Surprisingly enough, Taniguchi wasn’t a stranger to alcohol.
His father was an old man with old ideas of how things should be done. Like his annoying policy to never take a leave from school without a 40°C fever or worse symptoms or his more interesting opinion that “a man should know how to handle his booze.”
That’s why it didn’t take him too much to figure out what this head-splitting headache first thing in the morning was about.
After a few seconds of definitely-not-whimpers, Taniguchi’s first thought was to reach out for his cellphone and check the time. Even though the room was (thankfully) pretty dark, he had no trouble finding the device in its usual location at the head of his futon and to the side, close to the wall to avoid stepping on it by accident.
Sunday XXth, 6:03 AM.
As he was about to turn off the daily alarm before it gets the chance to go off, Taniguchi noticed the first oddity of many this morning: his favorite wallpaper of his girlfriend was gone. Without really thinking about it, he devoted his slowly returning focus to put the image back on. He was serious about keeping the snapshot of a smiling Yanagimoto until she would eventually make him delete it.
Not that he would really do it even in that case. Girl has the cutest little smile ever when she thinks I’m not looking. I even had to beg Kunikida for the picture. Thinking of the shorter boy and the surliest expression he had on his face at the time (seriously, what was that rant about never taking a photo by request ever again?), Taniguchi discovered oddity number two: he wasn’t holding his phone. It was Kunikida’s
“What the–?” A quick inspection around also revealed that he slept with one of his nicest set of clothes on. Mom is going to give me an earful about it. The light jacket was missing but Taniguchi found his wallet in one of his pants’ back pockets.
“Ah, probably I took his cellphone by mistake last night.”
Thoughts of how to recover his lost property or whether or not send a few prank messages to random contacts with his friend’s mail account were drowned by the somewhat startling realization of the third and by far the biggest oddity so far: This wasn’t his room.
For one, it was too spacious. At a glance he could fit his bedroom two or three times within that much space. Secondly, even though it was soberly furnished, there was a distinctly girly vibe in the decoration. Nothing too obvious like plush toys laying around, but he was sure that everything was cleaner and tidier than what any guy would care to keep it.
Unless maids were somehow involved.
After his brief lapsus to levity, Taniguchi put his newfound acuity to good use. Namely, finding out where he was and how to do it without bothering his probably still sleeping unknown host.
His endeavor was surprisingly easy to accomplish. A short walk to the heavy-looking curtains uncovered one of those glass sliding doors behind the drapes and a not-too-small balcony. He was in an apartment building, a fifth or sixth floor judging by the overhead view of the city he could get from there.
Fortunately, it was too early for the sunrise light to hurt his currently oversensitive eyes but not too dark to miss the easily recognizable landmark of a nearby train station, one not that far to the east of Kitago.
Not too worried about going back to home just yet, he did got permission to sleep over at a friend’s place after all, Taniguchi’s found himself wondering if he was actually at a friend’s place. A priori he could rule out the possibility of being in Kunikida’s or Kyon’s homes. He has visited the former enough times to not recognize it right away and a bit of thought confirmed that Kyon lived in a two-store house that Suzumiya used once to hold the audition for her band thing a while ago.
Therefore, his best bet so far was that he was at the residence of the fourth and last participant of yesterday’s boys-only day out, one Koizumi Itsuki.
“Wait. If memory serves me right…”
Didn’t Koizumi mention that he lived alone and away from his family? The guy must be pretty well-off to live in such an upmarket apartment on his own, that’s for sure.
After briefly contemplating about life’s everyday unfairnesses, Taniguchi arrived to a more pressing issue: Did he just spend the night in the pretty boy’s room and futon?
…
After grabbing the phone and walking somewhat briskly out of the room, Taniguchi stepped into a corridor that opened to his right and found an ajar wooden door facing the bedroom. A little peek revealed that the room was a western-styled bathroom containing a bathtub surrounded by a shower screen, a laundry basket, toilet and washbasin. The latter immediately caught Taniguchi’s attention and after fumbling around trying to illuminate the room, he found a little knob on the wall.
Guessing from the lack of any other obvious switch that the dial’s function has to be to turn on and off the lights, Taniguchi turned the dimmer slowly like he would do with the volume control of a radio.
“Jackpot.”
