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Yuuji really isn’t into films.
Until he died and Gojou-sensei made him train with a daunting stack of DVDs and the Director’s doll, he doesn’t think he’s ever really sat down and watched a film and paid attention. Movies are there to run during class for lessons the teachers can’t be bothered to teach themselves. They are there in the background of his grandfather’s hospital room to create white noise above the inorganic machinery.
He stumbles, not quite literally, his way through the process of acquiring a ticket.
“It’s easy,” is what Ijichi-san told him when he asked for this favour. “You go to the cashier and ask them for the available screenings and times. And then you choose a movie you want to watch and a time. And then you choose a seat. And then you pay for your ticket.” Yuuji thought, at that moment, that it was all rather uncomplicated and maybe he shouldn’t have worried about anything.
Ijichi-san added, “And there are also snacks you can purchase.”
“Snacks?” Yuuji had asked.
“Like iwashi senbei. Or popcorn. You’re allowed to eat inside,” Ijichi-san informed him.
“Popcorn,” Yuuji echoed in wonder.
He thinks of Ijichi-san’s guidelines when he approaches the theatre. Through the glass doors, it is obviously nearly empty, and something cold settles at the bottom of his spine. The desertion is likely due to the murders that have taken place here; not many people, it seems, enjoy the haunted atmosphere.
The cashier seems unbothered, however. It takes three calls of excuse me in progressively louder volumes before she turns to regard Yuuji with half-lidded eyes. Slouching over the register, she looks like she’s dead on her feet. She yawns.
Yuuji glances at the charts taped to the glass divider. Ijichi-san said to ask the employees for the available shows and times, but Yuuji can easily read everything off the poor prints. They are all titles Yuuji has previously come across thanks to Gojou-sensei’s obscure training regimen, save one which is probably a recent release. His focus skips right over it, however, and settles on a promotional poster displayed by the ticket booth that has his guts churning uncomfortably.
“Can I,” what else had Ijichi-san said? “Can I see the seats for the next Human Earthworm 2?”
The cashier squints at him. “It’s free seating. You just need a ticket to enter,” she tells him, sounding tired of their conversation already.
Yuuji squints at her in return. Ijichi-san did not tell him anything about free seating. Perhaps it is this shoddy place. Ijichi-san did ask him in a strained voice if he wanted to see a movie elsewhere, somewhere nicer, somewhere less crime scene-y, even when he was aware as to why Yuuji wanted to go to this particular theatre anyway. In his pocket, his fingers tighten around the cool rectangle of his phone.
Almost impatiently, the cashier presses, “How many tickets?”
Yuuji feels strangely out of his depth. “Uh. One.”
She taps on her keyboard with a single pointed finger, the clacking very pronounced. She raises a brow. “Adult?”
He looks down at himself, then up at her. “Yes.”
“That will be a thousand and eight hundred yen,” she states. For a moment, Yuuji is taken aback. That is — it’s a lot. Is this how it always is? Or is it just Tokyo? Or is it just this specific, somewhat dilapidated theatre? There is so much Yuuji doesn’t know about these things.
But he doesn’t ask. Instead, he pays with the card Tokyo Jujutsu Kousen gave him and accepts it with his ticket stub the cashier slides on the rusted metal tray, presumably scraped clean of its decorative chrome from decades of use. The stub is ugly, he notes. A plain white rectangle with the movie title in thick font and other little details. Junpei had told him about how some movies get specially printed tickets; it’s disappointing, to put it mildly, that Human Earthworm 2 just gets a tiny stub with Human Earthworm 2 written on it in academic font. At the very least, Yuuji appreciates the text identifying the exact date and time of his purchase as well as of the film itself.
The interior of the theatre resembles a set in a bad zombie film nearly as much as the exterior does. Somewhere, the HVAC system rattles like a dying car on its last legs, or wheels.
There are only two theatre halls in this building, and it’s not very complicated to find the one showing Human Earthworm 2. For one, it has even less people than the other hall — which is to say, none at all. For another, there is a small monitor next to the entrance playing a trailer for the film that Yuuji has never seen before. He takes a photo of it on his phone. After he lets the employee posted there stamp his ticket stub, he takes a photo of that, too.
