Finger Training

[Minister of Gloom]

Postmodernism is the escape route of the lazy writer, so says I. Or at least so it seems in my case, at least. I think there's already more than enough evidence, on this forum and on others, that I should stop messing around with all this experimental bull and just focus on writing. I guess I'll get to that at some point. When I gather the courage to write something without hiding behind this excuse.

So, this one's inspired, believe it or not, by my cousin, who does, in fact, need to write a lot as part of some kind of finger therapy and can't write for shit. Being the twisted excuse for a human that I am, I (ab)used it all in this little masterpiece. I might try to return to this one later, maybe get more deeply into it. Like, give the narrator a name and a gender. Or work on an actual plot with things in it. This is also important to a story.

Finger Training

I'll write a little now.
Shouldnt have bought this special notebook.
Couldve torn a page from another one.
My physiotherapistsaid that word is so long it's not right yet I should write a little as training for my fingers. (fingersfingers !!) stupid
I asked him what to writtte about. He said it does n't really matter. Makes sense I guess (sShould be a comma?),.,.,., comma and period come out same. All he cares about is whether I am mo ving my fingers or not. But it's like this for me too.
In a way? really
It's hard towrite about nothing.
(why do I have to use a pen computers are easier)
He-said-to-write w hatever goesthrough myhead. isn't that a website?. no it's different
That's just a bit ea sier.
Just a (very),very little bit.))
Not too much goes. Or maybe it'stoo much for me? I have neverbeen in another person's head.
I'd like that. to be in another person's head I wish I was a superhero who could read minds
(wasthat dej a vu?)
I wonder if other people think like me.

They wouldntbe other people if they did.
Are there other people anyway? oh Descartes you French bastard


Sometimes I hate p eople.
>:(
(this was a horrible drawing, don't know what I was thinking)
I need to use a pencil so that I can erase
(this is so cliché I am not very creative am I)

But only sometimes. When I am upset I hate people. But most people are like this.
7!?
I hatewriting like this (in general?). It's difficult and fru strating. Can't hol d the pen properly. My fing ers end up hurting. I feel like a re tard when the doctor has to tell me how to hold astupidpen.
Etetet&&& nice symbols too bad I ruined them (I think it's in latin)
People sometimes think I am a retard because of the way I speak.
They speak softly and slowly to me, little words.
This is one time when I hate people.
But it's not their fault I guess
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

(those three lines were pe rfect)
I don't think it's my fault
I need to find someone to blame (what terrible honesty maybe)
So for a while I didn't speak much. People still thought I was a retard.
(screw people)
Maybe they are ri ght. Would I have thecapacity to understand that myself if I was?
I would say ihave no idea, never been a retard.
But that's the whole point ofthe last question.
It's c onfusing
stupid
This sc hool is far bet ter than the last one, people are more unde rstanding.
Naturally
Some of them think I am deaf though and try signlanguage
Irony?
I need to call my parents and tell them I like this school.
It feels great to be away from sister.
(Sometimes I miss her but when I am with her I usually hate her)
If all people were like me it would have been a miserable word world
Won'tcha nge anythi ng if I didn't
I keep cutting corners with my writing. I should stop doing that. Every word in the sentence is important, and so is every letter. (even the periods are important.).
You can never have tooo many periods...... not funny
I'll never understand other people by refusing to speak and write
I have to try harder.
Both are difficult.
Tired now.
Still not late enough to go to sleep. I wish I was allowed to take pills for that.
But the doctors know better
That's why they are doctors.
Maybe I'll be a doctor one day I sure have the right handwriting
Once I woke up with bedsores. It was disgusting. Hurt a whole lot.
There was blood everywhere.
I hated my sister. She didn't deserve that this time. Did she ever?

