Mob didn't know why they didn't just call these things fruit pizzas.
Fruit pizza made a lot more sense than fruit tart. It didn't even taste tart, it was sweet. That was because the base was a cookie, the frosting was made out of cream cheese and sugar, and it was topped with fruit salad. It was mostly berries though, berries and slivers of apple. Sho only liked slivers, not slices, and the only fruits he would eat were apples and berries. He was allergic to citrus so that meant that Mob couldn't top it with the oranges and pineapples that the recipe called for. It wasn't that bad, though, it was pretty good…
At least she thought so.
Sho hadn't had any yet…that she knew of. He had been out with Fukuda and Mukai for the whole day. Mob had been mostly on her own. Mostly. Shimazaki had come home eventually, he'd been busy that day. Everyone had. Mob knew that Dad was out there making her friends do bad things and hut people but…but there was nothing that she could do about it. Dad said that world domination took sacrifice and also that it was the other people's fault for not just following him. She didn't know why someone wouldn't have wanted to join Claw, for all the bad they did they made sure to balance it out with the good, but she didn't always understand people. Not strangers or enemies or allies or even her own family….
But at least she understood dessert…sort of.
"I don't know why they don't just call it a fruit pizza." Said Mob as she brushed some of her hair out of her face. It was windy up here. Shimazaki had teleported them up here as soon as dinner was done. He had called it a rooftop picnic. Mob just called it cold and windy…not that she was going to make him feel bad or anything. She knew how much trouble this must have been for him. Finding a blanket, weighing it down, helping her make dessert, getting hem all of this food for dinner…he had worked hard on it. He had done all of this to make her happy.
It was kind of nice having someone worrying about making her happy for once…or even caring how she felt.
"Why they don't call what a what?" asked Shimazaki. He couldn't hear shit up here. Too windy, way too windy…but Mob was happy and that was what mattered. He liked making her happy, Toshi too, but Toshi was on body disposal duty tonight so it was just him and Mob. The good thing about having the two of them. He never had to feel lonely. That was such a boring feeling. Being all alone and not knowing when the next time someone was even going to look at you…eventually you started to wonder if you were even real…
He never had to wonder about those kinds of things when he was with Mob. She always made him feel like he was real….she made him feel just about everything good that one person could make another feel.
"Why do they call this a tart?" asked Mob as she held up her slice of fruit pizza….fruit tart. That was what this was. It was important to call things what they were. Dad had said so. You had to be as precise as possible otherwise nobody would know what you were talking about and then you were annoying. But wouldn't pizza have been better? Or did it need cheese and tomato sauce to be pizza…but then how did taco pizza work? Well it didn't, of course…why was she still hungry? Maybe because she and Shimazaki had been going all day like this. Minegishi wasn't around to tell her not to and…and even if they did Mob didn't know if she would have listened. She knew her limits and she wasn't eight anymore, she was almost thirteen, she could take care of herself.
She had been taking care of herself for most of her life.
"Who are you calling a tart?" laughed Shimazaki
"This fruit thing we made. It's not a tart." Said Mob
"Well we don't know that for sure. Who knows what it gets up to when our backs are turned?" laughed Shimazaki. He was the only one laughing. He could feel Mob watching him. She either didn't get it or he wasn't as funny as he thought….well he knew for a fact that he was completely hilarious so she must just not have gotten it. Toshi was better for that back and forth, they got him. They could be pretty funny too when they wanted to be. Like that one time when he and Toshi had been feeding the birds they threw some bread and then he ate it and they said the funniest thing…he couldn't remember exactly what they'd said but he remembered how their voice sounded….all light and airy and just…
Toshi.
"Get it?" asked Shimazaki
"No, not really. It doesn't get up to anything. It's just dessert." Said Mob. She didn't get him sometimes. Maybe because he was high all the time, that must have been it. Mob knew what when she got like this she didn't always make the most sense too. She wasn't going to make fun of him for that or anything. She was his girlfriend…and even if she hadn't been she wouldn't have treated her friend like that.
