milliways_bar | (no subject)

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noriko ashida

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Noriko comes down to the bar today in comfortable leggings and an overlarge shirt (not hers), and a very large armful of bulky white yarn: it must amount to several dozen yards when stretched out. Luckily for her it's in a huge wrapped skein that's somewhat easier to carry, and doesn't take up nearly as much room in the chair with her.

She has about half of her shape done, which currently looks like a slightly misshapen bag of white stiff knit. When she's done, she'll have a very big--think person-sized--white fox ready to be stuffed. That part may be somewhat more messy to deal with, but she'll manage with several trips to the bar for more stuffing.

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Nearby there is a cyborg with a rather unimaginative name, studying a holoprojection, when Noriko enters.

"Hey. Long time no see."

"I haven't been in for a while," Nori says, sitting down with her stuff and picking up the knitting rather easily. "A bunch of stuff has been going on."

"Same here. Sometimes I have no time to even think." Or at least think about not-hero stuff.

"Oh, I always time for that," she says. Even at her normal functioning speed if she couldn't think, something was very wrong. "This is just something to take up downtime."

"Lucky you. I try to focus, and the comm buzzes and I'm off to Bialya or something." He exaggerates. He's never been to Bialya.

"I'm lucky, I don't get yanked off like that unless I know what's happened, generally speaking."

"Your team must do things differently. Or your team leader." Nightwing still acts like if he tells the Titans to jump, they jump and then ask later about "how high?"

"I am my team leader," she says tonelessly. "We do things very differently."

He considers this. "I was leader of a team for about a month. I liked it, but things didn't entirely work out, and at the time I was happy behind just another hero."

"Hello, Chere'. Lookin' good." Remy smiles as he slinks in from outside the Door, carrying a small set of grocery bags in his hands and under his arms.

Okay, maybe not a small set, really. He sets them down near her and grins as he goes in for a kiss. "How the heck are you?"

"Hey, you," she greets Remy affectionately, smiling as she pushes her glasses up and sets aside the needles in her lap. "I'm pretty good, but evidently interrupting...?" she asks, nodding at the grocery bags.

"We catch you in the middle of being a normal man, Cajun?"

"Bar likes to steal me, apparently, from the world. Not objecting, as next errand I had to go to was a long, boring, meeting." He settles there near her, eyes warm.

"I was out buying presents for myself, and others." There might be a little teasing in his tone. Yes, some of those presents are for her.

"Oh, presents?" she asks, lopsided smile erasing the vague tension that's been hanging around for a while now. Since February, really, but not because of Remy.

"Dare I even ask, loverboy, what your solution to a long and boring meeting is?"

"Thinking of things we could share, things for you, period, and fun things." He grins as he digs in one bag and pulls out a pair of packages. The smaller one he held out first, then the larger one.

"First a present for you, then one for us. Might want to open the one for us in a room, though." His grin was smirky. He didn't mind others seeing the stuff, really. He most cared about her liking of them.

The present for her was a small package of very fine, very rare folding paper for origami, claimed from an expert's own stock, with a design book showing several designs from both ancient and modern times. It also included a very small pendant for her, one that was black on one side and a beautiful azure blue on the other, hanging on a chain of nonconductive metal.

The other package held him and her swimsuits of the very small and very shameless variety, specially designed for them both out of unstable molecules, so they could go transparent, or completely opaque, as desired.

"You're ridiculous," she chuckles. "You don't have to buy me things, Remy, you know that. I have a job, I can buy myself things."

Noriko took the smaller package carefully, and opened it with a small smile, growing brighter when she saw the origami paper and the tiny, precious necklace. It was beautifully carved black onyx caging a blue pearl, taking her breath away as she looked up to Remy. "Oh my god, Remy. You didn't have to buy something like this."

"I am, yes." He grins at her. "And I know. You can more than take care of yourself. This isn't about that. This is just me buying you something because I can. Because I love making you smile."

He smirks as she opens the package and sees the necklace.

"I know. But I wanted to make you smile. Just like that." he nods.

It's a beautiful necklace, and Noriko pulls it and the chain, anodized black to match the tone--out of the little box to hold it up to her neck. The stone cage looked surprisingly delicate and yet strong, given it was onyx. "This is gorgeous, Remy," she murmurs. "Where did you find something like this?"

"That's what took so long. I tracked down an old friend in Japan, where I was looking for the papers, and was able to find him. He does this sort of work, on request, and I wanted something that held both darkness and light. I wanted to give you a present that showed you the light and joy I see in you."

He bent to kiss her lightly, tenderly, for he was smiling against her lips.

"But darkness?" she asked, head tilted as she clasped the necklace around her throat.

"It's beautiful, and I do like it. As well as the papers--you know I love them." Noriko met him in that kiss, setting aside the knitted fox.

"We live in darkness, chere'. Finding joy, and light, in that darkness is what makes life worthwhile. You are a light, and a joy, for me." He murmured the words to her, his accent thick as he smiled softly at her.

"I just wanted to... well, make you smile." He liked making her smile.

Noriko smiled at Remy, and leaned into his shoulder a little. "I'm glad. I like making you smile too, it just usually happens a different way."

She didn't mind sex being the thing that made Remy happy, even if it wasn't the thing he liked about her the most. "You want to help me with this?" she asked, setting aside the box yet unopened and the origami papers, lifting the giant mess of white knit. "Big pillow." Like, as big as Noriko, easily. But one she can curl up in when she isn't sleeping with Remy.

Remy chuckled. "You'd be surprised what makes me smile about you, beauty." He loved to think about her, sometimes, when he was doing other things. He knew that he smiled when he did so. And sometimes those around him would apparently get nervous when he smiled. No idea why anyone would ever feel that way. Nope.

"Sure. How do you want to do it?"

"I wouldn't be if you told me," she murmured, smiling and wrinkling her nose. "I just need to stuff it and sew it closed, but I need a lot of help with the stuffing thing. It takes a lot."

"I like when you talk, that little accent you have, it makes me grin. And when you lay near me, and just are there. I smile a lot thinking about you being near."

He nodded, touching her nose lightly, tapping it. "I like how you create things, seeing you working, and making something, it makes me smile, too."

Remy listened, then grinned. "I'd be glad to help you."

"You know," she said, "If you like watching me work I have an idea we could try."

Something she's been relatively hesitant to bring up with Remy, but she likes practicing. "But it'd mean we have to be...a little more private."

"Oh yeah? I'm up for it. I'm always willing to be private with you."
He does like being around her, a lot.

"Well, then, let's take this upstairs, and once we're done with this, I'll show you," she says, hefting the white pile of knit into her lap.

"Do you know what shibari is?" she asks, swinging her legs down to the floor.

"Alright." He rose, smiling.

"Shibari... it involves rope, and... " He shook his head. "I am unsure of the rest."

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