A/N: So back from Youmacon rested and refreshed.

Chapter 8

There was something stupidly amusing about repetitious things.

Laying on her back, Natsuki found herself lost within the depth of her own mind. Absently, she searched her thoughts while tossing a ball up in the air. Over and over. It was maddening, and yet, she couldn't think of something else she would rather be doing…mostly because the things that she thought made sense to her, seemed insane to the rest of the world.

She had two options on this particular afternoon. She could dive head first into her studies, or she could melt her brain with games.

Feeling uneasy, this dull musing became the distantly third option. Truth be told, she hadn't any desire to pick up a controller, but, she also didn't want to do any more critical thinking…in fact, that's what bothered her the most. If it wasn't raining, she'd go for a jog, but as it stood, her only other option was to use the pull up bar she had hanging in the doorframe of her closet. She caught the ball one last time before turning onto her side, sighing at the cellphone that had yet to ring.

"Stupid…" She muttered, violently turning over onto her other side. "That's the kind of thinking I'm trying to avoid." Somehow the reminder only further served to unglue her, and before she knew it, she had chucked that knitted bean filled ball right into the wall with a loud thud. One of her trophies clattered to the floor in response. "Damn it!"

"I hope I'm not hearing a ruckus because you've lost your temper again." Her mother called from what sounded like the living room or possibly the kitchen.

"I don't know why else you'd hear one!" Natsuki yelled back, not willing to back down. It was one of those ungodly bad days anyway she looked at it.

Footfalls approached, and finally, her mother stood in the doorway. She was every ounce the scientist that she had desired to be, and had put in the effort to sometimes be just as sterile in her emotions at home as she was in her lab. "Do you care to explain?"

"No." Natsuki barked as she rolled her eyes. "I don't care to explain. I don't even care to talk." With that, she turned her back to the older woman. "Go away." She spoke quietly, fearful her voice would rat her out if she spoke any louder. Hiding the deep frown and swallowing down the tightness in her throat, she took very shallow breaths.

"If you continue to act like a child, Natsuki, I'm going to treat you like one." Saeko sighed, arms crossed, not that the teen that so embodied her seemed to care.

"Oh yeah, cause you're the adult." Natsuki rolled her eyes, as she stood up off the bed. Anger now replaced the agony of the last few hours. "One more year…that's it." Natsuki murmured quietly. "I'm seventeen, next year, I'll be considered an adult, and then I won't be your responsibility." She was only a little shorter than Saeko now, but pound for pound, she was much stronger. "Better hope to god that I don't cut you out of my life."

"I really don't think you would." Saeko replied analytically, pressing the glasses she wore further up the bridge of her nose. "An eighteen year old is still fairly powerless in this world. Without a line of credit you won't get very far. Without some sort of trade or university degree, many jobs are off limits to you. You're too young to buy a house or even an apartment on your own. That's just the start of an ongoing list of troubles a girl your age would face if she cut her mother out of her early adult life."

"It's hard." Natsuki growled. "It's not impossible, and I'm not as stupid as you think."

"I never said you were stupid." Saeko shot back, a frown on her features.

"You implied it!" The heated debate was rising in fire quickly, and Natsuki was the first to blow. "Why do you think I took all those paper routes during winter, do you really think it was for track practice in the off seasons?" Her accusatory tone set her mother aback, but Natsuki didn't stop there. "Or what about my bike? Do you think I take it to Yamada every third Saturday just because I'm bored? Do you even look in the garage to see the stuff that's in there?" Young, fiery emerald eyes met a pair of older, icy ones.

"I have trust that you aren't doing things to cause mischief." Saeko replied primly. "So long as you don't go around making havoc for others, then I've no need to concern myself with what possessions you keep. I don't even need to ask why."

Natsuki shook her head. "My point is, you're not here. You have no god damn idea what I'm doing with my life, because you're working yourself into exhaustion every damn day!" She sighed, hands clenched into fists at her side. "You think I sit on my ass and shoot zombies for hours on end…and yeah, you're right. A few hours before I go to bed, I do just sit on my ass. But if you want me to have those honor roll level grades and be the top tier on my team, I can't be burning out."

"I'm not asking you to burn yourself out." Saeko told her. "I'm asking you to prioritize your goals. You can't seem to do that."

"Oh for Christ's sake, you're delusional." Natsuki barked.

"Don't take that tone with me!" Saeko finally hollered back.

"I'll take whatever tone I want!" Natsuki hollered back. "Cause talking doesn't work! Might as well curse, yell, kick and scream! It's the only way to get you to pick your head up from whatever it is that you have on your laptop!"

