(I put a LOT of my memories of art history lessons into this chapter and had to fact-check a bunch to be sure about some stuff, so if some of the information that I put in is wrong, PLEASE let me know! Thank you in advance!)
"Alright, did you still want..." I trail off after seeing her fast asleep on the couch with her body laying down on her back, her arm over her beautiful eyes. I smile softly and walk into her room before coming out after searching for a few minutes later with a pillow and spare blanket from her closet. I carefully lift her head and place the pillow under her head before laying the blanket over her and grabbing a post-it note and pen from the kitchen counter. I quickly jot down a note saying, 'Hey, if you're reading this, I didn't want to bug you while you were asleep. I went to get some McDonalds and to go pick up your painkillers and my muscle relaxers from the pharmacy! I'll be back in a few! I hope you don't mind, but I borrowed your car! Sorry for not waking you and telling you, but you looked really tired. but anyway, I love you, babe! XOXO'. I pull the note off the pad and stick it to the television remote on the coffee table that was in front of the couch before quietly grabbing her car keys and heading out the door, carefully closing the door behind me.
~*Manami's POV*~
"Zashi, can you give me the TV remote, please?" I slur out tiredly as I come back to reality. No answer. I sit up slowly and yawn before opening my eyes while realizing I had fallen asleep.
"Hizashi?" No answer again. I look around to see if he had his headphones on and was listening to music, but I didn't see or hear him at all. I roll my eyes slightly and look over to the coffee table to grab the TV remote, only to see there was a post-it note stuck to it with some pretty, yet small handwriting. I pick up the remote and pull off the note before reading it.
"He went to get McDonalds and the meds...while taking my car. While that's totally sweet of him to let me sleep, he should've at least woken me up to ask me about using my car, damn it! He's so lucky I love that idiot to bits..." I grumble to myself before flipping on the TV to watch some old-school cartoons on Boomerang. Thankfully, it was playing one of my all-time favorite cartoon rivals, Roadrunner and Will E. Coyote. After about twenty minutes of watching that, I hear a car door close and not even a minute later, my front door opens to reveal Hizashi holding two bags of food in one hand, along with my car keys and a cup holder with two cups of orange juice on it and a small bag from the pharmacy beneath it intertwined in between his fingers in the other hand. He closes the door with his foot carefully, not realizing I was already awake, yet. As soon as he turns around, he looks at me and grins, saying, "Good, you're awake! How was your nap?"
"I didn't even know I fell asleep, honestly...you should've woken me up to let me know about you taking my car...I wouldn't have minded. But then again, I should be thanking you for going out if your way to get Mcdonalds and the meds...so, thank you. But anyways, let's eat! I'm starving!" He laughs and sits down next to me before setting one of the bags in front of me, along with one of the cups of orange juice.
"I didn't know exactly how many sausage, egg and cheese mcgriddles you wanted, so I got three for you. There's also a couple of hash browns in there, too, if you're still hungry. As for me, I got exactly the same thing, but with bacon added to mine, on top of the sausage." I smile and kiss his cheek before saying, "Thanks, babe. You know me so well."
"I've known you since our first day as students at UA high school, so I'd like to think I know you well enough!" He jokes before reaching into his bag and pulling out the first breakfast sandwich before unwrapping it and taking a big bite. I giggle before doing the same, saying, "True."
After finishing our breakfast, we both take our prescribed pills, since we were both still in pain and both of us had to have food in our stomach in order to take them beforehand. I lean against him while lying my head on his slightly broad shoulder, saying, "I almost forgot that I have an art class to teach at two...want to take me there and just stick around while I teach, so you don't have to go back and forth between my studio and here or your place?" He looks down at me questioningly.
"Are you sure you're up for that?"
"I wasn't planning on being on my feet at all, due to my thigh being injured, if that's what you're worried about. There's this thing called a chair, you see." He laughs at my sarcastic comment before I continue, "Plus, the people I teach paid for those classes and I don't think it would be fair to waste their time and money they've spent on my classes. Besides, I don't want to be cooped up and bored out of my mind in my own home these next few weeks while I heal up." I explain, grimacing at the thought of being in my home with next to nothing to do but allow my body to heal properly.
