Tatsuhiko Takimoto - Welcome to the NHK!

“I see! I understand!” I shouted. “That girl is a special operative for the N.H.K.!” I kept making these declarations loudly.

Despite my earlier resolve, I didn't feel better at all.

“Dammit”, I cried before I finished my beer and shochu.

My head hurt, and the anime songs ringing from my next door neighbor's apartment were fiercely annoying.

Before I knew it, I had somehow ended up violently drunk. My mood was headed, full tilt, toward negativity. Once again, the future held no hope whatsoever that I could detect. I suspected that, at this rate, I was just plummeting toward death—isolated, lonely, and looking like an asshole.

“That's it. This is the end. This is the end!” I chanted.

And still, the anime songs echoed from the room next door. In the lyrics, words like “love”, “dreams”, “romance” and “hope” recurred continuously—ironically. For someone like me, having lost my optimism, it all sounded very much like mean-spirited sarcasm. The words racked me with rage and self-pity.

For one thing, this was the first night my neighbor had played anime songs at such a loud volume. Usually, he played them only during the day, but it was already the middle of the night.

Then, it occurred to me: Might this not be some new harassment meant for me? Harassment toward me! Someone so pathetic and stupid that he couldn't even become a freeter!

If so, I couldn't allow it. I tried punching the wall. There was no sign that the songs would stop. I kicked at the wall. No reaction.

How dare you make a fool of me? They're all — every one of them — making a fool of me. Dammit. Just watch, I'll make you regret this.

I drank, got even drunker, drinking to deaden my senses…

I'm going, and I'll show you! You're the ones at fault.

Rising unsteadily from the kotatsu, no doubt looking like I was about to fall on my ass, I stumbled to open the door.

I tottered to room 202 and repeatedly attacked the doorbell. “Ding dong, ding dong, ding dong …”

No answer.

I tried punching the door.

No answer. The only sounds from inside were anime songs. This particular number was the theme song to Fancy Lala: “I am Fancy Lala… ”

In my anger, blood rushed to my head.

I twisted the doorknob. The door wasn't locked, and I no longer cared what might happen.

“Hey!” I shouted, losing myself in fury. Flinging open the door, I screamed, “It's too loud!”

At that very second, I saw him. A man sat at a computer desk in the back of the room, facing the speakers against the wall. Acknowledging the surprising arrival of a visitor, he slowly swiveled around in his spinning chair so he could look at me over his shoulder.

He was … crying.

Tears silently streamed down his cheeks.

On top of that, and even more unbelievable, I knew exactly who he was. Speechless, I couldn't believe my eyes.

Wiping his own eyes, he gazed at me in disbelief. Thrusting himself forward, he stared into my face. Finally, after a momentary silence, he stammered in a trembling voice, “Sa-Satou?”

There was no mistake. It was Yamazaki. After four years, this was an incredibly unexpected reunion.

In high school, I had been in the literature club.

Even so, that didn't mean I liked novels or anything of that sort. Rather, during the new-member recruitment fair, an awfully cute upperclassman had invited me. “You there, join the literature club.”

Without thinking, I had nodded. There was really nothing else I could have done. Despite being a member of the nerdy literature club, and despite being a year older than I was, the girl was as cute as a pop idol.

Unsurprisingly, having joined the club for such a stupid reason, I ended up playing solitaire through every meeting. And during any group free time, I played cards in the crowded office with the upperclassman. What in the hell were we doing? Obviously, we could have been focusing on other, more important things.

Well, that doesn't matter at all anymore. The past is the past.

Anyway, it happened after school on one of those club days. My classmate and I were walking along the first-floor hallway that faced the central courtyard. Suddenly, she pointed at one of the corners of the courtyard. “Over there!”

“Hey, that's bullying, isn't it?”

Several students had surrounded a boy wearing a middle school uniform. They were punching him in the stomach.

A weak smile appeared on the face of the boy being bullied. The ones doing the bullying, too, smiled broadly. It was the kind of scene you often saw.

“That's terrible.” The cute girl broke the silence. A very empathetic person, she made a face as though she honestly felt sorry for him—at which point, an amazing idea flashed through my mind: I could show her how cool I was.

“Shall I go help him?”

“You would do that?”

I nodded. I figured that middle school brats shouldn't be any problem at all. Of course, that ended up being a huge miscalculation.

It was fine when I yelled the slogan, “Bullying isn't cool!” and waded into the fray. Not only did I get beat up, the group of bullies also got away. The girl looked at me in disgust, and the victim continued to be bullied for the entire year, so my actions were completely fruitless.

Nevertheless, Yamazaki, the boy who had been bullied, seemed to respect me—though I didn't know what kind of mistaken impression he was under. He even joined the literary club as soon as he moved up to the high school division.

By that time, I was already a third-year student. Since the older girl had graduated, I had absolutely no desire to do anything. Thus, I set him up as the president so I could focus on my entrance exam studies.

Then, just like that, I simply graduated.

Except for talking to him two or three times at the graduation ceremony, I hadn't heard from Yamazaki at all since then—at least, not until this moment.

In the middle of his own six-mat, one-room apartment, Yamazaki was in exaggeratedly high spirits. He hadn't changed at all since I had last seen him. He remained slender, with hair as light as a Russian's. At first, he seemed to have become somewhat more masculine; that turned out not to be the case, though. He appeared to be a weak young man, with little combat potential.

“You? Is it really you?”

Though his eyes were swollen and red from his recent tears, he now smiled widely. The anime songs had stopped playing.

Rooted to a spot by the door, I asked hesitantly, “Why are you here?”

“What about you, Satou?”

“I …” I started to tell him that I had just happened to move into this building because it was close to my university; but unconsciously, I hesitated. I didn't want Yamazaki to learn my true status: unemployed, dropout hikikomori.

Not noticing my difficulties, Yamazaki voluntarily explained his situation. “This summer, I entered a technical school. When I looked for a cheap apartment close to school, I happened to like this one.”

It really did seem to be complete chance.

“Anyway, please come in. My room is dirty, though.”

The unbelievable coincidence still confused me, but Yamazaki warmly urged me inside. Obediently, I took off my shoes and stepped into the room.

Of course, the layout was no different than my room.

But… what was this? I stood frozen in place.

There was a strange atmosphere to Yamazaki's room, an extremely faint air that I had never before experienced. The room contained odd posters stuck haphazardly to the walls, two gigantic computer towers, a mountain of manga that nearly reached the ceiling, and various other kinds of furniture and decorations. Everything combined to create a peculiar, troubled ambiance.