[log] Match Made In Aisle B [Asuka, Hoshino]
Aburame Hoshino was not worried about Yuuhi Kureno, because he had explicitly told her not to worry about him.
Instead, she was worried about Sarutobi Asuka.
After all, Asuka was very close with Kureno-sensei, and seemed to care about his well-being. Therefore, the poor jounin was probably very concerned at the moment (although Hoshino, as ordered, was not) and in need of good news and cheerful companionship. And in need to spilling all the information she had on what was stressing Kureno out so much that his insomnia had kicked up a notch, and bothered him so much that he had actually recently remembered to take some time with his team.
It would be therapeutic for Asuka to share this information. After all, she only had the older woman's best interest in mind.
There only remained the problem of needing to actually approach her and strike up a conversation.
Hoshino had been tailing the jounin since the older woman had woken up for the evening. It wasn't so much that she was afraid of talking to Asuka, she mused absently as she tugged her collar a little higher, careful to be lost in the crowd without losing her mark. It was that she disliked the idea of... well, of talking at all to anyone who wasn't a member of her genin cell. Yet... she couldn't make herself give up the task and return to her glass-encased world at the Aburame home. Both hands in her pockets again, she forced herself to begin actually approaching Asuka.
...in an indirect way.
It wasn't really so much that Asuka didn't notice she was being tailed. It was more that...
... okay, she didn't notice she was being tailed. But come on, it was the middle of the after-work shopping rush, a person didn't want to be so paranoid that they couldn't go out into public and worry about being tailed, and she was distracted. Yes. Distracted. Completely distracted.
Where the crap was the kitty litter on this goddamn coupon? The aisle was only so big, where the hell did they hide it?!
The kunoichi stopped in the middle of the aisle, putting her hands on her hips and glaring at the shelves in front of her. There was absolutely no reason why this little store wouldn't stock the litter on her coupon. Granted, it was a little store, and granted, it wasn't the litter she normally got, but the litter she normally got was also normally on sale, and today... it wasn't. Bastards. They were doing this on purpose precisely because she didn't know what kind of litter she shouldn't use because she wasn't an Inuzuka and therefore genius at all things animal. Why couldn't she just let Mister be an outdoor cat or something?
.... right. Kitten. Not fixed. Maybe in a few more months...
With a sigh, Asuka gave up the fight and stepped forward to grab a bag of her usual, not-on-sale litter. And then when she stepped back, totally didn't notice the high-collared chick staring at her that had probably been standing on the other end of the shopping aisle for the whole time she'd been internally ranting over the coupon. At least she thought it was a chick. (Hard to tell with the shades.) Had she been in the way?
"Shit, my bad," she immediately said, before pausing and giving the stranger a second look. Wait a minute. This was Hoshino, one of Kureno's students. The quiet one. (Well. The other quiet one, who didn't stammer so much. Or talk much at all, that she knew.) Huh. Wasn't the Aburame compound practically on the other side of the village? Talk about a small world.
As Asuka wasn't an Inuzuka (not to mention the fact that Asuka was a jounin and an adult and therefore an Authority Figure), Hoshino managed not to snap at the expletive. Also as Asuka wasn't an Inuzuka (or Hyuuga or Yuuhi or Aburame), Hoshino wasn't entirely sure what to say. Her typical greeting of a tilting her head slightly forward and to the right would probably be recieved as an implication that conversation was not required.
It was bad when you realized you could think of the scientific name of the mosquito buzzing over the aisle more easily than you could think of a polite greeting.
Shoulders tensing slightly, Hoshino glanced at the ground before managing to mutter out a soft "...Asuka-sensei." Good. Words. Her shoulders relaxed slightly; that barrier crossed, everything else would come more easily, in theory. "I know that you have a busy schedule this time of day, but I was wondering..."
If we could talk? If you'd mind me following you around a bit?
"...if you needed help carrying that?"
At least she had the decency (and wherewithal) to drag a hand out of her pocket and gesture earnestly toward the bag of litter. Not as smooth as she would have liked. Thankfully, this was a conversation, not a battle. She could allow herself a little elbow room to make mistakes. Right?
Asuka blinked at her. And blinked again. Then glanced down at the litter.
.... it was only an eight pound bag of litter. Hoshino didn't honestly think she couldn't handle eight pounds of litter, did she?
If it had been a guy, she probably would have felt insulted. In fact, if it had been pretty much anyone else she knew (or didn't know), she probably would have felt insulted. But this was the first time she could recall ever hearing words come out of the Aburame's mouth that were directed at her. (She'd heard a few before directed at other people. Maybe twenty words tops over the last five years or so.) That made her wonder a) why in the world so many were suddenly flying her direction, b) why Hoshino had taken the time to know her schedule, and c) what Hoshino's ulterior motive must be.
... hey, she was one of Kureno's students. And Kureno was all about ulterior motives when it came to doing something unexpected.
Therefore, Asuka felt more curious (and confused; she imagined that came across in her expression) than insulted. Maybe there was a good reason for this.
".... sure," she said, after a hesitant minute. Letting Hoshino carry her stuff wouldn't be any different from making one of her kids do it, right? And she sure wouldn't feel bad about making Inosuke carrying stuff, so.
Mission status update: we're rolling, this is the good one.
Smiling in what she hoped was a friendly manner (well, letting the left corner of her lips quirk slightly for a second), Hoshino fell back into silence and took possession of the bag. Adjusting her glasses with her free hand, she made a point to tug up her sleeve and tilt her head forward inquisitively. Then, with almost a jolt, realized that Asuka probably wouldn't have any idea what she was trying to ask. Which meant she had to put it into words. Words which were not 'tell me the story of your life and everything you've ever known about my sensei.'
Hesitating for an appropriately awkward few seconds, all but latched onto the older woman like a parasite, the Aburame girl slowly and carefully laid out the words in her head before opening her mouth again.
"Your kitten... is one of the ones Hanabi-san found?"
This was what people called a 'conversation starter,' if she remembered correctly. Asking a question unrelated to what you really wanted to find out in order to 'break the ice' and 'create an atmosphere of comfort between the participants in the conversation.' Iruka-sensei had taught her this, if she remembered correctly, upon learning that the silent girl in the back of her room literally did not understand the basic idea behind the apparently elusive concept of 'conversation.' Really, she'd discovered, 'small talk' wasn't far different from surveying a battlefield. If you noticed the ground was slippery, you began planning to compensate for it. If you were carrying kitty litter for someone, you asked about their cat.
The girl took the bag of litter rather happily (if one could say an Aburame did anything happily; at least, it didn't appear as though she didn't want to take it), and the two of them proceeded down the aisle towards the checkout lanes. Asuka wasn't really sure exactly why Hoshino wanted to be her carry-out, but she supposed she couldn't complain; if she'd been buying more things, it would have been nice to have the extra hands. Unfortunately, as she didn't know the girl and had no earthly clue what on earth they could talk about, she couldn't think of a way to fill the silence with conversation.
