Simultaneously High and Low Amplitude

Dad's absent-minded swinging of our gift bags for Takumi is making me dizzy. Dizzy enough to swat at him. "Don't break it all before he gets it!"

He just looks at me with 'innocent' wide eyes that I know are fake.

It only lasts a moment before he sighs. "You are so uptight sometimes, Aika. How are you my daughter?"

I shake my head at him. "Sometimes it feels like I'm the parent."

"Hey!" Dad lightly kicks my shin and pouts at me. I can't help but roll my eyes. "Oh, Takumi, is that Lily just out there?" he suddenly asks my brother.

Takumi stops talking to Alex and Jay. "Yeah, that does look like her."

"Is that the last of us?" I ask when Lily joins the guys inside the movie theatre's entryway.

"Yeah, let's go sit at one of those tables," Takumi replies.

We all grab a tiny round table near the arcade and place our gift bags on top of it. Takumi said his movie starts at 7, so we have 20 minutes or so until he and his friends go in.

"All right, well happy birthday, Takumi!" Dad exclaims. He starts singing Happy Birthday, which draws the attention of a few people nearby. I feel like burying my head in my sweater. Takumi looks about 100% done, too, but his friends are joining in on the singing.

God, they're finally done. That was worse than a funeral march.

Lily's giggling uncontrollably and both Alex and Jay are slapping Takumi's shoulders and teasing him. Man, am I glad I'm not the birthday boy.

"Okay, okay, thank you, can we move on, please?" Takumi's teeth are gritted from embarrassment. It makes me laugh; he doesn't usually let people walk all over him. This is a rare sight.

"Aw, but we didn't even sing How Old Are You Now!" Lily pipes up.

"Lily, I swear to God, I will stuff these movie tickets back down your throat if you do that."

"Language, Takumi!" Dad looks thoroughly affronted. "Those tickets are Lily's thoughtful gift; you should treasure them!"

Takumi looks about ready to hide under his chair. He might fall over if he leans back any further with this eye roll he's doing.

"Oh, but speaking of gifts, we really don't have that much time, so let's get to it," Jay says with a laugh as he grabs one of the gift bags from the middle of the table. I'm curious about what Takumi's friends got him. They probably know my brother better than I do. They could give me some ideas.

Takumi starts opening Jay's gift. There's a card inside which he tosses aside dramatically before Jay shoves it back at him with a mock-offended look.

"Oh, thanks Jay! This is great!" Takumi says when he finishes reading it. "I love gift cards." Damn, I should have listened to Faith. And I can't even see where the gift card is for.

"Ok, next, I made you this mixtape of your favourite tracks from our setlist," Alex says. Oh wow, that's super cool. And thoughtful.

"You're not supposed to tell me what it is before I open it," Takumi comments as he accepts what I assume to be a wrapped CD case.

"Listen, I can do what I want," Alex replies. "Also, I don't want your Dad to be suspicious of a disc exchange."

"Why would he be suspicious?" Takumi asks. Alex doesn't answer. No one says anything. I think we all know.

"Ok," I pipe up awkwardly, trying to change the subject. "Uh, here's the gift bag Dad and I came up with for you." Takumi raises his brows in anticipation. Dad and I don't usually give a joint gift.

"You got me... glasses?"

"I got you the glasses," Dad interrupts proudly.

"Ok fine, Dad got you these glasses with built-in reading lights for your nerd studies, and we also splurged on a case and this sweater." Dad pulls a dark blue hoodie out of the bag, as if on cue. "I saw you eyeing it when we picked you up the other day."

"Oh! Hey, thank you, these are sweet." Takumi's voice, for once, isn't laden with sarcasm. I give him my biggest grin as he tucks the glasses into the case and then wraps it all up in his sweater.

"All right, now it's time for your family to stop embarrassing you and leave you to your shenanigans," Dad says after he checks his watch. "Call me when the movie is over and we can finish off the day with some cake at the house."

"So don't fill yourself with too much popcorn," I add. Lily nods solemnly and gives me a thumbs up. Takumi gives a quick "Will do" before we begin to quickly clean up. I assume we'll take these gifts in to the car instead of leaving them with Takumi.

I also assume he likes store-bought cheesecake. I hope he likes store-bought cheesecake. I thought it was some vanilla-white chocolate thing until we got to checkout. It's fine, right?

"Hey." Oh, speak of the Devil. I thought he went in already. "You look like a deer in headlights." I give my brother a glare. "Uh, what I meant to say was thanks for this really chill birthday day," he says. "And for the gifts. I really appreciate it. See you later." He waves and leaves before I get the chance to respond, but I'm feeling a little brighter now.

You're welcome, little bro. And thanks, Evren and friends.

The drive is short and quiet, save for the murmur of classical music from the radio. Our street is also nice and quiet today. I guess it's dinner time so most of the kids are in.

"Aika, would you check the mail? I'm going to put these in Takumi's room," Dad says as we step out of the car and come up to the steps to the house.

I give him a quick "Sure" and fumble around for the key as I walk over to the neighbourhood mailboxes. The creaking of the mailbox door hinges is worse than I remember it being; they should really fix that soon. All right, what have we got here? Mostly bills. An ad for yet another new pizza place. A Costco catalogue. More junk. Oh, something for me. No return address though.

Again, huh?

I don't bother opening it until I've plopped the rest of the mail on the counter and retreated to my room. Sure enough, as I tear the envelope, the same bland white paper comes out that did a week ago. It's just a few sentences, typed up in some word processor and printed off to make it look typewritten.

You're really running, Fast-Forwarder.

Fast, too.

Though, one would argue that that's in the name.

Looking forward to seeing where you stop next.

It's pretty similar to the other letter I got, and, just like then, the first thing I think is that this is an incredible waste of paper. Does Evren get these? You know, her fans have been awkward. If she has awkward fans, no doubt mine are even awkwarder. Lev is probably the exception.

I feel my phone buzz next to me. hey, i can't look at numbers anymore. please help me. what are you up to? Speak of the Devil. I take a photo of the note and send it.

Lev replies immediately, with a laughing emoji and a simple At least put your fanmail in nicer font, what the hell.

I snort and put the notes back on my dresser.

you should show Evren comes the next text, so I send the photo her way too via Visalogue's messenger. Unlike Lev, she seems to have a life and doesn't respond right away. I make sure to tell him that also but, of course, that just invites him to call me and now I'm having too shoo Dad away while begging Lev to hang up and let me eat.

"Oooh, what if it's a secret admirer?" Lev chirps. I can hear him swinging his legs excitedly even from here.

I sigh. "Wouldn't an admirer draw a heart or something?"

"That would definitely be coming on too strong."

"And finding out my address to send me vague letters with no return address isn't?"

"It's pretty easy to find you. Pretty sure there's a media article with a photo of your house on it already."

What? "Wait, seriously? Aren't they supposed to ask about that?"

"Media does weird stuff sometimes. I don't know. I'm an engineer and not a journalist for a reason."

He's got me there. Before I can think of a good response, though, my stomach growls.

"Wow, even I heard that. You weren't kidding."

"No, I wasn't. Now, are you going to survive if I abandon you for pizza?"

"Pizza?! Damn, Aika. For pizza, you can abandon me anytime."

I can't contain my laugh. "All right, you said it, not me." I hang up and leave my phone on the bed, zipping down the stairs. It's time for some refueling. And after that, I'm doing some internet sleuthing for this supposed media article doxxing me and politely asking for a takedown.