To the Readers: Someone commented that it would be nice if Tsubame would show up to live in the states. Well, not yet. Not yet. Kenshin can't go back to Japan to pick her up until Aoshi tells him that their business in San Francisco is finished. Even though he has sworn to no-longer kill, he still has many ties to the Tokyo yakuza.
This short chapter does absolutely –nothing- to advance the story. I just thought a bit of humor might once again be in order after the intensity of Kaoru and Kenshin's last meeting.
~*~*~*~*~*~ Chapter 6: ~*~*~*~*~*~
Kenshin held his hand in front of his face and flexed it several times as blood seemed to rush to his fingers. It seemed as if every ounce of his body's life-sustaining liquid wished to race towards the hand that had just gripped Kaoru's wrist. As if the now-warmed blood wished to rejoice by swirling about in some maddening aboriginal dance designed to melt the unseen winter snows right beneath his fingertips.
Her parting footsteps still rung in his ears, the gentle tap of each lavender slipper on the tile floor. But, the echo of her parting soon found itself dissolving to a new noise, the heavy clomp of Sanoretti's overly-shined shoes.
A few minutes later, Kenshin had completely forgotten his reverie, and instead stood behind his desk, a chair raised in front of his face as if he were defending himself from a rabid animal's attack.
"SHE WHAT??? That little minx. I can't believe she -stiffed- us. And I can't believe you -let- her get away with it. What is your fucking -problem-, Kenshin?"
Kenshin deftly dodged yet another plum being thrown directly at his forehead by deflecting it with the chair. He wondered if he could count this as "experience" if he ever decided to join the circus.
"I do believe you are ruining the lovely fruit basket you bought for your mother, you are," Kenshin mumbled, deciding that trying to diffuse the situation through force or attempted escape would probably only agitate the Italian.
"I'll fucking abduct that annoying little brother of hers and harness him to the front of a carriage and make him work off the debt as a human taxi! And then, and then I'll force her to get a job as a beekeeper, and then....I will make them both roll around in the dumpster in back of Mr. Liu's Restaurant...and then...I'll introduce them to my mother..." The Italian's brown eyes flashed as he searched his brain for proper tortures for his former clients.
"It is just money, Sano," Kenshin pleaded quietly after making sure the chair was properly position to defect any additional fruit bombardment.
"But..." the Italian began, his voice wavering slightly higher as he dropped a small orange back into the basket, "But, I -like- money."
Sensing the tantrum had subsided, Kenshin carefully placed the chair back on the ground and walked cautiously towards his partner. The shorter man placed a gentle hand on his friend's shoulder. "I know. I know."
"I really do, Kenshin. I like money. I like the way it feels in my hands. I like the way it smells..."
Kenshin carefully guided his partner out the door, "I know. Let's get you to a speakeasy, and you can tell me all about it, you can. I'll buy."
The Italian man continued to babble as they walked down the hall, "Hell, I even like the way it tastes."
Kenshin, who had previously been suppressing a smile at his partner's amusing antics, now felt his eyes go wide in confusion.
"Oro?" The expression both his father and grandfather often uttered in similar situations tumbled from the befuddled Kenshin's lips.
Sano shrugged and replied, "Hey. I wasn't always the strappingly handsome and supremely brawny man you see before you today. To tell the truth, in school I got beat up a lot. Ma would give me some pennies sometimes so I could pick things up on the way home. After the kids took to ripping my pockets out and throwing my shoes on rooftops, I decided the best place to keep the money was in my mouth."
Although the explanation made sense in a rather Giovanni-logic way, Kenshin couldn't quite shake the dual images of young Sano being scrawny and the look that must have crossed many a shopkeeper's face when the boy produced payment for goods.
"I feel sorry for her," Kenshin mumbled.
"Eh? Who? Kaoru?"
"No, Giovanni," came a mournful reply, "The woman who finally consents to be your wife."
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
If there was one thing that Kenshin knew, it was this: people change slowly, but lives change quickly. It had taken him all of his 22 years to become the vessel that held all of the convictions, desires, goals and hopes, the vessel known as Himura Kenshin. To grow from a rambunctious child whose eyes grew wide at the sight of his father's sakabatou, to the man who now felt he truly understood the meaning of that same sword took all of his 22 years of life.
On the other hand, lives change quickly. Tsubame's birth. His parents' death. Becoming an assassin. Being assigned to the States. All the events that fate had thrust upon him had come like lightning, unbidden in the night. And while they changed the circumstances of his existence, they did not seem to change the essential essence of Himura Kenshin.