Perhaps Hoshino was having the same problem, judging by they way she was fidgeting. Hm.
But the other kunoichi was the one to break the ice, and cats were an easy topic. Asuka thought, anyway. She nodded in affirmative to the question.
"Yes. Kiba sort of twisted my arm into it. Mister is..." she trailed off for a second and tried to think of a nice way to describe the cat. She couldn't insult animals around Kiba, obviously, and knew she couldn't insult bugs around an Aburame, but would the animal thing have rubbed off from Kiba to Hoshino? "... interesting. I've never had a pet before, so I'm sorta floundering through it. I always thought kittens were fluffy and cute, but Mister is more antisocial and full of claws. I'd like to think he likes me, but it's probably more that he just tolerates me."
Nodding in response was easy. That kind of relationship she could understand easily. The inverse of her initial relationship with Kiba, or her current relationship with Konchuu, who had taken into its little head the idea that Hoshino loved it madly. It was also easy to understand Kiba poking and prodding the unwilling into a large binding commitment. Admittedly, Hoshino had volunteered herself for the kitten. The comparable events in her own experience... she didn't wish to relive.
...now. Where did the conversation go from there?
Moving was easy. Carrying the bag, following the older woman, not getting too close to anyone so that no personal space bubbles would be shattered. Movement came naturally. Talking, on the other hand, required the ability to read the thoughts of others to the extent that the next words you spoke made a logical connection with the last words said.
What made a logical connection with an antisocial kitten?
"For cats... I think toleration and love are... very similar. They need less from outside of themselves than other animals... like people."
Something the Aburame knew all about, really.
As they got in line at the checkout lanes, Asuka pulled out her wallet and considered the logic in the girl's statement. She supposed she couldn't find fault in it; certainly older cats (the few she'd had the experience of interacting with) had the stand-offish nature that Mister had been displaying for the three months she'd had him. Maybe he'd just... grown up quick o something. Being stuck in a bag so that Harmful Things could be done could possibly have contributed to that.
And in the course of conversing with Kiba (and with Hanato, a little, just recently), had been the discussion of cats and their differences from dogs. Dogs were much more like little children that never grew up, while cats were far more adult and independent. A dog came to you for love and affection even when kicked, while a cat came for love and affection only if it liked you, and never when kicked. The same couldn't be said of kittens or puppies, as most all babies were the same; it was just the end result that could be button-holed into a concept.
Perhaps the idea that Mister had grown up fast and skipped the kitten phase was an accurate concept.
Asuka's gaze came back around to Hoshino after that thoughtful moment, a slight smile kicking up one side of her mouth. "That seems pretty accurate. Especially for older cats." The line moved forward some, and she stepped up to close the space. "Maybe I'm just the one that needs to change her perceptions of what to expect. He won't play with me, like he will with Konohako, but he does sleep with me during the day. I suppose that he wouldn't if he didn't like me somehow."
Asuka-sensei was smiling. Good sign. She must be better at this than originally anticipated.
"Hm."
...or not. Ah well. It had been a good try. Hoshino shifted the bag minutely as they moved forward, introspective for a moment as she tried to think of how to respond in more than a monosyllabic sound. How would one express what she meant by the single sound 'hm' in actual words?
"...you could look at it from this perspective," she tried, almost forgetting to move forward with the line. "It's better to be ignored by your kitten than to have your property destroyed... affectionately."
Her free hand rose demonstratively to her sunglasses, tapping the frame as she turned her head slightly. This pair, as... well, at this point, every pair she owned, bore the distinctive signs of a mangling. These were actually the best she had; the bottom of the left lens was obviously scratched up a bit, and a second glance at the surrounding frame showed signs of an intense gnawing session, interrupted as Konchuu's little fangs had gotten started on the earpiece. It was a source of great tension between girl and kitten. Hoshino couldn't get it through the little creature's head that she needed the shades to leave the house. Or perhaps the problem was that she had gotten the message across, as Konchuu seemed invariably pleased when its master stayed home for the day and allowed it to follow her around.
...she should learn the kitten's gender, perhaps. And manage not to bump into Asuka while not letting the woman behind her jostle her.
If Hoshino hadn't pointed out the damage, the older kunoichi honestly wouldn't have noticed. Mostly because of the distance they'd previous had, she supposed; as Hoshino stepped up to follow as the line moved, the tilt of her head and the shine of the overhead flourescents picked out the scratches she'd missed before.
Affectionately destroyed property, eh?
"Did Kiba saddle you with one, too?" she asked. It was perhaps a leap of judgement to assume that Hoshino was talking about a kitten, that said kitten was her own, and that Kiba had given it to her, but it made a twisted sort of sense. After all, Hoshino and Kiba were on the same team, and why wouldn't the Inuzuka try to saddle her team mates with kittens first? Asuka had gotten the last kitten of the lot, after all.
Never one to look sheepish (or... to look much of anything other than stoic, really), the Aburame simply snorted softly in response. Let Asuka take that as she would. There were only two options, after all: either she'd mistake it for slightly irritated confirmation, or hit the nail on the head with the 'meh, I guilted myself into adopting one before Kiba could even get started on me' interpretation. Either or.
Having run out of words for the moment, Hoshino settled back into the security blanket of movement. Checkouts were easy, particularly if there was someone else to handle the minimal conversational exchange. Without meaning to, she sank directly back into her own thoughts and began re-analyzing the situation. They were getting along. They were conversing. She had a good excuse to follow the jounin around for a bit. There would be a natural break while Asuka paid for her purchase.
All she needed was a smooth way to bring Kureno-sensei up in conversation, and she'd have fulfilled the objective of her self-appointed mission.
Studying Asuka's shoulder absently--not that it was particularly easy to tell where she was looking at any given time--Hoshino mentally replayed their conversation thus far. Cats. Antisocial. Affection. Property damage. Kiba. It was like a brain twister: how do these things naturally relate back to the original point? The best she could come up with was that Kureno was Kiba's teacher, had recently seen her about termites on his new property, was affectionate in a somewhat distant and almost antisocial way, and... knew people who raised cats.
Huh. No lightbulbs going off.
She decided to take that as an affirmative. If it was a negative, she would have made that more obvious, right? Or explained what had really done the damage to her glasses. At least, she thought the girl would.
... man, this chick totally had Kureno one-upped on the natural poker face.
The line moved up again, and this time with was Asuka's turn. Hoshino turned over the bag long enough for the cashier to ring it up, and Asuka handed over the cash and pocketed the change and the receipt. After bagging the purchase and making their way out, she realized that Hoshino's insistance on carrying the litter meant that this silence was potentially a thing that would be prolonged. Awkward, uncertain silence.
All. The way. Home.
Hm.
She snuck a peek back at the Aburame as she held open the door for them both, letting the younger woman preceed her out of the store. Perhaps the real reason why Hoshino had little to say was because she didn't know what to say. Hard to tell, but considering that she was looking forward to a very silent trip home, maybe she should try initiating conversation herself.
