The Chikamori Selfacy (A Reboot)
https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-451kWfI6hzI/X8bPPtEyeVI/AAAAAAAAk54/KB3_SyRJ73IFG8EkSAmOkYAyCBOz1giwgCK4BGAYYCw/s1600/ChikamoriSelfacyReboot_banner.png Prologue: June 12, 1970; Sacred Spleen Hospital...
Forum Discussion
The Chikamori Selfacy Generation One
Chapter One: Life in Sunset Valley
A Long History
Chapter One (Part 3)
Five Years Later
"River, are you going to see Star Wars?" Haruo looked over at his friend as they stood in the rain at Central Park. It was a cloudy day and the downpour had totally drenched the both of them. 1977 had had an interesting passel of movies being released by Hollywood; George Lucas’s grand space adventure being one of them. Haruo was itching to go see it since all his friends at school were talking about it.
https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-XpxhWdpk_aE/X7wfZJmOAFI/AAAAAAAAkfs/QuL8avoNYocHGj2NmNwgXYcL68Slw-vnACLcBGAsYHQ/s0/Screenshot-174.jpg
"I don't know..." River replied; she understood Haruo’s desire to go see the movie and she knew that Mayumi would gleefully prevent her son from going to see it since that was how Mayumi was. "It looks totally rad. You?"
"My mom says she's not letting me go." Haruo said looking frustrated. "She says I'll get scared of the bad guys."
"Man, your mom's a square!" River exclaimed, "Look, if my mom lets me go, I'll tell you all about it."
"i got the Scholastic book catalog the school gave out." Haruo gesticulated excitedly as he got a mischievous look on his face, "I gotta see if my dad will let me get one book from the Catalog."
"That would so cool..." River exclaimed, "you could get that Star Wars Picture Book." Haruo's face lit up in response to River's exclamation.
https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-e_TVk79hhI8/X7wfojOrkjI/AAAAAAAAkf0/z1Wub419MAoTCx8lhoEnuzImzz9cRStbACLcBGAsYHQ/s0/Screenshot-171.jpg
"Don't let her get to you..." River continued, with wisdom beyond her seven years of age, "I know she's a square and she gets on your nerves but y'know, we got eleven years and then we're adults and we can go see any movie we want then."
Haruo nodded as he knew she was right. They would be able to do a lot more when they were adults but it just seemed so long of a time between being seven years old and eighteen.
https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-rJQ7yXjh5xk/X7whQLlQ8XI/AAAAAAAAkgA/NVbpeFGM3nA7lK5G3jtBZAe_lMt1z4tEACLcBGAsYHQ/s0/Screenshot-172.jpg
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River impulsively pulled him into a hug. "Cheer up. Haruo...I'm your friend and I'm gonna be right beside you...all the time. So..if you have cmplaints about your mom, talk to me about it. OK?"
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"Yeah." The two friends grinned at each other. It was summer holidays and River and Haruo spent as much time as they could playing together on the swings in the park and on the playground at the school before they would walk tired back to their respective houses to, in River's case to help with chores that a seven-year old could do and Haruo to a bout ten sheets of math problems. His mother was a real drag.
"Hey..." River suggested, "You wanna kick the soccer ball around or something?" Haruo nodded in response and they decided to go over to the soccer net.
"You be Graham Mosely, I'll be Bobby Lenarduzzi." Haruo suggested, "...and then we'll switch positions."
https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-HIBLhU11syc/X7wl2pYxt0I/AAAAAAAAkgk/WQB5xu6Szikl9So-XZwpC-pS-pbMCBcxQCLcBGAsYHQ/s0/Screenshot-178.jpg
"I betcha, I'll make the stop..." River smirked at him.
"Yeah...sure..." Haruo said. "I betcha I can get the ball past you..."
https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-cFj1OgB2uKo/X7wmQoC3LNI/AAAAAAAAkgs/5LV1767Ufvg36zaw_sMGSWlS9QdazdkwwCLcBGAsYHQ/s0/Screenshot-179.jpg
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No...he wasn't able to. By the time that the game was over...River had managed to score on him once and he hadn't been able to get one single ball past her into the net.
https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-jwxRRCWcPcU/X7wmpuLh-iI/AAAAAAAAkhE/aWwSa1JpaowRQuRZsmPYLz-tTXZqwYkGACPcBGAYYCw/s0/Screenshot-185.jpg
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"Wow...you did good." Haruo exclaimed as he picked himself off the ground after barely managing to block yet another one of River's goal attempts. His fingers stung and man, she didn't kick that ball like a girl.
