now
He catches the slip of paper just before it careens across the dashboard and into the early morning breeze. His other hand on the door frame, he turns the ticket over, confusion doubling upon seeing the paper bears no official markings, only a cursive swirl reading "Share the lot." He checks the other side of the paper, then glances over the windshields of the other cars lining the block, all empty, save this one. Shaking his head, he tucks the note in his coat pocket and crosses the street, pausing to search through his shoulder bag for the keys. The door unlocks just as footfalls sound up the steps behind him.
"Morning, Ken."
"Good morning, Miyako," he greets, holding the door open for her. "How was your week off?"
"Oh, it was amazing." She removes her jacket as they enter the small adjoining kitchen, hanging it on the coat rack near the door. Taking his when he hands it to her, she arranges the coats carefully, continuing all the while, "My eldest sister came to visit, so I got to see my niece and nephews. I hosted them at my apartment all week, which was so cozy and fun, reminded me of how we grew up. Did I ever tell you about the time when I—,"
"How old are they now?" Ken interrupts, handing her an apron. He tugs a thin hairnet over dark hair, careful to tuck his long bangs behind his ears, and proceeds to the sinks to wash his hands.
"Oh!" She brightens. "Two, four, and five. Aren't those the sweetest ages? I still can't believe how much they've grown! It goes by so fast. Taichi said that when his—,"
Ken yanks the freezer door open, blocking her from his periphery vision. "Did you, uh, get to the wholesalers before your break?"
"Most of them," she answers easily, still oblivious to his crisp deferrals. "Mimi said she'd deal with the coffee supplier herself. She's so smart. I want to be just like her. Sometimes I feel I'm already—,"
The force with which he sets the tray of overnight sourdough rounds onto the immaculately sanitized steel counter jolts even his own nerves, making Miyako gasp in mid-ramble. "Sorry," he offers, wincing at the reverberating metal echo, "it slipped."
He flexes his fingers for extra effect, guiltily avoiding her confused stare, and peels back the plastic wrap, examining the integrity of the dough. He can feel her gaze studying him throughout; for all her chattery reputation, Miyako is defeatingly intuitive. She pulls her long hair back into a ponytail, then wraps that into a tight, high bun. "All right, Ken. Are you going to tell me what's wrong?"
"Not sure what you mean," he murmurs.
"Uh-huh," she says, unconvinced. "Now, Ken, we've been co-workers for—what, two years?" ("Ten months.") "And in those years, I have never not known you to get in your own way." She pauses here to let him speak, but he won't look up from his work, molding the hard dough into a flat round for even cutting. With a loud sigh, she marches to the swing hinged door separating the kitchen from the café. "Two months, Ken. Two months until the shop's anniversary. The perfect, most auspicious occasion. That's when you tell her."
His chin juts up, lips parted, dark eyes rounded in shock. "I—?"
She only holds up two fingers, mouthing the number once more. Then she smiles, a warm and earnest grin that makes her whole face radiant. "We both deserve to be happy, don't we?"
It's the confidence with which she announces it, or perhaps the smile that accompanies the declaration, or even the sheer lunacy of the statement entirely, that holds his tongue, and his hands, frozen for almost a full moment after she's left. He feels his palms go slick, unnerved, and puts the cutting knife down. Taking a step back, he pulls off his hairnet, teasing fidgeting fingers through the thick hair over his temple, rolling his neck back to stretch out the stress.
"Do that again, but in slow motion."
Ken turns to his right, glancing at the side door to the back staircase. "Hi, Daisuke."
Outfitted in a faded gray punk rock T-shirt, a cotton red unzippered jacket, and black jeans rolled up past his ankles, Daisuke strides forward, hair a mess and eyes swollen from another sleepless night. "I wish you were as happy to see me at the start of your shift as I am to see you at the end of mine."
Ken's already moving to the largest filtered machine in the kitchen. "We're a little behind today, sorry."
"I can wait," says Daisuke, characteristically cheery despite the hour. He walks about the room with a pesky curiosity, leaving Ken to tidy the mess he makes in his wake, returning cups to their rightful place and readjusting jars of frosting. "Where's my girl?"
