I do not own Sailor Moon, the associated characters or any of the songs appearing in this fic, please read and enjoy.
"So Dad... you wanna tell me where we're going?" Shingo Tsukino sat in the passenger seat of his father's car. Early this morning Dad had woken him up and told him he had a surprise for his son, first they had gone out to breakfast and were now driving toward the edge of town, taking their sweet time in the process too.
"I told you Son, It's a surprise! You're not the kind of kid to open a box of cereal in the store just to see what the prize is, or flip to the end of a mystery novel to know what happens, are you?" Kenji answered his son with a grin, "Besides, you'll find out soon enough."
"Great..." Shingo had just aced his high school final exams and was trying to thoroughly enjoy the all too brief summer break before he'd start college, studying education, at the local university. His job at the Crown Music Store was going well, he really enjoyed talking about bands and instruments all day long, helping kids pick out their first beginner guitar, finding sheet music for school chorale groups, and fixing and repairing old, used, and abandoned instruments until they were like new. Shingo himself played guitar and piano, he'd picked them up in junior high and something just...clicked. He was in both the Music Club and the Theater Arts Club in school and made a lot of good friends.
Good friends... He knew that he would be leaving them all too soon, he was lucky enough to keep some of his pals from primary school all the way though high school, the thought of them all going their separate ways like an open wound... but there was a sort of excitement too. next year he would be going to the same school as Ami Mizuno, Ami...
His thoughts drifted to her as they did often these days, she was studying medicine and was well on her way to becoming a doctor. Shingo knew that was her dream, she had pursued it diligently as long as Shingo had know her, which seemed like a very, very long time. He could remember the first time they met, when his sister had brought her home to help with her homework. He could never explain it but knew he and Ami shared a special, unspoken bond, a bond that had been strengthened that day at the beach all those years ago.
We were just kids back then,he thought, We're not anymore...
"Ah! We're here!" Dad's announcement interrupted Shingo's thoughts and he noticed that they seemed to be at some kind of self-storage facility. As Dad parked the car Shingo couldn't help but wonder just what the heck they were doing here, of all places, what could dad possible have stored here? Shingo ran over the possibilities in his head as he followed Dad down the rows of room-sized lockers, a car? Shingo had gotten his driver's license, and his class M (thanks to a crash course from Haruko, another friend of his sister's) almost a year ago, but finding a car on his budget was proving to be near impossible. Even that beat-up truck he had looked at a few weeks ago was just too far out his price range... It was really getting frustrating.
Dad obviously knew where
he was going, he barely even glanced at the numbers on the lockers as
he passed them, one after one, before stopping at one labeled G234
and pulling a key from his pocket. Dad lifted the steel garage door
and they walked into the dark locker. Shingo picked his way carefully
into the cool, dark room as his dad found the light switch and turned
it on.
"Happy Graduation son, do you know what this is?"
Inside the locker were two things, one was a positively ancient
looking footlocker and the other was one of the most beautiful things
Shingo had ever laid eyes on...
"Dad... this is a 1963
Norton Atlas Cafe Racer, heavily modified... The engine is far from
stock and the frame been reinforced to hell and back to account for
the extra weight..." Shingo walked around the motorcycle,
almost ogling it as he would a pretty girl, "The wheel are
cherry, the shocks are top of the line and the chain on here is brand
new, this bike may be thirty years old but it's still
top-of-the-line. Any museum or private collector would give their
right arm for a piece like this! Where did you find it?"
"It
was mine when I was about your age son," Dad answered wistfully,
"I bought her off an Englishman who moved here as a foreign
correspondence reporter, and for years this bike was my ONLY form of
transportation, wind, snow, rain, it didn't matter. Y'know, one
winter I went on a road trip to the mountains with some friends and
almost lost two toes to frostbite, but it was worth it for the
ride... I met your mother on this bike"
"Really?"
Shingo chuckled, "I could hardly see mom as a chopper hopping
juvenile delinquent"
Dad grinned "Believe me, she
wasn't, neither was I really. I was just a college kid with a
leather jacket, a cherry bike, and a problem with the establishment.