Didn't happen again,lucky (there are methods of prevention)
Summer autumn winter spring


Red bluered bluered blue



Itsharder to write about rando m things than to write about s pecific things.
Should I be surprised? No
This now loo ks like those pieces of pap er crazy people in the movies keep in their drawers
You see them after they die
Except mo re illegible
I wonder how the crazy people can have such fine handwriting
I should learn more about it.
If someone read this would hethink I am crazy?
No because only in the movies do they leave little pieces of paper.

#*#*#*#*#

I think it lo oks like people
That'snot even funny
My fingers hurt
I'll write about this!
Myfingers hurt from writing
My fingers hurt from writing
That looks so pathetic nobodyspeaks like that in real life do they only in visual novels and such
I shouldlisten to people speaking I do that enough in class (really)
Someone told a pretty funny joke yesterday but I don't reme mber it very well
Pretty sure it was fu nny though.
If someone were to see this piece of paper I wonder what he might think about me.
That my handwritingis bad.
He'd think I am dylsetctic dyslectic.
(It would have been funny if it wasn't already overdone.
I am joking formyself on a piece of paper <><><><><><>)
But also other things I won der how it can be so confusing you are the one who writes after all
But you would think I am a sad crazy person
Does that mean I am ?
Better not show this to anyone.
Wrote enough for tonight I have other things to do
(not really I need to get a hobby)
Maybe join some club maybe they have a book club?
Turning pages gets me mad
Because it's hard
If someone saw that sentence right now, maybe he would think it's very philosophical
: ) I'd like that
(Already decided not to draw anything stupid)
Now I wrote enough? Yes
Put in drawer write again tomorrow
=___="

That one was a little better I think

____________________________________________________________________________________

By the time I realized it wouldn't even be a good "story" if it was legible (Unless you are the type who enjoys Normality and stuff IOWA WE CASK NIACIN WE IX APOGEE IOWA use your light but awful chains), I already put too much effort into it (fucking BBCode tags) to just delete it. And now you have to suffer for my hubris.

Endure.

[Morph]

That's why Jack's manuscript in Shining is as it is. His therapist told him to train his fingers

Jokes aside, I think it is an interesting narrative style. Having direct access to someones thoughts without any rules of communication and stuff.
I like it. Gives me an opportunity to compare my own thinking processes to others.

[Minister of Gloom]

Is it so? Yet another reason for me to watch the movie, then. A real classic, this one. Can't call myself a film-making student without watching it.

Crazy texts do have their appeal.

[AapoAlas]

Suddenly, Decartes, out of fucking nowhere!
You made me burst out laughing right there, lovely!

[Minister of Gloom]

I was really unsure whether to put that in or not... I was referring to his writings about skepticism (could anything we perceive be just a great deception?), so it made sense to me to put him as a connotation to the question of "Are there other people anyway?"
My first fear was of coming off as way too pretentious. My second fear, far greater, was the text being read by someone who actually understands Descartes' work on skepticism far better than I do (extremely likely, since I guess I really don't) and telling me why I am wrong...

[AapoAlas]

I may be a stick-in-the-mud mathematician, but I don't think there's really much "understanding" to Decartes. Well, of course you can run through the same trains of thought as he did and all that, read his works, try to find flaws in his reasoning or explore new depths of it but all in all it comes down to questioning almost everything and trying to find something that is unquestionable. It is a fascinating subject, though. One that I like to explore almost daily.

[Minister of Gloom]

Cheesier than an American pizza and far less healthy, here's another creation of mine inspired by the former, starring the same personality-less angsty OC who's first name, gender, exact disability (although family name is given, and a certain type of unspecific disability is heavily implied) and any other personal pieces of information are still a matter of mystery (which is to say, I myself have no idea). I left just enough information in the last text so that I'll have something to latch on to in case I ever wanted to do something like this, so there you have it.
You will undoubtedly notice that this one is written like a normal story, instead of a scribble on a page. The narrator is the same character, mind you, but now it should be far easier to understand. It's rather short and not as balanced as my scriptwriting teacher would have liked, but it's what you get.