No. True change, inner change, took much time.
That is why, as he rose from his cot, less than 48 hours from the first time he met Kaoru Kamiya, many doubts still clouded his mind. But, like an alcoholic having sworn off the poison he knew to be corroding his body, the young ex-assassin tried his very hardest to put his best face forward in greeting this new era of his life.
Packing his meager things into a burlap bag he'd borrowed from the Giovanni household, Kenshin chuckled inwardly to himself as he caught sight of Tsubame's picture. How she would laugh if she saw him wearing Western clothes, if she knew he was working with an uncouth Italian man and accepting and invitations to live with eccentric schoolteacher that he hardly even knew.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
Yahiko met Kenshin at the Learning Center gate. Yahiko explained that he was waiting for the newspaper. Actually, he was waiting for the newspaper -boy- who was one of his friends, and had acquired a baseball card that the Yahiko wanted to see. But, waiting for the newspaper sounded a lot more adult than the other explanation.
"You have had breakfast, right?"
Kenshin hadn't. In fact, today was the first day in many weeks that he hadn't gone to breakfast at the Giovanni house. And while he felt a bit glad to not have to participate in the Italian-American version of urban warfare for once, he -was- hungry. But, he had wanted to get working on moving boxes while the morning was still cool, not for his own sake, but for the sake of those helping him.
"I have not."
"Just. Tell her. You have already had breakfast. For the love of crimony, man, tell her you've already eaten!" It wasn't until he had finished blurting this ominous warning that Yahiko realized he had been shaking Mr. Himura by the lapels of his trench coat. A quirked eyebrow caused Yahiko to let go of Mr. Himura's collar with a small shrug. "Well. I warned you." And with that, the spiky-haired boy started wandering down the sidewalk, whistling to himself.
This left Kenshin to open the gate while wondering if "Crimony" was one of the Learning Center residents he had not yet met. This pondering, the thorough shaking he had just been given by a 13-year-old boy, plus the rather large potato sack he carried caused his attention to be drawn away from the woman with the pruning shears bent over a nearby clump of vegetation.
And thus, in a comic effort unmatched by the silver screen's Keystone Cops, Kenshin Himura went flying into the air. He landed squarely on stomach, covered by half the contents of portion of the burlap bag which he had expertly maneuvered to break his fall.
Meg Takani looked up from her gardening, holding up her shears daintily and blinking in an overly-feminine show of concern.
"Mr. Himura, I presume?" The dazed man could only nod vaguely in response. "Are you quite alright?"
"Yes. I didn't hurt you, Miss, when I tripped, did I?" Kenshin asked, furiously stuffing his things back into the sack.
"Only my heart, Mr. Himura," Meg replied, gently fluttering a free hand over the specified area, "Only my heart." Ms. Takani stood and offered a hand to the newcomer, helping him up. "Meg Takani."
"Himura Kenshin."
"Yes," Meg purred, her East Coast accent dripping like syrup from her lips, "I know."
Kenshin attempted a polite smile and bow of the head, but kept his eyes on the herbalist. Although her features defined her as Japanese, little of the culture seemed to shine through. Unlike Kaoru Kamiya, Meg Takani wore an air of practiced elegance cultivated by American women. Her sky-blue dress was covered by a beige gardening apron tied primly at the waist, an outfit which complimented her ruby lips and sparkling eyes. But, the way she held herself spoke volumes about her background. Head held high, rather than slightly bowed, graceful shoulders and back set in an immaculate posture. Kenshin could imagine her trading her pruning shears for balcony seats and opera glasses without a problem.
"Do let us become good friends, mmm, Mr. Himura? Yes. I should like that –very- much."
Kenshin could only nod again as the woman folded her pruning shears and put them in the front pocket of her apron. Delicately, she put her hands around his upper arm and guided him up the path, as one might do when walking towards some elegantly upper-class evening affair.
"I do hope you have had breakfast already, Mr. Himura."
Why did everyone keep saying that?
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
Blocks away, on the outskirts of Little Italy, Mrs. Giovanni was inspecting a rather interesting basket of fruit her son had given her.
"Sanoretti, all this fruit is bruised. What did you do, go in back of the market and pick up all the ones the vendors threw out?"
"Cripes, Ma, I try to do something nice for you for once and all you can do is bitch."
Ava-May and Suzy-May giggled at the swear word as Mrs. Giovanni swatted her son on the back of the head.
