Searching for a Steady Self

Kabuto Yakushi, 24. An intelligent but aimless scholarship med student with an ambiguous past and an uncertain future, eternally struggling to relate to other people his age. Currently residing in Kazoku on his own. {Will of Fire-affiliated Naruto roleplay blog. Fanart images courtesy of 小恋次 on Pixiv.}

[allheartcare-deactivated2016010]

[filinlin]

[searchingforasteadyself-blog]

Tokens {Solo/Starter}

Kabuto wrinkled his nose as a snowflake landed on one of his lenses and melted immediately, leaving a blurry little smudge directly in his line of sight. Removing his glasses, he sighed, placing his package at his feet so he could wipe the lenses dry with a handkerchief from his pocket. He was standing in the middle of the sidewalk under the awning of a quaint little family-owned confectionary, where the window displays were full of faux snow and brightly colored candies. Once he'd cleaned his glasses to his satisfaction, he slipped them back on, picked up his package, and made it all of ten feet before a juggernaut of snowflakes rendered the lenses murky and opaque all over again.

Irritated, he huffed, tugging his scarf up past his nose, which was beginning to sting from the cold as he trudged blindly down the street leading to the post office. It was only a short walk from his apartment, but Kabuto was beginning to question the wisdom of this little errand in the first place. After all, Christmas was hardly a national holiday in Kazoku, although the friendly exchanges he saw in the streets certainly gave a festive impression to the unwary. It couldn't hurt to go through with this, he supposed--couldn't do any harm to perform a little friendly gesture just because, except...

Except he was terrible at holidays. Reflecting on this bitterly, Kabuto hastened into the sanctuary of heat and light that was the post office, sighing in relief as he stomped snow off his boots and dried off his glasses again. This was the first holiday since his arrival in Kazoku that he felt obligated to send gifts to anyone, and he was self-conscious enough about it for several other cripplingly insecure young adults. Holidays were so...intimate, so sentimental, so everything-he-was-bad-at. But somehow he'd gotten it into his head that it might be a good idea to express his appreciation for a handful of people before he graduated, and it was too late to turn back now--he'd already paid for everything and gotten his scarf positively soaked.

And so, with a deep breath and a mutter along the lines of "Here goes nothing," he strode up to the counter and withdrew several smaller packages from the large one, which he handed over for mailing. One, for a Naruto Uzumaki, contained a basketball, which was more of a reluctant, very belated apology than anything else, because the last thing Kabuto needed was to have a teenage street thug on his case (it was as close to kindness as he was going to get). Another held a black t-shirt for a girl named Saya, bearing an illustration of a cat with the caption "Wanted dead & alive: Shrödinger's cat"--easily one of the most ridiculous things he'd ever let himself purchase. Another was for a Touya Nagashi, containing a simple bag of sugar, with a note attached: "Went out grocery shopping again and thought I'd provide you with a staple. Just FYI, it IS just sugar. Don't attempt to ingest it nasally." Kabuto had gone back and forth on whether or not the joke was cruel, and he really hoped the poor boy didn't get too flustered and faint.

The other two gifts had a bit more thought put into them. One, for a certain librarian, managed to pull off being a genuinely nice present and rather snide simultaneously: a men's walking cane, with the gleaming head of a serpent set in chrome at the handle. Kabuto was almost completely certain that he'd be hit with it the next time he attempted to enter the library. Lastly, for (as far as he knew) a fellow student and perhaps his closest friend in Kazoku, Kabuto had gotten a textbook on hypertension...but not just any, as that would be a bit too pointed. No, he'd gone out and bought the very book that he'd reached for at the same time as her that day at the library, and he'd affixed a note to that as well. "To Kairi," it read, "A new addition for that spectacular collection of yours. Yours, Kabuto." He'd been unsure about the Yours. It seemed forward, and only after quite a bit of agonizing over proper etiquette did he decide it would do just fine.

Five minutes later, Kabuto walked out of the post office feeling broke, empty-handed, and cold. The peculiar thing was, as he walked back home through an increasingly heavy snowfall, he felt a strange lightness in his chest that he had not felt in quite some time. Feeling a smile pull at his lips, he decided to make himself some tea before hitting the books that night.

