Saturday, 14 April 2001 11:50:05 PM

hidoko Matsumoto

Black, grey, white. Illusion, ?, reality.

    The little boy closed his eyes, as he fell into the chasm of endless darkness. There was nothing, only something so deep that he couldn't fathom its true self.
    "What is this?"
    Something had appeared, out of the nothingness. As he reached out, something caught his fingers. He could see it clearly now: it was a spider, and he was trapped in a spider web. His lips were parted in a silent scream as thin thread cocooned around him, trapping him into the vast darkness, forever and ever….
    When he woke up, his eyes adjusted to the normal picture of the dimly lit room where the familiar night light shone onto the surface of everything.
    "……" He allowed himself to heave a breath of relief. Then he said, to confirm the fact that he could, in fact, speak, "I'm alive."
    Yes, I am. He laughed in triumph. His laughter covered up the sombre atmosphere which had been developed by the shadowing nightmare. God, and to think I was so scared….
    He allowed his fingers to travel over his own face, as if to confirm his existence. He fell back onto the pillow, brushing the hair, which was plastered onto his face, away, and then hewent back to sleep, refusing to think of anything in the process.
    And this time, he didn't dream.
 

existence

    The petite man sat on the staircase, one of his legs propped up and the other resting against the stairs. His head was lowered, yet even under the shadow of his fringe, his eyes pierced through the sunglasses that he wore.
    A brunette stepped forward. The sunglasses didn't hide the shining radiance from his eyes. A mobile phone hung down onto his flat chest, where it flowed down in a fluid shape towards a thin waist and slender hips. He donned a black jacket, white T-shirt, and long pants.
    "Ossu."
    The former glanced up, raven curls sliding off his shoulders as he lifted his head. He didn't say a word as he lifted a corner of his lips. The latter laughed, walking a distance away from him. They disappeared in the streets, among the crowd.
    The sun hung overhead, its radiant light piercing through the clouds.

    The raven-haired man was named Hyde, and the brunette was Tetsu.
    Hyde was petite. His eyes were large, almond-shaped with double-lids, and there was a defiant expression which showed in his pupils. His long sleeved shirt was purple, unbuttoned on the top, and leather pants clung onto his shapely legs.
    Tetsu was taller, but was even more slender than Hyde. His eyes were wide, not as wide as Hyde's but seemed to gather every ray and reflect them in one brilliant glimmer. The black jacket was of polyester material, and the shirt of cotton. There was a clover printed on it. A doll-like smile hung on his face, so tight and pristine that he could have been made of porcelain.
    Step by step they advanced forward, until they reached the destination—a studio. The set was almost set up, and there they were dolled up till their beautiful faces were flawless. Then, Hyde, being the more seductive one, sat in the set. The scene was in a classroom, and he wore a school uniform of unknown badge. His pencil box sat on the table, and he chewed on his pen, looking troubled. Tetsu came in, closing the door behind him. He wore a white shirt, black pants, and had glasses on, like a lecturer.
    "How's your work, Kousuke?"
    "Cut!" The director yelled. Immediately the brunette looked guilty. "If we can't get past this stage, I'm going to give up on you both! You sound like you're at a doctor's!"
    "I'm sorry," Tetsu hastily apologised.
    The grumpy director motioned for them to carry on.

    By the next day, they had finished with the first scene. Tetsu came in, asked Hyde about his work and offered to teach. Then he seduced him.
    Hyde had become a master by the time they finished the entire act, and Tetsu had gotten used to it. The two of them writhed in front of the camera as if they were the only ones in a love hotel. It was all moans, hips, thighs, sweat, rhythm, and they weren't anything but animals.
    The director was satisfied and they got paid. Everyone got to go home in time because they were good actors.
    When the VHS came out, Tetsu got a copy and invited Hyde over to watch. Hyde declined, saying that he had a copy too. At the end of it, Tetsu could only find himself laughing with a helplessness at the scenes.
    There wasn't a true meaning in that laughter. The two of them celebrated the success at a bar, got drunk and hooked up by somebody, and were split up. At the end of the next morning, Tetsu woke up in an unknown place with strange memories of himself having sex with three others—two girls and one man. He didn't remember enjoying it; he felt weird. The person who offered him his drink must have drugged him.
    For nights that stretched on later, he had the dream of that spider again. The spider was eating him, swallowing him, digesting him, and no matter how he tried, his screams came out as silent. He woke up to a cold sweat every time; it wouldn't have surprised him if he truly became nothing one day.
 

