He isn't employed at some big company, where he ran the whole thing and had money out the ass. No, not at all; he didn't want such a job, because it would eat at his free time and turn him into a person who he didn't want to be.
He is talented, albeit plagued with anger problems and gifted with a dreadfully short temper. His eyesight is terrible, so he has a pair of white framed glasses that were old and scuffed on bits that hit the floor most often when dropped and had smudges of ink and paint stained on them from countless years. He doesn't like change, and is incredibly fond of familiarity.
The anger has been an issue since early childhood, and is incredibly difficult to control. It shows with the veins that pop in his neck, and the noises he makes and the items that occasionally get thrown. It was only because of his brother – who was such a stunning actor, he regarded with beaming pride – that he had taken up attempting to curb it and find outlets. Art had given that to him, as well as the coloring on his spectacles.
Pottery was bullshit – he crushed every single thing he made besides a very lopsided pot that he had ever made – but painting was nice. He could paint over a mistake, erase it with color, cover it up to never be remembered again so easily. Drawing was tolerable, he supposed; it too had driven him up a wall more than once because of the eraser marks and pressing-lines that were left behind.
Literature however, was by far his favorite. Books sucked him in, latched on and refused to let go. It was brilliant, wonderful, amazing. Everything and more he needed to calm down and stop exploding at some helpless other person who didn't deserve it. And it all led him to his job, where he edited and corrected pieces that aspiring authors sent in for evaluations. To see the preliminary ideas, to read the possibly breath-taking novels or prequels, prologues, introductions to them made him happy as a proverbial clam.
His other job was interesting as well, but editing took precedence always. Piles and stacks of papers lined his desk at his apartment, the arms of his couch, the countertops in his kitchen; hard copies were always easier for him to go over than staring at a bleeding computer screen for hours on end. His eyesight was already shit as is, thank you very much!
And so it left him in his current state, picking up his coffee from the local café on a Saturday morning with his satchel over his shoulder. Countless promising – or perhaps not so much – submissions were waiting for his corrections and advice, and this little building was always a sanctuary of sorts; calm, serene and peaceful. A sip into his beverage however, left him nearly retching and gagging at the taste.
"Shit!" He all but hissed, having the grace to direct his coughing into a hastily snatched up napkin. Large mottled wings puffed out from his shoulderblades agitatedly and the glasses on his nose were skewed while his face was slightly flushed from the near choking experience, papers slipping in his grip a considerable amount.
A laugh caught his attention and a slim hand attached to an equally slim arm was placing a different cup in front of him while collecting the offending – absolutely wretched, vile, bitter – drink on the small rounded rectangular table. "Grabbed the wrong one." The new person supplied helpfully, tousled raven locks falling over his eyes which were red as garnets. "Especially considering that yours has enough sugar and cream to put someone into a diabetic coma." Vaguely familiar, this one; the slender male from the bookstore with the wings that were rather eye catching and pretty if he was allowed to say such a thing.
Shizuo just snorted, rolling his eyes dismissively. "Thank you." He grumbled, chasing away the taste of that black coffee or whatthefuckever was in that cup with his own sweetened – okay, so maybe he did go kind of overboard with the sugar and half and half – drink.
End feathers brushed, ruby red to iridescent gold, as the stranger flitted past, eliciting a gasp and a jolt from each. It was like the other day, maybe the other week because things sometimes ran together, because it was like lightning jumping up and into their very veins. No though; it was different. More intense in a way, for it was just a spine tingle last time and yet this was like a static shock that coaxed the hairs on arms and backs of necks and feather endings to stand up and puff out with surprise.
He was gone though, the pretty-winged one, though if one only looked then he could be found leaning against the corner of the store on the outside while catching his breath.
Shizuo clenched his fists slowly, opening them up again and exhaling shakily; this was unnatural and it was making his blood thrum in his ears and he most certainly should probably go home instead of trying to figure this out right now in public. And so his bag was stuffed with his papers, swung over his shoulder, coffee collected in a matter of seconds while the bell trilled at his exit.
A sheet had made its way to the floor in the blonde's haste, face up innocently on the tile.
'Order Made' it read right in the center with red pen marking the underline beneath. On the footnote at the very bottom right hand corner in tiny font, a single word was written in the same red ink in order to identify which submission it belonged to; 'Orihara'.