"So how is your team?" she asked, withdrawing her pack of cigarettes as she lead the way home, setting the lazy pace that did not indicate she was in a hurry to get anywhere anytime soon. "I heard that Kureno's been beating the crap out of you lately. And gave you to Gaia's team. Tough luck."
Apparently, sitting still long enough really did open windows of opportunity. Score one for the Aburame ability to patiently wait out other people's need to be sociable.
Hoshino lit up at the word 'team,' of course, in a way which was probably visible even to the untrained eye. Back straightening slightly, head tilting back a little, face relaxing into a comfortable almost-smile for a moment before falling back into its usual unconcerned expression. The team was a comfortable topic (and led in the right direction), one she could open up about most easily simply because she already had a vocabulary for it.
"It's affectionate," she replied in her soft monotone, glancing skyward as if recalling something. "Like cats. Clawing and scratching because they like you enough to give you attention. It's good for us." At least, if people like Kureno and her mother told her it was good to let Leigh kick her around on the training field for hours on end, that was good enough for her to buy into it completely. "Kureno-sensei..."
She didn't really fade off so much as fade into a thoughtful ellipsis. Kiba or Hinaji would have pounced on it with something along the lines of 'yeah, I'm worried about him too' or 'you know, I was talking to him the other day, and...' Then again, someone like Inosuke would have simply stared for a moment and then headed down the '...yes, and?' track, promptly freezing the Aburame against saying anything else. Where Asuka would fall on the spectrum was anyone's guess.
She glanced over her cigarette at Kureno's name, flicking on the dual-flamed lighter Chouko had gotten her the year before. It was interesting, how the girl chose to slide off into silence rather than going on with whatever topic she had been intending. Perhaps she and Kureno didn't get along so well? She heard plenty about Hinaji and Kiba, but to be honest the Aburame usually didn't come up so much as them. Asuka had always assumed that was because there was nothing good or bad to say about her; nothing frustrating. The 'just right' sort of thing.
Putting away the lighter, she took a drag off the cigarette and let a lungful of smoke float away in the sky, away from her companion. "You've been good for him too. The team, I mean." Comparing him to how he was before team eight and how he was now was not exactly like saying he was a completely different person, but there were noticeable differences.
She pursed her lips and looked away. Thinking about him wasn't quite as worrisome as it had been before her talk with Chiriku, but... not easier, either. "He's relaxed a lot."
The body language was much more communicative than the words, as usual. Tiny things like the glance at her teacher's name and the slight purse of the older kunoichi's lips were so much more important than words. It was always a wonder to Hoshino that people could transmit so many signals so easily and yet not understand her when she replied in kind. Maybe other people used the words of the conversation as cues to explain the body language. Interesting theory. She'd ask Hinaji. He was fairly intelligent.
"You're worried about him?"
It barely occurred to her that this was what Iruka-sensei called a 'conversational jump.' People who had known her forever (all four of them) rolled with this sort of thing easily enough, able to guess from years of interaction where the Aburame's thoughts had just traveled. Other people tended to give her odd looks... more because she didn't seem to notice what she was doing than because she jumped to odd places. It was disconcerting to miss out on something that went on in internal dialogue if it was, say, important to the direction of the conversation.
"He won't talk with me about it," she added as an afterthought, tilting her head forward so that her hair shifted slightly in front of her face. That action she was sure could be easily interpreted by anyone with eyes and any sort of logical capacity.
"No," was her immediate response - no thought put behind it, just a quick retort... that she paused after, and rescinded a little lamely with, "Not really, anyway." Damn, this whole thing really must be getting to her, if she was getting obvious enough that other people (besides Chiriku) were reading into her reactions. Then again, this was one of Kureno's students, and Aburame were creepy to begin with...
But she couldn't think of a way to really explain how she could be worried about Kureno without really being worried about Kureno... the complications behind how their relationship currently stood were more than she wanted to get into. And replying with it's complicated didn't close the conversation - unfortunately, it only opened the avenue for more questions. And she was not, under any circumstances, going to be discussing something like this with one of Kureno's own students. Anything she said right now could get back to him all too easily, and she... wasn't up to that right now.
So Asuka shifted her attention to the almost morose way that last statement was tacked on. Easier to attend to Hoshino than to worry about herself. Not that she was going to explain anything that involved herself right now, but. Hopefully she wouldn't come across as too obviously clueless. "About what, exactly?"
Right. So Asuka was worried about him too. That didn't bode well.
For a moment, Hoshino didn't respond, eyes flicking back and forth behind her sunglasses as she studied the older woman. Posture, tone, facial expression; nothing more than they learned to study at the academy. This was... 'big.' There was obviously something entangling going on (she was sure that meant she'd won a bet or two about Asuka and Kureno's relationship) that would take time to unfold. Probably not in this conversation. Given her own position as Kureno's student, it would probably involve multiple conversations, a trusting relationship, some hard alcohol and not the full story ever getting revealed.
Ah well. With people who didn't invade her personal space and teach Hinaji to swear, Hoshino was eternally patient.
"He's worried," she finally replied. "Not sleeping. He's been... difficult to read, lately." Beneath her collar, the girl bit the inside of her lip slightly. Hopefully it would make the rest of her face seem more apprehensive. She'd have a hard time getting any sympathy information if her looks weren't visibly altered.
What, you mean you can read him on a normal day? she almost blurted, but caught herself before she said anything stupid. Of course Hoshino would read Kureno better. She'd spent years in his back pocket as a student, after all. One didn't walk away from something like that without some kind of insight. She didn't dwell long on any kind of jealous bitterness, though; it wasn't fair that this girl could know him better after four years than she could after over a decade, but that was life. Life wasn't fair.
So Asuka focused on the question - or really, the 'what don't I know?' she was hearing in Hoshino's statement - sticking the cigarette back between her lips and stuffing one hand in her pocket. "I don't know everything," she said honestly, after another drag and lungful of nicotine to fortify her nerves. "He's always been an over-achiever, and he's been over-working himself a lot lately. He's been sick a lot lately, too, which is probably because he never rests enough to really recover. But I do know that he's been working on modifying a jutsu, and the logistics have been difficult. It's probably frustrating." She glanced back down. "The insomnia's new, though."
"Insomnia is typically caused by stress, anxiety, depression, stimulants, and change in schedule or environment. Behavioral insomnia is one of the leading causes of daytime irritability and usually results in a matter of days, not typically more than a week, as the patient becomes increasingly concerned about his or her inability to rest. Chronic insomniacs are more at risk for developing psychological dementia and acute anxiety disorders, as well as increasing the severity of chronic diseases such as high blood pressure or diabetes and causing a disconnect with both logic and physics, leading to poor problem-solving skills and an increase of risk-taking behaviour simultaneously."
Nearly 100 words later (94, to be exact), Hoshino had to pause, almost to catch her breath. She took a quick glance at the jounin before turning her attention to the road in front of them again. It was easier to contemplate speaking again if she could focus on the world around her rather than the fact that she was having a conversation.
"...if you wanted to know."