His jaw twitches at the affection. "She'll be in soon. We're looking for a new coffee distributor."
"Oh, yeah? Well, you could always try ours. The A. M.'s obsessed with it—or, was, I guess…. I know it's only been two weeks, but, God, I miss that guy's business. You know, you could've paid off the parking tickets we get in a year thrice over with the amount he used to spend on our coffee."
Ken's not quite sure what Daisuke's beaming smile is prouder of: the rather interesting financial tidbit or the evidently newly discovered vocabulary word. Experience tells him it's likely the number of tickets, what with Takeru's driving habits making Mimi look professionally trained and Daisuke's confused idea of what constitutes a compliment. He chooses to redirect the conversation, hoping to avoid a prolonged detour into whatever trivia website his friend had wandered into, leading regrettably to what would now be word of the week. He starts, "I thought Mimi got a ticket this morning. I found a paper stuck under her windshield."
"Doesn't she always park there?" remembers Daisuke, sniffing a lidded cannister.
"A lot of people overnight their cars on this block. Hers was the only one with a note." He retrieves the slip from his coat pocket by the door and hands it to him, relieved to have something interesting enough to keep Daisuke from poking about the kitchen, a habit at limitless odds with Mimi's particularity. "Take a look." He scrutinizes it far more than such a small sheet deserves, and Ken remarks, amused, "It's not magic, Daisuke."
"…Maybe," he consents after too long a pause, as though determined not be shown up by a sheet of paper. "Still weird though."
"It's probably a one-off."
"Or a prank."
The coffee machine hisses, beginning its slow work. Ken moves to check the pot is appropriately placed, mindful of any spillage. "You're saying this is your boss's work?"
"Not his handwriting," Daisuke shrugs. Then adds, anxious to clear up any confusion, "Anyway, I like to think of Taichi as more of a guidance counselor." He tosses the paper onto an empty corner of the pastry work space, while Ken pours out fresh coffee into two large pink paper cups, trying his best not to smile.
"Should that explain why you're up here instead of cleaning up?"
"I'm the one who opens and closes the bar," Daisuke points out smartly, "and therefore the one who sees any quote-unquote mess. He usually dips out early, depending on where he's staying that night. Like last night, Sora called and h—,"
Miyako's voice interrupts them, shouting from the other room, "Ken, I need help! There are foot tracks all over the—,"
The coffee cup goes flying, splattering across the counter, and Ken only barely manages to fling himself over the scones he'd been working on, shielding them from the offending drips. He spins, back to the edge of the table, arms flung protectively, and yells, "Daisuke!" before gasping when a kick to his ankle bone makes him buckle over.
"Shit!" Now at eye-level on the floor, Daisuke crawls towards him, finger over Ken's lips. "I'm not supposed to tell her anything, so shut up! She'll hear you!"
"She already did!" Miyako's fingers slide around the back of Daisuke's shirt collar, yanking him to his feet in an astonishing show of strength. "What's wrong with you?"
"Inoue! You're here!"
She shoves him, still furious. "I'm always here! Why are you here? You know you're not allowed in the kitchens anymore!"
He leaps out of her reach, but she only advances on him, shoving between each word. "Will you quit it? I was just leaving—," Daisuke ducks around the counter, then makes a dive for the swing door.
Ken, having returned the batter to the fridge for the moment, rushes after them into the café. "Watch the chairs, watch the—no, don't use the chairs—,"
"What is going on here?" At the door to the café stands a young woman in a parking meter officer's uniform, her cap tucked under one arm and a notepad clutched in the other hand. Her pristine, precinct-mandated boots tread forward, steps even and confident, while her dark eyes scan the three frozen individuals before her in quick assessment. "You know I can hear you from across the street?" she demands, voice shrill.
Daisuke moves backwards, shimming out of Miyako's lurching grasp and Ken's reach. He stops when he's safely ensconced behind the woman's sturdy stature. "Arrest them, Jun. They're being mean to me."
"When have you not deserved it?" she snaps back.
"Oh, arrest yourself—,"
Ken interrupts before the siblings can squabble further. "Is everything okay?"
"You tell me," she says. "I got a tip in saying there's a car parked outside in violation of this zone's restrictions."
