Chapter Text
The other times the two of you meet again, are brief, and far in between.
The second time, you were the one to spot him first as you sat on one of the highstools of the Kiminami restaurant as your mom chatted with the owner. It was supposed to be a quick hello, but then they started talking about some kind of hunting and you lost all interest.
I thought today was just going to be me and mom! You huffed as you kicked your legs, staring at your mother in the hopes she'd notice and remember why you were out in the first place instead of working. But, it was futile from the gasp she took, like she heard unbelievable news.
Your eyes wander to something else and spot two kids your age walking together. But, there's a familiarity to them that makes you squint your eyes before they widen with a smile in recognition. Ayato and Ayaka!
“I’m going to go play!” You say quickly, and before your mother could stop you, you hop off the stool and run to the two kids. Your mother sighs, but at the sight of two small people looking to be the same age as you, she lets it go and continues to converse after telling you not to go far.
You slow down when you’re close enough to the two, before you grin and put a heavy hand on both of their shoulders while making a scary noise. Ayaka jumps with a yelp as she turns with her hands out, but Ayato doesn’t seem at all bothered. It was like he expected you. Awesome.
“Awe, you were supposed to be scared!” You pout at the boy when he finally looks at you.
“How can I be when you’re so loud with those heavy footsteps.” he retorts, making you cross your arms.
“Are you calling me fat?” You ask, seriously, and his eyes widen before he shakes his head frantically, hands coming up in front of him and waving them.
“No! No I'd never!”
Ayaka laughs at the both of you before she comes to stand next to you, hands in front of her and swinging.
“What are you doing here? Not lost again are you?” She teases, making you drop your glare at Ayato to talk to her instead, a smile on your face as you humm with a shake of your head.
“No. Me and momma are supposed to have a day for just me and her, but she’s over there talking about hunting degrees or something.”
“Oh, you mean the vision hun- urgh!” Ayato is interrupted by an elbow to the ribs from his sister, Ayaka smiling as she goes to step in front of him as he groans in pain.
“That’s nice! Any special reason?” She asks quickly and you smile cheekily before putting your hands to your small hips.
“Well, it’s my birthday today. And every time we have a birthday, we take a day off and spend it together.” Then you hop excitedly. “And I get to get one thing from any store as long as mommy says it’s ok for me to have it. And I really want to get the new dress I saw at Ms. Oguras Kimono shop!” you tell them and Ayaka seems more amused then Ayato, who's stepping to the side so he’s no longer being blocked by his sister. He has a hand to his ribs that massages them briefly to ease the pain. Sometimes, he forgets how strong she is.
“Aren’t those extremely expensive?” He asks, and you shrug.
“I don’t know.”
“And you plan on getting it on a fish-stalls salary? You’ll barely have anything left to put food on the table.”
“ Ayato !” Ayaka yells with a hushed tone, brows pulled as she throws a look at him. He puts his hands up in defense.
“It’s true! ”
“You’re impossible.”
“I’m just trying to tell her that not everyone has the luxury to buy what they want!”
“It’s none of your business!”
“She’s the one that told me she sells fish. I can’t help it when I run the numbers.”
Ayaka glares at her brother before ultimately sighing and straightening herself. She mumbles something to him, which makes him sigh and walk away. It’s a little disappointing watching him leave, but you turn to look at the girl when she bows her head a little.
“Sorry about him.”
You shake your head. “No it’s ok. Boys are mean.” you tell her as she giggles.
“Well, I'd love to stay and talk more, but me and my brother have to join our father in the station.” she says as she turns to leave, but just before she does, she waves, smiling. “Have a happy birthday!”
“Thank you!” You wave as she turns to go inside the police station before you do the same to where your mother is, tugging at her dress until she looks down at you.
“Can we go?” you ask and she hums as she looks back at her friend, who nods her head with a smile.
“Alright then, we can go. See you another time!” She says her goodbyes to the lady behind the counter, before taking your hand and walking in the direction of the steps.
When you arrived in front of the kimono shop, the dress you had your eye on for a while was on the display dummy and both you and your mother stopped right in front of it.
“Is that the one you want?” She asks with a distracted sniffle, making you look up at her. She catches your eye, smiling encouragingly as she swings your linked hands forward to nudge you to it, but when you look back at the dress, it’s… not as pretty anymore.
Aren’t those extremely expensive?
Didn’t 'expensive' mean it cost a lot of money? You knew your mom made money, and to you it looked like a lot every time she sold fish, but then you remember the little box of mora she had hidden under the floorboard. It was always filled at least halfway, and you always giggled in joy when your mother allowed you to do the honors of putting more coins inside, but when those people came at the house, the box was always emptied. Sometimes there's some change left, others, there’d be nothing.
Mom made money, you knew that… but maybe it wasn’t as much as you thought after all. And maybe spending it on a dress wasn’t a good idea. Even if it was your birthday.
“Hey mom?” You say as you look at the white cloth, decorated in lilac flowers.
“Yes hunnie?”
“Can… can we just walk today?” You ask, looking up to see that her smile faltered a little.
“Oh but-” She looks up at the dress, pointing at it a little. “What about the Kimono?”
You shake your head. “I don’t want it anymore. I just want to walk around for a little.”
She looks at you with an unsure gaze, looking to see if she could find the reason behind your sudden want of… not wanting. Goodness knows you like to ask for things.
“Alright then. We can walk for a bit… then you can help me with dinner. Would you like that?” She questions as she tilts her head to look at you. You smile and nod with a happy humm.
Unexpectedly, it felt quite good walking away empty handed. Maybe it was because your mother wasn’t looking at her wallet after making a purchase and looked to be having fun instead as you strolled through the Inazuman streets.