I thought I could solve all the world's problems with a pen and a
typewriter, which reminds me..." Dad knelt down to open the
footlocker and pulled out a black leather jacket and a black helmet
with a silver visor. "Never ride her without these."
Shingo
looked at the polished black helmet and realized just how much his
father was giving him, this bike, the jacket and helmet, they were
treasured heirlooms. The bike he was on and probably the jacket he
was wearing when his father met his mother... The gravity of this
gift was almost overpowering... "Thank you, Pop..."
"Well? What are you waiting for boy? Go take her for a spin, I have to have this locker cleaned out by noon!"
"Right!" Shingo grinned as he put on and sealed up the jacket and fastened the helmet and flipped down the visor before throwing one leg over the bike and turning the key, bringing the the vehicle to rumbling, growling life under him. Shingo's grin widened as he revved the engine and the sheer power of the bike flowed into him. "You and mom and everyone are still coming to the Cabaret tonight, aren't you?" Cabaret was the very last thing the Theater Arts and Music Club students did, it was purposefully put off until after exams for the year had ended and was used as a way to let off steam and to say goodbye to the seniors in the club who where graduating that year. This would be Shingo's fourth and final one, something that excited, scared, and saddened him all at the same time, and he very much wanted his family and friends there as there was no telling when he would be on a stage again.
"Wouldn't miss it for the world, now get going!" Dad yelled back as Shingo shifted his weight slightly and let the motorcycle ease forward before opening up the throttle and screaming out the storage facility like a bat out of hell.
Ami Mizuno was where she spent most of her weekend afternoons these days, the Tsukino house helping Usagi plan her wedding. Today she was working on the seating chart, a chore that would be more enjoyable if Shingo were home to help. Not that he was some kind of genius when it came to seating arrangements, but his jokes helped the time go faster, and as head usher he knew who was with which side.
He certainly has grown up... Ami thought as she struggled to fill another table without splitting up families or couples. Ami wasn't really sure when Shingo had gone from the little brother of her best friend, and her younger friend to something more. There was certainly a shift in their relationship after that one day at the beach, when their raft had sunk and he almost downed. But even then she always saw him as more of kid than an equal. Maybe it was when she started going to the university, he called her every week just to see if she was okay and give her the news from home. He did a good job of keeping her up-to-date on everyone's busy lives, Makoto opening her flower shop, Minako's blooming career as an actor and idol, and the start of Mamoru's new job in hospital administration. Shingo had become good friends with his future Brother-in-Law, Mamoru had never had any siblings of his own and the way he and Shingo joked and fooled around it seemed like they were already family. Things certainly had changed since the days they would all sit around in homework club, eating junk food and worrying about exams...
"Usagi!" Rei
shouted, rousing Ami from her thoughts, "You've already had six
cookies, let someone else get some!"
"That means a lot
coming from you, you've had seven, I counted" Usagi retorted as
she took another bite of the cookies that Mrs. Tsukino had made for
them
Ami shook her head and
smiled, "The more things change the more they stay the
same."
"I swear, you'd never know they were in their
twenties the way they act, it's so embarrassing sometimes"
Makoto added.
Suddenly there was a loud rumble from outside, as if someone had parked a motorcycle outside and started revving the engine. "Wow, that's really rude!" Minako shouted over the racket. "This neighborhood used to be so quiet."
All four girls simply stared at her.
"Oh, you know what I mean!" She sputtered, embarrassed.
The five of them went to the door to give the rider an etiquette lesson. He was tall young man on a heavily modified and rather old-looking motorcycle. It was painted jet black and set off the chrome finish nicely.
"Hey!" Usagi
yelled at the rider, "Cut that out, there are people trying to
work in peace over here!"
The rider simply turned off the
ignition, got off the bike and started walking toward the house, his
features hidden by his black and silver helmet.
"I-I mean
it, you better leave or... we'll call the cops or something!"
The
rider unfastened his helmet to reveal a familiar face and mop of
unruly sandy brown hair "Shingo!" All the girls
cried.
"So," He said with a grin, "Who wants a
ride?"
