A day had passed.
The bunkbeds had arrived not long after Evelyn's visit, prompting us to bring the package it came in and unpack its components.
We then, with quite a bit of difficulty, assembled the thing; removing Judy's old one in the process.
I couldn't understand how the instructions we were given on its assembly helped so little with actually building the thing.
After an hour of sweaty frustration we had both finally collapsed onto our new beds and fell asleep. I had been the one to take the top bunk due to my victory in a battle of rock-paper-scissors; much to Judy's changrin.
The next day I had slept in, feeling much more refreshed when I finally woke up.
I threw off my newly acquired blankets and slid down the ladder to the floor.
Judy wasn't asleep beneath me, so I got dressed and sauntered into the main room to look for her.
Turns out she was sitting inside her studio, editing.
She was so engrossed in this activity that my quiet entry into the room escaped her notice.
"Good morning." I said, trying my best not to startle her.
Her head turned, and she glanced at me before returning my greeting.
"G'mornin' - oh man; you can't be walking around in that. We're gonna have to get you some new threads asap." Judy muttered, gawking at the bloodstained shirt I wore.
She tapped the screen in front of her, closing it down and locking it; before hopping out of the chair she was curled up in, stretching and yawning not unlike a cat.
"Whaddya' say? We can grab some food on the way there."
"Won't that be expensive?" I mumbled, glancing towards the computers behind her.
"That depends on where we go; I happen to know a place with good prices."
I couldn't do much exploring on my own as of now because of these faulty eyes, so Judy's offer of us going outside together was a pleasant surprise.
Although there was still the matter of the photo, which made me a tad nervous about going out.
Noticing my hesitation, Judy reached over and patted me on the head.
"Your're still thinking about the photo aren't you?" She asked, looking at me with a smile. "Don't worry, Ev got back to me; said she had someone sneak over and retrieve it."
'Perceptive as usual.' I thought inwardly, looking back at her. 'When Evelyn said 'I had someone sneak over', I'm assuming it means she hired a merc to do it for her; which would not be cheap.'
I grabbed the hand atop my head with both of mine and attempted to remove it. I could only take so much of this treatment; it felt demeaning to recieve oh-so-many headpats in the span of a day.
"She did?" I asked, looking for confirmation with a dubious expression.
Judy nodded, "Yeah, the guy's body was still there too; the NCPD hadn't found it yet."
"C-can you ask her if she still has it? It's the only photo of us together." My voice strained and trailed off as I stared at Judy, a tinge of desperation creeping into my tone.
"Ev thought you'd say that, she'll come by later to drop it off." The hand was back, ruffling my hair appreciatively. "Now are you coming with or no?"
I nodded in agreement, and both of us headed for the apartment's exit; slipping our shoes on as we did so.
While stepping through the door Judy offered me a hand, which I took gladly, knowing that I would probably need her help with navigation.
The route taken to this 'good place' she had mentioned was practically back the way we had come the previous night. It had deviated a couple of blocks away from Angela's apartment, walking up a flight of stairs instead of carrying on down the main road. We kept on going until we reached an overpass of sorts; looking down onto the main street.
In this overpass, numerous shopping stands had been set up by various different people; some official brands, some not.
Judy and I made a beeline through the crowd of midday shoppers, her body shielding me from the onslought of busy citizens.
Eventually we reached the stand she was searching for, and I saw a look of surprise cross my guardian's face as she stared at the owner.
"Why do you look so surprised?"
A heavily accented voice broke the awkward silence between us, the man's voice distinct amongst the many we heard.
'Japanese.' I assumed, listening intently his tone.
I made an outright guess as to his nationality, but it was difficult to tell as the man's face was covered with a verdant green facemask; in the shape of an oni.
This brought me to the conclusion that he was a Tyger-claw, a gang mostly present in Japan-town; but sometimes spread thin over Kabuki aswell.
Considering the mask and the rest of his attire, he was just a grunt; not at a high position in the orginisation.
The burning question to ask was why was a Tyger-claw member handling what seemed to me like the cheapest thrift shop in the area.
"I didn't think you'd actually end up joining them though." Replied Judy, looking at the man regretfully.
"A man's gotta' eat. Besides, you knew this was coming; hell everybody who visits my stand knew it was coming."
He paused for a second looking down at me, and I saw his optics glowing a deep red through the eyeholes in his mask as he scanned my person.
