Most people knew better than to interrupt Minegishi's bath time.
Most people knew not to disturb Minegishi end of discussion. It didn't matter if they were in the middle of a bath, or reading a book, or just sitting in their garden staring off into space. They were not to be bothered. Not even if the house was on fire…which it had been this morning. It hadn't been Ryou's fault, for once, it had been Shibata's. Honestly, they would have thought that he would have figured out not to walk away from the stove by now. They had no idea why he had thought that it would have been a good idea to leave a pan of bacon unattended on the stove, but he had, and the next thing they knew Ryou was picking them up out of bed and teleporting them into their garden.
It was the thought that counted, they supposed.
Even if they had wound up covered in dirt. Well it was a good excuse to take a bath….thinking positive did not come easy to them but they had to. Ryou came home shook as fuck last night so of course he would have overreacted when the house, once again, filled with smoke. It was touching that he'd saved them first…well they knew that he was in love with them but it was still touching. Having someone love them…it was nice. Especially when he wasn't being overbearing….
As he tended to be.
He had nothing on Mob, though. Sometimes it felt like no matter what Minegishi did, where they went, which way they turned Mob was there…like right now. They could feel her aura in the house. They could feel her getting closer…well that was fine. Mob needed them, especially with all the insanity that had been going on in her family. It was amazing that she hadn't snapped and made herself an orphan yet. Minegishi knew that they would have if they had been in her position.
They would have done a lot of things if they had been in her position…things that Mob never would have done. Things that she would have considered mean. Like laying down the law with Suzuki…well actually meaning it. Mob had made some threats that Minegishi knew she would never make good on. She was a lot like them when they had been her age…but not exactly like them. She still hadn't learned to block out that part of her, that part that loved her father even though he was an asshole of the highest order, and she still hadn't learned to cut ties with people she didn't need in her life anymore. She kept people around, mostly her father, that brought her nothing but pain….
Or maybe Mob had the right idea and Minegishi as just too quick to cut people off.
Their phone vibrated. They reached over to the plant on the bathroom sink and manifested a vine. Cacti didn't normally have vines…and also they weren't normally found in bathrooms. Not one of their plants. Ryou had probably found that one…they didn't want to know what he planned on doing with it. Hopefully not tormenting Hatori, they were in no mood to sit there and listen to another round of Hatori's histrionic complaining. After nudging their phone to a spot where it was less likely to plunge into the water and kill them they decided to shed all the needles off of that tiny cactus.
There. Now whatever terrible thing Ryou planned on doing to Hatori, most likely, was over and the day was saved…and it wasn't even nine in the morning yet.
They closed their eyes and leaned back. The porcelain was cool against the back of their head. The bathroom water was hot. It was a nice contrast. God…they could have just spent the entire day in the tub. It wouldn't have been so bad. Sure in the long run hot water destroyed their skin but they needed this. Even being on the outside of all the Suzuki family insanity was exhausting….they could still feel Mob outside the door. She was waiting for them to get out. Unless her brother had locked himself in the bathroom again she was waiting for Minegishi….the day long bath would have to be moved to another time. Most people knew not to bother them in the bath, most people would have paid dearly for even coming near the door….
But Mob wasn't most people.
"What is it?" asked Minegishi. There was some shuffling on the other side of the door. Then silence.
"Mob? I know you're there." said Minegishi. They were practically shouting…or maybe that was just the echo in this bathroom. It was pretty big by Tokyo standards. Not as big as the one in the Sydney house, though, that had practically been a bathhouse….they hoped they were going to Australia next…or someplace close to this time zone at least. They didn't need to deal with jetlag on top of everything else and neither did Mob.
She had enough to deal with already.