"I can see what you're getting at, but please be careful if you do happen to be on your feet for more than you need to be. I don't want to see you get hurt while pushing yourself too hard. After all, I don't think Doctor Shinsou would want to have to patch you up again if one of the stitches popped out."
"Sounds about right." I laugh slightly.
"And to answer your first question, I would love to stick around and watch what you teach your art students at the studio. Maybe if I'm lucky, I might see someone's art style that would work perfectly for my next Dubstep album cover art...or if you ever actually show me what you could do in terms of commissions, I could ask you to do it for me, if you're finally ready to show me your artwork so I can get a basic idea of what I want in the commission."
"I think I can do that, but first you've got to tell me what sub-genre of Dubstep you're doing this time. I know the last album was Glitch-step, and quite frankly, I loved it. In fact, I think I still have the CD around here somewhere, I just need to find it. I listen to it quite a bit in the studio when I'm doing paperwork."
"It wasn't as popular as the last one though, but I'm glad you love it. If I'm being honest, I had no clue you listened to my music...I don't think you ever told me."
"I did, actually. When you released your first album when we were, I think around twenty-two, I got curious and listened to it, then told you what I thought about it. It was really good, in my opinion, and still is. However, now that I recall, you were somewhat drunk at the time and it was dumb of me to not think about the fact that you wouldn't remember what I said by morning."
"Oh...I think you may be right. But anyways, the sub-genre is a bit of both Bro-step and Neuro-step. I think you'd really like the album, once I finish up with the final touches on editing. That shouldn't take too much longer than a few hours at most."
"Ooh, I love neuro-step, so I'm sure it'll be great! Now, about my artwork...you see that big, thick neon green binder filled to the absolute limit with the picture of you, me, Sayuri and Shota we took back in high school next to it over on the TV stand?" He looks to where I was pointing to and nods, "Can you grab it, please? That has my best works in there, in my opinion. Oh, and consider yourself lucky since you're the first person other than Shota to look through it. It has both digital art and traditional, hand-drawn with a pencil type art in there, but I keep them separate in each half of the binder, both separated by genre of art ranging from people and still-life, to cartoon and anime...yes, there is a difference, so don't give me that look...and even abstract and expressionist." I finish.
"What's the difference between cartoon and anime? Aren't they both animated drawings of either people, animals and sometimes even both, with a plot, depending on the show? I'm not trying to be rude about it, I swear...I'm actually curious because I've never really watched a lot of anime...I never have a bunch of time on my hands to do so." I smile widely.
"Okay, let me start off by telling you, while yes, they are both considered in both Eastern countries and here in Japan, cartoons. Both the most notable difference is that in most cartoons out in the Eastern culture, with the exception of cartoons like, for example: Avatar: The Last Air Bender and the Legend of Korra, the characters that they animate usually have four fingers, while in anime, they almost always have five. Also, in anime, the animators sometimes, not every single time however, put tons more detail into the art in each series, depending on the time period that it was made. In the early ninety's and back, they didn't have the best technology for animating just yet. If you watch an anime from the early ninety's like the original Sailor moon or Naruto when it first started out, you'll notice how different the style looks between then and the time they finished them, thanks to the technology we have available to the world now." I pause to finish off the orange juice to wet my drying mouth from talking so much before continuing, "As for the cartoons that first appeared in 1928 that were made by Walt Disney who, by the way started out in an small office occupied by holly-Mount Realty in Los Angeles, California. They had to actually had to hand draw out each cell for his first black and white, animated short, 'Steamboat Willie'. They did this until they introduced computers meant for animating in 1990, if I remember correctly, in which they introduced the movie, 'DuckTales the Movie' with said animating computers, I believe...I think that about covers everything I can possibly remember, so there you go, the difference between cartoons and anime!" I finally finish the explanation with a grin. He stares at me for a second to process the large amount of information I just gave him before laughing slightly while telling me, "You really know a shit ton about that particular subject, don't you? It's interesting to know that my girlfriend is a walking encyclopedia of art knowledge and the history behind it. I honestly didn't know that Disney started out in a small office space in LA...that just comes to show how far hard work can get you, but you already know how that is, right, Miss Fauna?" finishes with a small tease. I giggle.
