The First Steps to a New Life [Ayaka & Co.]

[Tensei Kaori]

The days after the Hokage's speech passed in much the same fashion for Ayaka. She either wandered aimlessly, chatted with any of her new friends she happened to run into, or sat on her cot, hugging her knees and staring at nothing. She enjoyed looking at her treasures – the red Oni mask, the picture Ryuurei-san had drawn for her, the photo of her and her mom, and even the “autographed” fence post – but she didn't want to wreck them by handling them too much.

The ninjas who ran the tents – Ayaka was actually getting to know some of their names by now, since it was usually the same ones taking the same shifts every day – kept them updated on the situation in the village: the Hokage had ordered every business capable of running to reopen, and the carpenters were working on rebuilding homes or important public buildings. Seeing the shops open up again meant that people were starting to go out and buy things again, which gave the shop owners money to feed their families and fund any repairs of their own. This of course meant that the entrepreneurs whose businesses were damaged were now losing money to their competitors, so they hired carpenters of their own to get the shops and restaurants and who knew what all back open so they could get back on their feet. Even the hot springs had reopened, much to the apparent joy of the workers, who – according to one of the ninjas with red and black hair; Ayaka could never tell those two apart – had practically stampeded to that district as soon as they got an evening off. All in all, despite the destruction and the chaos, the village was actually starting to feel alive. This did mean, however, that Ayaka found that particular level of liveliness quite daunting, so she stayed in the tent more and more as the days went on and more people began coming out to resume their lives.

She was a bit jealous of Tsutomegi, who seemed perfectly capable of going out and exploring despite the chaos going on outside. She had, however, gotten used to going outside in the evening hours for a bit of fresh air after most people had gone in for dinner, but that didn't give her much time to really see anything. For the most part, Ayaka's world consisted of the tents, the food pavilion, and the bits of the village she saw going and coming from the bath house. She had considered sampling the fare at one of the newly open restaurants – the smells coming from those places were almost too alluring to resist – but she had hardly any money left at all. So she did her best to remain content with the food the rest of the refugees ate, and getting her news from the tent ninjas. And, of course, by asking Tsutomegi about his explorations. She enjoyed their chats, and with her increasingly hermetic lifestyle, he was the only person she really knew whom she saw on anything resembling a regular basis. Their other tentmates were all out helping the other villagers during the day, and the tent ninjas had work to do.

The tent itself, despite the ninjas' reassurance that repair on the apartments was underway and the Administration would be requesting information from anyone seeking to gain residence in Konoha, was beginning to look very homelike. People had salvaged old bedside tables, chairs, and even a trunk or two, and were using them to create their own little spaces. Someone had even surrounded their cot with folding paper screens until the tent ninjas asked them to kindly remove the fire hazard. That didn't stop people from making themselves at home, though; brightly colored quilts and blankets had replaced – or covered – the dark green blankets that had been provided with the cots, photos were set out on tables, and children's toys were piled under beds when the families were gone doing whatever it was they did during the day.

Ayaka herself had managed to salvage a pair of wooden cratelike boxes from a pile of discarded old lumber and brought them back to the tent; stacked on top of one another so that their open tops faced out into the tent, they made a pretty decent shelf. With a hole-riddled tablecloth and an old stained shirt big enough to cover three of her cushioning the “shelves” and a worn out bedsheet draped over the whole thing, it made a pretty decent 'cabinet' for her treasures. The mateless geta she had tripped over all the time made an excellent 'stand' for Oni-san when propped up right, while the picture frames easily stood up on their own. All in all, even though it was nothing more than the corner of a tent, it was a more personal home than Ayaka had ever had before, so she didn't really mind staying there during the day while everyone else was out and about.

Still, despite all that, an edge of restlessness was beginning to creep in over her otherwise calm mood. The closer the apartments got to finishing, the closer she was to being without a home, and the longer these places stayed open, the harder it'd be for her to move around the village without being run over by a rogue wheelbarrow.