Taniguchi’s small sense of triumph vanished the moment he faced his reflexion on the mirror.
“Well, what can I say? I do look like shit.”
Without a moment of hesitation he let the cold water run and washed his face and tried to get his hair back in order, which was more difficult than the usual without the assistance of his favorite hair gel. Speaking of toiletries, the bathroom was strangely devoid of any. No soap, no toothpaste and…
“No towel.”
While wondering if moments like this made people say things about always knowing where one’s towel is, Taniguchi searched through drawers, under the sink and even inside the laundry basket, only to find them empty. Before weighting the practicability of using his shirt’s sleeves as a drying implement against the grief he would get from his mother for doing so, his eyes zoomed in on the only unexplored place of the room: the bathtub.
Unusual yes, but not too improbable. With nothing to lose, Taniguchi slided the opaqued glass open to find what he was looking for. And something else… rather someone else.
Biting back a more outspoken reaction, Taniguchi took a half step back and learned two things in that precise moment. One, big bathtubs can double as a place to sleep in a hurry if one place enough soft material, like a bunch of dry towels, on the hard and cold porcelain. And two, the sleeping Koizumi Itsuki can inexplicably make an unkempt hair, creased and stained clothes and a missing shoe look good.
The latter image led to reflexions on the potential revenues of selling such pictures among high school girls, but Taniguchi quickly dismissed such ignoble thoughts. For one, it would be wrong to take advantage of an acquaintance and budding friend like that and, more importantly, it would be a no-brainer to track down the pictures’ source back to him.
Taking one unused towel with him and slowly closing the bathroom’s door, Taniguchi pondered his options. It wasn’t too early to find a train home, but probably the right thing to do right now was to check on the condition of each member of yesterday’s quartet.
And speaking of yesterday, what did they do last night? His memories were clear until they left the Game Center to grab a bite at a fast-food place. There Kyon was generous for once and paid for everyone’s food (actually for the second time in Taniguchi’s experience if one remembers that time after that baseball tournament last year). Then Kunikida noticed something about Kyon’s wallet…
What was it?… Now I remember!
They discovered that Kyon owned a driving license. Not a permit, but a bona fide “Normal License” to drive must car weighting up to 5,000 kg, or so Kunikida told them. When he asked next how it was possible for Kyon to get one of those before turning eighteen, Taniguchi was sure Kyon begun to panic.
It wasn’t too obvious though, man had his deadpan so leveled-up that it takes something big like a Suzumiya-grade hijinks gone horribly wrong (or right) to get him to widen his eyes like that. That was when Koizumi laughed a little and told the rest about Kyon’s little secret: he was, obviously, eighteen already.
Such a trivial explanation made Taniguchi tempted to tsukkomi himself. Just because he and Kunikida were seventeen years old, it doesn’t mean that everybody in class have exactly the same age. For example, Taniguchi knew that Goto, the class rep, turned seventeen before the start of the school year and Arakawa, the guy from the Karate club, was even taller and older-looking.
Also, it’s not like a guy worries about other guys’ ages unless one of them can buy adult-only stuff for them like–
“I think now I know how last night got started.”
Following the unexpectedly long corridor, Taniguchi arrived to the living room when a sudden noise bring him out of his reverie. It was really weird “bamf!”, similar to the sound of air leaving an empty milk or juice carton when you press it flat with your hands.
He wasn’t yet lucid enough to tell where the sound came from, but when a second one went off Taniguchi was certain that the latter came from just around a corner.
Walking slowly towards the source (he wasn’t scared of course, probably it was just the air conditioner doing weird noises when the apartment was all quiet like now, surely) he peeked with one eye from the corner of a wall, only to find an empty dinner table.
Empty was probably a misnomer though. There was no one at the table, but there was a big pot of something in the middle, placed on one of those heat retentive plates designed to keep food warm. There were also a ladle, four soup bowls on a pile, and a taller vase with several sets of chopsticks next to stack of paper napkins.
It was only then that his nostrils registered the enticing aroma of the warm, apparently homemade, food.
Before knowing what was he was doing, Taniguchi already was next to the table, ladle and bowl in hand, and about help himself when he saw the note. It was just an unsigned and unaddressed sheet of paper that read “I read once that chicken miso soup was good for hangovers. Eat it while it’s still warm. P.S. Don’t forget to wait for the timer.”