"So, back to the subject we were discussing before I went on a tangent about cartoon and anime differences...you wanted to look at my artwork, so go ahead! But I'll warn you now, some of the art in the people section contains a bit of both naked men AND women...and...well you'll see when you get there, though I'm still a bit embarrassed to let even you see that section at all..." I watch as he opens it up to the first section, which just happened to be the 'people' section, and slowly flips through the overstuffed binder before stopping on one particular drawing I did of him about five or six days ago, which was a drawing of him wearing nothing but sweatpants and sitting on a windowsill with his hair draped around his shoulders and behind him, wearing a pair of reading glasses while looking into a small notebook with a relaxed expression on his handsome face, one of his legs propped up and bent close to his chest with his arm resting on his knee, along with a pen in his hand and the notebook resting on his other leg, the other hand bent to look like he was looking for a certain paragraph or word while using his finger to slide down the page to help the search. It was my favorite out of the few drawings that I did of him in the past. He looks at me with a small smile before murmuring to me, "I think I remember when you saw me like this...I didn't expect you to draw me out in the same exact position I was in at the time and in such perfect detail, though. You saw me like that for, like, five seconds when I heard you enter the room and I got up to put on some decent-looking clothes and yet...you got the moment down like you took a picture of me to remember it. You didn't have your phone with you, it was in your car at the time because we were going to the movies with Shota and Sayuri, who, if I can remember as clearly as you obviously can, were both in the car, waiting for us. So, I don't think you could've possibly taken a picture of me at that particular moment. You have such an amazing talent, babe...I don't know how I even remember that moment, though. So that's going to be forever a complete mystery, honestly." He says, staring at the drawing in awe. I blush and reply, "The reason I can remember certain details in my life so clearly is that the doctor I was taken to go to for a mental and physical evaluation when I was seven said that I've got an extremely strong memory, almost to the point of a photographic memory, but not quite, only because I only remember things perfectly when they are of importance to me and that I tell myself are required to be remembered, like school work or something like that. If it isn't note-worthy or interesting, I tend to forget about it within an hour or so. It's not a quirk, even though it seems like one. The doctor checked my lineage for anything like an intelligence quirk, but nothing in my ancestry line came up for something like that. I did, however, find out my grandmother on my father's side of the family was the one who I got my animal transformation quirk from. Anyway, I never did get around to asking you what you were writing in that notebook of yours. It looked like you were really concentrated on it...was it song lyrics or an idea for a song?" He smiles softly.
"Neither, actually...it was my month-to-month planner that I tend to keep with me most of the time, in case I forget about something...I was going to tell you this after talking with Shota about our plan to help Kaito-san and his boyfriend, but I was invited to open for Skrillex in Tokyo in a couple of weeks by both his manager and Sonny John Moore, or as everyone else knows him better as, Skrillex himself!" I feel my eyes go wide as I grin at him.
"Are you freaking serious?! That's so cool! I'm proud of you, babe! How'd you manage to get so lucky?" I ask excitedly, feeling so happy for his success.
"I got contacted a couple of hours after a gig I did a few weeks ago at that popular club downtown by Skrillex's manager, who happened to be there at the time. He told me how much he loved my music and after showing Sonny what my music was like, asked me if I wanted to open for Skrillex, since he really wanted to meet me, and of course, I said yes! And to top it all off, I was told I'm allowed to bring one other with me for the after-party, so I was going to ask if you think you'd be alright enough to go with me to Tokyo?"
"I'd be absolutely delighted to go with you! I think I'll be fine, as long as I bring my crutches! When is this whole event going to be happening, exactly?"
"It's on the 15th. It's on a Sunday, so we'll have to be ready to get back home very late, or early in the morning so I can make it back to the school in time to teach that following Monday."
"Sounds like fun! I can't wait!"