Three Years Ago.
~The 5th of July, 2022.
~Seiko Gymnasium.
He felt like he was standing on a minefield, surrounded by enemy troops flanking all escape routes. Young efforts come from vanity. Young efforts come from vanity.
The metallic clang of constantly hitting the rim....for the last three minutes.
The Pale skinned boy stood on the free-throw line. He was holding a basketball. And the weight of it was an oppressive thing. It was like holding onto an anvil with a rope tied around his neck. Sweat dripped down his corpse-like temples... Anxiety
The middle school gym wasn't even half-full, just a handful of parents scattered across the bleachers. Even less were the students and teachers.
But to the Pale skinned boy who stood at the free throw line, it felt like the entire world was watching him miss.
"Toru, Any day now!" Coach Matsuda's voice screeched right into his ear. He really hated that coach. He really hated everyone around him. He really hated everyone here.
He could feel the pity. From other parents, Thanking god their own child was decent at basketball and not this terrible. From the bench, the pale boy could hear boys laughing and saying even they could do better.
The Pale Boy could hear all of it. Feel all of it.
He bounced the ball once. Then once more. His hands were too big for his thirteen-year-old body, large knuckles and long bony fingers. The Pale Boy was already 6'1", taller than most of his puny teammates, taller than half the teachers at Seiko Middle School. People looked at the pale boy and saw potential. Saw a basketball player.
But they were so so wrong.
He got in position and shot. The ball sailed in this tragic arc and hit the front of the rim with a hollow clang. That hollow sound echoed through the Pale boys skeleton. The ball bounced pathetically to the left. And kept bouncing away.
*Even the ball wants to get away from me*
"For god sakes,Toru." Matsuda wasn't even angry anymore. He sounded fed up. "You're 6'1" and you shoot like you're throwing a grenade. How is that even possible?"
The other players snickered. The Pale Boy heard Kentaro whisper something to Daichi and then he turned only to see them both laugh. Their giggles rattled their way under his skin. It was deeply embarrassing. And he thought he'd cry. But the Pale Boy had learned to never show emotion to it. As his father had advised him.
"Run it again," Matsuda sounded like he was scheduling his own funeral.
But In truth, Ari couldn't run it again. He could not do any of it again. The missed layups, the turnovers, the way his body seemed to revolt against every basketball fundamental ever invented. He was tall and he loved basketball with a religious passion but his body just wasn't made for basketball... Or really anything else in life
After practice, he stayed later in the gym, and worked on his form in the dark like some kind of basketball ghost. But it never helped. His shot never went in without luck. His footwork never made sense. His agility was just not there. He was a tall statue with the coordination of a newborn .... utterly helpless..... utterly weak. His knees hurt when he moved too hard. He just....
Ari Toru just .....SUCKED.
Two months later, he quit.
Stupid Coach Matsuda had a smile on his face. It wasn't even hidden. It was a smile of relief. And Ari couldn't help but have that scene burnt into his memory.
It's Present Day ~ 22nd March, 2025.
~ Agano City
~ Niigata prefecture
The time is 5:47AM.
AriToru woke to the sound of his phone alarm playing a jazz piano instrumental. Why? Jazz was one of the only things that made him not want to throw his phone against the wall.
He lay there for thirty seconds as he stared at the ceiling. He was preparing his mind for another day of being wholly average.
At sixteen, he'd grown another five inches to 6'6", which should have been impressive but mostly just made him feel like a poorly-constructed tower in a city of normal-sized buildings.
His body was still slender despite his mother's best efforts to fatten him up. Around 78 kilograms stretched thin. Like you took a regular teenage boy and ran him through a taffy-puller.
His face was determinedly unremarkable: straight nose, full girly lips, thick brows that made him look like he wasn't Japanese, uncontrollable baby hair, high cheekbones that weren't quite high enough to be interesting.
Except for his eyes.
Ari had inherited his grandmother's eyes. It was the same type with his father's. It was very upturned at the outer corners, an extremely thin eyelid and the inner corner of his eyes curved downwards aggressively. Shaped like those of a kitsune mask. While the colour was something he got from his mother. It was a rare all black. Like a void, or an ink black onyx colour. The look itself was a problem.
