Half a year before his father sent a letter...
"I'm not...I'm not helpless, you know." Shinji mumbled to the empty classroom.
There was no answer, of course. Perhaps, had this been a different day, the desks would have held students—students with working ears who would have been able to hear whatever he had to say.
Now, however, there was only the dark.
"Just because I'm young...it doesn't mean I can't look after myself for a few hours..." Shinji continued his rambling to himself. His guardian—Shinji wasn't entirely sure of his name, despite having living with him so long; the two of them rarely talked with one another—had dragged him to some important Academy of some sort.
He wasn't sure why. Apparently his guardian had to talk to someone who worked there, not that it mattered to Shinji. His main point of gripe: why did he have to come along, too?
"He just brings me because he can't trust me..." Mumble, mumble, mumble. "Least he can do is actually watch me...instead of just shoving me into some empty room." Twenty minutes—that was probably how long he'd been here, waiting. Maybe he was off by a little, but twenty minutes was about right. He sighed, torn between irritation and self-pity.
...But it was hard to maintain such a depressing mood in a room with a window.
He placed a palm on the windowpane, then lifted it. I've left my handprint here, he thought, and it made him inexplicably feel a little better.
The pane was warm to the touch, and he could feel the heat from it still barely lingering on his fingertips.
It was hard to believe, in such an uncomfortably stuffy classroom, that just beyond the window there was a world filled with sun and wind and flowers...
Feeling suddenly claustrophobic, he pushed at the windowpane, wishing desperately to taste some of the fresh air that was surely on the other side. At first, all his grunting got him nowhere, but then the window unexpectedly slid open with a high-pitched squeal, nearly sending him falling backwards.
—But that was alright, because—air!
He inhaled deeply, and the scent of outside seemed to fill him for a brief instant—but then it was gone. He leaned his head out the window and tried again.
He thought to himself that he must look ridiculous, stretching his neck so far out of a building, head tilted back, eyes closed so to better drink in the scents. But it was a small price to pay—another five minutes in that classroom, and he would've gone quite mad.
He leaned forwards again. Just a bit further. Not too much, though. I don't want to—
(Posted Fri, 03 Aug 2007 17:13)
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らんま1/2 © Rumiko Takahashi
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