By the time they got home to their house, they were sweaty and tired. But River had homework that she had to do so she set about doing it.
https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-ppRSkI5A1B0/X7wn3exK3iI/AAAAAAAAkhQ/7RcuzExQ2WcOX0NetcobLqwFm5Mke3FnACLcBGAsYHQ/s0/Screenshot-194.jpg
There was nothing more boring than multiplication and addition tables, but well, that was how one learned back in 1977. Mimeographed sheets with blue ink that could potentially smear if it wasn't fully dry. And one could smell the ink used. It was a pungent odour that permeated the nostrils and that was the scent that told you that you have homework. But River being a diligent student sat at the table and no matter how boring it was, she put her effort into learning her addition, subtraction, multiplication and division tables. And the worksheet gradually filled up with carbon scoring as her pencil made lines and squiggles denoting numbers filling up the answers to the equations asked.
Haruo, on the other hand, having done his homework already lay on the bench and slept after a hard day of school and then playing soccer at the park.
https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-B1NsK7sSh2Y/X7wpE1AmUrI/AAAAAAAAkhc/sWFsUGVJo9k0RxxqCwMv7oLUyscvuFlgwCLcBGAsYHQ/s0/Screenshot-195.jpg
...and that was where Mayumi found him stretched out on the bench in the backyard asleep. "Just what do you think you're doing?!" Mayumi screeched. "Don't you have ay homework to do? Why are you being lazy and not doing your homework like..."
https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-r9Zhjc2Aybw/X7wpl2o6UFI/AAAAAAAAkho/paDfpsJNUWsaxSdVV5xHfEL1lB4oBS1vgCLcBGAsYHQ/s0/Screenshot-198.jpg
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"I DID MY HOMEWORK!" Haruo snapped back.
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"Don't you talk back like that at me...young man! I'm sure you're just lying to me. If your teacher didn't give you homework, I'll give you twenty sheets of equations that you can do."
https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-JFhaN9APcOY/X7wqbWoks4I/AAAAAAAAkh8/itidFErpbqUGIqPLWs0nwKMlHlPxZurlwCLcBGAsYHQ/s0/Screenshot-205.jpg
...and you'll get that every night for a week until you learn to not talk back to your betters." Mayumi looked smug as she looked at him with her beady eyes. "No son of mine is going to lie to me." Haruo looked frustrated and angry as he had done his homework and the fact that he was being called a liar even when he was telling the truth made him angry beyond belief. "You can start your twenty pages of equations tomorrow but for now, you can sit on that chair on the porch and think about what you said and about your lying to me."
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Haruo could only fume impotently as he stalked off to sit down in the chair and wish that his mother could disappear. When River got finished her homework, he defiantly got up out of his seat and walked over to the bench to sit with River. River could tell something was wrong with Haruo. "Your mom?" was all she asked.
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"She thinks I've lied about doing my homework...and now I get to do twenty sheets of questions for a week...because she says that I talked back to her." Haruo aired his grievances about his mother to River who nodded patiently. River thought to herself that she was really starting to not like Haruo's mother.
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"River, I don't know how I'm going to put up with this for another twelve years..." Haruo frustratedly waved his hands and looked up to the sky. "It's like she hates me or something."
https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-9axQ8ZNAlzo/X7wtFzwt_wI/AAAAAAAAkik/LpS2b3yt2GYVPY8SKHZ4rJX55gtwYRlpACLcBGAsYHQ/s0/Screenshot-213.jpg
"It's not the twenty pages of questions...I have to do...but she's doing this so that I can't spend time with you." he looked over at her, anger on his face. "And she knows that I like to go to the park with you and everything. So she's trying to stop me from doing that."
https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-kC9660GM14I/X7wtmqhmiRI/AAAAAAAAkis/ZB3LKJEhEEw5uwL6sJLyAnhkRu13a0m8ACPcBGAYYCw/s0/Screenshot-214.jpg
"It's so unfair..." he said. "I don't think she even likes me."
