Hanami – Chapter 32

            "Okay, your turn… um, what's the worst joke you've ever played on your brothers?"

            Mike's face split in two, toothy grin bright white against his dark olive skin.  "Whoa.  That's a tough-ie."  He tapped his chin and pretended to count out various crimes on his fingers.  "Hmm.  There was the time I – No wait, the time LEO – No, no –" 

            Cabbage stared at him from the other end of the porch swing.  "You were a holy terror, weren't you?"

            "Hey!  I haven't even given you details!"

            She rolled her eyes, "Then spill it already!"

            "Okay, Okay!"  Mikey leaned forward, "It all started when Raph left an open container of ice cream on the desk in the room that we used to share.  See, for whatever reason, he just up and forgot it was in the room.  So I come in and there's ice cream oobleck melted everywhere.  He's disappeared off the face of the planet; he does that at the most annoying times.  I couldn't just LEAVE it, so I had to clean up the desk and the papers under the container and where it dripped all over the floor.  He comes home at, like, 4 in the morning, and wakes me up cause the floor's still a little sticky and he steps in it.  He's bitchin' me out for the ice cream, then suddenly he's pissed about EVERYTHING… shit that happened before I was born, practically.  But I had to hear it all because we're sharing a room and I couldn't sleep through one of his hissy-fits."

            "So what'd you do to him?"  Cabbage's grin mirrored his own.

            "You know what epoxy is, don't ya?"  She nodded, leaning forward.  Mike looked over his shoulder and all around to check and see if anyone was listening.  "I got a friend to buy some pasties from a raunchy sex toy shop."

 Her forehead creased.  "Uh, pasties… like, little glue-on nipple covers," he hesitated, "Um… sparkly, with tassels."  She nodded her head slowly as she leaned back; he could feel his face heating up.  'Keep goin.'  Don't loose momentum.  Hell, Mike, you've already explained "pasties" to her; things can't get too much more awkward.'

            "Anyways, I waited 'til later in the week, so that Raph would let his guard down.  And one night, Raph was a-snorin' away – he can make enough noise to raise the dead, if he's tired enough.  And I borrowed Donnie's epoxy, and I stuck the pasties onto Raph's chest."  Cabbage's eyes were the size of plates.

            "How is it that he let you live?!"  She whooped between gasps for air.

            Mikey grinned kinda sheepishly, "He almost didn't.  I had to hang out at our friend April's apartment until Donnie found a solvent."  Suddenly the unrepentant half-moon of teeth was back.  "But it was worth it.  He never wakes up right away.  So he staggers into the dojo, all bleary and out of it. Little golden sequin stars with little gold tassels swinging back and forth.  Doesn't want to talk to anybody.  Isn't listening to anybody.  Finally notices that we're all staring at him when Splinter comes in from his morning meditations and busts up laughing." 

Mike heaved a happy sigh.  "Yeah, THEN he tried to break my arm."  Pausing thoughtfully, Mike added, "It wasn't until Donnie explained the strength of epoxy to him that he tried to rip my throat out." 

Mike winked at her.  "Brothers are fun."

She'd finally caught her breath, and wiped the tears of laughter from her eyes.  Mike had been waiting for his turn.  "Ok, now I get to ask one."  Cabbage nodded. 

"Have you seen Sterling?" 

Mike blinked.  "What?"

            Leonardo looked at them from the front door.  "She never came in for lunch.  I saw Raphael chasing her this afternoon, but now he says he has no idea where she is.  It's getting dark.  Pipes was out looking for carving wood, and she says she hasn't seen Sterling either."

            Cabbage looked to Mike, "If you're sure she's not in the house, then we'll take a quick walk around, see if we can find her."  He nodded.  Leo went back inside.

            Cabbage stood and stretched.  "She likes to be alone sometimes.  She's got a bit of a temper, so rather than upset everyone in our 'apartment,' she'd work insane hours in her workshop."  Cabbage jumped the front stairs.  "I bet she's going crazy without anything to do out here."

            Earlier that afternoon, Sterling took stock of her situation.  She was covered in mud.  Her cheek felt huge, and she was having some difficulty opening her jaw.  The last thing she wanted was to explain herself to a room full of family.  'Maybe if I wait a bit, I can get up to the shower without having to deal with the Spanish Inquisition.' 

            A quick scan around the farm told her that she had rather limited options.  'Could check out the barn.  whoo-hoo.  That'll kill all of three minutes.'  Since it was better than nothing, she headed on in, still wiping Raph spit from her neck.  'Asshole.'

            She went in the side door, flipping on the ancient light switch.  Nothing happened.  She jiggled it.  Still nothing.  She checked out the light fixtures.  There were only a few of them, and they were just a bare bulb on a wire, but all but one had a good bulb in it.  She spied the workbench in the corner.  A germ of an idea hatched in her mind.  'IT'S a WIRING PROBLEM!'  The afternoon wasn't going to be dull after all.

            +"Well, we couldn't find her."+  Cabbage was starting to get worried.  Shima and Pipes had gone with Raphael to see if she was on the workout trail.  Leo, Mike, and Donnie were following the driveway up a bit to see if she'd decided to leave.  Raph's group had returned and reported no luck.  Splinter and Cabbage had been waiting.  +"She gets stubborn, but she's not stupid.  She wouldn't have tried to run away."+

            Shima looked at Cabbage, "So that leaves two options.  She's hurt or lost somewhere and can't get back.  Or, she's deliberately hiding somewhere."

            Raph shook his head.  "No, she promised."  Splinter looked at his son.  "She wanted to be alone earlier today and I tried to make her come back.  We had a fight, but I promised to respect her freedom, and she promised to consider her actions… well not to worry her family I guess."  He looked out the window.  "Hiding from us would definitely break her promise."

            Leo, Mike and Don were headed back to the house in silence.  The falling dark and the cold made searching difficult.  "Dudes, she's probably back at the house by now."  Mike kicked a rock into the ditch on the side of the road.  "You heard Raph, she didn't want to leave the workout trail this afternoon."

            Leonardo came to a full stop.  "Don, when did you fix the lights in the barn?"  He pointed to the usually dark structure to the left of the house.

            Donnie looked at his brothers, "I didn't."

…American woman

Stay away from me

American woman,

Mama let me be

Don't want hanging

Around no more

Don't want—

            It was the radio's sudden silence that brought Sterling's attention to the doorway.  Leo, Mike and Don stood with their arms crossed across their chests.  'Uh, oh.  This does not look good.'  Sterling cut the gas to the flame of her welding rig.  She lifted her tinted goggles, and turned off the valves on the main tanks.  When she was sure they were closed she reopened the lines and bled out the remaining gas.  Wrapping the gas hoses loosely around the fuel tanks, she removed the heavy welder's gloves and turned to face her brothers.  "What's wrong?"  At least that had been the goal; it came out as, "Wuzz rrng?"  She blinked. 'Damn jaw.'  She hadn't tried to move it in hours, and it had swollen shut.