I was suffering from a certain amount of consternation. This was because I had been thoroughly ditched.

Thursdays were the only days I didn’t have a team practise, club meeting, or otherwise extra-curricular prior commitment immediately after school, which meant I could walk home the same time as my twin sister. I really looked forward to spending this rare time alone with Yuzu, when we could be together while neither of us were too busy to really give our full attentions to one another.

I had just pushed open the door to leave the school building, alone; my friends understood this was my Yuzu time. I felt my phone go off in my pocket once—a text message.

Asano-kun wants to go for coffee. Be back by six for dinner.

I couldn’t believe it! She’d been seeing this Asano-san character for the past month or so now. She really seemed to like him and from what she told me, he seemed like an all right kid. She smiled a lot when she talked about him.

But never before had I been discarded in such an off-hand, uncaring manner, and for a boy…

This was why I did not have friends who were girls. Not because we are a mystifying, complicated species (which we are) or because, for all our many, finicky standards and demands, even we have no freaking clue what we really want (which we don’t.)

I had never taken the time to befriend a girl because we are bitches.

Guys, I understood just fine. A guy will never break firm family traditions, unless his grandmother is in the hospital or something. This is because if he bothered to make plans in the first place, chances are he’s interested in keeping them. A guy isn’t naturally inclined to be underhanded or catty or jealous. He have the potential, of course he does, but some really weird shit usually has to happen to him first.

Like falling in love, or falling on his head. Not always in that order.

But my own sister… It was like the Ultimate Betrayal. The Cardinal Insult. The Most Impudent Slap in the Proverbial Face.

Our Thursday walk home had been shafted for coffee with a boy who was probably too old for her anyway.

I entertained the brief, mutinous possibility of telling Dad about Asano-san. This would have the double advantage of firstly making Yuzu’s afternoon as crap as mine was turning out to be (misery loves company after all); and secondly of getting to see the top of Ol’ Beardo’s head, at long last, blow off.

It would also result in me having to cook, clean, and fend entirely for myself in all things domestic, and I shuddered at the very notion. Pissing off Yuzu was so not worth it, at this stage in my life. I would have to show my displeasure in some other more creative way.
I texted her back: Have a GREAT time! Don’t do anything I wouldn’t do, ahahaha… xox

There, that ought to get the message across.

Sulkily, I tucked away my phone and started the long, lonely trek home by myself. It was still hellishly hot out and I wished I had some conversation to distract me from the way my shirt was sticking to me under my book-bag strap. I yanked the front of my cap down lower to protect my nose from sunburn and walked on as I usually did.

That is to say, walked on, and pretended I couldn’t see the people everybody else couldn’t.

It was easier that way. Both to forget, and to get home without incident. It was easier when you could just ignore everything. I’d always been good at that sort of thing.

I ignored a girl of ten or so chasing a small dog, who was yipping in a half-thrilled, half-terrified way, checking over his furry shoulder frequently as he playfully tried to escape from the laughing girl whose feet never quite touched the ground…

I ignored a very elderly couple who walked hand-in-hand together, with the steady, all-the-time-in-the-world pace of those advanced in their years. She wore a traditional cherry blossom kimono in cerise silk and had dusted her lined face with rice-powder. He wore a kimono too, of dark indigo, some kind of traditional emblem on the back in gold leaf; his iron-grey hair twisted back and up. These were old ghosts, neighbourhood ghosts; continuing to pass under the radar as the city was built up around them and spread and grew. I had ignored these two before. They waved as I passed.

I ignored a middle-aged business man, clutching a shiny leather briefcase like it was the only thing he had left in this world, staring out in unfocused confusion from under the shelter of a Stop sign. The broken chain protruding from his chest hung in a sickly, semi-attached way, like a scab ready to fall off. I especially ignored this.

My mobile went off in my pocket again. Another text message.

I ignored that too.

Then someone screamed bloody-murder, in the next street over. I sighed, wishing I’d had more practise ignoring things.

Skidding to a stop around the next corner, I saw a woman perhaps a few years older than myself crouching against a garden wall, trying to hide her face under her arms like an ostrich in the sand.

I can’t see you, you can’t see me.

I fucking wish.

“Help me…” she cried pathetically, cowering from the monstrous thing looming over her.

It was blurry for a moment, just an unfocused patch in the air. I blinked. Perhaps I’d become better at it than I thought.

And then there it was, fifteen feet tall with its horrible, white animal mask and six arms and claws like rice-knives. It raised its head as if sniffing the air, then shifted so it was looking right at me with its two black holes for eyes, so I could see the gaping hole in its chest and the scenery beyond it.

-Even better… it seemed it say, not quite aloud, as if the words were being inserted into my head through some other means.

This wouldn’t be the first time this had happened to me. There was always one or two of those serious, military guys around, prancing about in their black kimonos like nobody was watching. It was true that most people weren’t.

I felt it safe to assume that this would be the case now. I would grab this silly ghost-woman (who I couldn’t see), get her to relative safety if at all possible (which it was, because she didn’t exist) and wait for one of these Death God characters to get rid of the monster (which I wouldn’t see happen). With luck they’d take the non-existent ghost along with them, so I’d have one less nothing to pester me on my walks home.

-You smell of big souls… succulent soul… said the Hollow in my head, or rather didn’t.

“You smell of ass-sweat, so shut the fuck up,” I retorted, kneeling next to the fear-paralyzed ghost and resting my hand on the middle of her back. “Time to leave, I think,” I advised her, jerking my head back toward the mouth of the street.

She turned very round eyes on me and made a noise that sounded like, “Nyunngh.”

“Okay,” I said agreeably, hauling her upright. “You hang onto that thought. Now we’re going to flee the scene, as they say.”

We ran. The Hollow let out a screech that made my teeth hurt and gave me a feeling like my bones were all rubbing together. The ghost-woman screamed back, though not half as impressively.

Right, Death God, anytime you want to show up, it is actually your turn now…

“It’s going to eat me,” the woman whimpered, collapsing suddenly to the pavement in a fit of hopelessness. “It’s over, I’m done for…”

Losing my patience, I came to a stop, doing an about-face to stare down the fast-approaching Hollow. I grasped a moment at all these facts I’d worked so hard to pretend I didn’t know. Break the mask… rend the skull in two, ultimately, but a broken mask would at least allow us time to get the hell out of there.

Who had told me that? I didn’t think, for some reason, that it had been Ichigo.

Thinking of him strengthened my resolve. To be honest, all it did was make me mad, but I supposed that comes down to the same thing.

I opened my bag and found my baseball signed by one of my coaches in middle school who I’d had a humongous crush on, but who, in retrospect, could not actually play baseball worth a damn.

Dedicating this pitch to him, I wound up my arm, slid my foot forward, and let it fly.

The ball hit the Hollow’s mask just left to square-between-the-eyes. A visible crack crept down the centre of said mask, though it didn’t shatter like I’d hoped.

Oh well, dramatic one-offs rarely work. I knew this well enough already.

And now I was out a baseball. Goddamn.

“Go eat someone else!” I ordered in my best team captain’s voice, pointed in the direction I thought would suit it best—namely, the opposite of where I wanted to go.

It did its bone-rubbing screech again, and this time two of its claws came propelling forward in a wobbly, unsteady manner, sort of like a fire-hose, but with a nasty, ripping quality you didn’t commonly find in most fire-hoses. They were moving so fast you could hear the air slicing as the blades shot toward us and I didn’t think I could move both the ghost and myself out of the way in time—

“Shit, you again?”

