Balloon and the professional overthinker

Karaza went to the bench after the training's final practical exam, she recalled every last detail of every question and every step she did.

"You passed." The instructor cuts off her overthinking.

"Oh."

Two of her sector walked out, talking about hanging out after the exam, others followed them, and she didn't know what to do.

'Do I follow them? Since I'm from the same sector? What's the protocol?'

The last word brought some confusing nostalgia.

'Yeah, in the duke's palace I didn't have to think about these interactions, every protocol said how to behave exactly. Speaking of which, young master still comes here and uses Clowny as a tour guide…'

She didn't risk any embarrassment, so she didn't follow them and walked toward the general hospital.

She thought about people she could talk normally to, except for Antonio and Clowny, the list was empty. Yasmin, Momo, and Patitcha helped her but they helped everyone as supervisors.

Even the pattern was clear to her.

'I don't interact with people unless I have to.'

Unfortunately, social connections, genuine ones, didn't function like that.

She sighed.

'Let me get some smoke and peace.' She said as the shadow of the grand hospital blocked the sunlight, but perhaps today wasn't the day.

Something went flying in her way, which she caught with one hand while barely looking on instinct, earning a whistle and cheer from the nameless surgeon's acquaintances.

She looked at the object in her hand, a hexagon shaped mirror? She noted it wasn't quite like that of a mirror.

'Damn, forgot to wax my mustache...and why do I have all these blackheads?"

Today wasn't the day of quiet smoke and disjointed conversation with Doc since five people including her smoking buddy were smoking, chatting, and tinkering with the device.

She didn't know if she should sit and smoke with them, but they felt inviting enough, plus the surgeon was patting the empty spot on the bench.

The classic Tabaco refill was sold out, so she lighted a cigarette look a like, though much lighter in flavor, almost flowery.

The device apparently captured time, or took pictures and videos as they're calling it now. She saw artifacts like that in the wild so it wasn't so confusing.

"It's not working."

"That's what happens when you tweak the magnetic circuitry."

The two doctors bantered as to how to take pictures with the device. She eyed a circle on it, she was about to tell them to push the circle, as maybe there's an inside button that takes the picture, but she decided not to.

'If the doctors don't know then what do I know?' She sat quietly, smoking an unfamiliar flavor, listening to an unfamiliar conversation.

"Just use your hexagono." Khadijah, the department head told.

"It's actually harder to use the hexagono."

"Really? __ showed me pictures in his hexagono."

It was borderline funny, in an eerie way how a nameless person got referred to, she didn't like to think about it too much. The way sound waves were mutated when anyone referred to him. No one noticing that added to the oddity of it all, but again, most people who never made a wish or went to the wild had no business noticing such events.

She tried to convince herself she was keeping up with the conversation but ended up zoning out until his hexagono showed old pictures.

"No no, take new photos, not show old ones."

"If only I knew how."

The conversation subdued as they watched the pictures of him and his little bro, she recognized her arch nemesis' roommate in his childhood days, bathing a fox and combing its fur.

'Cute, even apex predators are adorable when they're small.'

They talked about how wacky it was to take a fox as a pet and how people in the countrysides are wild, but if taking raccoons as pets was normal then why foxes were a stretch, she wondered.

Three of the doctors went back to work so it was just both of them and Khadijah, he was still trying to get his hexagono to normal.

She stared at the picture of him getting his leg bitten by little Ryu. Something made her take a thorough look. He looked younger, his braid was shorter and his guard unusually down.

He was a little see-through in her eyes, but maybe it was the picture's quality.

'That's right, he's a person with a past and memories beyond this bench.'

She recalled her people list earlier.

'Most things I know come from him, and I didn't even think of him... That's horrible, only thinking of myself...'

"Right, how was your exam?" He asked, and the guilt was a sucker punch to the throat.

"I passed, I guess."

They congratulated her, she realized that multiple people saying the same thing at the same time like 'good morning' or 'congrats' throws her off for some reason.

"Alright, go to bed kid; you were in the OR for fourteen hours." It was time for Khadijah to go too.

"I can't! My cousin got engaged."

"So he finally kicked you out?" Khadijah teased.

"No, I just third wheel by existing near them...Wait, you think eviction is coming?"

"Boy just get your own place."

'You didn't even know who he lived with, good job you selfish information sucker.'

They talked more about the shifts rota before the senior went home.

"Can you believe it? She made me take Tuesday off." He whined, about to light a new cigarette before eyeing the lonely one between her fingers.

"Are you gonna finish that?"

"Nope, it teases weird." She gave it to him.

The mess of bee colonies wasn't the only problem in the commercial apiary, Karaza looked around. She can't do much without supervision, but the overgrown shrubs and broken tree branches seemed like something that needed to be dealt with so she did.

"Good mornin- whoa." Patitcha admired the cleaned up space.

She made her place the new queen in the lacking colony, unfortunately the bees didn't accept her.

Checking up on the colony with mite infestation, it seemed to be doing better.