"Not in front of the girls, Sano. Now don't you go drinking tonight. Tomorrow is Sunday, and I'm not having you hung over at Church. I mean, that –must- be in the Bible somewhere. No hangovers at Church. You remember last time, you were sick all over Mrs. Thompson and I was so embarrassed because she told everyone that my son was a good-for-nothing lout that ruined her best dress. Here's your bacon, doctor. Ava, darling, be a good girl and sit in your chair while you are drinking your juice. Where's Kenshin, Sano?"
"Eh? Ma, you going deaf? I told you. He's moving in with that Kamiya girl this morning." Sano replied as he put his feet up on the table and tilted his chair back to read the newspaper.
"Feet off the table, Sanoretti!!!" And before he could even comply, Mrs. Giovanni had kicked the two chair legs still on the ground out from underneath her son. Sano toppled over like a house of cards.
"JESUS CHRIST, MA!" the Italian man howled from the floor before realizing what he had said.
He could still hear his mother's frantic yelling in their native language when he finally stopped running to catch his breath three blocks away.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
"I'll leave him in your expert care, then, Kaoru. I should start making room in the back of the Apothecary if we are to move your supplies over," Meg said, thrusting a rather dazed-looking ex-assassin into the kitchen.
Kaoru had her back to them both as she poked at –something- on the stove, but turned her head to smile and nod before returning to the task at hand.
"Oh Meg, would you like some breakfast?"
Kenshin had never seen a woman move that fast.
"She's already gone, Miss Kaoru."
"Oh well, more for us, then," the young schoolteacher replied sweetly, setting a large plate of unidentifiable food in front of her new tenant.
The two began to eat breakfast, one across from another in Kaoru's purple-themed kitchen. Kenshin tasted the food tentatively. Yes. Indeed. It did taste as bad as it smelled. Smile through the pain, Himura, smile through the pain. After a few bites, Kenshin placed his chopsticks aside and admitted defeat.
"You certainly didn't eat very much, Kenshin."
"Oh. I...I ate earlier this morning, Miss Kaoru."
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
It didn't take long to move the various boxes, books and chairs out of the back rooms of the Learning Center, especially when Sano showed up unexpectedly and offered to help, murmuring something about "Escape from the terrible hag of the West Coast" while crossing himself repeatedly.
Kaoru produced an old mattress from the attic, one of the few things Yahiko had been unable to pawn. With that the crew left Kenshin to arrange his few belongings in his new bedroom.
Thankfully, Kenshin noticed, the room wasn't painted purple.
This short chapter does absolutely –nothing- to advance the story. I just thought a bit of humor might once again be in order after the intensity of Kaoru and Kenshin's last meeting.
~*~*~*~*~*~ Chapter 6: ~*~*~*~*~*~
Kenshin held his hand in front of his face and flexed it several times as blood seemed to rush to his fingers. It seemed as if every ounce of his body's life-sustaining liquid wished to race towards the hand that had just gripped Kaoru's wrist. As if the now-warmed blood wished to rejoice by swirling about in some maddening aboriginal dance designed to melt the unseen winter snows right beneath his fingertips.
Her parting footsteps still rung in his ears, the gentle tap of each lavender slipper on the tile floor. But, the echo of her parting soon found itself dissolving to a new noise, the heavy clomp of Sanoretti's overly-shined shoes.
A few minutes later, Kenshin had completely forgotten his reverie, and instead stood behind his desk, a chair raised in front of his face as if he were defending himself from a rabid animal's attack.
"SHE WHAT??? That little minx. I can't believe she -stiffed- us. And I can't believe you -let- her get away with it. What is your fucking -problem-, Kenshin?"
Kenshin deftly dodged yet another plum being thrown directly at his forehead by deflecting it with the chair. He wondered if he could count this as "experience" if he ever decided to join the circus.
"I do believe you are ruining the lovely fruit basket you bought for your mother, you are," Kenshin mumbled, deciding that trying to diffuse the situation through force or attempted escape would probably only agitate the Italian.
"I'll fucking abduct that annoying little brother of hers and harness him to the front of a carriage and make him work off the debt as a human taxi! And then, and then I'll force her to get a job as a beekeeper, and then....I will make them both roll around in the dumpster in back of Mr. Liu's Restaurant...and then...I'll introduce them to my mother..." The Italian's brown eyes flashed as he searched his brain for proper tortures for his former clients.
"It is just money, Sano," Kenshin pleaded quietly after making sure the chair was properly position to defect any additional fruit bombardment.
"But..." the Italian began, his voice wavering slightly higher as he dropped a small orange back into the basket, "But, I -like- money."
