, and Tomoyuki's eyes darkened, drowning in semi-darkness. Yet Tomoyuki's hand did not tremble, indicating his confidence, and his prank had every right to be no-nonsense. Judging by his hard face, the teenager was really thinking about shooting.
At that moment, Takashi, pulling himself together, calmly added: "When the time comes, Tomoyuki-kun, I'll be sure to tell you about my dream, whose accomplishment I aim for more than anything else. It is my main dream in life, and so, until it comes true, I will not wish to die or lose my temper. There's only a little bit left."
There was a brief pause, culminating in Tomoyuki's unresponsiveness, and Takashi continued:
"For the sake of my wishful thinking, I will remain a hateful sinner and appropriate as many more sins as it takes. No one will forgive me, everyone will wish me dead, sincerely. Their views frighten me, I'll be honest, but I'm not going to delt, and I advise you to do the same.
After listening to his words, Tomoyuki calmed down and lowered his weapon. He smirked as if nothing had happened, which caused confusion in the soul of Takashi, who had barely made it out of a critical state of affairs.
"I didn't intend to shoot, I was just checking its integrity."
Takashi, reflecting and remembering the grim face of the teenager, wallowed in the delusions engendered by his thoughts of what had happened. What could Tomoyuki's sullen appearance be related to, and why did he think he had experienced a premonition of death at that moment? Eventually Takashi came to the conclusion that Tomoyuki had an invisible urge for violence, which was abnormal for an ordinary person.