Chapter 4- Fear

We stood there staring at the entrance to the carnival- like- festival. The bright orange, yellow, blue, violet, and red lights shining from the decorative hanging paper lanterns were beautiful. And within the fair I could see many people from my school. All wearing bright colors; different from our ordinary school uniforms, making them all seem to stand out. Some even getting in the school activities by wearing the kimono’s the multi-cultural teacher gave us. I could hear the hundreds of kids calling out, screaming in joy, and laughing. I took the first step and Tsume fallowed,
“What do you want to do?” Tsume asked sounding a little uncertain. I just grinned.
“What have you never been to a carnival before?” I asked trying to tease him. He shook his head slowly. “Well I want to go on tons of rides, but that isn’t until tomorrow so I’ll have to make due with a Ferris wheel ride.” I gazed around the fair, at the many wooden stands set all around this part of town- each stand holding some sort of either game, food, or other surprises. “Maybe a merry go round, and we just have to have tons of fair food.” I went on.
“Are we truly going to get all of that done?” He asked, and I nodded,
“Hopefully.” I said grabbing his arm and dragging him along. We found a concession stand and I halted. Tsume stayed under a tree, staying close to me and yet being far enough away I wasn’t being suffocated. I walked up to the stand and the older women in the stand asked a younger girl to take our orders. The young girl, I realized to late, was Maya’s best friend Yuka. She looked bored and tucked a piece of long black behind her ear.
“Yeah… uh what do you want? There’s our menu.” She said pointing to a sign on the top of the wooden stand.
“Can I get a cotton candy?” I asked trying not to draw attention to myself. She left but came back with a wad of blue and pink fluff on a stick.
“That’ll be $5.50 please?” Yuka said in a dull uninterested tone. I looked through my small purse and realized I hadn’t brought my wallet in my haste to meet Tsume. Tsume, who had been watching me, noticed this and stepped forward to pay for me. He handed, the now surprised Yuka, the exact amount of money. But Yuka, being in the fan club, broke out in a smile. Her once dull bored blue-green eyes became shining and excited at the mere sight of him. It almost made me want to hurl. She handed Tsume the stick of cotton candy. He took it but didn’t do anything with it; he just held it looking stupid. Yuka’s smiling face turned to a terrifying glare as she looked over at me. I tried to duck away, but was unsuccessful. I knew Maya would hear about this and I didn’t want to have to deal with her. I wanted to go find a nice big rock to crawl under, but Tsume seeing my weird trance like state, decided it would be best to grab my hand and pull me out of the way so others could get their drinks, popcorn, or cotton candy. He then handed me the cotton candy seeming oblivious to the mini-drama scene that just happened right in front of him.
“So,” He said pointing to the fluff in my cold hands, “does this stuff actually taste good?” I thought about it as I steered us toward a bench and we sat down. He was glancing around at the fair. I pulled off a piece and stared at Tsume until he turned around. When he looked at me I stuffed the chunk of blue and pink candy into his open, ready to make a snide comment, mouth; as I said.
“Decide for yourself.” At first he closed his mouth and let it melt into a soft sugar filled mush then chewed softly and swallowed. I took a bite myself, and by the time he finished his third bite I had devoured four slightly larger pieces. “Well is it good?” I asked, getting tired of waiting. He smirked with some unknown emotion on his face- maybe teasing? - And told me,
“It’s ok I guess. I’ve tasted better.”