River nodded as she stared at the grass and contemplated Haruo's words. "I know you did your homework at school because I saw you in the school library before we headed to the park, but the unfair part of it is that even if I tell her she won't believe me." And that simple fact made River hate Mayumi too. She was always picking on her son, if not heckling him; out right denigrating him for even breathing the same air as she had to stand in.
https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-ra_DZeVTaBU/X7wuJpuMx9I/AAAAAAAAki0/eB4t1CubT14rkZtqLbMnJo5c12jTwlsYACLcBGAsYHQ/s0/Screenshot-215.jpg
Trying to deal with this kind of harassment from his own mother would set anyone at the end of their rope and Haruo looked frustrated to the point where he was about to curl up in a ball and cry out of frustration. As a child of seven, he shouldn't have had to deal with this kind of behavior, especially out of his own mother. Mayumi wasn't fair and she had a chip on her shoulder and a focus for her negative behavior and River was sick of it. Even if she couldn't place a word on how she felt about Haruo as a friend, she was protective of him and only wanted him to be happy. It was a pity that his own mother couldn't feel the same way.
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"I don't know what to do..." Haruo said...sounding half as if he was about ready to break-down and half like he was about to go nuclear. And River understood completely.
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"I'm your friend, Haruo...When you feel like this...talk to me." River said. "That way you don't get so ticked off." She said, "I can't do anything about the extra homework, but I can be someone you can talk to."
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"We can sit here together and dream about what it would be like to travel the world and see different things. If we were able to do that. Where would you want to go?"
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"...anywhere..." Haruo said, a hint of vehemence evident in his tone. "Anywhere away from here and away from my mother." River figured as much and Mayumi wasn't going to like the fact that she would be losing her meal-ticket. She sort of got the impression that Mayumi was just grooming Haruo in order to leech from him. She could see the distinct difference between how her mother treated her and Haruo's mother treated him. The difference was like night and day. Her mother treated her like the most precious thing in the world and Haruo's mother treated him like the dirt under her shoes.
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But to get her friend's mind off that she said dreamily, "I'd want to go visit France and the Eiffel Tower." she paused, "That would be like a dream vacation, y'know. Being able to see everything that France has to offer."
Haruo nodded, even though he was more of a homebody, he thought about going sightseeing around the world. However he was more cautious about things. The only people he trusted in his life were his father, River and Fiona who behaved more like a mother should to him as well as to her own daughter.
It was hard to know what would happen in the future...let alone a few years from now, so they knew that they had to work hard to learn the basics of what would enable them to become functional, upstanding citizens in the future.
Chapter One: Life in Sunset Valley
A Long History
Chapter One (Part 3)
Five Years Later
"River, are you going to see Star Wars?" Haruo looked over at his friend as they stood in the rain at Central Park. It was a cloudy day and the downpour had totally drenched the both of them. 1977 had had an interesting passel of movies being released by Hollywood; George Lucas’s grand space adventure being one of them. Haruo was itching to go see it since all his friends at school were talking about it.
https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-XpxhWdpk_aE/X7wfZJmOAFI/AAAAAAAAkfs/QuL8avoNYocHGj2NmNwgXYcL68Slw-vnACLcBGAsYHQ/s0/Screenshot-174.jpg
"I don't know..." River replied; she understood Haruo’s desire to go see the movie and she knew that Mayumi would gleefully prevent her son from going to see it since that was how Mayumi was. "It looks totally rad. You?"
"My mom says she's not letting me go." Haruo said looking frustrated. "She says I'll get scared of the bad guys."
"Man, your mom's a square!" River exclaimed, "Look, if my mom lets me go, I'll tell you all about it."
"i got the Scholastic book catalog the school gave out." Haruo gesticulated excitedly as he got a mischievous look on his face, "I gotta see if my dad will let me get one book from the Catalog."
"That would so cool..." River exclaimed, "you could get that Star Wars Picture Book." Haruo's face lit up in response to River's exclamation.
https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-e_TVk79hhI8/X7wfojOrkjI/AAAAAAAAkf0/z1Wub419MAoTCx8lhoEnuzImzz9cRStbACLcBGAsYHQ/s0/Screenshot-171.jpg
"Don't let her get to you..." River continued, with wisdom beyond her seven years of age, "I know she's a square and she gets on your nerves but y'know, we got eleven years and then we're adults and we can go see any movie we want then."
Haruo nodded as he knew she was right. They would be able to do a lot more when they were adults but it just seemed so long of a time between being seven years old and eighteen.
https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-rJQ7yXjh5xk/X7whQLlQ8XI/AAAAAAAAkgA/NVbpeFGM3nA7lK5G3jtBZAe_lMt1z4tEACLcBGAsYHQ/s0/Screenshot-172.jpg
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River impulsively pulled him into a hug. "Cheer up. Haruo...I'm your friend and I'm gonna be right beside you...all the time. So..if you have cmplaints about your mom, talk to me about it. OK?"
