I own nothing.
Burnt Sienna: Three
Her offices and workplace were just as he'd expected them to be: clean, simple, with demure white walls and honey-brown hardwood flooring. The couches arranged in the waiting room were white crossed with thin stripes of pale yellow and orange, and they were comfortable. Large windows allowed plenty of sunlight in, and the atmosphere was comfortable and homey, not edgy and displacing as most of the other fashion designers he'd worked with tended to be.
"She's not picking up her phone," the receptionist whispered urgently, looking at Yamato nervously. Her name was Yuki, her nose was a bit too long, her eyes were a bit too big, and her hands fluttered nervously when she spoke.
"It's fine. I'm early," Yamato managed, fiddling with the heavy silver ring on his middle finger and tapping his feet.
"You seem nervous," Yuki said, and Yamato was tempted to laugh.
"I'm fine," he said instead.
In the distance, a door swung open and slammed shut, and muted footsteps sounded down the hall until the main office door lurched open and Sora stepped through, looking thoroughly windswept and exhausted. She wearing a short black peacoat that was belted snugly at her waist, the worn black strap of a messenger bag crossed from her left shoulder to her right hip, and Yamato was strangely comforted that she didn't carry a purse, though he didn't know why.
"Hi," she said, breathing heavily. Her cheeks were bright red, and he assumed that was either very cold outside, or she had run from wherever she had been to back here.
"Sorry I'm late," she continued. "It's freezing outside. It's probably going to start snowing soon."
Yamato looked out one of the large windows and saw that the sky was darkening ominously and, looking down, that strong gusts of wind were toying with peoples' scarves and bags.
"It's fine," he replied automatically. "I'm early."
She raised a slender eyebrow and offered him a half-smile. "I'll go back and get everything together, and then I'll get you," she said, pulling her bag over her head and dropping it on the floor to unbutton her coat.
"Okay," he replied, and she nodded, bowing shortly and hesitantly and then disappearing through another door that, presumably, led to the back of her offices. Yuki looked at him again, bobbing her head apologetically, and Yamato sighed and leaned back against the couch cushions, wishing he'd brought a book.
X
She called him back about fifteen minutes later, looking more relaxed and less like she wanted to throw herself into the nearest river. She actually looked very pretty, and he hated himself for noticing, especially since she had been so cold to him during their first official meeting. His ego, though not nearly as large as Taichi's or Daisuke's, was still there and very susceptible to bruising.
Her hair was tied back in a neat ponytail, with her bangs pinned back securely, and he could see a small but defined widow's peak curving at the center of her hairline. She was wearing a short-sleeved hooded T-shirt and a pair of track pants that sat low on her hips and folded loosely around her legs. Her arms were crossed over her stomach and a pair of slim black wire-framed glasses sat on the bridge of her nose.
"Do you do small talk, or is it okay if we get started?" she asked.
"Are you this abrupt with everyone, or am I lucky enough to receive special treatment?" he replied coolly. He was surprised when she laughed softly and half-smiled.
"I'm being rude, I know. Sorry." She bowed, and when she looked up, made eye contact with him, stepping forward and around him, sizing him up. Yamato felt like a piece of meat in a butcher shop.
"How tall are you?" she asked, toying with the ends of her ponytail.
"I think I'm 190 centimeters," he replied. "I haven't measured in a while."
"That's fine," she replied, jotting it down on a clipboard that he hadn't noticed before. "Okay, I need to measure you," she said, meeting his gaze again. "You need to take your sweatshirt off, and possibly the shirt under that."
Yamato shrugged and complied mutely, pulling the sweatshirt over his head and tossing over a nearby folding chair, and raised an eyebrow. She tipped her head to the side, then shook her head.
"You're fine," she said, pressing her lips together.
