89/She Dreams in Black and White

She Dreams in Black and White
Date of Scene:	23 June 2015
Location:	Mitakihara - Frozen Beach Ice Cream Shop
Synopsis:	Hiroko -- Mei's nemesis -- has parents who hire tutors for her. The latest one is high schooler Mamoru Chiba.
Cast of Characters:	Mamoru Chiba, Mei Akatsuki, Hiroko Koumoto

---

Hiroko Koumoto has posed:
    Ice cream. More than magic or friendship or love, ice cream is the great equalizer, the tie that binds all living things together. Well . . . at least when it's hot. And it's hot enough this afternoon, this week in Tokyo hovering in the 80's, the gloomy humidity of the daily rains making it feel even worse.

    Hiroko didn't ask for it, of course. But she doesn't ask for anything. She doesn't ask for water. She doesn't ask for breaks. She doesn't ask for things to be explained twice. From what Mamoru has seen, she just sits there and listens and does the work asked of her, work that she likely would have no problem doing even without a tutor. Why is he here anyway? Why do her parents expend the not insignificant cost of hiring a private tutor for their daughter, a girl who's already one of the top students in her class?

    Looking at her might answer that. Dignity. Poise. Restraint. All things that occur in ten year-olds unnaturally. She's pushed to be like this, to be more than her age, more than herself, to be perfect. And maybe that's Mamoru's job. To make this girl a little more perfect.

    So why ice cream? Is this some small mercy on his part? Who knows. His reasons are his own, and so far, Hiroko seems to have little interest in knowing him personally. But still, no matter how much darkness creeps into her heart, she's not turning down ice cream.

Mamoru Chiba has posed:
It could just be the usual combination of sheer cussedness and lack of give-a-damn on Mamoru's part that ice cream is a thing; it could be that he actually honestly does tend to get along with kids and generally knows how they react to things without damage versus with damage-- it could even be that he sees something of his younger self in the quiet, expressionless, obediant perfection Hiroko's displayed and just wishes to god someone had taken him out for ice cream when he was ten.

Or he could also just really want ice cream.

Picking a table by the window for ease of peoplewatching, the high-schooler hooks a chair out with his foot and deposits himself in it, very preciously cradling his big cup of double fudge swirl with zero adornments. "Hey," he says to Hiroko, spoon halfway to his mouth, "would you basically rather be doing anything but extra credit a year above your grade level, hours after school's let out? Because I know kids who enjoy it, but you don't look like you enjoy it."

Hiroko Koumoto has posed:
    Hiroko stares down into the ice cream in front of her. Vanilla. That's it. And she plays with it, which is perhaps a bit surprising, an act almost out of character for her. Her spoon twirls around, softening it up to her exact favored consistency before taking cold, creamy bites. It actually takes her a few moments to catch up to Mamo's words, her mind having momentarily drifted.

    She looks up. "Academic success starts early," the raven-haired girl says, sounding very much her age, not at all like she can't be bothered to do more than simply repeat the words of her parents. And then she looks down again. Poke. Spoon poke. Spoon poke again. Spoon tuuuuuuu . . . uuurn. "And I do other things. I have a full life." Full life or full schedule?

    It's not clear if she will ever warm up to Mamoru, or if there is even someone warmer inside at all. She doesn't seem particularly eager to reveal anything about herself. Even her appearance seems a little too polished, trained. The only small token of individual expression seems to be her pendant, lustrous silver holding a deep gray gemstone. It's hard to place exactly which mineral it is, though, as such a uniform gray is rare.

Mamoru Chiba has posed:
Especially for someone as fascinated with (fixated on?) gems and minerals and pretty stones as Mamoru Chiba, it's bothersome how unidentifiable it is. But, "Mm," is how he answers Hiroko's statement, slouching his angular frame comfortably in the angular frame of the ice cream parlor chair.

It's not judgemental on the surface, but for someone like Hiroko, it can probably be identified as such. This high schooler is sitting across from her, eating chocolate ice cream and judging her. He only looks at her briefly after her claim of a full life, because as he slouches, he looks out the window.

Beyond his initial fairly rude question upon sitting down, he's been generally quiet himself, as reserved and polite and lacking an opinion as any parent could want in a tutor for their perfect child. Maybe a little overanalytical and cautious, but those are not out of the range of likely personality traits in nerdy high schoolers. It's just that he has chocolate now. Maybe it's judgemental, uncivilized chocolate that promotes slouching.

Chiba's quiet for a while.

Then he says, amazingly actually lacking the judgement of that 'mm' a minute or so ago, "I don't believe you, but that's fine. What I actually need to know as your tutor is what you consider to be your favorite subject. Not your best, but your favorite. It will help me structure sessions and find the best ways to explain things you may have more trouble with."

