thenearshore | [Closed] artbreak, heartbreak

Entry tags:

[Closed] artbreak, heartbreak

Who: Zeno, Kaya
When: July 1st
Where: The Near Shore
What: Prayer 26 - A prayer for heritage

"I will soon be too feeble to perform my craft that honors your stories, oh God/dess, but my pupils have all gone missing for one reason or another. I pray that their families allow them to return to the art before these old bones give out on me."

It had been a week since the day of the fire, since Yona's arrival.

Kaya looks from afar as Zeno talks to the old artisan and gets the addresses of the young students. He is all smiles, all kindness, all sunshine. She smiles, but it's obvious that she's too nervous. First prayer. It didn't seem like it involved the ayakashi at least. Zeno seems too easygoing to go for anything too bad. Kaya still fears that something could go wrong and she's unable to protect Zeno, but she wants to hope. She also has strong shinki and god friends in speed dial, in case they can't handle it. Her god seems confident, but he always looks cheerful like that.

She's also on the edge for different reasons. A prayer means spending time with him, and it's a bit awkward. She had been avoiding him for the last few days and crying when she was alone. She felt guilty over such a trivial feeling and she strongly suspected she was stinging him. Yet it was hard to say as he had yet to tell her anything about pains. Sometimes he sees him grimacing, but he could have tripped or just slept in a bad position. It doesn't have to be blight... does it?

She sees Zeno nodding and smiling one last time until he walks to her. She didn't pay attention to the conversation, but he's back with a piece of paper. Probably an address or more.

"How did it go? Where do we go now?" she smiles at him. She hopes it's not obvious she's bracing herself to walk alone with him, full of remorse for her jealousy and fear for the dangers that may await them.

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So maybe Zeno proposed answering a prayer because he noticed Kaya was avoiding him. Maybe. He was used to a certain level of emotional feedback through the bond of the dragons' blood; he hadn't even realized that gods sensed their shinki until Jaeha explained it to him, just because he was so used to having that connection to Shin-ah already.

"It's fine," he tells her, not wanting to create any more worry or negativity than he's already sensing from her. He smiles back. "Youth is Hebe's domain, so convincing the young people to go back to their passion should be easy, right? We'll remind them they can take pictures of it with their phones or something."

He took another look back at the workshop as they left it behind. Samples of the artist's work could be seen in the windows still, and Zeno admired them greatly. He didn't much care whether or not the artisan honored him, specifically, but there was a reason this sort of artwork had lasted so long alongside photographs and things. Helping it endure, maybe even introducing a few more youths to it-- hopefully the original goddess of eternal youth would agree with him, that was a good use of his position.

"I've been reading about Hebe a bit," she replies sheepishly. "And I think it's a good idea! I've only had my phone for a month and I already have a lot of pictures of Sunny and Ryuuryuu and everything else." She had named her potted sunflower and the dragon statue at the entrance respectively. "Cameras are fun!"

She followed his gaze. Zeno's eyes were full of respect. He did seem a more traditional sort of guy, so it made sense he would pick something like that as a prayer to fulfill. The art was really lovely, full of life and affection. More people doing things like that would be wonderful. A communion between the modern and the old. Yes, she could see it.

As they walked away, she thought about the advice she got from Lavi. Would she really feel better if she talked about her feelings openly? In any case, bottling it up would just make his pain and her guilt worse. It had been a torment of a week already, and this could hinder their job today. Even if their relationship isn't the same again, even if he laughs at her or rejects her, she would know and it'd be one less worry.

He wouldn't be mad at her, would he? If he was upset by any stinging or uncomfortable feelings from her, he would have confronted her days ago. He doesn't seem the type to be mean, either.

She takes a deep breath and begins, her eyes on the road they're walking on.

"Zeno... I'm so sorry. I have been a selfish person and I didn't know how to even look you in the face. Have I... have I caused you blight?"

"Oh? What's there to read about her?"

His voice hitches slightly as her thoughts go back down towards the worry, and he feels the little ache that has been his constant companion this week flare up. While some people clutch at the site of the pain, Zeno just feels around his chest experimentally. There are people in the world who poke and prod at their bruises, checking to see if they still cause pain-- Abi had been one, scowling as he waited impatiently for his body to heal. Zeno used to not be, but while he was no stranger to intense pain, pain that lingered, or recurred, that was a new thing. He'd honestly thought he was imagining at first, and he'd wondered if Kaya's sudden distance was either a cause or an effect of it...

