Gifts and roses..-*

Chapter 21 -

Sanemi sat on a fallen log, his fingers working a knife against a piece of wood. It was something to occupy his hands, something to keep his body busy while his mind ran in every direction, lingering heat from his earlier battle still simmering in his veins. His blade scraped along the grain, methodical and steady, as the rough surface of the stick gradually smoothed under his touch.

He didn't even know what he was carving. It didn't matter. His crow hadn't returned yet, so he was stuck here waiting for the directions back home with nothing to do. He hated waiting. Especially when there was nothing he could do to speed things up, it was like having a persistent itch he couldn't scratch.

The dust from his battle clung to his skin, mixing with the sweat that had dried on his neck, but he barely noticed it. His focus wasn't on the task in front of him. Once again, he found it on Giyuu. 'How do I go about this?' The question pulsed in his mind, not leaving him alone. He knew that he had decided to give him something, but he didn't know what Giyuu would want, what would help, what might hurt. And the last thing he wanted was to screw this up more than he already had. His fingers moved faster, the tip of the blade pressing harder as anxious energy built inside him. The bark peeled away in curls, but Sanemi didn't feel the familiar satisfaction of the task.

'What kind of gift wouldn't piss him off? What do you even give to someone like Giyuu?' His mind spun, one question bleeding into another, each one met with an empty answer. The longer he thought about it, the more uncertain he became. Giyuu wasn't the type to give anything away easily. Sanemi had been around him enough- fought alongside him, seen how he moved in battle- but beyond that, he'd never really bothered to get to know the man. They'd shared the same spaces, exchanged words, but when it came to actually understanding Giyuu on a personal level, Sanemi had kept his distance. Which made it nearly impossible to think of something meaningful to give him, something that wouldn't feel out of place or forced.

He grumbled obscenities under his breath, this wasn't something he could just muscle his way through or force an answer out of. It wasn't just about giving him something half assed and calling it a day, he needed to show Giyuu that he cared, that he was worth more than the way he had treated him. Which made this all the more challenging. He just couldn't come up with a solution to his problem, and the longer he sat, the more tangled his thoughts became, circling around the same uncertainties.

He scraped at the stick harder, frustration flickering to life again. 'What if he doesn't want anything from me at all?'  he could feel his grip tightening around the knife handle. He didn't even realize that the stick was almost gone, shaved down to a thin, brittle sliver. Finally, the blade caught a bit of resistance, and Sanemi blinked, snapping back to the present. His hand froze. The stick he'd been working on was barely more than a stump now, shaved down almost to nothing. He stared at it for a second, the raw edge of wood biting against his palm, before letting out a low grunt. Great. He'd gotten so lost in his own head; he hadn't even noticed he'd ruined the damn thing.

"Damnit..." he muttered under his breath, tossing the remains aside. He looked around, his eyes scanning the dense trees, as if searching for an answer hidden in plain sight. The forest was still, quiet except for the occasional rustle of leaves and the faint chirping of insects.

His crow was still nowhere to be seen. It was beginning to piss him off, he had been out here for far too long- he killed the demon ages ago for fucks sake. The solitude only made his thoughts louder, he wanted to be out of here as soon as possible.

It all hung in his mind, gnawing at him. He didn't even know if Giyuu would give him a chance to go near him again, let alone accept a gesture like this. He set the stick down, rubbing a hand over his face, smearing more dust across his skin. He sighed heavily. No matter how long he sat there, no perfect answer was going to fall into his lap. Still, he had to try. He had to figure it out. Even if it meant failing a hundred times over.