Kashii

I stood there and heard his words as he said them, but I was not sure if I heard them ccorrectly. My eyes searched his face for any sign letting me know if he meant those words. If he did mean those words, did he think that I was someone else? Was he not able to recognize my face through the bruises and swollen eyes? Did he honestly believe that I was a long lost son of his that had somehow drifted back to his doorstep? Why was I here? Why did my feet bring me to Nakagana, a man that I had only known as a neighbor, a person that waived his hand to everyone that passed his yard? My mind was racing, making those boulders roll around some more and make the inside of my skull bruise and throb all over again. I moved my lips to make the word, "What?"

"I said welcome home son," he smiled as he said it, his arms raised in an open hug, waiting for me to lean on him and hug him back. When I saw him raise his arms I instinctively flinched, I saw his arms lowere slightly, but not all the way. I saw the smile fade from his face and become a look of concern, and then sadness filled his eyes. I let the shame of my fear leave me and then I raised my arms back to give him a hug. He patted my back softly and then realeased me, he looked at me and smiled. "You are now home, you are now safe, you are now welcome."

I had never had a feeling of such warmth spread through me, I was dumbstruck. I did not know what to say or do. My legs felt rubbery, my knees wanted to fold up and let me fall to the floor. Nakagana had noticed this and just let me rest on his shoulder and cry. My eyes were opened up and the hurt and sorrow was pouring out of them straight from my soul and onto his shoulder. I do not know how long I cried on his shoulder, but eventually I was led to the couch and sat down on the unbelieveably comfortable cushions. I tilted my head back and let it rest on the pillow behind it and closed my eyes. It was not long before sleep came to me that evening, when I opened my eyes the room was filled with sunshine and warmth.

For a minute I thought that I had dreamed all of the events that I had just written about, however when I blinked my eyes I could tell that I had not because the boulders were still there, and they were rolling yet again. I closed my eyes and tried to let the boulders not get the best of me, however the constant drunning sound in my ears and the throbbing pressure inside of my skull became too great. I turned my head, getting ready to find the bathroom, instead saw a bowl on the floor next to me. I could not hold it anymore and I vomited in the bowl. Before passing back out I was able to notice that there was not any blood in the bowl with the vomit, this was a good sign. I fell back asleep and woke up with the room a little more dark and the sounds of people in the other room. The first voice I heard was Nakagana's, he was talking to someone, it seemed that they may have been arguing about something. "I stand by my decision. He is staying here, he will not go back to that hell. He does not deserve that, no one does."

The next voice that I heard was a woman's voice, worried yet warm. "Nakagana, please hear me. I am just concerned that he could do something to our home. I agree that no one deserves that, but we also deserve to be safe, don't we?" I could understand her concern and I could see her point. Who really wants to welcome a stranger into their home?

"Kashii, I hear what you are saying, and I know what you feel. He is not a danger to us, nor to you. He has respect and kindness in him. I saw that in his eyes, what I could see of them. I could sense it in him as well. He has no where else to go. He needs us."

"What guarantee can you give me that he will not be a danger?"

"If he makes one false move, I will rectify it and he will be gone. No arguments."

"Naka, know that I am not follish. I know that you will do everything you can to make sure it is safe for me, what if his being here becomes a danger to us? How do we know that the people that did that to him are not looking for him right now?"

"The people that did that to him I moved off of our fence earlier today, and his family is who he ran away from. They have thrown him into the street, they do not care about anymore. I cannot go to sleep knowing that I did nothing to help this lost soul when I had the chance to do so."

"One move that I do not like and he is gone. Now answer me one more thing if you will," I could hear the smile on her face, " What is his name and what does he like to eat?"

I had stood up and was standing around the corner from them listening to the whole situation and the concern of his wife Kashii, all of it understandable and expected. I cleared my throat so they k new that I was there, I did not want to frighten or scare them. Nakagana stood and walked around the corner and grabbed my elbow gently and led me towards the table to Kashii.

