Chapter 2 Part 1: a second cup

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Onikko

{鬼っ子}

chapter 2 part one - a second cup

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At exactly 1:52 pm, Yoichi Isagi once again braves Japan's pissiest barista.

Only, he doesn't. Not really. Because he spots a familiar head of messy dark locks already stationed at the same table from yesterday. The striker immediately gravitates towards Reina; he needs her as backup before facing Megumi-san. 'That crazy barista might just be more volatile than even Barou... and that's a pretty high bar to beat.'

Reina sits facing away from the café's entrance, so Isagi approaches her from behind. As he gets closer, he sees the completely cluttered table. Several textbooks are splayed out in front of her. The ones that are open are randomly angled atop each other, and some are half in between notebooks and other scrap pieces of paper. Multiple sticky notes in varying sizes and colours stick out from the textbooks, and also hang out of piles of printed out journal articles. Utterly engulfed amidst her disorderly piles of madness, Reina clicks away at her laptop. She's so absorbed by her work that she doesn't even notice when he seats himself in the chair across from her.

Isagi takes the opportunity to observe the girl.

'I can sort of see it, now.' The resemblance between Rin and Reina takes time to discover. It manifests in things that warrant a second look to recognize: the long curled eyelashes, the camber of their eyebrows, and the ears that stick out just a little.'Enough to use as a stand for a pen.' As he thinks that, she grabs a bright purple pen from its perch on her right ear to quickly scribble something in the notebook closest to her. Then he watches, horrified, as she proceeds to stick the pen in her mouth before hastily typing something in her computer. 'Gross.'

She's got ink smears and highlighter stains all over her right hand. Isagi doesn't remember the colourful splotches marring her tawny skin yesterday. His gaze leaves her to scan the notes stretched out in front of him. 'Huh.' Even upside down, he notices. "Your writing... might actually be worse than mine."

Reina startles at his words. She looks up, wide-eyed, and lets the pen plop out of her mouth. 'Still gross.'

She recovers quickly, picks up the soiled pen, and fiercely points it between them. Her cheeks puff out like a chipmunk as she chastises him. "Hello works better than insults to greet people, Isagi-san." She drops her gaze back to her screen. "But I'll host your manners lesson in a bit. Give me just one more minute to finish getting this idea down."

"Take your time," he placates, resting his head on a closed fist. To distract himself from the way she tucks the pen back behind her ear, Isagi looks closer at her notes while she click-clacks away. 'She's so messy.' Her notebooks, articles, and used looseleaf take up the entire surface area of the table that isn't already commandeered by her textbooks.'She's writing in Japanese, but she's also writing in... English?' He tries to decipher her sloppy penmanship to no avail. 'Guess she's fluent in both.' He examines the textbooks closest to him, too. Most are open to pages with long paragraphs and multi-line equations, but there's one book that shows some large photos of constellations. There's another open book that definitely looks like it's written in English, filled with pink and green highlighting. 'Wonder what that one's about?' He turns his attention back towards the girl, observes how her fingers go and go like an unrelenting motor, and how her eyes quickly dart from side to side as she types. 'Are those...' He looks closer and frowns. 'She's got pretty noticeable bags under her eyes today, and they're a bit red-webbed at the edges.' He runs his gaze over her, registering her shapeless sweater and hair that's tossed up into a messy bun.

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