"No I meant….never mind. You're right, it's not really tart. You know what's tart? Greek yogurt, gooseberries, kombucha-" said Shimazaki
"Sweet tarts?" asked Mob
"Yeah, those too. God, those are the worst fucking candies. I have no idea why people eat those, especially on Valentine's Day. That's obviously a day for chocolate." Said Shimazaki
"You'd live only on chocolate if you could." Said Mob
"Of course. Chocolate, good beer, vodka, and tea. If I could, that is, but I can't…and anyway you're one to talk. If it were up to you we'd have milk coming from the taps instead of water." Said Shimazaki
"I asked engineering about that but they said that there was no way to do that without redoing all the plumbing and adding a cooling system so the milk doesn't go bad sitting in the pipes." Said Mob
"Well then tell engineering to get off their asses and get to it." Said Shimazaki
"I could never be mean to them like that….and anyway Dad said 'no' because we don't have money for nonsense, he said." Said Mob
"If it'll make you happy then it's not nonsense. Want me to knock some sense into him for you?" asked Shimazaki. He was half kidding. He knew that he didn't stand a chance against Suzuki…but he had gotten his hits in. Not last time, no, last time he'd just taken it. He had been in the wrong, well teasing Mob had been fun but Suzuki had the right to the whole 'over protective dad' thing, and he knew when to just take it. Next time would be different. He needed to get a hit in, just one, just enough to make Suzuki bleed. He deserved it. Mob shouldn't have had to be afraid of him, Mob shouldn't have had to feel like crap all the time, and Mob…she deserved so much better than Suzuki.
He had his reasons too, of course, but they were mostly Mob related anyway.
"No, of course not. You can't win against my Dad, you'll just make him mad, and anyway fighting is wrong. I mean I know that we have to fight sometimes but I just wish that…that taking over the world was easier, you know? So that we didn't have to hurt people. I just wish that everyone in the world could see all the good things we do and then you and Minegishi and everyone else wouldn't ever have to hurt anyone ever again." said Mob
"While I would like Suzuki to slow down, every time he fucks off to Japan we spend the week playing catch up, I like the work. I don't mind fucking people up. It can be kind of fun, actually. You should try it some time." Said Shimazaki
"No way, Ryou, no way. I could never do that to anyone. It isn't nice. Even if someone hurt me I would never hurt them back. It's mean and…and I could really hurt someone. On accident or on purpose." Said Mob. She put her fruit pizza down and drew her knees up to her chest. She didn't know…well she did know. She knew exactly what would have happened if she ever tried to fight someone. She would have hurt them, badly, so badly…that was why she had never once fought back when Sho hurt her. She never would have been able to live with herself if she'd hurt her little brother.
She didn't know how she could have ever lived with herself if she had hurt anyone…she was so glad she had never hurt anyone, not even when she had exploded and ruined the Seventh and Eighth Divisions.
"You'd be surprised what you're capable of if you really try." Said Shimazaki as he teleported beside her. Mob was doing that thing where she curled up. She liked to turtle up, like a turtle. Toshi did the same thing but they were more like a porcupine. Did they curl up? Or was that hedgehogs? Toshi was kind of like whichever one of those animals hurt when you got to too close. Mob…well she was all smooth, like a turtle, or maybe an armadillo….wait, didn't those have leprosy?
He'd come back to this later.
"I don't want to try. I don't ever want to try to hurt anyone." Said Mob softly. Shimazaki brushed the hair from her face. She let him. It had been in her eyes after all and he had just been…being nice…and stuff. He had just been thinking about her, but not to be mean or to tell her what to do…it was nice.
"Well then it's a good thing you have me. I'll protect you." Said Shimazaki
"You have to, that's your job." Said Mob
"No, technically Shibata's the only bodyguard, I'm more of a hitman, but anyway even if I wasn't working for your dad I'd still protect you." Said Shimazaki. Her hair felt like Toshi's. All rough…he liked it. She felt like…not like home but the idea of it. Like what home should have felt like, like something familiar and warm and…just…Mob felt like Toshi and Toshi felt like home and he felt like walking on his hands but he didn't because Mob needed him right now.
"Because you like me." Said Mob. That was what you were supposed to do when you liked someone. Dad had said so. Men protected women and women took care of men. Well Mob already took care of everyone so did that make her a woman? Dad was always saying that she was but then Minegishi was always treating her like a kid….she would rather have been an adult than a kid. At least as an adult she was in charge of herself. She could do whatever she wanted whenever she wanted….and it came with a lot of other stuff, too, like responsibilities and stuff but it was worth it.
Even if it did mean, now, that Shimazaki liked her…but it wasn't so bad. Weird, but not so bad.
"Because I lo-because I like you. Even if I didn't I wouldn't have ever let anything happen to you. You're you and I'm me and…and this is a non-tart fruit tart." Said Shimazaki before he picked up a Mob slice of tart and bit into it. He bit into it, chewed, and swallowed. All the while she was watching him. He could feel it. She was always watching him, or something else, that was just how she was. The was just how Suzuki's were. They were always watching….he wondered what they saw. Well it wasn't like he had never wondered about that before.
And it wasn't like he hadn't realized long ago that there was no point in wondering.
