Settling In

Starring:

Buyo, Meimei (as Yoko)

Date: October 20, 2010

Summary:

Untrusting of her new situation, but not wanting it to go away, Buyo decides to plan for a possible future.


"Settling In"

Meimei's Apartment - Sunagakure

Buyo finally moved out of the medical center. There weren't many beds or much privacy there and the spare bed was set up at Yoko's so Buyo had been moved there to recover. She seemed overawed at the place, not having her own room or anything in ages, if ever. The orphange she was at when she was much younger didn't exactly over flow with wonders. So this was a big change for her. She tried to settle in but everything seemed a big wrong to her. She at least was off the crutch, her leg finally healing up a bit so she can walk but with a limp. Doctors expect the limp will go away in a few days too. Young people heal quickly, at least that's a benefit.
Once the place is a bit settled into, and things sort of settle down for the night, after Buyo thinks Yoko must be asleep, she gathers a few things she sort of 'borrowed' from around the apartment and hid under her bed. She very carefully opens her window and… proceeds to try to sneak out with her little pack of goodies. The things are nothing overly fancy. Some food, some clothing, that kind of thing, no money, no valuables. She tries to be very quiet sneaking out but then… she is living with a ninja and it is unlikely she's quite quiet enough.

Meimei/Yoko is feeling… Happy. She can't remember the last time she felt happy. Like… REALLY happy. That feeling has been rare for much of her life — or at least the past half-decade. Seeing how wide-eyed Buyo had become, how stunned she was by everything, helping her set up her presents in her room, showing her the dresser, and the fire escape incase of emergencies, and so forth… She wasn't quite sure if the little girl was happy about this situation or not. But she convinced herself that the only thing she could possibly be feeling was happiness, because who would be saddened by being taken off the street and given all the things a girl SHOULD have?
And yet, as Yoko sits in her own room (which is actually supposed to be storage space rather than a bedroom. She swapped rooms so that Buyo would have a nice big space to live, play, and keep stuff. Shhhh. She hasn't told her that!), looking out the single window, she gets the idea something is wrong. The window opening like five feet to her left is the first clue. The little girl crawling out of it with a pack of goodies is the next. "…."
Meimei has her goggles off, so she can see plenty clearly in the exceptionally dim lighting on this side of the apartment building. But she ducks into her room a bit anyway, just incase, and watches from around the window frame. She's a bit confused about why Buyo would leave, but… She realizes that even though she has been nice so far, even though she provided a home-cooked dinner, and before that some grilled cheese sandwiches (which are not exactly local cuisine, but Meimei has travelled a lot) for lunch, and just generally tried to be as welcoming and friendly as possible, without imposing on the previously-homelesss girl… She thinks she understands anyway. Too much, too fast. Too many changes. Too much to take in. Too different.
She sighs quietly and prepares to just watch Buyo, and see where she goes. And if she has any accidents on the fire escape, since it's on the third floor, Yoko will be there in a heartbeat.

With the bag over her shoulder, Buyo struggles down the fire escape a bit, mostly because she's trying to be quiet and her foot hurts still a bit. But she didn't pack too much. She manages to get down to ground level safely. Then she pauses, looking around. Something Yoko would probably notice is that Buyo makes sure to tie something to the ladder so she can get back up. This clearly means she plans to return, as she sneaks off into the dark night, apparently used to such movement at such times, being homeless for so long and all.
Buyo is pretty quiet, sneaking on her feet, even with her limp, as she heads off towards one of the areas of town near the appartment that she is familar with. She hefts the sack, and does her best to move stealthly through the night, with some skill even, although Yoko is able to keep an eye on her if she follows, right up to the point where Buyo slips into some rubble, an abandoned house it seems, with the sack.

