Yes, yes, what an atrociously long period of time. I'm sorry, friends.
Here it is, though! Chapter 6 of "Numbers Don't Lie"!
"You call me a mountain
And I call you the sea
I'll stand tall and certain
And watch you swallow me."
"Do you learn concepts or details better?" Renji asked her the next session. Mari had her textbook half out of her bag and froze. She was expecting Renji to print out generic study guides and schedules and little review-thingys for her to fill out. That seemed quite Renji.
She thought for a beat. "Uh, concepts, I guess?"
"I thought as much. Learners like you can think easier looking at the "big picture" rather than every detail." He pulled out a sheet of paper from his bag and slid it cleanly onto the table. "I've provided a menu styled to your individual learning patterns for the following month."
She was flattered he'd take the time to tailor a study guide for her. When he said "menu", Mari was excited. She thought it would have options.
Month One
-Day 1: Sentence structure*
-Day 2: *Vocabulary, conjugations
-Day 3: *Accusative
-Day 4: *Dative
-Day 5: *Time/Place
- Day 6: Accusative prepositions
She was wrong.
The list went up to day 31, at "Irregular verbs and conjugations". Mari rubbed her pounding head. Just looking at the thing made her feel pain.
"We start today," Renji said primly.
Mari glanced back down at the list. This was the point of no return. Doing things the way that was always done versus this new-fangled thing delivered by a boy she hardly knew. She could learn German by herself with enough hard work and effort. But did she want to? Hadn't she deserved the right to be lazy for once?
No, not lazy, Mari corrected herself. Just going along for the ride.
And she said, "Okay."
For once, she would follow.
Mari had been apprehending the start of the new menu, but it was actually decently okay.
Well, as okay as German could be, anyway.
"Remember: verbs always come second and is always with the subject. Next sentence: I sent a gift to my mother."
"'Ich...ich schicke meiner Mutter ein Geschenk.'" I send my mother a gift.
"That's right: the feminine form of a dative has the –er ending. Very good."
It was a bit easier going from sentences to words instead of vice versa: to Mari, it was more natural to see the whole picture before looking at details. How Renji figured out something even she didn't know about herself until now still evaded her.
Maybe it's in a section of his notebook, she thought.
It was on a seemingly regular day (16) when Mari was stuttering out full sentences with Renji.
"Nach Schule, muss ich Tennis mit meiner Mannschaft spielen." After school, I must play tennis with my team. He said it in a voice of second-nature. Mari couldn't help but feel envy.
"Uh..." Maybe she should try talking about tennis? Though the only word related was racket, and there was really nowhere to go with that one... "Ganz...toll...?" Quite...cool...?
"Was machst du später?" What are you doing later?
"Ich muss Hausaufgaben machen." I must do homework.
Babysit...babysit... "Ich...muss auf Babys sitzen."
For some reason, Renji burst out laughing. Well, his version of bursting out laughing, which was a twitched smile and relaxing of the face.
"Unless you actually get paid for sitting on babies, I wouldn't say that to people in Germany."
It really wasn't that funny: a child's joke kids used to feel clever making. But she smiled to see his mouth lift and his strangely closed eyes crease into moon slivers like the night sky with no stars that not many people noticed.
Day 22 started in with a general grammar review before tackling vocabulary. She was only two chapters behind the regular class now, and there was still a little bit of time before winter break. How Renji managed to teach the un-teachable (Mari was happy to admit not anymore!) this much to her was nothing short of a miracle.
Even that morning, Kawamura-sensei handed her back her quiz with a raised eyebrow. "Very good progress, Hikari-san," she noted. "I assume by this Renji-san's tutoring is proving well?"
"Yes, sensei," she nodded politely.
But when she got back to her seat, Mari smiled wide, at Renji, holding up a 94%. A few people around her watched, flitting glances, but she didn't care about rule number three right now: her feet were being carried away somewhere else, far away.
"German's okay, I guess, though it's mostly because Renji's really nice."
The chair was plush and well-used. Mari's blazer matched the green color, and her short copper hair slipped forward as she talked. "My classmates are really nice."
Under her blabber, Mari was assessing her current state. Did she look paler from before or was it just the hospital lights? Was she always so skinny? Half her body was hidden under the blankets pulled up to her wrists, where wires dangled onto plastic bags on a stand. Her coffee hair was wispy, spanned around the pillow like a spilled cup of cocoa.
"Ah, that's-that's good." Her voice fell like her eyelids. She was tired. But then again, she was always tired. Mari stood and smiled animatedly.
"See you next week, Mom." Mari leaned over and kissed her mother softly on her cheek.
She closed the door and leaned against the wall.
A headache boiled under the surface of her skin.
Renji had tennis practice and left her to review more: vocabulary was killer and there really was no way around learning it.
She was banging her head on the desk when the door creaked open. "That's not helping your headaches," Renji stated matter-of-factly, slipping a tennis bag off his shoulder and taking his usual seat across from her. He was in a yellow uniform with a big, fat yellow stripe running across the chest, like a half-painted bumblebee.
