little bird // r.keene

xxii. two snowflakes.

Hawk trailed down the stairs and back into the bookshop below. Wren had fallen asleep shortly after Hawk had let go of her and that didn't surprise him in the slightest. She had seemed so tired these last few weeks, stretching back to the tournament, as if she hadn't been sleeping well at all.

Now he could grasp the idea as to why.

He glanced around the room and spied Mr James still sitting in the leather arm chair, a book perched on the very edge of his lap and a pair of reading glasses perched even closer to the edge of his nose. Hawk swallowed, Mr James hadn't seen him and he wasn't entirely sure if he should speak, but he mustered up in a steady voice:

"She's asleep." Mr James' eyes looked up from his worn pages and landed on the teenage boy standing two metres away. "I figured it best if I go and let her rest- it was nice to meet you sir." Hawk told him, taking a few steps closer and holding out a hand for Mr James to shake but all he received was another warm smile.

"No need for such formalities, Hawk. A friend of Wren's is a friend of mine." Hawk lowered his hand but made no attempt to walk away. "I recognise you..." Hawk looked back at Mr James, who was pressing his fingers to his mouth in thought, trying to will the thought to come forward. Hawk's spikey hair made him distinctive in a crowd and Mr James hardly ever forgot a face.

"Valley Fest." Hawk cringed at Mr James' memory of him. "You were one of the student's onstage. You're on the same team, are you not?" He wondered out loud, waiting patiently for Hawk to confirm or deny his faulty memory.

"Yeah, yeah I was..." Hawk answered, swallowing hard.
Mr James seemed to dwell on this for a moment, he had seen the look on Wren's face when her teammates stormed past Mr LaRusso's demonstration. When she realised they had excluded her, left her out- forgotten her. "You should know how sorry I am about that... I was angry and knew she never would have approved, I thought she would have tried to stop us. I'm sorry." Hawk spoke gently and Mr James cast his mind back:

Mr James was not an angry man. In fact, he probably hadn't been angry since the late 90's but right then... Wren had won them the championship and they repay her by leaving her out and upstaging the competition, her friend, at their own demonstration? On the same day someone so special to her... Her first love, he liked to think, was given an extra three months in juvie?

Oh, how his heart broke for her then. Her family discarded her, the friends she loved left her and the friends she chose betrayed her.

"I agree it was a mistake. It was a bad day for her. But it was not entirely your fault, my boy." Hawk furrowed his brows, wondering what else may have happened to set Wren off the edge that she beat him the way she did after the performance. "Wren cared about both sides of the equation that night. She was angry that you had ruined Miyagi-Do's performance but also excluded her from your own...." Hawk looked to his feet, a suddenly warm flush creeping up on his cheeks. "But in my mind, you kept her from having to chose. Any decision she would have made would have eaten her alive..." hawk glanced up, he had never seen it that way before. "Though she may deny it-" Mr James continued, "She would have chosen you, I think, you are her team."

Hawk licked his lips and felt a sudden swell of guilt bubble in his chest, it had been one he had been feeling since the All Valley but hearing Mr James set it all out in front of him...

"Wren is loyal. It was just the wrong day, that's all." Mr James reiterated and Hawk swallowed again.

"Was it her dad?" Mr James looked at him, "That made it a bad day I mean." And he watched as Mr James slowly shook his head, opening his mouth before closing it again...

"Has she told you about William?" He asked, as if the question itself was a secret and Hawk remembered what Wren had said in the bathroom at the mall, earlier that day.

"That guy you went to see at juvie... What did he do?"
"He hurt a man."

"Badly?"
"Yes." 

"He's in juvie- isn't he?" Hawk guessed, since Wren never mentioned her friend's name, who was in juvie. It had to have been the same boy for Mr James to bring the subject up so cautiously, as if he was afraid Wren would hear them.

"Yes... Earlier that day she had received a phone call, he had three extra months added to his sentence." Hawk felt his mouth open slightly at this, William must have really meant a lot to her. He must still mean a lot to her...

"They're close?"
"Like two snowflakes falling side by side." Hawk thought about this and didn't seem to quite understand.

"What do you mean by that?" Hawk asked.
"Two beautifully crafted things surrounded by the cold and no matter how far they may drift, they land together, no matter how many times they fall." Mr James thought out loud with a sigh and Hawk could immediately tell the man was a writer since they way he had phrased that seemed to perfect.

"Why did William hurt that man? Did the man do something to Wren?"

"Not what he did to Wren. But to his sister..." Mr James said solemnly but before Hawk could ask another question, Mr James pushed himself up from his chair with a struggle. Managing to get to his feet before Hawk could step in and help. "I don't think I should answer any more questions for tonight... What happened is Wren's business..." He looked over to Hawk, who he could see wanted to know more but kept his lips together.

Mr James, walking stick in hand, walked over to Hawk and put a delicate hand on his shoulder, Hawk looked him in the eye. "Don't fret. If she brought you here, then she trusts you, my boy. She will tell you in good time, when she is ready. Not a moment before, not a moment after. I'm sure you have gathered by now, if Wren doesn't want to do something, there is nothing to be done about it." Hawk told him he understood.

"I better be going, it was very nice to meet you Mr James." Hawk said politely and Mr James exclaimed, making Hawk jump slightly as he walked towards the door but turned to look at the old man.

"I almost forgot! Do you know Robby Keene?" Mr James asked, walking towards Hawk again from behind the counter with something in his hand.
"I do." Hawk said simply, yet cautiously since he doubted that Mr James knew about the fight at the mall, earlier that day.

"He left this here a few nights ago, if it's no bother, could you please give it to him the next time you see him." Mr James held out a dark blue sweater and Hawk took it without a second thought.

"Of course." He replied with a smile, "Have a good night, Mr James."
"You too, my boy, you too."

Hawk left The Bookshelf with a new perspective and more angry than he had been in a very long time.

Losing the fight at the mall, Leo Evans, William. It was all simmering in his head and Hawk directed all that anger towards one person.

Towards one dojo.