The words cut deep, and silence followed, both of them at their wits end. The standoff was not an unusual one, it was however, an unsettling occurrence this time. Natsuki was the first to break the frosty stare down, her voice like quiet daggers. "I have to be at school an hour before it starts for morning warmups. After school I'm at practice again, trying to squeeze every decimal of a second that I can out of my run." She licked her lips, her fury still made her blood boil. She pushed her way past her mother, unwilling to even look at her. Still, the final barb was a harsh one. "Thing is, I'm not banking my future just yet."

"And just what is that supposed to mean?" Saeko asked, grabbing Natsuki by the shoulders to not only force her to stop, but to turn around. "I thought you wanted to become a professional athlete."

"You're smart. You tell me." Natsuki told her, brushing her mother's hand aside. "If I get a scholarship based on my athletics, I'll be going to a university geared for that…it won't be academics alone that they'll be looking for…I've still got a year of high school. What happens if I get hurt, what happens if in the competitions that matter, I can't run?" Natsuki knew it was a possibility, she heard stories about it from her coaches all the time. "Even my grades are good…but they're not that good."

"You're fine in math and science." Saeko said with a shake of her head. "Your Japanese and English courses are also in acceptable ranges."

"They won't carry me." Natsuki protested. "In history I'm sitting at a hard C plus." The younger Kuga shook her head. "You don't get it…hell, you don't even have a clue."

"I would if you simply talked to me." Saeko's bit out. "You never say a word."

"Because you just assume…" Natsuki told her, a truth there, underneath the pain. "You glance into my life when it suits you, but really…how much do you know?" She stepped out the front door, checking the mail before her bother could get to it. To her greatest relief she found exactly what she had been waiting for, grabbing the thick envelope addressed to her.

With a renewed sense of hope, she took a breath, and hugged the package to her chest, wishing to get to Yamada's shop to hide her newly acquired trade school application.

How much did she really know about Natsuki?

That was a question that couldn't be answered. After all, who really knew another person? Who could really understand every detail? On some level, it was entirely impossible, and Saeko was happy to oblivious to some things…things that, in her mind, were better left in the shadows. Privacy ruling a heavy hand over being a helicopter parent.

Still, much as Saeko hated to admit it, being a stickler for particular things was one of the unquestionable obligations of being a mother. Good grades, proper hygiene, polite manners, and a good sense of moral foundation, sat at the forefront of what Saeko believed was important for a woman of any age, with any background. With those four key things, she felt as if any trial could be met head on. If the person was willing to face the difficulties ahead, a solution could be found.

However, it was clear that she had thoroughly missed a step someplace. Natsuki was a fairly crass person, always had been, in her own little and unique ways. She was overly modest at least, but that did nothing for her foul mouth and unkempt attitude. Part of it was Natsuki's wayward inclination to deviate from the rules, Saeko was sure…but the other part was simply Natsuki's way of life.

Natsuki liked to do things on her own, come hell or high water, even when doing things on her own often beckoned the worst sorts of trouble. Considering that was easy, when one took a glance at the past it was obvious. Proof of the claim came in the form of a family album. A photo of her diaper clad daughter insisting to try to take her first steps on her own before she had truly been ready gave rise to that…and the resulting bruises when she made contact with the floor time after time, her knees and hands often bruised at a young age.

"There you go, stewing in your thoughts again." Suzume admonished softly as they spent a quiet evening in the living room, the television on, but flickering silently on mute. "You know that isn't good for your blood pressure."

"I'm not stewing." Saeko muttered, as she turned the page.

"Oh, and what might you call it then?" The woman asked playfully. Emerald eyes lifted momentarily from the book, but Saeko said nothing, prompting a frown from the woman of fawn hair. "Saeko, now I know something is completely amiss." Suzume said furrowing her brows. "Hiding emotions well isn't exactly part of your skill set."

Saeko sighed at length. "When Natsuki was little, she used to try to scare away the monsters under her own bed. When I asked her why she did that, she told me it was because she wanted them to know who the boss was." Saeko said, turning the page of the old photo album. "She was a very independent person, even then."

"She also used to hide in her closet during thunder storms." Suzume added with a shrug. "If it makes you feel any better, Shizuru used to snoop around in the safe that Tadao and I kept in our home office."

"How did she figure out the combination?" Saeko asked, closing the book softly.

"That, I have no idea." Suzume said after a moment. "Persistence and effort, I would assume." It was a sad admittance, a hint of shame in her tone that she didn't dare to mask. "Neither of us can win the title for mother of the year, Saeko...but our girl's didn't go hungry, and for what it's worth, they were good kids."