Mari looked up from the table, fingers pressed into her forehead. "How'd you know I have headaches?"
"Well, I-er..." Renji made a strange face, eyebrows coming together.
It occurred to Mari this was a face of embarrassment. It was kind of funny watching Mr. Eloquent at a loss of words.
Her eyes popped wide awake and a grin stretched her face. "You...yes?"
"I...have records. A-hem. How are you going along with vocabulary?"
"Mm. Is that a question?"
"I'm not sure, I honestly don't think..."
"It makes logical sense. The real reason behind her actions could be her secret discriminative attitude, or perhaps her genuine disinterest."
Mari walked slowly with Renji to tennis practice. The autumn tasted sweet, but not like sugar- like roasted chestnuts, and breezes a little too cold for comfort, and wool scarves being slung around necks untied.
Like for the past month, their conversation was random. And also like the past month, their discussion had wandered from Kawamura-sensei to literature toTo Kill a Mockingbird. Mari wasn't particularly familiar with the Japanese "pure literature" Renji enjoyed, but she was delighted when they found common ground in Harper Lee.
"I just think she fell asleep during the case because she was tired."
"Maybe she was apathetic. Maybe Maycombe is a metaphor and the townsfolk symbolize ignorance, and that the author's intent of the book is that pursuit of knowledge is strength."
Mari laughed out loud at that one.
"You're blabbering."
He turned sideways to look at her. It astonished him how easily she could get him to talk. It wasn't that they had some sort of special connection or anything like that. Introvert, extravert, Capricorn, Pisces, chains of fate, numbers, data- all the things people thought explained life boiled down to nothing easier than stuff like...well, stuff like this.
Mari didn't understand him nearly as well as Inui did. She didn't understand his need for numbers to explain everything around him. She didn't understand his thirst for safety in digits or his definiteness found only in facts, or the way data was truth and truth was life, but she knew him how he was each and every day. And maybe, that was all that really mattered.
Mari was inconsistent and loud and quiet and every word but nothing said and so very, very human that it was laughable to try to find her patterns.
She didn't see him in numbers or know him like the pages in his notebook.
She...was better.
First, a zit had popped up on her forehead today. Like, a volcano zit. Her bangs covered it sufficiently when her head tilted a bit to the right, but if she played tennis...the world would explode. Most likely. You know, as it does.
Why can't I have skin like Mari? Inoue Tani thought miserably, coating on a blob of foundation just in case. Then: wait. I did not just think that.
Mari wasn't particularly striking like Inoue was (certainly not as curvy), but she had a wide-eyed, startling look about her that was apparently certainly attractive. Her lip curled in distaste. Her own face seemed to distort. Her sallow cheeks stretched into a bony chin. Her nose was too long and flat and her eyes too small and too dull and too dead.
(And that zit.)
Her sister used to have her count the good things about her body in the mirror each morning with her before going to school. How could she focus on herself when Inoue Hitomi stood next to her? Always lovely with a ponytail no one else could pull off. With the bright blue eyes that sparkled like sapphires. And she looked so darn happy all the time.
Tani smiled in the mirror for a moment before scowling. No, her nose scrunched up and looked like a freaking Jack-O-Lantern. She looked at her watch and sighed. She'd smile on her way to school.
She'd have to practice being happy more before she got it right.
It wasn't like Renji thought a lot about girls.
Well- he did. Not in that way with the 'that way' in italics. But he thought about a girl- not a girl- just a girl. Just a Mari. Hikari Mari, who was everywhere at once and exceptionally confusing and changing all the time.
Well, not exactly changing, but... Renji stared at his list of traits under the title. It started with soft-spoken then ended with a resolute opinionated. These things didn't make sense. She was peeling back layers of herself right in front of him. Why? Why would she even do that?
New Mari was loud, and engaging, and sensitive. Even around others, she was beginning to thaw.
Why? Why did she decide to change all of a sudden?
Renji frowned. This made no sense. The data was useless. The numbers...there weren't any numbers. And that scared him. A ton. A whole two thousand pounds ton.
But New Mari was...better. She was easy to talk to, and listened to what he had to say, even if it was blabber (not really; Renji Yanagi didn't blabber). She was strangely more approachable. And most importantly, she was happier.
He could tell because she had all the signs: increased heartbeat, easy crease around the eyes, relaxed voice, positivity in speech, and her lips seemed so easy to draw up into a smile.
Sometimes, she'd even laugh.
Renji found an un-quantitative, out-of-character word to describe it.
It was nice.
It...was better.
Ingrid Michaelson's "Mountain and the Sea" at the top.
And OH YES. Mari has a backstory.
So the story behind my hiatus from fanfic-ing (it's a verb now) includes an obsession with the manga Bleach (also stellar. amazing series oh my goodness) and long marathons of How I Met Your Mother. That explains about three months of not updating...but yeah! You guys are great. It's not you, it's me and my lack of initiative.
But seriously. Biology is great and horrendous at the same time.