Disclaimer: Not mine, not now, not ever.


Everlong

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Chapter the Second

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God save him from his life.

Hajime Saitou sat in his serviceable car, staring morosely at the little horn emblazoned on the center of the steering wheel. It was Monday, and he had learned to positively hate Mondays in the past few months.

The truth was, Saitou would have been content to be a faceless body in the College of Law until the day he decided to retire. He had liked being a professor, no one to answer to but the Dean, responsible only for his lectures and the occasional talk and article in some law journal or another of note. If it had been up to him, he would have been happiest just lecturing, but university policy stipulated he had to publish at a fairly consistent rate; it was a predicament many of his colleagues found themselves in, but it was a minor annoyance, at worst.

At the end of the Spring Term, however, the Dean had suddenly announced he was leaving, and that was when life had gotten very complicated, very fast.

Saitou had never for a second thought about becoming Dean of the College. The fact was, he still wasn't entirely sure how he'd ended up taking on the position.

He was sure, however, that he was pretty well stuck in it.

Saitou sighed, pinching the bridge of his nose. He'd spent much of the Summer Term inundated with paperwork pertaining to the budget crisis, and even with it officially over, the aftermath refused to go away and die, already. People and their complaints streamed into his office daily. Despite the fact that he'd pushed hard and run roughshod over quite a few of the other Colleges, all in an effort to make sure the College of Law wasn't affected too badly by the budget cuts, there had been a drastic reduction in what the College could realistically offer for Fall Term.

And people were pissed off at him.

A lot of people.

That he was still technically a part of the lecturing faculty, and was subject to the same restrictions they were, didn't appear to help his position at all; professors were raising hell about the way their schedules had been rearranged, and the best he could offer was his sincerest apologies. And students wanting to be cleared to sign up for closed classes had been finagling their way into the office to complain, too. Enough that he was beginning to suspect that someone was pointing them his way on purpose.

It was getting to the point that last week, he'd flat out told his secretary that he refused to see anybody, he didn't care if the president of the university himself was knocking down the door. In addition, he'd told her to say she had no idea where he was or when he'd be getting in, and had no way of reaching him.

He'd been reduced to hiding in his office until nearly ten o'clock.

It was a frankly disgraceful state of affairs.

Wearily, Saitou started the car and pulled away from the curb. He'd dropped off Misao as usual, and for her sake, he'd pretended he didn't hate the idea of having to go to work. She was still upset about not being with him for his birthday, and he didn't want to give her cause to tell her mother she'd changed her mind—Yaso would flip a shit, and he had enough problems without adding his harpy ex-wife into the mix.

He drove to the coffee shop he usually hit before work, though no longer for coffee; his nerves were so shot these days that coffee only upset his stomach and made his days shittier, so he'd switched to green tea on the recommendation of one of the other coffee shop patrons.

At the thought of her, his mood improved slightly.

She called him Professor and he called her Hot Lips, as in Hot Lips Houlihan of MASH fame, because he always saw her in scrubs, and because she happened to be a very good-looking woman. He'd always seen her there—and always been nagged by the vague thought that she looked familiar to him for some reason that remained irritatingly elusive—but had never spoken to her until she'd asked him one day, tone politely curious, why he ordered coffee if he found it so distasteful. When he'd said he needed the caffeine, she'd smiled (perfectly straight, white teeth that were either the work of phenomenally good genes or a first rate orthodontist) and said green tea was probably a better, and healthier, pick-me-up. As he'd already ordered his coffee, he was well and truly stuck with it, but when he'd gotten to work he'd done a little research and decided she might be onto something. The next day, he'd ordered green tea in lieu of coffee, and had been spared the need to pop antacid tablets until his stomach settled.

It had been the beginning of a pleasant friendship.

When he arrived, she was already in line; she saw him and smiled and waved him over.

"Hi there!" she said cheerfully. "Saved you a spot in line, Professor," she added, and he smiled.

