Hello everyone. Hope everyone's been enjoying a good year thus far.
For me, it's new story, and new ideas. Here we go!
Cagalli leaned out the window of her bedroom, and took a deep breath of fresh air, while stretching out her arms as far out as possible. Despite the relatively generous size of her apartment, it still felt a bit stuffy sometimes, especially on bright mornings, when the window s never seemed big enough to let in all that great sunlight. Taking a moment to gauge the weather she completed the mental checklist. Sun: yes. Nice fluffy white clouds: yes... It looked like it'd be a nice day today.
A loud thud caught her attention as her gaze dropped 5 floors down, onto the sidewalk. A moving van was parked in front of the building, and apparently a moving guy had dropped a table or something... from her angle it could have just been a very large box. She raised a puzzled yet, somewhat amused eyebrow, then taking one last glance, turned back in and started to get changed.
"Looks like someone's moving in..." She mumbled to herself, in-between pulling on a loose green shirt, and slipping her arms into a dark tanned jacket. Dashing into the kitchen for a quick bit, her hand stopped abruptly at the fruit bowl.
Snatching the single lonely banana left, she frowned and made a mental note to go grocery shopping on her way back from work. Then, stuffing her laptop into her bag as gently as well... felt like, then doing a final self-check, she burst out the door.
Promptly ramming into a very large box.
Or at least what she thought was. After all, that's all she could see...
Feeling herself falling backwards, she quickly pulled her bag in front of her to shield her precious laptop within, then felt herself slam into the ground. At the moment she was lying halfway in her apartment, and halfway a few steps behind as far as she had gotten in the hallway, due to her stumbling backwards after hitting... the box? Taking a moment to register the situation, she blinked hard before the throbbing signals of pain registered in her arching head.
"What the-, Oh my g- I'm so sorry."
The box talked.
The box talked?
Slowly she watch the box make it way to the ground, and a tall azure haired man appeared from behind it, who immediately extended his hand towards her.
"Are you all right?"
She gently pried her right hand off her bag and took his hand, pulling herself onto her feet. Suddenly, her eyes widened and she promptly sat on the box, opening up her bag to check on her laptop.
"Miss? Are you all right?"
Cagalli looked up. The dark haired man was staring at her.
"Let me... just check if my laptop's okay." She responded, still slightly shaken. God, that must have sounded lame... She looked back up. "Then I will proceed to strangle you for ramming into me."
Okay... that sounded homicidal. Not that she had a habit of thinking before she spoke anyways.
Meanwhile, the guy simply blinked. "But... You're the one that hit me, when you opened that door."
She glared sharply at him. "Well then why are you apologizing? Besides, do you really think I can see through doors or something?"
He thought a moment. "No, I suppose not. And I was apologizing out of courtesy. Besides, I can't very well see through boxes either."
Cagalli promptly snapped her laptop shut and stuffed it back into her bag. "Well then, that's that." She replied curtly. Turning towards him, she raised an eyebrow. "Why are you still here?"
"Because you're sitting on my box." He pointed, stifling a laugh.
She frowned, then rose promptly. "Happy moving."
"Cagalli..." Kira started, stressing the second syllable. "You're going to be-"
"Yes, I know I know, I'm going to be late. Not my fault. I rammed into some guy on my way." She shouted into her cell phone, while weaving her way tough a thick mass of people gathered at a bus stop. "I'm on my way."
"Dear sister, sometimes I wonder why I put up with you." He teased with a grin. "And how is it not your fault if you rammed into this guy?"
Cagalli halted her step and took a deep breath. "IT JUST ISN'T!" She screamed as loud as humanly possible into the phone.
Meanwhile, Kira who had fully expected such a reaction was holding the phone 2 feet away from his ear. "Just get over here as soon as possible. You're holding everyone up." He sighed, then hung up and turned to the pink haired woman beside him. "Late." He shrugged.
Her pale blue eyes smiled. "As expected."
Cagalli burst into the office as quickly as physically possible, just barely obeying that rule of physics that said something about slowing down when you hit stuff, or as much as she could remember from 3rd year high school.
Suddenly, a bottle of water was pushed into her face. "Thirsty?"
Accepting it eagerly, Cagalli downed it in 10 seconds flat. "Answer you question?" She gasped, and grinned. "How are you today, Lacus?"
"Happy that you're hear. I need those articles you wrote about the festival last night." She replied professionally. "Have you eaten?" She added as an afterthought.