Oasis

    "We'll celebrate our success by ourselves this time," Hyde said over the phone, and invited him over to his place. Tetsu wanted to ask if the same thing happened to him, but refrained. He didn't want to talk about it.
    The things that Tetsu always loved most, at Hyde's place, were the blue walls and the blue glass pieces that were hung at the window. When one was there, one would feel as if he was truly a part of the sky.
    What everyone wanted most was the thing that were so far away.
    They took a few drinks, but were still left sober.
    As they stared out of the window, the clear blue shone in like the sky, reflecting everything in a heaven of vivid dreams.
    "…Why do we celebrate by getting drunk?"
    Hyde turned to glance over at Tetsu, a smile on his lips. "Because… We want to forget reality."
    "…aa…."
    Hyde lay back, and closed his eyes. Tetsu rested his head against the brunette's chest, so that he could hear his heart beat.
    "When we become rich, and famous, what do you wanna do?"
    "…I'll do drugs."
    "…n?"
    Hyde giggled upon hearing that surprised tone."….Because," he wondered if Tetsu could hear the hopelessness in his voice, "I    wouldn't have anywhere to go anymore. issai ga nai… nai."
    Tetsu's fingers trailed towards Hyde's hair and caressed his cheeks."……….I think I understand…." his voice trailed off, lifting his head so that his eyes were transfixed on Hyde's warm brown ones. "Hyde…"
    "…un."
    "…Don't lose your way." He had sounded so hopeful that Hyde laughed helplessly.
    "…..Humans have all lost their way—"
    "Only you have lost your way," he corrected. "You'll find what you want, no matter how hopeless it seems to be."
    Hyde could only smile. Maybe, you're right…But for me, I'll never be able to truly want anything.
    Tetsu kissed him on his lips gently, and resumed lying on his chest. The two of them fell asleep, in the warmth of the heavenly rays.
 

Black, grey, white.

    Since there wasn't time to brush his teeth, he simply bought a cup of tea and gurgled in it. The early morning wasn't exactly his time of the day.
    When I become rich and famous, I will…create a world for Hyde and me. He thought, smiling. It was a nice notion early morning. There has to be more than nothing in this world… There's still dreams.
    He was supposed to receive his script that day, and there was a meeting with the director. He hadn't been partnering with Hyde since the first video. And he wasn't so sure if he wanted to anymore.
    If they acted together again, he wasn't sure if he knew what to think. There was only so much as a thin line between love and desire.

    Indeed, dreams existed.
    Indeed, there had to be an oasis in the desert.
    It was because humans needed it.
    It didn't matter, if everything is but an imagination, because they needed a truth to cling on.
    And that is the ultimate truth.

    The spider was crawling.
    He wanted to scream, wanted to scream so much that the desire to express fear alone was enough to rip him apart.
    False… False.
    Only the existence of lies is truth.
 

Illusion

    When he took over the script, there was an expression of indifference. Yet as they were acting it out, he was filled with discomfort. The outline was that he was going to rape somebody, leaving her in shock, and somebody else was going to fuck her to save the day.
    As they acted it out, he felt disgusted. He couldn't do it.
    But he did. Dreams were motivating enough.
    A twisted expression rode his features as he tore savagely at her, who screamed and cried. It seemed so real, even if it was in front of a camera, even if it was a simple act that would feed peoples' sadistic streaks.
    When he closed his eyes, he felt so ugly, so corroded. The only stream of light that he could hold on to was his dream.
    "I'm not doing porn anymore," Hyde told him.
    "We started out together," he protested. He felt as if he was left to be alone all of a sudden.
    "I don't want to think of myself as nothing but an exhibition," Hyde whispered in his ear. "The truth is, I can't live anymore if I start to reduce to that in my mind's eye."
    He felt like he was about to break. His voice came out in shivering breaths, "but… what about me?"
    "Don't you have your dreams?" Hyde asked him, a twinkle in his eyes. "I don't have any. You do. There is nothing but myself in my own world, besides a vast emptiness."
    Tetsu couldn't speak, as he pulled Hyde into his embrace and held him tightly. Hyde simply gathered him closer, and kissed him. They couldn't let go of each other; instead their kiss grew deeper and deeper. There wasn't any camera in front, but his expression was so real that it scared him.
    The truth was, Hyde was his dream. He felt like a little child who was left alone to die in a spider's web.

