The imminent commencement of Konoha's annual Winter's Festival spreads joviality like a contagion. The atmosphere is rife with apprehensive excitement, whether it be partaking in events or immersing oneself in the ambience of a celebratory spirit.
On Izumi's end, she is spending an unusually bright winter's day with Nanami and Yuki, who have incessantly guilt tripped her into parting with training for the onerous task of assisting Nanami with purchasing a new dress for this evening.
"You should be thankful my mission has been cancelled and I have the decency to drag you away from that training field once in awhile," Yuki says reproachfully, and she is prising an ugly brown coloured dress from Nanami's curious hands.
"Yes, extremely," Izumi mutters.
Another half-hearted truth. Her sarcasm does not filter through with such a soften tone, but there is a small part that is secretly thankful for being pulled from the demanding stressors of her own perfectionism.
"It's nice to have girl friends who can give advice on all this," Nanami says cheerfully.
She glances gratefully in Yuki and Izumi's direction before drawing a green-blue coloured dress from the rack behind.
"You know, I can only wear this for a short period of time. Most of the time we'd be in yukatas," Nanami frowns.
"The Council's Mission ceremony is most important so that dress would have served its purpose," Yuki says assertively, "and besides, I think he would like that colour," she finishes lowly.
Izumi misses the growing red streak that is now transpiring heavily across Nanami's cheeks. Perhaps a strong reminder of Shisui's comment several days earlier.
Instead, Izumi's attention arrests on a shadowy figure behind three clothing racks. And it takes several seconds before she registers the person.
Honoka's brown hair is apparent from the mirror's reflection where she is crouching steadily on one very bent knee. But she does not appear to realise that Izumi is watching inquisitively from afar.
Without notifying Yuki and Nanami, Izumi remains remarkably still, gazing at Honoka as she sidles awkwardly towards them, her eyes transfixed on the pieces of clothing hanging from Nanami's arm.
"…isn't that right, Izumi-san?"
Nanami's voice floats through, disconnecting her entrancing moment with Honoka.
"Right," she answers automatically.
Her tone appears to satisfy Nanami, because she turns and peruses between the items in her arm.
On Yuki's end, her demeanour has turned unusually still, watching intently in Honoka's direction with something that looks like an underlying contemptuous smirk.
"Nanami, a stink is following us," Yuki glowers.
At her words, Nanami glances sharply in Honoka's direction, but subtle enough so that it could be mistaken as a neck stretch.
Izumi, looking thoroughly confused, is now staring anxiously between her two friends, the agitated silence a strengthening factor to the vexation growing on their faces.
Before the questions flow, Yuki suddenly speaks in an oddly sweet, friendly voice.
"Nanami, he would like this on you. I mean you know how it is when you wore this kind of colour?"
From the rack, Yuki takes a putrid green-brown coloured dress that befits an elderly lady more than a girl of fifteen.
And hesitantly, Nanami nods, as if unsure of Yuki's sudden facade.
Still, Izumi remains in baffled silence, the confusion of such scenario is keeping her thoughts and questions suppressed.
"Anyways, you've gotten enough here already, you won't need this, let's go shall we?" Yuki continues swiftly, and she roughly puts the dress back before taking Nanami by the wrist, an indicator that Izumi too should follow suit.
x
"What happened?"
Izumi's spoken puzzlement follows through the doors and out into the biting chill of winter.
"I'll have you know that pesky girl does not understand the basic concept of respect and anything that pertains to a mind your own business matter," Yuki answers pointedly from somewhere up front.
Only when a reasonable distance is placed between them and the shop does Yuki turn around with a severe look across her features.
"Izumi, you weren't there and Nanami is too nice to repeat such atrocity." She breathes deeply as a mechanism of anger management. "That girl decided this morning that Nanami is not entitled to be friends with Shisui in any shape or form," she pauses before gesturing her fist angrily, "Nanami was only having an innocent conversation with him when that girl comes out of nowhere after Shisui left and said, and very bluntly so I better give her some credit for that audaciousness, 'Were you two on a date?' Then…"
At this point of Yuki's explanation, Nanami has gone unusually pale, as if she has left the realm of embarrassment and is now hovering somewhere between humiliation and mortification.
"…it was obviously a no since Nanami only bumped into him on her morning walk. Then that girl just stands there and lectures her about how she is being inappropriate by standing too close to Shisui when they are alone and not on a date. Luckily I was still within hearing distance and gave her a piece of my mind. Little rut. There is something funny about her, socially impaired or just inept and rude…"
Yuki's rant continues for some time after, an element Izumi decides to tune out when the spillage of information becomes more of a circular tirade than anything that constitutes new information.
"I know she is friends with Shisui," Nanami says timidly as Yuki breaks from her rave.
"What has that got to do with anything? You are free to be friends with him just as much as she is," Yuki snaps pointedly, "and besides, what kind of stupid explanation does 'two people of the opposite gender can be considered as going on a date, so keeping a good distance would prevent misunderstandings,' come from?"
"Shisui told me she doesn't know anyone else so maybe that's why?" Izumi suggests.
Yuki lets out a short derisive snort that indicates a disregard towards Izumi's comment.
"Not surprised if she has no friends. Shisui is way too nice for his own good. She is probably worried Nanami is stealing him away and she would be left friendless. Serves her right. And stalking us into the shops? What is she playing at?" Yuki inhales exasperatedly before morphing her features into a condescending grimace, "If she was doing what I thought she was doing, then my plan worked out well enough."
In the midst of her sentence, Yuki has gone bizarrely absent, as if she is replaying and witnessing an event that is being plotted subconsciously in her mind.
Izumi has never seen this side of Yuki before, and she wonders whether Honoka's action is a reminder of something Yuki experienced in the past or whether she just genuinely finds Honoka's behaviour offensive.
When Izumi and Nanami exchange significant glances, they decide to keep quiet for fear of riling the already heightened atmosphere.
They walk home without speaking a word, Nanami and Yuki appear lost in their own thoughts whilst Izumi stares vacantly out into the distance.
Though she feels a twinge of sympathy towards Honoka, there is another ubiquitous emotion that is bearing heavily against her chest. Izumi is unsure of what it is, but she gets the strange feeling that it has something to do with the Council's Mission Ceremony tonight.