[PP-F1] Fine Dining and Breathing (Elul)

[Koumori 0]

I ended up carrying Elul all the way to the tea house. I was able to find one not too far away from where we started, bout a 5 to 10 minute walk. It was a good thing it had a giant tea cup sign hanging in front or I never would've seen the place. Elul had stayed calmly in my arms the whole time. She was probably happy with not having to walk. But she was so light I almost forgot she was there. I probably should've been embarrassed to be carrying a girl through town but for some reason I wasn't. Now if I was carrying Glory I probably would've tripped and given us both concussions at least 5 times. When I reached the store I stopped in front, obviously unable to open the door. I looked back down to Elul's face to talk to her. "I gotta put you down now. I can't really open the door otherwise." When I looked at her I wondered what she was thinking. I expected her to have asked to be let down but she hadn't. Maybe like before she was too scared to say anything. I figured I should probably ask. 

[Elul 0]

Elul opened her eyes, stirring at the sound of someone's voice.

Where Elul looked around, Oh, right, Kou... Elul slid her legs off and clumsily got out of Kou's grip, letting her feet scrape the ground to make she could touch before dropping onto the ground. She opened the door, yawning, why had she been in Kou's arms? Elul tried to remember her last moments of consciousness as she held the door open, she remembered flying into Kou, but everything after that went dark. She'd remember later, once then she'd apologize for anything silly she had done.

She really hoped she hadn't done anything abnormal.

Elul peaked inside, it didn't seem too terribly crowded, there was group of players in the far back, but the three of them weren't loud enough to make her nervous. Of course the npc was waiting for a prompt of an empty cup or a player calling for it as it idled itself by cleaning cups.

Edited November 7, 2015 by Elul

[Koumori 0]

She opened her eyes and I could see how hazy they were. I hadn't noticed it but she had fallen asleep. I didn't know that that was such a comfortable position. She slowly came to and carefully lowered herself to the ground as I bent down. When she was finally moving under her own power she opened the door and walked inside, silent. She must've still been pretty sleepy, she seemed pretty out of it. I decided I wouldn't say anything about carrying her. It seemed like she needed some rest after all. I followed her inside and saw that the place was almost empty. Aside from a small group in the back, there was no one. I decided to take a seat as far away from them as I could, Elul appeared like the nervous type so I wanted her to be comfortable. I sat down at the table and waited for her to do the same. "You must've been pretty tired. It's a good thing I found you then. So, do you come to places like this with your friends a lot?"

[Elul 0]

"I-I usually come alone" Elul spoke softly, still waking up, "What ex-exactly was I d-doing in y-your arms?" Kou sat away from the group, much to Elul's relief. Elul slowly sat across from them, she was still sleepy from whatever she was doing. Elul already knew what she wanted, green tea. Elul constantly drank green tea whenever she came in a tea house, mostly because other than the occasional sweet tea it was her favorite beverage. So now it was just a matter of Kou deciding what to order, "Occ-ccasionally a friend of mine will c-come in here to find me, b-but most of th-them don't care for tea, so its k-kind of my guilty pl-pleasure."

[Koumori 0]

She was still trying to wake herself up when we got to the table. She rubbed her eyes and tried to remember how she got in my arms. Of course I'd just tell her what happened. "Well I fell out of a clock tower and into your hay cart and you asked to go for tea so I hoped out and I caught you when you jumped. I offered to put you down but you didn't say anything so I just went with it. At some point I guess you fell asleep while I was carrying you haha." We sat down and situated ourselves at the table. She didn't look at the menu and instead finished answering what I asked earlier. I was glad to hear that she did have friends to come with after all. "What? I love tea. Maybe that's just a Japanese thing. I think you need cooler friends." I said to her with a wink. "On second thought, drinking tea isn't that cool." The waitress who was waiting came over to take our orders. I didn't need to look over the menu either, I always had the same thing. "I'll just have some green tea." I gestured toward Elul so she could order as well. 

[Elul 0]

Elul listened, she remembered leaping from the cart, but after colliding with Koumori everything was fuzzy, "I-I'm sorry for making you carry me." Elul was sure her memory would recover after she had fully waken up, but for now she'd have to take Kou's word for it. "Its n-not really that its a j-Japanese thing, its m-more like my best friend is basically a h-hyperactive child who only sits down when he h-has to. Last t-time we were in a place l-like this he asked the w-waiter to add a cup of s-sugar, and he g-gulped it down and then w-won a race against my s-sister, TH-THEN he walked it off like it was noth-thing and went to go t-terrorize some guy, so its probably not because he's not J-Japanese, he just w-won't sit st-still long enough." Elul perked up at the sight of the waiter, "green tea, please."

[Koumori 0]

"Oh don't worry. It wasn't a problem, you're really light. No trouble at all." I listened with a smile as she went on about her friend that went on a sugar fueled rampage. By the way she talked about him it sounded like they were pretty close. "Sounds like a pretty fun guy. I don't know if I should want to meet him or steer clear of him." We were interrupted by the waitresses arrival and both order green teas. When she left I resumed. "So your sisters here too. I don't even have a sister, you're pretty lucky to come in here with someone you know so well."

[Elul 0]

"I-It may be best if you know wh-where he is so he can't st-startle you" Elul placed her head on the table, "as for my s-sister, well, I-I'm to bl-blame for her b-being here. She m-managed to get her h-hands on a N-Nervegear and joined af-after she realized I-I was st-stuck in here." Elul rubbed her eyes, watching the waiter produce the drinks. "W-well, surely you m-met s-someone you l-like, this game was cl-clearly designed t-to be a t-teamwork game, and y-you're no l-level one." Elul yawned, turning her head at the sound of the three players in the back laughing. She turned her attention back to the player in front of her, closing her eyes, tapping her hand on the table to keep herself awake and allow Kou to know she wasn't asleep.

