She hadn’t expected the grander figure— in size, in presence, and in overall importance— to stride past her, let alone at such close proximity to her own meagre existence.
Let alone look into her eyes. Even if it were only with a look of scorn, it was still his cerulean to her pale lilac, and in that moment her heart skipped a beat. He disappeared into the library— thankfully they weren’t parting ways so soon, it seemed— and Touko stepped in quietly after him, bee-lining straight to her usual dust-lain haven known non-fiction literature section.
Spines labelled with numerous 800’s, Dewey Decimal codes people often couldn’t care less about, lined up along the rows. Ordered both numerically by code and and alphabetically by author among same numbers. Every few books, the literary girl would carefully slide out a misplaced unit from its spot, glossing over the rest quickly before putting it where it belonged.
Shelf-reading had become a routine to her when she was given Free Time, and tedious though it was, it helped her get away from everything and anything else on her mind.
Except those eyes. Those crisp blue eyes and how they looked down on her. How their chilly gaze made the girl’s heart freeze even for a moment in joy. She pressed the book in her hands, a thick hardcover biography about Charles Dickens, to her heated face to hide it from any passersby. Not that anyone ever came by the non-fiction section.
Reluctantly, she peeked up from her hardcover shield, placing it back in its corrected spot on the cramped shelf before looking around her. The lack of attention in her direction allowed her a chance to sigh in relief. Why would anyone bother to look her way anyways?
Least of all, why would he…? Touko peered around the shelf she was working on, reminding herself that it could only be brief. Leaving a shelf-read half-finished would otherwise prod at her from the rest of the day. She could spot his concentrated visage looking over the historical fiction section— were those the kind of books he liked? Maybe if she wrote something in that genre he’d…
No. Someone like Byakuya Togami would never touch a work by a writer as revolting as she… Those fingers, likely worn by years of business work, were ones that only turned pages of pristine writers who would be worth his acknowledgement. A category the female knew she didn’t, and never would, fit into.
The girl he went back to her shelf sorting, grumbling in frustration to herself when she couldn’t remember where she’d left off. With a sigh and a roll of her stiff shoulders, she started back at the beginning, scaling the stepladder at her feet before trailing a finger along the Dewey Decimal labels.
Byakuya was averse to glorifying a past that he never lived within: that was the foolishness of many people before him. To think that the conditions and circumstances that permitted the heroics of legends to occur are still applicable in the modern age without tremendous modification is what led to fortunes and glory dying on the wayside, right next to their then-destitute owners. But what was undeniably appealing was examining these heroics in comparison to one another, and their reinterpretation or mythization by generations contemporary and future. Perhaps even if he would not be introduced to these fleeting souls in person, he could learn something resembling acquaintance and personal knowledge by reading about them in his free time. And then he would strive to take these famous lineages and outdo them with his own Togami line, him as its ascendant.
He guided himself through the shelves with equal familiarity, as Fukawa did, not so far away from the heir’s own dwelling, though to the lack of his own knowledge or care. However, he was hardly meditative in the process or reconstructive. Choosing instead to retract a work every few steps after a brief scan by his eyes, like an automaton reading some invisible bar code. The small hardcover works beneath his arm grew in number as he paced more and more of the section, prominent titles making his arm grow tight, and the folds of his sleeve thin into flatness on his arm. The Three Musketeers, Romance of the Three Kingdoms, and The Egyptian, among less notable others.
Togami paused after reaching the limit of his interest, having near a half-dozen beneath the left pit of his body and the smallest hint of enthusiasm in his sharp eyes, aiming towards nothing in particular, but staring wistfully up for a brief moment. The respite was shattered as soon as it began, the murky green of his eyes lost again beneath his brooding Egyptian blue.
The scion moved then to an empty table and offloaded his literature, tome by tome. He made each thud purposeful, a dour signaling of ownership of both table and reading in the area. He watched each title collapse beneath the next as he does so, the different style and color of their lettering a small happiness to prelude his reading. However, this was only the first half of his material. While fictionalized accounts offered more entertainment and illustriousness, falsified illustriousness that he would exceed reality to top, non-fictional context and backing would allow him to dissect these purported doings and see if they were theoretically possible, or simply fantastical.
He strode for the shelves hosting non-fiction, hoping to acquire further vainglorious texts, but now written through the scope of political bias on a personal level. Byakuya knows even the most seemingly objective text can contain opinions pervasive enough to distort the actual information. But the appeal in sorting through it was its own reward, ciphers having been an interest to him in his younger years, with more-figurative ones being just as gladly accepted, regardless of their subjectivity. The mystery of the Super High School Level Literary Girl, and just what she was doing so meticulously fawning over the organization of the shelves was something he could care less about. This time he does not deign to acknowledge her, keeping his face straight as to not look up in curiosity, nor bow in humility. His form was absolute and sure of itself, not faltering as it stopped beside the ladder and combed through the shelf. The lesser-known but more-credible source on the late Han dynasty, the Records of the Three Kingdoms by Chen Shou, was the first removed from the oak of the bookcase. However, exact titles to consult concerning the other timeframes were less immediately known to him, and if there was someone playing librarian above him, he would put them to work like a librarian. Thus, he raised his eyes and head to pierce into the fumbling attention of the author, aggressive and attention-grabbing even in silence.
He would let the quiet pass for a few moments so that she may properly experience the aura of command before he spoke.
“You. I need four books. One on the Musketeer of the Guard and 17th century France. Another on Akenaten, the ancient Pharaoh of Egypt. And then one on Julius Caesar’s political career in the late Roman Republic. Deliver them to my table,” he made a quick dart of his eyes towards his nesting area for an afternoon of reading, rapid enough to make her miss it, if she were not paying complete attention. The anxiety resulting from it would be her punishment, and perhaps incentive to fulfill his orders with all the more expediency. Pressure was an excellent motivator. “And ensure that there are no pages missing either.”
Togami left her at that, not giving her the chance to speak back or mutter deference like a pathetic inferior. The table called for him, and the short tower of learning resting upon it. Immediately he obtained himself comfort at the area of study and reading, but maintaining poise and seriousness while he did so, eyes lulling low to examine mass-produced characters of little calligraphical value instead of mass-produced characters of little intellectual value that wandered the library. His eyes, beneath the clean glass of his spectacles, maintained their keenness and capacity for deconstruction even while placid from the calm of reading. A leg crossed over the other, completing his self-made image of a detached gentleman; enjoying luxury without becoming sloven, and regulating an appearance of formality without being obsessional.