Last Night

What is a walk, really, but a series of coordinated falls forward?
The only trick to it is that most people do it quickly and fluidly enough that they don't even notice.

I told myself that I'll go to sleep early on that night, since I wanted to have more time for preparation in the morning, but getting ready for that took a lot longer then I assumed it would- and I assumed a rather long time, mind you, being realistic and all.
I managed to take a shower without falling on my face, and I managed to dress myself without running out of air, but it was still way too much time. Thus, my little childish pride was diluted with frustration as I made my stumbling way back into my room like a ridiculous toy, trying not to make so much noise as to wake everybody up.
I managed to do surprisingly well, if I may say so myself.
Or so I thought, at least.

I entered my room silently, without even bothering to turn on the lights, and left my crutches by the bedside as I dropped on it. Covering myself with the heavy blanket seemed like too much of an effort, so I made do with an awkward roll of sorts that left me in a state which could be considered "covered", more or less.
It was about as comfortable as it sounds, which is to say, not, but it was one of the best feelings I have had in weeks.

Laugh at me as much as you want, saying such things about merely getting into bed, but as far as I was concerned, it was a rare and wonderful feeling of power and freedom. I did it all myself, without once asking for help from anyone. Not from mom, not from dad, not from Mika.
It was all my own work, and pathetic as it was, I was damn proud of it.

I wasn't used to doing it all like this. Usually I was escorted during the whole process- the entire Okada household scrambling into order and stopping still because the eldest needs to go to the stupid bathroom. There was always someone with me, making sure I didn't clumsy myself to death and that I didn't have to exercise too many limbs at once. Someone had to stop whatever they were doing and help wash me, or help me put my shirt on, or feed me because I can't possibly be trusted with something as dangerous as a spoonful of hot soup.
It was like being royalty, really, except humiliating and painful.

I didn't deserve any of this and they didn't need any of this. I had a difficult birth. Maybe someone messed up, or maybe it was karma taking revenge on me for something terrible I did in my last incarnation. The important thing is that none of them did it, so there was nothing obliging them to act this way. Nothing obliging them to give up their own lives like that. Mika wasn't even born back then, she wasn't even in my parents' designs, and she still had to live her entire life in this freaking shadow. No wonder she hates me.

Maybe if they expected me to speak more I would have been able to convince them that I don't want them to. I am not some ninety years-old who needs to be fed. And you know what? Even if I do, why is it any of their concern? I can handle some hot soup on my legs once in a while. Everybody else can, so why wouldn't I? I checked about my condition on the internet. My case wasn't even that severe. Some folks with this problem are confined to wheelchairs. Some of them are mentally retarded. Some of them get seizures. Like, all the time.

My mom was the one who usually put me to bed, covering me, kissing me goodnight, the whole deal, as if I was a baby. I loved it when I was younger, until I realized that she stopped doing it for Mika when she was five. It wasn't something you do with a normal, grown up kid. It turned from a lovely little habit into something that felt shameful, selfish and evil. I knew Mika would end up hating me for being like this.

My mom was really dedicated to the cause, more than any other of my relatives. Maybe she felt guilty about me, or something. She is stupid about it. If anybody's, it was my fault for coming out the way I did. Aren't babies supposed to have some instinctive way of doing those kinds of things? I must have been the dumbest baby ever.
Or maybe it was a fetal suicide attempt? Must be a real pain geting sleeping pills into the uterus, you work with what you've got.

She would say goodnight, she would say sweet dreams, she would say that she loves me very much, but it was years since I last felt good about it. She never even waited for me to thank her. She never even waited for me to smile. She knew I wouldn't, because saying two syllables in a row without tying my tongue must be such an ordeal for one such as me, so it became an automatic process for her. She loved me mechanically because she had too, because she desperately needed to feel better with herself about creating my life.

