The next day, I get up at 1pm, hyper-preparing for something that is happening in three hours. The shower is warm, it feels like I'm more energized, and taking a shower feels like something I have to focus on. I slick my hair back and i decide to spike it a bit, I don't try to style my hair but I want to look good.
When the clock hits 4:15 I begin to make my way to the purple benches near the playground of the school, and she's standing on a swing, for some reason, and she's trying to propel herself. Oh wait, I forgot, she wanted to hang out at 4:00, I thought she meant 4:30 but I don't think she'll say anything about it.
"What're you doing Mika?"
"I don't really know, I'm bored." As she is trying to push herself higher up with the swing, her knees bend, and her feet slip, tumbling her backwards
I start laughing—like actually laughing for the first time in a while. I quickly lose my balance and fall sideways
She starts laughing and is standing now all of a sudden, and I wonder if she's okay.
"Let's go Mika."
As we take our walk all of a sudden she says
"Get on the outside of the sidewalk and be a gentleman." I'm on the inside of the sidewalk
"Okay, okay sorry…" I move on the outside of the sidewalk, and I laugh a bit.
There's a ramen shop up ahead, I guess I didn't see it, I feel like I would've known if it was there.
"Mika there's a ramen shop we can go to, should we?"
"Oh sure, I haven't had ramen in quite a bit."
We get in the shop, and the man greets us. We take a look at the kiosk menu. I scroll down and there is hmm.. miso ramen, shoyu, shio and a lot more…
"Anything catching your eye?" I ask Mika as she is zoning out on the menu
I go to the drinks section on the kiosk and see if they do have boba.
"Oooh they have brown sugar boba, can you get me a large?"
"Yeah sure." I select Brown Sugar Boba on the menu and choose a 32oz cup.
"You don't want food or anything?"
"No, not really, I'm not hungry, I'll try a bite of ramen if you get some."
"Yeah that's fine I don't really mind." When I go back to the ramen section of the kiosk, I get shoyu ramen with two boiled eggs and napa cabbage.
I tap my card on the kiosk for the payment and it comes out to 4394 yen.
We get to a wooden booth with cushions and she sits on the opposite side of me. Today her hair is straight down, only reaching the middle of her neck, and her bangs look nice on her.
"Why are you death staring me?" Looking at me back with a confused expression
"Just zoning out"
"It's like you always zone out, what's wrong?" asking me with an expected answer
"Looking at you."
"What, you like my hair?." She asks like I didn't already know how her hair looked.
"Yeah, your hair is really pretty today." Mesmerization evident.
"Maybe I should have my hair like this just for you?"
"Well you should also do it for yourself, not just for me."
"So yes, okay got it."
The waiter comes over to our table, he places the ramen down and the boba. He leaves shortly, and she bows as his back is turned on her.
"Can I have a sip of your boba?"
"Yeah sure I don't mind."
I take a straw, and tear the paper around it. The boba actually is pretty good, a bit too sweet.
"It's too sweet." I say as I give it to her, scrunching my face slightly
She grabs the cup of boba and sips from the same straw and practically breathes it in.
"It's pretty sweet, but it's still good." She says with mocking intent
"Yeah it was quite a bit, these are the fruits of paying."
"Thanks for getting this for me. I do appreciate it." She says as I weakly grab the noodles with the chopsticks, and she looks at me with blank judgement.
"I'm still learning how to."
"I taught you and I'm the best chopstick teacher, it's a user error." She flicks my head and it doesn't hurt.
I raise the chopsticks with the noodle weakly, and before I bring it to my mouth…
"You said I could have a bite!"
"I didn't even have a bite yet."
I slowly take the noodles in my mouth, and she looks at me, waiting until I'm done, and the moment the noodles go in my mouth.
"NOW let me have a bite." A commanding tone with an undertone of vexation.
"Okay, geez, have it." I give her the bowl of ramen.
She has a bite but keeps getting more noodles.
"Alright, that's enough." I take the bowl from her and the chopsticks from her fingers.
I finish my ramen, and she wants to go shop at a mall that's only ten minutes away. We start talking about our favorite music, I mention how I like shoegaze and metal, and she doesn't listen to music too much. She buys 3 pairs of normal jeans and I decide to buy her a brown fur jacket that was however much money, I didn't want to look but there was six digits, followed by a one and a three.
Fifteen minutes later we exit the ramen shop, we're walking around the block and the air got louder with the silence of our voices, I think we both don't know what to talk about. I'm holding her shopping bag and the wind picks up and the bag isn't affected.
"So-"
"Well-"
We both attempt at talking, and it doesn't go well.
"You go first" She says.
"No what'd you have to say?" I ask, attempting it to be directed to her.
"Nothing."
We both proceed to walk in silence for another five minutes.
"It's 5:30, and it's getting pretty dark. Do you wanna walk me home? Or well, the adoption center, whatever you wanna call it." Her voice dims by the end due to her overexplaining, trying to not sound weird.
"Yeah sure, I wouldn't mind at all. How far away is it?"
She checks her phone and it says twenty minutes in walking distance, and we both don't want to walk twenty minutes.
"I can buy a taxi, I don't want to walk any longer my legs are giving out." I only suggest it because of the silence we've both allowed settle while walking alone, and it's dark.
"Yeah sure, we can."