When she came out from her room for a snack, she wasn't prepared for a sobbing scythe boy.
"What's wrong?"
Maka made her way towards the kitchen, raising her voice a little to be heard around the corner. Soul had rarely cried, and when he did, she worried for him.
He quickly dried his eyes with his sleeve, the roughness stinging his eyes more than the tears had. "Nothing. Just some cats."
Cats? "Why, was there a pretty one? I saw a photoset of one whose eyes looked like they had eyeliner on and were on point an hour and a half ago. It'd move me to tears too if I was into those aesthetics." No it wouldn't, but at least Soul wasn't upset over something else—unless…
"No, it wasn't that one, but did you reblog it? I didn't see it."
She hesitated for a moment as she was reaching the blueberries from the fridge. Something was wrong with his alibi. He'd been on the couch all day on his iPad, scrolling through endless of days' worth of content to fill his queue just as she was doing on her laptop. A mission every few days left them with limited time to keep a social media site updated but with Tumblr's queue, their online life was saved.
"Yeah, and everyone else did, too. I know you looked at Tsubaki's recipe that she posted almost immediately after reblogging it. Did you miss it?"
"Guess I did."
"Kilik reblogged it from Tsubaki, screaming in the tags immediately after the recipe that you liked was posted. Did you miss that too?" Subtle passive aggressiveness never hurt anyone.
Soul let out a groan. Just let him get emotional in peace. "I guess. Sometimes things don't line up well. You know how things get on mobile. Everything goes weird and wacko."
"You're stuttering."
"Anyway, some dust just caught in my eye as I was looking at cats alright? You should do your chores on time some of these days. I could die."
"From the dust?" she said with a small smirk, slapping the cutting board onto the counter and imagining Soul's wince.
"I'm sensitive. I'm going to my room."
"You banished yourself, not me."
Soul tumbled into bed, throwing his iPad to the side and rubbing his face on his covers. What a bother, he thought to himself as he pulled himself back up. Everything hurt and everyone was evil in the world. Just let a dude spend his Wednesday afternoons lounging, damn it. He did nothing wrong. Suddenly, he felt another involuntary hiccup and reached for his tissues before—
"Ah, ha! So there was something wrong after all!"
He yelped a little and hid his face behind his pillow. "Knock! You can't enter a maiden's room without knocking!" A hand patted his shoulder gently.
"You didn't close the door, and you aren't a maiden. Now what's the matter?" Maka was very worried. Never had Soul left her to cry to himself in his room alone. It was like abandonment. "Come on," she said soothingly. "You can tell me. Are you alright? I'm here to listen if you need someone to talk to."
His head shook slightly before his legs reached out to wrap around Maka's waist.
"Are you sure? I'm not going anywhere anytime soon." She rubbed his thigh with her clean hand; the other was still wet from washing the fruits.
Although Soul's voice came out a little muffled, Maka could just barely make out the words "the world is mean."
"Why is it mean, have you been taking your anti-depressants?
He thrust his pillow to the side with a pout and his hair disheveled, puffing his cheeks a little. A habit he'd picked up from her over the years, she noted as she resisted the urge to pinch them lest he grew angry. Ah, right. Focus on the boy.
"I only missed a day once last year. Holy shit Maka, we didn't have water when we were at the stake out. Forgive and forget it already."
"Health is important, mental or physical." She flicked a bit of water onto his face. "You're the only person I know who won't take a pill without fluids to wash it down though. Wait. Stop changing the subject and tell bae what's the matter."
Soul inched up her lap and wrapped himself around her front side, nuzzling into her hair that she kept down only when she was at home with him. Even though she was waiting patiently to hear from him, he couldn't help but to drag out the time with her. In fact, he almost fell asleep until Maka ran her wet hand down Soul's bare back.
"Why."
"You know why."
"Why have you abandoned me."
"My legs were- are falling asleep."
He crawled off. "You're a monster. Just like the rest of capitalism."
"Capitalism? You're upset over capitalism?"
Before Soul could shake his head, Maka gestured to him to follow her back into the kitchen. She leapt off his bed and made a "come hither" motion with her finger, not unlike last night. And Soul could never fight her when she called. He parked himself at the table and frowned as Maka resumed her snack construction.
"I could cut them faster."
"I don't want to pay for new counters," she replied pleasantly. End of discussion.
After letting out a sigh, Soul tried to explain his ailing without touching upon them too deeply. But he didn't get very far before Maka lifted the knife in her hand and warned him about funny business. It was only then when she found out the real truth behind the matter.
"So you really were crying over cats and capitalism." She saw him nod glumly from the corner of her eye. "And you were crying over a fucking meme."
"Tubbs is important to me. Sure, I only saw Tsubaki's post because she hastagged it 'yumms in the tubbs," but the tags beyond were so brutal. What did Tubbs ever do to them? Protect him, Maka. He did nothing wrong."