Hiroko Koumoto has posed:
    "Art," Hiroko replies. Art, of course, isn't even a subject where Mamoru is tutoring her. Nor is it a subject in which most people /could/ tutor her. She knows that. And from the corner of her mouth, the faintest hint of a smug smirk appears. Delighting in a little bit of passive aggressiveness? She's showing her sharp edges. But if her answer was actually quite useful, she seems quite unaware. She's also showing she's not quite as sophisticated as she tries to look.

    Art _is_ different for her. In the other areas of her life, her performance is largely the result of money poured into preparation and training. But art? That's something she has talent with, even if she often appears ambivalent about it.

    But then that not-quite-smirk fades. She's remembering something. Rules? Some reminder from her parents catching up to her? Who knows. "Literature," she begins again, sounding more serious now, that brief moment of enthusiasm now gone, "is something I enjoy."

Mamoru Chiba has posed:
"--art?" repeats Mamoru, blinking and not quite sitting up, but clearly taking interest. A little smile starts to show in his eyes, more than the rest of his face; they're warm eyes anyway, generally, even if the rest of him tells lies or shields everything else. But now there's a smile back there. He keeps listening, either missing or disregarding the smug smirk, and his attention is focused.

The weight of it is unusual, like something ancient taking notice and settling in for really intense tea like an imposing but well-meaning royal aunt, and bringing with it millennia of dustily forgotten events. It's at incredible odds with his young face and lanky, awkward grace.

He finishes his ice cream pretty quickly while Hiroko's smirk is fading, and when she starts sounding serious and rote, he waves a hand impatiently. "That's not what I want to hear about. I want to hear about art. What kind of art? Manga? Illustration? Classical?" He sets his empty ice cream cup down and laces his fingers together on the tabletop, leaning forward a little bit. "What media? What subject matter? This is important, Hiroko-san. Every preference you can tell me will help."

Hiroko Koumoto has posed:
    Hiroko wasn't expecting the sudden interest in her artistic abilities. She smiles, though only briefly, but there's enough warmth there to show that it's not another pastime or something forced upon her. There's passion there. "Charcoal. Mostly representational pieces." There's a moment of hesitation, as if something else was going to follow, but she doesn't continue. She just keeps picking at her ice cream, nibbling at slow intervals, looking up at Mamoru occasionally.

    She's trying to figure him out. From an older person, that kind of open inquisitiveness might seem intrusive or aggressive. From her, it's mostly harmless. Hiroko Koumoto is terrible and menacing to a great many people, but very few of them are above the age of ten.

Mamoru Chiba has posed:
Charcoal; her grey stone, her grey mood and bearing -- but the bright warmth, however short-lived, that shines out when she's talking about it is enough to both relieve Mamoru immensely and soothe something that's been tugging irritatingly at the back of his mind. Honesty from others is his jam, no matter their baggage or motivations.

Analysis and calculation are also his jam, and that kind of open inquisitiveness from a ten-year-old is to be expected. The only problem is, nothing else about her has been expected. Carefully, he reconstructs some of his walls, but leaves the warmth and the engagement looking out from behind the mask, leaves the interest visible. "Excellent. So contrast and reduction in combination with relatability and communication. Landscapes, portraits, a mix--?"

Hiroko Koumoto has posed:
    "A little bit of everything," Hiroko states noncommittally. The sound of metal clinking on glass is heard as the last few bites of ice cream disappear in front of her. "Mostly portraiture or objects. I find landscapes are harder when you're using charcoal." There's a roteness to her voice, as if she had experienced this part of their conversation, or some variant of it, many times before. And there's a note of dissatisfaction that Mamoru can hear as she repeats those answers, one that he never heard when she was at home. There's a rougher side of Hiroko, clearly, which comes out more the farther she gets from the authority figures in her life.

    She hasn't asked anything about Mamoru yet, though. It's not clear why. She might not care. Or she might not be used to real conversation at all. She does seem like a girl very much used to being talked at and talked around without ever needing, or being requested to, meaningfully engage.

Mamoru Chiba has posed:
It also means she's not actively fighting his inquiries, the lack of asking -- or it's simply something she hasn't learned is a social weapon yet, a defense mechanism against prying. On the other hand, she could just be gathering data points via what he asks and how...

One thing about Mamoru Chiba is that he takes kids as seriously as he takes adults. He could be patronizing her, but there has been exactly zero indication that that's the case this entire time, and that in and of itself is undoubtedly unusual. His body language is attentive and reservedly receptive; he's trying to listen to what she's not saying.

