Tamagotchi Boyfriend
xoxo
Chapter One
"Riiiin, your father left a present for you!"
Said blonde continued to stare at the ceiling, blinking slowly. This type of unproductiveness had seemed to become her hobby since summer break began. She recalled the many times she'd prayed for summer to come quickly as she sat in language arts class. As the saying goes, be careful what you wish for, because Rin had spent the past week bored out of her mind. She had friends, sure, but they also had lives of their own and most of them were off vacationing in the UK or some other fancy-schmancy place with cute boys.
"Rin, get down here now," her mother called impatiently from the kitchen.
Rin lazily rolled out of bed and clomped downstairs. Her mother stood expectantly in the dining room, dressed up in her usual suit with a skirt for work. Her red Couch purse was already on her shoulder and her car keys in her hand, obviously about to leave for work and most likely running late. Rin's mother seemed to always be working—but she understood. It must be hard being a single mother with a child enrolled into private school.
Rin noticed the small rectangular box in the woman's manicured hand only moments before it was hastily held out towards her.
"Your father sent it as congratulations for your good grades last quarter."
As soon as Rin took the plain cardboard box her mother was halfway out the door, walking quickly effortlessly despite the heels on her feet.
"If I'm not back by six, order something with the money in the envelope I left on the fridge. I love you."
"Love you too," Rin replied before the door was shut and locked.
She looked back down at the box. It felt light, she realized, as she tested the weight between her hands. The faint sound of an engine roaring to life and backing out of the driveway before even properly heating up could be heard.
Rin decided to open the box in her room, not really expecting it tpo be that spectacular based on the weight and the fact it was from her father, a man who never really noticed her existence unless it was her birthday or her mother called him out on it—which wasn't that often. Rin and Lenka, Rin's mother, shared a mutual distaste for her father. He was the picture you'd find next to the words "greedy" and "workaholic" in the dictionary.
Rin closed the door behind herself out of habit and landed on her yellow cotton bed three steps later. Whatever that was in the box jostled lightly from the movement, making a sound when it hit the walls of the box. It felt similar to a cheap flip-phone or a pack of cigars—Rin hoped her father wasn't crazy enough to offer his fourteen year old daughter cancer sticks for a present.
She wouldn't put it by him to do something that stupid though.
Rin shook her head, golden locks falling forward from her shoulders as she picked at the clear packaging tape. Playing guessing games wouldn't get her anywhere so she thought she may as well just satisfy her curiosity once and for all.
Enough tape came off to finally open one end of the box (with only minimum ripping) and Rin turned the box over until the contents gently slide out.
No cigars, just a plastic egg-shaped thing and a hastily written note. Rin skimmed over the note.
There's a rumor that these are magical. Enjoy.
She frowned. Leave it to her father to write such a simple, vague note. She pushed the paper to the side and brought her attention to the yellow, egg-shaped device in her lap. There was a black outline of a box with a silver screw on the bottom that Rin found to be the battery part of the device. Maybe it was some 1990's flip-phone?
She flipped the thing face-up to be sure.
There was a small, grey square screen in the center of the electronic and the outline of the word "Tamagotchi" was designed in white. There were three pink buttons below the square screen spaced like a wide semi-circle and a silver keychain extended from the top right of the thing—the Tamagotchi, she now knew the name of.
Rin had heard of these things before, cute portable little pets that little girls used to play with before real gaming consoles like the GameBoy and DS came out. She sighed. Was her father really "not with it" or was her just underestimating her maturity and sense of "fun"? She couldn't be sure.
In the other hand, Rin reasoned, she had spent the week complaining of boredom. This pixilated game was better than counting cracks in the ceilings again. After a minute of searching, Rin found the "on" switch and after a short moment the screen came to life—well, as close to coming to life as a boring gray screen with black pixilated words can get.
A simple egg appeared on the screen with the directions "hatch the egg" and further instructions on pressing the middle button to do so. After three clicks of the botton, the cracked up egg finally opened (well, really it just disappeared with a shitty pixel drawing in its place) to reveal…a rather cute Tamagotchi. Rin was pleasantly surprised to see a human-like chibi figure with grey hair tied in a small ponytail of sorts with messy bangs and the most heart-warming blue eyes Rin had ever seen on a game. Above the character were the words "it's a boy". She was about to "awww" when she suddenly noticed something.
