Disclaimer: I don't own the rights to any of the original characters.
This season on Desperate Princesses: It's been almost twenty five years after the sailor scouts decided to give up their powers so that evil could not exist and do harm to the world they live in. Now the former warriors of earth have moved into the suburbs and are causing quite a stir among their neighbors.
October 08, 2008
A mother's kiss is something some of us learn to cherish till the end of time. It is a reminder of just how lucky we naturally are. Or a façade to make the family look like a neatly settled bunch. Perhaps the most common reception of a mother's kiss though is the one that comes every night before we go to bed and every day before we leave to our busy lives away from home and the ones we love. On this particular day, Rini Shields would give her mother one last kiss goodbye, never knowing until it was too late, that the kiss that says I love you without a spoken word, would be her last.
October 12, 2008
On this very calm and chilly day, the residents of Wisteria Lane – Juban District, Japan, the denizens of this beautiful suburban neighborhood walked out of their houses with a face of stern brilliant method and a black outfit. One of their beloved neighbors was being mourned. Rei and Chad Hino, A successful super model and a businessman would give their condolences to the Shields family with a set of gift cards. The two calmly entered their boldly red Ferrari and floored it five houses down the street.
Baking a warm set of arranged muffins for their very unfortunate friends, Ami and Greg Mizuno would wake the unwilling but perfectly behaving two children they had, prep them on funeral behavior and scoot them off to the sidewalk where they meet Mina and her daughter Anna. A single woman with the sophistication of a blow fish. Last but certainly not the most situated, was Lita, Her husband Jason, and their four children. A set of twin boys, another boy a year younger, and a tiny baby girl. Lita would however drag the twins through the street, a war she waged with almost great futility.
The four very different housewives would converge together at the door, family in lock step as they presented themselves to one of their best friend's husbands. Darien Shields. The newest widow on Wisteria Lane.
"Hello Ladies." He said with a welcoming face. His body would resist smiling but he could not help it. He took their gifts one by one. "Ami. Greg." He gave Ami a peck on the cheek and Greg a hug. They walked inside and Ami set her muffins off to the side.
"Mina. Anna." He hugged both at the same time and they walked in, placing a bottle of wine on the table.
"Lita and company." He chuckled slightly and let them in with a pat on the back. Lita turned and gave him a great hug before scooting off after the children.
"Rei. Hi." He kissed her on the cheek and hugged her. She slipped in, gliding across the room in red stilettos and a black cocktail dress with rhinestones fluttering about the blouse. Chad came up to Darien with a solemn face and smiled just slightly. He opened his arms and Darien received his condolences with grief.
"If you need any help or anything man. You just come knockin' or you call. You hear?"
"Of course. You're the first set of man hands I think about Chad." The two laughed.
Inside of the house, Rei and Mina stood together with wine glasses filled to the rim. They coaxed a look around at the neighborhood entourage and settled on a familiar face.
"Is that?" Mina started.
"It's Sammy."
"He looks great. How old is he now?" The two stared down the twenty something year old and finished off their glasses.
"I hear he's modeling for men's swimwear now. Andrew something is the line."
"No kidding Rei. Shouldn't you know this by now?"
"Mina. If I knew every name in the industry, that would mean I'm a college super model, not a natural super model. People don't love me for my brain okay?" Rei set her glass aside.
"Rei, if you knew any name in the industry your co-workers probably wouldn't be so inclined to push you off a five foot runway. Do you even have co-workers?"
"Of course. I have the world. The world is my co-worker."
"You really need to stop making things up." They turned around to the banter of a lecturing Ami Mizuno. Her blue hair glistened from the light through the window. She was waving one finger at a caterer and the other was busy fixing an arrangement of flowers.
"Oh Ami." Mina canted her head, "What is she doing here anyway? I thought she was too busy with her job to take a day off. Even for Serena."
"We all were a bit busy this week…every week." Rei added. "I wonder long it'll take for-
Rei stopped speaking when she heard a splash in the pool. The two walked to the window to see Lita's twin boys swimming around and having a jolly time. They laughed subtly and shook their heads. "You two have three seconds to get out of the pool right this instant!" Lita commanded though her voice was muffled through the glass. "That's it!" Rei and Mina watched Lita as she dove in after them and grabbed them in a whirl and pulled them into the shallow end. She held one of them up above the water with one hand by his wrist. "You two are in deep trouble." And she let him fall back into the water with a terrified look on his face. She dragged the two of them out of the backyard as Darien stepped outside to see her leaving in time. She knelt down, "You two get to your father and tell them you're in trouble."