    Hyde used to be a metalhead who couldn't see more than three feet away in the murky vision that he saw. After all, he was so blocked by himself.
    Tetsu was a beautiful boy who grew up seeing the world through a kaleidoscope.
    The first time Tetsu met Hyde was at the aquarium. They were both high school students then, young and immature and full of innocence.
    "I didn't ask to come with you," Hyde was quarrelling with his mother, who looked bewildered and shamed as she yelled back at him.
    The thing that Tetsu noticed about Hyde was that he was simply atrocious.
    "Then you can go home by yourself."
    "Yeah, I don't mind."
    She got so angry that she did turn around and leave him, probably figuring that he was old enough to make his way back later.
    "Fine, you fucking bitch," He murmured as soon as she left. Raising his gaze, he saw the awkward-looking Tetsu who stood at a corner. His brows furrowed and raised, then he approached Tetsu.
    What happened was, Tetsu ended up letting this stranger stay in his home. There was something about this stranger that he couldn't see in others, and that made him more than a stranger. It was a defiance and a sense of loss, that lingered in the pupils of his eyes.
    They started out as friends. Hyde got dumped, stole into his room, forced him into sex, and the next thing he knew, everything changed.
    Affection grew so much until it was ready to consume him, but there was still a hint of hope that both of them could see. That was the innocence of youth. Hyde never went back to Wakayama after all.
    Tetsu flunked high school because he had to work to support both Hyde (who played in a band) and himself, so both of them came out to play in a band. Pretty soon they were forced to leave because the scene was so flooded with Indies bands that the two of them couldn't afford it anymore.
    They were invited to star together by a friend's friend—in their first video.
    Having come all the way, this illusion was shattering.
    It broke, leaving a vast piece of emptiness.
 

Reality.

    The video replayed in his lonely apartment; its changing light shone onto the shiny floor. Tetsu could see his own distorted expression, and as he sat there watching through the shots of flesh semen and lips, that reflected deep inside.
    It was a basic ugliness that he saw in himself, being degraded into mere sin now that his dream was gone.
    It wasn't like that truly. The idea of himself doing it alone was scaring him.
    To him, even though Hyde had always been the more empty one, he had always been the stronger one. It was he himself who had to mask everything up in dreams that was weak. They had started out together, and even though they went on their separate ways, the fact that Hyde was there elsewhere doing the same thing made him feel safe.
    Now that Hyde decided that he couldn't.. What could he do?
    Switching off the VHS player, he found himself at a loss. Maybe he could get some wine. It would indeed help him to forget, anyway he didn't have to buy much. He had a poor alcohol intake capacity; three quarters of a sake bottle could get him stinking drunk.
    There was a Seven Eleven that sat four streets away. It was one-thirty in the morning and he couldn't sleep anyway. A night walk could do him some good, he thought.
    So he opened the door, put on his shoes, and stepped outside.
    The night air was, indeed, satisfying.
    He found himself on a stroll, as he reached the Seven Eleven. Some thugs were there, arguing with the tenin about stealing six-packs.
    Tetsu realised that he didn't need to get drunk after all the walk, so he retreated back into the streets. He found himself staring at the night sky as he strolled back.

    He found himself dreaming of Hyde.
    Suddenly headlights could be seen in the empty street that he was walking along. He turned, and walked towards the left so that they could pass him without knocking him down, but they didn't. Instead the lights shone in his direction and motorcycles surrounded him.
    One, two. Three were in a car.
    The five gangsters surrounded him, as he tried to shield his eyes from the ravaging light.
    "We've seen you before. Aren't you a star?"
    "A porn star."
    "We saw you in a video where you raped this woman."
    "A fucking bitch."
    Tetsu found himself swallowing nervously, and backed against the wall, but they advanced too. There was no way that he could escape, he realised, as it occurred to him that they were probably the ones whom he saw at Seven Eleven.

