El Kozzy Vs The Machine by Niko Ino

El Kozzy Vs The Machine by Niko Ino

“Hey what’s up man? Long time no see,” said the rather short man standing behind a crowd of women and men of varying heights and shapes and tone of voices and accents all gathered around an elevator inside a mildly old and unkept building that was taking a little too long to arrive on the first floor.

“Yeah, it’s been awhile, missed the last couple of meetings,” responded the mildly taller, but much more frail man who had to continuously raise the volume level of each word he spoke to combat the sound of the crowd gathered at the building’s singular elevator. When they had entered it, the squished people who were able to fit in, quieted down, making the quite slim man a bit self-conscious as he lowered the level of his voice to adjust to his sudden quieter surroundings. Slightly whispering, “so did you go back home for the vacation?”

“I did,” the rather short man said with lazily raised eyebrows and a deep bassy voice that made him somehow appear taller than the other man, casting a masculine shadow over him. He continued, “My younger brother got married, so I went to his wedding”

“Your brother still lives in Texas?”

“He does,” slowly raising his eyebrows again along with his head. “But my younger brother is the one that got married and he lives in Cali,” he pauses for a second. “I gotta say though, I do miss me some Whataburger man,” he continues while he and the quite slim man slowly exit the packed elevator following the group they shared it with who waddle out into a narrow hallway on the 5^th floor of the aging building with its fading porcelain walls, raising their voices back to pre-ride levels that joins the loudness of the crowd of people already in the hallway, waiting in front of a singular door that is closed and hiding what is behind it.

Soon the door opens and the herd slowly waddle forward. The quite slim man thinks this is the beginning of the end of his conversation with the rather shorter man, that they will part once they enter the room and sit in separate areas in the rows of chairs lined up throughout the room that can be seen beyond the just opened door. He thinks of some filler to say, to chat about that won’t take much longer than the 30 or so seconds it will take until they reach the corridor of the door.

“So did you eat some In n Out when you went back home? Is it really as good as they say it is?”

“Honestly man, I think Whataburger may be better.”

The quite slim man eyes bud out, his mouth drops and he further adds to the fakeness, “No way!”

They enter the room. It’s one they have never been to before. Inside there are two separate columns of rowed seats arranged in sets of three parallel chairs with a sizable gap in between to walk through to maneuver to your chair. After passing through the threshold of the room the herd traverse this parting as they disperse into their seats while a couple of standing people in suits lightly shout by the open door, “make sure to sign in on the sheet with your head teacher’s name on it.” “Fill up the seats in the front first.” “Don’t go sit in the back yet.” “Let’s fill up the seats up front first.”

The quite slim man looks around the room calmly while his eyes frantically search for an open seat that becomes difficult to find.

Fuck, I’m gonna end up having to sit next to this guy all meeting. Shit. I didn’t even want to bump into him in the first place. Fuck.

They both sign their names at a cheap looking foldable table near the entrance of the door and then get pushed by the slow movement of the herd towards the back of the narrow room.

“Damn, no one wants to sit up front,” the rather short man’s low voice half laughs to the quite slim man next to him whose eyes throw in the towel and accept their and their owner’s fate for the next hour and a half.

“Yeah.”

And it’s not like the rather short man was a bad person, but it was not like he was a person you would want to spend the next 90 minutes beside trying to make casual conversation with in whispers or barely above whispers when the appropriate timings allowed it, timings such as they were not in at the moment.

(counting down w/ claps in between): 3 (clap clap), 2 (clap clap), 1 (clap clap)—“OK! Welcome back everyone,” the middle age woman in front of the room loudly exclaims after fumblingly with a cordless mic that didn’t seem to want to turn on after repeated switch on and offs and a couple of desperate slaps to its top.

“I hope everyone is enjoying the week and getting adjusted getting back to work. I know it’s hard after the vacation and especially with this chilly weather,” she says and makes a funny face, sticks out her tongue, leans back slightly and puts the back of one of her hands on her brow and pretends to be fainting, getting the wrong season and gestures mixed up.

“This meeting is gonna suck man.”

“Don’t they all?”

The middle aged woman continues to talk, next going into the percentages of the different kinds of monthly paper work turned on time, lamenting on the numbers not being 100% and encouraging everyone in the room to be more mindful of turning their stuff on time before continuing onto the objective of the meeting.