"Not one of ours," protests Miyako. "Ken and I walk here, and that one doesn't even drive."
Daisuke ignores her angry finger pointing, gaping at Ken instead. "Mimi's ticket!"
"What? No," and Ken shakes his head, confused, telling him, "that wasn't a ticket."
"But it was a prank," he cries, bug-eyed and borderline delirious. "A sign! A mark!"
"Daisuke—,"
"You're saying," says Jun loudly, "that Mimi hasn't moved her car since yesterday? It's been there all night?"
"It always is," insists Miyako, becoming distressed at the level of confused chaos in the room. "She lives upstairs—,"
Jun's mouth thins. "Does she know that street parking is not assigned parking?"
The tenor to her words isn't very kind, to which the younger woman takes offense. "It should be! She works hard!"
"That's not how it works, Inoue—,"
"Daisuke, I swear to God, if you don't stop interrupting, I will tell Dad."
"What's Tai—oh, wait."
Ken's eyes widen. "Jun, who called you?"
She looks at him, distracted, and then her shoulders slouch forward, "Are you kidding me?" Ken doesn't want to say, uncomfortable with even suggesting that any person could have a character flaw. He only shrugs, forehead wrinkling in sympathetic concern, while the other two look between them in confusion. Jun offers no further explanation nor does she ask any more questions. She stuffs her cap back over her head, grumbling under her breath. "Move the car back in the building's lot until I sort this out, okay? And keep it down in here," she points at all of trio in equal turn. "Don't put the rest of the neighborhood in misery just because you all have to be up so early."
The jingle-less door slams shut, and Miyako immediately starts her own questions. "What was that about? What's going on with Mimi's car?"
Ken relents to an explanation, detailing the events of the morning. When he arrives at the great mystery of the note, Daisuke's nearly ready to teeter off his feet from fidgety, sleep-deprived excitement. "That's it! That was it! Someone—someone else wrote it—but then he left early, he must have put it on the car then—,"
The door swings open again, and the trio freeze. Mimi places a large bag of coffee beans on the counter, unperturbed by the others' awkward staring. "Coffee distributor," she announces cheerily, "acquired. Here's a sample to try today with customers. Although," and she pauses, eyes brightening with the sudden strike of inspiration, "maybe we should organize a promotion? The social media one a few weeks ago was such a huge hit, right? Should we follow it up with another event?" Still, no one speaks. Her eyes clearing, she glances over them in turn, shrugging off her pastel green blazer and laying it on the counter next to the beans, so as to leave her hands free to fix the tendrils of hair teasing out of her high ponytail. "Bad idea?"
Daisuke straightens. "I feel I should remind you I'm the competition."
Her haughty chuckle makes him relax, while Miyako and Ken exchange wary glances at its ominous octave. Giggling, Mimi grasps Daisuke's cheeks and squeezes. "You've always been my favorite competition, Daisuke."
His inability to discern between the lines makes Ken wince on his behalf. He frowns, or attempts to frown, as Mimi pokes and prods his tan cheeks. Mouth pursed, he manages to begin to ask, "…because I'm the one Taichi spends most his time with, or—?" before Miyako cuts him off, perhaps saving his life.
She announces, "Mimi, there's been an incident."
"I'm not sure I'd characterize it such terms," says Ken.
"Jun was here," she continues, raising her voice and inserting a touch of assured authority for extra measure. "She said she got a complaint about your parking on the street instead of the building's lot."
"Well, of course she did, Miyako," responds Mimi, releasing Daisuke's face after a few more heavy pats. "I spoke with her outside just now. It's all sorted."
"You're not…concerned?" asks Ken, treading with care.
She smiles and drapes her blazer over her forearm, then picks up the coffee bag again. "Only for my lack of consideration! With all the deliveries I do, street parking was more convenient." She shakes the bag, the beans rustling deliciously. Even Daisuke's attention shifts at the attractive sound, remembering he never quite finished his usual full cup that morning. "Anyway, I shouldn't have bent the rules, even for myself, as Jun so kindly reminded me."
Ken squints as Miyako begins blinking rapidly; Daisuke cuts through the tension, ever direct. "You know you're talking about your car, right?"
"It's just a car," she repeats with a flourish of her right hand.