"Blight?" he echoes. He'd felt her emotions dip around the day that Yona arrived-- so identified mainly because it was the most significant day in his recent memory.

He doesn't want to say 'is that what that was,' the sudden hot, tender bruise... he rubs the base of his neck absently.

He's about to ask her to elaborate, but he catches sight of a young man sneaking out of a window, and claps her on the shoulder instead. He has what looks like a shoulder bag with some sort of brush sticking out, and Zeno double-checks his list of addresses against the numbers on the building.

He can't stop himself from prodding at his chest pain again, but he points to the young man.

"There's one!"

"There isn't much. So that family of gods kept themselves from aging by eating a food called ambrosia and drinking a beverage called nectar. Besides watching over the human youth, Hebe was a cupbearer who served the other gods the nectar. She was the daughter of the king and the queen, so I guess that makes her a princess? And her husband was more famous than her."

Nevermind that pouring drinks isn't a very princess-like thing to do.

She opens her mouth, wondering where to begin, noticing his hand lingering. But his other hand on her shoulder interrupts her before she can even begin, so she tilts her head to look at the boy he's pointing at.

"Ah! Shouldn't we talk to him before he leaves? Let's go."

To hear that there wasn't much written about the lady-princess whose place he'd taken, that was both discouraging and a relief. Discouraging, because it meant that she may be truly forgotten with him overwriting her existence, and relieving, because it lessens the expectations on him. Frees him up to be a god in his own way. And that he thinks he sort of needs, after having spent the vast majority of his entirely-too-long life trying to figure out the gods' expectations of him. This whole 'Hebe' thing was the point where he'd metaphorically thrown his hands in the air and given up; he'd learned to not care overmuch about expectations versus reality, but the whole 'by the way, now you are also a god' thing?

No. He was done. He was just going to do it how he wanted and let the results sort themselves out.

Zeno jogged in the young man's direction, waving a little.

"'Scuse me!" he chirped, tone higher on the last word to sound dissonant, to catch attention. "This is wonderful! We were just looking for a painter! It's so very urgent, please help us!"

Improvisation, go.

The young man looks surprised and perhaps a bit guilty when he catches Zeno's attention.

"Um... Do you mean wall painting or something more artistic?"

"No, no. Artistic!" Kaya nods.

He glances at his bag for a second, but raises his eyes instantly. "There's a talented painter a couple of blocks from here, but he's kinda old so I dunno if he's taking commissions anymore. Maybe an apprentice of his could help?"

"He's depressed," Zeno said bluntly. "He has the time, because he used to fill it with those same apprentices, but now that they're all gone, Zeno is afraid he's feeling the time pass much too much."

Trying to pass this (imaginary!) buck off to someone else? Zeno was just going to stop that dead in its tracks.

"But the art is clearly something you love, since you want to carry your tools with you. We hoped you'd be able to help us with a portrait. It's truly urgent. A photograph wouldn't do Kaya justice, and I just want something to remember her by, before her trip."

The key to good improvisation -- or, rather, tricking someone -- is to find a real truth and build on that. Kaya is not planning a trip, but Zeno does live in dread of the day the heavens separate them again. And he'd never had a picture of her before. He wants a way to remember her that's more... homelike than a digital photo. Something he could have carried through Kouka over the course of two thousand years.

Edited 2017-04-26 02:52 (UTC)

Kaya doesn't like to lie. She's not particularly good at it, either. But she knows that Zeno has a plan and she has to go along with whatever he says. At the very least, she can't contradict what he's telling this guy.

"A-ah! Yup! Zeno really wants my portrait! Paintings are really pretty."

Hopefully that's enough.

"I... I had no idea." The boy now seems uncomfortable, when he hears about his former master. Is he sad for him? His stare is lowered so it's hard to read the emotions in his eyes. He's biting his lip and shuffles his feet. "M-me? I'm sorry, It's true that I took a couple of classes but I'm an amateur and I don't think I'm good enough to do that kind of commission."

