Disclaimer: I still don't own Azumanga Daioh. Onward to chapter three! It's a bit short, but it needed to be done for a few reasons.
ps, Taking some artistic liberty with names. :3 You'll see.
pps, doing manual indents is tedious and futile. D:
ppps, If I've made any typos (spelling, sentences cutting off in the middle, et cetera) please throw spoons at me as you inform me of such things. xD
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Kaori...
Blue skies above and flowers below, rainbows of earth and air that joined at the horizon. And Sakaki, astride a magnificent white stallion, extending her hand to Kaorin.
Kaori...
The horse moved like a fine mist, so smoothly it seemed almost as though it were floating along the road. Kaorin was sitting in front, clutching the horse's mane; Sakaki's arms wound around hers and held her hands steady, showing her the best way to grip it.
They sped towards the sunset, along a road paved with tongue depressors and bandage boxes...
Kaori...
"Kaori!" came an irritated shout from the left, shattering Kaorin's blissful sleep. "Kaori, it's six o'clock. If you don't hurry, you'll be late for school." Kaorin firmly grasped the sheets and pulled them over her head, sighing in exasperation.
"G'morninmom," she mumbled sleepily. She desperately wanted to return to the dream she'd been having, but to her dismay it had already begun to fade out of her mind.
"Don't 'good morning' me, get up. You've got school today," her mother said matter-of-factly, as if Kaorin was unaware of this. Her daughter made a muffled sound of what she took to be reluctant agreement, and she marched back down the hall.
After unsuccessfully trying to call back the dream from the shadows of her mind, Kaorin sat up and stretched her arms above her head, mouth open wide in a long, leisurely yawn. At least it's Friday, she told herself.
The bright sunlight through her window forced her to close her eyes for a few seconds to let them adjust. After muttering something about "underhanded methods" with a glance at the doorway, she swung her legs over the side of the bed and groped at the space near the wall where her crutches were.
Kaorin had missed school the day before, and had taken a good three hours to get used to moving with crutches, an hour of which was devoted to mastering the art of getting out of bed without severely injuring herself. The practice had paid off- she'd developed an exact process.
She lowered her right foot to the floor and balanced on it (with considerable skill, for someone who had woken up only two minutes earlier) while her hands reached for the equipment leaning against the wall. Once the crutches were in her grasp, she tucked them under her arms and planted them firmly a foot in front of her. Small steps had to be taken in the morning, since she had fallen once or twice going further than two feet when not fully awake.
Stifling a second yawn, she made her way to the window. It was a beautiful day without a single cloud in the sky; but, she would enjoy that later. She shut the curtains and in doing so effectively extinguished the light that had been flooding into her room uninvited.
"That's better!" she declared, with a satisfied nod.
"Kaori!" her mother called from somewhere in the house. It seemed like she perpetually carried a megaphone with her, loud as she was.
"Coming!"
Kaorin shouted back. She picked up her schoolbag and caught sight of
her Classical Lit. homework, which she immediately tried to put out
of her mind. She hated thinking that she would have to see Kimura
today- she was sure that he would do all sorts of embarassing things
to welcome her back. I suppose he's just being nice in his own
way... it's a little creepy, but he's trying. She sighed. I'm
starting to feel compassion for Kimura-sensei, of all people. What is
the world coming to?
"Kaori! Hurry up! Your friend
is here!" There was a subtle change in her tone when she
uttered the word "friend", which drew a sigh from Kaorin.
Whatever her mother was mad about, Chihiro could wait.
She put the last of her things in her schoolbag and went to the hall while in the process of brushing her teeth. Swishing the foam off to one side, she looked around the corner and said, "Hey, Chihi... oh." The face that greeted her definitely did not belong to Chihiro.
Sakaki stood in the doorway, smiling patiently at her.
"Good morning," she said with a bow. Kaorin stood stunned for a moment, still in her pajamas with a toothbrush sticking out of her mouth. And her hair was probably a mess. And she hadn't washed her face. She quickly clamped her hand over her mouth to keep the toothpaste foam from going anywhere undesirable. With nothing else to do, she swallowed the stuff and tried to form some sort of a response.
