Shades of Petals

Just Wanted to Raise Your Spirits

Atsushi's chest pains and the strange, out of place white petals came and went and almost always around the time she met up with Francis. Which was actually quite often —ever since the truce between him and the Agency, he had grown a tendency to visit her everyday and most times took her out to do something or other. Sometimes they were playing tourist and visiting places, sometimes it was shopping for odd sales he came across, and sometimes he just took her out to various eateries around the area.

She had never failed to have a good time though, and she'd grown to be extremely fond and reluctantly indulgent of the man. She'd even admit to enjoying her time with him and was less and less reluctant in agreeing to accompanying him to places, worn down by his insistence on her joining him to wherever he wanted to go and whatever whim he was ready to entertain. The rest of the Agency had shrugged it off, not minding her disappearing off to odd places with their former American enemy, and so she ended up shrugging it off herself.

But now she was bewildered by the appearance of these petals and why she was suddenly coughing them up. She wasn't sure that was something people did and it seemed more than unnatural. She was hesitant to ask around, in case it was just nothing and some weird thing that had happened because she'd accidentally run across someone's ability accidentally manifesting itself when she'd been around.

"It's nothing," she muttered to herself, shaking her head. It had to be.

Without warning, as accustomed to when it came to him, Francis smoothly entered through the doorway without knocking and made for her quickly, ignoring the others in the room.

"What are we? Chopped liver?" Ranpo snorted while Kunikida grumbled about 'knocking properly' and 'announcing oneself politely.'

All of which Francis ignored blithely, holding out his phone to her. "Help me find a futon," he told her seriously.

She blinked, taken aback by the request (demand?) from him. "A...futon? Why on earth would you want one? And wouldn't an actual bed be best? I thought you'd want to stick to your western-styled beds, Fitzgerald-san."

"I want a Japanese futon, not one of those American futon couches," he made a distracted offhand wave. "And I want the full Japanese experience, so of course I need to at least try one of those futon mattresses you Japanese insist on sleeping on."

Bemused, she hesitantly took his phone, to which he took a nearby chair and, just as smoothly as he entered the room, had the chair moved to her side and sat in it, one of his hands comfortably settling against her lower back.

It felt like his hand was burning her.

༻❁༺

He'd had one ordered right away, to her amusement. And when he'd dragged her to his newly acquired building to show her it, she entered the tall skyscraper hosting the site of the security firm he now owned with an exasperated air and exchanged a look with the ever diligent Louisa May, who gave her a kind smile accompanied with a knowing look.

"Welcome to Manhasset Security!" he told her grandly, though he made a face. "Should change that name. It sounds hideous," he mused to himself, making her giggle. She was surprised at herself, while he looked way too smug. "Anyway, to my office!"

His hand held tightly onto her shoulder, continuing to burn into her skin and make strange flutterings in her stomach that made her feel out of sorts.

"Shouldn't you have had it set up somewhere where you'll be sleeping?" she asked in bemusement at yet again his weird decisions.

"I've a room set aside here to use," he revealed. "I tend to make sure I have space in each of my buildings for me to stay in, if I need to work overnight. Anyway, this futon thing is a really good idea —easy to put away, carry around, make space with! Ingenious really. Don't need it? I can shove it into a closet or some corner until I do! I like that."