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They met in the hospital activity room.
Vera had been drawing flowers. Wocky had been hiding from his nurse.
And, really, it’s the psychiatrist’s fault for them meeting at all. The activity room had been her idea. Or, Vera supposes, she could blame the hospital itself for assigning her the psychiatrist in the first place? She hadn’t asked for her, after all. One day, after Vera woke and was apparently deemed healthy enough to discuss her personal traumas, the psychiatrist simply appeared in her hospital room, sat down, and asked Vera if she was ready to get to work. Vera was not ready, but the psychiatrist didn’t mind. She smiled her soft smile and said, in her gentle, soothing voice, that Vera could take as much time as she needed. Though, if it was up to Vera (which it wasn’t) she would never be talking about this to anyone in the first place.
The psychiatrist made Vera nervous (though slightly less nervous than most people often did). She still makes Vera nervous, though not as much as she did upon their first meeting. She doesn’t mind when Vera draws out her thoughts instead of speaking them, which is kind of her. She also doesn’t press topics too hard or ask that many personal questions, but somehow, she gets Vera talking anyway. Vera supposes that’s what makes her a good psychiatrist.
And she’s the one who encourages Vera to gently push the boundaries of her comfort zone and spend more time in the activity room.
At first, Vera’s hesitant. She’s perfectly content remaining holed up in her hospital room; the four walls are familiar, and she’s used to spending all her time in one place. She doesn’t want to go to the activity room. She wants to go home , to that small apartment that she’s spent her entire life in. She wants to paint with her father.
But that’s the one thing she will never be able to do again.
Perhaps it’s because of that, or maybe it’s so the psychiatrist stops bringing it up, that Vera finally folds.
The first time she visits, Vera’s worried about there being a lot of people. She’s prepared to turn on her heel and leave (which she’s done a few times before. She couldn’t bring herself to open the door), but she’s pleasantly surprised at how quiet the activity room can be. She finds she rather likes it there once she learns which times of day should be avoided, and she often has the room entirely to herself if she plays her cards right. She prefers that. People make her nervous, and she always feels like they’re staring at her, their eyes cruel and their words wicked, full of bad intentions.
And how could she not, after what she’s been through?
And so that’s how she ends up in the empty activity room on that day, curled up on the back bench, the one with the soft blue cushions in the corner, right by the window. It’s late afternoon, and rays of honey-gold sun streak across the sketchpad resting on her folded legs. She’s sketching a vase of flowers, trying to perfect the delicate twist of the petals and the gentle translucence of the vase with the hospital’s low quality colored pencils. She wishes she had her own; it’s difficult to get a smooth color gradient with these and they’re so chalky , too, but she’s making do the best she can.
Vera’s so focused, in fact, that she doesn’t notice him until he’s standing right in front of her, his head tilted to the side to see exactly what she’s drawing.
She flinches, hard. Vera’s not the type to scream when she gets scared, instead taking in a sharp exhale that knifes down her throat, instinctively hiding the sketchbook against her chest and pressing as far as she can back into the wooden bench. She’s startled, yes, but more than anything she hates it when people watch her draw, even her own father, and boys in hospitals are not an exception to that rule. Her heart is pounding frantically in her chest, instinctive fear flooding her veins more at the shock of his sudden appearance over anything else. She can hear her psychiatrist’s kind voice in her head:
It’s alright, Vera. He hasn’t done anything to show ill intention. Breathe.
Still, she feels cornered and on edge, the bench is solid and unyielding at her back and leaving her with nowhere to go. She stares, wide-eyed and helpless, at the strange boy before her.
At her reaction, the boy’s eyebrows crawl up to his hairline. He cocks his head at her, like a bird might. He has brown hair partially dyed auburn, a curl of which bounces at his forehead. He isn’t wearing socks or shoes (it looks like his nails were once painted a long time ago), and peeking out of the low collar of his hospital gown are bandages, crisp and white as if they’ve been recently changed. Diamond studs glitter in his ears (Vera remembers wondering if they’re real) and a stick of pocky hangs from the corner of his mouth like a cigar. Vera isn’t sure how he managed to acquire such a thing; it’s not like hospital food frequently features chocolate-covered biscuits. At least, not her hospital food.
Vera’s arms tighten around her sketchbook as the boy’s gaze rakes over her, eyes light with curiosity. She thinks about running, but he’s right in front of her, and he’s bigger than her and surely faster. Her heart rate quickens with these thoughts, only speeding up more and more as the boy just stands there, looking at her for what really was only a few seconds but feels like an hour to Vera. It’s quiet in the room. So quiet that Vera can hear her own shaky breath rattling in her throat, and the crunch of the boy’s pocky as he finishes off the stick.
Breathe, Vera .
