Solo
In spite of its small size, with furniture bunched together that had no breathing room and the ease with which elbows could be bumped when both boys were home, the empty apartment felt like an empty void to Shige when he was alone.
Perhaps it was something about the unadorned white walls, or the sterility of the off-colored couch. Maybe it was that there were no Better Homes and Garden magazines on the side table (that barely fit the lamp that sat on it). No newspapers were spread out over a non-existent coffee table, littered with wet stains where they'd been used as coasters only for the stories they distorted to be played up humorously later. Nothing they cooked ever tasted the same, either, despite all attempts to recreate that feeling of childhood.
Despite the last few year there, nothing had really seeped into the place to make it feel like more than a place to sleep in.
Shige hadn't expected it to, on a conscious level. He'd expected to lose that instinct to walk down more familiar streets over time - he hadn't. Even now he was correcting himself away from that place. He'd expected to see less familiar faces - and those he did were distorted with this look of pity on them that twisted at that lump that had permanently settled into his chest. What did one do with a distorted lump like that? Nobody had any answers - so he just put it away. It was the only possession he had a spot for, anyways.
It was funny how one missed things they had never cared for before - like the silverware divider, or how the second drawer in the kitchen had to many spoons in it and was absolute chaos, or the small crack in a plastic cup that had formed when it hit the floor after being swatted away when it fell off of it's shelf. Standing at the counter - if 3 feet of prep space could really be called that - he frowned at the irregular shape of the carrots he was slicing.
Did Ren hate the lunches Shige prepared? That twisted knot in his chest sunk as he pulled up a tutorial on the Bentos his mother had made with ease. She could cut carrots that didn't look like a blobby mess. She knew what went well together. She didn't have to watch Youtube to figure out how to cook eggs right. Everything tasted good because she'd cared about how it tasted and here he was, struggling to find a strong opinion about it all. He cared that mother had made it.
She'd known how to make it right. She'd made everything right.
Carefully rolling the Tamagoyaki, the cuts would never be perfect and the lunches he put into the fridge would never look nice. He couldn't cook Katsu like she did, he was no good at boiled pork. At least he could grill tofu decently. At least Ren could make up for what he lacked as an older brother....
Cold clammy fingers of some emotion gripped at his heart, struggling to hold onto it like it was a bar of soap in the shower, desperate to hold on but not finding anywhere in his broken feelings to take hold.
Thought of his father followed quickly on the heels of his mother - seen in cabinets he couldn't just fix himself, and furniture it took two boys instructions to assemble incorrectly, only to unassemble it, to again assemble it wrong before Ren had shooed Shige away from the task. An ineptness that he would possibly never grow out of. Another set of shoes he'd never be able to step into.
He sat on the couch with a deep sigh, staring blankly into his phone and it's offerings of nothing. Nothing to think about, nobody to talk to.....then he set it aside, leaning his head back to close his eyes.
This place was so empty.
He was so empty.
In spite of its small size, with furniture bunched together that had no breathing room and the ease with which elbows could be bumped when both boys were home, the empty apartment felt like an empty void to Shige when he was alone.
Perhaps it was something about the unadorned white walls, or the sterility of the off-colored couch. Maybe it was that there were no Better Homes and Garden magazines on the side table (that barely fit the lamp that sat on it). No newspapers were spread out over a non-existent coffee table, littered with wet stains where they'd been used as coasters only for the stories they distorted to be played up humorously later. Nothing they cooked ever tasted the same, either, despite all attempts to recreate that feeling of childhood.
Despite the last few year there, nothing had really seeped into the place to make it feel like more than a place to sleep in.
Shige hadn't expected it to, on a conscious level. He'd expected to lose that instinct to walk down more familiar streets over time - he hadn't. Even now he was correcting himself away from that place. He'd expected to see less familiar faces - and those he did were distorted with this look of pity on them that twisted at that lump that had permanently settled into his chest. What did one do with a distorted lump like that? Nobody had any answers - so he just put it away. It was the only possession he had a spot for, anyways.
It was funny how one missed things they had never cared for before - like the silverware divider, or how the second drawer in the kitchen had to many spoons in it and was absolute chaos, or the small crack in a plastic cup that had formed when it hit the floor after being swatted away when it fell off of it's shelf. Standing at the counter - if 3 feet of prep space could really be called that - he frowned at the irregular shape of the carrots he was slicing.
Did Ren hate the lunches Shige prepared? That twisted knot in his chest sunk as he pulled up a tutorial on the Bentos his mother had made with ease. She could cut carrots that didn't look like a blobby mess. She knew what went well together. She didn't have to watch Youtube to figure out how to cook eggs right. Everything tasted good because she'd cared about how it tasted and here he was, struggling to find a strong opinion about it all. He cared that mother had made it.
She'd known how to make it right. She'd made everything right.
Carefully rolling the Tamagoyaki, the cuts would never be perfect and the lunches he put into the fridge would never look nice. He couldn't cook Katsu like she did, he was no good at boiled pork. At least he could grill tofu decently. At least Ren could make up for what he lacked as an older brother....
Cold clammy fingers of some emotion gripped at his heart, struggling to hold onto it like it was a bar of soap in the shower, desperate to hold on but not finding anywhere in his broken feelings to take hold.
Thought of his father followed quickly on the heels of his mother - seen in cabinets he couldn't just fix himself, and furniture it took two boys instructions to assemble incorrectly, only to unassemble it, to again assemble it wrong before Ren had shooed Shige away from the task. An ineptness that he would possibly never grow out of. Another set of shoes he'd never be able to step into.
He sat on the couch with a deep sigh, staring blankly into his phone and it's offerings of nothing. Nothing to think about, nobody to talk to.....then he set it aside, leaning his head back to close his eyes.
This place was so empty.
He was so empty.
