"My old man showed me how to make a kite once, when I was like eight," he said, his brow furrowed like it was a chore to remember. "I got so excited I ran outside with it half done," he added after a beat of silence, chuckling to himself. "I hooked it up to a length of twine and took off to find Isa to show him, and then when I tried to make it fly I couldn't get it to work right." He made a twirling gesture with one hand, index finger lifted. "It flew, but it just kept spinning," he said, shaking his head. "End over end, around and around, until it just nosedived into a tree."

He chuckled again, swirling up another chopstickful of noodles, but let it sit for a moment, not eating it.

"Isa'd been trying to tell me the whole time," he said, "that a kite needed a tail." He took the bite of noodles and slurped it up extra noisily, as if to make up for Riku's dainty eating. "Said it was unbalanced wifoud it," he said then, mouth still full, again, as if to offset how impeccably polite Riku always seemed to have to be. Swallowing the noodles, he pointed at Riku with his chopsticks. "So we made a tail out of one of his dad's ugly old ties," he said, "and wouldn't you know--the thing flew straight as an arrow."

He gave Riku about eight seconds before he questioned the point of the story.