Yoko watches, her light-sensitive eyes revealing the entire scene in crystal clarity, even in darkness. She watches Buyo dash off down the street after tying something to the ladder. So she DOES plan to come back, hm? Then why leave at all? The speed and grace she moves at and exhibits even with a limp is probably a bit above an average adult, as a rough estimate. Yoko can't be sure. But she feels it's interesting, at least. Maybe how she has lived for so long has to do with that natural agility?
She climbs out her own window, and being only a foot taller than Buyo, manages to slip out fairly easily. She stands on the outer wall of the building for a moment, and then pushes off with both her feet and her Chakra, hurling her in a blur towards a rooftop. She is not worried about Buyo coming back or not. But she is worried about her safety. Last thing she needs is another infection from stepping on a rusty nail or something.

After a short while, Buyo emerges from the building, looking fine really. A tad dusty but… other than that she's fine. She starts to sneak back towards the apartment and given time and all she'll climb back up to her room and settle in for the night. That isn't the interesting part, the interesting part is what Yoko finds when she enters the building.
The building itself is pretty intact on the inside and there's even a basement, not that uncommon around here for storing things in the cool as cheap storage and so on. Plus many of the buildings are built out of what were taken out of the ground for basements. There is a stair down and you know Buyo managed to get down here in the dark as she had no light source. She hid the small sack back in a corner behind some things. It really is a towel, wrapped around a few small things. Some clean clothes (not the fancy ones she got but sturdy ones), some under things, some soap, and a few cans of food she managed to swipe from the kitchen while you weren't looking. How did she manage /that/? She didn't go to the kitchen again before going out so her nimble fingers must have managed it during the day. All in all it is a survival cache, clearly for someone who fears she may not have a nice bed to stay in long. Its kind of sad, clearly Buyo wants to stay but fears that things won't last and so is preparing for what might happen if she loses her nice new home. Perhaps she has to do this, things like this probably are the only reason she's still alive, preparing for the worst and all.
At the bottom of the small towel sack is one of the smallest stuffed animals, apparently she thought that was important enough to keep, to store somewhere safe even if she loses everything else. All this is understandable of course, but probably near heart breaking for Yoko, realizing just how fear filled Buyo must be about her current situation to resort to this.

Meimei watches from outside, leaning over the edge of the roof of the same building as Buyo just went into. When she re-emerges, seemingly unscathed, though a bit dustier than before, she sighs in relief. Doubly so when she appears to be heading back to the apartment. She is about ready to return as well, when she pauses. She thinks she knows why Buyo didn't bring the bag of whatever that was with her on the way back.
She doesn't want to spy on her… And disrupting the bundle might tip Buyo off. So she goes with option two. She returns to the apartment. She then just exits out into the living room from her bedroom/storage room, and closes her eyes briefly. Putting her hands together in a specific seal that is used only by the Onohara, Meimei focuses her Chakra into her eyes… And when she opens them, the pupils and irises have become as reflective as glass. They look like some sort of bright-purple, liquid chrome.
Walking around the apartment, she tracks the passage of light from earlier in the day, using it to reconstruct images of the relatively recent past. She can see the two of them arriving, in the form of ghostly projections. Some of the detail is lost due to how old these images are, but as she speed things up a bit, she can see the times when Buyo managed to sneak off with certain survival-based goods. Except for one… The stuffed animal. She wasn't expecting that to be included. But…
Sighing, Yoko allows the metallic-purple sheen to vanish from her eyes, along with the events of the past. So she's planning ahead. That's good. Buyo has the ability to think things through and do what is best for her survival. But the fact she is still so scared she is doing so even now… That is troubling. Painful, really, but she supposes she cannot expect much else.
Finally, she goes to Buyo's bedroom door and knocks very softly, and asks quietly, "You asleep, Buyo?" If there is no answer, she goes back to her room.

After a small pause, there's an answer, "No… I'm not." Buyo sits up in her bed, wearing a night gown provided by Yoko of course. It's a tad large on her but that's good for sleeping in, "What… what's up?" She asks as she waits for Yoko to enter, watching the door, looking a tad nervous if Yoko does enter. The room is dark, some light from the stars through the window. Buyo doesn't like to keep it covered it seems, the window is open to get some air, or… so she doesn't feel so cooped up after living outside for so long. Hard to tell.

