Work Text:
Golden Hour Writing Challenge of July: Day 5
Prompt: Bare Feet On The Warm Ground (what the fuck do I do with this???)
Ship: N/A
I love Kyouka and Kenji so much 😭
BRING THEM BACK ASAGIRI, GIVE US OUR BABIES
. . . . . . . . .
‘Kenji-Kun, come on! The ice cream truck is gonna leave if you don’t hurry up!’
Kyouka called, tugging on the blonde boy’s arm in a valiant attempt to pull him away from what was apparently, in Kenji’s opinion, and incredibly fascinating orange caterpillar that had wrapped itself around a hyacinth stem and was slowly inching up the stalk.
‘But Kyou-channnn, look at her! She’s so chunky! How can you not think she’s just sooo cute?’
Kyouka raised an eyebrow at her friend’s gushing, though she did poke at the little thing in curiously. It was surprisingly soft for something that looked like a dehydrated, inflated worm infused with face paint and tiny spine-like hairs.
‘Kenji. You’re choosing a caterpillar over ICECREAM? Come ON! I want to get a strawberry cream pop, it’s gonna leave! Let’s go, let’s go!’
‘Awwww, can we at least give her a name before we go? Please? Pleaseeee, Kyou-Chan?’
‘…fine. What do you think we should call her? She’s awfully orange, it reminds me of Chuuya-san’s hair.’
‘Wait! What if we named her Mrs. Fancy-Hat? I bet we could get Dazai-san to send him a picture! Do you have your phone?’
‘Perfect! I do, give me a second to get a good angle… there! I’ll text him in a bit. Now let’s go!’
‘Awwww… I was hoping you’d forgotten…’
Eventually, Kenji allowed himself to be dragged away from the bush, an adorable pout replacing his earlier grin. He shuffled a few feet behind Kyouka, who had taken to walking in front for the sake of getting her sweet treat first. City folk… there was an icecream shop just a ten minute walk away, why was she so bent on getting it from this colorful car?
‘Kenji! Kenji, are you listening?’
‘Kenji? Are you there? Kenjiiiiiiiii?’
Several snaps in front of his face startled him out of his thoughts, his head whipping to the side to smile sheepishly at a seemingly very annoyed Kyouka, who gestured exasperatedly to the menu at the top of the truck.
What was going on again? Right! Icecream! He must have zoned out again, since the Singularity Incident and his memories coming back a bit foggy after being released from the sword, he’d started unfocusing on whatever task was at hand and just staring at the closest object until someone snapped him out of it.
‘What flavor do you want? Or do you just want the same as me?’
‘Oh, lemon is fine! It’s nice and tart, we used to grow lemons back in my village!’
Kyouka nodded, turning confidently back to the young woman running the truck. After giving her their orders, at least, he assumed that was what she was doing, Kenji wasn’t really paying attention, his friend handed a few hundred yen bills through the window, the colorful little rings on her fingers catching the light in a way that made them seem more like crystals than colorful plastic.
Due to the Yokohama heat moving in with the beginning of June, many of the agency members swapped out their usual somewhat formal clothes for casual, more breathable outfits, save for the President himself, of course, and Naomi, who had said her uniform was comfy enough.
Of course, the two youngest members were no exception to such a movement, Kyouka had swapped out her Kimono for a puffy sleeved light pinkish crème blouse and a flower patterned skirt and pastel rings, while Kenji opted for denim shorts, a honey yellow bee shirt and countless little flower clips decorating his lemon blonde hair.
A moment later, the woman reappeared, handed them their respective fruit pops, and waved them off with a smile as the small crowd of children behind them rushed up to collect their own treats.
‘Okay, now we can go do whatever we want. Was it really so hard to leave the caterpillar alone for 5 minutes, Kenji?’
‘Nope, not really. What do you want to do now? I think everyone else is still back at the office, and it’ll just be boring if we go back with no work to do.’
‘Hmmmmm… what if we went to the pier? I can show you how to make a witch’s sand castle? They look AWESOME once you get the hang of it.’
Kenji’s eyes lit up the suggestion, his mouth falling open in a little “o” at such an, in his opinion, ominous sounding name. Was she going to make an actual witch out of the sand? A sandwich! Probably not made out of actual sound though, that would get stuck in your teeth…
‘A witch’s sand castle? That sounds creepy… you know what? Why not? Let’s go! We should probably get some shoes from our dorms, though. I don’t want to burn my feet on the sand.’
‘That’s a good idea, shoes first.’