"Was there a reason you stopped...?" Zeno asks gently. This was the opening he wanted to create with a little white lie. He is genuinely curious, genuinely interested in the story here. Even without the old man's prayer hanging over their heads, even without being the god in charge of youth, all he's ever wanted is to make people happy. That was the catalyst that led him to this moment, really. And you didn't set out to learn ancient, dying artisanal techniques unless they truly, truly made you happy.

The boy wasn't expecting the question. He raises his head, a bit bemused.

"Um... You see, the entrance exams are coming. My parents signed me up to this really good cram school and said I had to focus on my studies so I could get into college. So I had to leave all my afterschool clubs and hobbies, in order to go to the extra classes."

"Aah, that's so exciting!" Zeno enthused. His hands clasped in front of him. "You're looking forward to the exams, then? If studying is to be all you do in your leisure time, it must be very leisurely!"

The boy seems irritated now, however.

"Are you being sarcastic or are you dumb? Of course not, I'm terrified! And who likes to study anyway? Unless you're a nerd."

Kaya hadn't heard that word, or even "college", but she smiles and acts like she has. If she starts asking about slang, their cover as normal mortals would be blown.

"I've never seen Zeno studying!" she admits with a grin. It was true, of course, but the confession might make him more relatable to the art student.

"Lazy bastard," the boy grumbles. "I'm full of stress, not excitement."

Not a wholly unexpected reaction. Nor a useless one. Zeno plucks one of the stray brushes out of his bag, and presses it into his hand.

"Relax," he insists. "Isn't practicing your art a form of study? But you can do it somewhere quiet and stress-free, and you can give that old man a break in his mind, as well."

Zeno tries to offer some perspective. "At the end of your life, you'll want to leave the world a better place than you found it-- and, if that fails, just don't make it worse."

He intends it as an allusion to the boy's former master, but it's the truth, too. "Zeno thinks if people sacrificed the things that make life worthwhile, art and poetry and music, any victory in getting into school would be hollow and empty. Even if the victory stays hollow, you might not be as stressed!"

"Do you even plan to go to college, dude? Like the entrance exams are going to ask me to paint stuff." He contains an exasperated sigh. "What a pushy asshole, giving opinions on people's lives when it's none of his business."

He extends his hand to try to take his brush back from Zeno's.

"All that is deep shit, but it doesn't matter if I agree with you. My parents are the ones paying my classes, and they decided for cram school instead of sensei's. They don't want me to be like my grandfather, who was an artist and was always in debt. And I can't be using my last supplies here, paid with my allowance in secret, to make a shitty amateur portrait of your girlfriend."

Meanwhile, Kaya looks like her cheeks had been painted with a bright pink hue.

"Aah, of course, you're right, you're right!"

Zeno bows, primarily in thanks for letting him see on this lovely summer day the most adorable sight of Kaya's sweet embarrassed face. And he is going to get her out of this miniature crucible real quick. He taps her shoulder to get her attention, turns around, and starts walking in the other opposite direction.

There's still a few names on the list, after all. This particular kid was struggling with other things. Pushing him any further would just create resentment, but he had a good feeling about the future. Some things had to be allowed to course-correct on their own schedule. The artisan was old but not ancient; he could have a few more good years in him. There was some time, if not a lot.

Once they're out of earshot, he laughs a little-- and feels the little twinge in his chest. "Think of a prayer like a fruit tree, I guess. It's a game of patience and not every piece is going to be ripe at the same time."

Some fruits didn't even have time to ripen before the snowfall, and Zeno rubs his chest absently. Was it pain? It wasn't comfortable, but his body healed... was he really sure it wasn't just his very adolescent body reacting to proximity with Kaya? Maybe his heart hadn't thudded and raced in so long he'd forgotten the sensation.

The student sweeps the air carelessly with his brush as he sees the weird boy and girl walking away. As much as he hated it, Zeno did make a fair point about how empty life was without following passions. It's not like he could return to classes, not with his parents spending their money on cram school. But perhaps on spring, if he managed to get accepted to university... Perhaps then, he could get a part-time job to pay that expense and also supplies.

To be honest, that comment about the master's status had worried him. Perhaps this dude with the girlfriend was lying in order to get a painting for cheap, but what if it was true? What if sensei was truly struggling? The boy was prickly, but he cared for people who was important to him. Even if he couldn't return, he could check on him... Visit the old man every now and then on weekends, even if it's just to say hi or get him fresh groceries.