“So now most of you are now encountering or have already started the junior high school life lesson, yeah?”

“Have you started that lesson yet man?”

“Yeah, shit sucks. It’s hard to teach. Who came up with that crap?”

“Yeah I know man. The lesson plan it shitty. I got to create my own lesson for most of it.”

“We want to give you some advice, some examples for…part 2…part 1…” Her words trail off as the looks to the back of the room to get confirmation from the handful of people standing in their worn out and inexpensive looking suit jackets and mismatched trousers. One of those persons shouts out “part 1!” and she continues, “Yes, part 1. So we are going to have a couple of your head teachers give examples of this lesson.” She again looks at the back of the room to get some kind of confirmation that comes in the form of two bodies walking towards her, a man and a woman, both dressed in suits; the man is small and light complected; he walks with a cheerful hop in his step that matches the cheerful smile that doesn’t abate from where it originated in the back of the room to when he arrives in the front where he gives everyone an enthusiastic ‘Hello’ and a strong wave to match. The woman besides him doesn’t wave, she merely says hello and begins to write the words ‘Junior High School’ with an erasable black marker on a portable white board. She’s dark complected and short, about the same height of the smiling man but she dwarfs him in size with her pear shape body that is disproportionally thick and soft at her lower body where her round bottom blends into her huge thighs that took her to the front of the room in deep heavy steps and now holds and supports her upper body, standing as she underlines the words she had just written. The smiling small man tells everyone to countdown from 3 and when it’s done he loudly smacks his hands and shouts “Action!”

“Good morning Mr. Tanaka,” the big woman says. She says it with a huge smile and an extra soft voice.

“Ohayogozaimasu,” the small man responds with a so so accent but with an accurate gesture as pretends to struggle with deciding to whether to bow or wave his hand.

“Club activities, Mr. Tanaka, what club were you in, in junior high school?”

“Watashi? I was in,” he gestures and awaits for everyone to guess, shout out the gesture he made. “teberu tenisu kurabu.”

“Wow Mr. Tanaka, that’s really nice,” she smiles.

“Hai. Thank you.”

“This guy’s Mr. Tanaka is pretty good. Much better than Jessie’s.”

“Yeah, definitely.”

Yeah, definitely. Yeah, this meeting is going to take forever, definitely. The quite slim man thinks and his mind begins to wonder, about the day about dinner about tomorrow. And his eyes begin to wonder and he sees the different bodies and faces that populate the room, most unlike the bodies and the faces that populate what’s outside the room, what’s outside the building.

“So you think either one of them is one of those new bot teacher whatever you call it…”

“Bot sensei?”

“Yeah, those.”
“Nah man, they can’t be. I’ve seen those two at the meetings plenty of times. For a while man.”

“Yeah, perhaps.”

The meeting goes on and the two return to the back of the room and another two come up, taking their place. And the sets of threes, the rows of people dressed in office wear watch with two eyes, some plus two more. Times passes and the middle aged woman returns up front and starts making announcements that come from ‘the office’.

“What about her? You think she’s one?”

“Gabby?? No way, how is that possible? The only bot sensei’s that would be here, would be faces that we’ve never seen before. No way man.”

“She looks different man, looks younger. A whole lot younger.”

“Nah…”

“And finally, we like to announce a couple of recipients of the Motivational and Excellence Award who couldn’t be with us last meeting to receive them. These awards go to those teachers that inspire their students and motivate them to work harder, help them grow both as students and as people.”

“You ready to pick up your award man,” the rather short man sarcastically asks.

“Whatever man,” the quite slim man says and laughs it off half-heartedly, not able to give the full energy because in the back of his mind he always wondered what it was like to get this award, had even confessed to himself that it would be nice to receive it but after year one and year two and the many years after, he said he no longer cared and that was true…for the most part.

“So this first recipient is a teacher that has worked for the company for many years now. His homeroom teachers have nothing but wonderful things to say about him. They say he has an excellent relationship with his students. They say he is very kind and patient with them, always encouraging them with kind words. He also has a wonderful rapport with the teachers and staff at his schools. They say he is a very enjoyable person to be around. “Can you please come here…um…Na, Nei..,” she begins to fumble with his name, like he was a cordless mic, looking at the piece of paper that is in front of her that she holds, silently mouthing the person’s name in between each stutter before settling on “Nayser” when she really means to say Nasser.