The cry came suddenly, in an unfamiliar voice, and then there was a blur of black-and-red and the flash of steel and I decided the situation was officially under control. I explained to the ghost to hide, in quite some rush, but that she mustn’t leave, and why. Then I booked it the hell out of there.

If the local Shinigami were starting to recognise me by appearance out of all the people living in one of the larger districts of Tokyo, I thought this was probably a sign that my turn-a-blind-eye-to prowess was gravely lacking, as of late.

*

It was later that night, after dinner and homework were out of the way. I lay on my stomach in bed, a pillow bunched up under my chin, facing the foot of the bed so that I could see Yuzu and the windows.

“…such a darling, Karin-chan! He held open doors for me and bought me whatever I wanted to eat and was just so attentive and thoughtful and he walked me to the door after even though it wasn’t even late yet but he said since it’s been so dangerous and weird lately with all those disappearances he just couldn’t, in good conscience, walk away without seeing me safe inside, and that made me feel like I could just about melt right there on the sidewalk and—”

I watched with growing fascination as Yuzu chattered on, without once stopping for breath, her eyes aglow and a pretty flush to her cheeks. I was just waiting for a key blood vessel to pop for lack of oxygen and see her keel over.

“Oh, Karin-chan!” she cried suddenly, flopping back onto her bed (I leapt up in alarm, thinking I’d accidentally predicted her death.) “I don’t know what to do. I like him so much, but he is quite a bit older than me, and you know I don’t like keeping anything from Daddy, but I don’t see how he’ll ever accept me having a boyfriend until after we leave school, and even then…”

Settling back onto my bed, unfounded fear abated, I rested my chin once more on the pillow scrunched up between my folded arms and waited for her to actually stop talking so I could offer my advice.

At length, she paused for breath, looked at me in impatient expectancy, and said, “Well?”

“Oh, do I get to talk now?” I replied sarcastically, then softened the blow by crossing my eyes and sticking my tongue out at her.

She giggled, hurling a frog plushie with startling accuracy at my head.

“I am serious though, nee-san. What do you think I should do?”

“Just have fun with it, I guess,” I replied with a shrug. “Like you said, you’re young, you’ve got school to worry about. It’s nice having a guy around who treats you so great, but I don’t think it’s a good idea to get serious about anyone right now. And then you don’t need to tell Dad ‘cos it’s not really a big deal, right?” I winked.

Her smile widened.

“Right.”

“I have to pee,” I announced, rolling off the bed. I beaned her with the frog plushie as I passed by. “You think on that, and we’ll carry on this conversation when I get back.”

She treated me to a not-very-ladylike farewell snort.

*

I left the bathroom, pulling the tank-top away from my body to allow for air to reach my damp skin. The weather was still so ridiculously warm and humid. Even with as little as I was wearing, I knew tonight was going to be a night for tossing and turning.

Loathe to leave the blessedly cool, ceramic-tile heaven of the bathroom, I’d stayed there a fair bit longer than was strictly necessary. Still, it seemed I’d been away longer than I first thought, because in that space of time Yuzu had managed to develop into an utter, utter genius.

“The hell?” I demanded when I walked back into our room, and saw what she’d done.

“Look, isn’t it clever?” she gushed, standing at the foot of her bed and holding onto a length of string. “I can make you one too easily enough. You just tug this string here, and that moves the poster paper, and voila—instant breeze!”

I stared.

Her face fell a bit. “Is it really dumb? I know it won’t work unless we pull it so if we fall asleep we’ll just get hot again, but I thought that if we were asleep by that point anyway it wouldn’t—”

I leapt up to join her on the bed.

“You devious mastermind!” I rhapsodized, giving her a tight side-hug, then snatched the string from her and tugging on it experimentally. The large piece of old poster paper (it looked like it came from one of our old middle-school class projects) had been secured to the ceiling via a metal hook. The hook had been screwed there years ago to support a mini-hammock that had once housed our old stuffed animals. It was one of a pair of hooks; one for each end of the hammock.

We scrounged around and found another piece of cardboard suitable for the job and together fixed that one to the hook closest to my bed, then attached a long piece of string to its upper border. It was a wonderfully simple design. If you tugged on the string the upper half of the stiff paper was pulled down, thereby swinging out the bottom half—and this caused a gust of pleasantly cool air to drift down towards the bed.

“I wonder if I should ask Daddy if he wants me to do him one too,” Yuzu said, eyeing our work critically. “There’s probably more poster paper around here somewhere.”

“If you’re willing to risk seeing him in the altogether, I wish you all the best of luck in your endeavours. I, however, am not so inclined,” I informed her, collapsing spread-eagled onto my mattress, and started to flutter the improvised fan.

She riffled through our closet for another moment, then drew out another battered poster paper with a triumphant smirk. She picked up the spool of twine and announced, “I’ll be right back.”

I grunted in reply, delighting in the draught that cut through the oppressively muggy air.

I heard her bare feet pad down the wooden floorboards of the hall and then there was a moment of silence.

Followed immediately by the second blood-curdling scream that day.

I cursed at the top of my lungs, rolled off the bed, kicked the sideboard in frustration—bit back tears at the pain that bloomed through my abused toes.

Eyes watering, I stumbled out the open bedroom door and turned the corner that led to Dad’s room. Yuzu stood half-way down the hall, frozen, with the poster board lying on the floor forgotten.

“Why did you scream?” I demanded, marching up to her. “What the hell—”

The scream came again. This time I felt what I’d missed before; the wave of sickening, heavy distortion that came with it. The cry of a Hollow.

“Here?” I growled, my fingernails biting into my palms involuntarily. “They’re coming here?”

“What was that?” Yuzu asked unsteadily, eyes casting around for something she felt sure she ought to be able to see. “It felt like—”

“Dad!” I shouted, lunging for his door-handle. “Dad, are you okay?”

The room was empty. Well, apart from the ten-foot-tall rhinoceros thing with razor-sharp tusks and hooves like dinner plates standing in the crushed ruins of my father’s bed. But Dad himself wasn’t anywhere to be seen.

This wasn’t exactly a comfort. Just because he wasn’t currently in his room didn’t mean he was safe. The Hollow was slavering wetly, long ropes of gleaming, vitriolic saliva hanging from its mouth, and I wondered morbidly if that was because his appetite had already been whetted by the soul of The Bearded One.

“What…” Yuzu came up behind me in the doorway. “What is it? What happened to the bed?”

“Yuzu-chan,” I said, slowly. “Run.”

“Run?” she said unsteadily, still staring saucer-eyed at the remains of the bed.

“Yes!”

The rhino Hollow stamped its foreleg once, twice, as if preparing to charge, and I didn’t wait to see when a neighbourhood Shinigami might show up. This was my sister. This was my home.

I grabbed Yuzu’s hand firmly, and ran.

The Hollow did charge then, crying its horrible cry, and I felt the force of it between my shoulder-blades, as if it was trying to pull me back my some invisible rope. The doorframe was obliterated as the monster crashed through, skidding a bit on its feet not meant for floorboards, and slammed into the opposite wall. Picture frames and chunks of plaster fell to the floor in its wake.

Yuzu wasn’t asking questions anymore. She knew exactly what this was now, even if she couldn’t see it. She felt it just fine. She also knew what happened to people who got close enough to feel a Hollow.