"Ah, Sak-ka-ka-ki-san!" Kaorin squeaked. She blushed and fidgeted nervously where she stood, trying to think of something to say. "Ano, ano... g-good morning!" she shouted, with a bow so deep she nearly fell forward. With that, she tore back to the her room as fast as the crutches would carry her. After taking a moment to thump her head against the wall, she dashed to the bathroom to finish getting ready.
She returned only a minute and a half later, dressed and properly groomed with an apologetic smile on her face. Sakaki was watching Kaorin's cat, who was fast asleep on a chair in the next room without a care in the world. Noticing Kaorin out of the corner of her eye, Sakaki looked up and smiled kindly towards her.
"Shall we?" she offered, stepping gracefully backward out of the doorway. Kaorin nodded mutely and made her way to the door, turning to bow as best she could to her mother, who was glaring daggers at her.
Her mother had been in a bad mood ever since Sakaki had carried Kaorin home from the clinic. Some of it was due to her being careless enough to sprain her ankle crossing the street, some for being late to arrive home. Chihiro had, of course, come by to tell her mother of the injury and the resulting delay, but punctuality had always been a big deal in the Aida household. Alas, that was not the only reason for the cold attitude that greeted her- Kaorin knew her mother was aware of her feelings for Sakaki.
It had all come out one night after a particularly nasty rumor made its rounds; what exactly was being said about her, Kaorin was almost too ashamed to say in the presence of her mother. Halfway through her explanation, Kaorin had broken into tears, and confessed that the other party discussed in the rumors was a girl that she had fallen for. While they both knew she would support her daughter no matter what choices she made, there was still reluctance in her mother's voice when she finally sighed, "It's all right, Kaori."
Aida Takako was the type of mother who always dreamed that her daughter would marry a successful businessman and raise grandchildren. Although Kaorin's current behavior was certainly not concrete evidence that she would never settle down with a man, the two were well-aware that Kaorin was predisposed to reject that particular scenario. Even if she developed an interest in the opposite sex, she wouldn't want to marry any enterprising businessman- the last thing she wanted was to wind up shackled to someone like her father. Especially since...
Kaorin shook away her thoughts as she felt a troubled expression beginning to surface on her face. Fighting it off, she focused on the same thing as always: You have to keep smiling.
And as her mother stared icily down at her, Kaorin just beamed cheerily back and promised to be home in time for dinner. Her mother sighed, hands on her hips.
"Just be careful, all right? There might be thunderstorms this afternoon. Remember, that couple on their second honeymoon got struck by lightning walking down the street near your school a few years back!"
"We'll be careful," Kaorin said with a nod. She had heard the story a thousand times, yet her mother found the need to repeat it every time there was a thunderstorm warning. Her mind wandered. What was the name of that couple again... Asahina? Marukawa? Wait, no, that's candy...
"Do you need any help with your schoolbag?" Sakaki asked quietly, bringing Kaorin's throughts to a screeching halt and sending them off into the wind like scattered bits of paper.
"Oh, n-n-no, no, I'm all right!" She felt herself drifting helplessly into her usual flustered tone. "But th-thank you v-ve-very much... a-ano, do you n-n-need any help with yours?" asked the shorter girl earnestly.
"Hmm? No, I'm fine." Sakaki gave her a small nod of thanks.
"Y-You're sure? I mean, y-y-you've b-been so helpful to me... ah! Wh-when I'm off the crutches, just let me know if there's anything I can do to help you! I'll do anything, anything at all! Really!" Kaorin was staring up at Sakaki with blazing determination in her eyes, and the flames had long since spread to her cheeks.
"It's all right. I do owe you, after all..." Sakaki stared up at the sky, still tinged pink by the sunrise. "If you hadn't been there, then Chiyo-chan could have..." she trailed off, having gotten her point across. Kaorin swore she heard Sakaki's voice shake a little bit as she spoke, but figured it was just her imagination.