"A bit. I'll have a big lunch or something." Cagalli brushed off the topic lightly, sitting down at her desk and starting up her laptop, which hastily connecting it to her printer. "And where's my dear brother?"
"In his office." Lacus explained. Cagalli nodded.
"I'll go and see him in a minute then." Drumming her fingers on her desk while waiting for her printer she stood up the moment paper started spitting out. "They're printing now, so just grab them off the tray." She explained, while walking towards Kira's office. Then with a paused she added, "Hey, do you know if this is anything important?"
"You mean, if it's good news or bad news?" Lacus asked, already reading the first page that had come out.
"Um, I guess?" Cagalli shrugged.
"It's... news. Take it how you like."
Cagalli pondered her words for a minute, then saying a quick thanks she bit her lower lip and continued walking towards the office.
"Cagalli?" Kira looked up from his desk to see his sister enter the office. "Hi."
"Hi... I asked Lacus and she just said it was 'news', so spit it out." She said impatiently, eager to hear what he had to say. She walked up to his desk and stood in front, arms folded across her chest and slightly leaned to the side.
"Sit down first. You look too angry like that." Kira motioned towards the chair in beside her.
"Spit it out!" She demanded, refusing to sit.
"Fine, I hired a new executive writer."
Her voice dropped a dangerous octave. "You what?..." She repeated slowly, eyes narrowing to block out all light, yet still emitting a fiery aura.
"I got a new writer." He sighed, motioning again towards the seat that she now slowly lowered herself into, well used to her threats after living with her on earth for 24 years. "I hired a new key writer... I know right now you're the only one, but you're dangerously stressed. I'm not trying to replace you, and it's definitely not that you're not doing great work, it's just that you're spread too thin. I'm hoping to take some of the weight off your shoulders."
She frowned. His explanation made sense... but hell, she still didn't like it. It was awkward enough to be working for her own brother, but the idea of him trying to replace her was just plain strange. "That's... okay. I appreciate the concern..." She mumbled.
Kira stared in disbelief. "Really? That easy?"
"Yeah, Lacus told me to take it how I wanted. I'm going to take it as less work." She explained calmly, desperately suppressing the urge to snatch him by the collar and strangle him just like they did when they were 7 years old.
"Okay then..." Kira nodded slowly, tightening his tie to make it harder for her to grab, should she make an attempt. He leaned back in his chair a bit. "He starts tomorrow... sorry for the short notice."
Cagalli nodded. "I understand. I know I'm not the… easiest person to deal with sometimes, Kira. Thanks."
He smiled gently. "Any time. And for tomorrow… Be nice."
"Of course." Cagalli replied naturally while strolling out the door. "How could I not?"
"Not very happy?" Lacus leaned over her desk.
"What makes you say that?" Cagalli frowned, pressing the keys on her keyboard a bit harder than usual.
"The fact that you have a stick figure labeled "new writer' and it appears to have taken numerous pencil stabs and drawn in arrows... and it's even pinned up on the side of your computer." The pink haired friend, and only person she trusted as an editor responded. Cagalli nodded stiffly.
"I'm a bit frustrated... Okay I'm a lot frustrated." She sighed. She had been moping all day. Now it was 4:30, and she was still angry over the announcement that had arrived hours ago. Today was her last day as the only key writer for the magazine... tomorrow there would be some other guy...
At first she didn't take it so hard. But the more she thought about it, the harder it was to swallow. Of course, she didn't want to take it out on Kira. He was trying his best, and had good intentions.
Not that she had to LIKE said intentions though.
Lacus studied her friend's face sympathetically. It must have been hard to take, but Kira hadn't meant it as an attack on her writing. He was simply concerned for her deteriorating health, due to the stress of the magazine's rapid expansion. If Cagalli hadn't' refused to let anyone else edit her work, Kira probably would have hired another editor as well.
"I'm taking off early." Cagalli sighed. "I just can't stay here. I'm too unproductive."
Lacus nodded understandingly. "Take care. I'll see you tomorrow."
"Of course."
Halfway home, Cagalli stopped on the street, muttering "Less work… It's just less work." to herself repeatedly, in a way that made several people turn their heads and eye her strangely.
She had focused so hard on convincing herself that she almost passed by the grocery store without stopping. Of course, her stomach protested loudly, and she pulled herself out of repetition to obey it. Of course... food! How could she have forgotten? She needed to buy groceries.
And a lot of comfort food. Ice cream sounded good…
After a quick spin around the store, she went to buy the one thing she always ate every morning: Bananas. Yet from this distance she frowned. There appeared to be... only one bunch left. Quickly speeding up her pace she dashed over just in time to see...