That was when Dad came bolting up the stairs dressed remarkably like a Shinigami, carrying an impressive replica of one of those wicked-looking blades, in a way that suggested he actually had any clue what to do with it.

I had no time to process the absurdity of this image, before he was making a beeline for the rampaging Hollow, apparently not about to shit his pants at the sight of this horrific creature which was, by all evidence, fully prepared to mow him down.

I had no time, either, to scream at him just what the holy hell he thought he was doing, when he raised his sword, brought it down cleanly on the head of the Hollow, and cleaved its skull an instant before its cruel-looking tusks could disembowel him all over Yuzu’s clean floor.

My breath escaped me in a faint squeak and I put out a hand to support myself against the wall before my knees gave out altogether.

“Did it leave?” Yuzu demanded, squinting at the space in the hall she thought the Hollow must occupy. “Is it gone? What happened? Why did we stop running?”

“Dad,” I said stupidly, lifting a finger to point.

She looked ahead of us a moment longer, then turned back to me.

“Where?”

I felt sure I was going to be sick, then.

*

I watched through a haze of shock as Dad in full Shinigami regalia, looking like my father with the same features—same nose, same hair, same goddamn beard—and looking nothing like my father, put a finger to his lips, as if to shush me.

And winked.

He disappeared then, and I tried to remember from my middle-school First Aid course whether extremely hot weather could induce hallucinations. I observed our torn up hallway, the smashed doorframe, the deeply scored floorboards; then I wondered if hallucinations were supposed to be this realistic.

Not happening, not happening, NOT HAPPENING…

I heard loud, swift footsteps on the stairs only a second later. It was Dad again. He was wearing one of his obnoxious shirts with the bold, colourful Hawaiian print and grey-and-blue checked pants. His collar was unbuttoned in a relaxed way, as if he’d been downstairs in his office all this time.

“Now, now, Karin-chan, Yuzu-chan,” he began in a scolding tone. “I understand the rambunctious nature of youth as well as the next father, but it’s well past midnight and all this noise is not… not… acceptable…”

He trailed off, affecting shocked amazement quite impressively.

“It was a spirit, Daddy, one of the awful ones,” Yuzu said in explanation for the state of the our hallway, her brow puckered darkly.

My former reaction would have been to tell her to shut up and follow that with a bit of fast-talking to change the subject and distract my bumbling father’s attention elsewhere. These things simply did not exist, after all.

I glared blackly at the amiably stunned face of my father.

All my life Dad had never been able to see spirits, just like Yuzu. Ichigo and I had been the only ones, though I'd always been quite a lot less willing to admit it than my brother. He had claimed never to see them. And now he was apparently a skilled Shinigami with not only the ability to sense and see spirits, but dispatch of them like any of your run-of-the-mill Death God? None of this made sense!

So now what?

“Dad—” I began, in my best ‘you bastard!’ tone, my eyes narrowed to slits.

He promptly grabbed me and buried my face in his chest.

“My daughters! My poor, defenseless daughters, nearly consumed by a rogue spirit! Oh, how can I live with the shame of not being there to protect you? I can only thank the powers that be that you escaped and were returned to me unharmed and unscathed…”

He continued this lament, speaking over my own muffled protestations—I was sure so that Yuzu couldn’t hear what I was trying to say. Pushing on his arms so that I could pull away from him and stop him suffocating me once and for all, I managed to get out a stifled, “Let me go, damnit!”

“Yes, Daddy understands, oh sweet, gentle Karin-chan. You must be traumatised by this experience. Do you need to talk about it with Daddy? Hm? Okay then, he’ll be downstairs waiting for you once you go put some pants on.”

Our father disappeared once more down the stairs before I could get another word out.

Still, I got what he was doing. He was going to give me a chance to ask questions, at least. Questions that I knew, now, were long overdue.

“That was so strange. Did someone come?” Yuzu asked me, still staring at the ruined hallway. She knew of the existence of Shinigami, though she’d never known about Ichigo alter ego—neither of us, apparently, had known about the other Death God living with us all this time.

“Yes. It’s gone. I think you can go back to bed. I have to go talk to Dad, now. I am traumatised. Good night,” I muttered distractedly, then made my way downstairs, foregoing pants just to spite him.

He was waiting for me in his office. I slammed the door behind me and stared down at him where he sat behind his desk in the most relaxed, unbothered of manners.

Neither of us said anything for a long time. It was an epic stare-down. There were eyebrow twitches and drumming fingers and grinding teeth. Our intense gazes never broke contact. It was a bit exhausting, actually.

Finally, I couldn’t contain myself anymore.

“It makes sense,” I declared, immediately starting to pace. “It explains Ichi-nii,” I went on, summarising my brother’s entire sixteen-year existence by the mere use of his nickname. I knew I didn’t need to say more than that. “Explains why we can see the dead. Explains why these… these things are always showing up when we’re nearby. What it doesn’t explain is why you never told us the truth about you before, you lying, deceitful creep!”

He lowered his chin and then raised it again, as if in silent acknowledgement of my accusation.

“You’re one of them, have been all this time, and even now you’re acting like nothing’s happened! Didn’t you think this was something your family might want to know?”

He did that slow, rough nod again, his expression of solemn attentiveness never wavering.

“Why didn’t you ever tell us?” I questioned, slamming the palms of my hands onto the surface of his desk, disrupting his mug full of pencils. My gaze was drawn to it. I recognised it as the misshapen clay creation from my brother’s toddler years. ‘DAD’ was scrawled on the front of it by a chubby child’s finger in blue paint.

“Think of Ichigo,” I said suddenly, my ire drained away to be replaced by wretchedness. My father’s face darkened now. “Think of… of what you could’ve done. You might’ve convinced him not to go away. If you’d talked to him, he might not have been so… so scared. And cold. He wasn’t Ichi-nii near the end. It changed him. Why didn’t you try to stop him? How could you have been so selfish?”

Dad rose from his chair, his stance oddly formal compared to the blundering, annoying fool who’d raised me, or at least claimed to have done so.

“I think of Ichigo every day,” he said shortly, his voice clipped and quiet. Seeing him like this was just too strange for words. “It is not my business to prevent my children from doing the things they feel are necessary. He was given more help and leadership than you think, even if it wasn’t from me.”

I knew he was telling the truth. I couldn’t say how I knew. But I couldn’t keep throwing the loss of his own son back in his face. Not when he was looking at me that way; like he actually believed what I was saying was true. Like it was his fault.

My body felt strange. I didn’t think I’d ever been this off-balance before. I was upset, surely, but not upset like when I found out Ichigo wasn’t coming back. Not upset like when my team lost a game or a tournament, either. In between. Out of sorts, more than anything. Hot and cold all at once, wanting to sit down and wanting to stand up, wanting to punch something and wanting to be held like a child.

Conflicted.

“And why aren’t you out there helping the other Death Gods?” I cast out desperately for something else to accuse him of, to ignore both what he’d just said and that pained look of stark honesty in his eyes. “That’s your moral obligation, isn’t it? You’ve been lazing around here for years while your fellow… fellow soldiers do all the dirty work?”

“There are other ways of keeping people alive, Karin-chan. It’s not only the dead we need to worry about,” he said softly.

I gave up.

“I hate this,” I said, slumping down into the chair across from him. “I hate feeling defenceless and stupid and not knowing anything. I’m sick of feeling guilty every time I see a Hollow because I know it’s me it came for. And I’m sick of not being able to do anything about them once they’re here!”