Totally smooth. Not awkward at all.
She didn't think it needed to be said out loud that hearing her sensei was pushing himself to begin with hardly boosted her confidence in his ability to 'be fine,' as he'd recently claimed he was. True, the summation of all the stress he was putting himself under could be the cause of the insomnia. That didn't mean knowing he was working on a jutsu while most likely in a phase of 'poor problem solving skills and increased risk-taking behaviour' was comforting. At all.
For a moment, all Asuka could immediately do in reaction was stare. (Hopefully not like an idiot.) That huge glop of information dump she'd just received was more than she'd ever heard an Aburame say in one sitting - hell, it was probably more than what Hoshino had said in the entire conversation thus far.
"... you've been thinking about this a while," she said finally, and couldn't help but give the girl a small grin. One wouldn't do all that research on insomnia unless it was for an important reason. And she didn't get the feeling that insomnia was something that Hoshino herself had a problem with, so.
Looking away again, she shoved her other hand in its matching pocket and turned her eyes up to the sky. She thought she might have sussed out the reason behind this encounter now: Kureno's student was worried and approaching her for possible reasons why. Asuka supposed she could understand why; if Inosuke couldn't get answers out of her, he'd probably start bugging other people, too. It was cute, sorta. A little reassuring maybe, too.
"We could just head the whole psychotic problem off and hit him over the head with a sock full of quarters," she suggested. Less than half of her suggestion was in jest. "Make him sleep now and deal with the bruises later."
She would not contemple violence against Kureno-sensei. It was some sort of cardinal sin. She would laugh the joke off as just a joke.
...she should not be contemplating violence against Kureno-sensei.
Wrinkling her nose slightly, Hoshino took a few moments to consider the logistics of that sort of situation. The Yuuhi was a jounin; currently a cranky, sleep-deprived jounin who was probably completely stressed out. Not the kind of person you wanted to sneak up on, should you desire to live out the rest of your natural life. This meant that there were two options: 1) approaching Kureno, explaining the situation and knocking him out consensually, or 2) luring him into conversation and then beating him unconscious, probably in the middle of a sentence.
...cardinal sin. Right.
With what her mother would have called a sigh (exhaling slowly and softly while biting one's lip), the girl shifted the bag in her arms. "...could probably convince Kiba to do it."
Note to self: while dead-panning around Hoshino, make certain to actually be willing to go through with your suggestion when you find her taking you completely seriously.
Still. Asuka's grin kicked up a notch, but it was less wicked and more rueful than before. Would she consider going through with beating Kureno unconscious? Yes. Would she do it right now, even excluding the fact that the jutsu he was trying to modify really was important and distracting him from it probably wasn't a good idea? .... no.
Though she could totally see convincing Kiba to do something like this. Good for future reference.
So instead, gasp and surprise, she made the more adult suggestion. "Or you could talk to him." Asuka looked down at the obviously-plotting student. "You're his student, after all. He'll try to brush you off, but the trick is to just be more stubborn than he is." If such a thing were possible. At the very least, an Aburame could out-patience him. Right?
Not that Hoshino had been seriously considering the question. Or that she was seriously going to beat Asuka to the punch and ask Kiba first.
"...have you, recently?" she asked, rolling easily with the conversation's shift away from dastardly deeds to the more mature approach to the situation. The slight tilt of her head expressed the thought fully: 'you've known him forever; he likes you a lot; he's worried about protecting you from different things than he's worried about protecting his students from; might that not just help him calm down because you can, like, talk about adult things and get drunk or whatever it is you old people who haven't devoted your lives to research do?'
From the slight furrowing of her brow, however, the girl also seemed to imply that as soon as the kitty litter was delivered, she might sneak off to sit on her sensei's porch and lie siege for a while. After all, Kureno was an ace when it came to reading Hoshino's silence, and would probably at least allow her to sit quietly for the night, listening to the hum of the kikai in and around his house.
After she went to see Kiba, of course.
... heh. As if having spoken to him recently would have really meant anything.
The kunoichi shifted her eyes back ahead, to the last street they have to take to get to her home. "On his birthday," she replied, and took the cigarette from her lips to ash it. "And not too long ago I gave him some suggestions on sleep aids that weren't prescription. Otherwise..."
Otherwise, if she'd shown much in the way of concern... well, she wasn't even sure if she should show too much in the way of concern, right now. Even after her talk with Chiriku, she wasn't sure if she wanted to influence anything. And more than that, anytime she ever did show concern, he blew her off the same as he blew anyone else off. What was the use if there was no point, right?
Asuka at least hoped he'd keep his promise if it did get worse.
"... we haven't really talked recently, no."
There were no words, because the situation was one which was not immediately understandable. Instead, there was another look. Hoshino glanced at the ground, then up at the sky, then back through her bangs at Asuka's face. If/when she went to bother check up on her sensei, she'd have to sound him out a little, to see if that lack of communication was part of the cause of his grumpiness. Or if there really had been a lack of communication. Or what was wrong with Asuka-sensei, who seemed distinctly not well herself.
Damn, this didn't mean she had to go find Inosuke and ask him what was wrong, did it? Maybe she could find Shikako instead. Not that that would be any easier to handle. Maybe Chouko was around...
...being social seemed to be quite the slippery slope. One minute you have two friends and a sensei, the next you're worried about or planning to contact more than 7 people about various things.
Maybe she'd go sit in the garden before calling on Kiba. Clear her head. All the talking had clearly gotten to her and was making her irrational and crazy. On the other hand, it made her feel almost natural when she finally murmured out an absent, "...ah. I see."
...
Well, she supposed that was as good a way to end a conversation as any, considering this was the first time she'd ever really spoken with Hoshino.
It didn't seem like there was very much else to say after that, so Asuka didn't try to prod the conversation along any further; let the girl think on whatever was currently in her head, and let her keep following if she wanted. So the jounin remained silent as they completed their walk, finished smoking her cigarette and ground it out on the sidewalk approaching her small apartment.
"Thank you for your help," she said politely, as she paused to pick the butt of her finished cigarette off the concrete (her landlord would have her ass if she started littering now). "It was nice talking to you, Hoshino."
With a quiet (and difficult to notice) smile (of the lips-curling-for-a-second-beneath-drawn-up-collar variety), the Aburame gave herself a mental pat on the back for having made it thus far without going into some sort of toxic shock. The last stretch of silence had helped, of course; that didn't mean she wasn't going to be completely silent for the next hour and a half to make up for all the talking she'd just done.
"Thank you for your time, Asuka-sensei," she replied with the slight bob of a bow she'd been taught to use for her mother. Handing back the bag of kitty litter, she searched for a moment before adding, "...if you ever need help, please let me know. And... give Mister a pat on the head for me?"
With that final comment, 267 words later, Hoshino tugged her collar up just a little higher for her silent 'good night and good luck (not having anything to worry about when you go out on duty)' of parting. Mission Talk To Asuka About Kureno-sensei: complete. Mission Find Out How Asuka-sensei Is Holding Up These Days: about to begin after completion of Mission Oh God My Voice Box Is Probably Going To Implode.