He reaches for his phone and looks for the right number to call. That's the least he can do, until he was able to return to art. Just not letting him feel lonely.

"Ripe fruit?" she tilts her head. "It's hearts, not a harvest. Maybe more that fruit, it's like flowers? They don't bloom at the same time, and some don't ever do. But it's okay."

She goes with him, increasingly worried by the hand over his chest. There was no mistake: something was physically bothering Zeno.

"Hey... We need to talk. It doesn't have to be now! It can wait until we talk to more students."

"Might as well be now," he answers, fishing the list out of his coat. "Time enough. Oh, unless you want to teleport. Keep forgetting about that..."

He gives her the out, but also doesn't want her to go that way just yet:

"But if you want to talk, maybe sooner would make things easier...?"

Kaya takes a deep breath. Sooner is probably better. She looks at her feet, swinging inside the summer sandals that matched her dress.

"I know I've been avoiding you a bit these days. I've felt... like kind of a bad person the other day so I thought I could be giving you blight over it. And the more I avoided, the more guilty I felt for feeling selfish, and the worse I felt. I heard you guys can feel your shinki's emotions a bit so maybe you know already but... I have to apologize!" She doesn't bow her head because she can tell Zeno wouldn't like it, so instead she shyly looks down and then up. It's hard to meet his eyes so she doesn't yet. "I-I... saw you hugging your friend Yona and for some reason I was jealous! I'm so, so sorry!"

'For some reason?' Though at least now he's sure that the pain was from being stung-- and not even entirely from Kaya's admission. His heart skips a beat when she says 'jealous.' His stomach feels like it's falling out from under him, and he has to brush his palms off against his coat because they're warm and clammy all of a sudden.

He is entirely too old to be getting this worked up over 'A cute girl likes me! Yay!'-- or, at least, his mind is. His body is still very teenaged, after all.

Anyway, and his mind starts reasserting itself, rationalizing, not getting his hopes up, being patient. It might not be that kind of jealous. It might just be something innocent. Kaya was young, after all, and a little lonely in life-- starved for human contact. Something Zeno had missed sorely before meeting her...

He stops walking and wraps his arms warmly around Kaya's shoulders. Pulls her close and rests his head on top of hers.

"Poor Kaya," he says, trying not to let on just how happy he is to get close to her again.

Trying, also, not to let on to the guilt he feels flaring up. Thank the dragon gods stinging doesn't go both ways. He can't even count how many times he's stopped himself from just spontaneously hugging her, and now to find out it was bothering her? "Zeno is all distant and cold and you're afraid you're doing something wrong? You have to put Zeno in the bad gods corner when that happens!"

Edited (clarifications!!!) 2017-05-21 06:22 (UTC)

"Well, it's... um... I... huh?"

Her attempts to save the mistake she had made are interrupted by the embrace. Her mind goes blank. She's too aware of his arms, of his head, of the warmth. Her mouth opens in an attempt to tell him that wasn't what she meant, that he must not feel pressured into hugging her. Words don't come out, though. She feels too comfortable, too happy even. But that's also wrong since he might be forcing himself out of pity. The 'poor Kaya' sure makes it seem so, at first.

Kaya raises her arms, but she freezes when she's not sure if she should hug back or push him away. She doesn't do the latter, but she doesn't do the former either. She drops her arms back to her sides, defeated by the inner turmoil.

"N-no... I'm the one who's been a bad shinki. You don't have to... any of this. Or anything at all! You're kind and loving enough as you are already, so it's okay. It's my own problem, you haven't done anything bad. You should be able to hug your friend or your... your girlfriend without me being this childish."

So she says, but she doesn't want the hug to end. And for that she feels guilty once more, and the sting can't stop like this.

"What's a 'girlfriend?'" He winces slightly, at that little tiny bit of guilt, and takes a step back. "You don't mean to say..." With Yona...? He feels a little red and warm in his face. She is the cutest thing in the world, present company excepted, and she makes his heart go pitter-pat, flitter and flutter and everything in between, but he remembers the day she was born too clearly, and that makes it weird. Intellectually, he knows Kaya is probably young enough to be his granddaughter, but they met more or less as equals and adults.

"Is that what the kids call it now?" Some god of youth he is! He starts to laugh. And with the little bit of distance, he reaches for Kaya's hand, not wanting the end of the hug to seem like a reprimand or something.