And so, following an invitation she'd received some time ago, Ayaka got up off her cot, and when no one else was in the tent to see her leave, she slipped out and started off down a route she only halfway remembered.

It was time to get herself a job.

[Tensei Kaori]

It took some time for Ayaka to convince herself that it was okay to walk at more than a snail's pace alongside the very edge of the road, and so of course it took her a while to make her way out of the "tent district" and down the streets. She did catch sight of Takeo-kun - an earlier encounter had finally given Ayaka something to call him other than "Hero Boy" - but thankfully, he seemed busy, so she just offered a smile and a wave before moving on.

A few wrong turns, and a couple failed attempts at asking directions later, she finally found the place she was looking for. The "HELP WANTED" sign was still in the window, which was a good sign, so she took a deep breath....

.... and stood stone still, staring at the front door.

Could she really do this!? She didn't know the first thing about restaurants! Just talking to people she didn't know made her nervous, but about getting a job? Granted, she'd already met the kindly woman once, so it wouldn't be too bad, but still...

"Yo, are you comin' in or not?" an unfamiliar voice asked after a few minutes, jolting Aya out of her daze. Finally breaking her gaze from the sign in the window allowed her to see a boy roughly her age, with dark auburn hair tied back in a white bandana, leaning against the doorframe. Blue eyes stared awkwardly in her direction, as though he wasn't entirely sure what to do or say or even what to make of her.

"Oyaji saw you out here starin'," the boy continued at last, shifting against the doorframe as he held the class door open. "Obaa-chan recognized you from the other day and said to come get you. C'mon, you're blocking the door. The customers can't get in with you standing here gawking."

"Eh? Ehh!?" Ayaka gasped as she found herself being led inside by the wrist. The strange boy wasn't hurting her, but it was very surreal, to say the list.

"Whaddaya mean, 'eh'?" The boy asked. "Obaa-chan said you're the new waitress we've been waiting for. Said you'd be back in a few days or so, right? C'mon, we're supposed to go 'round back so she can talk to you."

.... well. That was one way to get your foot in the door.

[Tensei Kaori]

What on earth am I getting into?

Ayaka sighed as she stared at her own reflection, trying for the umpteenth time to restrain herself from messing with the new clothes she had been given: a white, sleeveless blouse, a black skirt that was far shorter than anything she'd ever worn (though that wasn't saying very much), a white apron, and black high-heeled shoes she was still getting used to walking in. Her hands itched to free her hair from its low ponytail, to pull her bangs out from under her black headband and comb them back in front of her face where they belonged, but Obaa-chan said that health regulations meant she couldn't work at the cafe if she didn't keep her hair pulled back. Part of her wondered if she'd have dared to come back had she known she'd have to dress like this, but the very thought of approaching yet more strangers about jobs made her weak at the knees. Or, at least, weaker at the knees than the thought of serving customers in an outfit like this. Obaa-chan had told her over and over again that it looked nice, that clothes that actually fit were supposed to feel like this, and that young girls should show their faces in public. It still felt alien to Ayaka, and finally the kindly old woman had left her alone to get used to her new look.

And here she stood, in the upstairs portion of the building that served as the elderly couple's home, staring into a full-length mirror and trying to pull the skirt down to make it longer. It fit snugly right where Obaa-chan said it should, so of course it didn't go anywhere. It had taken the woman a while to find clothes that would fit Ayaka's slender frame - apparently she had daughters and nieces who had worked at the cafe at some point - but with a couple quick alterations, she had come up with something that had actually fit. Ayaka suspected she'd been working on them since the day Ryuurei-san brought her in, though.

Either way, she'd spent quite some time staring at herself, and going downstairs wasn't getting any easier. By the sounds coming from the cafe below, she guessed the lunch rush had finally died down, so now was as good a time as any. Taking a deep breath - and wobbling just slightly in her odd shoes - Ayaka ran a trembling hand over her unnervingly contained hair, turned away from the mirror, and went downstairs.