A tall older bald man stands up in the back, he looks to be in his 50’s or perhaps older; he wears a firm fitting jacket, a white button up shirt and slacks that are neatly ironed, contrasting the people around him. He looks surprised as he stands up slowly. A subtle, barely noticeable half smile emerges on his freshly shaved face as he begins to walk towards the front of the room.

The rather short man and quite slim man sitting next to each other who had been seated in front of him and turn around as his name was called and follow him as he makes his short but slow journey to pick up a certificate that is held in a nice thick navy colored folder that the woman who put down the mic momentarily holds up for everyone to see.

“Damn man, that’s unexpected.”

“Yeah. Wow. They usually give this award to some new teacher, who’s all genki you know.”

“Yeah, that’s cool man, he deserves it.”

“Yeah, that is cool. He’s a pretty cool dude.”

The old man reaches the front, gets handed the certificate by the woman who looks to be not much younger than him and stares at it for a second. His smile is still there. He folds it and places it under his left arm. The middle aged woman grabs the mic and begins to explain the reason he was unable to receive his award at the last meeting was due to him having the flu which caused him to miss a whole week of work for the first time in over five years. She asks him if he would like to say a few words to the group and hands him the mic. “Thank you.” He hands it back to her and walks back to his seat.

The quite slim man watches him, turning his head around, giving him a smile he doesn’t see and feels proud for the man. Feels like some weird kind of justice was achieved.

“Ok. So the next recipient of the Motivational and Excellence award goes to…”

Some new guy. Never seen his face before. Damn, it’s getting dark already. Not even 5 yet. Damn winter. “So would you share with everyone why you were unable to come to the meeting last month?” She’s smiling. She’s always smiling with that big mouth of hers. Always looks so fake especially with the red lipstick. “Yeah, so me and my wife…(he smiles from ear to ear, purposely elongates his pause)…just had a baby,” he exclaims and everyone claps and cheers on cue. Women cheer with high pitch voices. They drown out everyone else.

The middle age woman makes more announcements she says are from the office. The meeting comes to an end.

“Finally man.”

“No shit.”

The quite slim man doesn’t want to shake the rather shorter man’s hand and officially say see you later and risk getting caught in an invitation. He just wants to fade out, quickly go through the crowd, out the door, be one of the first people to hop in the elevator and disperse in the city that’s waiting outside.

A man in a suit stands beside the door shouting orders, “Ok everyone let’s let the people sitting in the first 5 rows leave first and then we will do the next five rows.” No one listens to him, they just push their way out and the man’s voice steadily decreases in volume as he realizes his powerlessness.

The quite slim man darts through and eventually finds himself alone with another person from the meeting in front of the elevator. Both men look forward, silently waiting for it to come. But it comes too slow and they’re no longer alone but packed in like sardines inside the tiny elevator once it finally arrives and inside it contains the rather short man who was hoped to be avoided. “So you guys are in rows 1 thru 5 right?” There’s laughter. The quite slim man smiles to the unrecognized voice and keeps his head forward trying not to make eye contact with the rather short man who stands squished diagonally behind him.

The door opens. And now there is another door, the glass door to the building, it now separates him from the pack in the elevator that walk slowly in conversation and into the greying mid-afternoon. He walks faster down the side walk, bypassing people going about their day, on their phones, living their lives stationary and in stride. He’s reaching towards the cross walk, sneaks in a glace behind, the rather shorter man’s not too far behind, caught up in conversation, but far enough. But not far enough as the flashing green silhouette disappears too quickly, reds too strongly like the seconds that hit invisible tick tock tick tock, the foot-steps move quickly tick tock tick tock, they get louder tick tock tick tock as they approach the corner tick tock tick tock tiktokジェームズ知っている？見えるよ。

The elevator riders all gather at the corner. He feels the pressure of their presence, pressured into turning his head slightly on each side to see out of the corner of his eyes that they are all around him, they are all laughing and loosening up their half wrinkled polyester ties. He kneels down to tie his ATR UB’s in hopes that if he ties them slow enough, by the time he stands back up the silhouette will have turned back to green or blue or whatever, been here too long figures you can make the case for blue and it turned blue.

“Don’t forget to turn in your paper work on time this month.”