A small surge of confidence runs through her, then. If worse comes to worst she can bash him over the head with the vase of flowers. She’s survived atroquinine poisoning; she can survive this strange boy with no shoes.
And then, and then , with her escape plan in mind, the boy sits down. Right beside her.
Despite the fact there is no one else in the activity room, this boy chooses to flop down right beside her on the bench, wincing as if the movement has caused him some kind of pain. He sits so close that their shoulders brush together, and Vera immediately flinches away. But if he notices, the boy doesn’t show it. He just leans his head back so it’s resting on the bench, his brown eyes sliding lazily over to look at her, as if he didn’t get enough of her face the first time. Up close she can see a smattering of freckles across his cheeks and nose, faint, like watercolor.
Vera stares at him.
He grins.
“I had a fat hunk of lead stuck straight up my ticker,” this strange, mysterious boy says, pointing at his chest. “What’s eatin’ you, sketch?”
In the times to come, Vera will remember these first words of his very clearly, because at that moment she had absolutely no idea what they meant. It’s English, yes, and he spoke clearly enough, but the combination of his sudden arrival and overall peculiarity had shocked Vera so much that her comprehension of what is happening has taken a rather significant blow. This results in Vera simply sitting there, staring at this mystery boy for much longer than she’d normally feel comfortable with, eyes wide.
The boy stares at her, clearly waiting for a response but Vera’s tongue is tied quite firmly in her mouth. His knee bounces up and down, up and down, lightning fast.
“You can talk, right?” He asks, eyebrows raised at her silence.
Vera nods, a sharp jerk of her chin, but still says nothing. She can’t make herself to. This boy wants her to say something but she can’t , all of her words trapped behind her lips with no way out. She’s clamming up , as her father used to say. People hate it when she does this, frown down on her for it but it’s not her fault. She just…can’t get the words out, no matter how hard she tries.
After a beat, the boy shrugs. “S’cool. You don’t gotta talk if you don’t want. Ma always says I can do enough talkin’ for two.” He pulls a box out of the pocket of his hospital gown - the box of pocky - and offers it out to Vera. “Name’s Wocky. Want a pocky?”
Before Vera can even think of answering, much less actually untie her tongue to be able to say anything at all, a nurse blows into the room like a hurricane, slamming the door open and shattering the quiet. The boy - Wocky - groans, thumping his head back on the bench.
“Shit,” he mutters. “Thought I lost ‘em.”
“Mr. Kitaki,” the nurse snaps, his cheeks flushed red with irritation ( his name is Wocky Kitaki? Vera thinks, incredulously), “if you leave your room one more time when you’re supposed to be on bedrest, I swear to any god that will listen that I’ll restrain you to the bed.”
Wocky snorts. “Kinky. Not really into that kinda thing, though,” he says, in his faint city accent, like a dialed-back version of Detective Gumshoe’s. He winks at Vera as he says it, and she blushes despite herself.
The nurse’s face turns even redder, if possible.
“You have three minutes to get back to your room before I call your mother and have her deal with you,” the nurse hisses, wielding his words like a well-used knife. It’s clear he’s dealt with this kind of thing before.
And it works. Wocky’s face pales at the prospect and he immediately leaps to his feet, way too fast for whatever injury is ailing him (Vera is still unclear on the details) judging by the way he grimaces, pressing a hand to his chest. The nurse shouts at him to be careful and calls him, in no uncertain terms, an idiot.
Wocky ignores the nurse easily; it seems he’s well practiced in this, as well. He turns to Vera, a wide and crooked grin lighting up his face. “Talk to you later, sketch,” he says, before prying her hand from its death grip on her sketchbook and pressing the box of pocky into her palm.
And then he’s gone as quickly as he’d arrived, dashing down the hall with the red-faced nurse chasing after him, shouting that he should not be running around while still recovering from surgery. A mystery boy with strange words and dyed hair and a grin like a fox.
Vera sits there in the silence of the activity room, shell-shocked. After a moment, she looks down at the box of pocky in her hand, bright red against her pale skin and crinkled slightly at the sides. There’s about half the pocky left.
And that is how Vera Misham met Wocky Kitaki.
Vera avoids the activity room for a while after that. It’s not that she’s necessarily afraid of Wocky; she’s almost surprised to admit to herself that she isn't afraid of him, actually. She’s just…overwhelmed. The only person she’s talked to after she’d woken up has been the psychiatrist and her doctors, Detective Gumshoe on a few occasions and her defense attorney, Apollo Justice, when he’d stopped by to check on her. And Wocky was decidedly different from any of these people, in many ways. They’d only interacted for a few minutes at least but Vera could tell that Wocky is unlike anyone she has ever met in her life.
And that’s overwhelming, to her.