[vylant]

[drowned-in-daydreams]

[searchingforasteadyself-blog]

Homeostasis

[thedarknessshinobi-deactivated2]

    “Shimura, Danzo.” Temperately lingual but a straightforward elucidation nonetheless.Aside and sequestered as the florescence of a sun that has long descended. Precisely all the man had enjoined for was all Danzo ceded. The syllabification of that gray tongue, even just a maundered epithet, was doubtlessly mulish and suave.

    The venerable gentleman had also indisputably remarked the allusion of effusive appraisal. And, coequally definite, it was of no entanglement to him.

    People sallied through that aperture into this imaginarium of treasured rarities, to be fetched or bargained, harboured hodgepodge of recollections and sentient worth, both benevolent and melancholy. The docket was monotonous. Guaranteed, that every ornate commodity here toted with it a sentimental value at some period in its actuality, to someone.

    Every vestige had its anecdote. Just like every person had theirs.

    “Here.” Reaching towards a draw just leftward beneath the davenport, Danzo slipped it open with a gauzy abrade of copse. A little bungle amongst manifold stationary, he retrieved a bantam memorandum pad of wan-hued blue. Setting it down, a capless pen he then collected from the aforesaid draw before scratching something on the apex flier.

    “My name, and number to the emporium if you have any further queries,” he chants colourlessly, tearing the viscid square leaf off the block and relinquishing it to the young gentleman.

    Although the penned cue and the affidavit uttered would have been deemed pragmatic and efficacious to most and their archetypes, something about it still reproduced that same extravagant thoroughness, frigidity.

    Interchanging the prior question aimed to him, Danzo asks, “And you are?”

[searchingforasteadyself-blog]

So the old man's name was Danzō. Shimura-san, Kabuto decided, logging the information away in his mind as if tucking an index card neatly into a small accordion folder. He was mostly just grateful that the shop proprietor had abstained from asking any questions that Kabuto really wasn't inclined to answer. Business, this was strictly business. He didn't want his personal affairs (personal issues) touching it with a ten-foot pole.

"Ah--"

Kabuto tilted his head slightly to observe the gentleman in his task of penning a makeshift business card, except he did it with such austere elegance that it was more like watching a very thoughtful letter being written to an acquaintance. It wasn't the material or the writing implement so much as Shimura's manner--grave, for whatever reason. Kabuto wasn't used to being in the presence of someone so much more serious than he that he felt obliged to be overly pleasant. It wasn't a comfortable feeling.

Nonetheless, he gave a grateful nod as he accepted the slip of pale blue paper, wearing a polite smile. "Thank you, Shimura-san. I'll be certain to stay in touch." Ah, but there it was: the inevitable inquiry. He paused at the perfectly reasonable question, staying silent as he folded the (already small) piece of paper and slid it into his pocket. Then he answered, "My name is Kabuto. Kabuto Yakushi."

Prickling self-consciousness, which had taken a sojourn earlier, returned to him. Everything about his present environment, from the immaterial to the flesh and blood before him, gave off an aura of antiquity. His decidedly new surname seemed to ring out into the air. It was not a old family name and it did not impress, and Kabuto was painfully aware of it. As if to bolster his credentials as someone of interest and note, he added, "I'm a student at the medical college."

[searchingforasteadyself-blog]

Trick or Boom~?

The interval of the holiday proper—that’s right, there was a holiday, wasn’t there?—having passed by with little incident up until this point, Kabuto stared in bewilderment at the young woman before him and wondered how he should proceed.

"Erm—"

Whatever “boom” meant, it didn’t sound particularly promising, so against his better judgment, Kabuto opted for a tactic of appeasement and rifled in his pockets until he withdrew the closest thing he had to a “treat”: a few breath mints, which he placed in a waiting palm.

"Have fun with that." Nailed it.

[searchingforasteadyself-blog]

Homeostasis

[thedarknessshinobi-deactivated2]

    Danzo hearkened, bestowing close assiduity to the information granted to him. He also remarked -attentively- that the man poised himself that bantam touch more arranged, extirpated his blanched hands from his trouser hollows and even asserted his voice more. Inwardly, Danzo was contented with the change in comportment. /Much better/.