"You're too kind," he said with a meaningful look at the people standing behind her.

Thankfully, no one was in the mood to fuss, so he was able to join her without uproar.

"How was your weekend?" she asked.

"Scattering of inclement weather," he said, remembering his "conversation" with Yaso, "but sunny overall. Yours?"

"Loud and rowdy," she said with a grin. "My oldest son was down from college. We've been missing him."

"Haven't seen him in a while?"

"No—he's been busy busy busy. He's gotten skinny, too," she added with a touch of despair, and he grinned.

"And you, no doubt, used the weekend to try and fatten him up," he said.

"It's my most solemn duty as his mother," she agreed, and he chuckled.

They made it to the register and put in their orders—green tea—then went to the side counter to wait for their drinks with everyone else.

Saitou thoughtfully considered his companion from the corner of his eye. He still found it impossible that she was old enough to have a college-age son, but there it was. She looked so young—too young.

Then again, pinpointing a woman's age was a tricky business…not to mention an occasionally hazardous one.

Their orders came up, and they retreated to a warm corner of the room to huddle over their drinks and talk some more. Usually, Saitou detested small talk, but she made it easy for him, and less tedious than he usually found it.

"Any big plans for Thanksgiving?" she asked.

He shrugged. "We'll be going to my parents' for dinner. It'll be the first Thanksgiving in a while that my daughter will be having dinner with my side of the family."

"You and your ex-wife don't switch off holidays?" she asked.

He marveled that he didn't feel like she was being nosy; it was because she always asked potentially prying questions in a tone that indicated only a desire to understand the facts of a situation rather than unseemly curiosity or interest.

"No. She's always had her for Thanksgiving, and I've always had her for Christmas and New Year's."

"Ah, she traded you a holiday," Hot Lips said with a grin, figuring out what he wasn't telling her.

"Mm-hm."

"Which one, if you don't mind my asking?"

"New Year's. Apparently, my ex-wife is taking her to New York."

"Oooo, sounds fun!" Hot Lips said. "Is your daughter excited?"

Saitou snorted, remembering Misao's aghast expression.

"Hardly," he said. "She's dead-set against it."

Hot Lips' eyebrows shot up into her bangs.

"Huh," she said. "Didn't see that coming."

"She's superb at throwing curveballs," Saitou said dryly, and Hot Lips laughed. "What are your plans for Thanksgiving?"

"It's my year to host," she said with a groan, and he smiled. "Don't get me wrong, I love having everyone get together, but all that cooking—ugh! My ex is the one who likes cooking. When we were married, Thanksgiving dinner was all him. I just baked the pumpkin pies, and peeled and chopped potatoes, it was fantastic."

Saitou laughed. It was an opinion he was familiar with, as Yaso had expressed a similar distaste for cooking Thanksgiving dinner when they were married. It was why they'd always eaten at their parents', one year with his, one year with hers.

"Any chance you could get him to take care of dinner for you?" he asked, only half kidding; he'd learned the relationship between her and her ex-husband was far more amicable than his relationship with Yaso.

Enough that he occasionally envied her—what he wouldn't give for that kind of tranquility in that aspect of his private life.

"No," she said with a pout. Then she brightened a little. "But he might help, if I asked really, really nicely."

"Sounds better than nothing," he said, sipping his tea, and becoming dismayed when he realized he was almost done—with his tea gone, he'd have no legitimate excuse to linger.

Then he'd have to go to work.

Shit.

He nursed his tea while they continued discussing holiday plans, and hadn't realized he'd been obvious about it until Hot Lips, smiling in noticeable amusement, asked,

"So I guess work is still an unappealing prospect, Professor?"

He blinked, startled by the question.

"I'm sorry?"

"You haven't touched your tea in the last fifteen minutes," she pointed out, smile widening.

He deflated a little.

"Oh," he said gloomily, and she laughed and gave his arm a sympathetic pat.