They aren’t nice photos, but Yuuji can see everything well enough. He is satisfied.
The theatre hall is a large room with soundproof padding on the walls and the ceiling and enough seats to fit a class of students. He counts the rows and rows of red chairs. On the massive screen taking up the front plays trailers for newer films Yuuji hasn’t heard of. He wonders if some of these were films Junpei wanted to see.
He looks back to the seats.
“I always choose to sit in the back, where it’s dark and I can see everything,” Junpei had said passionately. His eyes were shining. “It’s the best area in the house, definitely!”
It is almost easy, to settle in his chosen seat at the shadowed back of the theatre and ignore the faint curse residuals littering the floor and three seats a handful of rows down and to the side of him.
An hour and fifteen minutes later, he arrives at the conclusion that Human Earthworm 2 isn’t as good a movie as he remembers. In fact, it’s pretty shit.
There is the seeming development of the perfectionist protagonist into something more unhinged. There are also the effective splattery gore sequences — but Yuuji can honestly say he’s seen worse, has lived through worse even. When the scenes play out, flickering through the images of fake blood and fake viscera and fake grief, all he can think of is the grotesque transfiguration of Junpei’s body in his mind’s eye.
He sits through the rest of it and waits for the credits to roll.
Watching a film is better in the theatre, believed Junpei, the emotional impact of a good movie theatre experience is great.
“But,” Yuuji remembers asking, “what makes a movie theatre experience anyway?”
“The environment!” Junpei was quick to say. “The big seats and the big screen and the big sounds. And, and you should watch all the trailers for the next films before your movie starts and stay until the credits end!”
“Hah?” Yuuji had made a face then, twisting from his place on the floor so he could stare up at Junpei. If he tries really hard, maybe he’ll remember the exact places the shadows and the light from whatever shitty film they had on play on the planes of his face. “Why would you do that?”
“It’s part of the experience, Yuuji.”
He waits for the film to end, waits for the credit reel to end, waits until the beam of light overhead sputters out. There is a beat when the screen is empty and the audio system shuts down. It’s like he’s just been placed in a vacuum, negative pressure pulsing at his ears and his brains.
When he stands, he feels it in his trembling knees. His legs have gone numb, and there’s an unfamiliar dryness in the back of his throat. He suddenly remembers his grandfather, the three corpses they had to inspect in this very theatre, Junpei.
His fingers are slick with sweat when he finally manages to unearth his phone and dial Ijichi-san. It’s a short conversation; one that begins with Ijichi-san, I’m done and concludes with I’ll be there in five minutes.
Ijichi-san makes it in less time. Three clouds have passed him by in the period since the phone call until the Tokyo Jujutsu Kousen-issued car appears before him. Yuuji stands from the curb and pats his butt off.
“Thank you for driving me here,” he says in the passenger’s seat. “And for picking me up.”
Ijichi-san spares him a kind look from the corner of his eye before he returns his full focus to the road. He drives with both hands on the wheel, tense at the wrists, elbows, and shoulders. Yuuji relaxes into the clean-smelling upholstery. If he lets himself think about it, he’s surprised that there aren’t any obvious bloodstains anywhere.
“It’s no problem.” Ijichi-san clears his throat. “How was the movie?”
Yuuji watches the streetlights tick. It was boring. “It was okay.”
Ijichi-san hums. “Did you get popcorn?”
Yuuji’s lips open, a bit. Ah. His fist clenches. Junpei’s mother had made them popcorn.
“It’s all part of the experience,” she had said it in the same way Junpei did. The popcorn was a bit burnt, which Yuuji did not realise was possible when microwaved. It was buttered popcorn. Or was it salted?
“No,” Yuuji admits. He closes his eyes. What did Junpei say about popcorn? He said... A hand clamps over his mouth and cheeks, painfully. “I forgot.”
“That’s alright,” Ijichi-san says. “Next time, then.”
“I don’t think there’ll be a next time, Ijichi-san.”
“That’s alright, too.”
Yuuji breathes.