She was lingering outside of the door. She only did that when something was really bothering her. Fucking Suzuki. If Minegishi had been a stronger esper then they would have knocked some sense into him themselves. If he wanted a son to carry on his cursed bloodline, and it was cursed that was the only way to explain how a person like him had even come into existence, then he should have just had another kid and left the ones he had alone. Sure the world didn't really need another one of his children, he'd probably find some new and creative way to fuck it up somehow, but Mob and Sho didn't need any more of Suzuki's so called parenting.
For a man who wanted to rule the world he sure was hell bent on raising kids who were probably going to destroy it one day.
"Mob?" asked Minegishi. They could see Mob's aura…and this was not good. They had seen firsthand now, twice, what she could do when she lost control. She could have killed them without even realizing what she had done….and there would have been nothing that Minegishi could have done about it. Mob was like…the water in the tub shifted as they moved….a tsunami. Being near her when she was exploding…when she was losing control…they imagined that it was pretty similar to having a tsunami bearing down on you. You couldn't stop it, you could see it coming but you couldn't stop it, and you couldn't run away either. You could just watch the ocean recede and then pray to whatever God that was listening that you made it out alive…
None of that was Mob's fault.
Bad parenting and bad genetics. Minegishi had no idea how powers were passed down, the only espers that they had ever met with an esper parent had been the Suzuki kids, but they did know that nobody should have been as powerful as Mob was. As Suzuki was. Sho…he was a powerful esper but they knew that if it came down to it they could still take him. If Mob ever got the idea in her head that she'd had enough, that she didn't have to take this anymore, then Minegishi prayed for whoever upset her badly enough to cause her to…
She hadn't done any of that on purpose and being afraid of her was pointless.
"Mob, just come in already." Said Minegishi as they closed the shower curtain around them. Mob had seen them naked already but there was no need to make a habit out of this. This was a bathroom, not a bathhouse, and they did like their privacy. Shared anatomy or not, lifelong friendship or not, previous history or not they still needed their privacy. Boundaries and all of that.
They still had some of them.
The door creaked opened slowly, very slowly, but that made sense. Mob wasn't Ryou, she didn't just let herself into places. Not that they would have minded Ryou. Different boundaries…actually no boundaries. Very few of them. That was just part of being in a relationship with him. When he loved you he didn't let things like doors get between you and him….also there was all the physical intimacy. After that much of it they had pretty much gotten desensitized to it….it had been that long, hadn't it? Long enough for…twenty nine years old and they were already starting to feel old.
Not as old as the twelve year old who was making her way through the bathroom at a glacier's pace.
Minegishi could see her through the shower curtain. She was crossing this bathroom like she was one hundred and twelve, not the twelve and a half that she actually was. It was either embarrassment or some kind of inner emotional turmoil. They would have believed either…well they were here for her. Responsibilities of the bracelet and all of that. They were never taking that thing off again…and they were wrong to have done it that first and only time. Mob needed them and they didn't get to just cast of their responsibility to her when it got to be too much. She was a human being, not one of their exotic plants that they could just make dormant when she got to be too much, and she'd needed them even if they hadn't always been up to being there for her.
They were all that she had in the world, the closest thing to a responsible adult anyway, so they didn't really have much of a choice.
She certainly hadn't given them one. From the day that they'd met they'd been friends. They'd been humoring her back them, she had just been this little girl that she'd been assigned to teach and nothing more. Someone who just happened to have the same power set along with fifty others that she barely had any control over. Someone who's only social contact, at that point, had been with her insane megalomaniac of a father and her violent little demon child of a brother. Someone who needed a friend so badly that she had befriended THEM of all people….
Someone who still needed their friendship…and about fifty other things…including whatever it was that she needed from them right now.
She was sitting on the ground, now, on the bathmat. They pushed back the curtain just enough so that they could actually see her. She had her knees drawn up to her chest and she was staring intently at the pattern in the floor in front of her. Minegishi hadn't known that alternating blue and while tiles could have been so fascinating…maybe she was stoned. She smelled stoned. She smelled like she had decided to torch a dispensary….or rob one. Minegishi peeled the curtain back and sat up a little more. Her eyes were bloodshot. She was digging her toes into the bathroom rug….and her fingers…and her aura was all over the place.
