A Quick Reunion

            The birds are usually the first thing I’ll hear when I wake up in the morning. When my brother and I used to share a room, I remember he would often be annoyed by the sound of their chirping and start chucking spit balls at them in attempt to shut them up. I was always thought it was funny when the birds would start attacking him whenever he did this. Because of that, he ended up developing a strong desire to watch the bird population die.

My elder brother and I would always laugh at these mishaps of our youngest sibling. These days, though, I wake up to a mostly empty room that hosts myself and only myself. I don’t have a problem with living with people, but I do enjoy my solace. Although, I had forgotten that I had someone with me at the moment.

“Wake up!” screamed my elder brother. He opened the curtains in my bedroom and tired slapping my face around until I woke up. He got 2 slaps in before I lost it slapped him across the face. “Wow! Such a feisty attitude this early in the morning? You’re as spirited as ever, Daiki!”

“Give me a break, you fool!” I yelled at him. “You better have a good reason for waking me up this early!”

“It’s 5 o’ clock in the evening.”

“That’s not good enough!”

Although he called me spirited, my brother, Akihito, was always the one who had such high spirits and a positive attitude whenever I’d see him. It’s nice and comforting to know that my brother’s attitude hasn’t changed much ever since we were children. He was always the first one to wake up, the first in every exam when we were students, and the first in just about everything. I might sound like I’m jealous of my brother, but in truth, I was happy to have a brother like Aki.

“I woke up a little while ago and decided to let you sleep a bit more. I decided to clean up you place a bit an organize some of the things you had lying around on the floor. You’re a phenomenal charms creator, Daiki, but you have to be careful with your tools.”

“Good grief,” I spoke. “We’re both in our thirties and you’re still giving me lectures. When are you going to stop?”

“Depends. When are you going to stop living like a slob, brother?” I looked around my room and noticed a distinct lack of filthy around my futon. “Like your room now, little brother?”

“I think I’ll miss the smell of week-old ramen, but I shall manage for now.” I took a good breath of air and noticed a sweet scent tickling my nose. “What’s that smell? I noticed the rice, but what’s that other scent?”

“Nikujaga,” my brother replied. “I figured that we’d eat like old times. Back when we were still training to be exorcists.”

“Huh. I guess that brings back plenty of memories. Shame Isamu isn’t with us now.” He isn’t dead. He’s in Okinawa while we’re here in my flat in Shinjuku. Aki lives back in our family home in Ibaraki as he’s the Head of our Clan and leader of our exorcist branch.

“Knowing him, he’s probably spending all his time in maid cafes if he isn’t busy taking out yokai and the sort.”

“Really? I’d think he’s busy taking care of those wintertime yokai that are born this time of year.”

“Wanna place a bet on it?” I suggested.

“How much are we talking?”

“50,000 yen?”

“Deal,” I got up and followed my brother to the dining area. He really did clean up my flat. It was surprising to see all the furniture I had under the garbage.

“Tell me, how do you manage to make these sort of charms and weapons in such a filth ridden home?”

“Easy. There’s a simple factor in that thought that’s an essential factor to that statement.”

“And what might that be?” Aki asked. Aki sat down while I went and grabbed the bottle of cola out of the fridge. I walked on over to the cabinet and took out a couple of glasses and poured cola into them.”

“You’re assuming that I work here in my flat and not in a proper workshop that was approved by the council.” I placed the glass on my brother’s right and vice versa on my end.

“It’s reassuring that you’re managing well in work.” I sat down and Looked at the jumbo size bowl sitting in front of me.

“It’s a bit nostalgic, isn’t it, Aki?” I asked.

“It certainly brings back memories.” Early in the beginning of our exorcist training, our father had us put in the wilderness of America where the populace consisted heavily of wild animals. My brothers and had to do our best with surviving the ordeal for 6 months. We had care for ourselves and defend ourselves against the low-level monsters that we came across. It mostly consisted of wild yokai who became violent or wandering souls who thought they were still in battle. At night, when things finally calmed down, we’d set up a barrier to protect ourselves from wandering yokai and animals. On a rare occurrence, we’d find a random cow and butcher it for our survival. Along with that, we’d find wild potatoes in the forest. Then, we’d throw it all together and enjoy nikujaga. I think Americans called it “stew” or something like that.

“Itadakimasu,” we said, and we began our dinner.

“How are things going with your current assignments?” Aki asked.

“Meh,” I replied. “It’s easy to take care of what’s out there when it comes to being an exorcist. Isamu and I may not be on the same level as you, but we can take out the occasional or random yokai should it come across our path if need be. Making charms and weapons of the sort are a more difficult thing to take care of.”

“I would imagine, brother,” he replied. “I’m hopeless when it comes to making tools or weapons of the sort. Years later, I’m still surprised that you’ve managed to create such a magnificent tool like my left arm. I was completely ready to start a life with just my right arm.” I chuckled.