"It... it was n-n-nothing," stammered Kaorin, staring hard at her raised left foot. "I-I just did what any of us would have done..." She was beginning to miss the blurry calm that had descended upon her after the accident.
For some reason, she had been able to speak with Sakaki without any problems, unhindered by her perpetual shyness for the first time. There were plenty of possible reasons for it- drowsiness, shock, an overload of closeness to Sakaki... perhaps even a bump on the head from when she fell. Kaorin didn't know what the boost of confidence was or from whence it had come; what she did know was that it certainly wasn't with her now.
"Uhm... s-so, how's Chiyo-chan?" she asked in an attempt to shift the discussion into a slightly more casual area.
"She's fine..." Sakaki said, and waved to a small figure standing on the other side of the nearest crosswalk. Chiyo-chan gave a small wave in return, then spotted Kaorin and began to jump up and down as she waved her arms in welcome. "...as you can see."
Kaorin grinned and waved exaggeratedly back as she and Sakaki began to cross the street. Chiyo-chan was bouncing up and down the entire time, shouting, "You're back, you're back!" and continuing to wave.
"Hey, Chiyo-chan!" Kaorin said with a smile as she stepped up onto the sidewalk. The smaller girl dashed over to them, pigtails bouncing wildly, and threw herself at Kaorin.
"I was so worried about you, Kaori-san! Is your leg okay? Are you okay? Did you have to go to the hospital?" Chiyo-chan's questions rambled on for a few seconds more as she stared at Kaorin with wide, worried eyes.
"I'm just fine, Chiyo-chan," Kaorin assured her cheerfully, once there was a break in the interrogation. "Matsuo-san said it would take about four weeks at the most to heal completely," she added with a gesture at her ankle.
"Ah! You've met Matsuo-san, then?" Chiyo-chan looked pleased as she said this. "How did you get to the clinic?"
"That's right, you left pretty soon after everything happened." Kaorin thought for a moment, trying to recall the details.
She had heard the entire story in an e-mail from Yomi the night before, in response to her inquiry as to everyone's condition. Osaka had immediately left with Chiyo-chan to get her home, and the two had been in and out of bookstores all the way in search of a new picture book Chiyo-chan was interested in. Sakaki had stayed behind, deciding to wait for Kaorin to wake up before taking her anywhere. Yomi and Tomo had gotten a ride to the Mizuhara residence from Yukari which, Yomi added, did nothing to ease her troubled mind. And Kagura, barely staying long enough to explain, had raced back towards the school to tell Chihiro about the incident.
She had not been conscious long enough to ask Sakaki, so Kaorin had to ask Yomi about what exactly "the incident" was; as it turns out, the car had swerved away from Kaorin at the last second, and as it did so, Kaorin's foot twisted beneath her and caused her to fall. Chiyo-chan had not been hurt at all, which became quite apparent at that moment.
"Ah! It's late, it's late!" shouted Chiyo-chan anxiously, hopping once again. "We should start walking or we'll be late to school!"
Sakaki nodded and glanced at Kaorin's schoolbag again, looking at Kaorin with a cautious murmur of: "You're sure?". Kaorin bobbed her head wildly, utterly touched by Sakaki's concern. Sakaki smiled and turned away, gazing into the window of a toy store nearby. Kaorin looked around as well, trying to find something else to focus on, lest she lose her balance.
"Yee! Ch-Chiyo-chan's right!" She yelped, spotting a clock in the window of a small appliance store. The school bell would ring in thirty minutes, and the walk from their current location was at least twenty-five, considering their speed (or lack thereof). Sakaki looked at Kaorin's bag one last time, and it seemed as though she'd finally given up. With Chiyo-chan already a few yards ahead, there wasn't any time to argue.
And so, the three of them made their way down the sidewalk as quickly as they could, giving Kaorin a good bit of speed practice on her crutches.
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Next chapter coming soonish. :3 School starting up in a week, summer reading is attacking me. X.x;;
Sorry, this was mostly a character development-centric chapter. It mentioned a few things that you'll want to keep in mind...
One final note: "Marukawa" is the name of a japanese candy company. Random. xD
