Tokyo Demons: Book 3, Chapter 8, Part 2

Jo knew, from the minute Daniel and the adults tried to put him back in school, that it wouldn’t end well.

And it didn’t. He and the other Fukuhashi students–which included a few Byakko members and Riot Girls with milder injuries–got through less than a week of classes before the school shut down entirely. It wasn’t just their behavior, although Jo could admit he was feeling especially resistant to teachers’ orders right after winning a drug war. Considering the number of students who’d died or gone missing, and the fact that the disastrous memorial service had caused more injuries to parents and teachers, Fukuhashi just gave up. The police protection roaming the halls wasn’t enough to save the trimester from itself.

Jo was sure some of the non-thug parents were furious about the premature closing, since all Fukuhashi students would be a trimester behind the other high-schoolers in the city. But he, personally, didn’t give a rat’s ass. It meant he would get an actual vacation.

It also meant Fukuhashi was shutting down the dorms.

“You’re not going back to a home for wayward boys,” Mitsuko scoffed as she pulled down shirts in his closet.

Jo threw her a skeptical look as he stuffed his toiletry bag. “Don’t call it that. It’s just a group home.”

“It’s an orphanage.”

“So? It was fine. It was better than the last foster home they put me in.” He grimaced at the memory. “I was stupid and literally fucked my situation there.”

“Literally fucked? I think I wanna hear this story.”

“Believe me, you don’t.”

Mitsuko tossed the last empty hanger on the stripped mattress. “Who else is in government care?” she asked as she folded the shirt in her hands. “I lost track with you guys.”

“Uh…not Kado, he’s got parents. I thought I heard somewhere that his family is shitty, but he was adamant about going back. He got that crazy look in his eyes.” Jo shrugged. “So yeah, not like we could stop him, even if we wanted to. But sounds like he has a plan there.”

Mitsuko laid the shirt in the over-piled suitcase and flipped the bag’s top closed. She pushed down on the cover, straining with the zipper.

“Sachi has a foster mom,” Mitsuko recalled aloud, her voice turning to a grunt as she leaned her bodyweight on the suitcase. “He was gonna go back to her place, right? Fuck this thing, agh!”

Jo shoved his toiletry bag on the dresser and moved to help her, but she let out a triumphant cry. She tilted back from the bulging, barely zippered suitcase talking up half his mattress.

Jo’s eyes wandered back to the closet. “You…got all those shirts in there?”

“I’m a woman of many talents.” She snaked an arm around his waist and hummed against his neck. “And you have more clothes than any man I’ve met in my life.”

“I’ll take that as a compliment.”

She chuckled. “What about Ayase? Does she have somewhere to go?”

Jo thought on that a moment. “She was in a Christian group home, I think. With nuns.”

“Nuns? That sounds boring as hell.”

“Well, Ayase’s not exactly a…party girl.”

“Not with that attitude, she won’t be.” Mitsuko paused, her fingers tapping up and down the knife-wound stitches in Jo’s waist. Jo shivered and stopped her fingers with his own.

“You’re tickling me.”

She hummed. “You’ve seen how huge my house is,” she explained at last. “We’ve got a bunch of guest rooms. It’s always been hard to convince my parents to let boys stay over, but a girl shouldn’t be a problem. Ayase can stay with me.”

Jo blinked. “Really?”

“Sure. We’re already roommates at Fukuhashi–not that I’ve been in that room much. Should be an easy sell, if she wants to go for it.”

“You’ll have to ask her, but I don’t think she particularly wants to go back to the nuns.”

Mitsuko laughed.

The door opened with a chak behind them; Jo turned to see Kiyoshi step inside. His roommate, seemingly distracted, froze in the doorway.

“Oh. Hi, Mitsuko-senpai.” Kiyoshi’s fingers dragged from the doorknob. “I didn’t mean to interrupt… Whoa, you’ve already packed up half your stuff.”

Jo furrowed his brow. “Because they’re kicking us out in an hour, Kiyoshi–where have you been? You haven’t touched your side of the room.”

