Yesterday, I spent the day and night running. Though stray thoughts occasionally creep in, when I run for long stretches of time my mind becomes calm and ordered, only faintly aware of everything but the path in front of me.
Today as I ran, those thoughts hovering around me were of Naruto. Of he'd have heard of my visits with Aoba and Ibiki, but almost no one knows what I was really talking to them for. I can't imagine him trying to get an explanation from Ibiki... would he be jealous? Would he start to visit my house, only to remember I'm not there? I wonder if he might feel like he was missing a part of himself... After that disastrous talk we had last month he didn't act any different, but he felt different to me; it was like my heart had leapt out of my chest and started walking around, and whenever I wanted to feel alive I began having phantom pains. I even started putting that into a haiku as I was running, something I normally can only do with a great deal of time:
"One body and flow,
You the heart, and I the blood
Beating together."
Well, the syllables fit, but it doesn't have anything to do with nature. I still need to work on my haiku...
Right now, I'm sitting outside my tent with my shogi board. The game has changed drastically since the last time I took a look at it. I'm no longer an invisible third player; I've stepped in as a gold general on the side of Yusei, who is now the king of his side. Taizo's generals are within reach of me, and one move will could mean certain victory or death for either side. But even so, the daimyo's court, figuratively speaking, would be an entire shogi game unto itself. I sigh. What will I- or Raiko, rather- have to say to say to Yusei? It would be no small coincidence for her to arrive at the palace the same day as Ruza. Should Raiko make it clear to Yusei that she's Ruza? I still don't know if Yusei has said anything about Raiko... but she needs to appear active in the royal city at some point to be distinct from Ruza.
I'm not too far from the palace. The anxiety that was strangely absent during the rest of my run is now asserting itself, and all of the things I have to do and people to be seem too far apart to be brought together. Perhaps instead of being the bird about to flap its wings in the storm, I should just be the wind.