"Explain to me one more time? I don't play your cat collecting game. I still can't believe you downloaded the Japanese version of Neko Atsume and made me translate it two months ago for you."
"For the true aesthetics, do it for the aesthetics. Anyway, cats visit when you put down food, and when you've established a bond between yourself and the cats, you get to collect their most prized item as a mark of love. They randomly come and play on items that you can buy with fish that they leave you after they're done playing with them, so the food is like an off and on switch for the cycle."
"A self-sustaining system, like the economics."
"Gross, not when you explain it like that. Now, Tubbs is a special, rare, beautiful neko—"
"Say the word right, weeb. I will not have this under my roof."
"Cat. Instead of playing on items, he eats all your food but leaves huge tips if you let Tubbs come and go as he pleases. The problem is that when you leave out expensive food, Tubbs eats it all and so people get very upset with Tubbs since during his stay, no other cats can come."
Maka reached for the skewers, poking the tip with her finger and testing out the point. "So Tubbs is anarchy."
"Tubbs is capitalism," Soul corrected sadly said as he leaned back on his chair. "And so the Tumblr Tubbs Discourse became a thing. A bunch of parody blogs popped up and now we must choose sides—to protect Tubbs, grudgingly accept the system, or fight him."
"Naturally."
"Exactly, now I have to read all these mean—"
"Tubbs is corrupted. He starves the poor and pockets their cash. It's the only reason he has all those fish to give in the first place."
"Maka," Soul whispered. "No."
She stuck another piece of strawberry onto the skewer. "You said it yourself. We can't protect ourselves from Tubbs. He comes and goes as he pleases and eats us out of house and home and starves the rest of his own kind. What a menace, not even Satan—"
"No, stop this. Maka you don't understand! He gives us back so much. Tubbs is so generous!"
"That's what the rest of the big companies what you to think too. Why must we all suffer while Tubbs is the only one full. What about the rest of them Soul. They just wanted to play with your toys. Honestly, the entire system is so flawed. You're stopping productivity at the whim of just one cat, and that already confirms that Tubbs has too much power. How much longer until he turns on us? Oh wait, he already has by eating first instead of waiting towards the end. The African waterholes have an order and every animal must wait in line to get a drink."
"Tubbs is white and fluffy and pure and kind. He leaves me jerky and it symbolizes the everlasting and tasty bond between us. Do you know how you make jerky? You wait, just like how you have to be patient with Tubbs. He isn't hurting anymore and leaves you with more than enough to compensate. There is no sin for eating too much!"
"I don't even play the game and I already don't like him. You need to do what's best for everyone and what's best for them isn't Tubbs."
"In both the long run and the current run, Tubbs helps you and you have to love that kind soul. Tubbs lives with his heart bared on his sleeve and just wants to be himself and not hold back. Tubbs is a cinnamon roll who is too good for this world, too pure!"
"You know what, Soul? I should have known you'd support an overeating hog seeing as how you barely left any watermelon for me. That's not even the only time either. Face it, you and Tubbs are greedy!"
He sputtered indignantly. "Greedy? I'm not the one who eats more dinner than the other, Maka. And whenever I cook, I still have to do the dishes because you pass out from a food coma every single time. Lazy, lazy. Unlike hard working Tubbs who has to search for snacks in the middle of the night to compensate. Let the man eat. Let him do what he wants!"
"I've had enough of this. I was going to share these rainbow fruit kebobs that Tsubaki posted about but now I see what a Tubbs supporter you are. You'll probably eat them all and leave none of me, too!" Maka picked up her plate and turned to her room. "Enjoy the scraps, now you know how the rest of your cats in the yard feel.
"And now you're leaving without cleaning up the mess that you made? Typical behavior for someone so mean and heartless."
"Just like Tubbs."
"Enough of this. I've had enough of this cruel and unjust world. Why can't you just allow good to flow in the world. You have to clog it with all your… your…." Soul wrung his hands and finally threw them up in frustration.
He stomped to his room and promptly threw himself onto his bed, feeling around for his iPad. A few seconds later, he fired a subpost with plenty of exclamation points and a "delete later" tag. That'll show her.
"What the fuck is this." Maka swiveled around on Soul's chair and held up her phone. "Passive aggressive hate blogging? Are you fucking kidding me?"
At the sound of her voice so close by, Soul squeaked and backed up against the wall, pointing to Maka with an accusing finger. "Get out of my room! And I put that under a read more so you're the one who looked at it, nosey!"
"It doesn't show up on mobile."
"Leave!"
After she did, taking her stupid fake kebobs with her, Soul threw himself back onto his pillow, taking a moment before refreshing his app. Except when he did, the first post that appeared was a captioned photo that read "Maidens are so delicate. #thats how you pa #delete later # me next time"
People were just so mean.