“Yeah right,” he says to the rather short man and fakes laugh to him as a much taller man standing beside him, a man taller than both of them, the tallest man out of all three whose strange and squeaky voice doesn’t match his vessel says, “Yeah man, I remember when we had to turn in a transportation sheet, a work report twice a month and then the hanko sheet. Good thing we only have to turn in the transportation sheet and hanko sheet, still sucks though huhuhuh,” he then laughs goofily.

“So are you guys resigning a contract for the next school year,” he asks both of them. The rather short man raises his eyebrows and says, “Yeah, gonna sign for another year for the time being.” He tries to say it real cool, but his coolness betrays him and his look gets uneasy when the middle heighted quite slim man half questionaly says, “until something else comes along?” “Yeah…” But before he feels the pressure to complete his abandoning sentence, the much taller man interrupts, “Man whatever you do, don’t ask to change to Yokosuka. They make you stay there until five!” “Whaat?” “What time do classes finish?” “Same time as here, around 3.” “That fucking sucks.” “So what did you do until then?” “Just chilled man, most schools I taught at had English rooms, so I would chill out there by myself and watch basketball games on my phone and stuff.” “Hey that don’t sound too bad.” “I don’t know man, I would get restless if I had all that extra time to kill.” “Yeah, I know. That’s why I left and got switched here to Yokohama.”

They walk down, down the streets, down pedestrian heavens, pass people removing their jackets in a warming winter day, pass the baseball stadium and towards the station that’s inside the checkpoint—Kannai—was inside the Meijian check point, but there is no longer a foreigner’s check point so all three of them can go beyond it. The middle height quite slim man doesn’t want to go further. So he thinks of an excuse to break away before they arrive at the entrance gate as the countdown begins. “So yeah man, I wouldn’t mind teaching at high school, the only thing though is that most of the positions are only part time.” “For real?” tick tock “Forget that, I’ll just stick with elementary.” Tick Tock. “Yeah, definitely better than junior high school. You gotta attend all kinds of events and speech contests and join club activities. Man, I’m just trying to clock out.” Tick Tock. He looks at his invisible watch. The needles are stationary. The needle is moving. Tick Tock. “Say I’ll catch you guys later, gonna head to the record store.” “Alright bro, take it easy.”

On the other side of the check point, there are streets full of gas lighted lamps, brick sidewalks that look like they could sandwich horse carriages in the concrete in between, and somewhere in a building at a corner the quite slim man goes up an escalator. It’s quiet when the prime knit lays down on the first step. He ascends. And there is a sound. It gets louder as he continues his ascent, as the escalator leads up to the second floor. Louder and louder it becomes. The bass booms, the high hat shakes, that sax blows, that tanpura waves around hypnotically around the center of a harp that sounds like warm waterfall—Journey in Satchidananda, Stopover Bombay, Side A—an employee greets near the entrance blurring out pre-programmed store info, campaign reminders and the sales of the day while simultaneously sending a faint warm wave to your body to scan for stolen merchandise and to send personalized coupons to your phone. Dadada dum dum dum, dadada dum dum dum, dadada dum dum, and the sax blows.

He turns left and walks to the very opposite end of the floor, slowly. Soul/ Rare groove. A—Ptah, no. For some reason they don’t categorize it in the jazz section. The section behind. And for obvious reasons they categorize by the name that comes first. P—they got Karma, 180g reissue, no thanks. Walks back towards the entrance, slowly—80’s-90’s rock. Loveless, that fucking price! S/T/U- Sister, Sister—no. Washing Machine, 95 DGC original EX-/VG+, maybe. ‘Forgotten and never returned, images, books, outlooks on life…’ Paris, Texas…maybe next time. Plantasia, no やっぱり。

He goes up to an employee, a different one, but like the first, not human. You can tell in the way they don’t make eye contact when you speak to them. No. They do make eye contact but when they look at you, they don’t look at you. They look right through you.

He asks a question. It, she doesn’t understand, asks for it to be repeated, so he does, but it still doesn’t understand. Does not compute. He goes to the conbini, and again and for the third time. The teninsan asks, 「Tポイントカードお持ちですか？」 He says yes and mentions he thinks his new haircut is cool. The teninsan smiles, bots don’t do that nor do they get haircuts.