    "Piano, eh?" The clavier. Though, reasonably indubitably, he could not truly rebuttal the younger fellow arrant. Melodic apparatus were neither Danzo's eminent forté, and then the natural guise in which he had standing, Shimura wasn't one inclined to presuppose aught he heeded right away, inadvertent of circumforaneous stipulation. A cynic. though one of grave laconism a preponderance of the time.

    Too many numerous proceedings before had persons wrangled their hand at this antiquity lark, and many times before they'd no indication to what they were jabbering on about. T'was that or striving to get paltry wherewithal for something they apperceived was entirely abject, inconsequential.

    Danzo fathomed that, most feasible as the attenuated man plausibly contemplated, Shimura would have to /see/ it for himself. Pianos were, undoubtedly, grandiose, lacuna-engrossing commodities that were onerous to transpose if the amen emptor didn't sojourn. /But/, yes. He was enticed to bite the lure, that much could not be denied.

    "I am prurient, yes. Though pianos are laborious to shift and galumphing to harbour." Danzo respites, deliberating that it's presumably the most akin vindication this gentleman has; just no longer wants it. Was habitually the plight with pianola. No longer requisite, in the way, if not just a patrimony from a loved one's will.

    "But with the Christmas spell around the corner, I predicate /someone/ will purchase it as some profligate gift. But I would need to inspect it myself. Pictures, would suffice. I cannot give money for something I have no seen, you understand. But yes, in the long run, we shall be able to take it."

[searchingforasteadyself-blog]

It was a subtle shift in the older man's demeanor, but Kabuto was sharp enough to catch it all the same; he knew when he was being taken with a degree of seriousness and when he was not. So long as he was erring on the side of the former at the moment, he allowed himself to feel hope. The vases and paintings seemed a trifle less intimidating in their unattainability.

Of course, the shop proprietor had picked up on a little snag that Kabuto had neglected to consider. Perhaps he ought to think these things through a little better. "Ah, well, as for that..." He smiled with good humor, as if this were the kind of thing he did every day and not something he was pulling out of his ass, albeit successfully. "If you'd be so inclined to cover the cost of transferring it in whatever final payment you decide upon, I'd be more than happy to pay for the service myself when it's required. But..." Kabuto chuckled to conceal the fact that the mere thought of what that would cost him, even if temporarily, instilled within him a sense of despair and terrible visions of ramen noodles for every meal forever. "I'm getting ahead of myself. Of course, I'll provide you with pictures first."

This was also a bit of a stretch, seeing as he was relatively sure that he didn't own a camera or a phone with the capacity to take pictures, but that wasn't the sort of thing he wanted to disclose when he was trying to construct a professional image. Bowing his head politely, Kabuto said with the same pleasant air, "I'm much obliged to you." Then he added without thinking, straightening up, "The instrument has a fair bit of sentimental value attached to it, you see, and I--"

Wait. That hadn't just come out of his mouth, had it? Kabuto stopped mid-sentence; somehow the vocalization of his only real dilemma here made it seem real in a way that it hadn't when it lingered only in his head. Hastily, he attempted to change the subject before the man could ask questions.

"Might I get your name?"

[searchingforasteadyself-blog]

Homeostasis

[thedarknessshinobi-deactivated2]

    A temperate exhale. Danzo could descry the sonance of tremulousness in the young man’s flappable inflection. Granted, his apparent vacillation was not shorn mediocre justification. Danzo distinguished the manner he appeared was acquiescent-hawkish, naught in his gray visage as such to endorse to whether he was being calculatingly browbeating. Just that uncompromising glimpse that could make one undergo the sentiments of ineffectual, negligible. And that semblance about his venerable aril; that undeniable presentiment of gelid frost like some poignant, evocative apparition.

      His dark eye impeached the younger gentleman. A weapon that could impair him if he'd accredited himself to be intimidated so. Shimura was inured to people being disconcerted, terrorised, by him habitually, and without feeling the indispensability to spiel aught a moiety of the time. In clandestine factuality, the elderly man approved such contrivance over much else. After serving in the martial throng of Japan in dour wartimes, interim as one of the honourable commanding brigadiers, an inkling pageant of trepidation or disquiet was a means of presenting subservience, abjection.

    An estimable indication, in some distorted way.

    A grandfather clock swaddled neatly in the furthermost dappled crook of the hoard chimes the hour in a profound drone; the dolente clangourous /tromp/ of its lay almost zestless, stale.