Girls would complain to teachers when he just happened to cross eyes with them. People called him a creep. Most people used his eyes as the excuse that he was a bad apple that needed to be avoided.
But who cares about any of them
Ari had stopped playing basketball, but he'd never stopped watching it. Never stopped analyzing it. While other kids were out being normal teenagers, Ari would be on his laptop and he would dissect games like a military strategist. He even memorised game plans. It was an obsessive dedication that would have made him a genius if he could actually just play the fucking sport.
But he couldn't. So instead, he'd become a genius elsewhere. He put everything into academics.
His room reflected this pivot: walls once covered with basketball, anime and yes power rangers posters now held a single, faded Kobe Bryant print above his desk. His room was now riddled with achievement certificates. A small bookshelf was crammed with textbooks and study guides and more text books. His old basketball was deflated and sat in the corner. For it was gathering dust like a relic from a past life. A loser life.
The Pale One pulled himself out of bed, his black hair fell across his forehead in a mop-top chaos. Thick and even darker than his eyes. He'd need a haircut soon, but haircuts required caring about your appearance, and Ari had allocated exactly zero mental energy to that particular concern.
Downstairs, his parents were already awake.
Toru Hideaki was sitting on the kitchen table reading the morning paper with a peculiar fixity. A man who clearly still believed in print journalism. *Who even reads newspapers in 2025*.. At times Ari would wonder how they still even existed.
Regardless Ari wouldn't bother to ask where his father even got them. Hideakk was 36, with zero silver treading through his black hair and he always had reading glasses perched on his pointy nose. He was the one Ari had to thank for the thick chaotic black thing he called his hair. At least balding was something he would never worry about. They both had an abnormally close hairline for Japanese males. Especially Ari who wouldn't care to at least trim his mosaic of baby hair.
Hideaki worked as a mid-level accountant at a manufacturing firm. It was reliable but utterly unmemorable work that paid the bills and kept the family comfortable.
"Morning, Ari," he said without looking up from the article.
Hideaki's wife, Toru Michiko and Ari's mother was at the stove. 34 years old, a beautiful woman. Making tamagoyaki. Muscle memory tamagoyaki. She'd of course had time to master the breakfast for the 16 years she'd been married. His parents were already betrothed when he was born but they hadn't actually gotten married.
She was smaller than her husband, petite and energetic, with smile lines around her eyes. Those came from years of finding joy in mundane things. Her hair was a beautiful pixie cut of brown that revealed her eye catching expressive face. She worked part-time at a local library, which suited her perfectly. Michiko loved order, loved books, and loved the quiet contentment of a well-organized life. And now her tummy was swollen large (4 months) expecting what Ari hoped would be a baby sister. A baby brother would be nice but he preferred a sister. The age gap was already high. He'd be 17 when his sibling would be just one year.
Ari's parents were both young when they had him. And that always made it easier for them to talk. Though even Ari noticed both his parents seemed like people who were forced to grow up very fast. They were a lot more mature than their age or appearance would lead you to believe.
"Ari! The eggs are almost ready. Did you check your email last night?" What a lovely frequency her voice was. It was bright, cheerful, and conveyed multiple layers of meaning simultaneously.
"Not yet." Ari poured himself a glass of water. His height made him duck slightly under the kitchen light fixture that had been installed for normal-sized humans.
"Check it now." His father finally looked up from the paper. There was something almost excited about his expression. "There should be something important."
Ari pulled out his phone, thumbing through his emails. Mild interest. He expected nothing but spam and school announcements. Then he saw_
Subject: ACCEPTANCE – Yoshimura High School Scholarship Program
His thumb hovered over the email for three full seconds before he opened it.
"Dear Toru Ari,
Congratulations! After careful review of your academic records and entrance examination scores, we are pleased to offer you a full scholarship to Yoshimura High School for the upcoming academic year...