“You don’t know they’re after you,” he said in a comforting tone, mistaking my distress for fear that I was going to be eaten.

“I do know,” I argued stubbornly. “Ichi-nii told me some things before he left. Once he knew that I knew about him, he talked to me a little bit. He said we can see them because of our high spirit density. It’s also why we’re targets for Hollows—we smell more appetizing than most people. He said he didn’t know why we were different, but I guess now I do.” I gave him one final glare, making it clear who I thought the finger of blame ought to pointed at.

He lifted his shoulders rather elegantly, as if to say, Genetics, you know.

We were quiet for another long moment.

“So what do we do now?” I asked almost under my breath, staring sulkily at my bare knees. I didn’t like this abrupt change of authority.

Yuzu and I had practically raised ourselves, using our own set of morals, and we’d done a damn fine job of it, too, if you asked me. We had been resourceful and independent from an early age. I didn’t resent my father for this. He’d still been there, supporting us and making sure we got on okay. I think more than anything he recognised that we weren’t going to let him help us and just tried to do his best from the sidelines. I was grateful for that much of it, at least.

But regardless, my twin sister and I had always been our own people. And Dad had always been one half of two people. Even after Mom died, he remained just one half. And I’d always seen him that way, as someone who walked through life with only a vague idea of where he was going, but who talked loud enough that nobody actually noticed his uncertainty.

Confidence over ability. He’d taught me that. He’d also taught me that it never hurt to have some of the ability, too.

And now here was my without-a-clue father, Ol’ Beardo, kneeling in front of me with his big paw of a hand on my shoulder and a warmth in his eyes that struck deep down in the core of my memory. This was a warmth I hadn’t seen since I was a very small child. Or maybe I’d just been too busy growing up to notice.

My hands started to shake. Or maybe that was something else I was just now noticing.

“Shoujo-chan,” he said in a too-soft tone that was still undoubtedly his. “I kept this a secret because I thought it would be easier for all of us. I wanted a normal life for my children. I gave up that life so you could have a better one. But maybe there was never any point. Ignoring certain facts can never change who you are, as I’ve begun to realize.”

I curled my hands into fists to stop the trembling, pressed them into my abdomen to ease the ache there.

I, Kurosaki Karin, was good ignoring things. Secrecy and keeping myself to myself were mere habit for me by this point. At least now I knew where I’d inherited the trait from.

“Dad,” I said, and to my horror my voice gave way to a sob, which I choked on. “Daddy…”

He didn’t hug me, because even now, in this time for revelations, that would be taking things a bit too far. But he squeezed my shoulder tighter and said, “I won’t let you be hurt, Karin-chan. You or your sister. You’re all that’s left.”

I wanted to say something back to him, something nice and heart-warming to show him I did actually love him. The simplest way would be just to say, “I love you.” I didn’t want him to die from shock, however, and just held onto the hope that he already knew it without me having to utter it aloud.

I didn’t want to say that he’d missed the point, either. I wasn’t afraid of getting hurt. I was afraid of not being able to defend myself or Yuzu or anyone not strong enough to fight for themselves.

I was afraid of not being enough. And to assuage that fear, I had to become more.

I didn’t really know what that meant right then, and I had no idea how to phrase such a question. I had a feeling though, a shivery sort of pressure on the back of my neck, that said to me simply: soon.

*

I listened to Sensei screaming at us, stared down at my hands so I wouldn’t laugh.

His face was not particularly attractive to look at when he got angry. His skin grew blotchy, plum-coloured on the ridges of his cheekbones and the tip of his nose, and rice-powder white on his chin and forehead. A vein stood out and pulsated at his temple, turning steadily blue as his rant grew louder. Spittle flew and the dangling membrane at the back of his throat danced threateningly.

He was also four-foot-three and had a face like an old walnut. The overall effect was alarming enough, surely, but also really, really funny.

The rest of my team-mates kept their heads down as well, maybe out of respect but more likely for the same reason as myself, as we patiently let him berate us. I wasn’t totally sure what it was we were in trouble for this time; the most information I’d been able to glean from his incoherent shouting was something along the lines of “ball seams,” whatever that was supposed to mean. For all I knew, it could be the actual cause of his anger, or just the punishment we were about to receive.

I felt a momentary inner glow of pride that I did not, at least in the very literal way, have any balls to speak of.

There was a momentary break in the din. We all looked up.

It appeared he had asked us a question, and was presently glaring at us with expectant rancour.

Everybody turned to look at me. I sighed heavily at their expressions, which all very clearly said, It’s your turn, you know.

I got to my feet, standing at a respectable distance and still towering over him with my own five-foot-six-inches. Then I said, without actually knowing what the question had been in the first place, “It was my fault, Sensei.”

He puffed himself up with a bloody gleam in his eye and a triumphant grimace, and if he’d had any breath left, I felt sure he would have followed that with an exultant, “A-ha!”

With a familiar, rough gesture, he indicated to me the usual punishment: one hundred drop-down push-ups, followed by twenty-five laps of the kendo studio.

This included the outer stairs and corridors, which were open to the public.

“Hai, Sensei!”

I extended my arms with my best martyred expression, and tipped solemnly forward to the ground for the first of the push-ups.

“Rest of you, get changed,” Sensei puffed shortly, then wandered off to his office, probably for a nice soothing round with the sparring dummy.

This was a regular occurrence for our team. We were rarely fully aware of what crime we’d committed to infuriate him so totally, but since it usually happened on a weekly basis regardless of our behaviour, we’d found it was much easier just to take the punishment than try and argue our case.

As he never caught us in the act of whatever it was we’d probably never done, Sensei didn’t seem to know who to blame, and in the early days he would simply accuse all of us. To reduce the unfairness of it all as much as possible, we had decided to rotate between us who would stand up and take the blame. There were twelve of us; we figured that if you only had to do it once every twelve weeks, you hardly noticed it at all.

Besides, it was probably character-building.

I could feel my own character trying to burst out of my chest as I leapt up from the hundredth push-up and fell into step for lap number one. My team-mates were filtering out of the change rooms in their normal clothes with bags slung over their shoulders and water bottles in their hands.

“Hey, Kurosaki!” one of them called to me, just as I was nearing the side-door leading to the first hallway. “Meet us later tonight and I’ll treat you to ice-cream!”

I thought it was probably Hanako-kun who’d offered. I waved a hand in breathless acceptance, and exited the practice studio.

Running was easier. I could pace myself, could control my breathing a lot better than I could jumping up and down until I was dizzy and lights danced across my vision. Drop-downs were the devil’s work.

Still, there was no denying Karakura 1st High School’s kendo team were to be very seriously reckoned with when it came to striking power. We went through broken sticks faster than the school’s budget could accommodate and had been told if we didn’t stop hitting each other so damn hard we were going to have to make do with imaginary sticks.

It was only Sensei’s very adamant opposition to this idea—there was no telling, he claimed, what sort of trouble those kids could get up to if allowed to use their imaginations—that resulted in a slight sports budget increase and a new shipment of Kendo sticks within the week.

I kept my pace at a slow but steady run, moving easily in my light-weight training hakama, passing open classroom doors and fellow students often.

“What’d you guys do this time?” someone called good-naturedly.

“Hell if we know,” I panted, rounding a corner, and their laughter followed me into the next corridor.

