Marionette

Skies, Chapter Twenty One - Koyasudo [小休止]

For what was probably the hundredth time Thursday morning, Amaya inwardly cursed as she found herself glimpsing the henna that Maehara had drawn on her, and in turn cursing her weariness ever since she'd started this so called treatment sessions that Shigure had her start on.

Yes, her temper for the most part was a little better it seemed, though she was tired all the damn time.

After managing to calm down from her fit of embarrassment over the henna on her neck yesterday afternoon, she'd gotten her chores done, made her own equivalent of dinner for herself and Reiko, and then went to bed. She decided that she'd purchase lunch for herself and Reiko on the way to Kunugigaoka, first and foremost she needed rest in order to try and get some of her had-been energy back.

The amount of rubbing she'd done to try and get rid of the henna had reduced her arms to tender patches of broken skin here and there, which by morning had turned into small lines of dried weeping, much to her irritation.

The ink had not faded even the slightest, a sure sign that Amaya was going to be stuck like this for a while.

She made a point to ask Sugaya if there was any way to help speed up the fading process without the use of chemicals.

Of course, Reiko's sharp gaze never failed to amaze Amaya, especially when there was something there that would interest the young girl. She'd spotted the mark on Amaya's neck during dinner, and made a point to tease her about it when Amaya's face started to redden from an oncoming blush.

In turn, Amaya had retaliated with the long-awaited questioning of how Reiko knew Isogai's little brother.

The interesting thing was that Reiko had turned a little meek at the question, though coughed up an answer that surprised Amaya as she ran to her room with her dinner in hand.

The two were pen-pal exchanges for Japanese classes last year, and apparently they'd been hanging out at the park just down the road from Reiko's school every Wednesday afternoon before she and Yuta would wait for Amaya at the arcade.

The other part of the story was that Yuta and Isogai's brother did not quite like each other - Yuta's clingy behavior towards Reiko when he wasn't in a nagging mood was likely a cause of this.

Which was a little foreboding since Yuta was currently staying at the Isogai residence, of all places.

She hoped Yuta wasn't causing trouble for Isogai and his family, considering that they were all being so nice as to have him stay over for a short while. Isogai probably wouldn't tell her if the boy was, even if she asked him about it.

He'd keep that information to himself purely because he was so nice to everyone and anyone, no matter if they wronged him or not.

Amaya made a note to buy a thank-you gift for Isogai and his family for all the trouble she was causing them.

She had the money on hand, so it wasn't like she couldn't afford to.

And she believed whole-heartedly that Shigure wouldn't have a problem with it, if she was doing it because she actually wanted to.

She wasn't spending the money on Yuta or Reiko.

That was probably half the problem the man had with the way she spent money, after all.

Always on her siblings, never on herself or a friend purely because she wanted to.

But that was just the way she was - They were living off of someone elses kindness this whole time, so she'd taught herself to be as efficient with money as she could possibly get.