Her psychiatrist notices, of course. Vera supposes she can hardly blame the woman for that; it’s her job , after all, to be observant of Vera and her moods. She just wishes she was a little worse at it.
“I notice you haven’t been spending as much time in the activity room as of late,” her psychiatrist says, a few days after the Wocky incident. “Is there a reason why?”
Vera shakes her head. She’s in her hospital bed, sketchbook open on her lap to the unfinished drawing of that vase of flowers. There’s a smear against the petals from where Wocky startled Vera and she smudged her hand against the paper.
The psychiatrist is watching her, her expression thoughtful. “You know,” she says, her tone light and conversational as she folds her hands in her lap, “I heard there’s another patient here that keeps asking after you.”
At that, Vera looks up.
Her reaction must’ve been what her psychiatrist was looking for, because she smiles. “I forget his name, but I remember it was something very strange. He kept asking the staff about the “quiet artist girl”, if I recall correctly.” She tilts her head. “I imagined that must mean you, Vera. I believe I thought correctly?”
Vera frowns, and looks back down at her sketchbook. She tucks a strand of hair behind her ears; she doesn’t have her bandana on to hold it back, so her hair spills around her shoulders. Perhaps she should cut it short. It might be nice to make a change.
“You know, Vera,” her psychiatrist says, patient as always, “you’re still meant to be here for a little longer, still, while doctors make sure all traces of the poison are out of your system. It wouldn’t hurt to make a new friend to keep yourself company during that time.”
I’ve never had friends before , Vera thinks. I don’t know how to do that.
“And I’ve heard that boy has been through something rather terrible himself. It might do him good to have you as a friend, as well.”
And with that, the psychiatrist takes her leave, leaving Vera to her thoughts. She might as well have told Vera exactly what she thinks she should do.
Vera fidgets with the spiral of her sketchbook, the metal cool against her skin. Wocky’s been asking about her. Is that what friends do? Does he want to be friends?
It’s strange to think about having a friend when you’ve never had one before. Vera’s not entirely sure how she feels about it. It’s not like she wants friends; she’s never had one before, so why should we need one now?
But her father always wanted her to have a friend, didn’t he? He always wanted the best for her.
Vera purses her lips, before swinging her feet over the side of the hospital bed and sliding on her slippers.
Vera approaches the activity room with apprehension coiled low in her stomach. She’s not really sure what she’s doing, why she’s doing this.
When she was younger, she was too sickly and nervous to ever leave the apartment. She was homeschooled because of that, so she never met anyone her own age. It was just her and her father; he was the only friend she needed, wanted. But she remembers distinctly one day, when she and her father were painting together. They didn’t often talk while painting; they didn’t need the words.
You know , he’d said, in his quiet way, I think a friend might do you good, Vera. Can’t sit around talking to your old man all the time, can you?
So perhaps she’s doing this for him, then.
Or perhaps her psychiatrist is just more convincing than she originally thought.
Vera takes a deep breath and opens the door. She’s hopeful no one will be there at all, but she’s quickly proven wrong. Because he’s there, of course. Wocky Kitaki.
What an odd name.
He’s lying on his back on the ground, his feet kicked up on the bench they’d been sitting at the other day. Vera’s not sure that he should be laying on the floor like that if he has an injury that required surgery. He’s throwing one of the activity room’s fidget toys, a hacky sack, into the air and catching it. There’s no one else there, just him. Vera supposes it’s late; the sun has set, though the moon has not yet fully risen. She wonders if Wocky is running from his nurse again.
Vera approaches him, nerves setting her blood aflame. She’s doing this for her father, she reminds herself, but her confidence has already started to fray. She almost turns back, but Wocky spots her before she has a chance to flee.
“Oh, it’s you!” Wocky says excitedly, but he’s mid-toss as he says it and the hacky sack hits him right in the face on the way down. He sputters and sits up, albeit inelegantly because he seems to forget his feet are propped on the bench, so his transition from sitting to standing is…interesting to watch. Vera’s certain his nurse would be extremely displeased if he saw it. Wocky seems unperturbed, though.
“I was hopin’ you’d come back, sketch,” he says, wincing slightly as he finally straightens. “I’ve been all bottled up in this joint with no one to talk to ‘cept docs and nurses. You’re the only patient around here that’s my age that I’ve spotted, at least. Rest of ‘em are all old geezers and the real sick kinda people, and I don’t wanna bother them folk. They got other problems than some wack loudmouth kid jatterin’ their ears off, yeah?”
Vera is almost entirely certain that jattering is not a word.
“’S why I was so excited when I saw you doodlin’ in here the other night! Didn’t think you’d be all shy and stuff, though. S’cool. I don’t mind,” Wocky adds, grinning. He has a slight gap between his front teeth. “But then you went missin’ for a beat there and I thought I’d gone and fucked it up. Good to know I didn’t, though.”