"It'll get better," she assured. "You said it was a big change, and change always takes some getting used to."

"This change goes from bad to worse," he muttered, frowning. "I've been reduced to hiding in my office and having my secretary lie about where I am to get a moment's peace."

"It's always darkest before the dawn," she said. "Once people adjust, it'll ease up. You just have to buckle down and ride out the bad bits for a little while longer."

He shrugged listlessly, expression morose as he stared down at his drink.

"I suppose," he said, though he didn't really believe it, and he knew it showed in his voice.

Hot Lips patted his arm again and smiled kindly.

"I still wonder how they managed to rope you into taking over a position you clearly have no desire to be in," she said.

He snorted. "You and me both," he said, finishing off his drink reluctantly.

They threw the empty containers away and walked out together, Saitou's spirits considerably dampened by the reminder that his job—and all the headaches it entailed—was waiting for him.

"Aw, cheer up Professor," Hot Lips said. "I'm really sorry I said anything."

He shrugged again, feeling suddenly tired; it was a sad state of affairs when one's favorite part of the day was the few hours not spent at work.

"Even if you hadn't, the prospect of having to drive there would have done it," he said.

"You would have been a lot happier for a little while longer, though," she pointed out.

"What's a minute or two in the grand scheme of things?" he asked, raising one hand, palm up, in a careless gesture.

"You'd be surprised how much of a difference a minute makes," she said, cocking her head, amusement once more creeping back into her face.

"Possibly," he diplomatically agreed. "But that, I fear, is a topic for another day. Have a good one, Hot Lips."

"You too Professor," she said warmly.

"I'll certainly try," he said, nodding.

Though it's really out of my hands.

They parted ways on the sidewalk, both walking to their respective vehicles.

He was halfway to his car when the absentminded thought that he should ask her out one of these days popped into his head.

The prospect of dinner with someone he liked talking to at the end of a crap day might do a lot toward making this new job suck a lot less.

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"She what?"

Kaoru stared at Misao, blue eyes wide with surprise. Beside her, Kamatari's eyebrows were up around his hairline.

"Yeah," Misao said unhappily, eyes trained on the sky.

It was lunch, and the three friends were camped out on one of the picnic tables in the school courtyard. They used the benches to hold their book bags and books, and sat on the table top, usually; today, Misao was lying haphazardly on one end of it, head pillowed by her bag, feet on her math book where it sat on the bench. Kaoru and Kamatari were sitting on the other end of the table, cross-legged, their lunches spread out before them.

Misao had just finished telling her friends about her mother's wanting to take her to New York for New Year's. Both were familiar with Yaso's penchant for neglect.

"That's bizarre," Kamatari said. "Your mother, like, never wants to take you anywhere."

"She works a lot," Kaoru said quickly, not liking the way Kamatari had worded his comment—he made it sound like Yaso purposely decided she didn't want to spend her time or money on Misao.

And even if it was true, knowing it was one thing, and hearing it from someone else was something else entirely.

"It's weird that she'd want to have me New Year's," Misao said. "I think she's doing it partly to be a bitch—she knows that's my dad's birthday."

"You said it's January first," Kamatari pointed out.

"Same difference," Misao said, annoyed, sending Kamatari a frown. "The point is she got all butt hurt when I said I wanted to live with my dad instead of her, and now she whines about it when she's got nothing better to do. This is probably another way of doing it, is all."

Kaoru drank her juice and kept her peace; she and Misao had talked about Yaso many times since they'd become friends the last year of middle school. Her parents were Misao's biggest problems, though her father, his strictness aside, wasn't nearly as bad as her mother. Kaoru thought it was weird that the woman could so affect Misao, all without even seeing her all that often.

Then again, Kaoru's mother had once observed that Misao was a sensitive girl.

"She hides it pretty well," Tokio added, "but Misao's feelings get bruised easily."

And from what Kaoru had heard about Yaso from her friend, Misao's mother wasn't what you'd call the understanding and supportive type.