"No!" One of them spat.
"If you don't, I'll make sure you go to bed early every night this week and wake up extra EXTRA early for school for no reason at all. Got it!?" She pushed them towards the front yard where their father would be waiting on the lawn somewhere. She turned to Darien, soaking wet. "I'm really sorry, but we're…we have to-
"I understand. If you and Jason want some food or some cake later on, Rini and I will stop by."
"That sounds wonderful Darien. Thank you." She went for a hug and stopped just short of grasping him in her arms. The two exchanged awkward looks before Darien waved Lita off to her house. He turned to the rest of the guests and smiled reassuringly.
In the den of the house, a large space reserved for events such as this, chairs were set up so that someone could make a short speech if they wanted to say something they had not during the burial. Sammy Tsukino would step up to the front of the room for a short written word he had prepared. Darien turned as a few neighbors grabbed his attention and turned him around.
"Hi everyone. It's nice to see all of Serena's friends socializing and gathering around for her. I'm sure she would have loved this. Her favorite times in the world were when she was with those she loved the most. I just want to say that I'm very grateful for her friends and her family. For Darien and their daughter Rini, wherever she is right now. Poor girl." Sammy looked down quickly, feeling Rini's pain. He could only empathize so much as he placed his stern eyes on those standing around in the room. "So I hope everyone understands me when I say when I find out why she killed herself and who was involved, I'm going to get even with you. You better hope to the moon that I don't." With a clenched fist he shook his head and wandered away from the eye of attention.
Darien shrugged as a slew of his neighbors looked at him daunted. An older woman, retired and experienced looking with a sack of extra pounds walked up to him and nodded, "A putz. That's what he is. By the way, you got any of those neat cookies with macadamia in the middle? I love those things."
"No Mrs. Haruna. You can get that at any Chinese food stand. Not here though. Don't you have a cat to tend to."
"Oh you know me and Toby. We have nothing to worry about when we leave each other for a short while. Please, be a dear and find me some Macadamia cookies." Darien shook his head and walked away.
In her room, she felt at home and free from all the worry. The unease that came with seeing your mother lying as still as a rock in a box that was barely big enough for her body to turn over in. Rini kept thinking, 'What if she's alive? What if she's still alive and she needs the extra space in that coffin to get out?' There was no alternative thought to ponder on except hope that there was still hope and at Rini's age, there was plenty of hope. It's her naivette that her father worried about which seemed to wither away with each passing second. She became less vulnerable every day and she fed into her hatred of the world around her. Suddenly she felt as if she were very alone.
"Even with Papa…" she began to cry, "I don't feel that same shining light I felt before when mama used to hold me and tell me everything was going to be okay. So why should I talk to anyone about this…I don't need anything!" Rini wiped her face and gathered her things.
Later that night – Shield's Residents
The phone rang and Darien went to grab the closest device.
"Hello."
"Hello." There was a pause of silence. A very eerie few seconds hung in the air till Darien answered back.
"May I help you?"
"Yes. Do the Shields live here?"
"Yes. May I ask who's calling."
"No thank you." A click reverberated through the line and Darien knew whoever had called just hung up. He shivered.
"What a scary phone call. I wonder what they want." The door bell rang and Darien jumped suddenly. He walked to the front room and he looked through the peep hole. "Oh my goodness." He relieved the latch and opened the door to see Rini standing under the arms of Lita.
"I found this jumping out of her back window and leaping over the fence. Good thing I have a good view of the side of your house huh?"
"Rini what were you doing? Running away?" The girl refused to answer. She just took three steps inside, turned to nod and bow at Lita and took off to her room.
"Thank you so much. I'm sorry about that."
"It's okay. I understand. We're all really hurt over this." Lita paused and put her hand on the back of her hip. "When I lost my parents I was a lot younger than Rini. . . I don't remember it hurting as much but that was a long time ago. Other things are still a lot more familiar you know?"
"Tell me about it." Darien looked down. He had an epiphany suddenly. "Do you want to come in for some tea or something?" He held the door and Lita shook her head.
"The kids need to be put to bed. It's a two man job and Jason's only half a woman." Darien laughed, "Unless you want me to. Unless you need it I mean…I can spare the time." Lita put her hand on Darien's shoulder. "Don't be afraid to say you need something guy. You know we're all hurting but you were close to her."