Vera blinks. She’d really tried to prepare for this, but his open friendliness is throwing off her guard. It’s a stark difference from the quiet life she’s lived thus far; there’s never been anyone so loud and talkative and odd in it up until this point. Wocky bounces on his heels before her, tossing the hacky sack from one hand to the other. Then, he pauses, looking at her with those big brown eyes. She feels like if she learned his patterns, she’d be able to read his mood just from his eyes alone, expressive as they are.
“I didn’t fuck it up, right?” He asks, his mouth tilting down in a frown. “Like, I ain’t got the best track record with people, see, and I wanna make sure I’m gettin’ off on the right foot here first, so if you’re gonna accuse me of murder or blow me down in a back alley or somethin’, I wanna know that straight up this time.”
Vera can’t help it. She’s so bewildered and confused that she feels like she’s dreaming. Her grip on the sketchbook tightens, and she stammers out a very quiet, “W-what?” Her voice is soft to even her own ears, but Wocky hears it all the same, and his face lights up, a wide grin flashing across his face fast as lightning.
“Holy shit !” he exclaims, so loudly his voice echoes off the walls. “So you can talk!”
Vera flushes, looking down at her sketchbook pressed against her chest. She’s not great with eye contact even on a good day, but as Wocky leans in closer she can’t help but catch the excited glimmer in his eyes before she fully looks away.
“So what’s your name? You got a name, right? Listen, I can’t just keep callin’ you sketch all the time, yeah? And the nurses won’t tell me what your name is ‘cause of patient confidentiality or some wack shit like that.”
Vera swallows, glancing back up to briefly meet his gaze. He’s watching her expectantly, and that makes Vera nervous, that unabashed, fearless eye contact. She grips her sketchbook a little tighter and clears her throat, though when she speaks her words slip from her tongue in a squeak.
“…Vera. It’s Vera.”
“Vera,” Wocky repeats, rocking back on his heels. “That’s pretty.”
Vera flushes even harder. “T-thank you,” she stammers, and he grins at her, wide enough to crinkle the corners of his eyes.
And like that, she broke the barrier. She’d spoken to him, and almost as if that act alone had signed off on some kind of contract, Wocky becomes a firm fixture in her life at the hospital. Every time she visits the activity room he’s there, waiting for her. She still gets nervous speaking, though, and relies on her sketchbook to illustrate her thoughts more often than not, at least at first. He doesn’t seem to mind at all, though, much to her surprise. In fact, he likes it when she draws her thoughts about, because she was, in his words, a “class act artist” like he’s never seen.
To Wocky’s credit, he never asks her why she was in the hospital, not after that first time. He seems to pick up on the fact she doesn’t want to talk about it, so he lets it go. He seems perfectly content filling up Vera’s silence with his chatter, though he sometimes jumps from topic to topic so quickly that Vera can hardly follow his train of thought. Though he makes her nervous at first, and she worries over his ulterior motives, she gets used to it. Used to him , surprisingly. And she learns a lot about Wocky Kitaki during those nights in the activity room.
She learns he quite literally never stops moving. He’ll bounce his leg or crack his knuckles or tug at the scruffy longer hairs at the nape of his neck, drum his fingers on the bench seat or suddenly hop to his feet and start wandering around the room, like he’d explode if he sat still for one moment longer. He’ll pick at his bandages without really realizing if he didn’t have something to keep his hands occupied, only to get reprimanded by his nurse. After a day or two he finds a colorful pink and purple slinky in one of the baskets where they keep kid’s toys, and starts to play with it whenever he visits Vera in the activity room (his exasperated nurse won’t let him bring it back to his room).
She learns about his family. Originally, he says they own a bakery and that his dad makes “real class muffins better than anyone’ll ever stuff their chops with” and his mom, though poor at baking, has excellent managerial skills. He said he thinks working there once he gets out will be boring, but Vera wonders if he actually thinks that. He’s a little vague about the details of his family, and she can’t tell if it’s purposeful or accidental. He also casually mentions that he’d been accused of murder, something that he doesn’t elaborate on. The topic seems to be a sore spot, which is a little surprising, because as far as Vera can tell Wocky will talk about anything , really. She supposes being accused of murder isn’t very pleasant, and she’s not the type to ask questions, so she doesn’t press.
She learns why he was in the hospital in the first place - what he’d said to her when he first met her.
“I got shot,” he tells her, tapping his chest at a spot Vera assumes is where he got shot, far too close to his heart. “’S a good thing I don’t got a bum ticker, yeah? Spooked my folks somethin’ awful, though. They thought it was it for ol’ Wocky Kitaki. But a bullet can’t keep this fox down,” he says, winking at Vera with that cocky grin of his. “The doc wouldn’t let me keep the damn thing though, once they got it out.”
