Shiro & Haroun, Monday evening

[x-sanfuaiyaa.livejournal.com]

A few hours after Clarice and Shiro have their spat, Shiro meets with Haroun for Krav Maga lessons and finds himself receiving love advice from the crippled Moor. Testosterone and racial slurs abound.



The first sign that something was unusually troubling Shiro was that he showed up a minute late for his Krav Maga tutorial with Haroun, whereas he was normally there at least fifteen minutes early. The second was that he was faltering. He even managed to fall on his ass once or twice. Muttering a "Sorry," he went back to the form.

Haroun sighed. He was in the wheelchair, which he hated, but it was fairly obvious that Shiro's mind was Just Not With The Program. So he couldn't go over there and beat it out of him. "Give it a rest already. Your form is sloppy, your concentration is shot, and it looks like somebody just nuked your hometown. What's got up your nose, boy?" he asked not-unkindly.

A silent string of curses left his lips as Shiro sat down against the wall and took a drink from his bottle of water. Haroun's bluntness was usually a welcome reprieve from the passive-aggressive tendencies of some of the other residents of the mansion. But not today. "It's personal," he replied in the same tone of voice Haroun had used.

"Judging by the swearing, I'd say your problem is purple and obsessed with glitter." he said with grin. "If you want to talk about it - what happened? Wait - I know. Valentine's Day. She got up your nose about Valentine's Day." He wheeled himself over next to Shiro, and awkwardly patted the boy. "Wait - don't you Japs do Valentine's Day backwards from the Americans?"

"Call me that again not having proper use of your legs will be the least of your problems," Shiro threatened. Then he sighed and hit the back of his head against the wall. "And yes, that is exactly my problem. Valentine's Day is a day for girls to give gifts to their husbands or boyfriends. Men reciprocate a month later on White Day."

Haroun sighed. "Cultural barriers. I empathize - Valentine's Day is a nonentity in Morocco. Nobody even knows what it is, let alone celebrate it. I usually duck it with a quick call to the florist. Hard to go wrong with flowers. Flowers will save your ass every time. I don't know what your cash situation is like, but if you can afford it - and believe me, you'll pay through the nose for it - I suggest flowers. At least one dozen, preferably two."

"But why am I the culturally insensitive one because I do not follow an American custom?" Shiro asked. "I do not believe that you were here, but last year I wrote something rather scathing about Christmas on my journal because the Japanese realize how stupid a holiday it is. And yet I was still berated."

"Because they're Americans, and we're in America. They're especially irritating that way. Alison's not too bad, but she has her moments." he mused. "And even if we weren't in America, Americans like to take a little piece of their country wherever they go." he said with a snort of amusement. "This shall pass, but if you want to keep this girl you're going to have to suck up what's left of your pride and go apologize. And get her something. And don't expect her to reciprocate in March. Part of the price we pay, man. No two ways around it."

"Fucking gai-jin," he spat, the insult feeling familiar on his tongue. "What ought I to do if, theoretically, I not only did not get Clarice a gift, but also called Valentine's Day a sham? Theoretically."

"Free clue for you, from the man who knows shit from shit. It may mean Jack Shit to you, and I might even agree with you there, but it's important to her. And if she means anything at all to you, you've got to respect that. In the privacy of your own mind, you can rant and bitch all you want. Cuss her out in Japanese, go rape Nanking again, whatever you need to do. But it's important to her, and that's all that really counts in the final cut." he said firmly. "However, having said that, if she's going to piss all over your heritage and nationality, you might want to consider if she's someone you really want to spend time with."

"~Why don't you go bomb an embassy, Osama?~" challenged Shiro. Those slurs were really starting to get on his nerves. "She did not make any comments about Japan and how we view this holiday. She basically said what you said, but in purple-girl-speak." He sighed again. "I suppose that I ought to go buy her something really nice and beg for forgiveness on my hands and knees?"

"Depends." he said, now that he was sure he had the boy's full attention. "You ready to listen to my advice, or would you rather get pissed off and lose your head? We are still in Krav class, you know." he pointed out. "Anyway. Yes, I think that you should track her down. Let her know you're still interested - assuming that you are - and that you want to make up for your "mistake". Don't choke on that, by the by. Try to say it and mean it. Then let her tell you what you need to do."

"I am still interested. But am I always going to have to do this whenever she claims that I have made a mistake? It cannot always be like this . . . can it?"

"You're asking me?" he said with a laugh. "I know even less than you. But I would think not. If she's truly interested in you, and wants to be with you, she will adapt herself to you as much as you adapt yourself to her." he said. "Or, at least, that's the way I like to think that it works. I'm a lousy judge."

"I guess that asking an Arab was not such a bright idea either," Shiro said mournfully. "You would just offer her family forty camels and drag her off somewhere to marry her and live with your other twelve wives." But he grinned when he said this, because it would be no fun to get Haroun too pissed with him. They were still in Krav class, afterall.

Haroun grinned back. See, the boy had spirit. "I can barely afford one girlfriend, let alone forty wives. Theoretically, if I could provide for all of them, I could have them all." he said with a satisfied grin. "And I'm a Moor, Jap. And your girlfriend's only worth twenty camels and four sheep. She is young, and glitter is evil."

"I thought that you liked them younger. It gives you plenty of time to have lots of children." Shiro finished his bottle and got back to his feet. "We still have another ten minutes," he said, getting back into form.

Haroun grinned at Shiro, trying not to let the boy see how he'd scored a hit on a sensitive area. "Right. Back to the bag." he said, wheeling himself back to give Shiro more room to work out.