In the chair in front of me was one of the most beautiful women I had ever seen in my life. She had skin that was flawless and smooth, an olive-ish tint to it. Her smile was wide and welcoming, full of genuine warmth and concern, her eyes were deep pools of thought. I could feel myself smiling at her, and thought of how hideous I must look to her. She stood and held her hand out to me, I grasped it gently and shook it softly, keeping my eyes on her. "I am Yojiro. I am honored to be welcome in your home. I will not be a danger to you, and if I do make any threatening move, please tell me and I will leave on my own."

Kashii smiled her beautiful, peaceful, wondrful smile at me and asked, "How do I know that you are not telling me a lie? Do you have something that I can hold on to for a guarantee?"

I kneeled down in front of her and held her hand in my two hands, I looked upinto her eyes and let her stare deep down into my soul. I showed her the entire extent of what my heart and soul held, she did not flinch or look away, she took it all in. "I swear to you that I will not do anything to take this feeling of home away from you, Nakagana, or for the first time in my life, me. This is my promise to you Kashii."

Nakagana

I should start this post off with a quick explanation about something that I had stated in a previous post. I had said that my parents never hit us, or did anything harmufl to us, or raise thier hands to us. I am recalling the people that I consider to be my parents, not the original biological parents. A person has no control over who decides to get together and breed, that is something that just happens. Sometimes the result is good and the biological parents end up being the best peope to raise the child, but otehr times the biological parents don't deserve to raise a Sea Monkey, let alone a child. A line of dialogue from a movie with Keanu Reeves in it best sums it up this way, "You need a license to drive yet any butt reaming asshole can be a father." With that in mind I continue my posts......


I ran down the street into an unknown future, scared, humilitaed, sad and alone. I passed several houses with their lights on illuminating the front porches of their homes, peole that lived on my street and near me, but yet I would never have been able to tell you their names or what they looked like. Running down the street in the middle of the night with a bloodied and swollen face, in a land full of strangers, I let my feet guide me. They seemed to have taken on a life of their own as they led me down the streets towards the school, towards the palyground were I had just been not too long ago with Shishimi. They led me past the playground and onto the street that led to her sweet face and caring eyes. My chest was hitching as I was crying and panting from the running, my head had started to stop thrumming and was now booming inside, deep bass drum sounds filled my ears. It was not until later that I realized the drumming sounds was the blood rushing through my veins, much like the "roar of the ocean" inside of a seashell.

My feet stopped their predetermined run in front of the fence of Nakagan's house. I stood there and looked up at the front door, the light was on and a slight mist was in the air. I caught my breath as quickly as I could, must have been five to ten minutes if not more, and then pushed the gate open. As my hand touched the cold chain link fencing I felt a strange warmth spread through my body, starting from my feet and working itself all the way up to my head. I held my hand there with my eyes closed for a second letting the warmth spread through me and then I pushed the gate open, expecting a squealing noise. It moved silently and swiftly, it stopped right before it hit the fence behind it. I inhaled deeply and exhaled slowly, I still had no idea what I was doing here at Nakagana's house, yet here I was. I walked slowly up the concrete walkway that connected the front steps to the sidewalk, a feeling unlike anything else I had ever felt was building inside of me. Looking back on it now I think that I was feeling hope for the first time that I can remember.

I reached my hand out and knocked on the wooden door three times, on the thrid time the door opened up and Nakagana was standing in front of me looking down at my upturned face. We stood there and blinked at each other for a little bit of time, neither one of us saying anything or moving a muscle, just staring. Nakagana raised his hand, I was expected him to close his inside door and leave me out on his doorstep in the rain, however he opened the outer door and held it open for me to walk in. As I was walking inside the door, he half-smiled and half laughed while he said, "Come in my son, what took you so long?"

Homefront

As I said I was stopped by Nakagana as I ran down the sidewalk from Shishimi's mother, he brought me inside his house, past Hokori and Hakana as they hung on the fence and lay on the sidewalk, and I collapsed inside the coolness of the air conditioned entryway. When I woke up I was laying on my couch with my mother and father standing by my side with looks of concern on their faces, along with another adult I did not recognize. He was wearing a dark suit and had a small notebook in his hands, he also had a pen. As I opened my eyes further I was able to take in the entire room and saw three other adults, all of them wearing blue uniforms, and guns on their hips. They also had small badges on their left breast of their shirts, all of them gold. I knew that I was in trouble then as I could tell that they were cops. I was not happy in the least bit, nor were my parents.