Sensing the tantrum had subsided, Kenshin carefully placed the chair back on the ground and walked cautiously towards his partner. The shorter man placed a gentle hand on his friend's shoulder. "I know. I know."
"I really do, Kenshin. I like money. I like the way it feels in my hands. I like the way it smells..."
Kenshin carefully guided his partner out the door, "I know. Let's get you to a speakeasy, and you can tell me all about it, you can. I'll buy."
The Italian man continued to babble as they walked down the hall, "Hell, I even like the way it tastes."
Kenshin, who had previously been suppressing a smile at his partner's amusing antics, now felt his eyes go wide in confusion.
"Oro?" The expression both his father and grandfather often uttered in similar situations tumbled from the befuddled Kenshin's lips.
Sano shrugged and replied, "Hey. I wasn't always the strappingly handsome and supremely brawny man you see before you today. To tell the truth, in school I got beat up a lot. Ma would give me some pennies sometimes so I could pick things up on the way home. After the kids took to ripping my pockets out and throwing my shoes on rooftops, I decided the best place to keep the money was in my mouth."
Although the explanation made sense in a rather Giovanni-logic way, Kenshin couldn't quite shake the dual images of young Sano being scrawny and the look that must have crossed many a shopkeeper's face when the boy produced payment for goods.
"I feel sorry for her," Kenshin mumbled.
"Eh? Who? Kaoru?"
"No, Giovanni," came a mournful reply, "The woman who finally consents to be your wife."
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
If there was one thing that Kenshin knew, it was this: people change slowly, but lives change quickly. It had taken him all of his 22 years to become the vessel that held all of the convictions, desires, goals and hopes, the vessel known as Himura Kenshin. To grow from a rambunctious child whose eyes grew wide at the sight of his father's sakabatou, to the man who now felt he truly understood the meaning of that same sword took all of his 22 years of life.
On the other hand, lives change quickly. Tsubame's birth. His parents' death. Becoming an assassin. Being assigned to the States. All the events that fate had thrust upon him had come like lightning, unbidden in the night. And while they changed the circumstances of his existence, they did not seem to change the essential essence of Himura Kenshin.
No. True change, inner change, took much time.
That is why, as he rose from his cot, less than 48 hours from the first time he met Kaoru Kamiya, many doubts still clouded his mind. But, like an alcoholic having sworn off the poison he knew to be corroding his body, the young ex-assassin tried his very hardest to put his best face forward in greeting this new era of his life.
Packing his meager things into a burlap bag he'd borrowed from the Giovanni household, Kenshin chuckled inwardly to himself as he caught sight of Tsubame's picture. How she would laugh if she saw him wearing Western clothes, if she knew he was working with an uncouth Italian man and accepting and invitations to live with eccentric schoolteacher that he hardly even knew.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
Yahiko met Kenshin at the Learning Center gate. Yahiko explained that he was waiting for the newspaper. Actually, he was waiting for the newspaper -boy- who was one of his friends, and had acquired a baseball card that the Yahiko wanted to see. But, waiting for the newspaper sounded a lot more adult than the other explanation.
"You have had breakfast, right?"
Kenshin hadn't. In fact, today was the first day in many weeks that he hadn't gone to breakfast at the Giovanni house. And while he felt a bit glad to not have to participate in the Italian-American version of urban warfare for once, he -was- hungry. But, he had wanted to get working on moving boxes while the morning was still cool, not for his own sake, but for the sake of those helping him.
"I have not."
"Just. Tell her. You have already had breakfast. For the love of crimony, man, tell her you've already eaten!" It wasn't until he had finished blurting this ominous warning that Yahiko realized he had been shaking Mr. Himura by the lapels of his trench coat. A quirked eyebrow caused Yahiko to let go of Mr. Himura's collar with a small shrug. "Well. I warned you." And with that, the spiky-haired boy started wandering down the sidewalk, whistling to himself.
This left Kenshin to open the gate while wondering if "Crimony" was one of the Learning Center residents he had not yet met. This pondering, the thorough shaking he had just been given by a 13-year-old boy, plus the rather large potato sack he carried caused his attention to be drawn away from the woman with the pruning shears bent over a nearby clump of vegetation.
And thus, in a comic effort unmatched by the silver screen's Keystone Cops, Kenshin Himura went flying into the air. He landed squarely on stomach, covered by half the contents of portion of the burlap bag which he had expertly maneuvered to break his fall.
Meg Takani looked up from her gardening, holding up her shears daintily and blinking in an overly-feminine show of concern.