Yoko opens the door a crack to peek in and says, "Just making sure everything is okay. I know it can be hard to get to sleep in a new place, and… This must be as new a place as you can imagine. So… If you need anything, let me know. There's something called 'hot cocoa' we used to make back home, before… Before I left. We could only have it rarely. But chocolate is more common here, so, umm…" She shrugs. "Just… Let me know if you need anything, please."

Buyo hesitates then says, "Yoko? You… I mean… how… how long can I stay here?" Her mind still full of what-ifs about how long this good luck can last. "I know you said… I could stay here but… once my leg is healed and… and all…" She bites at her lower lip, looking worried, "I'm sure I just will get in the way… and all…" She says softly, as she pulls a pillow around and hugs it to her chest, "It's a really nice place to stay, but… I'm not really used to sleeping in a bed and all." She admits, "It just… feels so strange. Like… like a dream and I'll wake up and it'll all be gone." She glances out the window at the sky, "Maybe I never did wake up from my foot hurting… do you think maybe that's what happened?"

Yoko opens the door a bit more, so they can see each other. "You can stay as long or as little as you like. You're free to come and go as you please. I would… Like it a lot if you stayed, but I won't force you. I WILL make sure that you have somewhere safe and clean to go though, if you decide to move out. And you can always come back here. Whenever you want." She smiles.
"As for not waking up… I get what you mean. But think of it like this… What if the life before now was the dream? Not a 'real' dream, but just… 'Like a dream'. And that dream was a nightmare. You were having a bad dream all this time, and then… Then you finally woke up. That would mean this is the real world. This is the way things are SUPPOSED to be. You're supposed to have a nice place to stay, and people who care about you. You're supposed to be safe and well-fed. You don't have to run for your life, you don't have to hide from bad people…"
She feels like she's talking too much again, so she cuts off the explanation. Looking at the floor briefly, she says, "This is your home for as long as you want it to be. And I'll do everything I can to make sure you don't have to live like I did… Alone, ignored, and no one would come looking for me if I disappeared."

Buyo nods a tad, still holding the pillow close as she looks back to Yoko, "I guess. It's just… I don't want to move out. I just… I'm afraid." She admits, "I'm scared I'll do something wrong and it'll all go away. Even at the orphanage sometimes kids got brought back. They did something the people they went with didn't like or… something. I'm… just afraid. Cause I don't have any where to be sent back to and… and I don't know how to do all the right things." She says as she takes a little breath, trying to cut off more emotion.
Yoko's words seem to touch Buyo, "I'd come looking for you if you disappeared. I don't know if I could find you, but… but I'd come look." She says softly, "Maybe before was just a nightmare, I don't know. But… if this is all a dream, I don't really want to wake up…" She hides her face in the pillow, trying not to let Yoko see her fresh tears coming.

Meimei looks up and sighs. "Thank you. I appreciate that. I really do. We did make a promise didn't we? We won't forget each other. No matter what. So you'll come looking for me, just like I'll come looking for you. And if this is a dream right now…" She steps into the room and walks over to Buyo, to rest a hand lightly on her shoulder. "Then we're dreaming the same dream together. And I don't want to wake up either."

Buyo looks up, her face wet in the darkness, but not badly, just a bit, the pillow helped. "Thank you." This is all she manages. She can't seem to figure out what else to say. She reaches out her hand to touch Yoko's arm, and just looks up into her dark eyes. The moment stretches a bit, much unsaid. Maybe it doesn't even need to be said.
After a while, perhaps even a bit too long, minutes certainly, Buyo says, "What cocoa stuff?" She asks, not quite sure what Yoko was offering before but showing she certainly has paid attention and rembers that part of what Yoko said. Buyo certainly seems to have some attention to detail about her.

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