Stroganoff
Third Wheel: Parsley
Disclaimer: Takda hak apa-apa.
Thanks for the reviews. I never really judge quality by the quantity of reviews but sometimes I'd like to know whether people read my stuff. *grins* This is one weird chapter. It's so hard to write the workings of a kappa! *Bows to UltraM2000* I'm only good at doing Sanzo, Gonou and Goku. I don't really like it but anyway: enjoy.
***
He knows where the teacups are; and the teapot, too. Removing them from their glossy stand, languishing polished by clumsy exactness because of his large hands but with a meticulous care that can only come from grasping at the light he cannot see. A sodden tea towel perpetually snakes across his shoulders.
The cups are eggshell-thin and devoid of any fanciful filigree. Taking dictation from brutal practice: he doesn't need decoration that he cannot see. Handling them requires a lightness of touch that can be mastered only without the deception and distraction of sight. How could one handle such a piddling cup without breaking it? The mind and eye would inevitably pose the question of such a feat. A slip would be rewarded with a scalding from the minute quantity of fragrantly steaming tea he serves you, not enough to warrant medical attention but serious enough to leave a mark. Squeezing the cup in a sweaty palm could break it (such was his taste in owning the finest and most delicate pieces of porcelain). No choice but to hold it: poised on the lip of two fingers and a thumb, cradled by the other two, grin and bear the subtle prickles of heat invading fingertips.
He knows where to offer a cushion. Long fingers, darkened by punishment taken from toiling in the blistering temperature of the glass furnace and a smoker's habit, argue with one another across the landscape of the brocade cover. Deciding--was this the one with the phoenixes dancing in the seven streams?--or was it the one with the pink lotus blossoms being picked by a smiling novice monk? To him, the exploration and decision takes only a minute, but you do wish he had carried on longer with such a fascinating dilemma that only the sightless could comprehend.
Steam fogs up the eyeglass. He proffers a cooler batch of tea. Declined, he sits still--stiller than what is possible except for the continuous wiggling of one foot.
Rapid questioning returns slow burn answers. But both have patience enough to sit out the centuries without getting anywhere.
Red hair he wears short, or it would have burned off in the hungry, sweltering kilns of the glass workshop. If possible, he seems to want to consider going completely bald for a change, another retrograde fascination of his. Another obsession--matching sets: pillows, cups . . . determined to conquer his own elaborately unfinished blind jigsaw. He seems to alternate between garish elaboration and numbing simplicity in a conflicting cycle perceivable to only his intangible mind.
Distraction from duty is not a problem; in fact it seems to come naturally to him. You can see why this shop is famous for stocking up on boilers in the shape of curvaceous women and impossibly irregular bowls that have no place other than in a bin. That was how the window got shot and the sutra and bullets stolen, wasn't it?
"He's not a just a child. Boy monks don't carry guns." Too cheerful even after having his premises violated and his stock stolen.
Black notebook banished into the deepest pocket along with the flipside smile that never lingers after hours. Tossing in a blindfolded sayonara. Departure.
Third Wheel: Parsley
Disclaimer: Takda hak apa-apa.
Thanks for the reviews. I never really judge quality by the quantity of reviews but sometimes I'd like to know whether people read my stuff. *grins* This is one weird chapter. It's so hard to write the workings of a kappa! *Bows to UltraM2000* I'm only good at doing Sanzo, Gonou and Goku. I don't really like it but anyway: enjoy.
***
He knows where the teacups are; and the teapot, too. Removing them from their glossy stand, languishing polished by clumsy exactness because of his large hands but with a meticulous care that can only come from grasping at the light he cannot see. A sodden tea towel perpetually snakes across his shoulders.
The cups are eggshell-thin and devoid of any fanciful filigree. Taking dictation from brutal practice: he doesn't need decoration that he cannot see. Handling them requires a lightness of touch that can be mastered only without the deception and distraction of sight. How could one handle such a piddling cup without breaking it? The mind and eye would inevitably pose the question of such a feat. A slip would be rewarded with a scalding from the minute quantity of fragrantly steaming tea he serves you, not enough to warrant medical attention but serious enough to leave a mark. Squeezing the cup in a sweaty palm could break it (such was his taste in owning the finest and most delicate pieces of porcelain). No choice but to hold it: poised on the lip of two fingers and a thumb, cradled by the other two, grin and bear the subtle prickles of heat invading fingertips.
He knows where to offer a cushion. Long fingers, darkened by punishment taken from toiling in the blistering temperature of the glass furnace and a smoker's habit, argue with one another across the landscape of the brocade cover. Deciding--was this the one with the phoenixes dancing in the seven streams?--or was it the one with the pink lotus blossoms being picked by a smiling novice monk? To him, the exploration and decision takes only a minute, but you do wish he had carried on longer with such a fascinating dilemma that only the sightless could comprehend.
Steam fogs up the eyeglass. He proffers a cooler batch of tea. Declined, he sits still--stiller than what is possible except for the continuous wiggling of one foot.
Rapid questioning returns slow burn answers. But both have patience enough to sit out the centuries without getting anywhere.
Red hair he wears short, or it would have burned off in the hungry, sweltering kilns of the glass workshop. If possible, he seems to want to consider going completely bald for a change, another retrograde fascination of his. Another obsession--matching sets: pillows, cups . . . determined to conquer his own elaborately unfinished blind jigsaw. He seems to alternate between garish elaboration and numbing simplicity in a conflicting cycle perceivable to only his intangible mind.
Distraction from duty is not a problem; in fact it seems to come naturally to him. You can see why this shop is famous for stocking up on boilers in the shape of curvaceous women and impossibly irregular bowls that have no place other than in a bin. That was how the window got shot and the sutra and bullets stolen, wasn't it?
"He's not a just a child. Boy monks don't carry guns." Too cheerful even after having his premises violated and his stock stolen.
Black notebook banished into the deepest pocket along with the flipside smile that never lingers after hours. Tossing in a blindfolded sayonara. Departure.