"Mr. Himura, I presume?" The dazed man could only nod vaguely in response. "Are you quite alright?"
"Yes. I didn't hurt you, Miss, when I tripped, did I?" Kenshin asked, furiously stuffing his things back into the sack.
"Only my heart, Mr. Himura," Meg replied, gently fluttering a free hand over the specified area, "Only my heart." Ms. Takani stood and offered a hand to the newcomer, helping him up. "Meg Takani."
"Himura Kenshin."
"Yes," Meg purred, her East Coast accent dripping like syrup from her lips, "I know."
Kenshin attempted a polite smile and bow of the head, but kept his eyes on the herbalist. Although her features defined her as Japanese, little of the culture seemed to shine through. Unlike Kaoru Kamiya, Meg Takani wore an air of practiced elegance cultivated by American women. Her sky-blue dress was covered by a beige gardening apron tied primly at the waist, an outfit which complimented her ruby lips and sparkling eyes. But, the way she held herself spoke volumes about her background. Head held high, rather than slightly bowed, graceful shoulders and back set in an immaculate posture. Kenshin could imagine her trading her pruning shears for balcony seats and opera glasses without a problem.
"Do let us become good friends, mmm, Mr. Himura? Yes. I should like that –very- much."
Kenshin could only nod again as the woman folded her pruning shears and put them in the front pocket of her apron. Delicately, she put her hands around his upper arm and guided him up the path, as one might do when walking towards some elegantly upper-class evening affair.
"I do hope you have had breakfast already, Mr. Himura."
Why did everyone keep saying that?
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
Blocks away, on the outskirts of Little Italy, Mrs. Giovanni was inspecting a rather interesting basket of fruit her son had given her.
"Sanoretti, all this fruit is bruised. What did you do, go in back of the market and pick up all the ones the vendors threw out?"
"Cripes, Ma, I try to do something nice for you for once and all you can do is bitch."
Ava-May and Suzy-May giggled at the swear word as Mrs. Giovanni swatted her son on the back of the head.
"Not in front of the girls, Sano. Now don't you go drinking tonight. Tomorrow is Sunday, and I'm not having you hung over at Church. I mean, that –must- be in the Bible somewhere. No hangovers at Church. You remember last time, you were sick all over Mrs. Thompson and I was so embarrassed because she told everyone that my son was a good-for-nothing lout that ruined her best dress. Here's your bacon, doctor. Ava, darling, be a good girl and sit in your chair while you are drinking your juice. Where's Kenshin, Sano?"
"Eh? Ma, you going deaf? I told you. He's moving in with that Kamiya girl this morning." Sano replied as he put his feet up on the table and tilted his chair back to read the newspaper.
"Feet off the table, Sanoretti!!!" And before he could even comply, Mrs. Giovanni had kicked the two chair legs still on the ground out from underneath her son. Sano toppled over like a house of cards.
"JESUS CHRIST, MA!" the Italian man howled from the floor before realizing what he had said.
He could still hear his mother's frantic yelling in their native language when he finally stopped running to catch his breath three blocks away.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
"I'll leave him in your expert care, then, Kaoru. I should start making room in the back of the Apothecary if we are to move your supplies over," Meg said, thrusting a rather dazed-looking ex-assassin into the kitchen.
Kaoru had her back to them both as she poked at –something- on the stove, but turned her head to smile and nod before returning to the task at hand.
"Oh Meg, would you like some breakfast?"
Kenshin had never seen a woman move that fast.
"She's already gone, Miss Kaoru."
"Oh well, more for us, then," the young schoolteacher replied sweetly, setting a large plate of unidentifiable food in front of her new tenant.
The two began to eat breakfast, one across from another in Kaoru's purple-themed kitchen. Kenshin tasted the food tentatively. Yes. Indeed. It did taste as bad as it smelled. Smile through the pain, Himura, smile through the pain. After a few bites, Kenshin placed his chopsticks aside and admitted defeat.
"You certainly didn't eat very much, Kenshin."
"Oh. I...I ate earlier this morning, Miss Kaoru."
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
It didn't take long to move the various boxes, books and chairs out of the back rooms of the Learning Center, especially when Sano showed up unexpectedly and offered to help, murmuring something about "Escape from the terrible hag of the West Coast" while crossing himself repeatedly.
Kaoru produced an old mattress from the attic, one of the few things Yahiko had been unable to pawn. With that the crew left Kenshin to arrange his few belongings in his new bedroom.
Thankfully, Kenshin noticed, the room wasn't painted purple.