Inside Your Mind

50 - Shinsou

And when she needs to shelter from reality she takes a dip in my daydreams

"Bartender dude!" Kaori Shinsou exclaimed when she saw him and finally recognized him. He had light hair that was in that awkward length between being a certain vibe and a short haircut and just looked like he needed a haircut really badly. Kaori knew he had seen his face somewhere before when she had seen him with Mr. Kan before, but only now did she make the connection.

"Oh, you're that one from the Psychology department party! I remember you!" he exclaimed after a few seconds.

"What are you doing here? Aren't you a bit old to be with all the first years?" Kaori wanted to know. The bartender guy laughed and shook his head.

"Nah, I'm not with them. I'm Kan's TA. I'm actually studying Health Economics." he replied to her.

"They have that course at U.A.? That's wild. Never heard of that."

"They do, but it's not very well-known. I'm finished soon enough anyway. The name's Natsuo Todoroki. And what are you doing here?" he wanted to know. Kaori grinned at him. How funny was it that she saw that bartender again?

"I'm Aizawa's TA. Well, not yet, I'm going to be next term, but he made a deal with Nezu, so he could take me on the trip. I think he just doesn't like dealing with so many people at once. My name's Kaori Shinsou, but seriously, Kaori is fine." she explained. Natsuo looked like he was having an epiphany.

"Oh... I see. Well, don't worry about me, I'm not going to tell anyone anything." he said with a sly grin on his face. What the hell was he talking about? What was he not going to tell anyone?

"Uh, thanks, but I'm not really sure what you mean." Kaori answered. He seemed a little taken aback by that.

"Well, you and the professor seemed pretty close at the party, and then he wanted you to tag along here, I mean... I thought there was... sorry, I shouldn't have assumed things." Natsuo stammered, looking embarrassed. Oh God. Of course. This guy had seen her all over Aizawa at the party. Fuck. Kaori was honestly kind of surprised that he had been quiet for that long. She burst out laughing. This guy was funny. At least it seemed like he had never heard of the previous rumours.

"Nope, sorry to disappoint you. There's nothing going on. I got way too tipsy at that party and he just made sure I got home safe. That's all there was to it." she replied. Natsuo blushed a little and nodded.

"Oh, right. Sorry, it just looked like... you know..."

"Yeah, I know what you mean, but no. There is nothing going on, I promise." Kaori clarified. Jeez, this sure had made things awkward. Natsuo just laughed it off and grabbed his jacket from the hook on the wall where it had been hanging. It was the ugliest track suit jacket Kaori had ever seen.

"Well, now that that's out of the way, this might be a fun week, huh? At least they won't make us do much work and we can just chill out for a week." Natsuo replied. Kaori sighed. If only that were true.

"Yeah, that might be the case for you, but I think Aizawa has me on some sort of training plan, too. Wants to get me all prepped for getting my gun license and all. So I guess I'll be doing target practice the entire time." she answered. Natsuo's eyes widened and looked like they were about to pop out of their sockets.

"Holy shit, what course are you in?" he wanted to know.

"I did Criminology with a bit of basic training and I'm specialising in Criminal Psychology right now. Two more years and then I'm done. And I already got my foot in the National Police Department, so hopefully they'll employ me full-time once I'm done." Kaori replied, feeling quite proud of it.