Nine in the morning and already stoned out of her mind….most likely.
"So, we're getting stoned this morning." Said Minegishi. Mob didn't say anything. She just kept on staring down at the floor in front of her. Some beads of water began to rise up out of the tub. Minegishi slapped them out of the air…but they just broke apart and kept on hovering like they were in space or something. It would have been interesting if Mob hadn't been the one causing it.
Bad things happened when she lost control over her powers.
"And we're losing control over our powers, too." Said Minegishi. They waited for Mob to say something, to argue something ridiculous like she had been meaning to do that but just hadn't realized it yet, or that she was super sure that this was the last time that she would ever get this stoned and she made her best pinky promise to exercise some basic moderation next time, or…well…anything. She was still staring down at her feet…at the floor….
Minegishi crossed their arms over their chest and craned their body over the side of the tub…they got a good look at the floor….there wasn't anything there.
"Is there something there that I don't see? If it's a spirit exorcise it. I don't want any company right now." Said Minegishi. They wouldn't have been able to sense it, not really, if there had been a spirit there. They had a terrible range and an even worse sense for spirits. Matsuo said so…well he had an incredible range and sense for spirits….but he was Matsuo. He collected spirits like the nerd brigade had been collecting Pokémon…at least that was what she assumed Hatori had been yelling about through the walls the other night. All of his yelling just sort of blended together, sort of like the lines between the tiles after a while…
Well now they at least knew that reality hadn't turned into a magic eye photograph.
"Mob, come on. What's happening here? You stoned or what?" asked Minegishi. They splashed a little bit of bath water onto her side. That was the thing that broke her out of whatever trance she had been in. She snapped to attention…and so did the water in Minegishi's bath. For a moment they were naked and cold…and then they were just plain naked. Mob covered her eyes and shook her head.
Minegishi wasn't going to let themselves get mad.
Even though she knew what happened when she lost control over her powers…and if she didn't she could always check on the progress at the Seventh Division. She knew not to get this stoned, too, Minegishi had been telling her for years and…and Minegishi was not going to get angry with her. That wouldn't get them anywhere and anyway she had a perfectly good reason to be getting stoned at not even nine in the morning.
That reason's name was Suzuki Touichirou and, really, the only way to deal with him was to at least get a little buzzed….though full on stoned was best.
Minegishi didn't get mad at her. No, they just reached over and patted her on the head. They made sure to keep one hand crossed tightly across their chest. Same anatomy didn't mean that they felt like being naked right now…well they were….but this was not a bathhouse and they needed to have these boundaries with people. Even Mob. It was just this thing that they had about people seeing them naked…well that most people had…or at least should have had…and they had no idea who they were justifying themselves to….who this argument was even for. Mob, maybe, if she asked…but she didn't seem like she was in any state to ask them anything.
Up until a second ago she hadn't even been in any state to speak.
"I'm sorry…" said Mob softly. She took her hands away from her face and now she was back to looking down at the tiles. Minegishi just kept their hand in her hair…greasy…she was the one who needed a bath. Maybe they could have a spa day, that might have cheered her up. A nice spa day where Minegishi washed her hair and did something about her skin…she was broken out more than usual….oh. She wasn't wearing her usual three layers of caked on makeup. She was still in her pajamas, too, that was weird. She had turned into such a clothes hog over the years. Now she was just in some sleep shirt…one that might have been a little too small. Maybe a nice trip to go and get some more clothes to hoard would help.
Whenever Mob came out of this. Not now.
"About the tub thing or the getting stoned thing. I forgive you for both, you are forgiven, alright?" asked Minegishi. Mob didn't even nod. She just kept her eyes trained on that one spot on the floor. Her aura reached out towards Minegishi's, though, and Minegishi reached out to her as best as they could.
The minute their auras touched she pulled away.