"What's your dad say?" Kaoru asked instead, thinking of Misao's severe-looking, gruff father; she often marveled that such a brusque man had raised a child as outgoing and personable as Misao.

It really boggled the mind.

"Dad is a traitor," Misao muttered, crossing her arms over her chest and frowning fiercely up at the sky. "He totally didn't tell me it was my decision until after I'd already made it. And then he wouldn't let me back out of it once I'd said I'd stay with my mom for New Year's. It's like he wants to get rid of me for his birthday or something."

"Maybe he's got a girlfriend he wants to spend New Year's with," Kamatari suggested with a smirk, and Kaoru and Misao rolled their eyes.

"You've clearly never met Misao's dad," Kaoru said.

"I don't even think Dad looks at women, Kam," Misao said.

"Boyfriend?" Kamatari tried.

"We're pretty sure he's asexual at this point," Kaoru said, not even wanting to entertain the idea that Hajime Saitou, who scared the crap out of her on a good day, might be batting for Kamatari's team.

Kamatari sent Misao an appalled look.

"You've discussed your father's sexual preferences?" he asked in a horrified tone.

"We tried to find him a girlfriend two years ago," Misao said dismissively. "Kaoru helped me narrow the prospects."

"And?"

"We couldn't figure out what his type was."

"Male or female," Kaoru added. "Therefore: asexual."

"I will never understand how you're even alive," Kamatari said, eyeing Misao, after a pause.

Misao shrugged. "I'm pretty sure my mom made him that way."

Kaoru and Kamatari, having never actually met their friend's mother, had to take her word on it.

"So why do you think she wants to have you for New Year's?" Kamatari asked, absently gnawing on the lip of his water bottle; Kaoru gently pulled the bottle away from his mouth, and he rolled his eyes. "Sometimes I curse that Tokio is a dental hygienist."

"I know," Kaoru said patiently. "You'll thank me when your teeth aren't all fucked up later in life."

"I don't know why she wants me New Year's," Misao said. "I honestly don't see why she bothers taking me at all. She's not even interested half the time."

"Misao," Kaoru chided.

"Come on Kaoru," Misao said, pushing herself up on her elbows to better look at her friends. "I don't talk to her for months—I can not call her for months—and she won't notice until my dad asks her if she's talked to me lately. I'm pretty sure she forgets I'm her kid ninety-nine percent of the time."

Kaoru sighed and looked at Kamatari for help. He looked at her and shrugged helplessly.

"I don't care or anything—it's not like we had an awesome relationship before she and Dad split up," Misao continued, "but I really wish she'd pick one: either she wants to be my mom or she doesn't. It's annoying how she's always changing her mind, and then getting mad about it when I'm not super-happy that she's remembered I exist."

"Maybe she's trying to do that now," Kaoru suggested brightly. "Be a real mom, I mean."

"Uh-huh," Misao returned, clearly unconvinced.

"You should ask her next time you talk to her," Kamatari said with a nod. "Don't be a jerk about it or you'll start a fight, but ask what made her want to trade all of a sudden."

"I don't like talking to her," Misao mumbled, throwing herself back down on the table, and Kamatari sent her a withering look.

"Well cry me a river," he snapped. "Your only other option is to wait until New Year's rolls around, and I, for one, refuse to listen to you whine about this until then."

"Wear ear muffs then," Misao said grumpily. "'S cold enough for 'um."

Kamatari made a move to throw his water bottle at Misao; Kaoru reached over and grabbed it from him, rolling her eyes.

"Kam has a point, Misao," she calmly said, holding the water bottle as far out of Kamatari's reach as she was able to without also falling off the top of the table. "I know you hate talking to your mom, but if you really want to find out why she switched up holidays on you so out of the blue, you're gonna have to call her and ask."

Misao scowled up at the sky, then sighed impatiently. Then she abruptly sat up, grabbed her book bag and hopped off the table.