*

It took me half an hour to complete eleven laps, and by that point Sensei had gone home anyway (I checked his office around the ninth lap). I could have been honest and done the twenty-five laps I’d been sentenced to, but in Sensei’s mind, justice had been served whether he needed to stick around and see it happen or not.

I stumbled into the empty changing rooms, collapsing on a bench and leaning back on the cool brick wall, turning to press my cheek against it gratefully. Fighting to regain my breath, I wiped the sweat from my face with my sleeve, and debated showering now, or just waiting ‘til I got home. Either way, I was going to have to walk there and it was unlikely I would be very fresh anyway at the end of that. The weather had grown unseasonably warm.

Electing to give myself five minutes to first recover feeling in my legs, I pulled my bag before me, dug through it for my cell phone and checked my messages.

There were two voicemails from Dad, the first asking where I’d last seen his tie, failing to mention which tie he meant, and then telling me to never mind, he would just go without a tie today. The second was to inform me he’d found it stuck behind a couch cushion, not to worry, though it was all wrinkled now, and where had I last seen the clothes iron?

There was a text from Yuzu, asking when I’d be home. I sent her one back telling her to expect me within the hour and did she need me to pick up anything for dinner and also was dad completely insane. As I was replying to the other texts waiting for me, she sent me back this succinct response: OK, no t-y, & not today, maybe tmrw.

My sister was a realistic sort.

In the end, I peeled off my hakama and treated myself to a brief, but chilly shower, hoping it would stay me against the heat at least until I got home. I dressed again in jeans and my favourite Kagerou band-shirt, then rammed an old baseball cap over my damp hair, pulling the ponytail through. I stopped a moment at my locker, stuffing my dirty uniform in my bag along with my textbooks and homework for that night.

I had just set out on the sidewalk in front of the school, waiting for the light to change so I could cross the street, when my phone went off in my pocket.

The caller I.D. was an unfamiliar number. I was debating whether to answer it anyway, when it suddenly stopped ringing. The ‘Missed Call’ icon lit up. I was still puzzling over this when I heard the beep! overhead indicating that it was safe to cross, and I stepped off the curb.

It happened in the space of an instant. There was an ear-piercing screech to my left, and my head whipped round to see a car slam on the brakes much too late, and then someone was grabbing me around the waist and snatching me back onto the sidewalk a split-second before the bumper could slam into my legs.

People were shouting, at me, at each other, demanding to know if I was okay and why was I such a goddamn idiot and hadn’t I seen the car? Someone was patting me down, as if checking for injuries. Amazingly, my phone was still in my hand.

“I’m sorry,” I stammered, shaken, as the driver got out of the car looking as pale as I felt and seriously upset. “I’m sorry. I’m okay.”
my

I looked around to see who had pulled me to safety, intending to express my gratitude, but nobody immediately presented themselves and I just murmured my stunned thanks to the air in general.

“You’re going this way, missy?” an elderly woman asked kindly, gesturing back out into the cross-walk, which now was (truly) safe to go across.

I nodded shakily and tried not to dwell too much on the irony of the situation when she tucked my hand in the crook of her wool-clothed elbow and helped me cross the street.

*

Not to say that this sort of thing happened to me everyday, but I had all but forgotten about my near-death experience by the time I got home. Nothing else remarkable happened on the way there to make me forget it; I just knew it would worry the others, and that was something I never let happen, out of pure habit now more than anything, so that I barely had to think about forgetting.

“You look tired,” Yuzu greeted me from the kitchen, as I toed off my shoes and dumped by bag by the laundry room door.

“It was my week,” I said in explanation, with a shrug. “How was school?”

“I passed my Calculus test,” she announced after a moment, as if hesitant to be proud of herself.

I gave a proper congratulatory whoop and crossed the room to throw my arms around her.

“And you were worried,” I said, mock-chiding, then snatched the wooden spoon from her hand. “What’re you doing cooking, we should be the ones treating you!”

“No offence, Karin-chan, but it’s not much of a treat for me if I have to eat your cooking,” she told me with her attempt at wryness, taking back the spoon.

“Dad’s home?” I said, not offended in the least, leaning back against the counter.

“He’s finishing up paperwork, you’ve got time to clean up a bit before dinner.”

I took the hint and went down the hall to the bathroom. After a real hot shower and drying my hair properly, I pulled on track bottoms and my Kagerou shirt and padded down the hall to my bedroom.

Plopping down onto my bed I lay back against my pillows to check my phone once more; there was a text from Hanako-kun telling me what time they were going for ice cream and did I want them to pick me up? I fired off a quick response promising to be there and that I planned to just walk but thanks anyway.

“Karin-chan!” Yuzu’s voice carried down the hallway. “Time to eat!”

I rolled off the bed, my stomach gurgling appreciatively at the prospect of food. My legs, I noticed as I got up again, were in definite need of some sustenance after Sensei’s punishment laps.

I entered the kitchen to find Dad slumped in his chair at the table, pressing a damp flannel to his forehead as Yuzu set down the last of the dishes.

“Ol’ Beardo,” I greeted with an aloof nod, sitting down across from him.

He cracked open one bloodshot eye.

“Daddy’s tired, Karin,” he complained, “Can’t you show him some love just for one night?”

“I haven’t asked you to do my laundry,” I pointed out smartly.

He nodded once. “This is true. I appreciate this. Thank you.”

“I do have some nasty Biology homework, though.”

He got a distant, determined sort of look in his eye, and clenched his fist to his chest. “Daddy is always willing to help his little girls to succeed.”

Yuzu began to fill our bowls, hiding her expression behind her hair.

“Who is this ‘Daddy’ you’re always talking about?” I wondered aloud, picking up my chopsticks.

The flannel hit my forehead with a wet smack.

*

I tossed my own laundry in the washer while Yuzu and Dad did the dishes. Then I dug my homework out of my bag and set it on the table.

Dad would be irresistibly drawn to it and by the time I got home I knew he’d have written down every tip and tid-bit he could think of to help me figure it out the assignment, short of actually doing it for me.

Come year end, the margins of all my textbooks were completely filled with his barely legible scrawl and his idea of helpful doodles. I had spent many a boring lesson killing time just trying to figure out how a drawing of a panda-bear in culottes was supposed to be relevant to the x-axis on a time-distance diagram.

Yuzu said sometimes his mind just wandered. If this was only the beginning of his supposed golden years, I didn’t want to be around to see what he was like by the time the incontinence set in.

I left the two of them sitting companionably in the living room, Yuzu watching TV and Dad sharpening his pencil industriously, my Biology textbook open on his lap.

Outside it was just beginning to get dark, but the pavement still radiated warmth from the day’s baking heat. I rolled up the legs of my sweats, tying my hair up away from my neck, and just enjoyed the walk in the street-lamp lit dimness.

The ice-cream shop Hanako and his friends favoured was only a few streets away from mine and I thought I recognised his car driving past the mouth of the road. I wouldn’t be there first, at least, I realised with some relief. I didn’t exactly have a problem with going places by myself, but this particular ice-cream shop had you pay for your orders as you made them, and I’d been promised free ice-cream, damnit!

Ten minutes later I was pushing open the glass door, the greeting bell jingling happily above my head, and I gave the shop a brief scan for my friends. Juzo and Nagira spotted me at the same time and they both waved to catch my attention over the heads of the other two boys there.

Hanako turned, then, and sent me a grin over his shoulder. He stood up and met me at the ice-cream bar.

