14 - A Club Room of Our Own

… After a few more of these 'another' days, we're finally done.

The club room is clean (enough).

The floor is (relatively) spotless, the wall's (mostly) repainted, and the mold is (probably … hopefully?) gone.

Actually looks pretty nice. Not bad, for a couple of isekai protagonist losers.

We decorate it with the requisite waifu posters and wall scrolls. We fill the bookshelves with anime figures and Alex's game collections. We sit at a table too big for just the two of us. (It's meant to accommodate an actual club, after all.)

"So … what do we do now?" asks Alex.

Fuck. We never thought that far ahead.

We're pretty tired from the non-stop cleaning, so we kinda just take it easy. Play retro games. Read manga.

"I wish we could drink here," I say, flipping through the pages of that one series I never finished. "Kill for a beer right now."

"I mean, it's limbo, right? I don't think we're allowed that kind of stuff here. Technically, I don't think we're supposed to have any emotions or desires at all."

"What? Then explain why I'm so angry and psychotic all the time."

"That's because you're mentally ill, Odd-kun."

"Oh. Oh, yeah."

We pass several days like this. We try and brainstorm what our first official activity will be, as the Isekai Waiting Club (Temporary Name).

I cross my arms, rocking my chair back and forth, deep in thought. "Hmm … How about this. You know that bootleg cheat skill guy? Who hangs around the back alley?"

"Yeah—that dude tried offering me a deal on an Appraisal skill. I got him to admit that it basically only works on half-eaten Dor*tos chips that happen to be shaped like G*ndo Ik*ri's butt-crack. … Nobody would be stupid enough to buy his shit, right?"

"Ha ha. Yeah. Totally," I say, trying to hide the sight of my new Bag of Holding, which can't actually store anything, but instead keeps burping up what looks like belly button lint, and the occasional centipede, from some fucking stupid goddamn pocket dimension or something, I guess. "… Anyway, what if we bought some like, I dunno—wind magic or something from him?"

"… Okay? And do what?"

"Well, I was looking around the cafeteria and thinking … If we wanna cause as much trouble as possible to Jessica, and L.I.M.B.O., maybe we could cast a couple of powerful tornadoes. And like, sweep up everybody's meal tickets. Then we'll hoard them all for ourselves! Katsu curry for life! … Er, I mean—Katsu curry for after-life!"

Alex just looks at me, incredulous. "That's—That's just Ang*l Be*ts. You're describing Ang*l Be*ts. That happens in literally the first episode."

"I don't, uh—I don't know what that is."

He points at my chest. "You're wearing a G*rlDeM* T-shirt!"

"Oh, is that what this is? I pilfered it from the lost and found."

He points at my digital audio player. "You've got Ichib*n no Takar*mono blasting on your 1st-gen iP*d Nano!"

I take out my white earbuds. (They weren't called EarP*ds back then, kids. They didn't even really have a name.) "… Sorry, were you saying something? I couldn't hear."

He points at my bookshelf. "You've got the entire physical collection of K*y/Vis*al A*ts titles, including a first-print copy of L*ttle B*sters signed by J*n Ma*da on display!!!"

"Ha ha ha, Alex," I laugh, "you're so funny. Anyway, let's go get something to eat."

"DON'T CHANGE THE SUBJECT!"

"(Those were some good-ass retorts, Alex. Exactly why I pay you the big bucks.)"

"(You don't pay me anything.)"

"(Not like Jessica. All she does is, uh—kill me.)"

"(You deserve it, some of the time.)"

"(I deserve it ALL OF THE TIME!)"

"(Don't get defensive over that …)"

… Needless to say, we come up short with any ideas for the I.W.C. (T.N.) to do.

The days pass by.

"Hey," I say to Alex, one day, "do you think it's possible that this—all this, the clubroom, the refusal to reincarnate—is all just us unable to deal with the lingering feelings and regrets we were never able to properly resolve in our past lives? … Like me, who always just did what other people wanted, and you, too scared to go outside? Could it be that this whole club is a continuation of the unresolved baggage in our past lives, manifesting now in the form of endless procrastination, as we continue to avoid addressing our respective deep-seated real-world traumas?"

The two of us look at each other in silence for a while.

Then we burst out in laughter.

"PFFFFFT—YEAH, RIGHT!!!!! AS IF!!!!!" we scream in unison, like some kind of totally rad and tubular 90s slacker comedy duo.

… Anyway, we still don't come up with anything for us to actually do.

But thanks to my newly pathological, compulsive need to manufacture conflict and draw attention to myself when surrounded by normal people minding their own business, I delude myself into believing that Jessica has it out for the IWC(TN), and will shut us down by the end of the semester if we don't find three more members to join our club. (I actually believe it whole-heartedly, too. Call it my own personal cheat skill. Its name? Paranoid Delusional Psychosis. Requiem. MK II.)

"I won't let you shut us down, Jessica! The IWC(TN) won't be silenced by your tyranny," I shout, as I cross Jessica's path in the courtyard, one day.

Jessica looks at me, somewhat dazed, her usual composed, corporate demeanor frayed at the edges. Dark circles under her eyes. Stray hairs sticking out from her normally-pristine ponytail.

"A-Ara … Odd-kun … Good day to you," she says, forcing a smile.

For some reason, Jessica always seems stressed-out these days. She barely even has time to slash my open my palms and pour lemon juice all over the cuts, these days! A-and whenever she throws me into the industrial shredder, feet-first, I can tell her heart's just not into it.

(Honestly, I'm kinda annoyed. I was never able to get under her skin this much. Who's the lucky bastard who succeeded where I failed!?)

"I can't believe you'd shut us down, if we don't find more members!"

"Ara? … N-No, Odd-kun, I don't care about that, actually …"

"And I can't believe you're making us filling out all this paperwork for club approval! We're totally swamped!"

"Eh? … N-No, there's no paperwork, Odd-kun … I don't consider you a real club anyway … Actually, clubs aren't a thing in Point Parallax …"

"…"

"…"

What the fuck is this? Jessica's no fun now.

I return to the dorms, a bit stupefied.

I meet up with Alex outside the dorms. Apparently he was just returning from the clubroom.

"Yo."

"Sup."

I tell him about the weird interaction with Jessica, as we head back to our room for the night.

"I wonder what's bugging her … She's not herself. You know what I mean?"

"Huh?" says Alex. "No, sorry, I, uh—I'm gonna be honest, I wasn't really listening."

We get to our room, and freeze.

The door's ajar.

Alex and I exchange looks.

Then we slowly push the door open …

… revealing a girl, curled up on the floor, her long, greasy, unkempt black hair a tangled mess, dirty socks strewn all around her—some of them ours, the rest belonging to other people—inhaling deeply with relish the scent of a pair of week-old gym socks.

She smells terrible, to put it mildly. And it's not just from all the dirty socks.

We stare at her for a bit, as she keeps sniffing, making weird noises as she does so.

At some point, she notices the two of us standing in the doorway.

"… Ah. … I've been caught," she says, face red.