My Will

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As I lay sniffling on the foldout bed in our new apartment, I cursed myself for the thousandth time.
I was such an idiot…

I’d totally embarrassed myself in front of the girl my father had been trying to introduce me to. More accurately, the incredibly gorgeous girl he’d been trying to introduce me to.

I could only imagine how dumb I’d looked earlier, sneezing my ass of with a damn scarf on my head. If only the apartment had at least been somewhat inhabitable when we arrived, I could have made a much better impression.

‘nothing I can do now. Can’t go back in time.’

I continued to think about her when I heard a door creak from down the hall. Soft footsteps walked past my apartment towards the elevator, and I watched curiously as the shadow passed before the light that peeked under the door.
When the presence was gone, I concentrated on falling asleep. We still had a lot to do tomorrow, and then after that, I would have to enroll in school.

Thank God it was my last year finally. After that, I wouldn’t have to bother with classes, or schedules, or any of that bullshit. Then I could get a full time job, and help my father with settling someplace permanent.

Maybe someday I could have my own room again.


**


The next morning, I was awoken by a voices that seemed to be coming from right outside my door. I could hear a muffled female voice and a familiar male one. Half asleep and even more annoyed, I got out of bed and stumbled to the door and looked through the peephole. There was Kagome and Souta, arguing heatedly about something I couldn’t quite make out.

I was pissed off enough to want to swing open the door and curse them out for waking me up so damn early in the morning. But I was also embarrassed enough to stay right where I was, and not make more of an ass out of myself in front of her. I strained to make out what they were saying.

“You promised me you would take care of her today! I need the time to finish my report, and if I don’t, I’m going to fail that class! You can’t just back out on me like this!”

“I have things to do too, Kagome! You’re not the only one in school you know! If I don’t get to Suiichi’s house soon, he’s gonna say I didn’t do anything for the project. Then I’m gonna fail!”

She buried her face in her hands, and groaned miserably.
“This isn’t happening…Shit…Where’s Mom, is she home from work yet?”

“Yeah, but she’s dead asleep. Don’t wake her up, Kagome, she’s been at work all night you know.”

“Of course I know that! I just…oh shit….,”
From the slight tremble in her voice, I thought she would burst into tears at any moment. Just as I was about to open the door, her grandfather called to her down the hall.

“Kagome, if it’s that important, I will stay home today and watch her. Please, just calm down and get this done as quickly as possible. You know how she doesn’t like to listen to me.”

As they all finally left back to their own apartment, I returned to my bed, still tired enough to fall back asleep. My mind still buzzed with questions though…
Who were they all talking about anyway? As far as I had heard, it was just the four of them living together, yet this mysterious “she” was constantly referred to. Was there another kid? Maybe someone sick who had to be watched over?

When I woke up for good that morning, my father was just walking out the door.

“Hey Pop!”
He ducked back inside when I called to him.

“What?”

“Where the hell are you going this early in the morning?”

“I’m going job hunting. Do what you can here, but don’t kill yourself. I left you some money by the sink. I’ll be back by four at the latest.”

“Thanks.” He nodded, then continued on his way out. I hadn’t expected him to start searching for a job so soon. That only meant that we had very little money now, and had to find more income fast.

I began to feel uneasy just thinking about it, and tried to distract myself by giving a good long stretch.

The fold out bed was a bit lumpy, but nothing I couldn’t get used to easily. The apartment certainly had it’s share of pros and cons.

The neighborhood, from what I had seen on the drive here, wasn’t too great. But the actual building was clean, so that was a plus. It was as cramped and dusty as our attic used to be, but once again, wasn’t all that terrible to live with.

The Higurashi’s also seemed to be more on the pro list as well. They were a nice family when they weren’t arguing in the halls before sunrise. Of course having a girl like Kagome as a neighbor was never a bad thing either.

I grinned, and wondered if the Gods would offer me a second chance to meet her today. From her earlier words, she seemed like she would be too busy to socialize. I had a lot on my plate as well.

I set to work shortly after getting out of bed, again donning my dust mask, but passing on the goggles and scarf. Around noon, I heard a tentative knock on the door.
A look through the peephole showed me it was Jun Higurashi. I undid the bolt and opened the door.

“Oh, hi Yash. Sorry to bother you, but I was wondering if you wanted to come over for some lunch. I didn’t know Souta and Kagome were gone, so I brought home too much.”

“Sure, thank you.” I agreed readily. Lord knew I was starving, not having eaten since the evening before.