"Didn't you and Yamato used to fight over leaving his gigs so you could follow the sun to make sure the car was always in the shade?"
Mimi laughs again. "Daisuke, your imagination!"
They stand in tense silence after she disappears into the adjoining kitchen, humming under her breath. Daisuke weighs his options, his insomnia kicking the conspiracy tone into higher gear. "All right, either she already did something terrible or is about to do something fantastic." He rounds on Miyako, startling her. "When's the last time you saw Tai?"
Her face flashing a dark red, she snaps back, "You work for him—,"
"—with—,"
"Maybe we should finish setting up," offers Ken, noting the way the corners of Miyako's eyes crinkle with extra pressure.
"That's my cue," says Daisuke, stepping out of the way as Miyako makes a last-ditch effort to yank him back.
"You made half this mess—!"
"And you made the other half, so apples and pickles, as they say."
Her face contorts, "Who—?" but Ken's grabbed her arms to hoist her back and Daisuke's already whirled his way into the kitchens, trotting to the rear staircase.
Daisuke pauses at the top to look back at Mimi, who's prepping a pink takeaway box with a variety of thawed and fresh pastries. She picks up a cinnamon twisty just as his stomach growls, earning him a sly smirking glance in return. "Heading back out?" he asks, one hand resting on the stairwell wall.
"My eyes are up here, Daisuke," she reminds him, and he tears his gaze from the box, grinning.
"Sorry," he says at once, then adds, "about the ticket."
"It wasn't a ticket," she corrects, voice remarkably even. "You tell your sister I've got nothing against her doing her job. I appreciate the reminder. I've been taking my place around here for granted."
He watches as she neatly creases the top of the pastry box and seals the sides with her monogrammed circle stickers. "What, uh, what place is that?"
Mimi picks up the box and braces it against her hip, retrieving her blazer from the coatrack. "Go home, Daisuke," she instructs so sweetly that even he gets the hint.
"Right, right." He casts another woeful glance at the pastry box, stifles a yawn with a mumbling remark she doesn't quiet catch, and then bounces back down the staircase, catastrophic morning now concluded—for himself, at any rate.
She waits until she can hear the door to the basement bar close, counting until she's sure his footsteps have faded away from the rear entrance, then shoves the box back onto a metal table and hurries after him. The staircase bottoms out perpendicularly into a narrow corridor with only two ways out: into the bar's rear stockroom, which Daisuke had earlier entered, she knows, and outside to the loading dock behind the building. The door to this exit is equipped with a small square window, which Mimi peers through, balancing herself on the toes of her ankle boots. It's a standard lot, with an alcove for the building's dumpster, a ramp that hugs the side of the building, and a few tenant cars—and one truck, belonging to the flower shop across town, parked underneath a small sign naming this the first floor tenant's delivery vehicle spot. Her floor.
"Yagami," she hisses. She turns around, back to the door, and glares ahead of hear at the bar's backroom entrance. A second later, she's upstairs in the kitchen, retrieving the takeout pastry box. Through the swing door she can hear Miyako's low voice quizzing a demure Ken and stops herself from entering the café. Another glance at her wristwatch later, she's back down the basement stairs, teasing the door open with her shoulder as she balances the takeout box with one hand and searches for her car keys with the other. She nearly drops both just as her fingers curl around the slim metal of the key ring in her purse when a car in the rear lot lays on its horn.
"What the f—," she cries, heart in her throat.
The driver's door pops open, and from the car emerges first a floppy blond head of hair. Her heart stays high, lodged tight, but her mouth still twists into an honest, candid smile.
She steps quickly down the short steps and approaches them, holding her pastry box before her. "There are kinder ways to say hello, such as, I don't know, 'hello'."
"The joy in that being…?" responds Takaishi Takeru, standing behind the wide open car door with one hand braced against the door frame.
Mimi stops when she reaches the front of the car, smirking. "Pick up duty?"
"My only give in this give-and-take, so not a bad rap, all things considered."
She opens her mouth to respond, but then the backdoor opens once more, and Daisuke spots them. He stops when he sees them, together, his face white with a mix of alarm, guilt, and sleep deprivation.
