origins-P9
PART IX
Sage arrived at his house later than usual. Besides hating the whole idea of the bus to begin with, he had wanted some time to think.
Ever since he'd seen the blue-haired boy - Rowen, Sage reminded himself - in the auditorium and then again at the top of the stairs, Sage had felt... sorry for him. He apparently seemed to have one friend, but what was one friend in the face of so much hardship, prejudice, and ridicule? It just wasn't fair..
And on top of that, Sage was annoyed. He was annoyed at the circumstances that had made Rowen's life the way it was and he was annoyed at the people like Kimi and Tammy who thought nothing of stripping his self image to the barest shreds of nothing. But most of all he was annoyed at himself for having done nothing.
Nothing. Why? It would have been so easy, to stick up for him, to tell the girls to shut up. Something, anything would have been good. But no. Nothing. "I just stood there and watched," Sage muttered. "Again." Sage sighed discontentedly and opened the door to his house. He placed his bookbag on the chair next to the door as he heard light feet come running through the hall.
"Nii-chan!" cried Sage's little sister Setsuki as she ran in and gave him a big hug. Even though he was only two years older than her, Sage could still sort of pick up the petite 13-year-old. "You're late," she said indignantly.
"I know," Sage replied. "I walked home. Where is everyone?"
Setsuki lead Sage into the kitchen. "Grandpa's in the dojo finishing with a class. Mom and Dad are both still at work. They both called earlier and said they wouldn't be home till late."
"Oh." Figures, Sage thought.
"Sage."
Sage turned suddenly. "Grandfather," he said, bowing slightly.
The old man was still dressed in his robes for working in the dojo. "You took your time getting home."
Sage kept his eyes to the floor. "Yes sir. I - there were some things I needed to think about."
"Mmm."
Sage looked up slightly to see his grandfather inspecting him carefully. Sage squirmed a bit under the scrutiny.
"Come," he said. "Change quickly. We have some practicing to do." The old man disappeared back down the stairs.
"Yes sir." Sage threw a last look to Setsuki and disappeared down the hall to his room.
* * * * * * * *
"... so you know that these two angles have the same measure because they're in the same relative position in the diagram."
Kento gave Rowen a look that said he was intent on arguing the point. "But how do you know? Maybe they just tell you that an' it's not really true."
"Kento," Rowen said patiently, pointing to the diagram, "they tell you that angles 2 and 6 are the same and since each set of angles has to equal 180 degrees, angles 1 and 5 have to be the same."
"But how do you KNOW?" Kento said again. "How can you take two numbers and put 'em together, and automatically make a new one? It's like magic!" Kento rested his chin in his hand and doodled in his notebook. "Math should be a religion," he mumbled.
Rowen recognized the line and rolled his eyes in amusement. "You've been reading Calvin and Hobbes again, haven't you?"
Kento grinned. "What of it? I like Calvin and Hobbes."
Rowen shrugged. "I do too. Remember the one where he made a duplicate of himself, and the duplicate made duplicates, and each duplicate only went to school one day a week?"
"Yeah. Man, I wish I could do that. Remember the one where he saved some snow so he could throw a snowball at Susie in July?"
Rowen laughed. "Do you remember when we did that?" he said grinning mischievously.
"Yes! Ha hah, that was great!" Kento cried. "You nailed Kimi smack in the back of the head!" He smacked his hands together. "It was awesome!"
"It's amazing how much bitchiness can be contained in one little girl," Rowen commented.
"Yeah, especially since she was all of, what, eleven at the time," Kento added.
"Yeah..." Rowen fell silent for a moment. "Thanks for that, by the way."
"For what?" Kento asked as he continued his doodle.
"For yelling at her. In the hallway this afternoon."
"Ah, don't mention it," Kento said. "It was my pleasure. Besides, that girl needs to be taken down a notch or two... or ten." Kento smirked.
Knock, knock, knock.
"C'mon in," Kento said.
Mama Fung poked her head in the door. "I'm terribly sorry to disturb you boys since I know how hard you're both working on your homework..." She winked at Rowen, who grinned as Kento groaned. "But Rowen, sweetheart," she continued, "would you mind if I borrowed Kento for a bit? I need him in the kitchen."
"Sure. No problem," Rowen said pleasantly.
"Thank you dear. Kento, could you come downstairs please?"
"Sure Mama. Back in a few," he said to Rowen, tossing him his pen, and followed his mother downstairs. He went into the kitchen and accepted a spoon as his mother instructed him to stir some pots on the stove.
Kento stirred. Ho hum, he thought. I hope Mom doesn't take too long. He glanced back towards the stairs and quirked a smile. That's the cool thing about having the same friends from when you were a kid, he thought. You can talk about all the weird little kid stuff you used to do.
Of course, when you make new friends you can do more stuff and you always got people to hang out with. And theoretically, Kento added dryly, you and ALL your friends can hang out.
Kento sighed and changed the direction of his stirring. Why can't those two just get along? Though maybe they are, Kento thought. I haven't heard anything from either of them about each other for nearly a week so maybe I'm not doing them justice -
"Kento! Just the man I wanted to see!"
Kento turned to see the grinning face of his father. "Hey Dad. What can I do for ya?"
"Son," Mr. Rei Fung said, giving Kento a good-natured slap on the back, "I've got a treat for you."
"Really?" Kento's eyes lit up.
"Yep. I'll take care of your mother's pot and you," he pointed back the way he'd come, "just step through that door there."
"Cool!" Kento said, relinquishing the spoon.
"And Kento?"
"Yeah?"
"Lemme know what you think when you're done."
Kento slipped into the other room and saw on the table an absolutely huge plate covered in a dish he'd never seen before. He grinned. He always had been his father's best taste tester.
Kento sat down at the table and dug in. He happily munched away for several minutes and when he'd eaten about half of it, he decided it was an excellent dish: three different kinds of meat, a few veggies, but not too many, and a sauce he'd never tasted before.
He was about to pick through the middle with his chopsticks to find another piece of chicken, when a light flashed in his eyes. Kento blinked, looked up, and frowned, but unwilling to be disturbed from his eating, he shrugged it off and turned back to finding a piece of chicken.
The light flashed again, brighter.
Kento frowned again. This is weird. That most definitely came from my plate, Kento thought as he rubbed his forehead in thought. The chicken momentarily forgotten, Kento began to poke through the food to find the source of the strange occurrence. Hah! There it is! Kento exclaimed silently. In the middle on the bottom was a ... marble?
Kento picked it out and wiped off the orange sphere. I'm sure Dad didn't cook this in there, he thought. So where did it come from? He peered at it a bit more closely. A kanji, he thought. Gi. Justice.
"Kento?" His dad poked his head in the door. "How are you doing?"
"This is great Dad!" Kento exclaimed, hiding the marble in his hand. "I'm gonna take the rest of it up to Rowen to see what he thinks."
"Excellent idea."
"But," Kento continued, "I do think it could use more chicken."
"That's my boy. Always willing to give it to me straight."
"Don't forget to get some homework done," Mama Fung cautioned as Kento headed up the stairs.
"Don't worry Mama, we won't," Kento replied and took the plate and two pairs of chopsticks upstairs.