MAILBOX; inbox

[shoubai]

WELCOME

House 1411

"Hello? Hello?? I'm sorry, there's nobody home right now. [ obnoxious peal of laughter: go ]

Ahh, that's right! Leave a message, and I'll get back to you. Right? That's how it goes? Aha, no telemarketers, please!

If you run up my bill, I'll have to ask you to pay the extra costs.

[ BEEP ]

Comments

Re: a call

[shoubai]

[ and he laughs

and laughs ]

Re: a call

[badbreak]

[the boy falls silent]

[he's... he's sometimes far too exhausted of men who laugh, especially when, sometimes, his face aches from drawn brows and a downturned mouth]

Re: a call

[shoubai]

[ he can laugh or he can shout or, worse yet, he could give into the quiet and the silence and the inevitable cascade of thought that comes with it.

laughing, for sakamoto, is what a stressball is to most men. a piece of string, an oft-chewed pen, a bracing shot of liquor.

with laughter, he thinks he can keep from sinking under too quickly.

with laughter, he can think himself different from the rest of the men who went to war and came back home broken things

so he laughs, and inevitably trails off into nothing ]

Re: a call

[badbreak]

[Badou isn't sure what to say -- but he doesn't hang up]

[(it's an appropriate summation of his life, really)]

Re: a call

[badbreak]

-- Sakamoto?

Re: a call

[shoubai]

[ a shuffle, a clink of glass on wood, the faint telltale ring of liquid in a container, in many containers. ]

Badou?

[ his voice is thick, bright, cheerful ]

Re: a call

[badbreak]

...Don't drink so much tonight. You're gonna get a bad hangover, an' then you'll be pukin' everywhere even more than when you get outta a car. You're gonna be a total pain, I just know it.

Re: a call

[shoubai]

That's what paper bags are for.

[ another laugh, short, but its followed soon after by the defined clatter of a glass on a harder surface.

business opens in the morning, after all. ]

All right.

Re: a call

[badbreak]

[it hurts, how familiar this feels]

...I can't sleep.

Can ya show me the constellations tonight?

Re: a call

[shoubai]

[ constellations, he wants to see the constellations the skies the stars, he

the stars the goddamn stars





its much too dark in this office ]

Re: a call

[shoubai]

Of course.

[ his voice is even and steady; a trick he'd learned over time ]

Just say where.

Re: a call

[badbreak]

By the ocean. Ain't no lights out there, so it's easier, right?

[as fantastic as they are, he doesn't give a shit about the stars, or even the ocean at the end of the day]

[the man on the other end of the line is the closest thing he has to something good, something that makes him feel not so -- so fucked up, and he doesn't want to see him get ruined (and we all play the same roles in different movies)]

Re: a call

[shoubai]

[ he's endured worse than this even on a good day, threats to his person and snide remarks and keeping his head bowed low even when the dregs of pride demanded no.

this is a slip, a break, an anomaly in the proper flow of things. all men have their weak moments, don't they? times when they slip up and give in briefly to despair and anger and rage?

he makes a note to stave away any repeats, and smiles to the empty room. ]

That's right. Give me a half hour, I'll be there.

[ its something he needs, he realizes, like a drowning man needs that hand up, the thing to keep his head above the surface, his eyes above the tideline. Dreams had always been his lifeline.

What a pickle, to find himself in a town there they meant nothing. ]

Re: a call

[badbreak]

Okay. Later.

[some people need dreams, Badou knows]

[he's not one of them; reality crushes his windpipe, pins him to the ground with it's insistence, makes him too sharp too angry too aware]

[but he needs people who need dreams, maybe]

[Badou slings on his brother's coat, and slides himself down the drainpipe]

[ CLICK. ]