Vera frowns. He got shot . How awful. He must’ve been terrified, and it must’ve hurt so much. She can’t imagine what circumstances there must’ve been for someone to shoot a nineteen-year-old boy. And then he got accused of murder ?
What a horrifying life this boy has lived, Vera thinks.
She scribbles a question mark on her sketchbook and turns it around, showing him, asking him why. Why did you get shot, Wocky Kitaki? She likes to draw a little fox instead of his name, and it usually makes Wocky grin, all crooked, that little gap between his front teeth flashing.
But Wocky hesitates, then. He doesn’t do that often, Vera is learning. He’s the type of person who speaks before he thinks, whose mouth runs faster than his brain, who wears his heart right on his sleeve for all to see. But he hesitates, then.
“…It was my own damn fault,” he says, finally. His knee bounces, and he drums his fingers on his bicep. “My ma always told me my blood runs too hot for confrontational stuff. She told me once I’d be knockin’ at the taker’s door before too long, the way I was goin’. S’why she taught me how to do…quiet stuff, stuff that didn’t involve face to face business, y’know, so my lid wouldn’t pop in the middle of a deal or somethin’. And, anyway, I don’t look real scary, do I?” he says, grinning. He grins like a fox, sly and mischievous but decidedly nonthreatening. “My dad, now, he’s class at it. The whole intimidatin’ business. He’s a real softy on the inside but man, when he looks at you all angry eyes-like, oof . Feels like it’s your last day on earth.”
Vera raises her brows, resting her head on her knees as Wocky picks at his nails, his foot bobbing in time to music only he could hear. He sighs.
“I wanted to be like him. That’s why I went and did it. Thought I could make my ma proud if I proved I could keep my cool, but I went and tried it and blew my lid and nearly got my ticker shot out of my spine,” he says, tapping absentmindedly at his chest. He does that a lot. Then, he grimaces. “She almost finished the job though, when she heard. S’what I get for not listenin’, I suppose.”
“Was it scary?” Vera asks.
“What? My ma chasin’ my ass down the street with a broom? Yeah, shit was terrifying .”
She shakes her head. “No. Not that.”
“Oh. You mean this?” Wocky points to his chest. “Nah. I knew it was comin’. I called the other boss’s granddaughter a wack ass bitch, Vera, obviously they were gonna shoot me.”
Vera frowns, and Wocky laughs. He has a decidedly unnatractive laugh, gruff and boisterous and he snorts halfway through. It makes sense, for him.
Eventually, Vera tells Wocky what happened to her. It’s only fair after all he’s told her, she thinks, and her guards have settled in his presence. At this point, she and Wocky have spent about five nights together there in the activity room alone, though Wocky has filled most of that silence with his “jatter”. But she tells him all the same. She’s not sure why.
She doesn’t like talking about it or even thinking about it, really. Because the simple truth is that she should’ve died. She was supposed to die. And she will never forget the way it felt, the tremors that started in her hands and snaked their way up her arms, down her legs, and that awful burning at the back of her throat like flames before she lost consciousness. But the dose wasn’t lethal, or, perhaps, as the defense attorney with the kind, nervous brown eyes had told her during one of his visits, she’d built up a resistance over the years from repeated exposure. But she’s not sure if she’s supposed to feel lucky or grateful for that.
For most of her life her whole world was confined to that small apartment with her father; he was the only person that mattered to her. She didn’t ever want to leave, didn’t need to leave. She was safe there. No one could hurt her, no one could steal her away in the night. All she needed was her art and her father and her good luck charm. And they could spend hours together, Vera and her father, without a word passed between them, the only sound the scratch of pencil against paper, brush against canvas.
And then he was gone.
And Vera almost died.
But she doesn’t tell Wocky all that. She only tells him bits and pieces, and he listens. Despite all his talk, he’s a very good listener.
“I shoulda died too, y’know.” Wocky says, once she’s done. He grins, but it’s not his usual crooked smile. It’s softer around the edges this time. They’re sitting on the back bench like usual, the one with the blue cushions and their knees are drawn up to their chests, facing each other like little kids spilling secrets. “But I made it. We both made it, Ver.”
Vera nods. They made it.
She gets cleared before he does. Apparently a bullet wound so close to the heart takes a while to properly heal, and the doctors want to keep a close eye on it, especially considering Wocky refuses to sit still and let the wound actually heal properly.
“You’re leaving?” Wocky asks, after Vera tells him.
They’re in the activity room. Where else would they be? Their positions are reversed this time, however; she finds him there first sitting on their bench, and she stands before him like he once did with her. He looks sad.
Vera nods.
