Throw Your Phone

The screen of Asahi's phone displayed a familiar notification:

"Payment Overdue"

The large bolded words followed by the amount he owed mocked him with the buzz the reminder made.

Ignoring the note, the blonde boy slid the key into his apartment door before stepping inside with a bag of groceries. In the dim room only illuminated by the evening sun, Asahi locked the door behind him and tossed his shoes off into a corner. He loaded a few boxes of microwave dinners and a pack of beer into the fridge before collapsing on the mattress, avoiding the exposed springs.

Asahi stretched his entire body, his hands and feet hitting the walls of the tiny apartment. Reaching forward, he opened his fridge and took out a can from the previous pack and cracked it open.

This was not the life Asahi had dreamed of when he first attended a university. He had thought it would be fun, hanging out with friends, meeting girls, and enjoying college life. Yet despite all his ambitions and effort to move far away from his hometown, none of those things had come to fruition.

Sure, maybe it was nice at first. Asahi had really put himself out there. He talked to his classmates, attended some clubs, and found fun events. But Asahi only found that he was not prepared for Tokyo's city life.

Things moved fast, really fast. And while people weren't exactly rude, no one cared a single bit about anyone else. If your hands were full, a person wouldn't hold a door for you. If someone bumped into you, they would just keep walking. But for those who did want your attention, it was either money for a service or potentially troublesome.

The living costs had also surprised Asahi. He was well aware of the difference between Tokyo and Kyoto, the expenses had quickly accumulated and Asahi soon dug deep into his savings. He had thought about returning home but dropping out would not be an acceptable choice.

The only thing that kept him moving was the support from his friends and family back home. Especially his younger brother and childhood friend. Both greatly admired Asahi for his courageous declaration and wanted to follow him wherever he went.

"Asahi-nii is going to study in Tokyo?! That's amazing!" his younger brother beamed while swinging his legs off the porch on a hot summer day.

"Of course, Seita!" Asahi stood up straight with his hands on his hips.

"It's not fair. You're not supposed to go first. Didn't you say we would go together, Asahi?" his childhood friend pouted and glanced away, her long hair whipping the brother as it flew by. The energetic kid placed a hand on his cheek and shot her a mean glare.

"It's not my fault Mihari is graduating next year," Asahi smirked and took another slice of watermelon. "Maybe you'll be born earlier than someone else in your next life!"

"Shut up! As if I care that you're going to Tokyo. All that means is that you'll have to study more than me."

"Well it's not like I don't already,"

"How dare you! You can't even beat me in a game of Old Maid!"

The two teenagers glared at each other, their faces only inches apart and fists clenched for an inevitable duel. Despite the tension, Seita began to laugh, snapping the two friends out of their rage and they turned to the gleeful boy.

"What?" the two of them asked simultaneously.

"I like this," he stated calmly while crossing his legs. "I like you two acting like this very much. You really are best friends."

Asahi's growl turned to a grin and he let out a sigh. He glanced back at Mihari who returned his gaze, now with a friendly smile. She twirled a strand of black hair with one finger before giving him a nod.

"Do your best, okay?"

It had been a year ago since Asahi saw any of them in-person. He and Mihari continued to text each other and he often held video calls with his friends and family. But throughout his first few months of studying, the occurrences became less and less before resulting in only occasional texts and pictures from Mihari and his family.

Staring at the last message sent from his childhood friend, Asahi read that they last talked three weeks ago. Her last message consisted of a selfie with her and two friends at a cafe enjoying some crepes.

Asahi admired the picture, reminding him of his hometown through the colorful scenery and a warm feeling from his smiling childhood friend. Seeing her enjoying her youth made Asahi feel like she was having fun for both of them, and that's what helped him continue pushing forward.

As Asahi moved his finger to close the photo, his phone vibrated. His finger tapped down on a notification, launching an app by mistake. Asahi groaned as he sat up, ready to close the app as soon as the system would allow him but noticing it was a short recommended video, he let out a sigh and decided to let it play.

A young girl with green streaks in her hair appeared on the screen holding her phone.

"These days, people have too much stuff and really cling to the past. That's why—" the girl suddenly turned and chucked her phone against the concrete ground, shattering it into pieces as the cameraman followed her movement. Another cameraman across the room filming let out a cheer as the remains slid across the floor.