"Daisuke—," Mimi starts to say, immediately recognizing the panic on the young man's face, but he's already scampering down the steps towards them, yelling all the while: "I had nothing to do with it, I promise—I told you I wasn't going in on his pranks anymore, and I meant it—," he gulps, "whatever she's told you, babe, I really didn't—,"
Takeru's expression doesn't even budge; his blissful gaze merely turns easily from Daisuke's manic fidgets to Mimi's exasperated sighs. "Should I ask, or—?"
"No," Mimi answers at once, before addressing the other, "Sleep it off, Dais."
"It's off! It's off!" and he yanks open the passenger door, diving inside to safety.
Takeru's nose crinkles at the bridge, thin lips pressed into a tight smile, "So it's going to be one of those mornings. Cool." He looks between her, the takeout pastry box, and the flower shop truck, before settling back on her once more with a knowing smile that feels far too perceptive for Mimi's comfort. "I have to admit, things like this make me wonder about Dad's spider senses, selling the bar to Taichi instead of us. Like he knew you'd want a good game to sharpen these killer instincts of yours."
"Your dad," says Mimi, squeezing the box a little tighter, "would have definitely sold me the bar if I'd been looking for a space here then. He should have."
"Ah, but then, where would I be, unemployed fiancé pestering me at home all night?" She doesn't answer, smiling with her mouth closed, and Takeru corrects his mistake. "Just, uh, try not to get convicted, okay?"
"Mm-hm."
Takeru glances inside the car, then tilts his head towards Mimi. His blond curls flip listlessly over his eyes, their twinkling blue shades a mirror she finds difficult to look into for long. "Anyway, better take this one home."
"Don't work too hard."
Boasting his best joke voice, he mocks, "Nice to meet you, pot, I'm kettle."
She hangs her neck, groaning, "Oh, my God, you did not just say that—,"
"Listen," he laughs, "I'll say anything until I get your reply."
Her nose wrinkles, lips pursed. She'd been bracing for this the entire conversation, but it's still got her on edge. "I know. I will—I mean, I just need to sort out a few details." She pauses, then heaves a breathy chuckle, "Always something coming up here, you know."
"I do," says Takeru. "Daisuke talks in his sleep."
"Can I pay you to double agent for me?"
He stands up rigid straight for emphasis. "Mimi, you know that I will do anything for you, for free, twice, but let's you and I be real fucking honest where either of us rank on Daisuke's top-ten-to-die-for list."
She grumbles, hands on her hips. Her glare glides over the top of his head and across the street to the basement entrance. "Does he even offer him health insurance?"
Takeru grins, "He's not a bad boss."
"He's not exactly challenging his managerial side with the staggering number of one full-time employee."
"As opposed to, what is it, two full-timers?" She sticks out her tongue, and Takeru leans over the door to kiss her cheek. "That seat's yours, Mimi," he says, keeping his voice low, "whatever you decide. Don't let him decide it for you."
She doesn't respond, not immediately, and they've already turned out of the parking lot by the time she's thought of something to say. So she walks slowly, at first, following the sidewalk around the building, then picks up her pace when she gets to the street. Checking her watch once she's inside her car, she chews her lip over the calculated time left before she'd really need to be back at the café for the big prep, eyes lingering on the entrance up the front of the shop. Play the game, huh?
Even with her habits, the drive takes less than ten minutes, an unusually empty early morning marking the day ahead. Ominous, perhaps, but Mimi's never been quite good at blatant, in-your-face signs, and she's already working this move a few steps behind, preoccupied as she is by the startling way Jun had accosted her on the sidewalk less than an hour ago. Today was meant to be a victory, a coffee day victory, and instead—"We're ending this," she tells herself, squeezing the car into a far too narrow spot on the block to his apartment building. She fixes up her ponytail, tugging her blazer sleeves down, and retrieves the pastries from the passenger seat. It's six floors up, and four doors down from the elevator bank, until she stops in front of the paneled entranceway to an apartment labeled "Kido" in stark, block letters.
Gritting her teeth, she forces her mouth into a perfect, award-winning smile, and rings the bell. It takes Jou only a minute to answer, ever prompt with his hospitality manners, and always up for his own routines. Mimi knows this all too well. She knows, as he does, everything about Jou's life, including his most dubious of living choices. One game at a time, Tachikawa.