Under the character was basic information that didn't seem to match with what she heard from her friends who play with Tamagotchi. For starters, the character already had a name: Len. Wasn't the player supposed to be prompted to name their baby after the egg hatches?
Secondly was the age. Instead of something like "1 minute old" or "baby" the box had "14 years old" written inside. A Tamagotchi the same age as her…?
The screen cleared before Rin could question further and she was taken to the more famous main-play screen with options like "feed", "wash", and "play". The option for cleaning up shit was absent on the screen though, further insinuating the Tamagotchi's unusual age.
"I guess I should start calling you 'Len' now, huh," Rin thought aloud, playing virtual baseball with Len. The longer she played with the chibi-like character the more unusual things about the game she noticed. As Len moved, his actions were fluid and normal—unlike the usual jerky, pixel motions of Tamagotchi. It was almost like he was human…Rin thought back to the letter her father had sent with the toy.
There's a rumor that these are magical.
Rin had a mini heart attack when her bedroom door was suddenly slammed open. Relief could not describe the relaxing wave she felt when she realized it was only Meiko, her mom's best friend, and not some psycho Tamagotchi killer with a saw…
She's been watching too many scary movies lately.
"Geez, what were you doing? Didn't you hear me call you a million fucking times?"
Rin had grown up around Meiko practically all her life and could naturally tell that the woman wasn't really that upset. It was just her speech style.
"Sorry, I was just…" Rin glanced down at the pathetic looking child's-toy in her hand, Len's smile (smirk) mocking her.
"I was just reading," Rin lied, quickly hiding the device under her messy sheets. Meiko smiked, already having saw the familiar 90's game.
"Oh? Are you sure you weren't playing a game of sorts?"
Meiko crackled at the girl's embarrassed and angry flush. Although she'd never owned one herself, Meiko clearly recalled girls in her class when she was in elementary school always playing with the little things. She'd enjoyed teasing and bullying the girls over it, thinking the toy was absolutely ridiculous. She was always more of a Call of Duty girl than a Tamagotchi girl.
"Anyway, Lenka told me to check up on you and I saw one of your little friends on the way. Muki or something is waiting for you downstairs."
Rin rolled her eyes.
"It's Miku."
The brunette only stuck her tongue out childishly and followed Rin downstairs.
"Why is Miku here anyway? She should be on vacation in Spain right now," Rin asked more to herself than Meiko.
The woman shrugged and made a beeline to the kitchen, obviously planning to raid the house of it's sake…again. Sure enough, standing in the middle of the livingroom with a shit-eating grin, was Miku. The girl's hair was, unsurprisingly, in its usual hairstyle and one of her many summer dresses was on. This one was a bold fuchsia. The tealette was grasping Rin's shoulders the second she saw her.
"Oh my god, you won't believe what happened in Italy!"
"Apparently something bad if you aren't still there…"
Miku decided to ignore the comment and replace it with a "welcome back, Miku-chan".
"His name is Kaito," she began, "let's talk about it at the mall."
Before Rin could even attempt to decline she was being dragged across the sidewalk with Meiko laughing at her drunkenly through the kitchen window.
At the mall, specifically the Charley's Grilled Subs food court area, Miku and Rin sat across from each other, the former describing Kaito's obsession with sorbet, some Italian ice cream thing. Rin was mostly zoned out, catching a word here and there. Her eyes were transfixed on a girl a few years younger than herself with short green hair and orange goggles on her head.
The girl was playing with some friends but what held Rin's gaze was the small item at her side, attached to her skirt with a keychain. It was a dark pink Tamagotchi, seemingly well taken care of judging by the smudge-free screen and cheerful looking character.
That Tamagotchi looked so different from her own.
It was named Oliver and looked like some bunny-Mickey Mouse-hamster cross breed. It's movements were also more jerky and computer-like than Len's…
"Nee, you aren't listening at all, are you?"
Rin's electric blue eyes met teal again and she gave a sheepish grin in reply, earning a groan from her best friend.
"Why do I even trytalking to you about boys? Ugh."
"Hey, you know those little Tamagotchi things?"
Miku was momentarily caught off guard by the subject change and her eyes widened before she nodded.
"Yeah, they were really popular in third grade. Why do you ask?"
Rin bit her lip, wondering how to bring up the topic without sounding crazy.