"I'll see you guys later," she muttered churlishly, grabbing her math book and stomping off, and Kaoru watched her go with a sigh.

"You did all you could," Kamatari said, still trying to get his water bottle back; Kaoru gave up and handed it back to him once she was sure Misao was out of firing range.

"I guess."

"Our Misao's temperamental, hon, you know that," Kamatari said, bumping her shoulder with his. "She'll be better by the time school's out. She's quick to rage and quick to laugh."

"I know. But her mom really gets to her," Kaoru said worriedly, chin anchored in her palm as she watched her friend, tiny as she was, expertly weave through the throng of people outside.

"She'll be fine," Kamatari stressed. "Now, on to more important things: are we getting hot chocolate after school or what? It's cold as a witch's tit out, so I totally vote yes."

Kaoru smiled despite her worry.

Kamatari could always be counted on to distract her from her worries, if only for a moment.

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Misao was not better by the time school let out, as it turned out.

If anything, she was worse.

She knew her friends thought she was overreacting, but they hadn't seen her father's face this morning. Hajime Saitou was best described as a stoic; when Misao had first learned the word, she'd immediately thought of her father, and in truth he fit the description very well. But Misao knew her father—she'd lived with him for sixteen years, after all. She was bound to know when something wasn't right.

And he'd been desperately unhappy today.

Saitou tried to hide it, and she gave him credit—for a little while, she had almost thought he was okay, that he was starting to go back to the way he'd always been up until March. But she'd caught the bleak flicker in his eye when he'd thought she wasn't looking, and worse, she'd seen the expression on his face when he'd been sitting in the car after he'd dropped her off.

He'd looked tired.

He'd looked old.

And it added to the resentment that burned in her at the fact that her mother wanted her at the one time of year when her father was at his loneliest. Because for all that her parents fought, Saitou was curiously troubled by the lack of any real and meaningful relationship between his ex-wife and his daughter. He very much disapproved of the whining Misao did when summer vacation rolled around and she had to spend a month with her mother, or when he dropped her off at her mother's for Thanksgiving. He had to force her to call Yaso on her birthday to say happy birthday, and more than once he'd bought a card and made her sign it so she could at least send her mother something. He never said a word against Yaso; the closest he'd come was to observe, in a decidedly mild tone of voice, that Yaso's vocal range had gotten shriller as she'd gotten older, and at the time he hadn't realized Misao had come into the room.

And Misao hated the way he always seemed to roll over for her mother when he never rolled over for anyone. She knew he did it just to keep the fighting down, but it wasn't in his nature not to snap back or bluntly say what he thought.

Not for the first time, Misao wished her father would get a girlfriend, or at the very least, find a woman whose company he enjoyed. She knew the odds of it happening soon were lower than low, though; right now, the College of Law was all he had time for, a state of affairs she knew he found distasteful. Her father was happiest when he could stand up before an auditorium of students and talk at them for an hour and a half, taking questions as they came, walking around the room with his hands clasped behind his back and his reading glasses perched on the end of his nose. A surprising number of his students frequented his office, given his reputation and his frankly intimidating persona. Among the student population, he was well-liked and respected. Among the faculty, he was regarded as one of the most professional, if less sociable, members of the staff. And it was this last that made his now being Dean the hardest adjustment.

Saitou had never really participated with his colleagues outside of the professional field. He had a few acquaintances in a couple of the departments that he occasionally spoke with at home, or had lunch with, but they weren't his friends and they weren't an integral part of his social sphere. He mostly kept to himself at work, polite but distant. It wasn't behavior he could afford to continue, now that he was the head of the College. The fact that he'd ascended to the position during a rough time for the university, financially, didn't help.