The precious bananas snatched again by a horrible, evil, selfish... surprisingly good-looking, young, dark haired man. Wait a minute... This was...
"The same guy that attacked me with a box!" She cried aloud, pointing foolishly at him with a cucumber she was holding. The young man blinked.
"First it was an accident, then you accuse me of instigating the accident, and now I've attacked you?"
Cagalli blinked, then slowly became aware of her surrounding. She was in a grocery store... in public... pointing with a cucumber... to some guy holding bananas... and accusing him of assault with boxes.
Blushing red enough to rival the sun-ripened tomatoes in the pile behind her, she frowned. "Sorry..." She uttered as softly as possible.
"It's okay." He grinned, still picking up her quiet voice. Cagalli was quite unsure as to how she felt about him actually hearing that. Turning to leave, he stopped again as he felt something tap him on the shoulder.
A cucumber?
"I... I really want those bananas." Cagalli said, pointing towards the yellow fruit in his hand. "It's all I eat in the morning." She added, as an attempt at fast persuasion.
"I see..." He started. "But I like bananas too, you see. So we have a problem."
Cagalli blinked. "But I like them more." She protested stubbornly. The young man chuckled.
"I'm sure you don't. But it is a bunch, so why don't we just split them?" He suggested. Cagalli hesitated, then nodded.
"Do you have a knife?"
"Do we need one?"
"Well, we might break one otherwise, Mr..." She trailed off as a prompt.
"Just call me Athrun." He shrugged. "And since we're heading in the same direction, I guess that'd be fine."
Cagalli stared at her laptop screen blankly. Currently she was sitting in her kitchen, pondering the events of the day while examining a perfectly yellow, slightly green at the stem, but completely freckle-less banana. In her fruit bowl now sat 4 other bananas, several apples, and an orange.
They had completed their shopping together to make sure neither of them tried to run off with the precious bananas, and even waited in the painfully slow-moving and sinfully long line at the cash registers. Surprisingly, he declined to reach for the tabloids, unlike every other person in line other than her.
He said that it was bad writing, and irrelevant writing of no material value. That it was all flippant and trivial and that there were more important matters than what famous pretty person was marrying, or divorcing, or cheating on, whatever other pretty person.
She had felt strangely… relieved to find someone of the same opinion as her. Pulling out a crossword puzzle to pass the empty time, she threw a sharp glare at him after he had leaned over her shoulder, in what was probably an attempt to do it as well.
Then he told her the answer to '5 down', and she smacked him in the head with the puzzle for giving her an answer. Jerk. That was one of the ones she was trying to figure out too.
It wasn't until they had gotten back that they had realized that he didn't just live in the same building... He lived next door.
And it wasn't until they tried to split the bananas that they realized there were an odd number. Nine bananas. But instead of having to put up a fight for the precious fruits like she had thought she would have to, he simply handed the extra one to her.
"You owe me a banana" He had said, as he chuckled at her surprised reaction. As she walked him simply exit her apartment, and presumably go to his, she stood there, kind of stupidly, and stared at his retreating back. Then at the door after he had left.
He liked the fruits, right? So either he was lying from the beginning and didn't' really like them, or he was just passive and didn't want to fight for a precious extra banana, or he was just impossible to understand.
She frowned.
In any case, she now owed him one banana.
And she hated owing people things. Standing up quickly, she reached over to the basket and pulled out a banana, writing a quick note with a thin black marker and stuffing it into a plastic bag, along with the banana, then shuffling over to his door in her fuzzy, purple, bunny slippers and hung the bag on his doorway.
The note read:
"You owe ME one banana."
Underneath, a dark spot, where she had evidently paused, before continuing. Where the ink in the marker had ran for a while, before she finished writing the note.
"Your next door neighbor, Cagalli."
Well, what did you think? I'm eagar to hear from you guys... I've been sitting in my hermit hole for a while now, and so I'm looking for a lot of feedback.
It's been a while since I've written anything multi-chaptered, so bear with me if I'm a little rusty. I'm also experimenting with um... less dialogue, since I feel like it sometimes takes away from description.
And also because I've been reading Great Expectations, Jane Eyre, and Wuthering Heights... Yes. All at once. I think their writing's rubbed off on me: Especially the first two. I worship Dickens for his mastery of plot. Both Bronte sisters are beautiful writers as well, though I still think Charlotte was better at writing prose than Emily.
Enough of my babbling now. Thoughts please!
Happily writing,
Periodic-Prose