    “Oh?” At the allusion of peddling something however, an eyebrow inclines itself a silver before the lone-eyed contemplation declivities from the intrepid insipid face to smoothly cast a privately entertained gaze, indeed, to the raiment the gentleman arrayed. The eyebrow resided at an uprisen position.

    /Uncustomary to call in such caparison for business/.

    Then again, Danzo reflects, he /has/ covenanted with persons who enter his petite emporium to wholesale articles of personal proprietorship. Rings of diamond and gold were greatly conventional to come by. Jewellery in a general spectrum, in matter of fact. Ladies were quite doting to finding wedding bands amongst the treasures here. Gentlemen, benefactions for their wives. Danzo doweled the younger man privately to be a subjective purveyor.

      “We do indeed deal in procurement, yes. What may I ask were you looking to sell?” Reposing the faded well-worn hardback in gnarled hand atop the ligneous bureau he sits behind, Danzo recoils his chestnut gaze to the man’s countenance once more, expectantly.

[searchingforasteadyself-blog]

If he were to be honest with himself (a rare phenomenon in some respects), Kabuto would have to confess himself unaccustomed to being so thoroughly scrutinized. It caused him immense discomfort. At school and at work, no one ever paid his appearance much mind. He showed up looking scholarly and neat, and that was sufficient, especially when professors and supervisors concerned themselves more with the content of his work, which was nearly always without traceable flaws.

This gentleman, on the other hand, wasn't quite eyeing Kabuto as though he was something rather unappealing found stuck to the underside of his shoe, but he did seem to be taking some quiet amusement at Kabuto's expense. Somehow, that was worse. He didn't much care for that slight lift of an eyebrow, the surprised tone.

No matter. Kabuto drew himself up and removed his hands from his pockets before proceeding; he would have to cultivate a more professional demeanor, and he'd always had a bit of a proclivity for acting--for selling himself, more like, even if he utilized that gift to its fullest potential very rarely. "You see, I'm in possession of a piano that I'm afraid I no longer have any use for," he said with a smile that betrayed only wistful regret and no real emotional attachment to the instrument. "And I believe you might consider it of some value to your shop. It's an upright model, American-manufactured. A Steinway."

He allowed what he hoped was an enticement (at least he was doing a good job of pretending to know what he was talking about) to hang in the air for a moment. Then he went on. "I believe it was crafted from ebony in the early twentieth century. You'll forgive me if I'm uncertain about the exact date. I'm sure I could uncover it with a little, ah, digging, so to speak." Kabuto was all charm now, as if defying the proprietor of the establishment to dismiss him. He knew full well that he'd touched on a few key points of intrigue--actually, he was beginning to wonder how on earth his foster mother ever came to own the damn piano in the first place if it was worth as much as he was claiming it did, but never mind that.

"So," he said, meeting the older man's gaze without wavering, "are you interested?" Remaining the very picture of amiability, he never allowed his smile to look either too eager or too insincere. However, he was beginning to internally err a little on the side of the former. This enterprise had started out as something of a half-assed attempt to clear out his apartment and end this confounded years-long process of grieving, but if he played his cards right and didn't give this man any reason to doubt his credibility (his family name would certainly be a mistake to give away, for one), he could walk out of this with a fair sum of money. That wasn't a prospect he'd indulged in for quite some time, if ever he had done so.

[una-su-un-milione-deactivated20]

[living-in-the-silence]

[searchingforasteadyself-blog]

Homeostasis

[thedarknessshinobi-deactivated2]

    The miniature bronzed bell atop the obverse ingress to the obscure antique dealers pealed adroitly, attractively. The mellifluous timbre teemed the otherwise tranquil, allay dust-strewn air, it's bantam clang like a pleasing birdsong, as if blissfully yearning to impart with the interiors that persons had endeavoured into this habitation of forlorn wonders. This Wonderland of antediluvian pastimes.

    And there in the posterior leftward crook of the shop floor, deskbound at a marginally stooped locus in a baroque, elaborately incised and etched timber stool throned the Hatter to this realm.