“Oh. Well, that’s good then, isn’t it? Means you’re all healed up,” Wocky says, raising his brows. He has another box of pocky, though Vera has never figured out where he gets it from. This one is cookies and cream; she didn’t know there were different flavors. He hands her a stick. “S’gonna be real lonely sittin’ round in this room by myself, though.”
“You don’t have that much longer,” Vera says, trying to sound reassuring. Wocky doesn’t like being in the hospital, she’s gathered. He often calls it the “big house”, like it’s a prison. She supposes he’s not the type to enjoy being cooped up in one space for a long period of time; how different they are in that.
Wocky shrugs, snapping a stick of pocky in half. “Ain’t that a relief. Should be gettin’ out real soon, in a few days or so if I’m on ‘ good behavior’ , whatever that means,” he says, making air quotes. Then he looks up at Vera, his expression hopeful. “But…we’ll see each other on the outside, yeah?”
Vera nods again. “Of course,” she says softly, and Wocky’s eyes light up in that way she likes so much.
It’s been several days since Vera was released from the hospital. And it’s okay. She’s okay. Her psychiatrist recommended a lovely therapist who keeps plants in their office and wears lovely dangling earrings, and returning to her apartment wasn’t as awful as she thought it would be. She undergoes a rigorous cleaning of the place, scraping up all the ancient paint that’s crusted on the floorboards, organizing her father’s old painting supplies. The police took all of her forgery equipment, which she’s fine with. She never wants to be that person again.
Wocky had given her the exact date of his hospital clearance. He’d even written it down in his pointy handwriting in her sketchbook, just to make sure she doesn’t forget. And she didn’t forget; she just got caught up in cleaning, and she wanted to make sure Wocky had time to settle back into his life.
Though, she may have been stalling a bit. Old habits die hard. But she’s proud to say she’s broken many of them.
The Kitaki bakery is right next to People Park, close enough where its windows overlook the sprawling grass and the little winding river. The outside walls are painted a pleasant shade of pastel yellow, and there’s a wooden sign hanging over the door with a cute picture of a fox on it. Perhaps being foxlike is a family trait then, Vera thinks, looking up at that sign. Even from the outside the bakery smells lovely, like muffins and cakes and all kinds of sweet, harmless, sugary things.
You’ve faced much more frightening things than a bakery, Vera reminds herself. It’s almost surprising, really, how brave she can convince herself to be when she remembers that she survived atroquinine poisoning.
And so, with that reminder in her head, Vera takes a deep breath and opens the door.
There’s a little bell above the door that jangles as she does, and the smell of bread and baked goods hits her as she steps inside the Kitaki bakery. The walls are made of lovely old brick and there are glass display cases full of muffins and bagels, a basket of cookies with a little sign reading FREE SAMPLES on the front counter. There are some tables scattered around for people to sit and enjoy their food, and there’s a little table right by one of the windows that overlooks the park, and it looks like a wonderful place to sit and people watch and draw.
And standing behind the wooden counter is the second most terrifying man that Vera has ever seen in her life. He’s gigantic , with heavy black brows drawn down over his eyes, and the frilly yellow apron he’s wearing does very little to make him less intimidating. When she walks in the door he turns to face her and she feels her heart stop in her chest right then and there. She freezes like a deer in headlights.
“Hello,” the man says, and his voice is deep, gruff and terrifying. “How can I help you?”
Vera squeaks something unintelligible in response, and the man stares at her. Neither of them say anything; they simply stand there instead, staring at each other. Luckily, their faux staring contest is broken by the arrival of a woman bustling out of the kitchen, wearing a pretty black kimono patterned with flower blossoms and a nine-tailed fox. She’s carrying a tray of cookies that smell like oranges and cinnamon, which she deposits on the counter before turning to Vera, a smile gracing her face.
“Why, hello there, young lady! I thought I heard the bell ring,” she says; she has a lovely deep voice that rings with self-confidence. Her face is round and pleasant, and she has thick black hair streaked with silver done up very elaborately. She sizes Vera up, her eyes scanning her from tip to toe before she breaks out into a smile, wide and genuine, crinkling the corners of her eyes. A familiar smile. “Oh, you must be Miss Vera!”
Vera blinks.
At her visible confusion, the woman laughs. It’s a loud, boisterous laugh. “From how much my Wocky talks about you, I’d be able to recognize you anywhere,” she says, waving a hand Vera's way.
Vera blushes. Behind the counter, the large, scary man has begun to put cookies away in one of the display cases, but he pauses at the woman’s words and looks back up at Vera again, considering her. Vera feels a bit exposed, like a little animal under a microscope.
“He tells me you don’t talk much, and that you’ve gone through something real awful in your life.” The woman continues, and her tone takes on a note of genuine sympathy. “We have too, little flower. Don’t worry, you’re here among family! You want a cookie?”