“What’ll you have, o brave and valiant saviour?” he asked, pulling out his wallet.

I’d made a point of leaving room after dinner with this very outing in mind.

As the server put together my banana-split with strawberry ice-cream, whipped topping and extra chocolate syrup, Hanako asked me how long it’s taken me to complete the laps.

“I still haven’t finished,” I replied with an embarrassed grin, and he laughed loudly, slamming me on the back in boyish appreciation.

Juzo seemed to be in the middle of a story when we returned to the table, ice-cream in hand. The other two were rapt with attention, their eyes widened enthusiastically at whatever topic he was talking about.

“…still haven’t found them, not even a body or anything. They’re saying they keep hitting dead ends.”

“Who is?” I asked, attacking my confectionary monster with my spoon.

“The police. You must watch the news occasionally, Kurosaki-kun, don’t you? With all the mysterious disappearances lately?” Nagira expounded, with an all-suffering roll of his eyes at my lack of knowledge.

“Oh,” I said, choosing to ignore this rude treatment in favour of another mouthful of frozen banana and chocolate sauce. “Wha’sh your poin’?” I asked, chewing appreciatively.

“It’s all just so weird, even for this city,” Juzo carried on, then slurped up some of his own enormous chocolate milkshake as he shook his head in disappointment. “Nobody can figure out where these people are ending up. It’s gotten worse lately, too. Three people just last week!”

That gave me pause. I knew about people disappearing suddenly from my life, and I knew very well what that felt like.

“No clues or leads at all?” I asked, ducking my head under the ruse of chasing a rogue chunk of banana with my spoon.

“Nothing that’s led anywhere useful,” Juzo told me with an almost apologetic shrug. I noticed then that everybody seemed to be carefully trying to avoid my gaze.

“Well, whatever,” I said, trying for brightness. “These things happen all the time, really. Probably someone’s just made a bigger fuss than usual and now it seems like it’s worse than it really is. They probably have it all under control, there’s just some things you can’t always share with the public right away, right?”

They latched onto this theory with considerable enthusiasm, even if Nagira now looked severely disappointed that it appeared we weren’t talking about it anymore. Obviously he’d had some theories of his own to share.

*
We stayed for another hour or so just hanging out and talking, occasionally ordering another soft drink. Eventually it got late enough that we were all glancing uncomfortably at our watches, and Hanako at last rose from the table and announced he would give anyone a ride home who needed one, but they would have to leave now.

“I’ll be okay walking, I’m close,” I told him, punching his shoulder affectionately. “Thanks for buying, Hanako. I’ll see the rest of you jerks at school?”

“Yeah,” they all said, treating me to a variety of physical parting gestures, collectively resulting in what I knew was going to be a nasty bruise by morning.

The air seemed thicker once outside, charged, and heavy with the smell of ozone. No sooner had Hanako’s car pulled away from the curb and driven off, did the sky break open and it began to pour rain.

I uttered a curse as the fat drops splattered the top of my head and the pavement under my shoes. Not wanting to get soaked, I debated for about half a second whether to just make a run for it or wait under the eaves of the shop for the rain to pass. I was late enough as it was; the decision was not hard to make.

Sprinting down the sidewalk towards the mouth of my street, I knew my choice had probably been the right one. The rain was only falling harder now. It wasn’t cold, but I didn’t need Yuzu scolding me when I finally got home and dripped all over her clean floors.

Besides which, I’d already dried my hair once today, and really didn’t want to have to bother with styling it again tomorrow morning. I liked to sleep in as long as possible before school, and if that meant getting the majority of my preparatory routine out of the way the night before, than I was more than happy to comply.

Traffic was blessedly not heavy and I was able to cross the street each time with only the briefest of pauses. I did take an extra long look both ways, though, mindful of the incident earlier that day where I’d nearly had my legs mashed to so much pulp.

I booked it down the last stretch of my journey, turning into my house’s street, and barely noticed the small figure standing just inside the short alley-way set between two apartment buildings. I skidded to a halt (literally—I just barely managed to keep my footing on the slick pavement) and jogged back to the mouth of the alley.

There was no one there. I could’ve sworn I’d seen a little girl. She’d had pigtails.

Sighing impatiently at my own evidently waning mental faculties, I made a mad-dash for the remaining distance to my front door, an excuse already on my tongue for why Yuzu shouldn’t make me strip on the front porch before being allowed inside.

My clothes weren’t that soaked, after all. My shoes hadn’t even begun to squelch yet.

*

“D’you think maybe it’s a secret code for something?” Juzo suggested, leaning over my shoulder to get a better look at my open Biology textbook. “Like maybe you’re dad’s a whole lot smarter than he looks and just, you know, gets things on a different, higher level from everybody else.”

I squinted at the doodle of a snake trying to swallow a wheelbarrow whole.

“No,” I said decisively. “I think maybe he’s an idiot.”

“I wish my dad did my homework for me,” Nagira grumbled mutinously from the seat behind us.

“He doesn’t do it for me,” I retorted, turning slightly in my seat to address him in a dignified-at-all-times manner. “He merely assesses the curriculum ahead of time and then leaves me helpful little hints to lead me along the right path to comprehension.”

“I thought he was an idiot?” Hanako chimed in, unhelpfully.

“I don’t know if I’d call this stuff ‘helpful’,” Juzo remarked without hostility, tilting the textbook as if to achieve a more enlightening angle. “He’s captured the, er, wriggly-ness of the octopus tentacles really well, though.”

I snatched back the book, slamming it shut.

“Look, he may be touched in the head, but his hints make sense to me. And I have a higher average in this class than any of you dickheads so let’s just drop it, all right?”

There was a pause.

“The sushi pyramid makes sense to you?” Hanako asked mildly.

“Well… no, I think he’d skipped lunch that day. I meant the written stuff. I think the doodles are either because he has the attention span of a ferret, or because he still thinks I find that sort of thing cute anymore. Apparently, as a child, I once told him I liked his beard.”

The others gawped.

“No way!”

I nodded.

“Were you one of those… slow kids?”

Shot Nagira a sharp look.

“Did anybody actually witness you committing such heresy?”

“Just one of the secrets Mom took to the grave with her,” I said with a solemn shake of my head.

*

I was suffering from a certain amount of consternation. This was because I had been thoroughly ditched.

Thursdays were the only days I didn’t have a team practise, club meeting, or otherwise extra-curricular prior commitment immediately after school, which meant I could walk home the same time as my twin sister. I really looked forward to spending this rare time alone with Yuzu, when we could be together while neither of us were too busy to really give our full attentions to one another.

I had just pushed open the door to leave the school building, alone; my friends understood this was my Yuzu time. I felt my phone go off in my pocket once—a text message.

Asano-kun wants to go for coffee. Be back by six for dinner.

I couldn’t believe it! She’d been seeing this Asano-san character for the past month or so now. She really seemed to like him and from what she told me, he seemed like an all right kid. He made her pretty happy.

But never before had I been discarded for a boy…

...given that i'm supposed to be going out in about twenty minutes.

instead i've had a little bit to drink all on my own ("Look what I can do!" *flail*) and now i'm distracted by silly things, like the noises my tummy is making and the fact that my wrist smells like rubber bands. how unattractive is that.

not very, i suppose. people don't make a regular habit of smelling my wrists, though i still painstakingly apply perfume there. it's the neck that gets the most action, but of course that is scented too. not of rubber.

thank god.

okay bye then!