Instead, she was worried about Sarutobi Asuka.
After all, Asuka was very close with Kureno-sensei, and seemed to care about his well-being. Therefore, the poor jounin was probably very concerned at the moment (although Hoshino, as ordered, was not) and in need of good news and cheerful companionship. And in need to spilling all the information she had on what was stressing Kureno out so much that his insomnia had kicked up a notch, and bothered him so much that he had actually recently remembered to take some time with his team.
It would be therapeutic for Asuka to share this information. After all, she only had the older woman's best interest in mind.
There only remained the problem of needing to actually approach her and strike up a conversation.
Hoshino had been tailing the jounin since the older woman had woken up for the evening. It wasn't so much that she was afraid of talking to Asuka, she mused absently as she tugged her collar a little higher, careful to be lost in the crowd without losing her mark. It was that she disliked the idea of... well, of talking at all to anyone who wasn't a member of her genin cell. Yet... she couldn't make herself give up the task and return to her glass-encased world at the Aburame home. Both hands in her pockets again, she forced herself to begin actually approaching Asuka.
...in an indirect way.
It wasn't really so much that Asuka didn't notice she was being tailed. It was more that...
... okay, she didn't notice she was being tailed. But come on, it was the middle of the after-work shopping rush, a person didn't want to be so paranoid that they couldn't go out into public and worry about being tailed, and she was distracted. Yes. Distracted. Completely distracted.
Where the crap was the kitty litter on this goddamn coupon? The aisle was only so big, where the hell did they hide it?!
The kunoichi stopped in the middle of the aisle, putting her hands on her hips and glaring at the shelves in front of her. There was absolutely no reason why this little store wouldn't stock the litter on her coupon. Granted, it was a little store, and granted, it wasn't the litter she normally got, but the litter she normally got was also normally on sale, and today... it wasn't. Bastards. They were doing this on purpose precisely because she didn't know what kind of litter she shouldn't use because she wasn't an Inuzuka and therefore genius at all things animal. Why couldn't she just let Mister be an outdoor cat or something?
.... right. Kitten. Not fixed. Maybe in a few more months...
With a sigh, Asuka gave up the fight and stepped forward to grab a bag of her usual, not-on-sale litter. And then when she stepped back, totally didn't notice the high-collared chick staring at her that had probably been standing on the other end of the shopping aisle for the whole time she'd been internally ranting over the coupon. At least she thought it was a chick. (Hard to tell with the shades.) Had she been in the way?
"Shit, my bad," she immediately said, before pausing and giving the stranger a second look. Wait a minute. This was Hoshino, one of Kureno's students. The quiet one. (Well. The other quiet one, who didn't stammer so much. Or talk much at all, that she knew.) Huh. Wasn't the Aburame compound practically on the other side of the village? Talk about a small world.
As Asuka wasn't an Inuzuka (not to mention the fact that Asuka was a jounin and an adult and therefore an Authority Figure), Hoshino managed not to snap at the expletive. Also as Asuka wasn't an Inuzuka (or Hyuuga or Yuuhi or Aburame), Hoshino wasn't entirely sure what to say. Her typical greeting of a tilting her head slightly forward and to the right would probably be recieved as an implication that conversation was not required.
It was bad when you realized you could think of the scientific name of the mosquito buzzing over the aisle more easily than you could think of a polite greeting.
Shoulders tensing slightly, Hoshino glanced at the ground before managing to mutter out a soft "...Asuka-sensei." Good. Words. Her shoulders relaxed slightly; that barrier crossed, everything else would come more easily, in theory. "I know that you have a busy schedule this time of day, but I was wondering..."
If we could talk? If you'd mind me following you around a bit?
"...if you needed help carrying that?"
At least she had the decency (and wherewithal) to drag a hand out of her pocket and gesture earnestly toward the bag of litter. Not as smooth as she would have liked. Thankfully, this was a conversation, not a battle. She could allow herself a little elbow room to make mistakes. Right?
Asuka blinked at her. And blinked again. Then glanced down at the litter.
.... it was only an eight pound bag of litter. Hoshino didn't honestly think she couldn't handle eight pounds of litter, did she?
If it had been a guy, she probably would have felt insulted. In fact, if it had been pretty much anyone else she knew (or didn't know), she probably would have felt insulted. But this was the first time she could recall ever hearing words come out of the Aburame's mouth that were directed at her. (She'd heard a few before directed at other people. Maybe twenty words tops over the last five years or so.) That made her wonder a) why in the world so many were suddenly flying her direction, b) why Hoshino had taken the time to know her schedule, and c) what Hoshino's ulterior motive must be.
... hey, she was one of Kureno's students. And Kureno was all about ulterior motives when it came to doing something unexpected.
Therefore, Asuka felt more curious (and confused; she imagined that came across in her expression) than insulted. Maybe there was a good reason for this.
".... sure," she said, after a hesitant minute. Letting Hoshino carry her stuff wouldn't be any different from making one of her kids do it, right? And she sure wouldn't feel bad about making Inosuke carrying stuff, so.
Mission status update: we're rolling, this is the good one.
Smiling in what she hoped was a friendly manner (well, letting the left corner of her lips quirk slightly for a second), Hoshino fell back into silence and took possession of the bag. Adjusting her glasses with her free hand, she made a point to tug up her sleeve and tilt her head forward inquisitively. Then, with almost a jolt, realized that Asuka probably wouldn't have any idea what she was trying to ask. Which meant she had to put it into words. Words which were not 'tell me the story of your life and everything you've ever known about my sensei.'
Hesitating for an appropriately awkward few seconds, all but latched onto the older woman like a parasite, the Aburame girl slowly and carefully laid out the words in her head before opening her mouth again.
"Your kitten... is one of the ones Hanabi-san found?"
This was what people called a 'conversation starter,' if she remembered correctly. Asking a question unrelated to what you really wanted to find out in order to 'break the ice' and 'create an atmosphere of comfort between the participants in the conversation.' Iruka-sensei had taught her this, if she remembered correctly, upon learning that the silent girl in the back of her room literally did not understand the basic idea behind the apparently elusive concept of 'conversation.' Really, she'd discovered, 'small talk' wasn't far different from surveying a battlefield. If you noticed the ground was slippery, you began planning to compensate for it. If you were carrying kitty litter for someone, you asked about their cat.
The girl took the bag of litter rather happily (if one could say an Aburame did anything happily; at least, it didn't appear as though she didn't want to take it), and the two of them proceeded down the aisle towards the checkout lanes. Asuka wasn't really sure exactly why Hoshino wanted to be her carry-out, but she supposed she couldn't complain; if she'd been buying more things, it would have been nice to have the extra hands. Unfortunately, as she didn't know the girl and had no earthly clue what on earth they could talk about, she couldn't think of a way to fill the silence with conversation.
Perhaps Hoshino was having the same problem, judging by they way she was fidgeting. Hm.