Ari read the email three times. Then a fourth.
Yoshimura High School.
Yoshimura High School.
It was one of the most prestigious boarding schools in Japan, a private academy that consistently sent students to Tokyo University, Kyoto University, all the top-tier institutions and beyond. And that was all a regular occurrence.
Students who graduated from Yoshimura were bound for success in life both in Japan and abroad. Especially abroad. It was a globally renowned school..
It was also, Ari knew with a sinking feeling in his core, home to one of the best high school basketball programs in the entire world.
"Well?" His mother had turned from the stove, her voluptuous body was moving gently. She had a wooden spatula still in hand, her face was bright and excited. "Did you see?"
"Yes", He forced a smile, "I got in."
"YOU GOT IN!" Michiko practically launched herself across the kitchen, pulling Ari into a hug that his height made awkward but his mother's enthusiasm made inescapable. Pressing him against her soft comforting body.
"I knew it! I knew your scores would be good enough! My brilliant boy!"
"It's a significant opportunity." His father had stood up now and folded the newspaper carefully. "Yoshimura's academic reputation is exceptional. The connections alone would be very useful for university applications."
"And it's a full scholarship!" His mother was still clutching his arm. "Room, board, everything! Do you know how much that saves? This is incredible, Ari. This is incredible."
They were happy. Unreservedly happy.
But in the Pale One's inner self, AriToru felt like he had swallowed a stone.
He spent the morning in a daze, mechanically going through his routine at Seiko. It was a perfectly average public institution where he was a perfectly average student. An average student who just so happened to be very tall and very intelligent. His friends (the few he had) congratulated him with little interest. It was the reaction people give for things that don't directly affect them. His teachers nodded approvingly, as if his acceptance validated their own teaching somehow.
It didn't. Most of Ari's academic success came from his parents own homeschooling and his own personal studies. He was even known to miss school entirely on some days so his parents would prepare him themselves for the exams.
And yet Ari could not shake the dread pooling in his gut.
He knew about Yoshimura. Everyone who followed high school basketball knew about Yoshimura. Their team had won the national championship three times in the last seven years. And if you know how competitive Japanese highschool basketball was you'd be speechless.
They produced players who went on to university programs, sometimes even overseas. Their gym was state-of-the-art. The coach was an NBA champion.
And their student body, according to every forum and social media post Ari had ever seen, was a hierarchy of athletic excellence. It was social status that would make a medieval feudal system look egalitarian.
At Yoshimura, basketball players were gods. The starting five were celebrities. Even the bench players had lots of social clout. The school's culture revolved around the team, their games, their victories, their drama.
And then there would be Ari: 6'6", the exact physical profile of a power forward, surrounded by basketball excellence, and completely hopelessly talentless.
He'd be a walking target. A joke. The tall kid who couldn't play. In a school where basketball was everything, he'd be nothing. Worse than nothing, AriToru would be a disappointment. A waste of good height.
That afternoon, after school, Ari walked through the small park near his house, hands shoved in his pockets, trying to figure out how to tell his parents he didn't want to go. They were so happy. His mother had already started planning, talking about what he'd need for the dorms, about visiting during breaks. His father had even smiled.
How could he tell them he'd rather stay at his mediocre Seiko than go to Yoshimura?
The basketball court in the park was empty, the chain nets swayed in the breeze of spring. Ari stopped and he stared at it. Some kids had left a ball behind. It sat in the middle of the court like an invitation. Or a trap? Was god taunting him?
Ari walked onto the court and he picked up the ball. It felt foreign in his hands now. It had been three years since he'd seriously held one. He dribbled once, twice. His form was still terrible. He could see it in his mind's eye, all the mistakes: too much wrist, not enough drive.
He knew everything about basketball. He just couldn't do any of it.
AriToru raised the ball up and shot it....
It hit the backboard and bounced away. Beyond his reach. Beyond AriToru.
"Of course," he muttered to himself. AriToru missed now and he has been missing his entire life.
He left the ball where it may and walked away.
But little did the Pale One know.... What blessings he was to receive.