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This won't make any sense |
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Clouds above Kyoto callously hide the stars tonight. The whole sky is steely and blank. It lies above Kyoto so heavy that everything droops below it. Plants bow listlessly in the humid air as people duck under the eaves with newspapers over their heads. They all expect rain soon, guesses Pike. By the looks of things, they are probably right. But Pike doesn’t want to stop walking. She is in that unusual position where her mind has sped so far ahead of her body that her thoughts have to wait for her legs to catch up. Each building and person that keeps Pike from her destination only makes her more and more impatient.
God, it was so frustrating! After everything that happened, he calls her out of nowhere and asks to meet, only to back out at the last second. Twice, this has happened. This time he wants to meet in some obscure little café downtown. If Pike wasn’t so determined to take a chunk out of that patronizing face, she would have stayed home this time. Suddenly, the wind picks up and the sky gives a great sneeze that sprays cold rain everywhere. A few sputtering coughs of thunder, and the sneeze turns into a downpour. Pike retreats into her coat and runs the rest of the way downtown.
Inside the café, Pike takes a seat by the window. While she waits for her coffee, she peels off her soggy coat and wrings out the water from her hair. Of course, he isn’t here yet. Perhaps it would be easier to expect him not to come at all. That way she won’t be disappointed. But it’s too late for that. She is already going over what she will do when he arrives.
What she’ll do is this: she’ll wait for him to sit down, and then stare at him as coldly as she can until he starts to fidget. Then she’ll up the ante by mentioning something small about his appearance like, “One of your buttons is undone, you know,” or, “You’ve got some shaving cream on your chin.” As he goes to fix it, she’ll continue to dance around the issue by making small talk; maybe about the weather or how he likes Kyoto. Finally, he won’t be able to stand the tension and blurt out something like, “Pike, listen-.” Oh, she’ll have him then!
She watches the smoke swirl around a sign in the window. To her dismay, the neon glowing through the smoke suddenly and vividly draws Pike back to a place far darker than Kyoto. It is darker and more evil too--well, perhaps defeated is a better word. But in this case, defeated is the same as evil.
If Pike closes her eyes, even now, after all that has happened, she can still remember her last night on the town in Nero. For some reason, her senses were particularly astute the constant beat of Nero pounding behind her eyes. It’s all too easy to remember the familiar, neon lights that adorned every person, place, and thing.
 Wingwax · Sun Apr 06, 2008 @ 09:34pm · 1 Comments |
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