"Were?" Saeko lifted an eyebrow to that. "They're still kids."

"They're young." Suzume murmured. "But they're women, Saeko."

"Are they now?" Saeko took a gulp of coffee, as if trying to swallow that truth. "Am I really that blind?"

Gazing down at her tea, Suzume tilted her head to the side. "I think, maybe, you're closer than you need to be. In order to see clearly, sometimes you need to take a few steps back." The woman concluded after a moment. "That is not to say that I agree with Natsuki. Simply that the two of you are too much alike to see eye to eye on much of anything."

"Golden week preparation begins tomorrow." Saeko murmured, handing the woman of her affections the school newspaper. "Shizuru's class seems intent on hosting some type of food stall. To be announced. Natsuki won't be with her class, she'll be on the field."

"You should compete in the mother daughter race." Suzume said with a smile. "They have them every year near the end of the day."

"I haven't run in years." Saeko laughed. "Last time I ran for sport, I was in middle school."

"All the more reason to give it a go." Suzume told her, taking Saeko's hand in her own. "You might be surprised."

"I'm not racing my daughter." Saeko said with a shake of her head. "There's no point."

"There is too a point…and you've just proved it." Suzume sighed. "You know that you can't win, so you aren't willing to put forth the effort to do something you know is fruitless." With a shake of her head, she ignored the firm glare that it earned her. "You both share that trait. If it's not worth the effort, you don't put in the time to try in the first place. Part of that comes from calculation, but the other half comes along with the fact that you both can't be bothered to put your own agenda aside. Until someone forces you to look the other way, you simply stay in your own little bubble."

Saeko knew what her lover had been implying, but having it so forcefully crammed down her throat was a difficult thing to swallow. That was a shared difficulty, she knew, but it was one she was all too happy to accept and engross herself in. "I like my work." Saeko answered defensively. "It's easy…logical…it just makes sense."

"There's always a method to the madness, Saeko, trust me." Suzume said then, putting her hand lovingly on Saeko's knee. "You just need to figure out what that method is."

They were all very set in their ways, and even if Shizuru was more quiet about her rebellion, she was always steadfast in her choices, and she had decided she didn't desire the inheritance.

"I'm sorry." Shizuru said, sitting at the dinner table at her father's house. "I just don't want it."

"You have no idea what you're giving up." Tadao replied with a shake of his head. "You should take the time to really consider your options, Shizuru. There are a great many places a talent likes yours could go. You have a very good grasp of how to handle a company."

"My desires go against your own." Shizuru explained a bit more carefully. "My choices would tarnish the family name anyway." She folded her hands in her lap. She had never been a daddy's little girl, but, she had always respected him. In some way, she even idolized him. It hurt to know that her inheritance wouldn't be hers, but, it wasn't something she had the luxury to keep. It would afford her very little happiness, and she knew that. "I'm sorry father, but I must stand my ground."

"This is about the arranged wedding, isn't it?" Tadao asked, but his daughter merely shook her head.

"Something a bit more difficult to overcome than that." She told him, averting her eyes. "It's a scandal waiting to happen, really. I'm almost surprised that it hasn't happened already." With a shrug, she forced her red eyes to look at him, to really see the man before her. The father whom she'd felt a partial resentment words. Unsure if she should love him, or hate him. "It's true, I refuse to be married. However, that's merely because I've already found a suitor."

"I think that's just fine. I should have known you might seek out a man for yourself." Tadao shrugged. "If that's the case, I have no qualms about his bloodline, so long as he is an upstanding man."

"You assume it's a man." Shizuru said with a sigh. "That's the scandalous part. My suitor is a woman…upstanding in her own ways, though a bit rough around the edges. She's loyal mind you, but also unwilling to have expectations thrust upon her. She never has done well with stipulation, I'm afraid. Although, she's honest beyond what she should be, almost to a fault."

Emotionlessly, he closed his eyes, hiding the embers of anger he felt start to form. They seemed to be trying to catch flame as confusion muddled from within. He was unsure whether to yell at her for making an improper joke, or to laugh at what he felt to be a jibe to his ego. Opening his eyes again, he saw no smirk, no sign of deception, and his lips thinned into a tight line. "I'm waiting for the punchline." He told her.

"There isn't one." She gave him a pained smile. "You weren't able to notice, and I felt it best to keep that particular little nature about myself buried."

It was for the best, she believed that whole heartedly, even as her father's frown continued to persist through their dinner. In the back of her mind she knew there was only one cure for the ache she felt...and that cure was Natsuki.