“Your praise is not necessary, brother,” I replied. “I am simply happy with knowing that the arm you have right now is great and still holding up. Allow me to give it a quick overview to make sure that it’s running well.”

He looked up from his bowl with a surprise look on his face. “Is that really necessary, Daiki?” he asked. “It’s been working pretty well without any sort of problems.”

“That may be, but it’s always good to make sure that it’s running smoothly. You take your car into the shop every once in a while, to make sure that everything is running smoothly. That same logic is applied directly to every single thing I’ve created.”

“If you say so, brother,” he said through with his mouth full. I smacked his head when he tried doing it again.

He rubbed his head. “It hurts, but it doesn’t hurt as bad as when Hel does it.” I laughed. Hel, a fine woman who has some sort of interest in my brother, is a woman who is in some sort of relationship with my brother.

“How are things progressing with her, Aki?” I asked him. “Are you guys planning on making things settled or are you ever going to continue this estranged love life with her?”

Hel is an interesting woman my brother met many years ago. She was out an about while he was finishing up a night of slaughtering yokai of all sorts. He thought that she was the occasional being coming around to cause trouble for citizens of the land people live on. One thing led to another and here we are, 20 years later and they have some sort of strange relationship going on.

“I’m not entirely sure where the two of us stand when it comes to being in a relationship, Daiki,” he began. “I like her well enough and all, but I’m not so sure about how things will go about with her.”

“Are you for real?”

“What?”

“With how often the two of you hooked up when you were younger and to this day, I find it baffling to think that you still act as teenagers in a ‘will they, won’t they’ sort of situation. I swear, both of you still act like rabbits in heat.”

“Please stop, Daiki,” he said with his cheek turning into a perfectly bright hue of red. “I can’t stand listening to this sort of talk.”

“You’re almost 40 and you blush like a teenager. How amusing.”

“As if you’re one to talk!” he exclaimed. “At the very least, I’m enjoying time with a wonderful, thoughtful, fantastic, perfectly well rounded and beautiful woman! When are you going to find yourself a bride to be, Daiki?!”

“I should’ve expected him to attack me with that response,” I thought to myself. Aki isn’t exactly wrong in asking me that. And despite me grilling him and his messed-up situation in romance, I do know that my brother has his own trauma when it comes women. Seeing all that go down has, more or less, made me weary of women as well. It’s not as though I can’t get the attention of a woman. I’ve my own trauma as well when it comes to beginning some sort of romantic relationship with a woman. On Aki’s end, he’s unfortunately had his heart broken and betrayed one too many times by a woman he loved and a person he called his friend when we were in school together. I’ve met far too many women who interested in using my name and influence for monetary gain. Isamu’s the lucky one out our trio. He hasn’t had any misfortune in love such as Aki and me. Actually, I can’t say that he’s ever been in a relationship. Isamu adopted this mindset of simply using a woman for their body if he feels the urge to perform a certain “physical activity” if we were in the mood. 

"Heh!" I chuckled. Aki quickly realized what he said and began wishing he hadn't said it and starting wishing he could take it back. I couldn't help but laugh. 

We finished our meal and I started to clean up. “Give me a few minutes. Go sit down at the living room table and I’ll go grab my tools to check out your arm.” I placed the dirty dishes in the sink and quickly grabbed my tools and met Aki at the table.

It was a quick and simple procedure to take care of. There were a few banged up parts that only took moments to fix. “What’s the damage looking like?” Aki asked.

“There’s a few banged-up parts here and there,” I joked. “But it’s mostly safe to say that it’s all running quite smoothly. Just some minor things that’ll take me a moment to fix.”

Looking at his arm reminded me of when I first put this arm on him. At that time, I was mostly training to be a full-time exorcist, but then the incident occurred…Aki nearly gave up his life to protect people who betrayed him and did whatever they pleased. I don’t know what has come of them and I don’t care to know either.

“Something on your mind, Daiki?” Aki asked me. I took a quick glance at him as I finished up looking at his arm.

“Not really, Aki,” I replied. “Just wondering how things will be the next time you bang this up again.” He laughed and then we parted ways.

Aki was in the neighborhood while I was busy working on another project. I know that it was simple work for him to take care of, but he hadn’t seen me in a while and I him. It was a nice reunion that led to take care of a simple gang of yokai.

After he left, I decided to go out and see the Shinjuku nightlife that I’ve often heard of. Despite me living here for more than a few years, I rarely found myself coming out to see what the nightlife had in store. I suppose that was the same night thing took a funny turn for me. I was standing in front of a bookstore, gawking at my newly purchased manga when a young woman bumped into me and mistook me for someone else. I don’t consider myself lucky or unlucky, but this sort of thing was unusual thing to occur. Good grief.