But the other kunoichi was the one to break the ice, and cats were an easy topic. Asuka thought, anyway. She nodded in affirmative to the question.
"Yes. Kiba sort of twisted my arm into it. Mister is..." she trailed off for a second and tried to think of a nice way to describe the cat. She couldn't insult animals around Kiba, obviously, and knew she couldn't insult bugs around an Aburame, but would the animal thing have rubbed off from Kiba to Hoshino? "... interesting. I've never had a pet before, so I'm sorta floundering through it. I always thought kittens were fluffy and cute, but Mister is more antisocial and full of claws. I'd like to think he likes me, but it's probably more that he just tolerates me."
Nodding in response was easy. That kind of relationship she could understand easily. The inverse of her initial relationship with Kiba, or her current relationship with Konchuu, who had taken into its little head the idea that Hoshino loved it madly. It was also easy to understand Kiba poking and prodding the unwilling into a large binding commitment. Admittedly, Hoshino had volunteered herself for the kitten. The comparable events in her own experience... she didn't wish to relive.
...now. Where did the conversation go from there?
Moving was easy. Carrying the bag, following the older woman, not getting too close to anyone so that no personal space bubbles would be shattered. Movement came naturally. Talking, on the other hand, required the ability to read the thoughts of others to the extent that the next words you spoke made a logical connection with the last words said.
What made a logical connection with an antisocial kitten?
"For cats... I think toleration and love are... very similar. They need less from outside of themselves than other animals... like people."
Something the Aburame knew all about, really.
As they got in line at the checkout lanes, Asuka pulled out her wallet and considered the logic in the girl's statement. She supposed she couldn't find fault in it; certainly older cats (the few she'd had the experience of interacting with) had the stand-offish nature that Mister had been displaying for the three months she'd had him. Maybe he'd just... grown up quick o something. Being stuck in a bag so that Harmful Things could be done could possibly have contributed to that.
And in the course of conversing with Kiba (and with Hanato, a little, just recently), had been the discussion of cats and their differences from dogs. Dogs were much more like little children that never grew up, while cats were far more adult and independent. A dog came to you for love and affection even when kicked, while a cat came for love and affection only if it liked you, and never when kicked. The same couldn't be said of kittens or puppies, as most all babies were the same; it was just the end result that could be button-holed into a concept.
Perhaps the idea that Mister had grown up fast and skipped the kitten phase was an accurate concept.
Asuka's gaze came back around to Hoshino after that thoughtful moment, a slight smile kicking up one side of her mouth. "That seems pretty accurate. Especially for older cats." The line moved forward some, and she stepped up to close the space. "Maybe I'm just the one that needs to change her perceptions of what to expect. He won't play with me, like he will with Konohako, but he does sleep with me during the day. I suppose that he wouldn't if he didn't like me somehow."
Asuka-sensei was smiling. Good sign. She must be better at this than originally anticipated.
"Hm."
...or not. Ah well. It had been a good try. Hoshino shifted the bag minutely as they moved forward, introspective for a moment as she tried to think of how to respond in more than a monosyllabic sound. How would one express what she meant by the single sound 'hm' in actual words?
"...you could look at it from this perspective," she tried, almost forgetting to move forward with the line. "It's better to be ignored by your kitten than to have your property destroyed... affectionately."
Her free hand rose demonstratively to her sunglasses, tapping the frame as she turned her head slightly. This pair, as... well, at this point, every pair she owned, bore the distinctive signs of a mangling. These were actually the best she had; the bottom of the left lens was obviously scratched up a bit, and a second glance at the surrounding frame showed signs of an intense gnawing session, interrupted as Konchuu's little fangs had gotten started on the earpiece. It was a source of great tension between girl and kitten. Hoshino couldn't get it through the little creature's head that she needed the shades to leave the house. Or perhaps the problem was that she had gotten the message across, as Konchuu seemed invariably pleased when its master stayed home for the day and allowed it to follow her around.
...she should learn the kitten's gender, perhaps. And manage not to bump into Asuka while not letting the woman behind her jostle her.
If Hoshino hadn't pointed out the damage, the older kunoichi honestly wouldn't have noticed. Mostly because of the distance they'd previous had, she supposed; as Hoshino stepped up to follow as the line moved, the tilt of her head and the shine of the overhead flourescents picked out the scratches she'd missed before.
Affectionately destroyed property, eh?
"Did Kiba saddle you with one, too?" she asked. It was perhaps a leap of judgement to assume that Hoshino was talking about a kitten, that said kitten was her own, and that Kiba had given it to her, but it made a twisted sort of sense. After all, Hoshino and Kiba were on the same team, and why wouldn't the Inuzuka try to saddle her team mates with kittens first? Asuka had gotten the last kitten of the lot, after all.
Never one to look sheepish (or... to look much of anything other than stoic, really), the Aburame simply snorted softly in response. Let Asuka take that as she would. There were only two options, after all: either she'd mistake it for slightly irritated confirmation, or hit the nail on the head with the 'meh, I guilted myself into adopting one before Kiba could even get started on me' interpretation. Either or.
Having run out of words for the moment, Hoshino settled back into the security blanket of movement. Checkouts were easy, particularly if there was someone else to handle the minimal conversational exchange. Without meaning to, she sank directly back into her own thoughts and began re-analyzing the situation. They were getting along. They were conversing. She had a good excuse to follow the jounin around for a bit. There would be a natural break while Asuka paid for her purchase.
All she needed was a smooth way to bring Kureno-sensei up in conversation, and she'd have fulfilled the objective of her self-appointed mission.
Studying Asuka's shoulder absently--not that it was particularly easy to tell where she was looking at any given time--Hoshino mentally replayed their conversation thus far. Cats. Antisocial. Affection. Property damage. Kiba. It was like a brain twister: how do these things naturally relate back to the original point? The best she could come up with was that Kureno was Kiba's teacher, had recently seen her about termites on his new property, was affectionate in a somewhat distant and almost antisocial way, and... knew people who raised cats.
Huh. No lightbulbs going off.
She decided to take that as an affirmative. If it was a negative, she would have made that more obvious, right? Or explained what had really done the damage to her glasses. At least, she thought the girl would.
... man, this chick totally had Kureno one-upped on the natural poker face.
The line moved up again, and this time with was Asuka's turn. Hoshino turned over the bag long enough for the cashier to ring it up, and Asuka handed over the cash and pocketed the change and the receipt. After bagging the purchase and making their way out, she realized that Hoshino's insistance on carrying the litter meant that this silence was potentially a thing that would be prolonged. Awkward, uncertain silence.
All. The way. Home.
Hm.
She snuck a peek back at the Aburame as she held open the door for them both, letting the younger woman preceed her out of the store. Perhaps the real reason why Hoshino had little to say was because she didn't know what to say. Hard to tell, but considering that she was looking forward to a very silent trip home, maybe she should try initiating conversation herself.