He followed her through two rooms to a brightly lit studio with a raised circular platform in front of a tall, three-way mirror. She nodded at the platform, and he took his shoes off before stepping on it obediently,
She pulled a yellow measuring tape out of her pocket, pushed a pencil behind her ear, and looked up at him seriously. "Okay, I have rules that you need to follow so I'm not tempted to stick you with a needle next time we meet. For one, don't talk when I'm working. It's distracting, and I want to get through this as quickly as possible so I can leave at five. Second, don't move when I'm measuring you, because then the numbers will be off. If we finish with enough time, I'll start fitting you, but I doubt we'll get there today."
"What's at five?" he asked.
"I get off," she replied evenly.
"Do you always work with a model personally?"
"Only the ones Mimi begs me to work with, apparently," she replied, and there was wry and rueful twist to her half-smile. She straightened the measuring tape, told him to stand up straight, and began working.
He preferred not speaking to making awkward small talk, though he would never tell Sora that—his ego wouldn't allow it. He simply moved his arms and legs and shifted his weight when she told him to. There was a stony determination to her face as she worked, and Yamato could imagine her as a schoolgirl, completing her work with the same look on her face. The muscles in her arms shifted smoothly under her skin every so often, and her ponytail swished over her shoulders when she moved.
She was exceedingly thin and proportioned like a dancer, with long legs, delicate wrists, and slim, strong musculature. She carried herself with lithe grace that Yamato was sure that she didn't have when she was younger, because mild surprise would flicker over her face whenever she moved without tripping or knocking something over.
She also had a distinct sadness in her eyes that had made Mimi wonder when they were out. Taichi had said that he would be late coming home and Mimi hadn't wanted to walk to the corner market alone or bother Sora to walk with her. Yamato suspected that it was more of Mimi wanting to spend time alone with Yamato, which happened only occasionally now that they were out of school. Mimi had told him during the walk that Sora used to be far more vivacious and charismatic when they were younger, and that when she laughed, it was always out loud and with her head thrown back, and she used to yell and chase after Taichi and play soccer like her life depended on it. She had been pretty back then, and though lots of boys were interested in her, it wasn't likely at all that she would give them the time of day.
Yamato wondered vaguely what could have made her so much quieter, reserved, and melancholy.
She smelled the same as the day that he'd run into her on the street, though the musty, summery scent of rain was less distinct than the extraordinarily feminine scent of rose petals.
She stood up abruptly and tugged on one of his belt loops, smiling slightly. "You can put your shirt back on, if you're cold. I'm done."
"What time is it?" he asked.
She walked over to her laptop and leaned in to check the screen. "Four forty-five," she said.
"Do you have anything to do after five?"
She shifted her weight to her right leg and raised her eyebrows. "Why?"
"We could go get—"
She laughed and shook her head before he could finish. "Sorry. Mimi asked me to work with you, that's all."
He was strangely compelled to convince her to go somewhere with him, for whatever reason. Maybe it was her perfume, maybe it was her hair, or maybe it was the fact that she was pretty, sad, and not giving him a second chance. Maybe it was his damaged ego trying to redeem itself.
"I'm doing this because of Mimi and Taichi," he said, and she shifted her weight again, looking only mildly interested.
He appreciated her genuine detachment.
"You're good friends with Mimi and Taichi," he said patiently and rationally. "I'm a good friend of Taichi and Mimi. We're probably going to see a lot of each other, and it would be awkward if we didn't get along."
"We could always ignore each other," she suggested, and rolled her eyes and sighed when he looked at her plaintively. Yamato marveled at how well she played a bitch.
"I hate you," she muttered, then amending, "for being practical." She paused, sizing him up, and her shoulders slumped minutely; Yamato knew she would give in.
"Let me get my coat," she said. Her gaze sharpened into a glare. "You're paying."
He laughed, and she stalked off, muttering in Korean.
X
"It's cold," she muttered as they walked against the wind.
Yamato looked at her passively. "We could have taken the subway."
She shook her head stubbornly, and he could see that the tips of her ears were bright red. Her cheeks and nose were the same color, and her eyes were watering.
"I told you I didn't want to waste money," Sora grumbled. She took her hands out of her pockets and hugged herself, balling them against her sides. She looked up and met his eyes, and her burgundy eyes widened as she let loose a loud, single shout of laughter. "Your hair!" she said, giggling. She blinked her eyes deliberately, and a lone stream of tears trailed down her cheek.
