1761/Why Are You Still Here

Why Are You Still Here
Date of Scene:	26 July 2016
Location:	University of Tokyo library and environs
Synopsis:	Ami is trying to study for entrance exams. Zoisite turns up to Not Help. There is bad language. And stomping. And crying. And throwing ice cream.
Cast of Characters:	Ami Mizuno, Zoisite

---

Ami Mizuno has posed:
It's mid-afternoon, and Ami Mizuno has sequestered herself in a small cubical at the University of Tokyo's library. There, a small stack of textbooks and study guides and practice examinations dominate the available space, leaving only the tiniest fraction for her to actually use for writing on the exam she is currently working on.

The teen herself has on her glasses, a white camisole beneath a sky blue capsleeved chiffon overshirt, and a pleated black skirt. She has her legs tucked up beneath her beneath the chair, feet in her typical white and black saddle shoes with a pair of white, lace-top socks beneath.

Without any haste or rush, the bluenette completes the exam, then reaches up and taps a clock in front of her. She eyes the time on it, then frowns and looks back down at her work. Picking up a piece of paper with the answers on it, she leans back and tucks her feet up on the chair next to her bum, then starts comparing her work to the cheat sheet.

Zoisite has posed:
"I realize it's a disappointment," says a voice both not that familiar and possibly too much so -- library-low, and from a couple of cubicles' width away. Not too close. "But you can't actually score better than perfect on those things. And you must have been doing that for a couple of years now."

Ami has only once before now seen Zoisite in anything but the Dark Kingdom's uniform, and that once was less seeing him than seeing a cluster of boys in which Zoisite was buried almost to the point of invisibility. Not to mention that she was distracted by her own reactions at the time. He's not in any uniform now. Artistically tattered jeans, an intensely green T-shirt under a linen jacket subdued enough to let that green fail to draw attention in the sea of blues and olives and neutral colors that's the run of the male university students. Just enough individuality not to stand out for the lack of it. In other words, he looks like he belongs here.

The riot of curls somewhere between blonde and copper hasn't changed, though. And apparently he's still addicted to tying it back with teal.

When -- if -- she looks over to him, he lifts an insulated carrier that probably has no business being in the library. It does not match any part of its outfit. It's blue. Specifically, it's her blue. "This might do you a little better than your sixtieth hour of studying this week."

Ami Mizuno has posed:
Ami startles and nearly drops her work. She does drop her feet to the floor and peer up at Zoisite. She blinks at him, once and twice and then glares, "Twenty-seventh," she observes tartly, utterly missing the point of his teasing.

She glances back at the test and the cheat sheet, then sighs, "And if my scores were perfect, I wouldn't still be studying. I should be able to complete this version of the test in five minutes fewer than it takes me, right now." Yeah, it's not about accuracy it's about time.

"What have you brought, anyhow?" she asks, rolling forward out of her seat and dropping a page on the desk. It's laminated, and in artful, florid kanji it says, 'Be Right Back'. She pushes her chair back in, then peers at him, "Whatever it is, I suspect it doesn't belong in a library. Get it out of here."

Zoisite has posed:
The glare ought, given his previous habits, have gotten a lean in and a glare back and maybe a hiss. Or possibly a stalking-off, which would probably have been the desired result. It does neither.

Zoisite ducks his head and glances at her sidewise, green eyes bright through stray curls. "Come help me get rid of it," he counters. "Ten-minute break? Say hello to the sunlight? It'll speed your next round up better than just plunging right back into it will."

There is a distinct lack of a threat backing up the coaxing. It might possibly be a little unnerving.

Ami Mizuno has posed:
"... have you gone entirely insane?" Ami asks, voice growing just a little louder than it aught. She immediately looks around as if to ensure no one's looking, then lowers her voice back to a hushed whisper, "What is wrong with you?"

But she does edge a little closer, because the idea of a break sounds oh so tempting right now. "Ugh, whoever put you up to this is an ass. Whatever," she says, then grabs Zoisite firmly by the elbow and starts to drag him towards the door. "If this is what it will take to get you out of my hair, then fine." Besides, she's beginning to suspect that might just be ice cream.

There's always time for ice cream.

Once they're out of the library, she lets him go and turns with a slightly less brusque and annoyed pace towards a nearby bench beneath a tree. "What do you want?"