    Looking aloft to the entryway from the open leather-bound hardback in his epoch-wizened hand, tearing his cosmic ingenuity from that engrossing classical anecdote he comprehended as if it was his own; Danzo affixes his dark, chestnut-hue eye on the hypothetical patron to have appeared. From behind the opulently-brunette, finished worktop, Shimura scrutinizes him with conventional regard.

    A young fellow. Late-twenties to his early-thirties if the senior gentleman was to proffer a conjecture. Though indubitably, only one undisclosed impugn mattered to Shimura; was he here to sincerely /purchase/ something, or merely peruse like the preponderance of the public who came here?

    It had been a temperate interval since someone had indeed merchandised aught from the antiquities broker. My, my… the latter purchase to his reminiscence was an erstwhile rondure that had been sedentary in the parallel corner for an age, it seemed.

    Departed for a blameless appraise nevertheless. Danzo couldn’t recollect the visage of the individual he’d retailed it to. Queer.

    Still, the singular eye in his weathered, leather-like countenance keyed onto the young man as he allotted the hefty wooden door to assiduously, sluggishly, swing close behind him.

    The shop was noiseless once again, that uninhabited, eerie nihility that utmost would be disconcertingly adjourned by with the ilks of looming, gaunt sculptures and suchlike effigies about in the overcast, shadowed corners.

    Oh, yes. The portraits of oil and watercolour with their penetrating, discordant eyes that seemed to stalk the gingerly-taken paces of your being, scrutinizing you with an almost haunting meditation.

    Danzo, conversely, in his copious years of volunteering here through his subjective partiality and genuine fascination in virtuosity and vintages, found the moderately-chilling ambiance of the diminutive but deferential shop peaceful. Auspicious.

    After a trice, after the commonplace resonances of the September thoroughfare external the curio stonewashed, dampened by the virtually inaudible closing of the egress, Danzo speaks to his punter in that elderly and brittle twang of sophistication. “Good afternoon.”

[searchingforasteadyself-blog]

No sooner did Kabuto step foot inside the antique shop, hearing the bell chime behind him, than he felt woefully out of place. A single room overflowing with so many expensive, austere old items that it was as though the proprietor's secret scheme was for some unsuspecting customer to accidentally knock into something, summarily create a domino effect that destroyed every item in the shop, and force them to pay for it all in one go, it seemed to whisper to Kabuto from every oil painting and vase that he was unwelcome. It was like the Yutani mansion shrunk into a much smaller space and taken up several notches in terms of its contents; the sheer wealth and antiquity overwhelmed him with the overt impression that he was in over his head. Being without a history in a culture that placed so much importance on things like family names made being confronted with so much history feel like an assault.

With these thoughts in mind, it took Kabuto a solid minute to realize that someone else was even in the room, so quiet it was in all its intimidating grandeur.

When the man spoke from his desk that was almost hidden in one of the back corners of the shop, Kabuto looked over immediately with all the manner of one caught someplace he shouldn't be. Right away, there was something about the one who had spoken that made him straighten up a bit to create a first impression that by all accounts he really shouldn't have cared about. The speaker was a much older man who looked at Kabuto with surprising penetrative ability for one narrowed eye, his face wizened and dignified, and there was a slight hunch to his back as he sat at his desk, a book in his hand. There was something about him that commanded the kind of deference that went beyond the basic manners drilled into Kabuto over the years.

As such, he took a step forward and maintained eye contact as he answered, not without hesitation, "Good afternoon. I beg your pardon, I was only..." How did he phrase this? "I was just...in the neighborhood searching for...an establishment that might be interested in purchasing something that I have in my possession." Once the words were out, there was no taking them back, and that was a little unnerving; he hadn't even made the decision to sell the piano yet, let alone investigated whether or not it would truly be worth anything.

Besides, he had the feeling that he was about to be laughed at. Antique sellers rarely showed up, he was sure, in sweatshirts and jeans that, however obsessively cleaned and neatly ironed, were purchased through thrift, and he doubted many of them were his age.

[kairiyutani]

Silver Linings

[kairiyutani]

Once in the same lavish hall they had passed earlier— her gaze unconsciously drifting to the right to the framed photo on the wall on which Kabuto commented earlier, and the comment to which she replied with unnecessary force— Kairi pauses and turns back to look up at the silver male. She’s naturally quiet now, with a calmer subdued air around her, the color to her cheeks fading to merely a mild dust of rose. Not that she could erase all the thoughts threatening to swallow her up with too many mixed emotions, but she sure as hell gave it a damn good effort to appear so.