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We finished the cotton candy ten minutes later. And after an hour of walking around, riding the ferris wheel, the merry go round, and watching fireworks it was getting late and we needed to go home. A few people still roamed around. But most were either to drunk to notice if Godzilla walked by or were impatiently waiting for rides to get there. A group of young men were walking towards us and I could smell the beer from where we were walking. The sharp scent burned my nose. Tsume pulled me closer; and leaned down close to my ear and whispered,
“Stay close ok?” I nodded trying to keep our talking to a minimum. The men all went a different way then we did- in fact the total opposite way. I forced a little distance between me and Tsume. A small distance away two older, rough looking guys blundered in from an alleyway to our left. The one bigger man, that looked as though he could be a boxer, had a red blush across his face, definitely drunk. The smaller one, but not by much, didn’t have as a red blush to him. They were talking very loudly, loud enough for both me and Tsume to hear from where we stood- several paces away.
“You know, animals are really stupid.” The large one said in a booming voice. “You know I hate animals, especially dogs;” The smaller one was just nodding in agreement. “wolves too. They are probably the most stupid out of all- hick- the stupid animals.” I saw Tsume stiffen ever so slightly in front me. The large man nodded in Tsume’s general direction,
“Hey boy, don’t you think wolves and dogs are retarded?” he yelled wobbling closer. Tsume turned his ultra death glare on the guys,
“No, no I don’t. Wolves aren’t stupid.” he explained through clenched teeth. The man floundered his way over, stumbling a few times.
“Why would you think that? They really are brainless, they even kill each other. They really are dumb- hick-.” The man looked about as cross as a drunkard could be. Tsume snorted arrogantly,
“So humans kill each other too, don’t they? But you don’t think humans are morons do you? In fact humans are worse, they pollute the planet- their own home.” he had balled up his hands into fists but held his arms beside him. The drunken man was angry now,
“Hey, you arrogant punk! You’d better respect your elders and –hick- agree with me.” He looked mad now, raging. Tsume snorted again,
“I would never agree with the likes of you.” he stated in a cocky tone. The old drunken man looked stunned,
“Well then, I’m going to have to teach you some manners.” He swung a fist at Tsume and I gasped. The other man was cheering for his buddy on. Tsume easily dodged the clumsily thrown punch. The man punched again and again but each time Tsume just dodged them. After a small time Tsume started to back up as he dodged, moving away from me. The other man saw me and walked over,
“Hey boss, how about her. I’ll bet he cares for her. Beat this one, she seems vulnerable.” he said while kicking me down. The drunkard stopped and Tsume was about two feet away from him and the drunk was about four feet away from me, he stopped too. The drunken man came over to me, he was snickering. My eyes bulged wide with fear. He had pulled his leg back ready to kick, when Tsume thrust himself in front of me. The punch connected to his chest. He flew back and landed on me, as I was trying to get up; pushing me back a few feet, only coming to a stop when my back hit a tree a couple feet away. A gust of air rushed out of my system. I tried to push myself up but Tsume was heavier then I expected; he laid there his breath heavy and uneven. I tried again to struggle free but we were tangled so badly that it just made everything hurt so I stopped trying as well. A small crowd, of the people that were left at the park, was forming around us yet keeping their distance. The two drunken men sauntered toward us,
“Tsume! Tsume get up.” I pleaded in a whisper. The men were getting closer. Tsume blinked, shook his head to clear his mind, and then pulled himself free of the tangled mess we were in. He grunted as he pushed himself to his feet, wincing, and holding his side with one hand. The drunkard looked happy that Tsume was up.
“So are you – hick- going apologize to me? If you do then maybe I’ll leave you alone.” He threatened but Tsume ignored him and picked me up bridal style and turned to run. But the drunkard wasn’t having that, he picked up an empty beer bottle near him on the ground, and chucked it at Tsume’s feet. He tripped and fell, almost falling on me. He let me go about an inch from the ground and caught himself with his hands on either side of my head. Now he looked angry his face contorted with rage. Tsume got up and ran at the drunkard, he ran so fast he was almost a blur. He caused the small number of people- half of them still drunk- to gasp. Sirens could be heard and most of the crowd dispersed. He was about three feet away from the now astonished drunkard and he leapt straight up into the air. He was high over the drunk man’s head, his feet folded neatly under him, he appeared to be a high hurdle jumper, he was coming down very fast too. He landed an arms length away and on his way he put his arm out and scraped the drunkard down the length of his back.
A blood curdling scream rang out in the clearing by the forest where I sat. It was the drunkard’s scream. Blood squirted out and he fell to the ground, four long gashes ran from his neck to his legs. In some places it they looked pretty deep. His eyes were open but glazed over; he was dieing. Tsume ran back to me. He picked me up again and ran into the woods. The crowd was screaming in terror now and what little amount of people were left were running, trying to get out of the way of the police and paramedics. I was scared and dirty but I clung to Tsume’s black shirt, my face pushed into his chest. My hair was coming undone and I only had one of my shoes. I could hear him whisper,
“I’m sorry.” a few times. I think maybe he thought I was scared of him or something. But I wasn’t, a little shaken maybe, but not really all that scared. Yes, fear wasn’t something I felt.

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