Chapter 5: School Daze
Serena was driving to work with Karen in the back. "Thanks for taking me to school Mommy." Karen said.
"It's no problem sweetie." said Serena. She pulled over in front of the school. "Have a good day!" she said as Karen got out of the car.
"I will mommy!" As soon as Serena drove off Karen's face lost its smile. "Or I would if I wasn't bullied so much." She walked into the school building and went to class.
When class started Miss Kaioh took role call. "Tuskino."
"Here." said Karen. Her parents agreed that her mother would keep her maiden name and any girls in the family would have Serena's last name while boys would have Darien's last name if they ever had any.
"Mizuno."
"Here." said Alice. (In Japan, if a household has a son and a daughter, the responsibility to take over the household usually falls on the son, even if the daughter is older than the son. If there is no son, or if the son is unable to take over the household, the daughter must take care of her parents, and must find a husband willing to come and live in her family's house called a "muko" or "son who comes from another house to live." In cases where a man comes and lives in his wife's family's house, he generally takes his wife's last name. This is why Karen's friends' last names are the same as their mothers'.)
"Hino."
"Here." said Rachel.
"Kino."
"Present." said Lisa.
"Aino."
"Present." said Marie.
As Mrs. Kaioh continued the role call Karen's friends started whispering to her. "Hey dummy!" said Rachel. "We didn't find anything wrong with our moms the entire weekend!"
"We should have known that you'd be wrong!" said Alice.
"I'm sorry." said Karen.
"This is exactly why you shouldn't be the leader!" said Rachel.
"Why the White Lady even chose you to be a scout I'll never know!" said Lisa.
"Something you want to tell me?" said Mrs. Kaioh.
"No ma'am!" they all said.
Michelle shook her head as she went to the blackboard. She knew that the other girls didn't like Karen and were always trying to ditch her, taunt her or bully her into leaving. Those four had no respect for anyone; other children, their teachers, even their parents; though obviously never in front of them. It was such a shame, Karen was a sweet girl; perhaps too sweet for her own good. She was so gentle and she liked her "Friends" so much that she never stood up for herself. This has got to stop.
Serena was at her office talking to a client over the phone. "I think you have excellent taste. I'll try to get the house for you and I'm confident that you'll get it." She hung up and leaned back in her chair. She only got a second or two to relax when the phone rang again. "Hyde's Real Estate, Serena Tuskino speaking, how may I help you?"
"It's us Serena." said Raye.
"Hey guys how's it going?"
"If you're talking about finding the Silver Crystal, then none of us has been able to find anything out about who the parallel scouts are, they probably are as good at covering their tracks as we are." said Lita.
"And our jobs don't leave us much time to search." said Mina.
"From what I could tell most adults don't think they exist or they pretend that they don't." said Amy.
"Well on the bright side if we're stuck here we'd be living out our dreams." said Serena. There was silence on the other end. "What?"
"Maybe our dreams aren't what we made them out to be." said Mina. "Sure I like what I'm doing but it was a bumpy road getting here. In college I drank, partied around, and, well you saw the tattoo." Mina was referring to a tattoo on her right arm that was shaped like a heart with wings. "I almost messed up my whole life."
"I thought being a priestess would have been enough for Me." said Raye. "But Chad is a high school teacher as well as a priest and because of that we don't get as much free time together as we'd like. I want him to be home more often, I never felt so lonely for someone before."
"I have always dreamed of having my own shop." said Lita. "But it's been rough going. We've only started making a little profit recently, so there is the possibility that everything could take a nose dive and we could lose the shop."
"Greg and I did very well until we graduated from medical school." said Amy. "Not many hospitals were hiring and we couldn't start a private practice, so we work at a local clinic. We ended up owing a lot of money in student loans and housing so we're in debt trying to make ends meet. But still even though this life isn't ideal, it's not bad either. I wouldn't trade it in for anything."