"I know. I know. It's just that, I don't think after what happened, it's appropriate to have any of you so close to home." Darien looked even sadder.
"Darien. Of all the people who were there for you and Serena and Rini that time I was happy to help then. The others may not have been here, but I'm here. I've always been here. Just you know…things have changed."
"Like what?"
"Don't get offended please." Lita put her hands in the air. "I'm just saying, if Jason left me like Serena did I would need someone –
"I think you need to leave. It's too much right now. Too much to think about. I need to go and be with Rini before she tries to escape again."
"I … I understand. I'll be around." Lita turned and walked away, blowing a kiss off her two fingers and smiling back as she headed home. Darien closed the door and walked to Rini's room. It was closed. He knocked on the door and when he heard no response he opened it to see Rini laying on her side. He took up the spot right next to her, held her in his arms and squeezed tight.
"I miss her papa. Why would she do this to us?" She sobbed softly.
"Sometimes baby…my little princess. . . people can't handle the world they are given. And when it gets to be too much for them they make a decision."
"Why would she make this decision. Mama's so smart. She's so intelligent. Why would she leave us."
"Sometimes people don't know how to make decisions in times like this."
"What happened papa?"
"I don't know princess. I don't know and if I did I don't think I would feel any better." He kissed the back of his daughter's head and buried his head into the pillow. "I love you Rini. Don't forget okay?"
"Okay papa. I love you too." She sobbed quietly some more and fell asleep in her father's arms.
October 13, 2008, Monday Morning
Minako being the resourceful single mother that she was, objectively rummaged through her daughter's belongings while she was in the shower. Mina was looking for nothing in particular but if she happened to find something, like say, a bad grade that was hidden in her daughter's room somewhere, or pregnancy pills and she pleaded upon the moon that she did not find pregnancy pills, she would be able to ground her daughter from going to school so that she had someone to hang out with today. Unlike most mothers, Mina loved being with her daughter on Monday mornings. Like most mothers though, she had work to do and errands to run. So like most people, she would rather do them with a person she could spend quality time with instead of no one at all.
"FOUND IT!" Mina yanked a C+ paper from her daughter's filing cabinet.
"What are you doing?" A sixteen year old blonde spitting image of Mina had appeared behind her mother.
"Uh…I'm … WHAT'S THIS!?" Mina spun and shoved the English paper in her daughter's face.
"It's a quiz…why? Are you going to ground me from school again!?"
"Of course I am! You can't go around getting 'good enough' grades at school and expect me to let you do what you love to do every week day!" Mina flung her arms around as to distract her daughter from the fact that she was obviously finding reasons to ground her.
"Mom! You can't go grounding me from school just because I want to go. And the only reason I want to go is so that I can get into a good university. I don't want to be stuck here doing manual labor for the rest of my life."
"You won't dear. You really won't. As long as you go to community college at least."
"I'm not going to community college. I already told you."
"Aren't you supposed to be thinking about partying and boys at this age."
"I'm not like you mom. I was never like you. Stop trying to make me like you. I can come home later and help you with the laundry. Don't you have friends or something?" Anna began getting dressed, ignoring her mother in her path.
"I have friends! Of course I have friends!"
"Mother. Your forty. You don't have friends. You have drinking buddies. Forty year old women have drinking buddies."
" I do too have friends."
"Name one!"
"Lita! Lita is my friends." Mina crossed her arms.
"Uh-huh. You and Lita speak once a week and you live down the street from each other."
"So. We spoke yesterday, plus Wednesday at the park. That's twice! And she waved to me when I got the groceries from the car on Friday!"
"Mother," Anna said annoyed, "I told you she was flinging things at her kid."
"She knew I was there!"
"Mom! Come on! I have to go to class today! If I miss again, they're going to need a doctor's note."
"I can get one!"
"From who?"
"My old friend is in town. Ami. She's a doctor. I'll ask her for a favor."
"None of you have seen Ami in the last ten years and one of the few things you're going to say to her is that you need a favor before she leaves?" Anna pulled shoes out of her closet and slipped them on. She grabbed her book bag and headed down stairs.
"She's cool. We're all cool. Don't you want to be cool like your mother." Mina chased after Anna.
"No. I'm plenty cool."
"Oh no, you so not cool it not even funny."
"Mother! Knock the asian accent off."
"We are asian!"
"We're speaking in ENGLISH!" Anna opened the door and started walking towards the curb.
"Young lady if you –
Mina stopped suddenly and Anna knew something happened. She looked back and saw the look on her mothers face.