"Are you awake son?", asked the man in the dark suit. I looked at him and blinked, it hurt to do that, God it hurt so bad. I nodded my head up and down, boulders moved around inside my head and I swear to God it bruised the inside of my skull. He continued on.

"My name is Hanzo, I am the Lieutnant of these fine police officers", he gestured with his hand, " and we need to ask you a few questions. Do you mind?" He held his notebook towards me and I again moved my head to answer, this time it was a slow, small shake of the head left and right. More boulders moved around the inside of my head making it hurt more and more.

"Great, can you start by telling me your name?"

With a great amount of effort and strength I told him, "Yojiro."

"How old are you Yojiro?"

"I am twelve years old."

"Where do you live?"

At this point I was a little annoyed, I hurt all over, my head was throbbing, the boulders were moving around all over very fast and hard. I wanted him to stop talking so I answered himt he onoly way that I could answer him at that moment. I opened my mouth and said, "Where did you drive to?"

The response was immediate, my mother made a gasping noise, my father shot his hand out and struck me against the back of my head. Now I don't know if it was the fact that I was just insubordinate to their Lieutnant or if they didn't care about me, but the police officers did not make a move when my father struck me. Explosive hurt filled my head, my eyes teared up, and I was close to fainting from the pain.

Hanzo just looked at me and smiled, he continued with his questioning and asked me all of the pertnant items, such as place that I live, year that I was speaking in, mother and father's name, any sisters or brothers that I may have had, any pets. Then the questions took on a whole new direction when Hanzo threw in the mix this question: "Do you make it a habit of sneaking around the bushes and hurting people for no reason?"

I stopped my flow of answers at this point and just looked at him, disbelieveing what he had just asked of me. Did he not know what really happened and was he just asking me this to see what I would say? Was he testing me, or did he really not know? My head hurt from all of the boulders rolling around the inside of my skull, I swear that I endured fifteen concussions just from thinking. I opened my mouth and said what seemed to be the best response I could, my mouth moved and my voice spoke without my control, evidenced by "What do you think?"

My father slapped the back of my head again, fresh pain exploded behind my throbbing eyes. I turned and looked at him, tears of pain and frustration leaking out of the corners of my eyes. I glared at him, stood there staring at him, trying to figure out why he wanted to cause me more pain than I was already standing. Did he not love me? What did I do wrong in protecting Shishimi? Why was everyone blaming me for what happened to her? Why was I being treated like the criminal here?

Hanzo was obviously not happy with what I had just said to him, his face flashed red and his brow wrinkled in fierce concentration. He was trying to intimidate me and it was not working, I just didn't care at that point. My head hurt too much for me to even care about the tears streaming down my face and falling off the edge of my jawline. All I wanted to do was sleep, lay my head on the pillow (which I know would hurt once I did it), and just close my eyes and let sweet dreams come to me. He picked up hi pencil and wrote down an answer, judging by the quickness of the writing he wrote down the word "No" and then continued with his pointless questioning. What did the attackers look like? Why didn't I defend myself when they were beating me up? In the immortal words of Yul Brenner, "Et ctetera et cetrea et cetera..." My ears pricked up when he asked, in his condecending voice, "When did you feel it was safe to hurt the others?"

Once again my voice acted of its volition and said to Hanzo's arrogant smirk/smile, "When they decided to wave their pricks in the air." One more slap from my father, more blinidng pain, more tears, this time my head was split in two from the scream of rage that left my mouth as I turned to my dad's shocked face and wide open eyes. The next thing that happened to me was I was being held down on the living room rug, my face turned off to the side so I could breathe, my arms being held behind my back. I was being contained in the classic police hold that you see so many robbers being held in on those cop shows on tv.