The woman - Wocky’s mother, Vera corrects herself - doesn’t wait for Vera to answer. She plucks a cookie from the tray and presses it gently into Vera’s hand, closing her fingers over it. “On the house,” Mrs. Kitaki says, winking.
Vera glances down at the cookie in her hand. It’s shaped like a maple leaf, with cinnamon sugar dusting the surface. Both Kitakis (for she’s assuming the man behind the counter, with her background knowledge from Wocky’s stories, is Wocky’s father) are watching her expectantly. Nervous under their gazes, she takes a tentative bite; it tastes like cinnamon and oranges and cloves, like fall in one little delicacy. She blinks in surprise. She wasn’t aware such a small thing could taste so wonderful.
“Do you like it?” Mr. Kitaki asks, in his slow, gruff voice. Vera wonders if perhaps he’s also not so good with words.
“It’s very good,” she says shyly.
Mr. Kitaki smiles at that. It’s a nice smile, Vera thinks, and takes another nibble of her cookie.
Mrs. Kitaki brightens, too. “Wonderful. I figured you’d like it. Of course, all of our baked goods are excellent here thanks to Winfred here and his talents. And our resident little troublemaker, of course. He’s a very fine baker,” she says, smiling at Vera, “even if he didn’t want to be at first. I assume you’re here for him, then?”
Vera, flustered, nods. It’s all she can do, really. (Wocky is very much like his mother, she thinks.)
Mrs. Kitaki nods sagely back. “Wocky’s in the back. Let me get him for you,” she says cheerily. “You enjoy that cookie now.”
Vera watches as Mrs. Kitaki rounds the counter to the back door which she’d come from. And then she takes a deep breath. “ WOCKY! ” She bellows, louder even than Vera’s defense attorney had been (which is saying something). “Come out here for a moment, will you? There’s a pretty girl here to see you!”
Vera flushes even redder. She wishes she could hide behind this little cookie, but she’s almost eaten it all already.
There’s a loud thud from the backroom and a crash, then, followed by the unmistakable sound of Wocky Kitaki swearing before he himself appears, flour in his hair and a streak of chocolate icing across his cheek that makes it look like he has whiskers.
“Ma, you don’t gotta shout so damn loud,” Wocky says, wiping his hands on his apron. He’s wearing a pink button down shirt underneath tucked into a pair of straight-leg jeans cuffed at the ankles, the sleeves rolled up to his elbows. Several golden bracelets jangle on his wrists, and those same diamond studs that Vera remembers glitter in his ears. A stark difference from his hospital gown, and Vera is pleased to see he’s actually wearing shoes. “My ears work just…”
He trails off, then, because his gaze lands on Vera in his family’s bakery and his brown eyes widen like stars. “Vera!” He exclaims, like it’s been months since he last saw her instead of a week. “I thought you’d gone and forgotten all about me!”
I don’t think that’s possible , Vera thinks, and smiles. “Hi, Wocky,” she says shyly.
And then, quite suddenly, Wocky throws his arms around Vera and hugs her harder than she’s ever been hugged before in her life.
It’s been a long, long time since someone last hugged Vera. She’d almost forgotten what it felt like, this simple human contact, and her surprise causes her back to go stiff and her eyes wide. Wocky is warm and smells like fresh bread and chocolate, his arms around her shoulders. It’s…nice.
And then he’s gone. Wocky pulls back just as quickly as he’d done it.
“Shit, sorry. Shoulda asked first,” he says sheepishly, rubbing at the back of his neck. “Sorry. I get excited sometimes.”
“I know,” Vera says.
“Oh, fuck. I got flour all over you.” Wocky makes a face. “My bad.”
“Language, Wocky,” his mother scolds. She’s started sweeping the floor; Wocky made quite the mess of flour when he burst into the room.
Wocky winces. “Sorry, ma.”
“Are you…okay?” Vera asks. “Did you heal okay?”
“Oh, yeah! And I got a real wack lookin’ scar now,” Wocky says proudly, tapping his chest. “I always wanted a battle scar. Helps me look intimidatin’, y’know?”
“How can it help you look intimidating if no one can see it?” Vera asks.
Wocky frowns. “Ah, shit. Didn’t think about that.”
“Wocky, what did I just say about your language?” Mrs. Kitaki says warningly, and she flicks her wrist and Vera swears she sees a glint of metal hiding in that broom handle.
“I got popped in the chest and nearly smoked the big one, ma, I think I can say shit once in a while,” Wocky says sardonically, apparently feeling brave. This seems to be a bad idea, considering the amused little smile that works its way up his father’s face, and how his mother raises her brows like he’s challenged her. She rests the broom against the wall and approaches Wocky and Vera, dusting her hands off on her kimono.