You knew Futaba just loved to play scary pranks on you to get the giggles when you’d jump and scream, and sometimes even end up crying when her pranks went too far. But this was on a different level. She was never this insistent before.
“But I’m telling the truth!”
“Last time you said that you took me to a cave full of monsters!”
“Those were fake! Takeru was the one moving them around.” She says in a small wine as you pick flower weeds from the ground, frowning lightly as you turn away from her.
“I’m really being serious! There’s a boy by the river that said he wanted to see you.”
“True or not, momma said not to talk to anyone but the men in purple suits, because they protect us.” You nod, final as you get up to go somewhere else to pick flowers.
“Then how does he know your name?” She says, making you stop and turn to look at your friend.
“My… name?” You frown as you think. “I don’t know anyone outside the village that knows my name.” Maybe it’s one of momma’s friends? No, they usually just go to her…
Futaba nodded with a humm, factual as she pointed in the direction of the shrine, where the river bed was exposed this season because of… well, you just know that the river is always gone when it starts getting cold outside. It's the best time to collect the shells and pretty rocks in the sand.
“Yup. and it looked like he was holding something too~” Futaba sings, putting her hands behind her back as she comes in front of you, a sly grin etched on her lips as she comes closer. You lean back a little. “Is he your beau~” She asks, hushed, and your face explodes in color as a face comes to mind. Specifically one with sky-blue hair with eyes the same color as the Amakumo fruit, or the special purple shade sakura blooms turn into around the shrine you often visit.
“N-no! He’s mean!” Flustered, you turn around abruptly, dress tattered in grass and flower dye briefly twirling around your legs before you make a go for the tree full of lavender melons. They're too high, and there's barely any on it, but you still circle the tree as a means to get away from your giggling friend. She catches up quickly and traps your back in a hug, mouth close to your ear as she speaks, almost making you go deaf.
“I never told you who the boy was! I guess he really is your intended hus-”
“We're not getting married!” You shout with a stomach full of butterflies as images conjure your mind uninvited. Futaba pouts at your yell, sliding off your back.
“Well, intended or not, he still wants to see you. Something about birthdays, but your was months ago so maybe he wants to invite you to his! That'd be so cool .” She says and you huff, glancing at her as your turn before looking down at the flowers in your hand, the stems hot and bending in your unforgiving grip.
“If-... if I go, will you stop being annoying?” You ask and Futaba nods eagerly.
“Promise!” You looked at her suspiciously and for some reason, you doubted her. Still, you sighed, maybe going to talk to Ayat- the boy, since it wasn’t certain that it was going to be him- would make her stop pestering you.
Walking in the direction of the shrine, Futaba follows behind you, silently so you wouldn’t catch her, before hiding behind the closest tree as you cross over the water with careful but practiced steps.
Futaba watches you wave at the boy in clear recognition, a smile so wide on your face she could tell that, whoever this little boy was, you had taken quite the liking to. It made her giggle some more, keeping this information in mind so she could tease you about it later, but focused back on the two of you when the boy had his hands stretched out in front of him. He was taller than you by a good few inches, but his shoulders reached at his cheeks as he tucked his neck in what looked to be slight embarrassment.
Ooh, he gave her a gift~ “Maybe it’s a ring.” Futaba mumbled to herself with a grin, watching you take the bag and look inside, a hand reaching to grab and pull out a… Well, it looked like string, made of either something shiny or silky, or maybe both, but it looked really pretty.
“He’s a rich kid.” She mumbled, frowning as she wondered what one of those people were doing in their little village. But, she dropped it after some words were exchanged, watching as your smile slowly started to disappear the longer you two spoke. The boy first pointed at your dress with an open palm and explained something, and your hands followed to clutch at the material, then he’d point at your hair and your hands went up to it, frantic as you stepped back.
“U-oh.”
The boy froze on the stop before he was waving his hands around, denying something and talking loud enough to the point where Futaba could hear ‘no, I didn't mean it like that!’ and other things along those lines.
But, you were turning around, holding your head as you shook it and running back to the village. The boy followed you until you jumped down the small ledge to where the miniature waterfall was, running across it before slipping a little. But, you shook it off as you braced yourself with your hands and shuffled back up to our feet, soaked as you crossed the riverbed and down the hill to your home.
Futaba heard the crying before she saw it.
“Aw…” She mumbles your name, feeling bad as she looked back at the boy with worried brows, but they turned angry at the sight of him as he still looked at you with a hand out as if to reach you. But, when he lost his balance, it immediately went to his clothes as he brought them up.
So they wouldn’t get dirty .
Futaba stuck her tongue out at him from behind the tree before going after you. Rich boys are always meanies.
From then, you avoided Ayato every rare chance you got to see him. Sometimes it was Ritou when he was by a market stand with his sister- to which you tried talking to but, after seeing her brother, you decided that it wasn’t worth the trouble-, or during festival preparations when he seemed to be helping what looked to be his dad, the same man that had asked you where you lived that first time you got lost.
You didn’t wave back or say hi, walked quicker or in another direction when you saw him as you tugged at your mother's hand or arm- anything to make sure he wouldn’t have time to see you.
Because while he looked ravishing in the newest trends of clothing, or ones that you never saw on the market with bits of jewelry here and there, you’re reminded that you're a village girl, bound to poverty until you could get a job yourself to help your mother. Everytime you see him, his wealth continues to show in the form of clothes, ropes, speech, smile, and gestures, but his words echo as you cling to them like a leech.
Stained. Unclean. Dirty. So I…to give you… so you can be pretty.
You avoided him until he seems to have finally forgotten all about you when you catch that his eyes no longer go to yours, too busy being flocked by all kinds of people, girls and guys alike. But, you forget all about him too as you finally get busy with your new job.