They were all like this. My very own team of happy robotic servitors. I couldn't wait to get away from all of them. I also wanted to get away from steep staircases and kids who won't stop calling me a retard, but I think that more than anything I was happy about this new boarding school thing because it meant being away from them. It meant living by myself and doing things by myself and finally giving all of them the rest they must so want and that they so deserve from me and all of my stupid conditions.

I always had problems falling asleep, so I was still wide awake and nervous when I heard someone coming in. I didn't bother rolling around to see who it was. Nobody was surprised anymore when I didn't; it was far more dramatic when I was a baby.
Besides I was angry at myself that I didn't manage to do everything quietly enough, and I was angry at whoever it was for coming over to check up on me in the middle of the night. I didn't fall off my bed. I didn't break anything.

"Are you alright?" I heard my sister asking. I didn't answer. I thought maybe she'll go away if I didn't.

"You are not asleep, aren't you?"

She annoyed me. I wanted so much at that moment for the morning to come. I wanted to leave her behind to her friends and her hobbies and all of the things she'd rather do than have me around. Did she come to mock me one last time?

I made a slight movement of the head that could be interpreted as a sign of reaction if you've had years of training in the subject. Which Mika did, of course, as did every other member of my family.

"I came to check up on you."

"Go back to sleep," I replied with my signature slow stutter of short sentences. I was pleasantly surprised that I didn't get anything wrong this time. Doctor would be proud.

She was silent for a few moments so I thought she was starting to go away, but I didn't hear any footsteps. She was just standing there, watching me.

"You are going to that boarding school tomorrow, right?"

"Yes," I replied. "You are happy," I added silently.

I hated Mika just as much as she did me. She's four years younger than me. I think my parents decided to have her so that they can feel like at least one of their kids is normal. Or maybe they just needed another pair of hands to help them take care of their precious living-breathing garden ornament. Nobody made any mistakes during her birth. She was more mobile when she was four years old than I was at the same time, age difference and all. She walked and talked and ran and jumped and painted and had friends.
She'd play with them down in the park, and I'd sit nearby with my crutches and look, maybe struggle with the pages of some book or another. Not because I was watching over her until it was time for her to go home.
Because I had to wait for her to take me. Because I wasn't allowed to cross roads without help.

It was absurd, it was humiliating, and it was a twisted way that should have never been. I was her older sibling. I was in the fourth grade and she was barely in kindergarten.
It was wrong in any way it could be. It should have been her waiting. It should have been her needing my help. I wanted to help her and take care of her. I wanted her to adore me and admire me and maybe even fear me as you do your older sibling. I wanted her to love me.
I thought she should have been the one born crippled. A little sister shouldn't be babysitting her older sibling like this.
It should have been the other way around.
Hers is the life that I should have had. It makes no sense, not in any kind of way, but I knew that it's true.
We both knew it, and we both hated each other for it.

"Will you come back for the holidays?" she finally asked.

"Don't know," I answered and screamed at her in my mind to go away already.

I heard her approaching me.

"What do you want?" I said a little more angrily now, and the words came all twisted. I wanted to tell her to leave me. I wanted to tell her that she wasn't needed anymore, that I was no longer her problem.

"Aren't you afraid of going there? Living in another place for an entire year? Not seeing mom and dad for a year?"

Three years, if I am lucky. I hated all of them at that moment.

"No"

She came even closer. "Not at all?"

"No," not a little bit. For all I cared, I could have never again seen any one of them and it would have only been for the better. She stood there, quiet, maybe considering what I said. I could hear her breathing. It was quick and sharp, and it didn't let me sleep.

"I am," she said.

"What?"

"That you'll go away from here. That I won't see you for such a long time."

What was it that she was trying to do? Was she trying to make me feel guilty? Was she trying to make herself feel like a better person? It was pitiful, and I didn't want to believe a word of it.

"You are not," I replied. She had no reason to be. She had nothing to lose from it. I was ridding her from a very big problem, and she came to disturb me at night.

"I'll miss you a lot."

