Found Footage

Chapter 2

Chapter 2She swung her bag over her shoulder, hastening her step as she made her way down the narrow alley, the press of restaurants and bars around her, chalkboard signs put away in the bright light of the early morning, the air crisp, her breath calcifying in white clouds before her.

In the distance, she could hear a radio playing, gentle crooning, syrupy sweet, feelings that seemed too big to fit into words and made little sense to her, not, of course, that she had the time or patience to stop and listen to them, being late as she was. This, Miki thought, would mark the third time in a month she had been late, the unsettling silence of a winter’s Saturday morning crowding in on her as she made her way to school. Not real school, she thought, even if her parents could not distinguish, but cram school, because her grades had been sinking over the last term, and begrudgingly had they taken out their check books and signed away the tuition fees in the hopes that she might be able to pull it together enough in the space of the next two years to graduate and make it into a decent college.

Yet who cared about college, who could even think about college this soon after New Year? People had no heart, she thought, hurrying along, the soles of her shoes tapping against the stones, the chill upon the bare flesh of her face, of her hands, of her legs. Anyone so concerned with rushing into the New Year was not a person to be trusted, Miki considered with annoyance; why everyone couldn’t just let her ease into the new season as she would have liked was beyond her, but instead all she got was the same old tired lines about how this was one of the most important years of her life, how everything was building up to her future now, how she was about to become an adult with adult responsibilities, and she wanted none of it.

For as long as she could remember, she had worked in her parents’ restaurant, starting off in the kitchen out back, making her way to waitressing out front when she was old enough to be trusted with ferrying food back and forth. Every day, every evening after school, there she was, an apron about her waist, a bored expression on her face, her mother scolding her for chewing gum whilst she took orders. If her parents wanted an explanation as to why she was falling behind at school, then they needn’t have looked any further than the restaurant; perhaps, she thought sourly, if she didn’t spend all her time carrying bowls of udon back and forth, then maybe she would have some actual time to study.

It wasn’t as if she even knew what she wanted to do with her life; she was only sixteen, after all, and what sixteen-year-old really knew what they wanted to do? Like, really and truly, she thought, not just some stupid s**t like be prime minister or become an astronaut. Such thoughts annoyed her. Maybe she could have been like one of those kids who dreamt of being prime minister or becoming an astronaut if only her parents had encouraged to do something other than wait tables and prepare for college entrance exams. She was an untapped fount of potential, and here she was wasting it away stuck in cram school on a Saturday morning and standing around before tables every evening as the usual losers tried to work out how to net the most meat in their soup for the cheapest cost. It disgusted her. She might not know what she wanted, but at least she still had her pride, which was more than she could say for every adult that she encountered during her long days.

Scowling darkly to herself, she continued to hurry, exiting the alley and finding herself at a crossing, languid Saturday morning traffic stirring up into action before her as she waited for the lights to change; squat delivery vans, hatchbacks ferrying little kids to little league practice.

Who cared about growing up anyway, she thought.

There was a sudden squawk above her, a loud cry and the movement of wings, and a large bird landed atop the traffic lights to her right, a crow or a raven, something feathered and ugly. She looked up at it, and with dark eyes, it looked down at her, and she shuddered unhappily, the attention of such a creature unwelcome. Who made birds, she thought, even though she knew this was a stupid question; who made birds, and why were they so creepy?

Looking directly down at her, the bird squawked once more, and she shivered, hastily turning away. Ahead of her, the traffic lights changed, and she hurried across the road, dark eyes watching her as she departed, her breath frozen before her with every step.