The door cracks open, revealing Jou in plaid pajama bottoms and a simple grey crew shirt.
"Good morning," she says, beaming.
His face drains. "Mimi—," and he gasps, slamming the door hard but forgetting his leg is in the way. His eyes water, mouth open in a silent moan of pain, but he only blinks it back bravely. "What, uh, what are you doing here?"
She holds up the pink takeout box. "When's the last time I brought us breakfast, Jou?"
His memory begets nothing, and he's astonished at the realization. "…Never?"
"Jou!"
"Am I ever allowed to answer you honestly?"
She shoves the box into his hands, overlooking the impulse to banter with him. Instead, she continues, her usually charming demeanor now cutting a forced, manic tenor, "I'd love a cup of tea with breakfast, too."
He doesn't budge, exhibiting quite a show of strength for his lanky stature, sized as it is against her petite vengeance. "Great, let's go get some."
She keeps her tone smooth. "Why should I pay someone else to boil water for me?"
A bark of deep, sarcastic laughter echoing from inside the apartment makes Jou close his eyes, defeated, and Mimi's crease into lines so thin they nearly disappear into her rigid anger. Her hand slams on the door, pushing it back, while Jou wrests the door forward with the handle, initiating a battle of wills worn down to sheer muscle memory.
Mimi gasps through gritted teeth, "Do—you have—any—Darjeeling?"
"Fresh—out," hisses Jou. "Sorry—,"
"That's—fine," she grunts, "I prefer—English—breakfast—,"
"You—lie—,"
The door pulls back suddenly, causing Mimi to stumble forward, face-planting into Jou's broad chest. Her foot slips and he grabs her about the waist, hoisting her up again, while Taichi easily lifts the pastry box from her startled hands. "Cheers," he says, shaking the box, and walks away from them. "That was English breakfast, right?"
"I actually don't have anymore tea," confesses Jou.
His smile is sly, lips pressed thin. "Coffee, then?"
Mimi's arm jerks forward and her fingers smack Jou in the nose, knocking off his glasses at the unexpected impact. She lunges for them in the same second, gasping, and forces them back on his face as she pats his cheeks frantically in an attempt to mimic physical care, "Sorry—sorry, reflex!"
"Jou?" calls Taichi, unbothered by the scene.
"Y—yes, coffee's good—ow!"
Mimi retracts the calculated second strike of the side of her hand on Jou's forearm, moving to slick back a loose tendril of hair from her forehead. She steps into the apartment, and Jou, fixing his glasses properly, latches the door shut after her while Taichi turns around, box open on the counter and an almond pastry in his hand. "None for me, thank you," she says despite his pointedly not asking.
He retrieves another coffee mug to add to the one already on the counter, then stuffs the rest of the sweet into his mouth, mumbling, "How's the café?"
"Oh, we're excellent," she responds at once. "How's the bar?"
"Also excellent."
"How about that."
"Fantastic."
"I'm sure."
"As am I."
Jou, wincing for an entirely different reason now, clears his throat. "I'd prefer a fight to whatever this is, honestly."
"No, you wouldn't," and they glance at each other, startled at the unison response.
It's Mimi who breaks first, taking a pause to recollect her focus. "Although there was one thing."
"One?"
"Yes."
"Ah."
"This morning."
"'course."
"Stop," interrupts Jou, striding forward. He pushes Taichi away from the sink, taking the stove pot expresso maker from his hands and wresting back authority of his kitchen. Pointing into the living room, he continues, "Just do whatever this is over there and save me from having to listen to it."
Taichi shifts his gaze back to Mimi, teeth pulling on the corner of his smirking lip, "Hear that, Tachikawa? Kido wants something else to listen to."
The older man gives a start, his cheeks a deep red and a yelp trapped in his throat. Taichi laughs again, slinging an arm around his friend's neck. "You make this so easy—," he teases, while Mimi stalks towards them, irritated, though she'd never say so, by the affection still between them.
"Apparently someone complained about my car," she says, raising her voice.
"What, about your parking job?"
"You know what it was about," she retorts.