Edited November 7, 2015 by Elul

[Koumori 0]

"I'll keep that in mind." I could hear the sadness in her voice when she talked about her sister. She must've blamed herself for getting her sister into this mess. "Hey you get what you pay for" I made the mistake of trying to comfort people before. Saying nice words and acting sorry only makes it worse. I find that people respond better to humor. It makes them laugh and takes their mind off of whatever they were sad about. The waitress returned and have us our drinks. I took a sip of mine as Elul went on. My face turned red when she mentioned finding someone I like. "Someone I l-like? Well uh....of you meant like friends. Yeah haha I've met plenty. I have a few really close ones." I was ashamed that I got flustered when she brought up a person I liked. Obviously my mind drifted towards the love aspect of that saying and immediately thought of Glory. I was glad I came to my senses before I made too much of a fool of myself. 

[Elul 0]

Elul listened to the man say something about getting what she paid for, if it was his attempt at a way to lighten the mood, then Elul was too tired to understand the joke. After a couple seconds Elul understood, but it wasn't very funny. Elul continued listening, Wait, did he stutter? Yes he definitely stuttered, and I've listened to him long enough to know he doesn't have trouble with pronouncing the beginning of words, so something's up. Elul began examining his words as if she suspected him of a crime, Let's see, stuttering, generally something someone does out of nervousness when their breath isn't regulated accordingly to their word of choice, generally when thinking about word choices ahead of the time, I suppose that's why Whit doesn't stutter often. Elul eyes swished about behind her eyelids, moving an imaginary chart to keep track of her clues, back to the matter at hand. Kou specifically stuttered on the word "like" and paused after the word "well," thus I can conclude that he wasn't originally talking about normal friends, instead he was talking about his lo-

Elul's thoughts were interrupted by the sound of the cups from the waiter clanking them on the table, prompting her to sit up and take a sip of her presented cup.

What was I thinking about? Elul savored her tea, her last thirty-seconds arranging ideas gone like an essay that a college student forgot to save.

[Koumori 0]

I just sat there watching Elul. After i finished talking she started to just stare ahead and not say a word. I could see by her face that she was in deep thought about something. It must've been what I was worried about. She probably picked up on my stuttering and was trying to figure out what it was for. Neither of us said anything, the only movement was of Elul's eyes. When the waitress brought our cups she seemed to snap out of it and grab a cup. I was unsettled by the whole thing. Even weirder was that she continued to not say anything. "Are you alright? It looked like you were just thinking really hard about something."

[Elul 0]

"I'm fi-fine" Elul took another sip, enjoying the slight sweetness of the tea, "I-I was th-thinking about s-something y-you said, b-but I l-lost my tr-train of th-thought when the w-waiter c-came." Why did she care? It was probably because he was an interesting character, I mean, I've never met someone who took being confused for the opposite gender so lightly, most throw a fit of some kind, yet he laughed like he thought it was funny. I suppose he did say it happened often, so maybe he's used to it? Elul shook her head, she was supposed to be talking to Kou, not figuring out his lifestyle. "So, b-beside cl-climbing churches, wh-what do y-you do for f-fun?"

[Koumori 0]

"Oh alright. I hope it wasn't something too important then." She took a sip of her drink before she became lost in thought again. I could tell by the way she quickly shook her head like she was trying to erase something from her head. This girl was funny. Everything was on the surface with her. It was kind of refreshing in a way. Most people I meant were reserved and tried to not give much away. Maybe being readable was a characteristic of shy people. I too took a sip of my tea as I waited for her. It was pretty good actually. Not the best I'd had but not half bad by Aincrad standards. I chuckled a bit when she asked me what I do for fun. "Well I used to stay to myself and not do much but being in here has changed me somehow. Now I take the chance to do crazy stuff like that whenever I can. It's more enjoyable in here if you can keep finding new things to do. I recommend snowball fights, they're pretty fun." I took another sip of tea with a content look on my face. "What about you?"

[Elul 0]

"I-I like sn-snow, and r-reading" Elul recalled times she had gone to the fourth floor just to sit and watch from the warmth of a restaurant, it was especially pretty at night. "I-I  was reading an old b-book series c-called Pendragon b-before I-I got st-stuck in h-here." Elul sighed when remembering that she had never finished the fourth book before being stuck in SAO, she had always wanted to go on adventures with Bobby Pendragon imagining what it what be like to atleast be his sidekick. Oddly enough the fourth book was about a world of people who lived in a virtual reality.

Oh the irony.

"I-I a-also play v-videogames as y-you can probably guess."

[Koumori 0]

Elul shyly replied that she enjoyed playing in the snow and reading. I could get behind that, although reading wasn't my favorite past time. Unless it was manga, I could read the crap out of that. I raised an eyebrow at the book she mentioned. Just the name gave me the full picture of what the book was probably about. "Pendragon, huh? I usually just read manga so I've never heard of that one. Maybe when we get out of here I'll check it out. You seem like you have good taste." I said smiling at her. I watched as she sighed to herself, no doubt thinking about how being trapped here put a damper on her plans. She looked back up and spoke once more about her interests. Ha, videogames, coulda guessed. "Ahh video games. I shoulda stuck to the old fashioned consoles, coulda avoided this mess. Oh well, can't change that now." It was my turn to sign as I reflected on my curiosity being what landed me here. "Revolutionary technology" they said, "will change the face of gaming" they said. Yeah well what they didn't say was that it would trap us lucky souls in a virtual world for God knows how long. I adjusted my position and leaned back in my chair, the front legs in the air as I balanced myself. I took a sip of the tea to wash down my thoughts before I looked to Elul once more. "Have you ever wondered what it would be like to be someone else, just for a day?"