Kiyoshi clutched his arm awkwardly. “Uh…”

Mitsuko released Jo, flashing him a look before retreating deeper into the room to pack more things. Jo took the opportunity to grab Kiyoshi’s empty backpack–still flopped at the foot of his bed–and hold it out.

“Here.”

Kiyoshi only stared at it, his eyes distant. When Jo shook the bag, Kiyoshi grabbed it, his forehead creasing as his dark eyes flicked up.

“Um, Jo…”

Jo waited.

“I was just…with my sister. Working out some stuff.” Kiyoshi brushed the edge of his bangs from his forehead, shifting the reddish fibers and their now-visible black roots. “I told you she was looking at apartments, right?”

“Yeah.”

“She signed the paperwork today. And her new place has two bedrooms, so I’m gonna…move in there with her.” He slowly lowered the backpack to his side. “But one of the rooms is a lot bigger, and she wanted to give it to me. We were talking about it–and how, like, it’s big enough to unroll more than one futon in it…”

Jo could hear Mitsuko’s tiny snort-laugh from behind him, but he chose to ignore it. Kiyoshi didn’t seem to notice, since he still squirmed in the doorway like a kid on his first day of school.

Jo waited.

Kiyoshi swung his head, his dark eyes flicking to the wall. “So I was just wondering if… I mean, I dunno what your plans are, but I just wanted you to know that… I just wanted to ask…”

Jo sighed. He pre-emptively reached forward and took the backpack from Kiyoshi’s hands; Kiyoshi’s eyes widened as Jo dropped it on the floor to get it out of the way.

“You’d be doing me a favor if I could live with you and your sister, Kiyoshi.”

Jo slightly regretted the words when he said them–they weren’t as polite as they should’ve been–but he couldn’t follow up from the suffocating crush of Kiyoshi’s arms.

 

Jo had too many bags for the train, so he called a cab. When he left the chaotic dorms and headed for a quieter corner down the street, he was surprised to see Ayase already there.

She stood on the edge of the sidewalk–facing the street, a single backpack hanging from her shoulders, her expression even but serious as she stared at the ground. She looked so focused that he briefly wondered if she was peering through insect eyes somewhere else.

“Ayase?”

She blinked and looked up, the concentration melting from her face. The hard line of her mouth softened.

“Oh,” she said. “Hi.”

Jo rolled his suitcase near her and dropped his duffle bag on the concrete. She took a step back, as if to give him room, even though several paces still separated them.

“Are you waiting for something?” he asked. “I called a cab to meet me here, if you wanna share.”

She shook her head. “Mitsuko-senpai said she’s sending a car, since I don’t know how to get to her place.”

“You are moving in with her? That was fast.”

Ayase shrugged.

A long moment of silence passed, although Jo didn’t feel the need to break it. He flipped open his phone and checked the time.

“You’re…going to live with the Hondas?” Ayase asked at last.

“Yeah.”

“I thought you were moving somewhere with Shouri-san.”

Jo shook his head. “She just wants to do some testing on me. That’s all local.”

“Testing?” Ayase repeated, an uncomfortable edge to her voice.

I had the exact same reaction. Jo pushed his phone back into his pocket. “It’s a…Malum thing,” he said, lowering his voice out of habit. “She wants to figure out what my trait is, since we still have no idea.”

Ayase’s eyes widened. “I almost forgot about that.”

“Well, I sure didn’t.” He grimaced. “I’m not sure what ‘testing’ she has in mind, though.”

Ayase’s fingers rolled over her backpack straps. “Hopefully nothing too bad.”

The way she said it made a fresh bout of anxiety churn in Jo’s stomach. Whereas he had simply assumed the tests would be annoying, Ayase made it sound like Shouri would strap him inside a car and drive it full-speed into a wall.

Maybe Ayase noticed, because she awkwardly added, “I’m sure…living with the Hondas will be nice.”