"Let's just go inside somewhere," Yamato grumbled, his hands going to his hair in an attempt to assess the damage.
"Fine," she agreed, her eyes gleaming with mirth, and she veered off to the left, cutting him off and forcing him to follow her into a music shop.
"Awesome," she breathed as she took her gloves off and rubbed her hands together.
Yamato watched her as he unbuttoned his coat and sifted his fingers through his hair, trying to get it to lie flat without looking too flat.
He hadn't pegged her for a music lover, simply because she didn't look like one. She didn't carry her MP3 player with her (at least, not that he could tell), and though she had known about his band, it didn't mean much, especially since they were, as Sora had said herself, "right on the brink of popularity."
Yamato watched as Sora made a beeline for the back, wondering how she knew where all the good music was when she had obviously never been here.
The atmosphere was pleasant; the walls were painted black with smatterings of white, CDs were stacked in tottering piles, gleaming black racks stretched all the way back through the fairly small store, and cardboard boxes were lined against the walls, open and overflowing. There was other merchandise tacked to the walls and kept safe in scratched glass cases, along with imports, bootlegs, and the mother lode of music-no-one-knows-they-don't-know-about.
Yamato knew the owner of the shop, though not very well, and he'd spent hours after school or on weekends (and whenever he wasn't in cram school, which his father insisted he attend). He knew the store like the back of his hand for about a week before new shipments of CDs and merchandise came in, and then he would start over.
He hadn't been back in over a year, after his career and his band's career started kicking up and they began making plans and signing contracts to record their first single. Still, he managed to track through everything and find Sora in the back.
She was sitting on the floor, going the CDs in the rather vast Korean section.
"They came out with a new single," she said mournfully, looking up at him when he stopped beside her.
"How'd you know where to look?" he asked, squatting beside her and falling back gently to sit.
"My grandfather's friend's son's cousin owns the place," she said absentmindedly, trailing her fingers over stacks of CDs and pulling fifteen or twenty off the rack.
"What?"
"My grand—I'm kidding," she said, grinning. "Did you know that Clazziquai came out with a new CD?" She waved the case in his face, and Yamato raised an eyebrow.
She sighed when she caught his expression. "I used to come here and get stuff the day before it officially came out. L'Arc-en-Ciel, Miyavi, Due le Quartz when they were still together, you name it. It was cheaper and I didn't have to deal with screaming fangirls. I'd find new band here too, which was always nice."
"Oh." Yamato picked up one of the CDs she had discarded and looked at the front. "TVXQ?" he asked, flipping the case over and looking at the back.
"You haven't heard of them?" Sora asked, pulling her knees up to her chest and pushing herself forward into a crouch. "They're hug everywhere in Asia right now."
Yamato shook his head, and she laughed again. It was open, genuine, and lively, just as Mimi had promised.
"You're a music snob, aren't you," she teased genially, waving her finger in his face.
Yamato blinked, startled.
She sighed, slowly unfolded, and stood up, stooping momentarily to collect a small stack of CDs. "You're still paying, right?" she laughed again, and shook her head reassuringly. "I'm kidding."
"No," Yamato said, standing up and digging around in his back pocket for his wallet.
"You don't," she said.
"I dragged you out in the cold," Yamato said matter-of-factly, smiling slightly and pulling bills out of his wallet.
"Yamato-kun…" she said, pushing at his hands.
Yamato was surprised that she addressed him so familiarly after spending so little time with him, but he didn't mind. She had been cool, formal, and a bit sarcastic earlier, bordering on rude, but she had kept the pretense up well. He preferred familiarity to forced formality.
"I'm paying," he replied firmly.
She followed him to the register, mutely setting her CDs on the counter and widening her eyes when she saw the total.
"Who's paying?" the cashier asked, bagging the items and looking between the two of them.
Yamato set his money on the counter and Sora sighed.