"...do you like doing portraits and still lifes?" he asks, cocking an eyebrow and sitting up, then reaching up to adjust his glasses. "Or do you like landscapes better, and it's only the medium that's giving you difficulty?"

Hiroko Koumoto has posed:
    Hiroko may be polished outwardly, but on the inside, she's separated from her peers by less than one might think. Almost. There is one thing different about her, of course, though that just might be a very big thing. And as far as /the other girl/ goes, she also might be less calculating than /her peers/. Calculation doesn't even quite seem like Hiroko's thing, if her actions are any indication.

    She swallows, a nervous smile spreading across her face. Mamoru has hit a soft spot, it seems, and now she's trying to hide her reaction. But it's not malicious deception; it doesn't look like there's a dark secret behind this specific response, even if she might have her share of them. No. It's just unhappiness, veiled, but obvious to those who know how to look. "There are other mediums which might make landscape artistry a bit easier," she replies. Easier? What kind of artist describes methods and mediums in terms of easier and harder? "But I'm good with charcoal, and I'm confident with landscapes too."

Mamoru Chiba has posed:
Unhappiness.

It's Mamoru's least favorite thing to see in children: that bone-deep hopeless unhappiness that's not old enough to be weary or develop a gallows sense of humor about it. It's Mamoru's soft spot, because he's walled himself off from other people's joy so long that it's the thing that resonates the most loudly. It's Mamoru's soft spot because he actually does care, no matter how hard he usually tries not to.

It's practically tinnitis when the source is a child.

He can't quite keep his empathy completely out of his expression, but he's firmly not solicitous. "If you go to art school, you're required to have classes in an incredibly diverse array of different media," he observes, folding his hands on the table again. "If you're especially good in some of them, there are merit scholarships, and if you're best at expressing your thoughts in something that's not charcoal, when you take those classes? That would be the way they'd encourage you to go for the scholarship, and the opportunities for exposure and contracts that would come from it. So even if your heart's set on charcoal, it would be a good idea to keep an open mind. And it wouldn't be a bad idea to start practicing now."

There's a very brief and crooked half-grin on the high schooler's face for a moment. "Artistic success starts early." The delivery's tonally deadpan, and combined with that grin, that adds up to a distinctly conspiratorial air.

Mei Akatsuki has posed:
Just then, Mamoru's Tuxedo Kamen burner phone -- wherever he keeps it -- begins going off, with whatever combination of sound and/or vibration he has set up. The source: Red-chan. But she is not speaking.

Instead, whatever he hears when he picks up (or listens to the voicemail) is muffled noise, with feedback to spare. There's the sound of frantic running, with all the strained, panicked breathing you'd expect, ended after a few seconds by a startled cry and an impact with the ground, followed shortly by the phone hitting the ground as well. It's a miracle it's even still recording, honestly.

From a distance, Mei's voice can be heard: "If you want it. Come take it from me." Her feeble tone does not match the spirit of her words.

The call is ongoing, still ticking upwards in time despite the silence that falls after her short ultimatum.

Mamoru Chiba has posed:
Before Mamoru can say anything else, before Hiroko can even react, Mamoru's pocket is buzzing and playing the Final Fantasy victory music. He is, indeed, the type to put a ringtone on a tracfone. It doesn't even occur to him that this may make for awkward situations at some point.

When he hears it, though, he gives Hiroko an apologetic look and takes the phone out, flipping it open. "I'm sorry, please excuse me, it's a friend of mine who has a tendency to get in trouble," he says, then lowers his voice and half-turns away. "Yo." After a second, he frowns, expression (sideways as it is) going instantly concerned. "M--" he starts to ask, and then the color drains from his face.

He gives Hiroko a look that's flat with fear for exactly a fifth of a second before it turns completely business and quite grim. "My humblest apologies, Koumoto-san," he says formally, getting up quickly, and then his words grow increasingly rushed as he continues, "I have to go right now. I'll see you next week, but if you need anything from me before then, you have my number."

He basically just has enough presence of mind to push his empty cup into the trash as he's going out the door; he hits the sidewalk at a dead run, phone plastered to his ear.

Hiroko Koumoto has posed:
    She's about to say something, maybe even about to smile, but then the phone rings, and as soon as she hears that ringtone, Hiroko's face goes blank. There's a certain staid stoicism in her expression as it unfolds, as the call captures his attention, as he suddenly stands and leaves. What does she think about it? What does she feel about it? Who knows; she probably doesn't herself. She just quietly reaches into her bag at her side, withdrawing her wallet, popping it open, checking. Enough for two more scoops? Yeah. /May as well/, she thinks. This kind of ending? To her, it just might be old news.