"How are you a bad shinki? Maybe Zeno should be introducing you to people, telling you whether or not Zeno's gone a-wooing the young ladies!" The mental image makes him laugh harder. And with Yona! How suicidal can you be? He wonders if Hak would let him choose where he got stabbed...

"She's the cutest little missy but Zeno doesn't make a habit of going courting, no. Zeno traveled with her before coming here, and missed her terribly, that's all."

"Oh, you two are not...?"

Of course they weren't. She feels a bit relieved to be honest, but that also is a bad thing to feel. Him not having a lover didn't make things that much different, emotions wise. She still had to keep the crush under control and not getting her hopes up.

It just seems he likes to hug his friends. Did this mean he considered her his friend and it wasn't a hug to calm her down?

Actually, she would be happy if he considered her special enough to mean the hug. She might be falling for him, sure, but she mostly wants to be friends with him. It's a hard labor since she barely knows him and he isn't so communicative. Now to find a way to tell him.

"Still, it would be okay if you... you know... had someone... one day..."

No. Try again.

"One day I want to be able to be someone you can trust and care, Zeno. Someone you really want to hug. I consider you a dear friend already! No matter how I feel about you now and later, you'll always be important to me. It doesn't have to... You love who you want, don't worry about me being jealous. What I'm trying to say is, the hug made me happy but don't force yourself just because I'm a selfish girl. I promise I'll keep my crush in check-- I mean!" Oh dear. At this point she's finding her own feet so interesting. "Look, I just wanted to apologize for being like this. I'll be better! I promise."

"Kaya doesn't have to be making any excuses..."

Still, she's so uncertain, he reluctantly drops her hand. Better not to confuse things further.

Even so, his heart is beating so hard and so fast. It's almost hard to think. How do teenagers ever get any loving done like this?

"Or apologizing..."

Crush. She did say 'crush,' right? Aaaah. That's so cute. It makes sense. There's no countdown until her health fails her or he gets infected. There's nothing to compel her to actually fall in love with him. He wonders about her eyes, maybe, getting a crush on a short, bony thing like him...!

"Kaya can feel however about Zeno, and shouldn't feel guilty at all. How's that?"

"But... Well, I don't want any of us to be blighted so I need to be careful anyway? If I feel something too mean or too sad, I could accidentally feel guilt again and hurt you."

She finally stops looking at her feet. There's a hint of a smile on her lips.

"I also read that shinki should apologize because otherwise the blights can't be cured with holy water. So I do need to say I'm sorry and to not be guilty anymore. Even if you're alright with me liking you like this, I have to be careful from now on. Anyways, I do want you to be happy, okay? It'll be fine!"

So long as she was near, he was happy. The fact that she's smiling again makes him mirror her.

"So you apologized and you have Zeno to tell you never to feel guilty about feelings. Even a little jealousy is understandable... and it passed, right?"

"Well, yeah... I do feel much lighter now after saying it, too. I'll try to be honest from now on, then."

She straightens the shoulder of her dress.

"You're such a good person, Zeno. Thank you for always being this kind to me, okay?"

Is that true or is it the crush talking? He isn't even sure anymore. It isn't like he wasn't always concealing his true nature from her, but somehow not telling her 'I was part of the country's founding and also an immortal' is different than hiding 'Yes, I love you, too; in fact, we were married and nothing else would make me happier...'

"You're going to make me blush!"

"I could say the same thing often. So anyway, should we visit the other students, now that we talked it over?" Her smile turns sheepish. "I've stopped the prayer long enough and the grandpa needs our help."

"No, this was right... can't be our best if there's something else distracting us!"

But he is ready to go back to the task at hand. He'll think about this later...

"In the end this had to be done, huh?" She raises her eyes to look up at the sky. So it had been a good thing that she had cried over her worries with Lavi, because otherwise he would've never given her the advice to talk to Zeno.

It is a weight off her shoulders, even though the worry of blighting him is still there. Come to think of it, he didn't admit if he had been stung or not. Were those pains unrelated? Asking Zeno again will lead nowhere so she might ask another day. At least he can heal himself now that she apologized.

But back to helping.

"Then let's go find more! I'll follow!"

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[Closed] artbreak, heartbreak

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