Jo grunted, happy to change the subject. “I’ll get stepped on a few more times when Kiyoshi inevitably sleep-walks over my futon, but whatever–I’m used to that. Food should be good.” Jo shrugged. “Won’t be as nice as where you’re going, though.”

Ayase pursed her lips.

“I went to Mitsuko’s place once,” he explained. “It’s a mansion. She has servants.”

Ayase furrowed her brow. “She mentioned that.”

“I have a feeling she’ll pamper the hell out of you.”

A frown dragged the thin line of Ayase’s mouth.

Jo sighed and shifted the pack on his own back. “You could try to enjoy it,” he murmured.

He heard the faint scuff of her sneakers on the concrete. “I’m really grateful,” Ayase said in her defense. “Please tell senpai that for me. I mean, I told her myself, but it might help to hear it from you, too.” As she tightened her grip on her backpack straps, she added, “I might not be…the best person to appreciate living in the lap of luxury, but I’m still really grateful.”

“Right.”

Another silence stretched between them, and this one felt more awkward. A cab slowed by them, giving Jo hope, but then it sped up and drove past them, heading for the dorms.

“Uh…got any plans for next week?” Jo tried. “Since we basically have until September to sit on our hands.”

“Maybe.” Ayase glanced up at the clouds. “Sachi and I were thinking of seeing a movie.”

“Which one?”

“Not sure yet.”

“If you tell Mitsuko, she and I can double with you.”

Those dark eyes dropped from the sky to Jo’s face. “Double?”

“Y’know. Double date.”

In an unexpected move, Ayase’s brow furrowed at that. She looked away.

“I don’t know if it’s…a date exactly,” she mumbled.

Jo raised an eyebrow, but refrained from comment.

“To be fair,” he offered, “if I go anywhere, Kiyoshi’s probably gonna tag along.”

She visibly tensed.

Huh?

Now it was his turn to furrow his brow. “What’s the matter?” he asked.

She shook her head. “Nothing. And anyway…we were thinking of bringing Kadoyuki, so it’s already more of a…” She trailed off.

Jo let out a breath and scratched the back of his neck. “Is this ‘date’ gonna become twenty people?” he asked wryly.

“Pfft.”

Blinking, Jo looked up. Ayase was covering her mouth, an aborted grin still curling her lips.

Did she…just laugh? he wondered in disbelief. He didn’t even need to scan his memory–she’d definitely never done that in his presence before.

As he stared at her, she slowly turned her head toward him. Her fingers slipped from her mouth to once again clutch at the backpack strap over her shoulder.

She smiled.

 

 

The faint rumble of a nearby car made Jo snap back to attention. A taxi had rolled up beside the curb, the driver peering out of his open window.

“Oda-san?” the man called.

Jo threw him a quick nod. In the few seconds it took Jo to shift his backpack and grab his duffle bag, the driver jumped out of the car, grabbed Jo’s suitcase, and rolled it off the curb. The man disappeared behind the rectangular mass of the popped trunk.

Jo turned to Ayase. He opened his mouth to say goodbye, but the words vanished when he saw her staring at him–her smile gone and a small crease forming in the skin between her eyes. She looked like she wanted to say something.

“…?”

An unreadable emotion fluttered across her face, closing her lips and twitching the fingers on one hand. She shuffled a step closer to him and slowly reached out.

Her hand landed on his shoulder.

“I…” Ayase swallowed, paused, and tried again. “I’m…glad I met you.”

The blip of tension that spiked in Jo–maybe surprise, maybe confusion–melted as she stood there, her face tilted toward the ground. She rigidly kept her arm out, her fingers gently squeezing the edge of his hoodie.

…Damn.

A breath puffing past his lips, Jo reached out and gripped her opposite shoulder; she didn’t even twitch. Slowly, he took the step that separated them, his hand sliding across her shoulder blades.

He hugged her close so he could bury his smile in her hair.

“Yeah,” he murmured as he felt her face tilt against his neck. He dragged his eyes up toward the sky.

“I’m glad I met you, too.”