"Must be nice to waste money like that,"Asahi muttered as he watched the girl casually hurl another perfectly good phone onto the pavement.

"Get rid of things you don't need. We all get new phones every year or so. Why keep the old one? Learn to move on. Get rid of your old phone as a way of letting go! Let's move forward, people!"

The video began to loop over as Asahi let out a sigh. It was such a stupid move to do that, and just for view too? He shook his head, chuckling slightly to himself.

Sliding up on the screen to move on to the next video, Asahi shook his head as he noticed it was another short of someone chucking their phone. He slid down once again but this time, he froze up for a second.

A compilation video of people chucking their phones. Whether it was against the ground, the wall, or even off a bridge, there seemed to be an abnormally large amount of people doing it.

Confused by such an event, Asahi scrolled back to the original video and opened up the comments. Over twenty thousand of them.

"Getting rid of my phone was great! I felt like I just lost all of my stress!"

"More! Get rid of more phones!"

"This is my last comment from this old device! Say goodbye to this piece of trash!"

Asahi went to the homepage of the app to find maybe suggested videos of the new phenomenon. The blonde boy watched in disbelief as influencer after influencer smashed a brand-new phone against the ground, all in the name of some viral trend. It wasn't soon before he found himself back at the original video that started it all.

"Letting go of the past by tossing away a phone?" Asahi scoffed as he repeated the woman's sentence. "That's absolutely absurd. Who has the money to do that?"

Asahi stared as his cracked phone screen. He had been using the same phone for half a decade now and couldn't even afford to get it repaired. Day after day, he studied at the library until his shift at a supermarket. On even days, Asahi additionally took a shift as a waiter in the afternoon and moved his first job to early morning. Often due to his hectic schedule, Asahi would skip both lunch and dinner and forget to eat breakfast until two days later.

After work, he had no choice but to travel straight home rather than hang out with some classmates. He often had to recharge his card before getting on the metro and walking home, there were no less than ten traffic lights he had to wait for before crossing. Once he got home, it was back to studying managing his finances, before eating a quick microwave meal and collapsing on his mattress.

Four or five hours of sleep later, he would wake up, stop at a convenience store to buy some breakfast, and head to classes before repeating his schedule all over again. Yet while he could barely make ends meet, other people were chucking old and new phones around without a care in the world.

"This is ridiculous,"Asahi muttered as the viral video continued to play. Frustration boiled over as Asahi's phone buzzed with another notification about overdue bills. Gritting his teeth, he let out an infuriated yell and chucked his device against the far wall.

The phone hit the wall with a satisfying crunch before falling to the wooden floor. As Asahi took deep breaths to calm himself down, he quickly regained his composure and glanced up to inspect the damage done to his phone.

His eyes widened and he noticed something new in his room. His phone laid on the ground, no worse than before the toss but resting next to it was a camera. Asahi crawled over and picked up the device. It wasn't just a camera, it was a high-end brand new camcorder! In fact, Asahi knew he had just seen it earlier.

Picking up his phone, he noticed that the video was paused on the frame after the woman had tossed the phone against the ground. Held in the hand of the cameraman on the screen was the exact same camcorder that Asahi now had.

Hands trembling, Alex picked up the camera once again, his mind racing.

"T-this can't be real," he whispered, his eyes vacillating between the camcorder and his phone. The item sure felt real. From every angle, the camera looked like the real thing. It even turned on when the screen was flipped open. Asahi had to pinch himself to make sure he hadn't fallen asleep.

As realization slowly fell over him, Asahi returned his attention to his phone.

"What if..." he quickly typed into the search bar before clicking on the first result. As the video loaded, Asahi hesitantly lifted his arm. With a deep breath, he hurled his phone against the ground. As a sound crunch was heard once again, the phone fell flat against the ground.

Asahi stared at the phone in silence. Nothing happened. He let out his breath and closed his eyes, knowing that it was obviously too good to be true. Yet, he felt something soft brush down upon his hand.

Opening his eyes, Asahi saw that a thousand yen bill had landed upon his hand. He then finally noticed the unbelievable phenomenon occurring before him.

Bills were erupting out of Asahi's phone, popping out initially as translucent shaped light but rendering into thousand yen bills. It began to rain down, covering his floor and mattress in a blue wave.

A smile tugged on the edges of his lips as Asahi stared at his phone with hopeful eyes. Perhaps there was something good about this new trend.