"Get to school."
"What?" Anna asked. She looked back towards whatever it was that Mina was staring at and noticed nothing.
"I said get to school." Mina walked back inside the house and dialed a single seven digit number as Anna jumped on the bus.
In a house where two successful career people meet every morning, the routine is always somewhat the same. The suit and the dress are pulled off the rack they were placed upon the night before. The cufflinks and the jewelry are put on to match the suit and the dress. And when the two come down stairs, they put on the coffee and the tea and have breakfast that is prepared by the housekeeper. When the breakfast is half eaten and the cell phones and bags are put into the sport cars, the morning routine is over and the work tradition begins.
Rei and Chad Hino separated that morning only to wish they could stay at work forever. But on this particular morning, Rei Hino would be kept from a place she loved by a long lost face she would rather not see again. It would begin with the ring of a cell phone.
"Hello."
"Rei! It's Mina!"
"What do you want Mina? I'm working." Rei said with her hair already whipping in the wind.
"Oh please. I'm watching you pull out of the drive way."
"I can be here to China in five seconds with this car. What's so important?"
"Did you see who just arrived? The white house a few homes down from yours." Mina sounded anxious.
"No. Who?" She looked over at a nice humble looking couple checking out the house for sale. "Those two kids?" Rei huffed, "Mina. Stop calling me for such trivial-
She slammed the breaks down and a screech could be heard the next city over. Rei stared down another sports car and its owner stepping out. Long legs and a not so modest dress suit that hugged the shape of this red headed woman. "Molly?"
"I KNEW IT!" Rei pulled away from the phone with a scared face. She shook her head and closed the device. Rei parked on the sidewalk, then stepped out of the car. The sultry model strutted across the asphalt and all eyes became victims to her hips. "Molly Stanton. How are you?"
The girl turned and smiled, placing her hands on her hips as she recognized the face. "I'm doing fine Rei Hino. You're looking good. . . for your age."
Rei stopped. "And you look….so what are you doing here?"
Molly shook her head giggling. "I'm showing these nice people a house in the neighborhood. I'm looking for 14431 Wisteria Lane.
"Why would you be looking for that house? That's Serena's house."
"I know. Darien called me. He wanted to sel- oh. I've said too much."
"What? He wants to sell the house? Where does he think he's going."
"Hey! MOLLY! MOLLY STANTON!" Mina was running down the street till she failed to lift her foot up enough to get it over a protruding slab of concrete. She lifted herself up with a smile.
"Oh. Mina. Yeah, he wants to sell the house. I'm selling the house. Please, let me sell the house."
"First of all Molly, you're at the wrong address. Second of all, didn't your license expire years ago?" Rei scorned.
"Silly Rei. I've been here almost half the month already. I've been shopping around for the perfect house. My associates here wanted to see my new home. I just showed it to them." Rei and Mina's jaws dropped. "Now if you will excuse me. I need to show them their new house."
"They didn't already buy the house did they? DID THEY!? Molly answer me, please."
"Rei Hino, your best friend just committed suicide. Do you really think it's appropriate to pine over a man that you never had a chance with. Aren't you married now? I mean come on. Only so many men fall for the pumps and nice rump. You actually have to have class too." Mina and Rei froze. They were stunned at how this woman, once their grade school friend, once a sweet beautiful soul…now they were looking at a cold woman. Someone they did not know.
"Molly I think you need to take that back. That was very mean." Mina demanded with glistening eyes.
"Mina, I know you don't have much in common with these girls. I mean, with their success and their beautiful families, what do you have? A few independent films and the title of single mom. I would hardly say that your opinion holds gravitas. So please, step aside." This cold woman walked away with the couple behind her. They followed her down the street to the Shield's residents and when they arrived, they were greeted by a polite Darien and Rini Shields.
Yes, it is true that a kiss goodbye is something so special that we learn to appreciate it later in life. There is a time though when the kiss would rather be missed then have to experience one person's bite. It is true that when it is too late, what is lost is prized more than ever. And it is true that when we have such value, we take it for granted because there is no other way to live life as happy. What is questionable though is when we list expect it, the kiss we once cherished may bite harder than we ever expected.
(If you guys have any question at all about what's going on, please feel free to ask them and I will answer. Just keep in mind though that it's only the first episode and it won't be as long as the show. It's a new kind of formula so it's bound to have kinks. Thank you for reading very much and I'm open to any suggestions as well :D)