Chapter Text
“You like menthols, right?”
Sojiro looked up at the door to Leblanc opening and the kid's quiet voice just in time to catch the thing hurtling towards his chest. He fumbled it at first, one hand still wiping down the counter, and had to readjust the little box against himself before he got a good hold on it. He grunted when he read the label. Not his favorites, but not terrible, either. Still a thoughtful gift. “Eh, I’ll smoke them. Thank–” he choked. “Wait, how the hell did you get these?!”
Ren just looked at him in that slinky, head down way he normally did, his hands jammed in his pockets. “School counselor. He’s trying to quit, so he gave those to me to give to you.”
Sojiro blinked in disbelief. “I…”
The kid shrugged in a “what can you do” gesture, shoulders doing all the work while his hands never left his pockets. He did look Sojiro in the eye, though, with that rare little smile when he actually spoke his mind. “He’s really bad at his job.”
“Goddamn, I bet,” Sojiro grumbled to himself. He’d figured out that the kid got fidgety when stared at, so Sojiro opened the pack of cigarettes and looked inside. Only two were missing. “Doesn’t he know you’re on parole?”
“Eh. At least he bribes me with candy.”
“...Do I even wanna know?”
The kid pulled his right hand out, holding a brightly colored package in offering. He jiggled it once. “Fruit snack?”
“Uh. No, thank you. They’re probably warm.” Sojiro made a disgusted sound – unrelated to the fruit snacks – and shoved the cigarettes into his apron. “Look, be careful what you tell a shrink like that. Last thing I need is for you to make some smartass comment and then I have to check you out of wherever you get committed. Talk to your friends, or something. Keep your head down and don’t go talking to strange men that give you cigarettes and candy. ”
Ren laughed, almost too quiet to hear. “Yessir.”
“I mean it,” he snapped. “You don’t know what they’re gonna hold against you.”
And there the kid went, all quiet and closed off again. Sojirio softened his tone, which was very difficult for him to do and normally he wouldn’t, but the kid had a way of looking real sad without actually looking sad. It made him feel bad. “I mean, thanks for the cigs. Just don’t go getting things planted on you, yeah? You’ve got enough to worry about without some weirdo giving you trouble.”
Ren nodded, his eyes glazing over behind his glasses. Sojiro used to think it was him not giving a shit. Turns out, he just did that when he was thinking. “Understood. I’ll be careful.”
“Good.”
The kid wasn’t going to talk anymore about it unless he damn well wanted to, so Sojiro politely returned to wiping down the counter and Ren went upstairs to his room. Sojiro waited until he heard the sound of the TV upstairs paired with the cat meowing – he swore it was like it was commenting on the show – to step outside to smoke. He pulled the gift out of his apron and lit one, taking a drag and screwing up his face at the mintiness.
He shook his head on the exhale and glared out at the light rain. “Fucking cigarettes… What is going on at that school?”