He counts the cans on the kitchen counter. He counts the needle ticks. He wakes up with all his clothes on and a headache. Thinks of taking a shower, but can’t come up with the energy to and only turns off the lights and changes clothes and drinks a glass of water the same amount he drinks in the morning a few hours later. His headache is still there and he goes back to lying in bed thinking of the lie he will give when he calls in sick to work after taking only one gulp to down the glass of tap water. After 5 minutes of pepping up the courage, he calls. 「はい、インタアクトございます。」“Good morning.” “Oh, um, good morning. How can I help you?” The man on the other line makes a slight stutter before switching languages, bots never do that nor do they make you feel at ease when they pick up the other line; they don’t show concern when you say you can’t make it to your work assignment because you are feeling sick and can’t get out of bed, instead they immediately question you about your ailments and they say, some employees that is, it’s because they try to scan for lies in what you tell them and your tone of voice when you say it, comparing them to the recorded data base they have of you and your previous calls. “Get well and don’t forget to send in your TOR and call us by 3 today and let us know if you can work tomorrow.” “Ok. Thank you.”

It’s always good to hear another human’s voice, one that speaks directly to you, one you can understand. There are humans on the television. In that series, in that movie. 25% loading… They haven’t put the bots in them yet, they say people wouldn’t like that, that they couldn’t relate to it. Who knows.

「はい、インタアクトございます。」“Hello?” “Yes, how may I help you?” “Uhm. I was absent today, so I’m calling to follow up…uhm, I can make it to work tomorrow.”

The train gets so packed in the morning that a one day absence from it is a nice little relief. The extent to which it will be packed on any given morning can be seen once you arrive on the platform. Today the train is late by five minutes, long lines of people form on both sides of the platform. Most look downward at their phones. Some look sleepy. Some look washed. Everyone hears the incoming sound of the violent clash of metal against metal and the loud horn that comes riding on its wave warning people who didn’t adhere to the announcement coming from the speakers above the platform telling passengers to stay behind the yellow line that is around 70cm away from where the platform ends.

When he gets in the train, he looks around and sees there are no seats available in the car, so he stands and stares out one of the windows attached to the automatic doors. At the next stop, no one gets up from their seat, more people come in, forcing him to stand squished against the window of the opposite non-opening automatic door. He doesn’t look out the window this time, there is a face obstructing his view so he closes his eyes and listens to the sound of the clashing metal below his feet, freighting it sounds if you think about it too long. You have to really concentrate to overcome the noise inside the car to be able to think about it too long.

At the next stop the door he leans on opens, he exits the car and waits at the side of it in front of a perpendicular row of people lined up who push their way inside, filling the car to capacity like an elevator packed full of sardines. At every side, all around there are humans and their clothing fabrics, perfume, bad breath, soft silky hair, can’t look left or right without hitting one of these so he doesn’t bother to look for a seat anymore, closes his eyes until he gets off at the next stop.

It takes about twelve minutes to get from station to school. It’s a nice walk when the weather is pleasant, one you can stroll slowly and enjoy if you get there early enough, which he does, and doesn’t get weighed down by the need to rush, the rush you can feel by the thick thoughts of tick tocking too fast needles.

Of those twelve minutes, only the first eight you can enjoy alone for once you hit the last four and are within the area of the route where there are no backways, no long ways, no big enough trees or bushes to hide oneself, you are surrounded by the children who walk to their school in pairs and in groups of varying numbers that can exceed as much as 6, the number there are grades of. He walks past a couple of kids who pay him no mind and shout in conversation with one another about something. He passes a couple of more lazily kicking rocks down the pavement who say hello and smile and continue their conversation about something. Two minutes left and he’s reached the hardest and least enjoyable part of the walk, a flight of stairs attached to a hill 200 meters high—reaching towards the sky, looking that way, feeling that way as you climb up up up up up up, for money money money, weekly weekly weekly weekly weekly weekly weekly, for money money money money, step step step step step step, money money money, up up up up up up money money money, climb climb climb climb climb climb, for money money money.

