"Do it!" exclaimed Haruka with a gleam in her cobalt-colored eyes.
Mizuru's throat bobbed, with a palpable gulp of anxiety.
"N-no way..." Mizuru protested weakly, clenching her skirt so that the sweat from her palms smeared onto the coarse material.
Haruka's eyes betrayed minute exasperation, but she continued to goad on her companion with honeyed words. "C'monnn, Mizuruuuu," she whined sweetly. "It's not like anyone's going to see," she assured her.
"Still, I..." Mizuru stared at the structure beside her stagnant left hand. Her face scrunched up with unpleasantness. "I feel stupid, Haruka."
"No, no! This is only for practice! I promise!" Haruka saw her friend's doubtful expression, and proceeded to bolster her argument with wide hand gesticulations. Her arm propped akimbo, Haruka leaned forward and frowned disapprovingly at Mizuru's blatant uncertainty. For added effect, she sighed heavily, as if she were a divine disappointed. "Mizuru, Mizuru," she repeated, "how you gonna do this, anyhow? I tried, didn't I? I told you to just go and do it straight-out, but--no--you're too chicken still, after all this time. And what, you won't even do this small--"
"I just...Haruka...this isn't normal..." Mizuru piped up, quietly, looking hopeful for a way out.
"'NORMAL,' Mizuru?" Haruka threw up her hands. "You wanted 'normal'? Then you should have done it like I said before! But you're too scared, and now here we are, still arguing about something really so simple."
The ten-year-old girl hung her head, ashamed. "Well...it's just...it's not even a real person..."
"Real person? What, you wanna practice with GAARA?"
Mizuru gasped sharply in fear, stumbling back a step. "No, no! I never said that!"
"Well, then!"
Mizuru Takata ran out of fight. On the other hand, Haruka seemed to accelerate to passion with every passing second, speaking considerably louder now than before.
Mizuru's shoulders sagged in defeat. Haruka was an unquenchable force of nature; bending wills was her specialty. And, as much as Mizuru wanted to deny it, she did want to try...just not this way. This was mortifying.
Nevertheless, whether it was her own feet or Haruka's eager prod, she stiffly shuffled forward. Her unclenched left hand barely brushed the matted brown hair.
It made her want to crawl into a hole.
Mizuru stared at the stationary figure next to her, lackadaisically spread upon the short, stout, wooden work table. Huge, bulbous eyes stared up, and she almost swore that the third one revolved dementedly in its socket. Then--horrors of horrors--lingered on her, infinitesimally, of course; but it was enough to make her want to shake her head vehemently and swear to nunnery. She did neither, though--not under Haruka's watchful eyes. Oh, she was such a lovely best friend, but sometimes she was just asking to get spanked--
"Mizuru."
"I...I know," she coughed, eyes transfixed on the unnaturally white set of wooden teeth. She leaned forward, licking her dry, chapped lips anxiously, hoping her lips would never hit its target. As she bent forward, her whole upper body shook and trembled in revulsion and nervousness; but if she just closed her eyes like Haruka said--she could almost imagine his mischievous, green eyes and his messy mop of brown hair...his idiosyncratic speech, his flat, retarded jokes...
Her crush, her crush, her crush.
Heart--a-thump-thump. Heart--a-thump-thump.
Suddenly, a hand slammed into her back, speeding her forward. Mizuru screamed, elbows locking automatically. Her hands immediately braced themselves on the edges of the table.
She had stopped herself just inches from contact.
Her organs pulsed erratically. Stunned, she stared at the unattractive carved face in front of her's before snapping her head back, eyes wide and wild. "HARUKA!" Mizuru shrieked.
Haruka's features darkened at her Mizuru's censure, but she only opened her mouth to justify her playful gesture. She shrugged. "You were taking too long." Haruka brightened instanteously, unable to be dampened in her endeavors in any way. "Go on..." she urged, nudging her forward with the soft push from the base of her palm.
"No!" came Mizuru's fearful cry.
Haruka's mouth dropped open, but was soon set to recover. "Mizu--"
"No! I-I...I just can't do it!" Mizuru ululated.
"M--"
Mizuru twisted away from Haruka's hand, and did an about-face. As her eyes alighted on the exit, they also fell on one somewhat chubby, brown-haired ten-year-old standing two feet away from it, and two inches right in front of her, holding a melting, vanilla ice cream cone in one hand.
Mizuru's eyes widened and practically shattered like light bulbs.
Much to the boy's alarm, she opened her tiny mouth wide--
And screamed like the devil.
Kankuro almost clapped his hands over his ears, but, in passing, realized his hard-earned ice cream would be in mortal danger.
Rather, Kankuro managed to stumble backward a step, before a fumbling Mizuru pulverized through his room in flight.
He was only going to ask Mizuru what she was doing in his puppet room. After all, she messing with his marionettes...lips puckered, cheeks of flaring red, humiliation riddling her rotund face...
He turned to stare at Haruka.
"What's her problem?"
→ KANKURO.
OH, KANKURO. You utterly adorable doofus, you. :3
Because sometimes I have no life.
And that's because I've been sporadic, at best. So, I apologize. That's an apology banner; don't let it fool you.
And I'm going to attempt to be normal now. No, really. I'm not joking. Stop laughing.
So, this was a bit ambiguous, but I hope you picked up on all the context clues, because if you didn't, I fail as a writer and you'd be confused. I'm not going to explain it, but if you're like, "WTH/F?" then it's perfectly acceptable if you just want to breeze on by without a second thought.
P.S. Contrary to popular belief, I haven't actually been that stagnant. None of you noticed this, but--ha!--I updated.
http://www.quizilla.com/users/rainhealsme/quizzes/%26%2312300%3B%20Life%20.%20NejiTen%20.%20Support%20%26%2312301%3B/
And if you made it this far, kudos. ♥
A fanciful treat for yewwwww.
