Chapter Three: Musings of a Cat

It had been three weeks since Haru had brought Baron home, and the time was showing. Baron had progressed from barely able to move to running laps around Haru's studio and living room, after she went to bed of course. He also devoured the contents of all the books Haru had, including the manual for her laptop, which he now frequently used to look up information on the world for the past sixty years.

He very quickly became acquainted with WW2, the Vietnam War, modern politics that he knew weren't all that modern, and much more. By looking at a British aristocracy listing, he found an old English family with a German surname. He had been surprised to find that no new generations had been introduced to this particular family since the disappearance of the eldest son and heir sixty years before, along with news clippings, begging for information leading to the heir's whereabouts. And, of course, Baron looked up his new owner.

This isn't as hard as it looks. 25, 000 hits on Haru Yoshioka. He learned that she had actually graduated high school two years early, and had completed her masters in art the summer before at age twenty. She had also understated herself as a painter. Her works were immensely popular, and each one had sold for enough to keep a small family fed and sheltered for over a year. Even after her organization takes their share, she had to have enough by now to retire permanently if she wished.

She has more class than I thought, which is indeed saying something. Baron scanned the modest living room. With her artwork selling like this, she could easily afford a more luxurious place. But she prefers to live modestly. He again opened his mouth in an attempt to speak, but nothing issued from his throat. He was still, as Haru had put it, a wooden doll, which doesn't usually come equipped with vocal chords. His eyes narrowed in anger again, but he kept up his search.

Turns out success ran deeply in her family. Her father had been a famous violinist before a fatal heart attack at a country club several years before. This would explain the worn violin case that Haru kept on a high shelf in her studio, only occasionally taking it down to do minor maintenance and polishing on the antique violin inside. He had to say, she did know proper violin care for someone that wasn't able to play. Her mother was a well—respected quilter who often had to travel for her popular lectures and demonstrations. As far as he could tell, she rarely called or visited.

This would explain why she would feel lonely. Is that what makes her strong? No, that could just be a piece of the puzzle, but there had to be more to it. There were plenty of lonely people in the world, but something told Baron that was not the only reason why this girl was so special.

Haru… she had given him so much already. First rescuing him from that boring shop, then taking him to a warm home and speaking to him. Speaking…to him. He'd spent so long in that shop, with no one acknowledging his existence, until he himself started to forget he was there.

Then she came, dripping wet from a storm and looked him straight in the eye. He didn't see how much more she had given the shopkeeper for him than what he had asked, but the look on the old man's face had lifted Baron's already high opinion of the girl who had seen him. More than seen him. Haru had instinctively known he wasn't a regular figurine, although she could not explain why.

Haru had told him anything and everything she could think of to tell him, and Baron had soaked it all up, relishing every word she tossed at him like the tea he used to make. She was even a lover of fine music, and played classics he had known forever, as well as newer things, luckily none of them contained the screaming and whining that the shopkeeper's grandson would sometimes play at the shop.

Sometimes, if she was in a really good mood or just felt like it, Haru would even sing along with the music. Although her voice was, by no stretch of the imagination, in danger of being targeted by record companies, it was a pleasant voice that Baron preferred to whoever was originally singing, just for the tone of sincerity that seemed to encompass her.

Thanks to her, Baron felt brand-new, but he was at a bit of a loss as to how he could express his gratitude. He had practically been given a new chance at life because of her, and all she was going to have to show for it was a portrait that she was going to sell off anyway. He couldn't even talk back to her when he thought of a funny comment that would have left Haru gasping for breath.

The hardest part would be when the phone would ring, her face loose its radiance, and she would disappear for a few hours. Then she was always in a sad mood when she returned, and Haru would tell him about the latest guy that Hiromi had thrust at her.

Needless to say, Baron didn't have very warm feelings for his owner's pushy friend.

It had been very hard on him, not to sneak a peek at his portrait after Haru was asleep each night. Only the thought that she promised that Baron would be the first to see it would make him firmly turn his back on the canvas Haru would cover with a sheet each night. When Haru had first brought him into her studio, he could immediately see why an unsuspecting innocent might break his arm intruding, and why she had cried out when she entered without the lights.

Haru had called the studio a perfect example of 'organized chaos'. Although she usually kept the rest of her apartment as neat as a pin, her studio resembled the aftermath of a tornado. She had propped a folding table on top of another table, insisting that it was more stable than an easel, and had various stretched canvases, paintbrushes, collapsible furniture, and several tubes of paint in the appropriate shades scattered all over the spare bed, floor, and dresser.

"I have to clean it all up when my mother comes to visit." Haru had said with an apologetic grin as she hunted for the correct colors.

"The only reason she doesn't get on my case about it is that she does the same thing with her fabric stash, except all over the house. When she still lived in one before I moved out, anyway."

Since the two weeks that have passed, Haru had declared that she was making so much progress that if she pushed herself, Baron's portrait might actually be ready in time for the art gala and auction. And at the rate that Baron himself was going, he may be able to leave her by then, a thought that tore him up.

It's hard not to become fond of a girl that you see constantly for weeks, and is completely open to you. Heaven knows that would have been useful in my last relationship. Baron twitched violently as he shut down her computer for the night, a twinge of red and orange seeable from the side window. Last relationship? He didn't really have a current relationship with Haru. She was ignorant, to an extent, that he was even alive. There was also the fact that he was much older than he looked.

But somehow, as his eyes would stray to the room Haru slept in, that fact seemed to matter very little.