"…I was kidding," she confirms very quietly, her voice a whisper in the large hall as if she’s unwilling to break the comfortable silence around them. The way she says that though, it’s like her joke fell flat…but all the same, she’s glad the air is lighter now. She’s glad that she can actually breathe. Breathing in the presence of a stranger in her home for the first time never really happens, ever, so this was quite a feat, she notes to herself.

That brings up the topic of her own cooking skills in her mind, and she soon finds herself quietly fumbling with figuring out what to make to eat. She had been so rushed to finish her work late last night, and then at least grab a solid four hours of sleep before a lab session early this morning, that she had completely forgotten to buy a few extra things to stock up with, just in case this older med student really did show up. …Not that she ever got real visitors, so she left it at a fifty-fifty chance until Kabuto texted her back, that is. She had no clue what’s lying around in her kitchen, and she’s trying to think of anything that comes to mind, anything that sounds even remotely easy to make, because truth be told, her culinary skills are truly lacking. Thank whatever deity above that she planned to heal humans for a living, not poison them with her cooking. Ugh, and I just got dismissed from my only paying job too— focus, Kairi. Come on, focus. 

She leads them down the hall, down the stairs, and just when she reaches the bottom, her teacup and saucer in one hand, she places a hand on the wooden rail at the foot of the stairs, and turns her head back to look at her visitor. In the distance between them of a few steps, she seems infinitely more small. “What…do you like to eat?” Kairi’s voice is a little mousier than usual then, and she notes absentmindedly that her sheepish shyness seems to be the norm around this Kabuto, for whatever reason.

[searchingforasteadyself-blog]

The silence was getting to be a little oppressive as Kabuto followed Kairi downstairs. Chatter and pleasantries might have been preferable; they'd have allowed him to focus much less on his own discomfort with what he'd just discovered about his hostess. Kabuto didn't want to add agoraphobia to his repertoire of psychological issues, but the house was so enormous that it was beginning to feel like a vast open space from which escape was impossible, and if this devastatingly awkward silence continued, he was going to have some sort of attack that inhibited him from remaining long.

Which meant, of course, that he was going to have to fill that silence, but he hadn't the foggiest idea as to how as he stopped a few stairs up from the bottom, looking at Kairi with one hand resting on the banister. "I, ah." Not the most auspicious start. "Anything?" No, that wouldn't do. He cleared his throat and managed a small crooked smile as he stepped down to join her, standing a few solid inches taller than her petite self. "I'm partial to most anything that isn't instant ramen, actually. Other than that, there's nary a thing you can try to feed me that I'm not either sick of or averse to in general." He paused. "Actually, I'm not altogether fond of cold cuts, but that would severely limit our options.

"That is--I can certainly stomach them, so if you'd like to take the sandwich route, I'd be more than happy to comply. Cold cuts are at least precooked; I just can't stand raw meat. Truthfully, I much prefer the artificiality of fish that's been grilled and salted to death, but that's a terrible amount of work, and I'd rather not subject you to that, or the fire department, for that matter..." He probably should have warned Kairi beforehand of his weirdness about accepting prepared food from others, but then, it was such a poverty-stricken-ward-of-the-state thing that the explanation would have been more trouble than it was worth.

[searchingforasteadyself-blog]

{OOC: Replies coming soon! Mun is applying to colleges and gradually turning to an insufferable stress machine whose sole function is to hyperventilate and diffuse her anxiety among all in her vicinity. In short, I'm being IC but not channeling it into RP, so I'll fix that ASAP (take a shot for every acronym in that sentence--no, please don't). Might be a bit hypocritical of me to remind everyone, as a mod, to please mind your inactivity limits, but seeing some more action on the dash would be great! Best, lovelies.}

[searchingforasteadyself-blog]

Homeostasis {Closed RP - thedarknessshinobi}

Kabuto Yakushi, as a general rule, did not care for change. He liked to consider himself fairly adaptable, but the scope of such adaptability was limited primarily to minor annoyances, trivialities and inconveniences--he could handle changes in his internship shifts or having to replace a broken microwave when it exhausted itself over countless frozen dinners that were all he could afford, which were feats he was very proud of. (Never mind that an altered shift left him discombobulated and irate for the next week and new appliances took still longer to get used to. He had a very liberal definition of handling things.) His responses to external stimuli were inhibited by his obsessiveness, and disruptions in routine were not looked at kindly. Where most people had a regularly functioning control center, Kabuto had a mind that was most efficient and sharp when nothing tampered with it; its level of delicacy rendered it a mess of tangled wires and broken receptors when changes afflicted it.