"I'll be back," she said. "Can you wait outside? It'll only take a second."
She disappeared before Yamato could object.
X
His apartment was cold when he managed to get the key into the lock and push the door, which was heavier than he remembered, open. He adjusted the temperature on the thermostat, took the black plastic bag to the kitchen with him, and set it on the counter as he took a can of beer out of the refrigerator. He lit a cigarette while he opened the can, and, puffing on the fag and watching the smoke rise slowly, walked to the living room, sitting on an armchair. He grabbed a remote, turned the TV on, and as the light from the screen flickered on the carpet and cast strange shadows around the dim room, he opened the plastic bag and emptied its contents onto his lap.
Sor hadn't lied when she said that she would only take a second; she had emerged barely five minutes later with her own bag. Yamato had walked her back to her office; by that time it was almost six o'clock and getting dark.
He had walked her to the elevator door and handed her the bag of her CDs, and she had handed him the bag she had come out of the shop with.
"Promise you won't open it until you get home, all right?" she had said, holding out her pinky. He had nodded and promised, taking the bag but not linking pinkies with her, and she'd smiled before stepping on the elevator and waving as the doors swished shut.
There was a CD, a small plastic case, and a folded piece of paper in his lap. He unfolded the paper, which was covered in small, neat, bubbly kanji and read.
Yamato-kun,
Thank you for the CDs, though you really didn't have to pay for them. I would've gotten them at some point. Anyhow, to thank you, I got you two things. I know you'll like the first one, though I'm not sure about the second one. (TT) We can't have everything, can we?
The first thing is an imitation of the earrings Hyde was wearing at his last solo concert; you said in one of your interviews that he was our musical inspiration when you were high school, so I thought you might like them. Second is The TRAX's first album; they're a Korean rock band. They're not as popular back in the motherland, but I don't know how much you like pop music and I didn't want to take a chance. I put the Japanese translations for the Korean tracklistings on the back of this page.
Also: let's get to know each other, okay? Your idea was reasonable and I was just a bitch. My phone number is at the bottom; so if you ever want to do something sometime, please call me.
Sora
Yamato re-read the letter twice, looked at the CD and earrings in his lap, and inhaled thoughtfully, watching the tip of the cigarette glow red and slowly fade to grey, as the ashes grew long.
How strange.
X
"Yeah, she was pretty moody," Taichi said as he ran on the treadmill. His shirt was damp and his face was slick with sweat, and his breathing was labored. "But that letter sounds like something she would do," he added, pushing a couple of buttons and lowering the speed of the track. "She hates apologizing or doing nice thins for people in person. Says it's embarrassing."
Yamato grunted noncommittally, leaning against a wall.
"It's classic Sora," Taichi concluded, stepping off and walking around in slow circles with his hands on his hips. He wiped his face with a towel and looked at Yamato. "She means it."
"I figured," Yamato replied, following Taichi down the stairs and into the locker room.
"You should call her," Taichi said, pulling his shirt over his head and opening a locker. Yamato sat down on the bench with his back to Taichi and replied.
"I should."
"Go watch a movie. Go to that music shop again. How did she not strike you as a music freak? She listens to everything she can get her hands on, and then some. Korean, Chinese, French, Spanish. There's even some Indian and German in there. She's got an 80 gig iPod and she running out of space on that, and she's filled up three or four external hard drives with music files."
Yamato shrugged.
"You've only met her twice," Taichi said. Yamato heard the locker click shut, and he stood up, waiting for Taichi to walk to the door.
"Don't judge her."
Yamato planned to take that to heart.
"But," Taichi added hesitantly, after a short silence, "if you hurt her in any way, our nine years of friendship will do nothing to stop me from kicking your sorry ass. She's damaged in the worst way possible."
Yamato looked at him expectantly. "How?"
Taichi shook his head. "Get it out of her, man. I'm not telling you anything."
A/N: I however, will tell you. In the next chapter, that is. :)
Thank you to all my lovely reviewers! I'm glad you're all liking this story.
As always, tell me what you think. :D