"Let go of me you fucking asswipes, get your fucking hands off of me. Dickheads! Batards! Pricks!" I was completley enraged, with each scream I thought for sure my eyeballs would explode. I was thrashing around as much as I could, surprisingly I threw two of the cops off of me, they went rolling into the coffee table and sent the contents on the floor. The table itself was turned over from them colliding with it. I stopped moving when one of the cops hit me in the back with their baton, my legs went numb, they felt like ice was being poured through the veins. I immediately stopped thrashing around and let them land one more blow before they picked me up and sat me back down.

Hanzo looked me right in the eyes with his obnoxious little bastard's face and wanted to know why I was such a violent person and when did I start having these tendencies. Again my mouth was moving before I could stop it, and I told him that I was only having these violent thoughts since my dad started hitting me and I had to sit and look at his ugly dog-fucking face. Maybe not the best choice of words, but they were exactly how I was feeling at the moment. I was expecting another slap from my dad, instead what I got was nothing. Stunned silence greeting the room, the hands holding me down let go. Finally, they realized what I had been saying all along, let me go. I don't think that was exactly what they wanted to do.

I jumped up from my chair, my body moving on pure adrenaline and instinct at this moment (however I have no idea, even to this day were my body learned this particular instinct) and slammed the chair over Hanzo's head. The chair broke into pieces and lay on the floor around our feet, I bent over and scooped a leg into my hand. I stood up and hit one of the approaching cops in the chin with it, sending him off of his feet and landing on top of the table, breaking it on the floor. I had grabbed another piece of wood from the chair in my other hand as he was falling down and hit the other cop in the knees as I was kneeling down out of the way of his baton. He hit the floor in a scream as I shattered his kneecap.

I stood up holding both pieces of wood in my hands waiting for the next move from anyone in the room. Fate being the funny beast that it is had a crazy plan for me that night as my father was the one that made the next approach to me. He made three steps towards me with his fists raised and his mouth open and screaming. The wood in my right fist had slammed into his mouth spreading his lips back into his mouth and knocking loose three teeth. He stood there swaying on his feet, looking like he was about to topple over. I spun around on the heels of my feet and felt the wood in my left hand connect with his temple. I watched him fall into a heap of an unconcious body. I heard my mother screaming and turned towards her, she was clawing at her face leaving red lines down her cheeks as her nails dug into her skin.

I dropped the pieces of wood and ran out of the door leaving my mother's screams behind me. I heard the screen door slam as I ran down the street towards Shishimi's house, having no idea where I was going or what I was going to do. The night air rushing past my face as I ran down the street cooled down my face, the blood was drying on my eyelashes and face, turning hard and crusty. I heard sirens in the background, I was not sure if they were going to my house or not, I never looked back I just kept running down the street into God only knew what was waiting for me. To this day I have never been back to that particular house and I have no desire to go back, ever.

Beginnings

Every story has a beginning and mine is pretty simple and boring. I was born to a simple, hard working family in a suburb of a major city. I was the youngest of four, I had one brother and two sisters. My mother and father were loving parents, never did anything to abuse us, never did anything harmful or hurtful. They were alwasy ready with their arms out for a hug and mother was always ready to give us a kiss. If we got hurt she was there with a plate of cookies and a bandage for us. If it was a hurt that could not be mended with a bandage she was there with the soothing and kind words that made us feel like we were the most important person on the face of the Earth. Father was also there to give us support and affection, he was not the hard skinned grumpy man that most people associate a father of that generation to be. For that I am truly grateful. I think that I take after my father more, now that I am older I can look back on my life and really see that I do. I would have thrown a punch or a kick at the first person that ever suggested such a thing as I was grwoing up. It's funny how things change as you get older isn't it? I remember once when I was little I used to think that thirty was old, now I laugh at that simple idea. I used to think that it would be so hard to drive a car, now I wonder how I ever got around without one. I used to believe that love was something I would never know about nor care about, now it is all that I live for. I used to be so silly to think that I would never be like my parents (or father in particular), now I wonder why I spent so much energy trying to avoid ever becoming such a wonderful person. I am not trying to sound arrogant when I say that, I know that I am not perfect nor is anyone, but I know that I resemble my father and he is one of the most remarkable men that I have ever known. That is why I am able to say that I myself am a wonderful person. Not that I don't resemble my mother, she is amazingly patient and kind and loving and funny, and her attitude towards life is something that I have inherited. She has the best outlook on life and she is so loving and kind, I only hope that sometime in my life I have someone remeber me with half as much love and pride as I remember my mother. I could only be so lucky......