Which was the long way of saying that he really, really, really did not want to sell his piano.

The damned thing was, of course, the exact opposite of practical. His shoe box of a studio apartment was cramped enough without the antique instrument that was desperately in need of restoration and tuning, He had neither the money nor the time to play or maintain it, and he was running out of room for his books more and more by the day. The only thing his piano had going for it, which he was trying desperately to let go of, was nostalgia--it had been left to him posthumously by the only person who had ever adopted him (and what a brief, cruelly snatched taste of paradise that had been), left in storage until he departed from the orphanage to officially inherit it, and brought with him here to school. Now his finances were so dismal, and his patience with himself so thin, that he was urging himself to get rid of it. How did he ever have a prayer, after all, of moving on and making something of himself if he couldn't forget about the fucking piano?

Frustrated, Kabuto decided to take a walk, to give himself time to think. It was a rare day off, and as he strolled through the streets of Kazoku with his hands in his pockets, Kabuto gave himself over to further deliberation as the September sun warmed the sidewalk. How long could it take, really, to adjust to the absence of something so pivotal in remembering her? He was over twenty years old. A new semester of school had just started. He was speaking to people more now, forming new attachments with fellow students and others--he still had the human heart that academic nutcase of a librarian had given him a few months ago. Wasn't it time to let the past go? Was it possible?

Thinking it all over, he found himself in the path of the local antique shop as he walked down the street, and nothing was really stopping him from walking in. He found himself really hoping that something did.

[xxkellycoolcatxx]

[tayuyaofsound-deactivated201310]

Offscourings

[tayuyaofsound-deactivated201310]

The small pink haired girl continued to wait on him. She didn’t know whether to feel sorry for the man or to just laugh in his face. Ah, choices. before he could even answer she turned towards him, exhaling some air to move her bangs from her face. 

"Ya comin’ or what, Noodle?"

Damn, minutes in their meet and she already has a nickname for him. She could have called him something of the worse possible names. For a tough one like she is, she sure was letting him off easy. She could have beaten him to the ground and taken whatever was on him but instead she offers protection….possibly because of pity.

As she finally saw him walking, she waited until he was utterly close until she turned at the corner with him. Friendly company,huh? She knew it was complete sarcasm. All she could do was crack a smile on her face at his little joke. For a moment she looked up at the sky before saying anything else to him.

"So…With your attire, you must go someplace nice. College perhaps?"

She was curious. What was a student or whatever he was doing out here by himself at this time of night? Her eyes darted his direction, noting his every body movement. 

[searchingforasteadyself-blog]

Kabuto nearly stopped in his tracks. Noodle? That was a new one. Frankly, he wasn't altogether accustomed to nicknames...and this girl was reminding him why he was more than okay with that. They tended to err on the side of the disparaging, at least in his experience. Frowning, he said shortly, "Just 'Kabuto' is fine, unless you'd rather be on the receiving end of some highly offensive height comparisons."

Clearly they were not off to a good start. And yet, in some flight of insanity, he found himself walking with her instead of making up some excuse about needing to take an imaginary detour through the nearest alley to Anywhere But There. She was watching him rather closely, he noticed--as if for all her emasculating comments, she half-expected him to turn around at any moment and send her sprawling onto the pavement. Her question, however, made him laugh outright.

"My attire?" he repeated incredulously, chuckling as they passed an empty basketball court. "What, is my trust fund showing?" Kabuto sobered after a moment, however, deciding there was no harm in curt honesty. "I'm a student at Kazoku Med and an intern at the hospital." He hoped for a second that that didn't come off as condescending, but experience had come to show that he hadn't yet mastered the alternative.

"It's nice enough," he went on. "For what it charges those who pay in full, it ought to be." Maybe that was a good enough hint.