A Daily Grind

Sun Dec 12, 2021 10:07 pm

Walkin', talkin' like you know
L I T T L E
PSYCHO

Miki had finished up her morning shift at the local tavern; she had prepared everything and had heard talk about a few different local jobs around Konohagakure that paid a decent amount, she inquired with the men that were talking about them; saying they were jobs for genin; Miki knew that most genin were far younger than herself; as she never finished with her own training, nor did she bother going any further after the academy. She made a mental note of each job and it’s location within the village. Once she was free, she set off to the first; it was a simple job from the sound of it, the Yamanaka Clan was famously known for the delicate flower arrangements; Miki in the past had even acquired some for herself at the old brothel. She certainly didn’t mind having to help them out at all – in fact she figured that she would quite enjoy helping with the flower picking.

As Miki was lost in train of thought, she rounded the corner coming up to large flower shop, inside of it was the owner, and of the elders of the Yamanaka Clan; the woman greeted Miki as she entered the shop, it was a quite day, and not to many people were inside; but the smell of fresh flowers, the shop was decorated for the winter festivities; her emerald eyes were mesmerized by the difference the holidays would bring to the village of Konohagakure, it amused her greatly as she walked towards the older woman. “Good morning Miss Satow! How can we help you today?” Miki returned the woman’s smile, “Well actually – I was hoping to be able to help you! I heard that your in need of some help today?” Miki questioned, the woman looked slightly puzzled for a moment before replying; “Well actually we were looking for some help gathering some flowers for a large bouquet order, but this is meant for genin, Miss.” Miki would let out a small but subtle laugh; “well, I guess it’s a good thing that I am a genin.” The woman appeared shocked for a moment, most people who meant Miki wouldn’t assume right away that she was even a kunoichi.

A small tint of red would rush across the woman’s face, “O…Oh! I’m sorry… I didn’t realize!” Miki waved her hand, “No need to apologize, it is a simple mistake, I know having the knowledge of me being the leader of clan and also being a genin is strange for certain; but would it be alright if I took the job?” The woman nodded, rummaging through one of the drawers until she acquired a small piece of paper, handing it over to Miki; “I need these here, I’ve also wrote the quantity I’m looking for.” Miki would nod, “I shall return with them as quickly as possible.” Miki would take the list, before Miki could leave the woman would remind her; “All you need to do is head over to the Yamanaka Clan Compound and give them this note; they should have them close to if not already ready; all you need to do is bring them back here as quickly as possible as we have no one else in the shop today, and it is just my husband at the compound. If he doesn’t have them ready yet, could you be a dear and help him finish picking them?” Miki would smile and nod, “You’ve got it ma’am!” She would quickly leave out the door, hurrying down the road – it would be approximately five minutes before she would arrive at the compound, it was surrounded by not a gate but large green bushes. Miki would enter the compound, calling out to see if anyone was around.

As she received her answer, she headed towards the voice, the older man was kneed on the ground, cutting roses off the bushes in a line; “Hi there! I was sent by Ma’am, and she gave me this list to give to you.” The old man graciously took it, looking down at it; “Well, I got most of them cut and ready to go, I just have these blue roses left, would you care to help me finish? Two pairs of hands are always better than one.” Miki would nod, and kneel beside him, he would hand her a pair of sheers, and show her a few times before letting her begin cutting the stems of the plants. The two would work in unison for around thirty minutes before they finally had gathered just enough to fill the order; as they walked back, the man would place the roses in a large cart beside several other types of flowers; Miki noted they all had a winter type color to them, she was intrigued as to where this order would be going, but knew that it would be considered disrespectful is she asked.

As Miki waved goodbye, and hurried back to the shop; the man would stop her, “Just wait, I have one other thing I would like for you to bring to the shop!” Miki turned to look back towards him once again, “Alright.” She said as she was handed a single… Rainbow? Miki’s eyes gazed heavily towards this rose, it was far different and very much the most intriguing flower she had ever seen before, “Give this to my wife, if you could.” Miki nodded, returning to her rushed pace as she made her was back to the flower shop; her return seemed to happen a lot faster than her arrival. As she opened the doors and brought the cart in, Miki would take the single rose out of the cart and hand it to the old woman, “You’re husband says this is for you.” The old woman seemed to be delighted, another tint of red rushing across her cheeks, “Thank you dear. Thank you so much!”

Miki would smile and nod, “would you happen to know of anyone else with work or odd jobs that I would be able to do?” The old woman looked at Miki, a mournful look on her face, “Oh yes dear, I know of a few more… I just heard about the brothel… I am sorry.” Miki shrugged, “Sometimes things happen that we can’t control, and that’s okay.” The old woman would write down the addresses of the other jobs and Miki would once again be on her way.

As Miki looked down on the list, she would make note of the butcher shop, she often enjoyed going in and chatting with the man who owned it; he was an older man, whos son use to run the shop; but after his son died out on a mission he took over; hoping that one day he would be able to pass the shop onto his grandson; Miki made haste as she finally reached the butcher shop; the old man would be speaking with another customer as Miki made note of his grandson trying to finish loading a large cart full of meat; “Common’ Gramps! We need to go to the Inuzuka Compound! I wanna see the dogs!” He cried out, the old man excused himself from the current customer for a moment to go over to his grandson, “Don’t worry, as soon as I finish up with the customers, we’ll close up and head over.” The boy whined, complaining he wanted to go now, Miki would interject, “Why don’t I go with him and make the delivery?” The man turned his attention to Miki, smiling; “Are you sure Miss Satow?”