Taniguchi didn’t known about any kitchen timer, but he was sure about five things:
1) The neat, almost calligraphic missive was written by a girl. And if his gut was on the money, a beautiful one on top of that.
2) Said pretty girl was an unparalleled amazing cook.
3) Such a talented female was considerate enough to cook for four hung over guys without raising a word of complain.
4) Considering the time of the day and the state of the main inhabitant of the condo, such a paragon of kindness owned her own set of keys (a telltale sign of great trust) and she most likely wasn’t a legal guardian because of the point #3 above.
5) Being forcefully waked up by cold water in the face because someone “accidentally” opened the shower’s valve was a fitting divine punishment. Koizumi probably already used up all his karma points with such an impossible girlfriend anyway.
In hindsight, it’s amazing how such a weak deductive process managed to get almost everything spot on.
After finishing his third serving of soup, Taniguchi decided that he should try to find his other two Drinking Pals (temporary designation) before undertaking his Crusade For World Fairness (temporary designation). If Belldandy (also a temporary designation) placed four bowls on the table, probably she knew for a fact there were (or should be) four people in the apartment.
So, where to start? Easy: the living room. Anything else involves engaging in the nosy and potentially scarring activity of opening unknown doors.
Sure enough, there he found two silent, probably sleeping, young men sat on a big couch with their backs facing him. The one at the right, with his arm hanging over the sofa’s side, was undoubtedly Kyon. He was the only person he knew who still persists on wearing a warm clothing item like his greatcoat that far within the hot season. It was amazing for Taniguchi how he never saw Kyon sweat in that getup.
Curious about how well his two classmates fared after the blank in his memories known as “last night”, Taniguchi rounded the couch and took in their visages.
And then stopped dead in his tracks, his mind failing at trying to make sense of the sight.
Taniguchi’s musings were partially correct. The guy at the right side of the coach, the left side from his current perspective, was indeed Kyon. He didn’t look too bad. Kyon either was an unexpectedly heavy drinker or he got saddled as the designated driver. Most likely the latter.
The late teen/early twenty-something guy at the right was the problem. First off, he was not Kunikida. Secondly, the unknown tall blond had bruises and small cuts all over his face and, with the exception of the jacket, his clothes surely had seen better days. And thirdly, his right arm was handcuffed to Kyon’s left.
Some part of Taniguchi’s brain remained in working condition and dutifully totalled facts and drew hypotheses while his conscious mind rebooted. Obviously something happened to Mr. John Doe last night. Either he took a beating or fell down some long stairs. Repeatedly.
Nope, scratch that. Closer inspection revealed that John Doe’s body in fact fared far better than his clothes. No broken nose for one, and the black spots on his face weren’t too swollen. Strange.
The damage on his clothes was odd too. In some places they looked burned. In others they looked cut in suspiciously straight and clean lines.
“Wait a moment, is that my jacket?”
Certainly it was, but Taniguchi could already tell he won’t get it back too soon. The handcuffs were in the way.
Yes, handcuffs. And a weird looking pair on top of that. Both cuffs were wide, a pair of matching big bracelets like the ones Punk/Rock/whatever band members wear in TV. Instead of a chain, the cuffs were connected by a cable, similar to the wire ropes used on suspension bridges but this one was thin like a pinky. Also, the whole contraption was sleek black unlike every pair of handcuffs he saw on Police Dramas or movies.
As he noticed that, Taniguchi was sure that the time in Japan was exactly 6:30:00 AM.
He knew because he daily got up at that time and, more importantly, because the shrill alarm of his cellphone went off at six and a half sharp every morning. Just like it was doing it now from the inner pocket of his jacket. Rousing the person wearing it, who Taniguchi would know later as Fujiwara, back to consciousness.
He would also learn later that morning that Kunikida never put a foot on the residence number 505 of certain apartment building.
But what mattered the most to Taniguchi right now was the fact that loaded stares from his father, mother and recently his girlfriend didn’t hold a candle to this guy’s half-surprised/half-menacing glare fired from less than a foot away. It was like the look alone could tell him that the blond could kick his ass six ways to Sunday if he just made one wrong move.
“…”
“…”
“…”
“…”
“C-Can I get my phone back? The alarm gets worse every ten seconds or so.”
“.... Sure.”
§