[ETA: holy crap that last tummy-gurgle sounded like a freaking wookie... i'm concerned, i think i have to go to the bathroom now...]

Hello all! *waves expansively*

My Valentine's update. Don't worry, I've brought cookies. I will, however, (due to certain pesky laws of physics, and so on) be forced to eat them all myself.

Since I know you were wondering, my plans for the evening are as follows:

1. Wash hair
2. Pick up the bestie from work and record us some new voicemail greeting messages.
--->Mine is depressing (previously it was a certain lyric from the song "Rollercoaster" by Blink, thus declaring myself to all the world--rather, anyone who calls my phone--as property of the SK. Then I went all feminist and changed it and apparently I sound like people should just shoot me in the face and put me out of my misery already. And I fear for my survival enough as it is, ever since I started my Pathology class and realised 33% of my family already has herpes and I am not safe from anyone;) while Al's is, like, normal. And she is not. So that's just dangerously misleading, is what that is.<---
3. Laundry ugh fuck off

I love (love love love LOVE) my school, but I hate having to go all the way down to the scary, dark, smelly core of the city to get there. I don't see the sun until well after ten o'clock in the morning, the buildings are so tall. And getting up so early, it's got to be that my idea of a glorious sleep-in is 8:30 a.m.


HOLY SHIT WHO RUINED MY CLOSET DOOR THERE IS A GIANT SCRATCH IN THE PAINT I MUST GO INVESTIGATE


Hang on, not a scratch. Just a smear of lotion, from last night when me and my partner in crime were having a lotion fling-around...

Said partner in crime is called Michelle (or Meeshoo, as I have dubbed her... a.k.a. Elephant Butt, er, as I have dubbed her... and Semitendinosus, which is her gang name undercover for the dastardly Pes Anserine Crew... we perform drive-by massagings [for a reasonable fee] and don't piss us off when we're in an oil-rubdown mood cos you will NEVER get that shit out of your clothes again. Our rivals, the Anatomists, scrubbed for days and days but to no avail. The cads.)

I think one downside is getting asked on the train by homeless people if my scrubs are pyjamas and would I like to just climb back on into bed with Hey-there-pretty-lady-my-name's-Dwayne? Because, you know, I'm sure a luxurious four-poster Louis XIV can fit right easy in his house (i.e., the cardboard box at the end of the alley.)

Ahahahaha I'm such a jackass (a.k.a. Sartorius, the Brains of the Operation and also longest muscle in the body, baby!) And I love it.

It's not my fault I have no patience for people when they talk slowly.

I wish for them to simply get to the point.

It's not necessarily that I have anywhere else important to be, I just don't want to have to stand there listening to a bunch of "ums" and "ahs" and "wossnames." I could be holding intelligent conversations with, say, a chicken.

Less pointless flapping and so on.

Bugger I'm hungry. Living with three teenage boys does not prove advantageous if you're looking for there to still be food in the house when you get home from school...

Curious, curious... I started to type the LJ URL into my address bar, but apparently only got as far as "liv" because it sent me to http://liv.com...

'Tis "Olivia," (cue lovely pastel shades and plenty of curly, cataract-inducing flourishes) a site for women's health and general well being. It is Olivia Newton John's site! I shit you not, I was like, "Waah...? John Travolta flashbacks?"

She is older looking obviously, but still girlishly adorable--oh wicked ravages of time! The bastards! Still putting out music. Not totally clear on why, but there you have it.

My bed is falling apart. I haven't had a restful sleep in a week... waking up every morning having to search for your pillows because they are scattered to the four corners of your bedroom is not especially pleasant. And since I rearranged my room, my bookshelf is directly above the head-end of my bed. Nearly brained myself with my hardcover copy of Me Write Book, a charming tale about Bigfoot's trials and tribulations regarding press conferences and agent funding during his attempt to, er... write a book.

Um. I hope you weren't expecting an actual point to this entry... Tra-la, all!

how does one break up with someone one was never technically dating?

before anyone asks, nothing's really changed with the SK and me, don't you fret. it's stayed pretty much the same, nothing new, not for over a year now. which is why i want out... i just hate that the idea of us (can't put a name to what "us" is) being over makes me so irritatingly sad. i want it to be easy, but that would be worse... i want, more even than convenience, for this whole wasted fucking year to be worth a cry or two.

something is killing whatever it was that used to let me write/draw/be myself. that spark is gone, and it fucking hurts. i don't think it's him, not consciously. but i've got to start changing shit around, start living for myself, or soon i won't be able to recognise who that is... he takes up the majority of my thought, drives practically all my decisions, and i can't understand what he's done to earn that level of priority in my life. he's top on my list, and i feel like i've just barely made his.

i've lost my voice (whoever that happened to be at the time). i never used to think when i wrote, i never had to have a game-plan set out. the very thought made me feel like i was stunting any creativity that might have come from that idea. now i just sit and stare at the blank paper (and a crisp, white, totally blank sheet of looseleaf, just waiting for me to ink all over it, used to send little shivers down my spine). no inspiration presents itself. i can maybe get a page into a story and either lose all interest or train of thought.

it's not like what little i come up with is crap. i know what i'm doing, i still do after all this time, time-wasting modesty aside. i just don't enjoy it anymore. there's so much more of this world i can explore, and i keep getting stuck on stupid details, like naming a character (Tia wasn't even called Tia for like, three chapters and actually went nameless for two of those) or who might read this once it's finished.

god, that's the worst. as soon as you get it into your head that your'e writing for another person, you automatically close up, get self-conscious, analyse every line you put on the page... it's agonising. the whole process is supposed to let "it" all out, but if you've got some faceless stranger who might make some comment on one particular line you wrote in one particular paragraph standing in the way... well, fuck.

i call it having a constipated muse. she's backed up and i'm bitter as hell about it and just so damn tired all the time... i'm not strong enough to carry around what i used to let fill up binder after binder of frankly crap writing, but still. i used to be proud of the writer's callus on my ring finger. my fingernails used to ache from supporting a pencil for hours and i'd go to bed with that pain and feel happy...

i need some sleep and some closure and some kind of mental stimulation before i eat somebody's face without even noticing. i must have used a dozen elipses in this entry, christ... (<--!!)

When I realised today was my official Last Day of school before Christmas break.

I shall, however, be working non-stop until Christmas break ends.

I shall not be getting another break until graduation, and yes, that does include the summer months. My Boss Lady Employer is fully aware of these facts.

I shall shoot myself in the head, I think, as it might make the time pass quicker.

Now that all the "I'm so pathetic, *woe-vomit*" tosh is out of the way, how is everybody? What plans have you got for the holidays? Staying at home or going back home or running as fast as you can away from home? What festivities are in store for my lovely little Christmas elves? (I have made hats with pointy ears on for you all, but have also spent the last of my cash just yesterday so if you wish to receive said hats in the mail, you may have to come fetch them from the post box down the street from my house...)

I don't know why I'm not more freaked out that it's three days 'til Christmas and I still haven't got the SK anything. He's the only one out of everybody whose gift has not been bought/made/wrapped with a shiny ribbon and stuck under my communal tree. He's bought me something, and he only just started his shopping yesterday morning.

I thought of getting him a puppy because shit, who doesn't love puppies? He's got two already, mine would fit right in. I was just worried that he might consider three dogs too much responsibility, or his mother might come after me with a shot gun if all her furniture got chewed up by an adorable doe-eyed creature (the pup, not the SK.)