“You know,” Mrs. Kitaki says, patting her son on the shoulder and turning to Vera with a mischievous glint in her eye, “Wocky couldn’t stop talking about you once he got home-”
“ MA.”
“-and you sure left quite an impression on him, and he got so sad when you didn’t show up right away. He worried he might’ve written the address down wrong and was moping around the kitchen for hours- ”
“Alright, that’s enough of that , ma, thank you so much and yes I am sorry for my language, I swear I’ll scrub my tastebuds off with soap tonight,” Wocky says quickly, trying and failing to shove his laughing mother away, toward the back room.
Vera giggles, covering her mouth with her hand. She can’t help it; there’s a bubble of genuine happiness in her like she hasn’t felt in quite some time. Wocky flushes, and his mother grins at him knowingly before he successfully pushes her out of sight. Unfortunately for Wocky, his father is still very much there, and he turns to Vera. His brows raise, and Vera realizes his eyes are actually very gentle under there after all.
“I like this one more than Alita,” Mr. Kitaki says gruffly, and Wocky’s face flushes even redder, if possible.
“ Dad ,” he hisses, and though Vera doesn’t know who Alita is, she feels like that was something like approval. She smiles behind her hand.
Wocky groans. “Okay, that’s enough, we’re goin’ outside, now ,” he says, giving his mother a pointed look before tugging off his apron and tossing it at her.
“Love you, kiddo,” Mrs. Kitaki says cheerily, deftly catching the apron. She winks at Vera. “You better say it back or I won’t let you leave.”
Wocky groans again, louder this time. “Yeah, yeah, love you too, ma. And you, dad,” he says, and there’s no heat in it at all, just honesty. It’s nice, Vera thinks. She’s delighted to find that she likes this family quite a bit.
Wocky gently pulls her outside and slams the door behind him. His face is red, and he still has flour in his hair. “I’m sorry for my crazy family,” he says, flustered, stuffing his hands into his pockets.
Vera shakes her head. “It’s okay. I think they’re sweet,” she says quietly. “And they make very good cookies.”
Wocky perks up. “Oh, you tried those? You liked them?” Vera nods, and Wocky grins even wider. “I made those! Isn’t that wack? Been keepin’ myself busy by tryin’ out some new recipes. Turns out baking is kinda fun,” he says, shrugging a bit sheepishly. “Who’da thunk.”
“Well, I think you’re a natural at it, Wocky,” Vera says, smiling.
Wocky flushes, and looks away, out into the park. There’s a smile on his face, though, working its way across his lips. Vera catches herself being pleased that he’s okay; he looks better out in the sunlight rather than in the hospital. “God, I’m glad you remembered,” he says softly, running a hand through his hair. The bracelets on his wrist catch the sun, glinting pretty and gold. “Kinda thought I’d never see you again.”
Vera tilts her head, furrowing her brows together slightly in question. A silent question, but he’s good at picking up on these kinds of things from her by now. A fast learner.
“It’s like I told you. I don’t got the best track record with people,” Wocky explains, with a lopsided shrug. He bounces on his heels, and Vera can’t tell if it’s nervous energy or simply just Wocky being himself. He glances at her. “The last person I liked framed me for murder.”
Vera blinks, and blushes. Of course Wocky would say a thing like that, so much wrapped into just a few words. “Framed for murder?” She repeats, because she thinks that’s probably the thing she should be focusing on right now (or the thing she would be most capable of focusing on, anyway. She decides she’s going to let the other part of that sentence lie).
“Ha. Yeah. Didn’t tell you that part,” Wocky says, scratching at his chest, right above his heart where that bullet nearly struck. “Ma always tells me I fall in love with any kind of folk so long as they’re halfway decent to me and got nice eyes. Last one had nice eyes for days but weren’t so decent. S’ kinda a long story, though.”
Wocky squints into the park, shielding his eyes against the sun. He still has that silly streak of chocolate on his cheek; Vera wonders if he even realizes it’s there. “Y’know,” he says slowly, glancing back at her. “Suppose we could…walk around some, and I could tell you the rest of it?”
Vera considers Wocky. He’s watching her expectantly, like he always does, his brown eyes bright in the sunlight. But this time his shoulders are a little tense like he’s nervous, shifting his weight from foot to foot. Wocky Kitaki, always on the move, she thinks.
And Vera, then, feeling inexplicably brave (a feeling she finds herself enjoying quite a bit), reaches out and takes Wocky’s hand in hers. She’d expected him to have calloused hands for some reason, but they’re not rough at all, instead soft and flour-coated.
“I would like that,” she says. “I would like that a lot.”
And Wocky’s face burns red and he ducks his head away from her, and it is a lovely, lovely sight.