Espresso Love (A Dystopian Japan Novel) #Wattys2014

Rendezvous

I manage the rest of the trip without much trouble and reach the convenient store, hands freezing, throat burning. I set my bike on the rack beside a small office building, and head across the street over to the Family Mart when there's a break in the traffic. There's a woman smoking outside on the corner with a colleague – both are in trench coats, twill, beige and dark grey. They don't speak, nor look at one another. They're simply smoking their cigarettes. The smoke makes conversation. It distorts their faces.

They ignore me as I open the door, but yet I can feel their attention on me. Do they have anything to do with the System or the Cause? I find it strange that I'm considerably more aware and more sensitive than before. I can almost feel the effects of their thoughts like frequencies that resonate through the air. My hands are still sweating and my forehead throbs maybe from fatigue or hyperawareness or the lack of sleep. Every detail seems to stand out; every face seems to look in my direction. Colours mix and swirl around me like dancing cartoons on a Saturday morning. The more cautious I am, the more people seem to know, like how a wolf might smell fear.

Inside the store, I take off my sunglasses. No one says anything. It's quiet and sterile. There is no need to welcome new customers it seems. At the counter there's this thin scrawny boy, hair gelled up in a messy patch of grass. His eyes are dead, like he had just woken up and is trying to conserve his energy. He glances fleetingly at me, but returns to staring at a patch on the counter. He's probably wondering why the surface is so empty; there ought to be more going on, he might think. Next to him stands two glass boxes, labeled Hot Snacks, half full of fried chicken, skewers, jumbo sausages and nikuman steamed buns. Several microwaves and posters of celebrities advertising cell phones form a protective wall behind him. There aren't any other customers at the moment. Shizuka isn't here yet so I make my way to the back, my feet silent, past rows of multicoloured packaging – chocolate, candy, pastries, crackers, chips, bread, soft drinks, canned coffee, alcohol, medicine and toiletries. Then a refrigerated aisle packed with onigiri, bento boxes, ready-made noodles, rice bowls and soup. I pause and pretend to browse for food. But I don't find anything of interest and I wander towards the magazine section as promised. I pick up the first one I see. It's a B-Pass with a flattering picture of Flumpool on the cover. I remember hearing their music a few times. At one point in time I might have been a dedicated fan but I can't be so sure now. The pages are thick, glossy and well lavished with colours as I thumb through. It smells sweetly of ink and laminate; I've always loved the scent of printed publications.

Something else catches my attention. I pause on an article about ONE OK ROCK, and an image of Ahn Mi Hyun and her t-shirt on campus comes to mind. We haven't seen her since that night at Cosmo Clock 21. But ONE OK ROCK has virtually nothing to do with the Cause or the System, surely. Their music is fierce and charismatic and forward-thinking and challenges the norm. I can't imagine such music having to do with the System. The article writes about their upcoming international tour, the Philippines, the States, Europe, and plasters images of Taka, the vocalist, foot up on the speakers, arms out in cruciform, preaching to the crowd. A halo of light surrounds him. I can imagine the audience, hands outstretched, for a little portion of something more. The rest of the magazine is more or less the same. There are a few ads for guitars and new album releases and pop singers in high contrast edits. A spread that doubles as a poster.

I close the magazine but as if on cue, I realize there's someone standing beside me then. I'm not surprised. Such things seem to happen suddenly, without warning, as if they can just appear and disappear in and out of my life, no questions asked. It's definitely not Shizuka; she's much shorter and in a high school uniform: blazer, sweater, shirt and skirt and all. Hair black, as black as fresh rubber tires. There are glasses on her nose protruding awkwardly, large and square on her small face, like binoculars fastened to her nose. In her hands, is a ViVi fashion magazine, which she flips through carefully. I could imagine the same kind of intensity in examining an exam paper or a contract. I see a lot of pink on the pages.