"I'm really sorry." said Mob again. Minegishi kept on patting her hair like she was a cat…maybe she wanted to go and liberate the cat from Fukuda's house. He probably wasn't home and as much as Minegishi disliked the shedding machine they liked seeing Mob happy. She had been so happy when they'd gotten that cat…she'd been so happy before all of this drama had started….
Minegishi wished that they had been a stronger espers. Maybe then they could have done something about Suzuki…knocked some sense into him…or something.
"It's fine, Mob. We're fine…alright? Everything's fine. Now come on, what's going on? You can tell me." Said Minegishi
"I'm sorry." said Mob. She was like a little raven, wasn't she? Her hair was at least the right kind of glossy black. If only she'd said nevermore then this whole thing would have been complete. Stoned Mob…talking to stoned Mob was in some ways worse than talking to stoned anyone else…even Ryou. At least Ryou made sense when he was stoned….well to himself, anyway. Maybe Mob made perfect sense, in her own mind. Well Minegishi would have liked to have been given a clue or a book of instructions or even a decoder ring.
Because, really, this was getting to be a lot.
"About what? Mob, seriously, you're not giving me a lot to work with here." Said Minegishi. They had maybe left a little bit of anger seep into their voice…but it wasn't like Mob would have noticed even at the best of times…and these were not the best of times. They weren't the worst of times either…but they weren't good. These were bad times and Mob…she was only dealing with them in the only way she knew how…and that was alright.
Minegishi was her and it was their job to help her through this….even if she wasn't exactly making this easy on them.
"I'm sorry….I'm sorry." said Mob. Minegishi sighed and pulled their hand back to the warm and loving embrace of their bathwater. Well this was going nowhere fast. They wondered if Mob had been drinking, too, she kind of smelled like beer…and gunpowder? Had Sho and Ryou been playing with fireworks again and they'd slept through it? No, no, they wouldn't have….well then why would she have smelled like that? Why…there were a lot of whys here….a lot of whys she obviously wasn't going to be explaining to them anytime soon.
"Mob, come on, I need more to go off of than 'you're sorry'. Whatever it is I forgive you, alright? Now come on. What do you want to do today? We could have a spa day and I could do your hair…or we can go shopping at one of those places you like….or we could watch one of those movies you like where the people fall in love…or one of those extra long kiss scene compila-" said Minegishi before the bathwater in their tub jumped, once again, this time to the ceiling. It all crashed back down onto them…water hurt. It was heavy and it hurt…and now it was raining….the ceiling was wet. They sat up-
Oh.
And there was a cactus in the tub, now. One with needles…Mob had made needles. The tub was full of them…a cactus and needles…well now they had to come out. The reached for the towel on the rack behind them….soaking wet. The entire bathroom was probably soaking wet….well at least they had dry towels in the cabinet. Minegishi got up. There wasn't any more need to hide under the water. Mob had gasped out one last 'I'm sorry' before she ran out of the bathroom…and left the door wide opened…
Minegishi closed it quickly.
The only person who was home besides them and Mob was Serizawa. He had been actively avoiding them, and for good reason, and they didn't want to make things even more awkward between them. They had enough to deal with when it came to Mob…well at least they liked Mob. She was their friend…and their responsibility…and the person who came first in this. They didn't come first anymore, she did, and that meant that no matter how badly they wanted to stay in the tub and run themselves another bath they didn't. They just wrapped their towel around their chest and made their way to their room. They had to change and then they had to see what Mob needed.
What she had been so sorry about.
They had no idea what she had been so sorry about…but the house was still standing so it wasn't that. They'd figure it out, Mob wasn't good at keeping secrets, and she was worse at being cryptic. She probably just stole from their stash again or something…well no matter. She was going through a lot, more than most people her age had to go through, and she deserved it. Mob…she wasn't just anyone…so she deserved it.
Even if she did kind of ruin Minegishi's well-earned and much deserved bath.