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"Yeah." The two friends grinned at each other. It was summer holidays and River and Haruo spent as much time as they could playing together on the swings in the park and on the playground at the school before they would walk tired back to their respective houses to, in River's case to help with chores that a seven-year old could do and Haruo to a bout ten sheets of math problems. His mother was a real drag.
"Hey..." River suggested, "You wanna kick the soccer ball around or something?" Haruo nodded in response and they decided to go over to the soccer net.
"You be Graham Mosely, I'll be Bobby Lenarduzzi." Haruo suggested, "...and then we'll switch positions."
https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-HIBLhU11syc/X7wl2pYxt0I/AAAAAAAAkgk/WQB5xu6Szikl9So-XZwpC-pS-pbMCBcxQCLcBGAsYHQ/s0/Screenshot-178.jpg
"I betcha, I'll make the stop..." River smirked at him.
"Yeah...sure..." Haruo said. "I betcha I can get the ball past you..."
https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-cFj1OgB2uKo/X7wmQoC3LNI/AAAAAAAAkgs/5LV1767Ufvg36zaw_sMGSWlS9QdazdkwwCLcBGAsYHQ/s0/Screenshot-179.jpg
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No...he wasn't able to. By the time that the game was over...River had managed to score on him once and he hadn't been able to get one single ball past her into the net.
https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-jwxRRCWcPcU/X7wmpuLh-iI/AAAAAAAAkhE/aWwSa1JpaowRQuRZsmPYLz-tTXZqwYkGACPcBGAYYCw/s0/Screenshot-185.jpg
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"Wow...you did good." Haruo exclaimed as he picked himself off the ground after barely managing to block yet another one of River's goal attempts. His fingers stung and man, she didn't kick that ball like a girl.
By the time they got home to their house, they were sweaty and tired. But River had homework that she had to do so she set about doing it.
https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-ppRSkI5A1B0/X7wn3exK3iI/AAAAAAAAkhQ/7RcuzExQ2WcOX0NetcobLqwFm5Mke3FnACLcBGAsYHQ/s0/Screenshot-194.jpg
There was nothing more boring than multiplication and addition tables, but well, that was how one learned back in 1977. Mimeographed sheets with blue ink that could potentially smear if it wasn't fully dry. And one could smell the ink used. It was a pungent odour that permeated the nostrils and that was the scent that told you that you have homework. But River being a diligent student sat at the table and no matter how boring it was, she put her effort into learning her addition, subtraction, multiplication and division tables. And the worksheet gradually filled up with carbon scoring as her pencil made lines and squiggles denoting numbers filling up the answers to the equations asked.
Haruo, on the other hand, having done his homework already lay on the bench and slept after a hard day of school and then playing soccer at the park.
https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-B1NsK7sSh2Y/X7wpE1AmUrI/AAAAAAAAkhc/sWFsUGVJo9k0RxxqCwMv7oLUyscvuFlgwCLcBGAsYHQ/s0/Screenshot-195.jpg
...and that was where Mayumi found him stretched out on the bench in the backyard asleep. "Just what do you think you're doing?!" Mayumi screeched. "Don't you have ay homework to do? Why are you being lazy and not doing your homework like..."
https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-r9Zhjc2Aybw/X7wpl2o6UFI/AAAAAAAAkho/paDfpsJNUWsaxSdVV5xHfEL1lB4oBS1vgCLcBGAsYHQ/s0/Screenshot-198.jpg
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"I DID MY HOMEWORK!" Haruo snapped back.
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"Don't you talk back like that at me...young man! I'm sure you're just lying to me. If your teacher didn't give you homework, I'll give you twenty sheets of equations that you can do."
https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-JFhaN9APcOY/X7wqbWoks4I/AAAAAAAAkh8/itidFErpbqUGIqPLWs0nwKMlHlPxZurlwCLcBGAsYHQ/s0/Screenshot-205.jpg
...and you'll get that every night for a week until you learn to not talk back to your betters." Mayumi looked smug as she looked at him with her beady eyes. "No son of mine is going to lie to me." Haruo looked frustrated and angry as he had done his homework and the fact that he was being called a liar even when he was telling the truth made him angry beyond belief. "You can start your twenty pages of equations tomorrow but for now, you can sit on that chair on the porch and think about what you said and about your lying to me."
