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[lapidarius]

"This is Kakyoin Noriaki. Please leave a message, I'll contact you as soon as I can."

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[mylegacy]

[Rude . . . whatever. Once he gets to the top of the stairs, he makes a beeline for the nearest chair, one of the wooden ones by the card table. When he sits, it's clear he's holding tension in his shoulders.]

This is the place your weird friend was standing in front of without clothes on, isn't it.

[lapidarius]

[SIGH.]

For the record I had absolutely nothing to do with whatever that was. I know Polnareff lost a bet and I chose to ask as few questions as possible.

[Kakyoin dropped down onto a chair across the same table, rolling his eyes.]

But this is the place. Jotaro owns it, so I borrowed his keys to get in.

[mylegacy]

I'm not going to tell you what happened when Jojo and I met up with them, because it's awful and I don't want you to have to live with that knowledge.

. . . He just lets you take his things all the time?

[lapidarius]

...I definitely don't want to know and I'm sorry they're both idiots.

[SIIIIIIIGH.]

I left a note. Besides, I don't think he'll be looking for them right now.

[mylegacy]

Hm.

[He thinks about that for a moment, then just shrugs.]

So that's a yes.

[lapidarius]

Basically.

[No point in denying it.]

If it bothered him, I'd know. Or he'd outright tell me to knock it off.

[mylegacy]

Trusting people with your things is strange. Not family people, I mean — other people.

[lapidarius]

Is it? I don't really have much that he'd borrow--the most important thing I own technically belongs to both of us anyway. [Beat.] Then again, Polnareff and I steal each other's earrings once in a while. I never really thought much of it before.

[mylegacy]

Maybe it's just because I never had anything to share before.

[But his life is full of things now, objects and things less tangible, most of them shared so well that he doesn't know which part is his and which isn't.]

[He rakes his bangs out of his eyes, frowning.]

I'm starting to think that none of the things I'm used to are really normal.

[lapidarius]

I didn't have anyone to share them with.

[What a pair of disasters they made.]

...I've been thinking the same, occasionally.

[mylegacy]

Why are you good at it, if you're not used to it?

[lapidarius]

I guess it's just-...

[Kakyoin paused, taking a pen out of his pocket and twirling it idly between his fingers as he put his thoughts in order.]

...If I think about it, the person I was before I met Jojo and the others wasn't really me. It wasn't Tenmei, it wasn't Noriaki, it was just...someone that was kind of empty. My friends--Jojo especially--are as much a necessary part of me as my Hierophant. So things like Polnareff stealing my earrings or borrowing Jotaro's shirt once in a while just kind of come naturally somehow. We each know the other isn't going to be seriously angry about it, and it's something we just want to do or makes us feel better. So we already know it doesn't exactly hurt anything on either side.

[mylegacy]

[My friends are as much a necessary part of me as my Hierophant.]

[He's a little distant, after Kakyoin is done talking. Is that what it is — that if he had a Stand, whatever it was, it would feel the same way that it does being around Joseph? That same comfort, and without it he'd just feel strange and incomplete. Is it the same?]

[It would be so much easier if he had anything else to compare this to.]

. . . Do you think that's what I am? Empty. Missing something.

[lapidarius]

No. [The answer came easily, without the need for thought behind it.] I think you're just less desperate and more hesitant to get close to people than I was. There's nothing inherently wrong with that. And it doesn't make you empty or anything of the sort.

[mylegacy]

. . . Mm.

[He's not sure he agrees, but he can't think of a way to say that without sounding self-pitying. So he just doesn't bother. Instead:]

What you were saying before. About being too confident, or not confident enough. Is that related? Does confidence make you less empty, or more?

[lapidarius]

...I don't know, really. I guess if someone was honestly confident then they probably wouldn't feel like this.

[mylegacy]

Hm. Maybe.

Sometimes I wonder if confidence is selfish. Or if selfishness is bad. Or lots of things. I don't know, I—

I miss when I knew, without a doubt, that I was doing the right thing.

[lapidarius]

Yeah. I'm not so sure I really know what is or isn't 'selfish' anymore. At the very least it's gotten difficult to distinguish the acceptable selfishness from what one should be careful of.

[...]

How've you been doing?

[mylegacy]

That was a bad segue, Kakyoin.

[lapidarius]

Yeah, it was. I never said my social skills were perfect.

[mylegacy]

You're usually so subtle, and then this.

[lapidarius]

Even I screw up sometimes, Caesar.

[mylegacy]

Not that often.

[. . .]

I don't know how to answer that question. I'm thinking and I don't know.

[lapidarius]

It's been that kind of week, has it?

[boy didn't he know a rough time when he saw it.]

...You don't have to talk about it if you'd rather not. We can talk about anything.

[mylegacy]

I just don't know what the right thing to do is. Or . . .

I do, but I think if I did it everyone would tell me I was being stupid . . . I don't know.