He didn't talk to her a lot about what was going on at work, but Misao wasn't dumb, and she regularly read the online edition of the university newspaper. There had been several articles concerning the disbursement of the budget for the Fall Term, and her father's name had come up more than once because of the way he'd hammered away at the committee. The paper had been grudgingly impressed with his tactics, but it was obvious from the editorial pages that her father's diplomacy had bent quite a few noses out of shape, a lot of them in the Colleges of Education and Arts and Sciences, which had lost the majority of the programs cut from the university in what her father sardonically called "The Great Purge."

He'd caught more hell from the local paper, ironically, than the school newspaper, which had reluctantly admitted that it had been a necessary evil, although it protested the way education and the arts had been hit the hardest. Misao thought the only reason her father—who hadn't been the only Dean pushing hard for his College to survive as whole and intact as possible—had come under such heavy fire was because he had been thrown into the position at the same time all this chaos was erupting. He came off as an upstart trying to trample everyone else so he could make himself look good, and it was a perception that got people's backs up.

She knew her father had read all the unflattering articles about him—he read everything, which was why he always seemed to know everything. But he hadn't mentioned any of it. And though Saitou on the whole could have cared less how he was perceived by others, she knew all the negativity had to smart, at least a little. Some days it felt to Misao like she was the only person in her father's corner, and she was smart enough to know that while he probably appreciated it, she alone was not enough. Especially since he couldn't—or perhaps wouldn't, she wasn't sure which was right—dump his frustrations with her.

Misao brooded on all this and more on the way to the coffee shop, where she and Kamatari and Kaoru got their hot chocolates and commandeered a table. She mostly let Kamatari and Kaoru talk, sipping her drink and frowning down at the table top while she worried over her father. She was almost tempted to call him and see how he was doing—and how late he was going to be home tonight; she'd been worried last week when he hadn't gotten home until well after ten, which was unheard of in all the years he'd been teaching—but in the end decided against it. In all likelihood, he had enough to worry about without her interrupting him with an admittedly unimportant question—at least in the sense that it was a question that could wait and wasn't an emergency.

Kaoru dropped her off at home, and Misao thanked her friend, and, feeling bad that she'd been such poor company, said she'd call her later. Kaoru only smiled and said sure, and Misao turned and made her way up the walk to the door, unlocked it and waved to Kaoru and Kamatari, who waved back before they drove off back towards Kaoru's neighborhood.

Misao locked the door, toed off her shoes and then trudged upstairs to dump her bag in her room and then take a shower. Then, she decided, she'd see what they had in the fridge to eat, and if there was enough, she'd make dinner.

One less thing for her father to worry about.

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Tokio was lying on her bed watching TV with Yahiko when Kaoru appeared in the doorway.

"Uh oh," Yahiko said, rolling his eyes as he sat up, "girl talk time. I'm outta here."

Tokio rolled her eyes.

"Brush your teeth," she said. "And don't forget to floss, mister."

"Uh-huh," Yahiko said, ambling out of the room, and Tokio watched his retreating back with a frown before she turned her attention to her daughter.

"Come on sweetheart," she said, patting the vacated space beside her. "What's on your mind?"

Kaoru immediately came into the room, dressed for bed in a pair of Sano's sweatpants she'd stolen from him before he'd left home, and her class T-shirt. She was wearing a pair of gray crew socks she'd stolen from Tokio; only the fact that Tokio had three other pairs saved Kaoru from having to surrender the pair she now wore.

"Misao's really upset about going to her mom's," Kaoru said, crawling up onto the bed beside Tokio, who obligingly put the TV on mute and sat up to give her daughter her full attention. "Her mom wants her for New Year's, and Misao doesn't want to go because then her dad'll be alone on his birthday."

"His birthday is New Year's Eve?" Tokio asked in surprise, not for the first time wondering what Misao's father looked like—she'd never seen the man, only heard about him from Kaoru and Misao, and most of that had been that he was kind of strict and scary and no-nonsense and scary and abrupt—and had she mentioned scary?

Tokio mentally rolled her eyes—Kaoru regarded the man with a healthy dose of wariness, although she had admitted that he'd never been anything but polite to her.