He hears a group of older kids lingering at the top when he arrives there with a heartbeat that never gets so fast during anytime of the week as it does now. He hears them mention teacher, the word teacher なんとか先生, he faintly hears it a couple of more times until he becomes too curious and heads towards their direction to see if they are talking about him, he smiles and greets them ‘Good morning’, they turn around in his direction and say “Hi” with disappointed faces because they thought it was ケイス先生. ケイス先生、だれ？They say it was the English teacher that came the day he was absent, yesterday. Case? Of course, a bot. They let go of all the part time and sub teachers a while ago and replaced them with bots. If you call in sick or use one of your dwindling paid holidays, a bot comes in to teach your classes and you hear about it the next working day. He heard it, heard it all day. He heard how Case sensei’s class was so much fun. He heard how he played outside during recess and never got tired. He won at dodge ball. He stayed after school and helped out the teachers. He definitely could communicate with everyone easily, sub bots very rarely error in conversation nor do they run away from it with downward glances and uncomfortable body language when caught alone in such places as the printing room, the locker room or the shoe locker entrance, sub bots make eye contact and make friends or so it is believed. Some people say they’ve seen them with other teachers around town, even holding hands. And it is believed and it is believable because they are not held to the employee guidelines of not fraternizing with school staff because they aren’t employees but property who make for better company, preferable company, it is believed.

When the quite slim man gathered his belongings and cleared up his desk near the window at the back of the teacher’s room, he said his goodbye greetings at the threshold of the room, apologizing for leaving early and no one greeted back, no one could hear. He said it with an unconfident almost whisper and he was happy that no one heard. He put his indoor shoes in the locker and put on his boosts and headed down the hill. A few of the children going home in that direction greeted him bye bye, but most of them didn’t look his way. And that was fine.

The next day was fine and so was the weekend and the following week and the next two following weeks after that. 3:35 and he arrived five minutes late. He took a piss and washed his hands, dried them with the handkerchief he took from his rear left pocket. While walking he looked at the damp cloth and how wrinkled it had become before putting it back in his pocket and staring face to face on the 5^th floor at the person standing in front of the door where the meeting was taking place. “Hello. It is 3:39, you are 9 minutes late to the meeting; could you please explain the circumstances surrounding your tardiness?” Explain the circumstance for your tardiness? Sounds so unnatural, that’s when you know you are dealing with a bot.

“Sorry, I had a 5^th period class today.” He looks at her with a straight face as he lies. She stares blankly at him for 2 seconds and responds, “Will you please make your school aware that on meeting days, you are not to be scheduled for any classes beyond 4^th period.” “Ok, I will do that.”

He enters the room and immediately looks towards the back for an open seat. There are several, all lined up together in a row. All the seats up front are taken, there are no gaps in between people sitting. He takes a seat next to someone he’s never seen before, perhaps a new hire. He feels his phone vibrate in his front right pocket. He takes it out and reads the email, dear so and so, please make it to the meeting on time, if you choose to eat lunch at your school after 4^th period, please give yourself ample time to come to the meeting. There is no mention of 5^th period, they know. She knew. Yeah, bots always stealth snitch.

The meeting went on, meeting stuff went on, meeting stuff was said, yada yadaやだ. “Ain’t that some bullshit,” he quietly said to the person he was sitting next to. “Please maintain silence while someone is speaking during the meeting. If you have a question for me, please wait to ask it at the completion of today’s meeting,” she said while continuously looking straight, never once glancing to her left where he sat slouched unlike her and all the other people sitting perfectly and attentively around him. He looked at hs surroudnigs, everyone was dressed impeccably, no wrinkled shirts or un-matching ties, no worn out shoes or bad self-dyed hair jobs. Everyone looked perfect. Everyone was looking straight with correct backs. Everyone but a few imperfect humans scattered around the room. He didn’t see the rather shorter man from the previous meeting nor did he see Nasser, Nasser who hadn’t missed a day of work in nearly five years until 2 months ago.

“Now that the meeting has come to a completion, what was that you wanted to ask me?”

“Nothing…nevermind.”

He entered at the south gate of the station, Kannai, stood on the platform quietly and listened to the violent symphony of the missed train rushing by, the bodies that had spilled out of it and the prerecorded announcements blaringly on the speakers overhead. They sounded so sterilized and cold and today, they never sounded so human.

