Date; 4/7

Time; 7:55 AM

The first day of school is a pleasure to some people. Seeing who you’ll spend the next 210 days with can be exciting, but to me, someone who would rather spend his time reading, it’s not really the most exciting thing.

In today’s homeroom class, we each gave a short introduction.

I sort of half paid attention to everyone’s introduction. Giving them about a sentence to catch my attention.

After a bit, it was my turn.

“Hello. My name is Atsushi Apollo. You can just call me by my given name. Nice to meet you.” I said in a less than entertaining way. Someone listening responded,

“Wow man, jumping straight to given names? Are you a foreigner?” I ignored him, and walked back to my desk.

Directly after me, was a real foreigner.

“Good morning. My name is Lucy. I hope to have a great year with you all.”

At some level, I think that everyone was in awe at the fact that there were two people with an introduction so simple, and jumping to given names.

I could almost hear their thoughts, “Are they related?” “Do they both have the same thought process?” “Do you think they’re both foreigners?”

The noise was killing me.

All I want is for the noise to go away.

As long as I’ve had this problem, I’ve blocked out the noise by reading books. I set my mind to one task, and let it go. I don’t have to think about anything other than the material I’m enjoying.

The other introductions were less memorable. Pretty regular, although not entirely boring.

I went through the day, book in hand. Language arts was perfect, because I could read for class, rather than in spite of it.

On the walk home, I saw Lucy. She was looking around, as if checking to see if anyone was watching her. She walked home, to the abandoned building she started in.

I arrived at my house, and had dinner. Perfectly served by none other than my mother.

“It’s good.” I said, being polite.

“Thank you.” My mom replied.

I walked upstairs to my room, turning on the TV. It switched onto the sports channel. A soccer game was about halfway through.

It was the semifinals of the tournament. Thousands were in attendance. The red team was the underdog, barely made it through to this match, while the blue team was expected to win the entire thing from before the season even started.

The score was 10-7, the blue team in the lead. They made goal after goal. Destroying the red team in a way that would surely haunt their dreams forever.

The game ended 30-8. The red team left heads down. Their dream was crushed.

I watched TV for another two hours. At 11:00, I went downstairs to grab something to eat. My mom had turned in already.

I checked the fridge, but the only thing in there was ingredients, and I didn’t want to prepare anything.

I went to the convenience store. The streets were dark, and I could barely recognize the same streets I had walked to school on.

But I still could make out the same abandoned building.

I walked into the store, and grabbed some instant ramen off the shelf. It was only 200 yen, and it was a bit of a ways walk, so I got a bit of chocolate with my remaining 300 yen.

I walked up to the register, and paid.

“Thank you, that will be 540 yen please.”

“Oh, sorry I forgot about tax, I’ll just put this chocolate back.”

“It’s only 40 yen, I’ll just pay it for you.” The cashier kindly said.

“Thank you!” I responded a bit loudly, as I was caught off guard.

“No, it’s fine. I didn’t know what I was going to do with a couple 10 yen coins anyway.”

I exited the store. Rather than feeling the kindness of the woman, I just felt worse about myself.

I glared back into the abandoned building.

I sat down on a bench, and started eating the chocolate, never taking my eyes off the building.

I dropped a piece on the ground. I took my eyes off the building, and kicked the piece of chocolate.

I finished the bar, and threw the wrapper in the garbage.

I started walking back to my house. I felt a warm breeze. Different for fall.

I turned back towards the building one last time, almost to say, “Farewell, until tomorrow.”

But I saw something.

It was a fire.

“Lucy!”