"No," Kaoru said, interrupting her thoughts, "it's New Year's Day, but she still wouldn't be there, and she says he's antisocial and doesn't go out with anyone and she doesn't want him to be alone on his birthday. Plus she's convinced her mom's doing it on purpose to be a bitch."

"Hm. And I suppose you're telling me this because…?" Tokio prompted.

"I'm worried about Misao," Kaoru said, scooting over to snuggle into her mother's side; Tokio put an arm around her and hugged her close. "I really wanna help."

"Well," Tokio said, rubbing a hand up and down her daughter's arm. "I know you do. And you're a really great friend for being concerned about her. But that's probably about all you can do, hon."

Kaoru groaned.

"Mooom," she whined.

"I know, I know, it just sucks when I give you reasonable advice, doesn't it?" Tokio said in amusement. "Just be there for Misao, and listen to her."

"Me and Kam told her she ought to talk to her mom."

"True," Tokio said. "Maybe she should talk to her dad, too."

"She already did," Kaoru said, shaking her head. "He's the one who wants her to go spend New Year's with her mom."

"Well if he's okay with it I don't understand Misao's dilemma," Tokio said, looking down at Kaoru.

"It's the whole him being alone part," Kaoru said.

"He doesn't seem to mind," Tokio pointed out.

"That's the problem," Kaoru said.

"Now you've lost me," Tokio said.

Kaoru sighed.

"Would you want me to be alone on my birthday?" she asked, looking up at her mother.

Tokio pursed her lips and considered the question.

"Not really," she said finally.

"That's where Misao's coming from. Especially since her dad hasn't exactly had a great year at work. He was promoted not too long ago, and it hasn't been going well."

"Ah," Tokio said, finally seeing the issue. "Well, I know you aren't going to like this, but there's nothing you can do to help her. Just be there when she wants someone to talk to."

Kaoru groaned into Tokio's shoulder, and Tokio patted her daughter's dark hair consolingly.

"Sorry," Tokio said sincerely.

"Yeah," Kaoru said morosely. "She's going to hate New Year's."

"It might not be so bad," Tokio said. "Misao's dad might go out for his birthday, and she's doing all this worrying for nothing."

"That's not really his style," Kaoru said, sending her mother a dubious look.

Tokio shrugged lightly, careful not to upset her daughter's head.

"Weirder things have happened," she said. "About all Misao can do is talk to her parents. As for you, you just keep on being a good friend. It'll work out."

"You should have been a motivational speaker, Mom," Kaoru said, and Tokio pouted.

"So mean, just like your brother," she said.

"Which one?" Kaoru asked, grinning.

"Good question," Tokio said with a huff, but she was only teasing and Kaoru knew it. "I'm burdened with such ungrateful children."

Kaoru laughed and hugged her mother, and Tokio hugged her back.

"Feel any better?" Tokio asked, messing with Kaoru's ponytail.

"I guess," Kaoru said. "I was hoping you'd have a better answer."

"There are no better answers, babe, just some answers we like more than others," Tokio said, giving her ponytail a gentle yank. "Now brush and floss and get some sleep—just two more days before your four day weekend," she reminded happily, and Kaoru smiled.

"Yeah," she said thoughtfully. "'Kay. 'Night Mom."

"'Night sweetheart."

Kaoru hugged and kissed her mother, then hopped off the bed and padded off to the bathroom she shared with Yahiko down the hall. Tokio heard Kaoru complain when she discovered Yahiko still in the bathroom, flossing (Tokio grinned, cheered by the thought that her son had followed her directions without her having to remind him as often as usual), and Yahiko's reply that it was his turn for the bathroom still.

"Guys," she called out warningly, then smothered a laugh when she heard the argument continue in lower but still audible voices.

She shook her head and turned the volume back up on her TV; hopefully she'd get to see the end of this episode before she had to go to bed.