    "Humans have all lost their way—"
    "Only you have lost your way."

    "Now the rapist is going to be raped."
    Jeering laughter sounded as hands shoved him down onto the cold leather seat, pinning him down. Tears flooded his eyes as reality replayed the video, with him as the lead character this time.
    Even if it was all an act, he was getting punished for something he haven't done.
    Even though he cried, his tormentors thought he deserved it. He cried for help, for anyone to help him. He tried to pull himself away from the hands which held him down. But each time he cried, with heavy fists he was beaten, until he was reduced to mere whimpers. Teardrops fell, as his black jacket was stripped from him, with every piece of cotton that lay on his skin was ripped off. One of their hands groped him carelessly.
    "This is so fun, we should do it again."
    "Yeah!"
    A fingertip traced onto his cheek, scratching it so that he bled.
    "No…" He murmured in horror, as intruding fingers probed in, as violating kisses degraded him to the prostitute that he was. From his neck to his chest, till it reached his lower body, a white-hot fire engulfed him.
    "He is a slut."
    "You're enjoying it too, aren't you?"
    "My, you are well endowed. No wonder they hired you."
    "…Slut."
    More laughter pierced through him.
    What burned inside of him was only fear, only humiliation as they entered him painfully, as they forced themselves onto him while threatening more blows if he resisted.
    Just like how it had been in front of the camera, he writhed and whimpered and cried out, and just like it was in front of the camera, life's scenes never stopped reeling on.
    The laughter and the faces of his tormentors all twisted and distorted, while he sobbed silently. It was but a mere game for them which they would triumph in.
    But to him, the whole world had crashed in.
    When they left him alone was when they started dressing. The air smelled of sex, just like how it would have been in a prostitute's room. When they were fully-clothed, they threw him out of the car, followed by his clothes.
    ……It ended.
    Finally, it ended.
    The person who lay there wretched on the cold asphalt was nothing more than a quivering mess of human meat.
 

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    1984, 'Room 101'.

    The beautiful boy with dark features watched his companion with sorrowful eyes, as if grieving that such a thing should happen.
    "….When we asked him what was one plus one…" The nurse was saying, "…He said, 'nai'."
    "nai ka…" His brows furrowed, and his gaze met the floor. When he lifted those dark pupils, he didn't appear to be seeing anything. "…about his physical conditions…?"
    "The tissues of his rectum have been badly damaged, and he is still recuperating."
    "….Thank you." He wasn't paying much attention now, as he moved towards the bed. The nurse watched from a side, then turned to leave upon deciding that the patient was safe.
    "What is one plus one?" The raven-haired's eyes were full of grief.
    "nai," Those large, shining eyes were filled with a deluded innocence.
    "….." He shook his head, a sad smile on his lips. "Do you remember me?"
    "omae ga nai."
    "…."
    "ore mo nai."
    A teardrop fell from the boy's cheeks, as he kissed the brunette gently. "issai wa sonzai shiteiru demo nai yo."
    "nande mo nai."

    Once again, he was a mere little boy.
    There was nothing but a vast darkness that stretched on mercilessly, until he noticed a thin thread that hung before him. When he traced it, he realised that it was linked to other threads, so that a web was formed.
    As he looked up, something was in the middle of this existence.
    The spider crawled towards him, and it was then that he realised that he was caught on the web.
    "No! No!" He cried, struggling, but threads cocooned around him, until he was like a larva. He was screaming, but he was deaf to his own sound. He was thrashing, but in truth he could no longer move.
    Everything closed in on him. He could feel the spider sink its teeth onto him, as he was suffocating to death, as he was torn apart.
    The beauty of everything was that it was nothing.
    He finally realised it, as those fangs sank into him, as he was torn from limb to limb and devoured… as everything faded to black…
    ….he was nothing.

Sunday, 15 April 2001 10:30:01 PM

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