Three stations later, he had to transfer to another line. He missed it. Had to wait a long 13 minutes for the next one. But it was ok, he didn’t mind. Came home to an empty apartment and kept the lights off while he sat on the coach as the budging spring afternoons were still giving in to the last gasping breaths of the winter causing the room to keep him company with nothing but the cool darkness that it was incased in. He sat for an hour. Went down stairs to the conbini and got a comfort sandwich and instant soup he poured hot water into from the store’s electric hot water dispenser, rotating the plastic spoon given to him clockwise as per instructions on the label, covering the lid for the necessary 3 minutes while he went upstairs turned on the lights and amused himself with the silly little name christened to the white little tablet warming up between his oily thumb and index finger on his left hand, ‘brotizolam’, ha, no wonder they changed the name to lendormin.

He woke up feeling good, feeling comfortable. In the pocket of his warm blankets and a mind massaged and well rested. He waited until exactly 1 minute before the necessary time to call in, 7:29. 「はい。インタラクットございます。」”Good morning. I’m not feeling well. I will need to take the day off today.” “Could you please give me your name, employee number and the name of the school you are scheduled to go to today.” He gave it, he gave all three and barely tried to put on a sick voice, it wouldn’t matter anyways. They say that all your conversations whether it be on phone or person to bot are recorded and stored as data to compare. They could compare today to how he was when he called in sick when he really was. They know. She knows. But they try to pretend they don’t. “Thank you. I will notify your schools of your absence today. Please submit your TOR and call us by 3 p.m. today to let us know if you will or will not be able to work tomorrow. Get well.”

They never say ‘I hope you get well’, what they say comes off more as a command, like get well as it is your duty as an employee to do so.

It wasn’t until noon when he stepped outside his apartment, beckoned by the grumbling in his stomach, a hunger that moved him two flights of stairs down as he ignored the usual fear of being seen by a former or current coworker or current or former student or worst yet someone from the company’s office. That usual fear would lead him to stay indoors all day not even venturing out to get a bit to eat and settling for anything he had in his cabinets or fridge. But not today. Not this time. He came back home 5 minutes later with a sandwich and chips dangling from his thin wrist inside a plastic bag while he stirred a cup of prepackaged soup, devouring all quickly and afterwards he took a walk, not caring to dodge the inevitable, not caring to be seen for who doesn’t see you, who isn’t watching. They are always watching. Sometimes you can find them in the supermarkets and the shopping malls. You can also see them on platforms, always standing at the ends and the center, pretending to read newspapers or counting, recounting their change. He stands next to one while he waits for the local train that only stops at this station. He comments to the man how nice the weather is today, but the man can’t compute what was said to him, asks for it to be repeated several times before understanding. By that time, the train has arrived and the man excuses himself and takes a seat next to another man of his ilk—and like his ilk—sits at the edge or the center of the bench, always looking straight forward with a slow glance to the left and right every 2 minutes or so. One day someone at a meeting told him about his. One day he timed it and found out it was true.

As prevalent as they seem to be, you still don’t see them on top of the hill, at the building on top on any floor, not even the third floor where the oversees words are located—words on pages, words in books, words borrowed and returned two weeks later. In fact this whole town—Hinodecho—is surprisingly nearly free of them yet they are still here.

You won’t find them amongst the old drunks stumbling through town nor the old men browsing the odds for the races of the day, but you’ll find them where these men congregate at—the betting centers, taking money, issuing tickets, sweeping the crumbled pieces of hope that are littered on the floors with numbers on them that no longer matter.

If you go walk on down along the Okukawa river, you can see them standing stationary behind the concrete barriers, staring down into the water. They say not all of them do this, but there are enough to notice this phenomenon that no one can explain it. They say they are given the autonomy to do as they please for three hours every day. They say their owner’s grant them this freedom not because of generosity but because of necessity. They say bots need the free time to move, to process information to keep their gears running smoothly, they say that just shutting them down in between hours of non-operation makes them erode. They say. But no one has ever seen a bot graveyard. But you can see them staring at the river at all times of the day. Never leaning and resting their arms on the parapet barrier, just staring, standing straight with arms to the side. If you go there at the right time early in the morning, they say you can see the ones that work at the soaplands, without makeup, fresh off their all day shift. But you have to go early, when the sun is beginning to rise, before they clock back in.

He’s never gone to the river so early, never seen them there in the flesh or where they lay down with the men who don’t receive an X armed gesture when trying to enter those establishments. He walks past them and their shiny neon colored price signages for amusement and a vague hope that perhaps he’ll get the chance to choose one and see if they resemble their photos they have on their establishment’s website. But not today. No success, yet again.