"So how is your team?" she asked, withdrawing her pack of cigarettes as she lead the way home, setting the lazy pace that did not indicate she was in a hurry to get anywhere anytime soon. "I heard that Kureno's been beating the crap out of you lately. And gave you to Gaia's team. Tough luck."
Apparently, sitting still long enough really did open windows of opportunity. Score one for the Aburame ability to patiently wait out other people's need to be sociable.
Hoshino lit up at the word 'team,' of course, in a way which was probably visible even to the untrained eye. Back straightening slightly, head tilting back a little, face relaxing into a comfortable almost-smile for a moment before falling back into its usual unconcerned expression. The team was a comfortable topic (and led in the right direction), one she could open up about most easily simply because she already had a vocabulary for it.
"It's affectionate," she replied in her soft monotone, glancing skyward as if recalling something. "Like cats. Clawing and scratching because they like you enough to give you attention. It's good for us." At least, if people like Kureno and her mother told her it was good to let Leigh kick her around on the training field for hours on end, that was good enough for her to buy into it completely. "Kureno-sensei..."
She didn't really fade off so much as fade into a thoughtful ellipsis. Kiba or Hinaji would have pounced on it with something along the lines of 'yeah, I'm worried about him too' or 'you know, I was talking to him the other day, and...' Then again, someone like Inosuke would have simply stared for a moment and then headed down the '...yes, and?' track, promptly freezing the Aburame against saying anything else. Where Asuka would fall on the spectrum was anyone's guess.
She glanced over her cigarette at Kureno's name, flicking on the dual-flamed lighter Chouko had gotten her the year before. It was interesting, how the girl chose to slide off into silence rather than going on with whatever topic she had been intending. Perhaps she and Kureno didn't get along so well? She heard plenty about Hinaji and Kiba, but to be honest the Aburame usually didn't come up so much as them. Asuka had always assumed that was because there was nothing good or bad to say about her; nothing frustrating. The 'just right' sort of thing.
Putting away the lighter, she took a drag off the cigarette and let a lungful of smoke float away in the sky, away from her companion. "You've been good for him too. The team, I mean." Comparing him to how he was before team eight and how he was now was not exactly like saying he was a completely different person, but there were noticeable differences.
She pursed her lips and looked away. Thinking about him wasn't quite as worrisome as it had been before her talk with Chiriku, but... not easier, either. "He's relaxed a lot."
The body language was much more communicative than the words, as usual. Tiny things like the glance at her teacher's name and the slight purse of the older kunoichi's lips were so much more important than words. It was always a wonder to Hoshino that people could transmit so many signals so easily and yet not understand her when she replied in kind. Maybe other people used the words of the conversation as cues to explain the body language. Interesting theory. She'd ask Hinaji. He was fairly intelligent.
"You're worried about him?"
It barely occurred to her that this was what Iruka-sensei called a 'conversational jump.' People who had known her forever (all four of them) rolled with this sort of thing easily enough, able to guess from years of interaction where the Aburame's thoughts had just traveled. Other people tended to give her odd looks... more because she didn't seem to notice what she was doing than because she jumped to odd places. It was disconcerting to miss out on something that went on in internal dialogue if it was, say, important to the direction of the conversation.
"He won't talk with me about it," she added as an afterthought, tilting her head forward so that her hair shifted slightly in front of her face. That action she was sure could be easily interpreted by anyone with eyes and any sort of logical capacity.
"No," was her immediate response - no thought put behind it, just a quick retort... that she paused after, and rescinded a little lamely with, "Not really, anyway." Damn, this whole thing really must be getting to her, if she was getting obvious enough that other people (besides Chiriku) were reading into her reactions. Then again, this was one of Kureno's students, and Aburame were creepy to begin with...
But she couldn't think of a way to really explain how she could be worried about Kureno without really being worried about Kureno... the complications behind how their relationship currently stood were more than she wanted to get into. And replying with it's complicated didn't close the conversation - unfortunately, it only opened the avenue for more questions. And she was not, under any circumstances, going to be discussing something like this with one of Kureno's own students. Anything she said right now could get back to him all too easily, and she... wasn't up to that right now.
So Asuka shifted her attention to the almost morose way that last statement was tacked on. Easier to attend to Hoshino than to worry about herself. Not that she was going to explain anything that involved herself right now, but. Hopefully she wouldn't come across as too obviously clueless. "About what, exactly?"
Right. So Asuka was worried about him too. That didn't bode well.
For a moment, Hoshino didn't respond, eyes flicking back and forth behind her sunglasses as she studied the older woman. Posture, tone, facial expression; nothing more than they learned to study at the academy. This was... 'big.' There was obviously something entangling going on (she was sure that meant she'd won a bet or two about Asuka and Kureno's relationship) that would take time to unfold. Probably not in this conversation. Given her own position as Kureno's student, it would probably involve multiple conversations, a trusting relationship, some hard alcohol and not the full story ever getting revealed.
Ah well. With people who didn't invade her personal space and teach Hinaji to swear, Hoshino was eternally patient.
"He's worried," she finally replied. "Not sleeping. He's been... difficult to read, lately." Beneath her collar, the girl bit the inside of her lip slightly. Hopefully it would make the rest of her face seem more apprehensive. She'd have a hard time getting any sympathy information if her looks weren't visibly altered.
What, you mean you can read him on a normal day? she almost blurted, but caught herself before she said anything stupid. Of course Hoshino would read Kureno better. She'd spent years in his back pocket as a student, after all. One didn't walk away from something like that without some kind of insight. She didn't dwell long on any kind of jealous bitterness, though; it wasn't fair that this girl could know him better after four years than she could after over a decade, but that was life. Life wasn't fair.
So Asuka focused on the question - or really, the 'what don't I know?' she was hearing in Hoshino's statement - sticking the cigarette back between her lips and stuffing one hand in her pocket. "I don't know everything," she said honestly, after another drag and lungful of nicotine to fortify her nerves. "He's always been an over-achiever, and he's been over-working himself a lot lately. He's been sick a lot lately, too, which is probably because he never rests enough to really recover. But I do know that he's been working on modifying a jutsu, and the logistics have been difficult. It's probably frustrating." She glanced back down. "The insomnia's new, though."
"Insomnia is typically caused by stress, anxiety, depression, stimulants, and change in schedule or environment. Behavioral insomnia is one of the leading causes of daytime irritability and usually results in a matter of days, not typically more than a week, as the patient becomes increasingly concerned about his or her inability to rest. Chronic insomniacs are more at risk for developing psychological dementia and acute anxiety disorders, as well as increasing the severity of chronic diseases such as high blood pressure or diabetes and causing a disconnect with both logic and physics, leading to poor problem-solving skills and an increase of risk-taking behaviour simultaneously."
Nearly 100 words later (94, to be exact), Hoshino had to pause, almost to catch her breath. She took a quick glance at the jounin before turning her attention to the road in front of them again. It was easier to contemplate speaking again if she could focus on the world around her rather than the fact that she was having a conversation.
"...if you wanted to know."
Totally smooth. Not awkward at all.