Not having much to do they sat on the chairs. While the supervisor worked on some paperwork, she recognized the structure of the accounting tables on the paper.

It's not like there wasn't stuff to do, in fact, the shed in the corner could use some love, but at the end of the day that was private property, and they don't have permission to do much.

She looked at the numbers in the tables, opened her mouth to say something but ended up closing her mouth.

As subtle as that was Patitcha caught it, double checking her numbers.

"Ah! I switched up the numbers."

"You should say what's on your mind from time to time you know." She continued after fixing the numbers.

"Nothing I have to say is that important anyway."

"Guess budget mismatching isn't that important then, you worked with numbers?" She changed the subject after joking.

"No, my young master talked about these things all the time."

"Whoa, y'all used the word 'master'?" That's crazy. Right, wanna try some gigs? There are some stray colonies near homes that need removal." She talked and her hands worked, clearly used to multitasking.

"...Sure but what about this place?"

"I don't know, it's a family business and they have problems. When my daughter moves I'll have time to set them down."

She looked at the supervisor, really looked at her.

'That's right... people have their own lives, their own relationships too.'

"You have a daughter?"

"Yup, she gonna go to the east city. She got accepted in a history course she really wanted."

She listened to the mother talking happily about her kid, how she was the fastest in the running team, how she leaves her socks on the ground.

For some reason she felt warmth and sadness, like drowning in pleasantly hot water.

"But history? Between you and me I think my kid is a little lame."

In their walk to the station she discovered a new smoke vending machine. Karaza looked at Patitcha as she bought the same tasteless, odorless diluted smoke her og smoking buddy likes.

She frowned with disappointment as the classic Tabaco was sold out so she tried a suspiciously orange refill.

'Who comes up with these wacky flavors?' She exhaled the citrusy smoke, enjoying it more than she liked to admit.

They chatted about flavors, there was no bench so they walked to the station. Apparently Patitcha only smoke once every two months now.

"It's quite nice after the surgery, no more short breath when I climb the stairs." She laughed.

"Surgery?"

"Well not a surgery technically, they just put a tube down your lungs and suck the nicotine out of your system, then you barely crave a smoke."

"I miss the time when hearing that would surprise me." She laughed.

"Girl you just came here yesterday. Seriously though you don't find it hard to breathe sometimes? "

"Ahh? Keeping my teeth good is the real pain to be honest."

"Maybe if you switched to this." She winked, advertising the tasteless refills.

At noon on a Tuesday the surgeon floated invisibly between the crowds looking at the huge question mark shaped cloud in the sky. Not having much to do he floated to a smoke vending machine.

He was about to swipe his hexagono on the machine before hearing coming footsteps.

Karaza was totally not looking at the vending machines' map in her hand.

He floated still to avoid causing any haunted vending machine rumors.

"Hi..." She greeted awkwardly and he almost jumped in the air like he was the one seeing a ghost.

She sighed when she saw the sold out sign on the tobacco section.

"I can't do this anymore…"

"Honey it's not that deep..You know, we have a quick surgery tha-"

"I know about the surgery!" She closed her mouth, scared someone would hear her yelling at the air in an alleyway.

He started floating upward.

"Where are you going?" She whispered.

"Can't control the floating sometimes." His voice subdued as he ascended upward, she grabbed his ankle before he was out of reach.

She walked in the streets, lightly clutching his leg, pulling him down from time to time. He moved slightly with the breeze, moving behind her like a balloon.

"You're not gonna scour every vending machine in the city?" He joked that they were on an empty road now.

"I'm not that much of a lost cause."

The blue line of the shore became visible as she walked upward between houses in the narrow streets.

He realized where they were heading. A mountain hill overlooking the sea, quite high and distant from the crowded spots.

"I gotta apologize to you doc." She told out of nowhere.

"About time to stop calling my smoke tasteless." His feigned offended tone was the instinctive response to the sudden sincerity.

"I'm sorry, asking weird questions and treating you like a tour guide."

"I don't mind, really." He said after a pause but the words didn't seem to have effect.

" Well your confusion about mundane stuff is funny to me so we're even."

"Really?" She seemed somewhat delighted.

She sat on the edge of the cliff, the never ending blues of the ocean blended with the sky. She looked up.

"It's about to start, the cosmic event."

He looked upward as the question and exclamation marks got bigger and bigger, like balloons about to explode.

They exploded in a sense, not a violent loud one but a soundless deformation, almost as if strong wind pushed the clouds far away leaving the stars behind them visible.

Stars maybe wasn't the accurate category, more like a scrabble of the shape on white paper.

Not sure if it was truly beautiful or truly bizarre but he couldn't move his eyes away, he laid down head to the sky.

The stars stayed like that till the sky got the orange tint of the sunset, then rivers covered every star and like clouds they rained.. colorful confetti.

Slowly dancing with the wind, falling to the surface of the water. Like an announcement of the end of a group project at school.

His mouth was slightly open. The sky was clear again. And nobody on the shore saw the surreal event.