Sticks And Stones

Day 1

This story is based loosely off the manga Hanazakiri no Kimitachi E. There will be quite a few obvious signs for those who have read the manga or watched any of the dramas.

[Day 1]

My name is Shaine Ashiya, 16 years old. If my name sounds funny, that’s because I am a mix-blood. My father is Japanese, but my mother is American. I have my mother’s cool blue eyes and blonde hair, but other than big, baby eyes from my mother, my other features are all Asian from my father. All my friends say I look like a baby doll, and even at 16 years of age, everyone says that I am like a real life Barbie Doll.

I have an identical twin brother, Ronin Ashiya. It is very rare for identical twins to have difference gender, but we must be the few out of hundreds of millions of people out there in the world. Ronin looks exactly like me, except he keeps his hair short and I keep mine long. Ronin has the habit of slanting his eyes whenever he looks at people, giving people glares though he might not be meaning to.

But Ronin and I; we are twins only in appearance. Ever since we were young, Ronin was quiet and silent. The kids in our kindergarten called him the Deadly, Silent Ronin. When the movie ’47 Ronins’ came out a few years back, it didn’t help my brother with his problem either. My brother isn’t someone who you could talk to easily. Many strangers have tried and failed to cajole him into conversations, and since we twins were usually always put together, many of them turned to me instead.

Mum and Dad always said that I took the talking genes right out of Ronin’s mouth, because when we are together, I can talk enough for the both of us. Ronin is great at portraying the silent, mysterious handsome guy brooding in the corner especially ever since he went through puberty, but he hasn’t changed a single bit at all. He’s still my big brother, and he’s still protective as hell, though he would rather die than to admit it. Between the both of us, I usually am the one getting us both into troubles with my clumsiness or my gunfire mouth, and Ronin usually has to clean up for the both of us.

But we love each other, and that’s what matters between brothers and sisters, right?

But ‘together’ wasn’t something my parents were going to tolerate –considering how Ronin never seemed to talk, make any friends at all, or even any attempt at either of the above.

So, when we graduated from Junior High School, our parents forced Ronin to join Heathrow Senior High School, an all-boys school. Their plan was for Ronin to be forced to talk to people without my help, and since boys were supposed to mix super well in all-boy schools, Ronin was thrown there. I, separated cruelly from my protector brother, was thrown into Sagona Senior High.

It really didn’t matter much to me at all for a few moments, but missing Ronin became quite real. Both of us moved into the respective dorms, and my roommate, instead of being my brother, became my best friend, Lydia. Lydia and I have a million things in common, but she cannot compare to my silent Ronin. I could only imagine the hardships my brother was suffering from in his own dorm, his own school. We constantly wrote to each other, and though Ronin was great at writing, it wasn’t enough for me to be settled.

To say I worried about Ronin was an understatement, but Mum and Dad had insisted that it was for his sake, so I tried my best to not act like a crazy mother hen.

Separation aside, I did have great fun in Sagona Senior High. I made lots of girlfriends, and a few guys asked for my number. I went out and partied, and by the first winter break, I was thoroughly baked. For the holidays, both Ronin and I went back home to spend some time together.

And that was when I found out that life for my big brother wasn’t as fun as I had.

Ronin had no friends. No roommate –because there was an imbalance of students in the dormitory, so some boys had single rooms. Ronin was thoroughly unhappy, and while he didn’t comment about it at all, giving excuses that he was fine being alone in that school, I could see he was grumpier. The typical anti-social brother of mine wasn’t making any progress, and he still grumbled and growled, glaring and staring at people.