Zoisite has posed:
Ami's hauling prompts Zoisite to close his mouth firmly, because laughter voiced out loud carries, whereas laughter muffled in the throat does much less so. His tug to reclaim his arm comes at the same time she's letting him go anyhow; there's a moment of sidewise stumble before he can catch himself.

(There is, now, no fever burning furnace-hot underneath the light layer of cloth. Maybe that was a Dark Kingdom thing, maybe not; but it's gone right now, at the least.)

The carrier is set down on the bench, unzipped, opened. Between the icepacks inside there are three containers. One container of green tea ice cream, sealed. One container of chocolate ice cream, sealed. One clear plastic container, closed but not commercially sealed, containing more ice cream, green with darker...

Apparently someone made green tea ice cream with chocolate, since there's a neglected niche on the market right now.

There are two spoons lying across the top.

Zoisite taps the open carrier toward Ami, deliberately waiting for her to make a choice and have it open before he says anything else. "Let's see. Makoto's pretending she's not upset. Takashi Agera is behaving himself, relatively, for no apparent reason. You're moping and, apparently, it's distracting enough to slow you down. I think we can take the 'with me' part off the question and just go with 'what's wrong,' don't you?"

Ami Mizuno has posed:
Ami doesn't sit. She simply stares at Zoisite, and the container, until it's open and the ice cream is revealed. She opens her mouth to protest that she knew he'd brought something he shouldn't have into a library, when her throat catches at the sight of the home-made ice cream container.

"Seriously?!" she asks, reaching in to grab the chocolate and green tea concoction. "You're more evil than I thought," she accuses, grabbing a spoon and flopping down on the bench. "Beryl could have won the war with tactics like these." But she's digging in, and has a spoonful of icecream when he starts laying down the careful explanation of his observations.

The look on Ami's face may be something of a cross between a deer in the headlights, and a raging bull. She covers it by taking another bite of green tea and chocolate ice cream, taking her time to savour it.

Because when it's done she hasn't got any real defenses left, except to look away petulantly and explain, "It's not really your business."

Zoisite has posed:
There is, just for the record, no sign of any magical energy whatsoever in the ice cream. Or the chocolate. There is also no odd aftertaste that might suggest anything else mixed into the ice cream and the chocolate. For the record.

Zoisite takes the commercial matcha and the other spoon, zips the cold back in over the plain chocolate, and tucks himself on the bench's far end. This is where he could be making indignant noises over the accusations, or flinching over the reference to Beryl. This is where he could be explaining the details of how Mercury's being not at her best affects her entire team's performance, therefore affecting Moon's safety, therefore affecting Endymion's, therefore making it his business. This is where he could even be explaining what his job actually is.

What he does instead is glance sidewise at her, head bent over his own ice cream, and say, "Usagi cries when you're upset."

Ami Mizuno has posed:
It's probably as much evidence that something's wrong that Ami didn't bother to check for magic. Either she's decided to trust Zoisite--something she really hasn't been given a lot of reasons to do--or she's decided she just doesn't care. One of those is far more alarming than the other, and tragically far more likely.

Ami has another mouthful of chocolate tea when Zoisite decides to give his answer. How she manages not to choke on her spoon is a miracle to investigate another day. She squeezes her ice cream so hard it nearly leaps out of the container, then stops herself and sets it down on the benchh beside her with the spoon buried in it.

Pushing herself up from the bench, she starts to walk away without another word--and not towards the library and her precious books. When she turns back, the look on her face is so filled with rage and pain it surely can't belong to Ami Mizuno. "How dare you," she says to him at a harsh whisper, then balls up her fist as if to punch him. She even draws her arm back, before she stops herself and turns to walk away again.

The walk returns back to his direction only a few moments later, landing it firmly in the 'pacing' category of movement, rather than retreating (although it really does look more like an uncomitted attempt at reat). "Usagi's better off without me," Ami points out to Zoisite a few moments later. "And if she's hurting over that, I really don't want her to .." she trails off, thoughts clearly racing leagues ahead of her mouth.

Again, the bluenette paces away, this time hugging herself quietly.

Zoisite has posed:
Even the people Zoisite shares a household with do not, by and large, eat things that Zoisite offers them unless they're known safe. Or allow him privileges in the kitchen they and Makoto cook in. It is entirely possible that that particular treat was designed from the idea stage onward just to see what Mercury did with it.

Strangling it may or may not have been on the list of possibilities. Strangling Zoisite was probably ranked a lot more likely.