He could see her, that was what mattered. He could see the way she turtled up, the way she drew her knees up to her chest. He could see the way she tongued at a growing cavity on the side of one of her molars. He could see the way her lungs expanded, the way they pressed against her chest, the way she was alive….well of course she was alive but she was ALIVE. She was there, right there, she took up space and air and…and she moved and her aura…he could hear her aura. It was like someone was shaking a bell against a plate, but one of those nice plates, the china plates that nice hotels had. That was what she sounded like and felt like and….and she was his….
Well she was no more 'his' than Toshi was…and he had to stop thinking like that. He wasn't needy or whatever else Toshi thought he was.
"It tastes like…like sugar. Not sweet but just like sugar. I think that I put in too much." Said Mob. She pushed the rest of the fruit pizza towards Shimazaki. He could have the rest of it if he wanted it.
"No, you didn't put in too much." Said Shimazaki
"But it tastes like I did." Said Mob
"Well I know for a fact that you didn't and you know how I know? Because I added in a shit ton of sugar when you weren't looking." Said Shimazaki. Yup, that God Mob out of her turtle shell curled up…thing. She was sitting normally now, good, she wasn't hiding. She shouldn't have had to hide from anything. If she was scared of something then she should have told him so he could fuck it up and make it go away. she didn't need his protection…but she wanted it. Not like Toshi. He didn't even offer it, he knew how they would take it. They didn't need him but…but he needed them but…but it didn't matter.
Mob needed him. That mattered.
"Ryou, why would you do that?" asked Mob. He leaned over and rested his head on her shoulder. She didn't shrug him off. That would have just hurt his feelings. Besides, he kept the hair out of her eyes.
"Because I figured that this tart should be as sweet as you." Said Shimazaki. He leaned in and kissed her. She initiated, sometimes, but those times were rare. That was progress though. Obviously this wasn't a sex thing, he would never have started a purely sex thing with Mob. It meant way too much to her and he had never been afraid to walk away from a good time, but he hadn't ever wanted to walk away from Mob. She just…it was different. She was like Toshi…but like if Toshi was nicer to him…not that he minded Toshi. He loved Toshi.
He could love more than one person. If Toshi could love more than one person then he could love more than one person.
"I'm not this sweet, I don't think that anything is this sweet." Said Mob. That got less and less weird every time. She figured it was one of those things that a person could get used to…well she had also heard that a person could get used to anything. She had gotten used to living with Dad after all and he was…well….Dad.
"Well it's better being as sweet as you than as tart as me." Said Shimazaki
"You're not tart. You taste like….a person?" asked Mob. She didn't know the word for it. People must have just tasted like people. She didn't know. She had only kissed two people in her whole life. People must have tasted like people, though, since everything else tasted like it was supposed to…well not mystery flavor gum…but people couldn't be mystery flavored…right?
She didn't know. Maybe she needed to taste more people…she decided that she could live with not knowing.
"I taste like a person but I do happen to be a tart so….wait, what do people taste like? I mean I know what people taste like but what would you even call that?" asked Shimazaki. Well now he had to know. What in the hell did people taste like? Raw or cooked….maybe this wasn't the question to ask Mob. She was making her confused face….God, she was so fucking….Mob.
"I don't know…maybe we should ask a cannibal." Said Mob. She didn't know where she would have found one but there must have been one somewhere. No Hatori, of course, she had been too little to know what he meant when he asked Minegishi…why did boys have to be so gross like that?! Boys were like a different species sometimes, and it felt like she had no chance of ever understanding them…or maybe it was just an adult thing. Adults did things like that for reasons…ones she would never understand. They were so weird sometimes…everyone was weird.
"So Hatori then?" laughed Shimazaki. Mob shook her head.
"That's not what he meant when he said that he wanted…that's….that's just not what he meant!" said Mob. She was red now, she could feel it. She was glad that he didn't know what red was. She just…she did not want to think about that! She wished that she could have been so little that she didn't know what things meant…but also that she could have been the age she was now…she wished for a lot of things.
"You're so fucking….you? You know that? That's what you are, Mob." Said Shimazaki. She was a lot of things. She was somehow everything and nothing and…and a lot of things. She made him nervous….that was what this was. She made him nervous but in that Toshi kind of way and…and happy. She made him happy…he couldn't remember the last time he'd been happy, actually happy….it was a good feeling…
"What else…who else, would I be?" asked Mob. She didn't know who else she could be. She was what she was, who she was, and that was Mob….Suzuki Shigeko. Maybe Mob and Suzuki Shigeko were two different people, things, ideas…if people could be things or ideas. She was Mob…the person she wanted to be….but she was also Shigeko, the person Dad wanted her to be…maybe one person could be a lot of different things.
Like how this could, somehow, both be a fruit tart and a fruit pizza….she liked fruit pizza better.