It turned out that the accident he saw what seemed to be half a week ago was the unfortunate partial burning down of the Enchanted Florist. Which was quite a shame; he'd wanted to take his parents flowers.
No, he was actually devastated the flowershop was closed. And there was no denying that.
Men in hardhats and vests against the cold had cleared off the area and chatter was drowned out in the unpleasant sounds of construction that filled the area. It would be a while before the shop was rebuilt...
All in all, it had been an...eventful week.
He found himself at the door of another familiar place, An Eye For Fashion. He had known the owners for some time now, and thought he may as well walk in for a new pair of glasses before going home to see his family.
...his mother teased him about it way too much.
@BeastofDestinySo far the day had been fairly slow, Kyle was cleaning a pair of sunglasses when he heard the bell chime, quickly depositing the shades back to its respective place on the frame board, he turned to approach the new customer.
"Hi, welcome to an 'An Eye For Fashion' how may I--- oh hey, its you." the person before him was completely unmistakable, teh silver dyed hair a dead giveaway,
"You're Shou right? We met at the Mochavine the other day, what can I do you for?"The white haired man hadn't been paying attention as he walked through the door, finding himself caught in mid-speech as the small bell above the doorframe chimed incongruously cheerfully and the infamous An Eye For Fashion welcome reached his ears.
"Doctor Dai-"
He paused when his eyes fell on the boy behind the counter, and it took a couple of seconds for it to process.
And when he opened his mouth, it was clear.
The American was strong with this one."Aah, Mister Parker." his brown eyes lit up finally in recognition and a collected smile took his lips, eyebrow quirking in pleasant surprise.
"I was actually in for a new set of frames; these might be getting too old for me. I was expecting the good doctor, but I do remember you, now. Fancy seeing you here today; how have you been?"
He hesitated before adding with a nervous laugh, "Say, did you tell me you worked here? I absolutely forgot if you did, and in that case, I shouldn't be so surprised. But...it's been a hectic winter."
He crossed the distance between himself and the counter in the little store with a graceful ease, though found his eyes lingering on some frames in displays as he made his way there.
"I'm guessing you'll need a new eye exam before getting some frames right? Let's ee if Dr. Daijianus has any openings," He began typing out information on the keyboard, pulling up the exam scheduling and waved his hand in a 'its fine' gesture when Shou commented about forgetting where he worked.
"Haha, don't worry about it, I don't think I got quite the chance anyway, you seemed pretty distracted by something and frankly, I was too." Kyle's face heated up a bit thinking on his first interaction with Nori, the way she strolled in while he was conversing with the silver haired man, the colorful, shining gaze from her eyes,
'damn' he thought, he just couldn't get her off his mind.
"I think I should be thanking you actually, had I not stopped to talk to you, I don't think I would've asked that girl out." He blushed again before clearing his throat,
"Sorry, that's not important, you're here for glasses."Scanning through the schedule he noticed an open slot,
"Okay, it looks like we had a cancellation, so there's an appointment available in the next 20 minutes if you wanted to snatch that up, it'd give you some time for us to find you a new frame while waiting.""Every time I take an eye exam, I find myself growingly depressed over my failing eyesight. ...and I just feel really old." the professor jested. He was now at the counter, giving Kyle a quick scan as he typed away. His demeanour changed, and Shou could have sworn he was blushing at one point.
It made him smile just a little bit wider. "You ended up asking her out, is it? I'm not surprised; she was a gorgeous young lady. Though I can't help but feel I keep seeing her around...
somewhere."
He reached by the counter to pat Kyle on the shoulder. An unspoken man to man bond established, and his gesture reassuring him that it was totally fine. "I might be, but it's refreshing hearing the stories you kids have to tell. Keeps me young. I'm quite honoured I played the role of catalyst, hah. Good luck to you both, you crazy kids..." he mused under his breath with a knowing smirk. Ah, young love...
Karma dictated that if you did good for people, good happened to you, too.
Of course, this was just a concept, but when Kyle told the professor about the cancellation, he couldn't help but be astounded in its ability. "That's...that sounds perfect, actually. Thank you very much, Kyle. As a fellow bespectacled man-" here he gave the boy a nervous smile, hands shoved into his pockets. He was tempted to pick out another smoke from the pack he kept close, but the several 'No smoking' signs around the building were more than enough to discourage him. "-you're going to have to show me something that won't drain my poor wallet, but still looks good, hah."
He smiled at the professor as he reached over with a comforting pat on the shoulder, he appreciated that even though he was talking about an completely irrelevant story that the man still appreciated it.
"Sure, I think we can find you something that'll look good and make you feel young again." he flashed a smile as he gestured for the man to follow him towards the frame boards. As Kyle started looking through the different options, he kept chatting the professor up,
"You might have recognized her from the flower shop, 'the enchanted florist'," a look of worry briefly crossed Kyle's features as he remembered her apartment above having burned down, the store temporarily closed because of the fire.
"Fortunately she wasn't there when the building above burned down, she was..." he probably shouldn't mention that he had her spend the night,
"Well, she was someplace safe."Getting an idea of the man's face, skin tone, hair color, etc. he started selecting a few different frames and placed them on a tray he had picked up from the counter earlier,
"She's out of town right now, but I was planning on asking her to the ball that's coming up, I know Dr. Daijianus, his wife, and Mr. Hiroshi are going, what about you?""Aaah,
of course." Shou mentally hit himself when Kyle revealed her identity. "I frequent The Enchanted Florist a lot, I was bound to see her around there..."
