Sayane and Masaru Pt III: Our Last Summer

Slams on the door sounded as though someone was trying to break in.

“Masaru?!!” Sayane cried out.

“I’m here! I’m here, it's okay!!” Masaru shouted.

Burning agony scorched across his eye, almost forcing him to his knees as he tried to rise.

Another deafening thud shook the walls, and Sayane screamed again.

Chiiiiiikkkkt. Chiiiiikkkkkkkkkkktttt. Chiiikttt.

The room bent on itself.

His hands and arms were nothing more than black smears that faded into the darkness of the room.

BOOM.

BOOM BOOM BOOM.

It sounded like an entire body was being thrown into the door, and Masaru was afraid the barrier might break if this continued.

“Stay in the room!” he called to Sayane.

BOOOM BOOOOOM BOOM BOOM BOOM BOOM BOOM

He was shocked that others weren’t shouting. This noise had likely woken the whole floor, and the shakes had probably woken those above and below him.

Clammy palms pressed on the ground as he forced himself up and towards the door.

“Masaru?” Sayane whispered.

The thuds stopped, and Masaru dared to creep forward.

Inches closed in years. Each shuffling step sent spikes of adrenaline through his veins. His teeth chattered against themselves.

Chikkt Chiiiickkkkttttt Chiiiiiittttttt chi cit cithakhtttttadcktkktttt

Silence.

Masaru reached the door and inhaled as he pressed both hands against the frame, bracing for another attack. His head rotated so that his good eye could look into the door viewer. But he only saw black.

The glass was clean, so he should have been able to see something. Masaru rubbed his eye and looked once again.

Black.

Nothingness.

Emptiness.

Masaru blinked to clear his eye, then looked one last time.

That time, he could finally see through the viewer. The blackness was gone. Nothingness had vanished, and now nothing was there. Everything on the other side of his door looked normal. Masaru feared it hadn’t been some trick of the light. Whatever those thuds were, and whatever that nothingness was, it had felt the same as the terror he felt in Warm Embraces.

His stomach sank into itself as he wrestled with the possibility that the hotel’s malice had followed them home.

“Oh shit. Oh shit, no,” he whispered to himself as he looked at his nearly invisible arm.

Throughout every miserable day that had occurred since Masaru started at Warm Embraces, he’d never once felt that its wickedness could leave those grounds. It wasn’t responsible for The Eyes, which had followed him since he was a child. He wasn’t sure it was responsible for the physical horror he was now experiencing as he faded. But those knocks and thuds, and that void, he was almost positive it was to blame for that.

Cruelty had descended on them in so many ways, and it was finally beginning to feel like too much.

pick

She was half dead and emotionally broken.

pick

He was wasting away, seemingly soon to fade from all perceptions.

pick

The Eyes were always there.

pick

And now something malicious and enormous was taunting them.

pick

His hand fully vanished, and tears formed in his good eye. Masaru exhaled a slow, defeated sigh. It was too late. At least for him.

Fingers traced his raw neck.

There were no more scabs to pick at.

The healing had stopped.

In the darkened silence, he allowed himself to look around his apartment to take stock of what remained of his days.

Totems of attempted happiness. Tools for survival. Prayers for peace that had never fully come. None of it had been enough to stop the slow spiral into nothingness.

At least he could be kind to her for a little longer.

That was the only thing he could think of as he recalled the damaged skin and purple veins he’d just seen. Maybe one of them could at least make it out, but it wouldn’t be him.

“Masaru?” Sayane whispered from the other room.

He inhaled to wipe his eye as his other hand began to disintegrate.

“I’m here,” he said as his tear smudged into an inklike stain on his cheek.

He entered the bedroom and knelt beside her. Even in the dark, he could see that she was still trembling.

“You know what’s cruel?” she asked in a childish, frightened voice.

“What?” he asked.

“I really am afraid of the dark…” she sighed.

Masaru frowned because he knew she wasn’t joking this time.

“I am. I have been all along. All those unfamiliar thuds or sounds that drift through the darkness. That feeling of being in an unknown room for the first time. The fear I feel when I misplace something. It’s all… so terrible… I hate… all of this…” she sighed.

“C-can you see anything at all?” Masaru asked.

Sayane shook her head.

“I don’t even see blackness. Just… emptiness. Nothingness…”

Her words struck him. Out of all the ways to describe it, she’d chosen the exact same wording he had just sensed. It also made him re-evaluate the darkness that bled across his sight any time his bad eye had strayed for too long. Nothingness had haunted them both for their entire lives, and now it was closing in on them like a bloodhound.

“What was that just then?” she asked.

“I don’t know. I…”

Masaru stopped himself. He feared that trying to explain what was happening to him would be too hard and might scare her away.

“What?” she asked.

“Nothing. It’s okay. Whatever it was, or whoever it was, they’re gone now.”

Shifts in the blanket told him her legs were moving. His had stopped tapping. She sighed in concern. Faint hints of light peered through the window blinds. Dawn was arriving. Masaru had an idea. He was unsure how much time he had left. By all indications, the nothingness would consume him in a few days, and he was losing hope that there was any way to stop it.

“Sayane?” he asked.

“Hmm?” she murmured through unparted lips.

“D-d-do you want to get out of here for a night? Take a quick day trip s-somewhere?” he asked.

She sat on her elbows.

“But your work?” she asked.

“I don’t give a damn anymore. Let that place rot. But maybe we could go to Kamakura, or Hakone, or Nikko, or something for the day? Stay a night, then come back? My t-t-treat.”

True, he did have some money in savings that could afford a simple trip. It wasn’t much, but it would have to be enough. She worked the idea over in her head, and he offered one more clarifying detail just in case.

“I can get us separate rooms. Or at least a room with separate beds. I’m not trying to be indecent or cunning.”

She laughed softly.

“I wasn’t worried about you, Masaru. You’re too kind to do anything indecent.”

He smiled again.

“I didn’t even sniff your underwear while you were gone.”

Swift exhales came from her nostrils as she chuckled to herself.

“Well, I can spread my legs real quick if you want to come over here and get a scent,” she whispered.

Masaru’s face burned red and he felt blood rush to areas he hadn’t intended as he tried to stutter a response.

“S-S-Sayane!” he snorted.

“I’m just messin’ with you, Ishikawa-kun-chan-san. …But I won’t stop you if you want to.”

He still had no idea when she was joking and when she wasn’t, but he blushed to himself when he felt his pants becoming unwantedly tighter.

“S-soooooo…” he stammered.

“Kamakura sounds nice,” she admitted.

“I’d like to hear and smell the ocean. If that is okay with you.”

“Of course. Want to leave soon?”

She nodded.

“I’ll pay for the tickets and meals, if you want to get the room. Want to get coffee on the way, or when we get there?” she asked.

Masaru thought it over with a grin. The idea of trying a new coffee shop sounded more enjoyable, since he wasn’t sure how many more chances he’d get. Melancholy optimism floated through his chest as he imagined having a single pleasant day.

“Let’s get coffee there. We can grab something at the store to tide us over. I’ll start packing.”

"Where do you want to stay?" she asked as he stood.

"Not sure. Just not a damn love motel..." he said in partial jest.