Tale of the Antonym of Friendship

V#1 Chapter 1-Building of the Battlefield(Part 4)(+extra)

Part 4

"Of grave importance is the balance of happiness and sadness in the journey of life. And since that balance is verified by God, be assured, there is no discrepancy."

-Shiroyama Seniichi, The AoF storyteller

[9th of December, 1997; 7:00 hrs]

[Private Orphanage "Children's Hope", Taketomi, Okinawa Prefecture]

Winter mornings here in Taketomi are rather addictive. I can see the still powerless sun, up in the sky, trying to radiate itself to the extreme, but it's effect is not as effective as in summer. The sunlight is able to brighten up the place, but it is proving inefficient to counter this freezing breeze, which pierces through the entire village like a sole tiger walking through the woods, and striking all the identifiable targets that lie in its way. Though the clock ticks at seven, I can still not see the post box of our orphanage which is just beyond this garden. To think the fog is still so thick that such closely located things are blurred to figure out. Looks like the birds living on these trees are still holed up inside their nests, and I cannot see the squirrel that lives under the side wooden platform of the backyard. Do squirrels hibernate? I wonder if they do. Lucky them! I wish I could also hole myself up inside my warm kotatsu for these four months without any worry in the world. But, human life is not that carefree, you know?

"Shishio, have you woken up the kids or not? They will get late for school...."

.....

"Shishio....Oi.....honestly, this brat...."

What the heck is he doing? Did I not tell you to wake up the kids when they have to go to school? If they get late..........OH....WAIT......you can only wake up the kids when you first wake up your own fucking self, right? I seriously do not understand as to why he does not wake up on school days with the same vigor as he does on leave days. That goddamn band! As if that huge ass guitar was not enough to annoy me, now he even calls his friends over! All they do is prick those guitar strings and bang those drums into some "out of a horror movie" shriek, and call it MUSIC!!!! If the God of music was watching them, he would have descended down on them with a punishment! If "music" was an actual person instead of an abstract entity, they would have committed suicide by touching some random live wire. And don't even get me started on the name of their band – "Symphonies of Youth". MY ASS! That horrid howling is symphony?? They better change it to "Noise pollution by Brats" or something. I mean, my mind went literally blank when Shishio told me this name with that smug look on his face. That look on his face made me almost cry......where did I go wrong with my brother?? Well, the worst part of it is that they are not making any advances towards improvement either.

"Shishio!!! Get your ass up!"

I bang through the brown sliding door of his room, which has been adorned with a cute looking tiger drawing, and inside the mouth of the tiger are the words – "Entry of personnel with unhealthy intentions is strictly prohibited." What the heck is up with this clearly stupid sign?

Ah! There he is.....lying under his tiger blanket, with his face inside as well. How many times have I told him to not put his face inside the blanket? Shishio's room is a rather peculiar one. In a sense, it is quite different than a normal high school student's room. The thing is, this brother of mine, has an almost disgusting obsession with tigers. He rejected a person who confessed to him back in first year of high school because she said that an elephant can beat a tiger in a fight. I mean, isn't it obvious? And how much of morons do they need to be to lead the confession into discussions of an inter animal battle? And they even exchanged fists for that! Seriously!

Anyone can see his craziness by looking at the state of his room.....the walls are covered with black and yellow stripes, the floor mat with a similar pattern. On the floor, I can see the "Flying Tiger" manga, all the thirty four volumes lined up neatly in the right corner. His bed, he actually modified it to look like a tiger's paws put together, by adding those spike shaped cardboards representing the claws. The blanket is covered with cute tiger faces, heck, even the potato chips on the study table are the "bold tiger" flavor! Do they really sell that shit? Like, why? Who buys them? Oh....there is the buyer, dozing off in his pajamas printed with tiger paws.