Izumi Armion
The apartment was empty. This was the only way Izumi could think of the place anymore. It had been three weeks since Elena's car collided with the telephone pole, and the quiet made his chest constrict daily.
He was fixated on that dumb stain on his ceiling. The alarm clock read 5:47 AM on those pesky red numbers. Moreover, sleeping would not be an option anyway. Each time he dozed off, Elena's laughter from a stupid commercial they used to watch together started ringing in his head.
The mirror in his bathroom was brutal. Hollow cheeks, dark circles that made him look like a zombie. He was sixteen but felt like he was carrying around fifty years' worth of crap. He put his hand on the glass and watched his reflection copy him.
"Take care of yourself, Izu. Promise me."
Elena had left that message on his phone the Tuesday before everything went to hell. He'd probably listened to it two hundred times. Sometimes he called his own number just to hear her voice on the greeting.
His school uniform was rumpled on the chair. It stank of that cheap soap they sold at the laundromat. Elena was always the one doing the laundry. Then Izumi just wore his clothes until they were gross.
The number 47 was as crowded as ever, and the stench of bodily grease, stale cigarettes, and who-knows-what-else swirled like a fog inside. Izumi located his spot, third row and window, head bent. He tried to tune out when he saw the commotion at the back of the bus.
Kintaro Yamada was messing with Mrs. Yomiko from the flower shop. The old lady was pushed against the window, with his friend Sato sealing all possible escape routes.
"Please," whispered Mrs. Yomiko clutching at her purse. "I have grandchildren."
"You should've thought about that before you sat in our spot, old lady," Kintaro said.
Sato was laughing like an idiot.
Something in Izumi's brain just snapped. Not like some heroic moment more like when you're holding too much stuff and one more thing gets piled on and everything crashes to the ground.
"Cut it out."
The whole bus fell silent. You could hear the laboring engine and the buzzing of a phone. Kintaro turned around very slowly with this mean grin on his face.
"Well, well. Talking like the dead boy himself." he stepped back from Mrs. Yomiko and confronted Izumi. "You're sure about that, Armion? Heard what happened to your sister. What a shame about that accident."
The way he said the word "accident" was like he was talking with air quotes. Like maybe Elena meant to do that.
"Shut up," Izumi said, but his voice was all shaky.
"Shut up about what?" Sato closed the distance between them. "About how she probably killed herself because she couldn't handle living with a pathetic loser like you?"
Izumi punched Sato right in his nose. Then there was this awful crunching sound, and blood spattered everywhere. Sato stumbled into a chair, swearing his head off.
Kintaro was quick - he landed Izumi with three swift punches to the ribs which doubled Izumi over gasping.
"You're an amateur," Kintaro stated, extending his knuckles. "My old man has a boxing gym. Do you seriously think your stick arms are gonna do anything to me?"
Izumi had been carrying the kitchen knife in his backpack for weeks now. Ever since Elena died and the apartment got too quiet and his brain got too loud. He'd never planned on using it on someone else, but here they were.
He swung it four times. The first three missed completely, but number four went right under Kintaro's ribcage.
Then everyone was screaming - Kintaro, Mrs. Yomiko, the bus driver, and Izumi too. Blood was soaking through Kintaro's shirt, way darker than Izumi thought it would be. The knife hit the floor with a clang.
Detective Morimoto had dealt with all kinds of kids in his twenty-three years on the job. But this one was different. Izumi Armion just sat there staring at the metal table like he could see through it to the floor below.
"Your friend says you jumped them for nothing."
"He's not my friend."
"Then why'd you stab him?"
Silence. The kid kept staring at that damn table. Morimoto looked through the file again. Parents burned alive in a house fire when the kid was twelve. Sister raised him until she drove into a tree three weeks back.
"Your sister was pulling doubles at the textile place. Must've been wiped out constantly."
Izumi's jaw got tight.
"I bet she felt guilty leaving you by yourself all the time. These single-car wrecks, they happen when people stop focusing on the road. When they stop caring if they make it home."
"She didn't..." Izumi's voice sounded strangled.
"Didn't what? Didn't mean to? Or didn't want to keep dealing with her dead brother's messed-up kid?"
Izumi slammed his fist on the table hard enough to make it jump. "You don't know shit about her!"
Morimoto gave him a cold smile. "I know enough. Troubled kid with no family stabs a classmate. Case closed." He picked up his papers. "Lucky for you, juvenile processing is swamped. You're out tonight. But we're not done here."
The rain was falling in sheets, and the roads were rivers of lights and dirty water. Izumi was sitting on the steps of the police station, getting drenched, the taste of blood and water in his mouth.
He kept thinking about this night last month. Elena couldn't sleep, and so they decided to take a walk to the bridge and stand there gazing at the city. She remained silent for the longest time until finally, she said something.
"Ever notice what it would feel like to just. let go? Stop trying to hold things together from coming apart?"
He thought it was about work. Bills. Taking care of him. Now, with the taste of blood still in his mouth, sitting out in the rain, he understood.
The truck was moving about forty when it struck Izumi at 11:47. He had just cut right in front of the traffic in Shibuya Avenue. The driver would recall for the police that the kid was moving as if he was sleepwalking, his eyes fixed on something that no one else was seeing.
Coming back to awareness was strange – everything came back in bits and pieces. Scents of wood and something mildewy. Wind whipping through a crevice somewhere in the room. Pain in his wrists – they were bound by chains.
This was certainly not a hospital. It had engraved stone ceilings with signs that were painful to the eyes to see
Izumi tried to speak but his throat felt raw. When he finally managed to speak some words, they echoed strangely in whatever this place was.
"Where am I?"