I seemed to have drifted once again, I was telling you about the beginnings of my life. Like I said it is nothing too exciting. But I will try to set it to words that will seem like I am telling you something good, maybe something that you could learn something off of. I was an overweight child, genetics and laziness had a lot to do with that. I would spend my day eating junk food and sitting in front of the television and play video games. When I went to school I was considered "the fat kid", meaning that I was not able to find one other fat kid around me that everyone else would pick on instead of me. With all of that teasing and bullying I became an even more withdrawn child, I would look at my feet a large amount of the day, never looking in anyone else's eyes. I never wanted to see the look of pity that I would get from teachers and adults, and I never wanted to see the look of disgust that I would see from the other kids (especially the girls). In all of the teasings that made up my childhood the one person out of all of it I owe a big thanks to is a kid that we will call Hakana.

Hakana was an unfortunate child living in a house of broken parents, broken hearts, and broken bones. His face did not look classically handsome, nor even attractive in any way. He had a bottom lip that stuck out past the top lip, he had sunken eyes, a large brow that looked like a caveman's and he had two eyebrows that grew into one. He had long gangly arms, stick like legs, and big floppy feet. In other words he looked like a walking monkey, yet he was able to make me feel bad about myself. Let me rephrase that, I allowed him to make me feel bad about myself. Every day he would say hurtful, mean things that would ake me cry. I tried to ignore him yet I was never able to get awy from him. His voice would echo nside of my head over and over again, making me feel even more down about myself than I already was. I learned how to hate the sound of a voice. For three years he tormented me until one day I snapped, and the world was not ready for it.

I spent three years in hell being told over and over again that I was a "pile of shit" that I "looked like a giant turd" and that I was nothing but a "fat pussy". Just a few of the everyday things that were told to me, yet enough to make me feel bad. I would be humilated every day from Hakana, he was merciless and wrong for a few of the things that he did. He would ambush me as I was running home from school, I would never walk because that would allow them to catch me and beat the holy hell out of me. He would have his brother wait for me up the street and watch for me, then he would come up and beat me up and then run away telling me how fat and stupid I was. One thing that I learned was that he was consistent, and that he always followed the same pattern. After a while I came to expect the beatings, yet at the same time I was studying the lay of the land as they put it.

After three years of schoold beatings and torments, beatings that would continue into the summer if he saw me by the school or on the street any where near him. I never once said that I hated him, and come to think of it I never did. I did feel sorry for him, because I knew what kind of a house he was coming from, that was eveident from the scratches, black eyes, and casts that he always wore. Not to mention the fact that I had heard someone say out loud once that his mother and father were divorced, and from the spying that I did when he was not aware. I learned a lot about my enemy, and used it against him in a way that people still talk about to this day.

On the fourth year of my schooling I finally found the courage inside of myself to stand up and fight back. I was walking Shishimi home, holding her books for her, and enjoyiung the fact that I was able to find a person that wanted to talk to me. (And the fact that she was a she made it even sweeter) Hakana saw Shishimi and myself walking down the street and he made his move. He had his brother, Hokori, walking with him watching for cars and adults. I don't know if it was the fact that Hakana was at this time evil incarnate or if he got the idea from watching tv or a movie, but Hakana and Hokori made it quite clear what they planned on doing to Shishimi. And what they wanted to do to her is not anything that a child, nor an adult, should ever have happen to them. To show that they were going to have superiority over her they showed her how powerful they were by shoving me to the ground and kicking me. After they each sat over me and beat me with their fists and left their foot prints on my back, and making my face bloody and nearly breaking my nose, they stood up and grabbed Shishimi by the hair and the waist and started to drag her towards the bushes on the side of the road. It was this image that made me ignite inside and stand up and follow them.