I was starting to feel uncomfortable about not looking at her, so I made the effort and rolled to the other side of the bad.
She was crying a little. I frowned at her angrily. I couldn't see very well in the dark, but I am almost sure that she was crying a little. I had no idea why.

"You won't", I said, just a bit more gently now.

She just kept crying.

I lifted my hand clumsily from its place, and touched her face with a finger without saying a word, as if to wipe away her tears. It felt strange, to touch rather than be touched.
Perhaps it even felt nice.

She raised her eyes and looked at my face, or at least I think she did. I didn't smile. I just looked back at her.

"Hush, Mika," I whispered to her. "You are happy. Go back to sleep"

I rolled again to the far side of the bed, almost touching the wall with the tip of my nose. A minuet or so later, I felt her body next to mine. Hands, legs, and breath, the whole package. Her movements became slower and more relaxed. She'll soon be sleeping. I kissed her goodnight on her forehead.
"Sweet dreams, Mika".
Her cheeks were still wet and warm. But they'll dry soon enough
It's good. I wanted my pillow to stay dry until the morning.
Too bad, then.

I told myself that I'll go to sleep early on that night. But it didn't work out.
I was too busy crying.

---------------------------------------------------

I tried to walk a very fine line with this character. I wanted it to be pitiful and and annoying, but also sympathetic. I wanted to be able to identify with its pain on an emotional level, even if on an intellectual level I want to kick it in the shins for being such a whiny, thankless bitch. Its whole perception of reality is terribly broken.
It's not the first time I write such a character, on this subject, even on this very forum.
I guess that's what I am good at doing.

Hope you had fun. Please tell me what you think, if you want.

[scott1and]

My reaction

I like how you really, actually emphasized how she felt, rather than doing a half assed job at it. Hope you write more about this character...like her name and stuff, but even without that it was a fantastic read.

[Morph]

Hope you write more about this character...like her name and stuff, but even without that it was a fantastic read.

I thought the protagonist of this story is a boy
But is it mentioned anywhere? I didn't notice if so.

[Minister of Gloom]

Hope you write more about this character...like her name and stuff, but even without that it was a fantastic read.

I thought the protagonist of this story is a boy
But is it mentioned anywhere? I didn't notice if so.

I tried my hardest to keep it ambiguous (do tell me if I slipped at some point, and note that if I did refer to the character as a female it's only because I subconsciously think of the word "character" as a female word, which it is in Hebrew), because I don't have anything really solid in mind right now. It could be a boy, it could be a girl, for all I care it could be intersexual (twist!). This is one of the reasons I didn't reveal any first name, and used the awkward "older sibling" instead of the perhaps more dramatic "big brother" or "big sister".
Frankly, I assumed most of the readers will simply give the character a gender from their subconscious based on it's actions, and this will solve me the problem of doing it myself logically. As you see, Scott1and thought the character was female, and you thought it was a male, even though, as far as I noticed, there was no concrete evidence for any of them.

[scott1and]

Hope you write more about this character...like her name and stuff, but even without that it was a fantastic read.

I thought the protagonist of this story is a boy
But is it mentioned anywhere? I didn't notice if so.

I tried my hardest to keep it ambiguous (do tell me if I slipped at some point, and note that if I did refer to the character as a female it's only because I subconsciously think of the word "character" as a female word, which it is in Hebrew), because I don't have anything really solid in mind right now. It could be a boy, it could be a girl, for all I care it could be intersexual (twist!). This is one of the reasons I didn't reveal any first name, and used the awkward "older sibling" instead of the perhaps more dramatic "big brother" or "big sister".
Frankly, I assumed most of the readers will simply give the character a gender from their subconscious based on it's actions, and this will solve me the problem of doing it myself logically. As you see, Scott1and thought the character was female, and you thought it was a male, even though, as far as I noticed, there was no concrete evidence for any of them.

It's not a very sexual character, anyway.