"Me neither." Everyone else but Serena said.
"Guys, we have to give it up!" said Serena. "These lives aren't ours! I'm starting to feel the same way but we can't stay here if we can help it!"
"We're acclimating faster than I thought." said Amy. "We better try to step up our efforts."
"I have an idea." said Serena. After work we'll all pick up the girls from school and ask them about the Scouts."
"Good idea." said Raye.
"I better go before my boss catches me making personal calls on company time." Serena hung up.
Back at school the girls were out for gym class. "All right everybody, let's play some dodgeball!" said Mrs. Tenoh.
As the kids assembled into teams Karen talked to the other girls. "Did you hear about my big sister?"
"What about her?" asked Alice.
"She's gonna be on TV this Friday with her band."
"Isn't Diana Neko in that band?" said Lisa.
"Yes, she is."
"Didn't you know?" said Marie.
"Know what?"
"You really are a dummy." said Rachel. "Everybody knows the Nekos are witches."
"They are?"
"Well Mr. Neko is a warlock, but that's just what you call a boy witch." said Alice.
"Anyway." Rachel continued. "You know that they keep all those cats there?"
Karen shook with fear. "That's why I stay away from there."
"Well each and every one of those cats was kid once."
"Yeah." said Lisa. "Any kid that goes into their yard or house gets turned into a cat."
"You're making that up." said Karen.
"Nope." said Marie. "I know someone whose best friend's cousin's neighbors were turned into cats when they went into their house."
Karen could picture it in her mind. Serenity walking into Diana's house and then being turned into a cat as Diana and her witch parents laughed.
"Alright everyone ready?" Mrs. Tenoh said. She blew her whistle and Karen was hit by more dodgeballs than the other team could have had. She had a feeling that Alice, Rachel, Lisa and Marie probably threw them at her to tag her out of the game. I'll have to bring this up with Principle Meioh.
The school day couldn't end soon enough for Karen. She was relived as the last bell rang and she stood by the curb waiting for her mom to pick her up. Her friends stood next to her as their mothers came up. "Have a good day?" Serena asked.
"Yes, Mommy." Karen said lying.
"By the way." Amy asked. "We have something to ask you. We heard a lot about these Sailor Scouts."
"Yeah, they're very cool." said Alice.
"We were wondering if you know who they are?" said Raye.
Karen, Alice, Rachel, Lisa and Marie quickly shot them down.
"Nope."
"Nada."
"Sorry."
"Can't help."
"No clue."
Their mothers sighed. "Ok." said Lita. "We might as well take you home."
"See you all tomorrow." said Mina.
After they got home Serena took a few moments to rest as Karen did her homework. The guys were right, I've had have my problems too. Darien and I came dangerously close to a divorce; we had to be attacked by some thugs before we realized that we were going to make a huge mistake.
A little later Serena heard the door bell and answered it to find Serenity and Helios, minus his horn, outside. "Hi, mom!" Serenity said before turning to Helios. "Thanks again for taking me home from practice!"
"No problem." said Helios. "It's the least I could do for ticket you gave me to your show."
"So is there anything else you can do for the ticket?" Rini asked.
"Well now that you asked..." Helios and Serenity then started kissing each other.
"Yuck!" said Karen.
"Get lost!" Serenity said.
"Dear, Helios really should be on his way home." Serena said.
"But Mom..."
"Now."
"I can take a hint." Helios said sounding a little disappointed. It wasn't that Serena didn't trust Helios and Serenity; it was just that in her mind she was still her little Rini and she wasn't ready for her to seriously kiss a boy.
"I'll be counting the hours." Serenity said.
"No, you'll just note the hour then do the math when we meet again." Helios then left.
"Why does like she kissing so much?" Karen asked.
"That's how grownups say they really like each other." said Serena.
"If she really, really liked him she'd get him some ice cream!"
"Well you can have some after dinner because I really, really like you." Serena said as she hugged Karen.