When she turns back toward him, Zoisite is still sitting in the same place on the bench -- feet tucked underneath it, elbows close at his sides, ice cream in his lap. Spoon lowered; he's given up eating it to lift his head and watch her. Even her drawing her arm back only makes him brace, one of his own hands drawn up to protect hi face --

But she turns and walks away again, and he exhales. For a second or two, he might think the crisis was momentarily averted.

Then she speaks again.

The container of ice cream hitting the bench doesn't make much sound, but the spoon dropped next to it clatters. "Usagi would be a wreck without you!" Indignation and anger: there, that's a more familiar tone. "And you aren't better without her, either. Either you replaced your entire idea of logic with a white noise generator, or you've got a faulty premise someplace. What's gotten into you?"

From the sound of his voice, he's on his feet behind her, maybe three steps forward -- maybe one into the range of her pacing. Closer. Making a point of coming closer. But not making so much of one as to actually be close -- far more the symbol of it. In range. Out of reach.

Ami Mizuno has posed:
Ami whirls around to face him, and reaches out an arm to firmly press against his chest, halting any progress he might have in her direction very suddenly and assuredly (unless he decides to push past her arm). As their eyes meet, the rage and the pain she evinced moments ago with a contorted face are still evident ... but it's gone from everywhere else. Her face is only vaguely parsiminous, as if touching something offputting because she must and not because she wants to. Only her eyes still hold the secrets of that inner turmoil.

"Usagi wasn't a wreck without me before she met me," Ami points out to Zoisite, tone tart and abitter. "She will only be one now because she wants to be friends with everyone. That's part of what I love about her. Part of what everyone loves about her."

"You're right, though," she concedes eventually, "I'm not better without her. Which is why I'm not trying to divorce myself from her intentionally."

Ami takes her hand from Zoisite's chest, turns it over, and the Mercury pen appears there. "I'm literally nothing, without her," she explains, then presents the pen towards Zoisite, as if offering it to him.

"Just another would-be medical student," she explains, "who will get lost in the minutia of a challenging but rewarding job, but won't have time for friends or family. And someday, I'll go crazy enough to think my mother's wish to be a grandmother is a good idea, and then I'll repeat the cycle.

"Because I can't change my story," Ami explains to Zoisite, "no matter how hard I try, it continues to be written the same exact broken way."

Zoisite has posed:
The hand against Zoisite's chest doesn't stop him, per se -- he was already stopped -- but it keeps him there. He doesn't try to move forward, doesn't try to move at all, except for the way his left hand comes up as if to brush those first bitter words away. Without touching her hand, or her wrist, or her arm. Without touching or threatening to touch her at all; just the air.

The anger is still there in his eyes, in the set of his jaw; but he's still looking at her. When she takes her hand back; when the pen appears -- he doesn't look away from her face. Head still bent, so that somehow he can almost be glaring up at her, despite the difference in height.

(A few other students in the middle distance glance over at them, but do not, so far, interfere.)

"Check your premises," he says again, low. "You already changed your story. All of you did. You can tell, because it didn't have a big 'The End' mark two chapters ago. Maybe you can't change things by yourself, but so what? None of you did it alone. And you're all still here. If Usagi never met you, none of us would be."

His right hand comes up, runs over his hair, catches at his ponytail to pull it forward over his shoulder where he can drag fingertips through the end of it. "You don't have to be perfect for people to care about you. You don't have to fix everything for things to be better with you in them. And you don't have to be able to solve every problem by yourself. That's what friends are about. Why are you pushing them away? What's got you wrapped around the axle?"

Ami Mizuno has posed:
"I'm not pushing them away," Ami replies, raising her voice angrily. But then the hand holding her pen slowly drops to her side. She reaches the other behind her back and grabs her wrist gently, looking very much lost. "Not on purpose," she tells him.

"Still, we're heading for disaster," Ami tells him softly, "and it's probably my fault. I let myself think everything was okay," she says, then looks up again not to meet his eyes but at least to come close. "I let myself think I could let my guard down and just ... be a normal teenaged girl for one second. Except like a normal teenaged girl I made a stupid, idiotic mistake."