Today he only wastes 10 minutes of his time before heading back to the station, heading back home, to the park across the street, to the bench under the tree that’s at the right side of the park when looking from the opposite side of the street, out the window from the third floor of the red tiled building he calls home.

He thumbs through the pages of the books he borrowed, flicking off the dying leaves that fall from the tree above him, that get scrambled in the words, get all mixed up in the behavioral descriptions of cetaceans in a bounded encyclopedia and some tale of anthropomorphic friends—a dog, an owl, a mythological dragon like creature and their silly adventures—incased in a coverless hardback. He puts the books down and picks up his own, a notebook full of silly words expressing silly emotions that silly humans feel. He picks up his pen and thinks and thinks and unthinks, and thinks about it. Nothing comes out of it, so he settles for reading stuff that was written when something did come out of it:

in the breeze
in the breeze

floating, dangling
falling,

like pink petals
temporary, non permanent

like your love
like,
us

I tried to remember
some of the lines

words, verses
I once wrote for you

but I’m getting old
my memory never was

and they are all escaping me
disappearing, leaving me
like you

deleting
deleting me

just like you did
from your phone, your apps
your life

yet still,
I write shit about you

still feel
shit
for you.

(complete ?)

chalk one down
for the old men

drink one down
for the clocking in
clocking out

jumping in front of problems, face first
moving trains

taking baby steps
and then learning to crawl,

saying almost first words and stirring up the emotions
making you feel, like hey it’s all worth it

all the shit that came before was just exactly that
and now I’m the one taking baby steps

in learning how to

(unfinished)

to hold you, in my arms
once again

there
you’ll remember

how it was,
how it was

so good, so necessary

you’ll remember how safe
how loved, you used to feel

and if you stay there for a few minutes
you’ll forget, just for a little

how bad it got

you’ll forget the monster
that is me
inside me, the beast within (unfinished)

Yeah, that’s enough. That’s enough of that, he told himself and got up and absent mindedly left empty handed, back to the apartment on the third floor across the street to where he calls home, where he lays his tired tired head to sleep—but before that—before the eyes are shut until the next day, five hours before the ventures to comforting eye closed absurdities, the tedious need to dos of a day are to be adhered to. He will need to tidy up, wash dishes, dispose of the weekly garbage as to not feel the downtrodding slothness a filthy home can cause. He will need to eat, need go to the supermarket down the street and choose the most nutritional ingredients to cook that aren’t too expensive and won’t take a substantial chunk out of his weekly food budget once his change and store’s point card are given back to him a couple of hours before he will need the necessary amount of motivation to get in the kitchen—a push—the push by the hunger he will no longer be able to hold off. And before that, he will need to do his duties as an earnest obedient employee—email TORs, make confirmation calls like a good employee, one who wants to keep his job, one who feels the monthly, weekly, daily fear, uneasiness as his flesh & flesh and bone cohorts disappear and get replaced, one who can’t get be replaced for if he befalls to that he wouldn’t have the means to shelter and shower in shelter, to stove and to cook inside shelter, shower to wash the day off and all its mess in shelter. Dry off. Between the ears and behind as well as other oft ignored crevices. Lie down face up, unclothed, in shelter. Feel good, the best 15 minutes of the day, in shelter, all paid for by the job that keeps him, sheltered.

The last hour of the day spent imagining what it would be like to have a bigger shelter, bigger tub, bigger bed, bigger appetite, longer leash, or rather, no leash at all and no fear of disappearing because it’s ok, if you disappear, willingly, on your own terms.

& & &

The hour had passed and he can’t help but feel disappointed, can’t find the last bit of motivation to remove himself from the chair and away from the desk and onto the bed. He used all his energy on hope that fell off his chest down to the floor when he read a single body email:

Thank you for entering our annual short story contest. We regret to inform you that your story “Exit 13” did not prize in our contest. We thank you for your interest and encourage you to enter next year.

The last hour of the day became negative a couple, the hope crumbled, no longer mattering, article headlines “AI program wins short story contest” sub-headlines “University created program entered in anonymously, defeating over 300 other entries.” Negative several more hours, but with eyes closed.

* * * * THE END * * * *
Copyright Niko Ino 2025

Image Source: MasashiWakui from Pixabay