| Welcome to My Morning [Ginta, Ryouma, Kakashi] |
[Aug. 29th, 2009|02:08 pm] |
[Takes place late morning on April 5th, almost a week after All We Know is Distance.]
A week in the hospital was enough to drive even the calmest man to extreme measures. Or at least that was Ginta's thinking. When they finally allowed him up from his bed, five days in, he immediately started making boredom contingency plans. Many of them, in fact most of them, involved finagling himself into a wheelchair and over to Kakashi's room with a deck of cards and a couple of cans of apple juice, to help Ryouma keep watch.
Shiratori had debriefed him and sworn that the docs said Kakashi was mending. The nurses and even his own doctor had said the same thing. Ryouma had gotten the same story, evidently. Chakra exhaustion and a soldier pill overdose were serious conditions, but they were known quantities. Kakashi would be in an uncomplicated coma for several days, and then he'd wake up. It had happened before, it would probably happen again. And it was happening now.
Patience, they said. Ironic that patient and patience were such similar words. Even his grandmother could get nothing more from the doctors. And, she'd told Ginta, she believed them. Of course Ginta believed them, too, at an intellectual level. Kakashi's vitals were stable, and his chakra readings were improving daily. Believing didn't make the wait any easier.
( On the seventh day home, the fifth of April, at a little after ten in the morning, Ginta talked his nurse into helping him get set up in the wheelchair again. ) |
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| Almost Not Alone [Genma, Rina] |
[Aug. 29th, 2009|10:40 pm] |
[Takes place on the 3rd of April, one day after After the Rain, five days after Meet You on the Other Side, and about five years after Got That Mountain to Climb.]
It was almost a rule, that Genma always had to screw up all of her hard work whenever she wasn't there to fix it. Turning up the water from 'hot' to 'scorching,' Rina poured another handful of shampoo and tried desperately to scrub all the branches out of her hair.
One week. One week she'd been gone, and this was the kind of thing he got up to. How did he manage it? She'd been looking forward to a nice, relaxing shower ever since she'd crossed back over the border, and instead here she was, frantically scrubbing her skin off along with the grime.
Ducking her head under the spray for the fifth time, she forcefully widened her eyes, not letting them close. When she closed them, all she could see was--
Don't think about it. The note said it wasn't as bad this time.
No sense worrying until she got there, anyway--right, as if thinking that ever helps--and they wouldn't let her into the hospital until she was clean. Dragging her fingers roughly through her hair again, searching for dirt and debris, she ended up with just a handful of pale, gleaming strands.
Finally.
The water ran clear now, instead of red-black with ink and unidentified blood. Rinsing her hair one more time, she shut it off gingerly, using her fingertips so the layer of grime she'd left on the knobs wouldn't transfer back to her hands again.
( Housekeeping could deal with the dirt; she didn't have time. ) |
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