“Please, come over to our place for a while.”
I nodded and after shedding my dust mask, followed her down the hall.

Their apartment was almost picture perfect. Everything was neat and in place, and comfortably decorated. The walls had been painted a pale blue, and the furniture was arranged in perfect complementary angles.

It was a little strange, but hey, who was I to judge? I was getting free food, wasn’t I?

Jun seemed to notice my curious look though.

“Kagome can be something of a neat freak sometimes. Cleaning is her way of de-stressing, and obviously, she does it very often.”

“I see.”

I was about to close the door behind me when something slammed against my legs. I yelped sharply, and looked down to see a tiny little girl sitting on the floor, looking a bit dazed. Then her eyes began to water and I started to panic.

“Oh, please close the door quickly! She’s trying to get out!” A male voice called from down the hall

I complied, and still a bit startled, looked down again at the girl. As the grandfather appeared from the hallway, looking rather frazzled, I started to apologize for knocking her down.

“I didn’t even see her, I’m so sorry!”

“She didn’t see you either. That’s her own fault for trying to get out. Keiko! What have I told you about running away from me like that?!”
As if on cue, the toddler began to wail. I pressed myself back against the door as she looked up at me tearfully.

“Open! Mama, Go to Mama, OPEN!”

“Kay, stop crying right this minute!”

She did no such thing, only screamed louder. I noticed the old man was having some trouble bending down to pick her up, so I kneeled down instead. Slowly I reached out to her.

“Shh…Don’t cry…I’ll take you to Mama, okay?” I cooed softly, hoping that would quiet her some. I was amazed when she stopped screaming, and held out her arms to me. I picked her up carefully and rested her on my hip, vaguely realizing this was my first time ever holding a child of any age. I began to walk towards the kitchen…

That’s when she exploded.

I almost dropped her when she let out a high pitched cry and pounded tiny fists against my shoulder. Jun appeared quickly, a strained look on her face.

“No!! GO MAMA!”

“Here, let me take her Yash.” I started to hand her over when she grabbed a fistful of my hair, and held on for dear life.

“AHH!” I cried out, “I’m giving you to your Mama, now let go.”

“No, no, no, no, no!!!” She continued to chant as Jun and I worked to pry her fingers from my hair.
Finally, she gave up, and buried her face into her mother’s shoulder and sniffled.

“I am so sorry, Yash. She’s usually very sweet, but she doesn’t like to be away from Kagome for so long.”

“Its okay, it didn’t hurt that bad.” I lied. Absently, I rubbed my abused scalp, “Okay, maybe it did.”
She smiled sheepishly, and asked me to sit down at the kitchen table. As she moved around the kitchen, she continued to soothe the little girl, and I began to wonder why she’d reacted like she had.

She wanted to go to her mother obviously; so then why did she blow up like that when I did so? And what did Kagome have to do with that?

A few minutes later, she squirmed her way down, and toddled out of the room still red in the face. Jun sighed as she sat down with our lunch.

“Every one always talks about the terrible twos, but I’ve always found it’s the three-year olds who you have to watch out for. They’re still young enough to throw fits, and old enough to know how to use that against you.” I caught her jovial tone and laughed with her.

“She’s cute though. Looks just like Kagome actually. What’s her name?”

“Keiko. We call her Kay most of the time though. We’re thinking she’s going to turn out to be an athlete or something-she has a habit of running away.”

“Lucky I was in her way then, huh?” I smiled.

“Very lucky. Kagome would have been worried sick.”

I merely nodded, still a bit curious about what that meant.
We talked some more as we ate, which turned out to be food from one of the restaurants she worked at. I told her about my mother, my grandfather and the trouble we’d been through for the past couple of years. She was very sympathetic, a great listener, and I felt very much at ease in her presence. Occasionally we would hear more cries from one of the bedrooms, but Keiko did not make another appearance until I left.

She ran in as I opened the door, but did not crash into me this time. Instead she stared up at me, her eyes pleading, and reached out for me to pick her up.

“Mama?”

I smiled and shook my head.

“No,” I pointed back towards the kitchen where Jun was washing dishes. “She’s in there.”

She shook her head too, and in turn pointed past me to the hallway.

“Mama went out. Kay go to Mama.”

The old man rounded the corner just then and scooped her up. I shrugged as she continued to watch me hopefully. Defeated, she let herself be carried away, but gave me a little wave goodbye before I left.

“Well…that was interesting.” I muttered aloud. I walked back down the hallway to my apartment, ready to get back to work.

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