Book One In The Ahh-Ness Of Things Series: April & Donnie were once inseparable, but now almost six years have passed since she left NYC. What if April O'Neil could set the record straight, once & for all! The only girl down enough to chill with the...
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With hands pulled back low at his side, he stood in a seamless angle; head straight, eyes forward. One hand over, one hand under; supporting the long oak kihon-yo. He effortlessly glided his hands back & forth in an exchange that was almost invisible to the eye, raising the nine foot long naginata up over his head to create a perfect horizon until he brought it back down to the other side of his body. The bo was one long piece of solid wood with a curved "glaive" blade carved into the end. It wasn't terribly heavy but the length required strength & focus on precise awareness of the body, to maneuver it through the air & back into place properly. He did this over one side & then the other, again & again. Always turning his knee out with the rotation of his hip, keeping his shoulders & upper body straight in line.
He began revolving the naginata out around his shoulder as he pulled it up above him & then down over his shell. Continuously changing hands in ukenagashi. Then guiding from down at his ankle in kiriage; upwards & out to a point he stared directly into, in the space before him. It seemed so gentle & slow. If someone had been standing within reach of that focal point; they would have been severely injured. As sweet as pie. People have a tendency to watch one hand but not the other. As one came down, the other was replacing it. Then there is the ishizuki; the other end that would then circle back around to strike you in some tender point if he had not cut you. This was an upwards cut & he was using a practice weapon for strengthening skill & technique. It was still deadly. On an o-naginata; like the one he brandished in the tunnels where he had found me, the blade is steel & as sharp & clean as a katana. Over six foot long & the blade alone was two feet long. If he had made this pretty sweep, with its deceptive reach, at me when he confronted me there; he would have sliced me from pelvis to collar bone.
I instantly remembered that moment of fear. There is nothing quite like knowing someone you love has the capacity for lethal control. He was capable of both creation & bloodshed. The latter was something that required less focus. There is often bloodshed in creation, though. I wondered what it means to bring life into something that never existed before you & how simply life can extinguish. It's reasonably easy to kill someone; is there creation of something else in doing so? He then spun the staff above his head, bringing it slicing downwards again, exchanging hands once more in the air. When he stopped he was poised as if to throw a spear over his head, body positioned into an almost exact X, back hand just behind his head as if he were the figure head of an ancient ship & the naginata a bowsprit.
He was breathing deeply. My heart pounded as I returned to the realization that even in my captivation now, he was no longer mine to admire. I went back to the bittersweet way my heart had ached over this young girl in his thoughts. How simple & perfect his affection was for her. Just like these simple basic cuts, he could perform so knowingly. I thought of how good for him she seemed to be. She had a good handle on him; his a-neuro-typical process; she was able to bring him back when he sank into noetic perceptions. Pulling apart every natural reaction, until it was no longer natural, & he was only alive in experiences as an observer. I had once questioned if the heavy hand & all encompassing beliefs of our Sensei had lent to his predisposition that constantly forced him into states of cognitive dissonance. His comment about never being cut out for this life was as right as it was wrong. He hated fighting, he hated Raphael's go to brute force. Leonardo's apparent blind faith & even Mikey's spontaneity. None of it made sense to him. As compassionate as he was, he could never comprehend that sometimes people just do what they feel. Empathic anxiety was my curse. Perhaps he was meant for this life because of that; maybe growing up, all the training made it easier for him to accept his maddening ability & need to compartmentalize.