Clever Mr Gloom, very clever..I'm actually very impressed that you kept that in mind while writing this. You've essentially created the ultimate crossroad for yourself as you've sculpted a protagonist that could become a male, female or hermaphrodite of you wanted, all the while making the narrative work without any one of them. You could even keep said information from the audience indefinitely, never telling the gender and letting the readers make that decision for themselves.

[Mirage_GSM]

To be honest, I didn't manage to finish the first part. I read until I went "Ah, I know what you're doing" and stopped reading there for fear of a headache.
I really like the second part though. I don't think the character's too whiny or thankless...
If he is really always treated that way, he has some right to be annoyed, though with him being the narrator, that view will always be biased. You'll have noticed, that I'm using male pronouns. For me the character is male. I thought of him as male from the beginning, but if I had to give a reason, it would be his protective feelings for his little sister. Sure, an older sister could also feel protective, but this points towards the other option.

[Minister of Gloom]

Thank you very much.

As for protectiveness being a male trait, you have to remember that there many different kinds of protectiveness- relevant to us most of all, among them, as male and female protectiveness ("fatherly" and "motherly", if you wish), and both may be visible in this case. For example, the narrator doesn't even smile while wiping away Mika's tears, which is archetypally a trait of the father (calm through example of calmness, emotional distance). On the other hand, after she falls asleep, the narrator does kiss her, which is far more fitting with the motherly archetype (in this particular case, also remember that the narrator said before that it associates goodnight kisses strongly with it's mother).
Then again, it could also just be a stereotypical girl who is just not very emotional (not unreasonable, considering her family situation), or it could be a stereotypical boy who doesn't mind revealing his emotions in this particular case (nobody can see them, he won't get another chance for a long time).

But I understand your analysis.
If this is really a problem, I think I'll just flip a coin the next time I need to write about this character. In the end, all it really amounts to is whether I'll need to make dick jokes or boob jokes when I get seriously desperate.

[Leotrak]

In the end, all it really amounts to is whether I'll need to make dick jokes or boob jokes when I get seriously desperate.

Well, I don't think there's anything stopping you from making both, even if you decide on a gender XD

Anyway, this second piece is brilliant. I have no other word to describe it ">_>

[Minister of Gloom]

It took a while to write this part. I made a whole lot of revisions to it over the last few days. I originally thought of making it a fair bit longer, with paragraphs about the history of the narrator's relationship with the mother, and experience from the last school it went to, and doctors and physiotherapists and dreams and god knows what. But it was even more boring than it is now, so I cut away half of it and this is the result.

I am not a chapter writing guy, you know? I am not used to writing this kind of stories, where you have the entire plot in your head carefully prepared from the beginning and each chapter follows the former in a logical and aesthetically pleasing way towards a great goal. When I write, it's most often because I have a very specific idea of what I want to say that just came up at some point, I write a few pages in a couple of hours, there's a beginning and a middle and a sort of end and ten minuets later it's already posted.

So in a way, this here is another experiment. I still don't know anything about the narrator, not to mention a plot (seriously, I haven't the slightest idea), I am just kind of going with the flow and advancing time a little, hoping to delay that fateful moment when I have to start actually making things happen, or creating a cast of interesting and likable characters and the interactions between them.

So for now, have a little pointless "chapter".

First Morning

If you asked me how it feels like, to be like me, than I think I'll have no choice but to answer "I don't know". I mean, how does it feel to be like you? I'd like to know that as well. I was born the way I am, so I never even got to experience anything different. Sometimes I imagine how it must be, though. I guess it's always exaggerated in my mind, but I think it would feel pretty wonderful. Like one of those superheroes on TV suddenly finding more power from within himself just when it seems like the bad guy is about to win. All of that strength inside your body suddenly becoming yours to command at will. You feel like you can do anything; Lift heavy objects, leap tall buildings in a single bound.
Walk around without crutches, in my case.