“Yes, of course. It would be my pleasure. After all the times you’ve given me discounts and been so generous. It’s the least I could do.” The man laughed and nodded in agreement, “Alright, it looks like you can go. Now listen to Miss Satow, and be a very good boy for the Inuzuka’s please?” The young boy would nod and grab Miki’s hand, as she took a hold of the cart, “Let’s go Miss! We don’t want to leave the doggies waiting!” Miki would let out a small giggle, pulling the cart behind her as the young boy would ramble on about the different dogs they had, and how he was allowed to play with the puppies when he got to visit them. Miki couldn’t help but laugh, as she and the boy enjoyed their peaceful walk towards the compound, hearing all the stories the young man had to tell her; as the pair finally pulled up to the compound two very large women and their equally as large dogs stood out side looking rather impatient. “It’s about time.” The first woman would say, Miki would apologies for the inconvenience on being late and the little boy would hug the second, explaining that his grandpa was dealing with a customer and that I offered to help. The women nodded; and allowed Miki to enter along side the boy; as the boy would take off towards where she assumed the puppies were; Miki would inquire on if she needed to go and fetch him before leaving, the woman laughed, “Oh their cousins of ours, he can stay; his grandpa will come around to gather him after the shop closes up. Thanks so much for brining both our shipment, and the boy.” Miki nodded, and headed out.

The next job on her list was an address, and nothing more… Miki narrowed her eyes at it, she was unfamiliar with the address but she did recognize it as the Uchiha District of Konohagakure. It was a legendary district; and one that Miki had only visited a few times prior when helping home a patron who gotten to drunk on sake. As Miki headed in the direction of the district; she began to wonder what type of job this was anyways… Not often the Uchiha’s would ask for outside help, let alone from strangers… Miki continued to stay deep in thought as she made her way through the district and to the house labeled; it was a smaller house, quite quaint in appearance; she did make note of a small to medium sized garden; although she couldn’t quite tell as it had grown over, weeds and grass as well as untended vegetables rooted through the ground; Miki finally gathered that perhaps the people in the home were elderly and needed help with fixing their yard.

Miki nodded to herself mentally as she walked up the walkway and knocked gently on the door; she heard shuffling around, the sound of something tipping over and crashing, along with a subtle mumble under someone’s breath that sounded vaguely like a swear word; before finally hearing the locks of the door unhinge. As the door would begin to creek open, an elderly woman stood before Miki, far taller than she was, but wrinkled and hunched over; one eye covered with a patch; and the other eye grey in color; almost as if she was blind. “Who’s there?” The woman asked, her voice was shaky and startled, Miki made a mental note that she had to be blind, there was no almost as if, she was. “Hi there Ma’am, my name is Miki Satow, and I got your address, someone told me that you had a job you were looking to hire for?” The old woman grumped, “Ain’t no job here. I already paid someone to clean up my lawn and garden.” Miki took a glance over, sighing gently, “Oh, alright. My apologies then.” The woman would slam the door in Miki’s face.

As the young kunoichi would stand there for a moment, staring at the garden, she let out a huff, deciding that she would simply do it without payment. This old woman was ripped off, and she didn’t agree with it at all. As Miki rounded to the backyard; she would find a small tool shed, as she opened it; she realized that there was no tools in it… Whoever had promised to do this woman’s garden probably stole them along with her money. Miki pulled out the cash she had, it wasn’t much and it was all that she had earned today, but she decided to go and buy tools and fix the garden. As Miki left the property she was stopped by a man from the next door, “Hey; where you going?” Miki glanced towards him, he was an a typical looking Uchiha, and nothing really struck her attention right off the bat, “I need to buy tools, whoever she hired before, stole them all and lied to her.” The man sighed, pulling out his own wallet, handing over some cash, “Here. We’re the ones who forced her to put up that ad, it’s only fair we pay as well.” Miki nodded, not wanting to argue with the man; she left and promptly returned with three full bags of tools, fertilizer, and different kinds of seeds.

Miki smiled as she got to work; her hands working at a steadfast speed, pulling out the weeds, cutting the grass; removing old rotting vegetables and other unmentionable things from the garden; the man from before came through and mowed the lawn for Miki; which she thanked him dearly for; as the sun began to set, she would make haste to quickly finish; she was done for the day, although she had lost most of her money helping the old woman out; she didn’t have any regrets.

As Miki finished up and put the tools away quickly, she was stopped by the same man from earlier; he had asked her if she had time to finish just one more job, which of course Miki obliged; and followed him out of the district and to the villages dog shelter, “If you could take the dogs for a walk, around the village quickly, so we could clean their cages that would be greatly appreciated.” Miki nodded, taking the first set of dogs out, she would take the animals in intervals of 5, unless the dog couldn’t be accompanied by other dogs; she would quickly bring them around the village, returning them back to the shelter and taking another set; this went on for a few hours before they finally came to a stop. The man thanked Miki and handed her a large wad of ryo, “For the money you spent today, as well as for the work you did here. We would like to thank you for being selfless.” Miki smiled and nodded, leaving the shelter behind her, she had a decent amount of money now; as she was finally alone walking the streets to head back to the tavern; she found herself with a little more excitement then before.

Before she would know it; she could be out of the tavern and perhaps own her very own brothel. She sighed, placing the money in her froggy wallet, as she reached the tavern, slipping in through the back door; it was late now and she was tired from all the running around today. It was time for her to get some rest and be up for her morning shift. Miki slinked into her room; changed and laid down for the night, staring at the ceiling; she still had a long way to go, but she would make it there eventually. She had faith not only in herself, but in her village; with enough jobs she would surely be able to make her life normal once again… It was just a matter of patience and time that was needed. The small woman smiled; closing her eyes for the night.

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