And thus, the next two days of Kokoro were sucked up.
They weren’t too eventful, only ever being filled with Mary lecturing him on ways and trying out methods to become ‘spiritually connected’ and other such stuff that’s supposed to help him bring out his Anima. All he felt made little progress. If it weren’t for the promise that he’ll be able to do a similar trick that Seodra performed and he had little idea how to do it on his own, he would’ve been a lot harder to keep in one place than he was.
Kokoro had tried to get Seodra to tell him how instead but the two women must’ve struck a deal as she would slyly avoid answering. The best he was about to extract from her was a single statement involving Anima.
“Don’t think of Anima as a supernatural object you obtain like an item at a store, your Anima is you! Think about bringing out your Anima as you looking inside yourself to explore what you are, why you are, what you can do, and discover yourself. When that happens, it’ll be the start of the road.”
While it didn’t spark any eureka moment in Kokoro, it was an insight he feels he can maul over more compared to what the angel speaks of.
He took it with him the next time he was made to meditate in the Limbo Room.
“Explore myself.”
As Kokoro mumbled those words to himself, he was baffled by the cognitive dead end he hit. An utterly bizarre reaction the young man never expected from himself, this was supposed to be a mental road that was once so clear he could slide across blindfolded, now it was so densely fogged he couldn’t see the two hands he had in front of him.
Realizing it's been a long time since he last evaluated this place, maybe it was time for a refresher.
“What you are?”
“I’m not some dump tank for idle gossip! This is not what I worked to be!”
“Why you are?”
“It’s my aspiration towards heroes that’s telling me to invest my time better if heroes inspire me so much.”
“What can you do?”
“You’re too late!”
“Discover yourself.”
…
“Discover yourself.”
…
“Discover yourself.”
“…What the fuck am I doing with my life?”
CRACK!
“Troubled thoughts?” the voice of Mary once again broke through his internal domain.
There was no answer but Mary could see past Kokoro’s stone face that something was off and it was boiling inside.
“Do you know what might help a clouded mind,” asked the angel, bending over as she held out a platter of cookies to him, “Sometimes, all you need are some happy thoughts.”
A desire to reject it was there but a tidal wave of a craving for sweets drowned it out, he hadn't had anything that sweet since he died. Begrudgingly he took one of the pastries offered, giving a quiet, “Thanks.”
Instantly he noticed how warm the cookies were and wondered, “Did she just make these? How would an angel’s homebaked cookie taste like?”
With a single bite, he could give a clear answer; heavenly made.
“The hell- or heaven did she put in these?” questioned Kokoro, these easily among some of the best cookies he ever tasted.
The texture, the taste, composition, the ratio between hard and soft; he wouldn’t call himself a food connoisseur but from his startlingly vast knowledge of sweets, this cookie had those aspects ranked in first grade.
But through it all, there was one thing Kokoro had to openly say about Mary’s cookie.
“Blah, I don’t like oatmeal.”
…
“HUH!?” exclaimed the angel, from the centuries of her existence, never had she heard a human say that about her cooking; especially her renowned confectionary skills.
“The oatmeal, I don’t like it,” repeated the silver-haired young man in his usual nonchalant tone, “These cookies are some of the closest I’ve seen to perfection, but the oatmeal completely ruins it for me.”
Working through the stun of what was said to her, the angel replied, “I-it’s supposed to be a healthy snack. Soul food can be very good and nourishes at the same time.”
“If I wanted a healthy snack to eat I would’ve eaten a salad or an apple.”
Generous as ever, Mary tries to reason with him, “Maybe this can be an opportunity to be more opened minded about–”
“Keep your health guru shit out of my pastries!” he states, for a man who seems disinterested in almost everything life has this was oddly a subject he was deeply passionate about, “And gross, you added raisins; that instantly lowers it to a ‘begrudgingly if it’s the only kind in the house’ score for me.”
Suddenly the crunching of metal echoed throughout the room. A wide-eyed Kokoro cracked from his stone-face expression seeing Mary’s fingers bend the metal of the platter from the amount of pressure being exerted on it merely being held.
“Kokoro Shikata,” the angel slowly calls out.
Taken aback by the universal sign of something being wrong, Kokoro stammered, “Hey are you—”
“Let’s take a walk,” she interrupted. While she kept her smile, it looked more hung up like a curtain. With the way her eyes were closed, the vein bulging on her forehead, and her hands shaking, it was miraculous she managed to speak in a calm voice, “Healthy and relaxing physical activity can also help with wiping away intense negative thoughts before one acts on them.”
“...”
“What do you say?”
“Yeah, sure, let’s go!”
It was one of the few times Kokoro so quickly accepted a request to go out with someone.
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