Just so you know, my muscles aren't weak. I mean, they are, because I don't exercise them very often and I don't eat well, but that's not the big problem. It's the nerves controlling them that are not functioning properly. I could have the biceps of a world-class bodybuilder and it won't matter one bit because they still won't respond when I tell them too.
Or at least, that's how the doctors explained it to me. Maybe they thought it'll make me feel better. I don't think I can really feel the difference, to be honest.

Usually, I wake up very early in the morning and just spend a few hours lying in bed facing the wall with my eyes open and thinking about all sorts of things. Sometimes I shift around a little when the posture of the moment becomes too painful to bear. That morning wasn't any different, at least in this regard. My face itched and my eyes burned from last night's crying, and I could feel the pressure and heat on my back where Mika was still soundly sleeping. It wasn't comfortable, despite my bed being rather wide, but it wasn't painful either.

I rolled over to see her face, and she looked so nice sleeping that I didn't want to interrupt her by moving her. Which would almost certainly involve waking her up and asking her to move, since I probably won't be able to push her around by myself. I haven't seen her asleep since she was really tiny, and maybe those memories were the ones floating back to the surface of my mind when I looked at her. All that was missing was the sweet, innocent smile of a little girl, but I guess it's only so much that real life can be like a television show. I thought about touching her again, but it would probably disturb her.

Don't think for a moment that those things she said to me the night before and the fact I let her into my bed like that completely turned around the way I thought about her from that moment on. You can't erase eleven years worth of a bitter grudge in one moment, no matter how precious. Real life doesn't work like that, and I don't think it will ever go away completely. A part of me, that may shrink over the years but never go away fully, will always think of her as the girl who stole from me the life fate intended for me, reversing the natural order of things without ever admitting to it.
She might tell you that she always thought of me as older then her, that she respected and admired me despite everything, but it wouldn't change the fact that in the end of the day, it was still her helping me into my pajamas, not the other way around.
I don't think I'll ever be able to fully forgive her for that crime, even she'll never even know about it.

So I just stared at her, thinking, until my parents came in. I rolled over when I heard the door opening and the steps on the thinly carpeted floor.

"Good morning," my mother said a second later in the cheerfully hollow voice she always kept just for me. My only answer was a slight nod of recognition, but I know she didn't really mind. My input to the entire process was really rather minimal. I just kept staring silently and waited for the upcoming inevitability.

"Mika, what are you doing here? Why aren't you at in your own bed?" she said with a voice just on that amusing verge between surprise and anger that we all save for such occasions.

Mika mumbled something unclear in response, still not fully awake, and I could feel her moving behind me and getting off the bed.
"I just wanted to say goodbye," she protested quietly, but mom just told her to go back into her room and get ready, helpfully reminding her how difficult it was usually for me to fall asleep. I felt like I should've intervened, but I decided no to.

I am not really sure why.

I knew that I and my mom both had the exact same thing on our mind right now, but she didn't mention anything about it, as if it was just any other regular morning. I wondered sometimes whether she of all people really understood it when the doctors said that I wasn't, in fact, mentally retarded.
The first day in a new school is an experience that I think any teenager would consider frightening, worrying or at the very least somewhat unusual, but I had a certain history with schools, not exactly a pleasant one, and it was obviously on both of our minds.
It's just that she thought that if she wouldn't speak about it, maybe I won't remember.
Maybe she pretended that she didn't.

"Let's get you out of bed, now, sweetie," she said with a voice completely unlike the one she used a minuet ago, and for the first time in a very long while, I replied verbally.

"No. I can do it."

She went silent for a second, perhaps confused, and then sighed. "You think you can manage it all on your own?"

"Yes," I said, even though I wasn't sure at all. But hey, I managed last night. It couldn't have been so difficult if I already managed to do it in the dark.

