The Final Resting Place of The Couch

It is amazing how easy people are to read sometimes, how transparent. Just over a month ago I posted my suspicions of the man who had claimed complete ownership of the blasted couch that had become such a headache at the closing of the year. It was a comfort when three of the four portions of this damnable piece of furniture were nine stops away on the Northern train but the questioned remained on whether or not, as promised, he would arrive to remove the final piece three weeks into the new year. I had my doubts. Have had my doubts since my offers of bringing the piece to his doorway back in December were brushed off without much explanation why save for him only wanting the piece after the holidays. Alright, okay, sure. But I’m a suspicous mind, it’s my nature and so I chided him about his possible intentions on shucking the couch my way. He assured me he was not a couch shucker. Three weeks later I’d be sitting on the three pieces of the couch we’d moved by train when he would tell me he’d decided to not take the final piece. Who didn’t see this coming? Not I. Oh, but three solutions were offered up in his defense of maintaining his none-couch shucker status. He offered to come to my home to smash the couch up in my parking lot and then dispose of it, he offered to come and get it and bring it somewhere and dispose of it and he offered to have me drop it off in his classroom and then he would dispose of it. I was none too keen on having a man smash up a piece of a couch in my apartment complex lot, draws attention you see, and so I opted for choice number three. He removed choice number three from the table instantly. Well, why offer? We came to an agreement that he would visit sometime this week, I gave him my schedule and when I would be available and we made a deadline of today. Should there be no couch removal solution brought forward on his part I would be opting for the removed choice three. Over the course of the week he did not stop by in the times I waited for him and I, instead, informed me he was looking into options on where to dispose of the couch or pick-ups of it he would foot the bill for. Whatever, I thought. Anything to get it out of my sight. I even made a visit to city hall to get him the pertinent information on disposal sites in the city, all in Japanese of course, but his wife was able to read this which gave him a couch removal advantage over yours truly. The days came and went and in the final part of the week there would be no emails. Finally, last night, the day before Couch Deadline 2008, with still no word I paid a visit to the school to find the spare key had been removed from the mailbox. Thoughts didn’t instantly turn to him removing the key to prevent me access, though they probably should have. I was concerned I would no longer be able to use this place as a refuge from heading into the Osaka office on my prep-days. When I returned home to find the inbox devoid of a professed reply I became pretty irate…well, as angry as a man who expected all of this to be. I instantly sent him off an email informing him that the deadline had passed and telling him of my not finding the school’s extra key. My solution was to contact head office in the morning to report this in hopes that the problem would be solved before the next time I would need it. I also told him that since I was no longer able to place the couch inside he would find it outside. I admit my final comment of “I hope it doesn’t rain” was a bit of an angry barb tossed his way for his deal breaking. Just under twenty minutes later a reply lands. Well, waddya’ know! In it I am accused of threatening him, I am told to go and insert the usual four letter word here to myself and that my letter to him was out of line. Well, howdoya’ like that? This is the same guy I gave a tour of a city too, directed to classes and, damn it, gave a freakin’ free couch too and despite it being free to begin with I did cart it to his home in my sickly state. This attitude was what was out of line. I retorted with a written history of our couch agreement, batted back my own witticisms (without the usage of the angry parlance of our times) and, in the end, would tell him I the responsibility of the couch was no longer his. I was expecting this, I reminded him, and I left it at that. If he replied I don’t know. I take the liberty of blocking idiocy whenever I see it. And so that evening I grabbed the thing, pushed it out the door and walked over to the apartment complex behind my apartment. There I had spotted that week an already growing pile of trash and various household items. One couch piece should blend in quite nicely and in light of all the other garbage left here for whomever to take wherever I believed that signs of my disposal would not point to me. It was 2am and only one light was on in a nearing home. I tossed the couch onto the pile and made my escape unnoticed. Mission Accomplished. The couch was gone.

Or so I thought…

Two days later I would be walking past the scene of the crime to get some groceries when I, in curiosity, looked at the pile. The couch was no longer there! Maybe somebody decided they needed it in their living room, I thought. I wasn’t very far off. As I was rounding the corner of the apartments a young boy was turning the corner, arms loaded with stuff from the pile. I looked up and started to laugh. I had to. Some laughing cannot be restrained. A canal runs between my apartment complex and the other and behind them there is a small steal landing and upon it sits a sort of pump that controls a set of doorways in the canal to control water flow. Up on this landing sat the final piece of the couch and upon the final piece of the couch sat another young boy, a king on his thrown. Out of the tossed away items in the apartment complex garbage pile the kids had fashioned a small fort and the couch piece was the center of it all. I noticed they were evening using the plastic frame of the dresser I had placed there a month earlier. Other items were used to accentuate the dwelling and the kids were having a blast. I mean, what young child wouldn’t with items to furnish their own apartment. I’ve had forts and even a few tree houses in my day. None of them had a couch! And as far as I know it remains there still. Not as conspicuous as I’d like but I’m happy that somebody is able to get so much enjoyment out of something I have come to loath. So now, knock wood, the saga of the couch comes to a close.