https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-q4d-b4Ue1D8/X7wrjl3MX8I/AAAAAAAAkiI/Adpa544u3cszF2nzLdhvifvpLfRNaLAowCLcBGAsYHQ/s0/Screenshot-209.jpg
Haruo could only fume impotently as he stalked off to sit down in the chair and wish that his mother could disappear. When River got finished her homework, he defiantly got up out of his seat and walked over to the bench to sit with River. River could tell something was wrong with Haruo. "Your mom?" was all she asked.
https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-iRnBNtq3OR0/X7xA5Ohpu7I/AAAAAAAAkkM/9L8l0iH_h1s75ejstK7j6T953yGEr51RgCLcBGAsYHQ/s0/Screenshot-210.jpg
"She thinks I've lied about doing my homework...and now I get to do twenty sheets of questions for a week...because she says that I talked back to her." Haruo aired his grievances about his mother to River who nodded patiently. River thought to herself that she was really starting to not like Haruo's mother.
https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-1IC8Ze7oYyU/X7wssTp_08I/AAAAAAAAkic/FfJcrQ4jox8XDEgzdG14grjh7thNbFfFwCLcBGAsYHQ/s0/Screenshot-212.jpg
"River, I don't know how I'm going to put up with this for another twelve years..." Haruo frustratedly waved his hands and looked up to the sky. "It's like she hates me or something."
https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-9axQ8ZNAlzo/X7wtFzwt_wI/AAAAAAAAkik/LpS2b3yt2GYVPY8SKHZ4rJX55gtwYRlpACLcBGAsYHQ/s0/Screenshot-213.jpg
"It's not the twenty pages of questions...I have to do...but she's doing this so that I can't spend time with you." he looked over at her, anger on his face. "And she knows that I like to go to the park with you and everything. So she's trying to stop me from doing that."
https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-kC9660GM14I/X7wtmqhmiRI/AAAAAAAAkis/ZB3LKJEhEEw5uwL6sJLyAnhkRu13a0m8ACPcBGAYYCw/s0/Screenshot-214.jpg
"It's so unfair..." he said. "I don't think she even likes me."
River nodded as she stared at the grass and contemplated Haruo's words. "I know you did your homework at school because I saw you in the school library before we headed to the park, but the unfair part of it is that even if I tell her she won't believe me." And that simple fact made River hate Mayumi too. She was always picking on her son, if not heckling him; out right denigrating him for even breathing the same air as she had to stand in.
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Trying to deal with this kind of harassment from his own mother would set anyone at the end of their rope and Haruo looked frustrated to the point where he was about to curl up in a ball and cry out of frustration. As a child of seven, he shouldn't have had to deal with this kind of behavior, especially out of his own mother. Mayumi wasn't fair and she had a chip on her shoulder and a focus for her negative behavior and River was sick of it. Even if she couldn't place a word on how she felt about Haruo as a friend, she was protective of him and only wanted him to be happy. It was a pity that his own mother couldn't feel the same way.
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"I don't know what to do..." Haruo said...sounding half as if he was about ready to break-down and half like he was about to go nuclear. And River understood completely.
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"I'm your friend, Haruo...When you feel like this...talk to me." River said. "That way you don't get so ticked off." She said, "I can't do anything about the extra homework, but I can be someone you can talk to."
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"We can sit here together and dream about what it would be like to travel the world and see different things. If we were able to do that. Where would you want to go?"
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"...anywhere..." Haruo said, a hint of vehemence evident in his tone. "Anywhere away from here and away from my mother." River figured as much and Mayumi wasn't going to like the fact that she would be losing her meal-ticket. She sort of got the impression that Mayumi was just grooming Haruo in order to leech from him. She could see the distinct difference between how her mother treated her and Haruo's mother treated him. The difference was like night and day. Her mother treated her like the most precious thing in the world and Haruo's mother treated him like the dirt under her shoes.
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But to get her friend's mind off that she said dreamily, "I'd want to go visit France and the Eiffel Tower." she paused, "That would be like a dream vacation, y'know. Being able to see everything that France has to offer."
Haruo nodded, even though he was more of a homebody, he thought about going sightseeing around the world. However he was more cautious about things. The only people he trusted in his life were his father, River and Fiona who behaved more like a mother should to him as well as to her own daughter.
It was hard to know what would happen in the future...let alone a few years from now, so they knew that they had to work hard to learn the basics of what would enable them to become functional, upstanding citizens in the future.