"Are you really sure? You won't have to do it yourself until tomorrow, why not enjoy being with your family for as long as you can?" I thought… I thought I might have heard a subtle hint of desperation in her voice, at that moment. She was actually desperate about it, but it only made me feel better and more confident in my decision. "Enjoy being with your family?" Did she really think being carried around the house was my concept of enjoying time with my family?
One of us must have been a horribly twisted person, and I still wasn't sure which one it was.

"Tomorrow's close," I said simply and started turning around in my bed. Tomorrow was close, indeed, and it was all the more a reason to learn how to do those things all by myself. I won't have mom and dad to help me at school. That was the very reason I decided to go there in the first place. That was my idea, and I wasn't going to betray it in the last moment, no matter how uncomfortable and scary it seemed. I was intent on doing it by myself even if it killed me.

Some people take getting out of bed for granted, but if you think about it a bit more deeply, I'm sure you too will come to appreciate the sheer complexity of this physical operation. Sure, I could have just made another roll to the side and be done with it, but I didn't feel particularly like banging my head against the hard floor so early in the morning.
So I decided to do it the slow, awkward way, crawling like a caterpillar who forgot how to move its many legs towards the floor, secretly glad that only mom was there to see me.

Probably figuring out that she won't be able to convince me to change my mind, she just said "I'll be in the kitchen preparing breakfast. Please call if you need anything," and existed the room, just like that.
Such a weird and wonderful feeling it was.

I picked up my crutches, opened the closet and took out a bundle of clothes to take with me to the bathroom.
I didn't leave the house much these days, so I never really got to wear very fancy or complicated clothes. I stuck to simple, comfortable things with as few pieces as possible that will be the easiest for my helpers to get me into or out of.
In comparison, my new school uniform looked terribly complex. Japan isn't a terribly cold country, right? Were all of those different layers really absolutely necessary? I knew it would take me forever to get everything into place. I swallowed in comical dread and for a moment I even considered asking for help after all, but in the end I decided not to make a complete fool of myself and just try my best.

I stood in front of the large mirror while struggling to get out of my pajamas.

"Looking great," I lied to myself quietly, and brushed my teeth while deliberately ignoring the painful yet obvious fact that most people probably didn't consider "slouched, bent, and devoid of facial expression" a kind of "looking great."
In my defense, at least I wasn't cross eyed anymore. I used to be when I was younger. That was positively ridicules.

It's far easier to fill a bath with water and lie inside than it is to have a standing shower, but it also takes a lot longer. I had an ominous gut feeling that putting on my uniform was going to take a while, so I decided to go for the shorter, more difficult route.
Hard in training, easy in battle, they say. I have to get used to things like that now so that I won't have to in school.

I think I did a fairly good job, both in terms of cleaning myself and in terms of not breaking anything too important, and it only took forever to get into my uniform, which was about half as long as I thought it would take.

My family was almost completely done with breakfast when I finally made it to the kitchen. Normally, they would never have started eating without me, but I guess my mom was a little angry about my decision to arrogantly try to get out of bed by myself. Naturally, I also insisted on not being fed, which meant having to arduously fish tiny pieces of precious nourishment off my plate with my head almost stuck to the table surface. My dad did have to help me sit down though, just to make sure I was positioned properly so that I won't slide down during the meal and end up on the floor. They'd have to crawl beneath the table to peel me off it. It happened a couple of times in the past, and I don't think they were amused by it as much I was.
I didn't want to start a fight, so I didn't argue.
Everybody was smiling at me, and nobody said anything.
Frankly, I was a little ashamed of myself. I wasn't really sure anymore if this whole performance was wise, or even worth it.

But deep inside, I knew it was. Every single excruciating last bit of it, then and before it and long after.

"Are we allowed to carry your bags to the car for you, or can you do that by yourself, too?"

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On a sidenote, it was really difficult keeping the whole ambiguous gender thing while writing the part with the mirror and the uniform. I had to rewrite it like five times, and two times I was almost prepared to give up and just give the narrator a freaking set of genitals already. But I didn't break! Oh such pride.

What do you think, overall?