Depressed boy and the wild girl.Volume 1.

10 years ago.
NARA,JAPAN.

Come on...
Come on..hurry up.

There is not much time before dad has to go to work,if I miss this bus then grandpa is by himself for the next few hours.

"Wait!"
I scream,the bus just barrels on and avoids my stop altogether so I try to run and running is about as easy for me as it is for my grandpa to get up on his own,I left breathless tears streaming down my eyes wondering now how am I getting home.

"Dad..."
"Where are you Kenji?!I only have maybe a quarter hour left before I have to leave the house....if I am late at all you know what manager Goni will do.Hurry up son!"

I feel even worse now,so did my dad who texted me right after his snapping turtle bit apologizing.

I am not even mad though,I'm scared and tired so tired of having to run after every break and moment to breathe but that is not the problem now.
How am I getting home quickly is the problem now.

All my pocket money is gone towards Grandpa and the Mt Fuji high bills,so the jerks at school beat me up for the sake of me being broke.
Fighting back is out of the question because I am still a head shorter than everyone else at fourteen years old so I cant get a cab.

"GOD help me I don't know what to do,maybe running into a car would be easier and Dad would have less bills to pay and Grandpa could get round the clock care instead of me....."

Oddly enough.
I really think about it.

I'm walking a bridge,looking over the railing and trying to let that thought go.They always tell me that I am the only glue that GOD gifted them that has kept them alive since Grandma died and Mom having to go and stay in Fukui to care for her mom.

It is night now.
Grandpa has texted me,kind of worried about me but I tell him I am fine that the sexy girls at the hostess club are just cooing over my sexy self,that makes Grandpa send me so many laughing emojis it is almost unreal but that is our humor.

Our friendship.

The night sky was a point of levity for us and the deep stuff too,I look at the stars wondering if he may become one if that is how things work in the next life and if Grandma will tell him off for taking so long to join her there.

"You can't go dying on me,not yet anyway please..."

I stand by the rails of the bridge,taking heavy breaths because I am much to chubby for so much walking that I am not accustom to and stare out at that water and think once more about it.

Could they be better off?
Or would only I be?

I hate I about myself how sometimes I am tired of always just going to school and the rest of my day is cleaning and cooking and tending to Grandpa.

He senses that too,I love him so much I do but sometimes I miss being just...
Just a kid for a little while.

But I will find a way home soon,just need a second to-

"OWWW!"

I yell out,I am sent to the ground landing hard on my shoulder almost,I repeat ALMOST dislocating it in...
Whatever this is.

"What do you think you are doing?!"
"What am I doing?What are you doing?!You are thinking about jumping and who said you could?Well who?!Santa claus!"

I hear the voice belonging to who tackled me and I am shamed.

She is like,five foot one inch and in her uniform with ice cream on her lips and looks so angry I could have sworn she were an onryo ghost coming to make me pay for some sin.

"What are you talking about?"
"I saw what you doing...No,NO you do not get to die today or any day until you are supposed to!Got it!Baka...."

This wild girl then proceeds to push me back down from my seated position and ties a thin little red thread onto my index finger and she does the same for herself.

"Now if you try to die again you will be taking me with you,got it?We are bound now forever."

My eyes are on this thin thread then back to this tiny little teenage girl before me wearing a red school uniform unlike my tan one,hers looks like Menamori High.The elite of the elite schools in Japan.

Why is she here?
I do not even see a car or driver for a long ways until that driver runs out of the car looking like if fear had a definition picture in the dictionary it would be his face.

"Lady Kokoro you should know better than to just jump and run away like that!Come,come now before your father murders me and hides you until you are married to that old pig who follows you around...."

Yet,Lady Kokoro...
Kokoro...
That little pig tailed,red uniform wearing,sumo wrestling practitioner of a girl is still before my eyes right above me and won't let me get up and if she were a boy I would have done a likely awful punch by now but she is a girl so that's a no but she will not stop looking at me.

"Are you rising up or falling down Baka boy?"

Her words.
Scathing.
Her manner.
Revolting.
Her voice and her eyes though.
They are screaming at me.

Don't go.

Girls with honey eyes are my weakness though.
Grandpa always said we had the same type.

Bossy and spirited with honey eyes.

I'm doomed.

"Rising up if you will let me get up,crazy spider monkey wild girl..."
"I will know it if you don't.We are stuck together now."

She twirls that threaded finger in my face and I gently swat it away,the driver grabs her like she is a bag of potatoes and carries her to the car complaining the whole way that he isn't paid enough for caring for a girl more frightening and wild than a boar.


ONE HOUR LATER.

"Sounds like you had a wild night,hostess bar and now a wild school girl who beat you up..."

Grandpa can not contain his laughter,he gets a coughing fit for it but he doesn't care and in a way nor do I.

He hasn't laughed this hard since Grandma died over six years ago now.

Maybe this meeting with that crazy spider monkey wild girl was worth it,it gave my Grandpa some mirth again.
I will have to thank her if I can without being tackled anyway.