I sent him a text to make sure, since buying animals then dumping them in other people's laps can be somewhat presumptuous, regardless of what he already knows about my personality:

KIM: If I got you a puppy, would you kill me dead?
SK: Holy christ yes, if you spend more than ten dollars on me I will get upset.
KIM: Ten dollars?? What am I supposed to get for ten dollars?
SK: I don't care. Honestly. Just... Don't spend lots.
KIM: Okay I won't. But that doesn't bring me any closer to knowing what to get you.
SK: You got something small but meaningful. Well, it's a two-part gift. It's freaking amazing actually, I don't know how I come up with this shit. But seriously dude, you could get me candy and I'd be happy.

*glares at SK* "Freaking amazing"... how am I supposed to compete with freaking amazing when all I've got to work with is ten dollars and a subtle hint of "get me candy"?

I had a brief moment of frustration (which shows just how much I care about this boy) and called the Oldbie for advice.

KAS: Dude. Head over to a five-cent candy shop with a ten dollar bill and go batshit crazy. Serve him right for being difficult, getting a huge-ass bag of candy for Christmas. Make sure you take pictures.

So I think that might be that settled. *strokes beard*

ahahaha no just full of shit.

okay so i'm not dead either.

i think a nice juicy "homigawd i'm soooo sorry" is in order... i really hate it when i forget to go on the pooter now and again, just to make sure nobody thinks i've tripped and floated off towards the moon... which makes absolutely no sense, but i am not going to backspace and come up with something clever-- a) because in a strange way, i like the moon, and b) because i'm not really sure anyone's going to read this anyway ... >.>

still love you all!! just too much to do with school and job and a SK to keep in line... he's a wriggler, i'll tell you that much, and not in a fun way either. *growls (and not in a fun way either)*

<3 (<-- I texted my friend and she thought that was a bum. There is now a way to moon people through text message. Oh yes. Makes me like the moon even more.)

Right all, here's the Low-down on the Ho-down, from the only reliable source. 

>.>

No I haven't a clue what I'm talking about, why do you ask.

Now-- onto business! 

I shall just get it all out there for you because otherwise I may blush and of course we can't have that. During one of the SK's and my escapades there was certain... movement... that led him to observe, after the fun was over, that I was rather like a rollercoaster and would henceforth be calling me "Rollercoaster," probably in public, just for kicks and giggles sort of thing.

Well.

I'm proud to say my head didn't actually explode when he finally held true to his promise (I am in love with an honest man *sighs*) but homigawd. 

so yeah. got off work early, was given a four-pack of bacardi breezers by my parents and a pat on the head, and now i'm not really sure what to do with myself. thus, an LJ post!!

*beams*

thank you to everyone who's wished me a happy birthday, it's actually not been too shabby considering how it started out and the sort of mood i've been in lately. according to my boss it's because of the added authority i've been given with the promotion, and hence wanting to punch people in the head. 

this is why she took up smoking, she tells me.

i am once more considering it. probably get punched in the head by the SK if i did that, though. or at least get cut off from kissing. 

which is a no-no.

augh.

i fucking hate PMS.

i am a monster.

i suck.

but my eyeliner turned out really sweet today.

and i am wearing a VINTAGE FUZZY INDIGO BERET OMG. THANK YOU tomatoseekssoup I LOVE YOU THIS IS SO AWESOME.

 

I’ve had a busy month. Oi, have I ever. I just finished telling loveable_pads about it in an email, though I fear it made little sense and shall attempt to convey to you the same story, though cleaned up a bit. For all our sakes.

 

 

 

Tra-bloody-la.

 

i just killed a moth. a harmless, innocent, stupid moth.

all because it wanted to be near me, since my iPod gives off light. 

it wanted solace in the glow of my screen and i smooshed it with a nearby text book.

how does this play into my everyday life??

I had a dream.

In this dream, I made small stuffed toys for children at ridiculously high prices and also Death Hats.

The Death Hats had tiny chimneys on top, which is apparently the height of fashion in that Department of Life (or lack thereof.)

I, of course, gave whopping discounts for my friends, though said discounts did not, unfortunately, extend to the sex animals I also sold. I mean this literally. They were animals who, like, gave sexual pleasure to whoever could afford them. I think the most popular one was a sort of snake whose tongue would... um.

Bloody expensive, at any rate.

There is a recurring theme here. I think I need to go back to school soon, this job thing is curdling my brain.

Also, excellent news! Turns out I never stopped loving the SK. Yup, I've been kidding myself all this time, and am now beginning to question my existential purpose on this earth!! *smiles brightly* Additionally, there have been several developments on the relationship front in that we have firmly and gladly declared ourselves Official Friends. We share cookies and dreams (oh, he had a field day when I told him about the Pants Dream, I'll never live it down) and he cooks me gourmet dinners, but have I ever got a single snog out of the deal? Nope!!  *blows noisemaker*

He is very generous and tight with his hugs however, no matter how I smell at the time. Which is nice.

I decided to take a page out of vampyre_faerie's book and make a collage.

*sighs heavily* Of my face. 


And if any of you can recognise who is, I will first have your babies and then do your hair for you. (And Jammah, I just told you who he is, so you can't guess :P I'd still hit that, though. *obnoxious wink* ... stop running away!)

you know when you go into someone's house for the first time, and it has a smell? not necessarily bad, but definitely different and distinct and the smell that defines that house as a home? in other words, not the way your house smells?

well.

i got home late last night. the plane landed at like ten o'clock and then there was all the fun baggage business and finding a cab big enough to contain the entirety of my (i have now realised) ridiculously large family. i just wanted to go home, eat something, sleep in my own bed finally and then enjoy my last day off before i have to go back to work. 

and i did all that. this is not the point.

the point is that, after living in someone else's house for so long, i'd got used to that home-smell instead of my home-smell and when we got in last night, i was completely blown away by the odour that hit me when i stepped in the front door.

my house smells of cooking sherry!

perpetually!

i don't think we even have sherry, and i wouldn't even know what it smelled like if i hadn't happened to walk in the room when my uncle was having a midnight sip-or-two....  worse, nobody seemed worried when i expressed my concerns as to the way it smelled. they all said, "what are you talking about? it smells like home."

my room smelled much nicer though. like hairspray. mmm. 

i may or may not have told some of you already, but i have a twelve-year-old cousin and i am somewhat concerned to say that he fell in luv with me this holiday.  cried a little when i left. had to go and have an alone-moment in his room. all very sad and tearful. and incestuous. and holy christ, how annoying are 12 yr olds when they have a crush on somebody? what part of their brain gives them the skewed impression that putting a whoopee cushion in a girl's bed and then hiding in her closet to hear the result will make her trip over her own feet in love with him?

well actually, he only threatened to do that. he really did do it to my older brother, the result of which was very... violent, or so i hear. but actually a bit hilarious, especially if you know what my brother is like when he wakes up.

funny little wankstain.

SHOEBOX

(and by "Bella" I do not mean tomatoseekssoup, but rather "Turns-tricks"... yes.)

So I was working yesterday and a girl comes in, wearing an oversize t-shirt and pyjama pants, her hair all scrubbed back looking very elegant and clas-say in open toed-sandals with pink socks on.

Her shirt said, "IT AIN'T GONNA LICK ITSELF!"

And I thought, "Ahahahahahahahaha....hahah!"

I worry sometimes :/