But he did see her somewhere else, too.
"...or on a poster or something. But that's probably just me imagining things, haha."
It clicked.
"Wait, if she was a florist, the-"
Kyle had answered his question before it even finished formulating itself. The silver haired man breathed a small sigh in relief. Little did he know, he was nowhere near as relieved as Kyle.
"I'm really glad. That was a pretty bad fire...the whole place must have gone up in smoke for that to happen to the building. I pray that nobody was inside; they'd have died, you know?"
Shou looked at the glasses the young optician had selected, gingerly trying on a pair of half rimmed glasses and immediately taking them off with a little cringe. The man was quite particular about his eyewear, and the style he wore remained fairly constant.
He was glad to see that Kyle had picked out at least a few squoval frames.
"There's a ball, huh? So that must have been what my students were so excited about..." he thought aloud. It was the first he was hearing of it, himself, as an event open to all. Up until now, he thought it was some event at the infamous Club LUSH or something.
"You really should ask her, Kyle, my boy. Personally, I had no idea there was a ball...in fact, I'll be going home for Christmas, so I'll know even less."
"Fill me in?" he asked, fingers tracing over the rims of another. Though coloured ones were nice, he tended to stay away from anything too flashy.
...for his students' sake, of course...
"Hm...try this..." Kyle picked up a frame and put it on Shou, inspecting for barely a second before he scrunched his face in disgust,
"Nope, nope, nooooo," and immediately plucked it off the professor's face before putting it back.
Kyle chuckled a little as Shou asked him to fill him in on the ball,
"Well the ball isn't happening until New Year's Eve, you'll be back by then right? I'm sure you've got someone special you'd like to take, or...if not, hm, I'll be right back." Kyle stepped away and allowed Shou to continue looking as he made his way into the break area and rifled through his coat pockets. When he found what he was looking for, he approached the silver haired man and presented him with two tickets. Amity had gotten a few of them through some kind of celebrity endorsement thing since she was one of the 'prizes' for the evening. Find Amity, get two tickets to a spa, as a result she had been given a few by the host to distribute to others and Kyle had been given a few himself in case he wanted to invite anyone. One was for him and one for Nori of course, but he figured he could spare a two for the gentleman.
Stepping back out onto the floor, it looked like Shou had found a nice looking and fitting frame,
"That's looking pretty good," Kyle stated, inspecting the frame,
"Good fit, shape, color...I think we found a match." He nodded his head affirmatively before presenting the tickets to Shou,
"Here, bring a date, or bring a friend, doesn't matter, but I figure you were the catalyst that allowed me to meet Nori, maybe I can return the favor?" He smirks a little,
"Wizards need to look out for each other, right?"The man shot the young optician a confused look and was about to speak before he strolled past him into the break area, Shou being left mid speech and clamping his mouth shut.
Sighing a little, he continued looking through the glasses, sorting a pile where he had potential 'maybe's.
He was just looking at something that he found himself drawn to, dark grey with a similar shape to what he wore already, squovals, but instead of the delicate spectacles he was currently wearing, these gave him a bolder appearance with sturdier, more solid rims with a larger room for lenses, which would give him almost a catlike air.
As he tried it on, Kyle reappeared from behind the door to the break area, immediately complimenting Shou on the frames. He glanced at his reflection in the mirror again. And thought.
...he did quite like what he saw.
"I think we do, to- Hmm?"
The man's eyes widened in surprise as the tickets were almost pressed into his hands.
"I..." he began, a little lost for words. "Are you sure this is okay, Kyle? Heaven knows where you must have gotten these...I, besides, I don't have anyone in mind; I'd take a friend, but he..."
His voice trailed off.
Maybe it would be better to go out and forget, on that one night of the new year, after all.
"...thank you." said Shou Matsuoka, genuinely, as he traced the elegant writing on the ticket itself before looking back up at Kyle with true gratitude in his eyes. "Thank you very, very much, Kyle. It...you're doing more for me than I ever could have done for you, hah. You and Nori may well have been meant to be."
Here he smiled a little wider, even chuckling at Kyle's remark on their wizardry. He wouldn't have known the real meaning of the term unless so casually flung around at the academy.
"Wizard, huh?" he chuckled again, handing the frames to Kyle with a bright grin.
"Something tells me you won't be soon, my boy. As for me, well..."
He let out a low whistle, smirking at the recollection as he raised his arms over his head in a lazy, nonchalant stretch.
"My wife was
an animal under the sheets, heh."
He fondly remembered a better time, a part of him glowing at referring to her as his wife as she rightly would have been, and before Kyle got the wrong idea about who Shou said about not knowing who to take, he added "Unfortunately, I...she passed away, four years ago."
He hesitated.
"...around this time of year, too. It...she didn't deserve to go, Parker. ...she was murdered."
The word hung thick in the air for Shou. It had already been a tough week and he didn't want to make it any worse for Kyle, or any more awkward.
Little did he know that the boy could relate to his situation more than anyone else, with the girl he loved being targeted by, unbeknownst to them both, the same killer.
It usually was those types of girls, huh...
"Thanks again, though." the professor shook his head and lightened up, following Kyle to the counter. As he was there, he let his eyes linger on the advertised contact lenses.
And then it hit him.
"Hmm. I think I'll invest in a pair of these, after all, if I'm going to a ball..."
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