Ami takes a deep breath, then finally meets his eyes again. "Not that it's your business," she points out, "but Makoto hates me for that mistake. That's the problem, Zoisite. I screwed up, and the 'team' is dissolving because of it. She won't even talk to me. 'More time' she asks, each time I try. And Usagi, bless her heart, doesn't know what to do when both of her friends are hurting and it's drama she can't fix. So she's avoided getting in between us. We're falling apart, and it's my fault, and I can't fix it."

Zoisite has posed:
Zoisite's hand stops moving, still tangled in his hair, and green eyes just stare at her for a moment. Not angry, in that particular lingering instant. Something else.

Then he makes the faint note of disbelief clear, largely through the tone in which he says, "Oh my god."

His turn to take a deep breath and drop his eyes for a moment, flickering to her hand on her wrist -- then back up to look at her directly. "Look. If somebody got a bad cut, stitches and antibiotics and everything, and their little sister kept poking at it because she wanted to help. What do they say? They say 'don't do that right now,' right? 'You have to wait, it needs more time.' It doesn't mean it's not healing, right? It just means /ow that still hurts,/ doesn't it?"

Ami Mizuno has posed:
Ami's expression shrivels, from that wounded and far-too-open look to something bitter, angry, and frustrated. "You're such an asshole," she accuses Zoisite, then stalks past him back to the ice cream. Picking up the carton, she pulls out the spoon and shoves another mouthful in as she stalks away from him.

Ami finds another place to be alone, not too far away; indeed she's neither hard to follow nor hard to find if he doesn't follow right away, given she's just found a patch of wall to sit on and stare out at the parking lot in frustration.

Zoisite has posed:
"Guilty," is the only answer that follows her initially. She knows he's following her; she can catch a glimpse of that hair in the corner of her eye, sometimes, or of the intense green of his shirt.

He lets her get halfway through the ice cream before he manifests again. Just past the end of her section of wall, so that when he perches on the next down, positioned conveniently for her to glare at, there's both empty space and a decorative little concrete pyramid between them. Just on the edge of the wall, feet pressed against the side of it to provide enough leverage to balance him. On the parking-lot side. Not even potentially between her and her books.

"Being mad at somebody isn't the same thing as hating them," he says. "You can be mad at somebody and still be up for setting anybody else who hurts them on fire. People on a team can be ready to just about strangle each other, and still have each other's backs. It's not the end of the world. It's not even the end of the team. For us, it's pretty much Tuesday. I guess it doesn't happen as much for you girls. You're --" He shrugs, watching someone crawl desperately through the far reaches of the lot in search of a spot. Decent human beings, he doesn't say. "Nicer."

There's a pause, and he risks a sidelong glance her way; and only if she's still actually there does he say, "You like him that much, huh?"

Ami Mizuno has posed:
And glare Ami does, staring down at him from on high with her knees pressed together and her pain locked away behind walls of anger. She starts to open her mouth to sneak in a snarky comment about what makes the girls less prone to this sort of drama, but Zoisite beats her to it.

In that pause, she debates arguing a point, but he beats her to the next question, too, and so busy was she dwelling on the point in her mind that the question throws her off guard.

For a moment, Ami stares at Zoisite slackjawed. Then she clenches her jaw and shrugs. "I told her I'd break up with him if she asked me to. I meant it. I love the idea of what he could be, but I don't love what he is right now. So I guess ... no. I don't like him that much."

Zoisite has posed:
"So you're hurting her, and you don't want to be hurting her. And that's hurting you. And making it easier to get mad, and that means you can't try to help him." It's thinking out loud, tracing the lines of a pattern; echoed in the way Zoisite twists a curl around a finger of his far hand. "And if you can't even try, then it feels like you're hurting her for no good reason, doesn't it? And that makes it even easier to get mad. At everybody else. And at yourself. Because that's not what you meant to do, and not what you want to be doing, and you can't find a way out of it. And you're not doing anything about it, because you can't find anything to do that wouldn't make it even worse? Is that right?"

Ami Mizuno has posed:
"I'm doing something about it," Ami corrects him through gritted teeth. "I'm giving her all the time and space she could possibly want. I'm leaving her alone, I'm not siccing Usagi on her, I'm trying to avoid siccing Kunzite or Naru on her, but they're harder to fool. I'm trying, very hard, to give her time. Because I get it. I hurt her. And if she's going to forgive me it will have to be on her terms. And there's literally nothing else I can do except ... wait. And try desperately not to feel like I did something wrong, even though I know I did something wrong. And pray to God she doesn't take as long to come back as ..." Ami chokes on the rest of that sentence with a sudden well of tears in her eyes.