I came up behind them and saw Hokori holding Shishimi down on the ground while Hakana was standing over her unbuttoning his pants and unzipping them, he never got any further than that. I saw the tears tracks cutting through the dirt on Shishimi's face, mixing with the blood coming from her nose where they had hit her, and pounced like a tiger. I felt my legs go heavy, my heart started to beat fast, the blood was throbbing in my ears, I shot my hands out and grabbed Hakana by the throat from behind and threw him to the ground. He was struggling for breath when I landed on top of his chest, swingin my fists and hands like a windmill.

The look in his eyes was nothing but terror and surprise, he did not have a clue how to react or anything. He lay there screaming over and over again and again "HELP! HELP! HELP!" Each "HELP" getting more and more weaker and softer as his lips spread out over his teeth, which he eventually started spitting up at me, trying desperately not to swallow them. My knees had pinned his hands to the ground just the way he had always done to me, my fists found his mouth and nose over and over. Blood was spraying out of his mangled nose, he was spitting mouthfuls of teeth and blood up at me, leaving a spray pattern on my face. I had to stop briefly to wipe the blood out of my eyes.

As soon as Hakana started to scream Hokori came running for him, before I grabbed Hakana's throat however, I had kicked Hokori in the balls and sent him to the ground screaming inpain. The whole time that his brother was getting his face rearranged by my hands Hokori was laying in the ground breathing in dust and dirt, choking, his face red. Once he was abe to catch his breath again he stood up and landed a very hard blow to the side of my head that sent me spinning off of his brother. I rolled out of the area that we were in that had been blocked by the bushes and straight on to the yard of Nakagana's property.

Hokori had leapt out and was kicking out at me swearing loudly over and over as his feet landed each kick he shot out at me. I was able to catch one of his feet and throw out to the side and sent him on the ground. I had my feet curled underneath me and my hands were grabbing the grass under them. I must have looked like an animal ready to attack. Hokori stood up and was looking down at me, as soon as he stood I had launched myself forward by unspringing my feet and holding my hands out in front of me. I knocked him down on his back and somersaulted over him and grabbed a handful of his hair and stood up. He had no choice bu to follow me as I walked him out to the middle of the road.

I started to yell for anyone that was home to come outside and watch what happens to people when they try to rape anyone close to me. I saw five faces, all adults that stood there and with their mouths hanging open as they looked at Hokori's face bleeding, eyes swelled shut, and his head being held up by my hand. When I saw these five people I kicked my left foot into Hokori's gut and heard his breath leave his body. He landed on the street with a sickening crunch of bone and blood, I kicked him in the face breaking his nose. Blood sprayed out from his face in a wide fane pattern. It was at this time that Shishimi had come out from the bushes and saw what I had done to Hokori. I picked him back up and threw over Nakagana's fence and left him hanging there, dripping blood from his face and smashed in nose. I walked back to the bushes and dragged out Hakana and made him stand back up in the middle of the street.

"I want everyone to see the face of a bad man. He tried to make Shishimi have sex with him. His brother held her down as he tried to do it to her. For this there is no excuse. For this this is the punishment that you receive from me," with that said I kneed him in balls as hard as I could and then grabbed him by the hair and dragged him towards the fence that his brother was hanging over. I grabbed a foot in each hand and pulled as hard as I could backwards, his nuts were smashed against the steel pole of the fence that his brother was on. I heard Hakana scream and then it faded away as he fainted in a pool of his own blood on the sidewalk.

I walked Shishimi home then, she was only five houses away from this, and her mother saw us walking up the sidewalk and saw what had happened to her daughter. She panicked and started to hit me with her hands screaming about how I hurt her daughter. Shishimi was still inshock and could not say anythng to her mother to make her stop. I turned and ran away from her and was stopped by Nakagana who grabbed me by the arm and pulled me inside of his house. I stood in the cool air conditioning of his front entryway and collapsed on the welcome mat.