"Well…my dad bought me one earlier today and I think mine is a little…weird."
Miku laughed softly, remembering her own moose-bear-squirrel character.
"Yeah, mine was too. The uneven buttons really pissed me off though. Nine possible options with only three buttons."
Rin frowned.
Nine? She could have sworn there were more than that…she shook her head and blamed her crappy counting skills.
The girls continued to talk, eventually changing subjects several times until Miku's mother called to tell her dinner would be ready soon and to come home. After they parted Rin headed home, grabbing Chinese takeout on the way after deeming it safe to say her mother would be a little late tonight.
By the time she got home Meiko had already left, leaving a trail of sake bottles in her wake that Rin was sure would earn her both a hangover and a beatdown from Lenka once she saw her house.
Rin smirked at the thought and left the bottles where they were. After a quick shower and change of clothes as well as dinner, Rin was ready for bed…or not.
Without even meaning to, Rin had already picked up her new game and began to play. Rin was surprised to see Len with an upset expression on his face. A speech bubble next to his head with the words "you left me..." appeared.
Rin didn't know whether to laugh or be creeped out...maybe the 90's had better technology than she gave credit for? She decided to stick with that theory and ignore the chills running up her spin. She attempted to play with him again to make him happy, which gradually worked until Len was his usual cheery, virtual self. She glanced over at the options to find something else to entertain Len with when her conversation with Miku was suddenly remembered.
Miku had said nine options but there was a tenth, Rin realized. The tenth was at the top very right, seemingly simple compared to the others. It was a ten pixel heart, easily missed if glanced over. Rin decided to find out what it was the old fashioned way. Only nerds and Chinese people read manuals. She was Japanese, bitch.
As soon as Rin selected the heart option-…nothing happened. The screen didn't change or make a sound or even make Len do anything. Rin frowned. Was her game broken? Everything else seemed to work fine…except, well, everything. Her Tamagotchi "baby" was freakin' fourteen and named itself.
"What a tease."
Rin sat the game down on her nightstand, ignoring Len's growing upset expression like the last time she left him alone.
The second plastic met wood the game began to vibrate violently like a vibrato—er, I mean a cellphone. Gotta keep this rated T.
The screen when completely white, burning her retinas for a moment before the whole room seemed to become enveloped in light. Rays of rainbow colors seemed to come from everywhere with a loud, high buzz like an over-worked air conditioner. Rin could distantly hear a high pitched scream and was shocked to find it coming from herself. After a second everything went dark, her bedroom lights, as the power, shutting off until all she could see was the tiny bit of light through the nighttime window.
For at least five minutes she just sat in the same position, eyes wide as if she could actually see something in the pitch black room. Her tense muscles didn't relax even as she eased out of bed, wary of even her own breathing and bare footsteps on the cool floorboards. Rin could have almost sworn to a deity that she heard small gasps similar to chocking but she knew it was impossible.
She walked downstairs, making it there only by memory, walls, and stair rails. Behind the living room she was able to find the circuit breaker which was lucky lit up with orange lights for her to read. Not that she really needed to anyway, as all of the switches were tripped. Each switch made a small "click" as she flipped them back on and she could hear faint sounds from distant rooms of lights and appliances coming back to life.
She closed the circuit breaker box door when she was finished, the thin metal locking into place. Rin's breathing only went back to normal when she reached the top stair. She decided the rainbow lights were just her mind playing tricks on her and the circuit breaker just randomly tripped like usual. It was an old house, after all.
All logical reasons keeping her sane flew out the window when she reached her bedroom doorway to find another human in her room, on the floor, turning purple.
Rin would have screamed again if her brain hadn't completely shut down from shock.
A/N: I really shouldn't be writing anything new right now but...ugh, I had another idea. Sumimasen (sorry). OTL
Speaking of OTL, I'm addicted to the Kagamine Len (the 96neko cover is better than the original in my opinion) song "ギガンチイック O.T.N" which translates to "Gigantic Dick". Seriously. It's like ten steps up from "SPICE".
I can't even feel bad.
Please review if you like it so I feel motivated to finish this over Summer... ^^"
~Happy Summer~
~Congratulations to Graduated Seniors~
(You'd better go to college
Love, Your Fanfic Mom
AKA: MOSHIxMOSHI)
Peace.