Firefly || Mezo Shoji

01. A Friendly Surprise

12 YEARS LATER

The afternoons had always been reasonably slow, but this was ridiculous. It had been hours since someone had last walked through the door.

The small, humble pet store situated in the quieter part of Hosu hadn't always been known for having a constant flow of patrons. Pet supplies clearly weren't a necessity for everyone.

The repetitious tick of the clock lulled me into a vacant state of mind as I observed the bustling world beyond the shop window. Watching the people pass by from my place behind the counter, chin propped up comfortably in the palm of my hand. The other hand mindlessly weaved the pencil over the page in my notebook. Musing over the kind of life each person that walked by was living.

Did their days also consist of the humdrum activities of everyday existence? Trapped in the cycle of a mundane job that had no future. Or had they followed their hearts and chosen to fulfil their dreams...

It's not that I disliked working at Pet's Paradise, it was quite the opposite actually. A nine-to-five job that paid reasonably well, even if it was a position that involved interacting with people on a regular basis. A factor of the job that had always put my nerves on edge but during the last few years, I had managed to cope with it and with time I had come to realise that I was pretty good at it.

The fact that it was a store that went unnoticed by the majority of the world helped a lot too.

But this wasn't the plan. It wasn't my dream job.

An exasperated sigh escaped me as I returned my attention to the scene of woodland creatures and floral patterns that were sketched across the paper. Focusing the graphite tip on the tail of the fox that I was now carefully outlining.

In the quieter periods of the day if I wasn't organising bags of cat kibble into alphabetical order or in the warehouse counting stock, then you'd no doubt find me like this. Lost in thought while my hand brought the blank canvas to life with the creations that filled my mind.

Something I would much rather be doing than working here. Awaiting the next person needing catnip to walk through the door.

One day...

In my absent-mindedness, I failed to notice the bell ringing out from the front of the store. The sudden thud of the door closing against its frame startled me, causing me to drop the pencil in the process.

"Ahh! Shoot. I-I'm sorry! I'll be right with you!" I shouted out, ducking under the counter to retrieve the pencil—that annoyingly had rolled just out of my fingertips reach.

I got down onto my hands and knees and hastily crawled forward. Internally panicking at the heavy footsteps nearing the checkout. "I'll be with you in one moment!"

Real professional Hotaru... I'm sure the pencil could have waited.

At the same time my fingers wrapped around the slim object, a familiar voice chuckled out from behind. I turned with a yelp to be met by a single onyx eye and a grinning mouth.

"Need a hand?" the mouth chuckled.

"Sho?!" I shrieked, scrambling out from under the counter as fast as my hands and feet would allow.

It had only been a week since I last saw my closest and only friend, but the sight alone was enough to capture my face into an expression of absolute joy. The exuberantly priced pencil was now the least of my worries as I blithely tossed it onto the countertop and bounded onto the shop floor. Shoji was ready and waiting for my enthusiastic embrace, hoisting me up into the air as if I weighed next to nothing.