"No data?" He muttered quietly, staring at me unblinkingly. "That's not possible."
Judy, not hearing his comments over the general hubub of the market, moved forwards and dragged me until I stood infront of her.
"Well, your stupid-ass decisions aside; Judas meet Itsuka, guy has the cheapest threads around that don't look like total shit. If you need something new come straight to him."
"You make it sound like I'll be running this place forever. Don't you see the mask?" Itsuka whined playfully, instantly changing my profile of the man.
Judy ignored him, clapping both hands onto my shoulders before pressing forward her agenda. "So, got any threads that could fit him?" Judy indicated me with a hand, staring at Itsuka, wildly unimpressed with his antics.
"For the kid? Yeah sure, I got a fuckton. Nobody respectable ever comes shopping here for their brats." Itsuka then gestured to his left, where their was a heap of clothes lying beside his stand.
"They'll be in that pile though, good luck searching for something wearable," He laughed, watching Judy's face drop as she stared at the somewhat formidable looking pile laying before us.
She glanced back towards Itsuka, checking out the clothes hanging from the main stand.
He looked at her sympathetically before commenting, "I see you looking over here, but it won't make a difference; I already told you nobody comes to my stand shopping for their kid. Why would I stock clothes that won't be bought in my very limited space."
"Ugh…" Judy stared at the pile, taking her hands off me to facepalm despairingly, clearly dreading what was coming next.
I edged away from her, wanting no part in touching the mound of 'threads' that had probably been sitting there for days, if not weeks even.
My guardian however, noticed this small movement; and I watched with horror as a blatantly evil smile crossed her face.
"Say Judas; how about you look through that and find something you like. I'll go and grab us some food and come back in a sec'."
"Ah- wait." I said, but Judy was already speedwalking away; jostling many of the engrossed shoppers, which led to her getting quite a few irritable looks as she passed by.
'She trusts this man enough to leave me with him on the street, interesting.' I mused inwardly, looking up at the man ahead of me.
"That's tough," Said Itsuka, smirking down at me.
"Shut it." I replied frostily, staring at the pile of clothes offensively.
"I'd start digging, the children's shit will probably be at the bottom of it."
"You," I jabbed a finger at him, "Your're helping."
"Fuck no, in case you haven't realised kid, that's the trash pile. You know, where all the trash goes." He then brought up a hand and began listing what counted as 'trash'. "Damaged beyond repair; Used, (don't ask); looks like trash; or smells like shit. Anything that ticks one of those boxes is dumped in there."
This wasn't going to be fun, and Itsuka's smug grin was starting to annoy me.
…
It was far worse than he made it out to be, I didn't even want to think about some of the things that were left in there, rotting for god knows how long.
In the end, after about ten minutes or so, and a few kindhearted customers later; I had managed to scavenge a few sets of clothing. They needed a thorough wash, sure; but due to this monumentous effort I now had a proper wardrobe ready to use.
"I'm done, Uncle." I said, causing Itsuka's jaw to drop. A few passers by glanced over at him in disdain. Using a child to do such arduous manual labour, such a shameless human being.
"Uncle? You little bastard, I'm not that old. Call me big brother."
Shameless indeed, he didn't give a fuck about my jibe or the allegations I had just dropped on his head.
Instead he was bemoaning the age I had dubbed him as, yelling loudly about how he was in the prime of his life for anyone around us to hear. The women around us were not impressed by his dramatic declarations, shuffling away from him discontentedly.
Grabbing the assortment of clothes from my hand and slamming them onto the counter, he glared at me heatedly.
"Fine, you little brat; you win. But if I'm going down, so is our dear Judy. She's actually waiting for me to text that you've finished your selection so that she can come back."
My eyes narrowed, no way the angel I'd gotten to know over the past day would do something like that, right?
"Your're lying."
"Am I though?" Itsuka's smirk returned in full force, and he grinned ear-to-ear as his eyes briefly flashed that same deep red as before.
Right on cue, and not even a second later; Judy's smiling face emerged from the milling crowd. She was carrying a half eaten burger with one hand and a small plastic bag in the other.
"Hey, are you done with your selection yet?" She asked me cheerily, winking at Itsuka conspiratorially as she walked over to the both of us.
He returned with an inconspicuous thumbs up of his own, before giving me the most annoying, self satisfied side eye I had ever seen in either of my chaotic lives.
No fucking way…What was wrong with the adults in this place?