He shakes his head and he releases Jou at last, ruffling his shortly cropped hair. "Not really?" The smoothness of his reply makes her pause. She studies him carefully. He's still in an old sleep shirt, some washed out sweatshirt bearing the logo of a car rental company, and orange shorts she's not quite sure aren't swim trunks. There's some stubble growing into a vague suggestion of a beard under his chin, and his sideburns appear to be coming in unevenly. Her silent staring still unnerves him more than he cares to admit. He leans back against the counter. "Should I be charging you for this?"
Exhaling slowly, she retorts, "Who'd take up that offer anymore?"
"Careful, now." He clicks his tongue. "Flattery like that leads to the kinds of fights Jou doesn't like listening to."
"Leave him alone—,"
("—leave me out of this—,")
"You mean how you leave your car alone, hours and hours over time?"
Her gasp is almost comical. She staggers back, clutching her chest with both hands, "I knew it! I use that car for deliveries, Tai! I need that space!"
"You have a loading dock at the back of the building, same as me. Be professional—,"
"Like you're being, using her van as some kind of calling card for these stupid pranks?" She rears back a few steps, making a show of looking through the apartment from their vantage point in the kitchen. "I assume she's in on this, too? Sora! Sora, darling, where's he stashed you?"
"Jesus," he interrupts, humor lost, "keep it down—,"
"No." It takes everything in her to keep from stamping her foot petulantly, though her fingers still curl into tight fists. "Don't you dare tell me to be professional about my business."
("—don't mind me, just going to move these glasses out of your…reach—,")
Taichi's tone drops, moving behind Jou as he trots between them, securing precarious items in advance. "When have you ever once in the entire time you've been in that building not tried to interfere with how I run mine?"
("—let's move the ceramic magnet of the baby's footprints into the cupboard here—,")
"Are we still pretending that's when this all started?" she laughs angrily. "You've had it out for me since the day Daddy fired you."
"You know, you should really talk to your parents more." Taichi returns to the stove to restart the coffee process, a move that makes Jou tense up at the rough way he handles his kitchenware. "You might learn a thing or two of what actually happened that summer."
"I learn enough from yours." She straightens, crossing her arms over her chest. "Just last month, Susumu told me he was the one to teach you how to fake your way through job interviews. Like father, like son, isn't it?"
Jou is frozen, arm outstretched towards a little Eiffel Tower magnet on the small fridge. "What?" she demands of him, taken aback, but he shakes his head quickly and looks with alarm at Taichi, who's face is twisted into something like surprise, or even confusion. "What?" she repeats, frustrated.
He's slow to answer. "You've…you still talk to my dad?"
His suspicion embarrasses her, as though he's caught her demonstrating the kind of clingy pining she had once so feared her friends believed she secretly held. She hates this thought most of all. Sympathy is one thing; misapplied pity, entirely another. So she bristles smartly, acutely aware of Jou's stare, "You talk to mine."
Taichi doesn't take the challenge, nor does he correct her. Instead, he says, after a long moment, in which he seems to struggle to make the words make sense, even to himself, "I haven't talked to my dad in two years." She knows he's spoken words, or otherwise a close approximation of something like words. But they hold no meaning to her. They couldn't. Not about Taichi, not about Susumu. Before she can think of a response, he corrects himself, "Or, I guess, he hasn't talked to me." It's the way she looks at him that makes him want to leave, afraid of what might happen, what else he might say, if he stays. "Spot's yours," he mutters as he passes by her on his way out the kitchen, and her hand reaches for him without her even thinking to move it when she hears the grief he can't keep out of his voice.
But then she remembers herself, and him, and what they aren't.
She makes to follow him anyway, until a hand settles on the small of her back. "Let her deal with it," says Jou, voice soft. He pulls her back, arm around her waist. "Come on, have something to eat—,"
"Stop," she says, sharp, and he does, letting go.
Mimi stands outside the apartment a minute later, back to the door. Her hands are empty now, hanging at her sides. The sun peers through the trees lining the block, warming her face. Since when was winning this unfun?
Author's Note: This was actually meant to be a lot longer, but had to split it up to rework a few continuity concerns for the long arc. Apologies for the awkwardness.
