The Worker and the Shirker (Tomomi / Kansuke)

Another day, another lot of work to do. Dressed in his usual garb from the Academy uniform, Tomomi walked through the streets of Little Tokyo. With latex gloves on his hands, and a hygiene mask over his face, the boy walked with a bunch of bags and a litter picker to do the daily task at hand.

Moving with a yawn beneath his mask, he made his way towards one of the alleys. He had so much work to do, and it was almost always in alleys. Alcoholics, people that dropped their trash everywhere. On one hand, it gave him a job. On the other hand, having less of a job to do would make life so much easier and more pleasant. Not that this would ever be pleasant...

That thought aside, he opened up the bag, and began putting stuff in, looking up every now and again for safety purposes.

He couldn't fix it. Kansuke glared at the wall, the spray drying, setting into a shape most dissatisfying. He'd tried - oh, with every fucking god as his witness, he'd tried, but inspiration failed him. Shadows painted turned into dull lumps of bland colour, the centrepiece a horrid semblance of the muse dancing in his mind.

He growled, taking the emptied spray can in hand. He couldn't crush it, but a good crack against the wall helped him feel better...

Until it bounced off the wall and skittered into the path of a litter picker, anyway. Kansuke spat a curse under his breath, rushing to seize the rest of his things and pull his hood over his head.

The clatter of a can was something that, to Tomomi, was recognisable from sound alone. As it rolled in front of him, a light breath escaped his lips.

Not again...

Looking up from the can as he carefully picked it up and put it in his bag, the boy looked to the seemingly hurrying stranger responsible. Coughing, he carefully moved to catch the strangers attention. "Um... Excuse me? Uh... Please do not litter..." The boy muttered, words getting quieter the further into the request he went.

Kansuke froze, tugging his hood uselessly into place. He'd been spotted. No use hiding. Shoulders slumping, he rounded on Tomomi, hunching forward. With his hood drawn tight, his hair tangled like thick vines over his face, and his flu-mask spattered with the viscera of his art, barely an inch of his face showed in the dark of the alley. He took a few steps forward. "It's not litter - it's mine."

His arm shot from his pocket, sticking jaggedly out with bony fingers splayed. "I dropped it. Sorry."

Oh! Um... Was this a misunderstanding? Oh dear.

Panicking slightly at potentially making a mistake, the boy quickly opened up the bin bag, taking the can he'd just put in out of it, and holding it out to the stranger. "Oh! Um... S-sorry for assuming it was rubbish! I, um... Well, yeah, sorry. It's um... No problem, but, please be more careful when you drop stuff? You don't want anything important to end up on the streets..." He replied, voice growing quieter still. Facing the other who had a flu mask, he tilted his head, looking to the wall the stranger had been evidently painting on. "So... Are you, like... An artist?"

He paused, unwilling to stop the stumblimg youth as he fought both to reclaim his paint and get a semblance of a sentence out. "Consider me warned," he grunted, hollow as he accepted the can, "No more littering."
Would a mock-salute oversell it? Probably. Kansuke returned the can to its home, revealing nearly a dozen different shades and sizes of spray paint. "You could say that I'm an artist," he muttered, rummaging to make room. "Not sure who'd agree with you. Are you always picking up other people's trash?"

The response from the stranger was odd. And somewhat unsettling. So... It was rubbish? Or it wasn't? And, did that mean he purposefully had littered? Oh dear.

"Ah... Um... Yes? I guess I am... It's kind of, you know, my job... Keep the streets clean and nice looking by removing rubbish that people leave lying about, either on purpose, falling out of pockets, or strewn about by birds... Not a fun job, but, I guess payment is payment? Haha..."

The awkward laugh emphasised the litter boy's uncomfortable situation. Still, wanting to, in his mind, de-escalate the situation, he looked to the graffiti. "So... Um, what are you painting? If it's okay me asking..."

Kansuke moved in front of Tomomi, using his body and the thick layers of coat, hoodie and shirt to block the view of the abomination. "Who said I'm painting anything, huh?" He growled, on the back foot, defensive. Admitting to vandalizing in public? Not a chance. "These are my supplies for the studio back home."

He'd rehearsed the excuse time and time again, to the point where he sometimes believed that there was, in fact, a sprawling art studio tacked onto the back of his parents' crappy abode. "Spray paints're cheap and they make a statement. Good for freestyling - I thought I had an idea, but it turned out crap."

He looked Tomomi up and down, trying to get a read on the trash-collector. "You a student?"

The sudden surge of aggressiveness instantly set off alarms in the poor boys brain. Clearly, the whole thing was a bad idea, but, hindsight was always twenty twenty. The opposition between the twos personality and style were as clear as day and night, and this worried Tomomi. This guy wouldn't get violent would he? And at the question about Tomomi's situation of being a student or not, the question of whether or not to answer, or answer honestly, crossed the boys mind. Was it safe to answer?

Still, hesitating would only make things worse, so, the boy replied with what he felt was best. "Uh, yeah... From Seven Stars... And uh... You?"

"Sure, why not," Kansuke grunted, non-commital. A student - who better to lick the boots of the unwashed masses? "Shouldn't you be studying?"

Kansuke peeled back his hood, slicking his hair back with the motion. The tangled mop would not be tamed for long, always flopping back over his face thanks to gravity and terrible posture, but it revealed his eyes long enough for Tomomi to get a better look at the masked youth. Eyes of trampled grass, wild and sharp, weighed by more than a few nights of little sleep. "You're not payin' your own bills, are you?"

The question on his personal finance after the pointed comment about studying further threw Tomomi threw a loop. Was this an acceptable point to draw the line? Well, he could always run away if things got dangerous because he didn't want to answer the questions. So, he didn't answer the question. "Um... I'd prefer not to answer about my personal finance, especially to a stranger... Safety and stuff, you know? Haha..."

With that said, he resumed picking up litter, hoping that this stranger wouldn't act out in any way. Yikes. At least the mask provided slight anonymity, even if only a little.

Tomomi carried on with his work, leaving Kansuke alone in the street, watching the litter-picker's back. A cocktail of confusion and frustration sparked behind his mask, ending with him slinging his bag onto his shoulder and calling after him. "Well, excuse me for caring!"
He started stalking back into the alleyway. At least he could do something about his painting...

At the shouting, the litter boy entered full blown panic mode, forgetting his work for a moment as he took off in a sprint the other way. He could always come back and finish that alley later, for now, it was time to get away. Forget that, he was out. So with speed and haste from adrenaline, he was gone.

Oh please don't bump into him again. Please...

Let's be honest, that stranger would find him again at some point wouldn't he?

[Running away - EXIT]

Kansuke hissed, kicking at whatever was nearest to vent the last of his empathy. Looking at his failure only pissed him off more, so he did what any self-respecting artist did after a bad day.

He cursed his way home.

[Sulking - EXIT]