She didn't think it needed to be said out loud that hearing her sensei was pushing himself to begin with hardly boosted her confidence in his ability to 'be fine,' as he'd recently claimed he was. True, the summation of all the stress he was putting himself under could be the cause of the insomnia. That didn't mean knowing he was working on a jutsu while most likely in a phase of 'poor problem solving skills and increased risk-taking behaviour' was comforting. At all.
For a moment, all Asuka could immediately do in reaction was stare. (Hopefully not like an idiot.) That huge glop of information dump she'd just received was more than she'd ever heard an Aburame say in one sitting - hell, it was probably more than what Hoshino had said in the entire conversation thus far.
"... you've been thinking about this a while," she said finally, and couldn't help but give the girl a small grin. One wouldn't do all that research on insomnia unless it was for an important reason. And she didn't get the feeling that insomnia was something that Hoshino herself had a problem with, so.
Looking away again, she shoved her other hand in its matching pocket and turned her eyes up to the sky. She thought she might have sussed out the reason behind this encounter now: Kureno's student was worried and approaching her for possible reasons why. Asuka supposed she could understand why; if Inosuke couldn't get answers out of her, he'd probably start bugging other people, too. It was cute, sorta. A little reassuring maybe, too.
"We could just head the whole psychotic problem off and hit him over the head with a sock full of quarters," she suggested. Less than half of her suggestion was in jest. "Make him sleep now and deal with the bruises later."
She would not contemple violence against Kureno-sensei. It was some sort of cardinal sin. She would laugh the joke off as just a joke.
...she should not be contemplating violence against Kureno-sensei.
Wrinkling her nose slightly, Hoshino took a few moments to consider the logistics of that sort of situation. The Yuuhi was a jounin; currently a cranky, sleep-deprived jounin who was probably completely stressed out. Not the kind of person you wanted to sneak up on, should you desire to live out the rest of your natural life. This meant that there were two options: 1) approaching Kureno, explaining the situation and knocking him out consensually, or 2) luring him into conversation and then beating him unconscious, probably in the middle of a sentence.
...cardinal sin. Right.
With what her mother would have called a sigh (exhaling slowly and softly while biting one's lip), the girl shifted the bag in her arms. "...could probably convince Kiba to do it."
Note to self: while dead-panning around Hoshino, make certain to actually be willing to go through with your suggestion when you find her taking you completely seriously.
Still. Asuka's grin kicked up a notch, but it was less wicked and more rueful than before. Would she consider going through with beating Kureno unconscious? Yes. Would she do it right now, even excluding the fact that the jutsu he was trying to modify really was important and distracting him from it probably wasn't a good idea? .... no.
Though she could totally see convincing Kiba to do something like this. Good for future reference.
So instead, gasp and surprise, she made the more adult suggestion. "Or you could talk to him." Asuka looked down at the obviously-plotting student. "You're his student, after all. He'll try to brush you off, but the trick is to just be more stubborn than he is." If such a thing were possible. At the very least, an Aburame could out-patience him. Right?
Not that Hoshino had been seriously considering the question. Or that she was seriously going to beat Asuka to the punch and ask Kiba first.
"...have you, recently?" she asked, rolling easily with the conversation's shift away from dastardly deeds to the more mature approach to the situation. The slight tilt of her head expressed the thought fully: 'you've known him forever; he likes you a lot; he's worried about protecting you from different things than he's worried about protecting his students from; might that not just help him calm down because you can, like, talk about adult things and get drunk or whatever it is you old people who haven't devoted your lives to research do?'
From the slight furrowing of her brow, however, the girl also seemed to imply that as soon as the kitty litter was delivered, she might sneak off to sit on her sensei's porch and lie siege for a while. After all, Kureno was an ace when it came to reading Hoshino's silence, and would probably at least allow her to sit quietly for the night, listening to the hum of the kikai in and around his house.
After she went to see Kiba, of course.
... heh. As if having spoken to him recently would have really meant anything.
The kunoichi shifted her eyes back ahead, to the last street they have to take to get to her home. "On his birthday," she replied, and took the cigarette from her lips to ash it. "And not too long ago I gave him some suggestions on sleep aids that weren't prescription. Otherwise..."
Otherwise, if she'd shown much in the way of concern... well, she wasn't even sure if she should show too much in the way of concern, right now. Even after her talk with Chiriku, she wasn't sure if she wanted to influence anything. And more than that, anytime she ever did show concern, he blew her off the same as he blew anyone else off. What was the use if there was no point, right?
Asuka at least hoped he'd keep his promise if it did get worse.
"... we haven't really talked recently, no."
There were no words, because the situation was one which was not immediately understandable. Instead, there was another look. Hoshino glanced at the ground, then up at the sky, then back through her bangs at Asuka's face. If/when she went to bother check up on her sensei, she'd have to sound him out a little, to see if that lack of communication was part of the cause of his grumpiness. Or if there really had been a lack of communication. Or what was wrong with Asuka-sensei, who seemed distinctly not well herself.
Damn, this didn't mean she had to go find Inosuke and ask him what was wrong, did it? Maybe she could find Shikako instead. Not that that would be any easier to handle. Maybe Chouko was around...
...being social seemed to be quite the slippery slope. One minute you have two friends and a sensei, the next you're worried about or planning to contact more than 7 people about various things.
Maybe she'd go sit in the garden before calling on Kiba. Clear her head. All the talking had clearly gotten to her and was making her irrational and crazy. On the other hand, it made her feel almost natural when she finally murmured out an absent, "...ah. I see."
...
Well, she supposed that was as good a way to end a conversation as any, considering this was the first time she'd ever really spoken with Hoshino.
It didn't seem like there was very much else to say after that, so Asuka didn't try to prod the conversation along any further; let the girl think on whatever was currently in her head, and let her keep following if she wanted. So the jounin remained silent as they completed their walk, finished smoking her cigarette and ground it out on the sidewalk approaching her small apartment.
"Thank you for your help," she said politely, as she paused to pick the butt of her finished cigarette off the concrete (her landlord would have her ass if she started littering now). "It was nice talking to you, Hoshino."
With a quiet (and difficult to notice) smile (of the lips-curling-for-a-second-beneath-drawn-up-collar variety), the Aburame gave herself a mental pat on the back for having made it thus far without going into some sort of toxic shock. The last stretch of silence had helped, of course; that didn't mean she wasn't going to be completely silent for the next hour and a half to make up for all the talking she'd just done.
"Thank you for your time, Asuka-sensei," she replied with the slight bob of a bow she'd been taught to use for her mother. Handing back the bag of kitty litter, she searched for a moment before adding, "...if you ever need help, please let me know. And... give Mister a pat on the head for me?"
With that final comment, 267 words later, Hoshino tugged her collar up just a little higher for her silent 'good night and good luck (not having anything to worry about when you go out on duty)' of parting. Mission Talk To Asuka About Kureno-sensei: complete. Mission Find Out How Asuka-sensei Is Holding Up These Days: about to begin after completion of Mission Oh God My Voice Box Is Probably Going To Implode.