Half-heartedly, Ami throws the quarter-carton of ice cream at Zoisite. But her aim is bad, and she's not seeing straight right now, and she's mostly just freeing up her hands so she can reach up beneath her glasses and wipe those tears away. After a moment of trying desperately to regain that fragile facade of control and failing, she mumbles, "God damnit. Why can't you just go away?"

Zoisite has posed:
He ducks anyway. Even with the blur, she can see that hair flying.

There's the scuff of jeans sliding against concrete; two quick, quiet steps, and a softer sound beside her before two more steps retreat to give her her space again.

If she looks, there's a handkerchief on the wall next to her. (It's not Zoisite's. He stole one of Mamoru's.)

"Because it --" It's almost an answer to that question. Almost. But he cuts it off; doesn't sit on the wall this time, but on the pavement at its foot. Curls knees up to his chest and wraps his arms around them, and leans his head back against the wall. The sky is not any more helpful to stare at than the cars. He does it anyway.

Ami Mizuno has posed:
It's a few more minutes before she manages to get control again. Stubbornly she refuses the handkerchief for most of that time. Eventually she stops being an idiot, and does wipe at her face. At least she isn't bawling; these are the silent tears of frustration and self-loathing, rather than the noisesome ones of need and a desire for attention.

Eventually, with a sniffle, she wipes her nose one last time, then slides away from him a few before she drops down off the wall. "Look, you got what you wanted," Ami tells him after a few moments. "Just ... leave me alone. I can't fix anything. And this isn't better."

Zoisite has posed:
"Making things better was never my job." Zoisite says that more or less in the direction of the clouds, before he lets his head roll a little to the side, looking up at her. "It's pretty awful, isn't it? Trying to save somebody when you're not even sure they really exist, and everybody else is really sure they don't." He half-unfolds, the arm toward her coming off of his knees and falling to his side, his legs straightening a little. "But trying to do it alone is worse. You've had first aid courses, right? Maybe lifeguarding? What's the first thing you have to make sure of when you're trying to rescue somebody?"

Ami Mizuno has posed:
"Why are you still here?" Ami asks, as she picks up the pace to try and walk away from him faster. "I don't want your help, or your pity, or your ... whatever it is you think you're doing. Or maybe you think hurting me is fun. I suppose you would. God, I hate you. Go away. I'm not trying to save him, okay? I'm just trying to wait for Makoto."

Zoisite has posed:
Zoisite gets to his feet as she's talking, but doesn't chase after her; just lifts his voice enough for it to carry. "Because people care when you hurt. And because it's a bad time for you to be alone --" He's talking over her, after that first question, but somehow he's listening to her at the same time.

She can tell, because when she says 'go away,' his words stop.

If she looks back, he's walking the other direction, one arm crossed over low on his chest, the other hand trailing against the surface of the wall. He stops, but only long enough to pick up the ice-cream debris that won't solve itself by melting.

Ami Mizuno has posed:
Ami only makes it about another twenty steps before she does turn back to see where he's gone. She stares after the boy, retreating, and replays the conversation in her mind. By the time she's done, he's already back on his feet and walking away.

Ami wipes at her eyes again, sniffles, then sighs and turns away, only to find the zippered bag still waiting with the chocolate ice cream inside. Ami reaches down to pick up the bag and puts it over her shoulders, then heads towards the library to put her books away.

"Speed up your next round," she sneers to herself as she heads inside with her head bowed low and a hand up to shield her eyes from view.

"Jerk."

Zoisite has posed:
Zoisite does not intercept her in the library.

Zoisite does not ambush her on her way back out.

But about fifteen minutes later, her phone chimes with a text from an unfamiliar number.

Ami Mizuno has posed:
By then, Ami's on her way back out of the library, having cleaned up her mess and collected the things she brought in. She's still mostly hiding her face. The sound of her phone going off draws Ami's attention. She pulls it out and sighs at the unrecognized number, then opens it anyways. After all, it could be someone from Virtue in need.

Zoisite has posed:
You can always tell me to go away.

There is no other follow-up.

Ami Mizuno has posed:
Ami glares at the phone for a few minutes, then sighs and thumbs in a name for the sender. In a few hours, she might even change it to his actual name, instead of the epithet she has used for the moment. Then she heads for the bus, and her ride home.