Masami was making an effort.
She was out of bed, that was what mattered, and she was spending time with her children. Both of her children. Sho and Shigeko. They were playing videogames, she knew that they had been playing too many videogames but it kept them quiet, and she was watching them. They were so happy, well they looked so happy, anyway.
"Mom, do you want to play? You can be on my team." Said Sho as he glanced backwards at his mom. She was still in her pajamas even though it was after lunch time and she hadn't done anything all day but sit on the couch and watch them play. He knew that girls liked boring things but that was the most boring thing that he could think of. Even more boring than playing Wii ping pong for what must have been hours and hours.
Girls were so weird.
Mom should have been the one playing with big sis. They were both girls, moms must have still counted as girls, and they could have had a lot of fun together. Not that Sho didn't like playing with big sis, she was his big sis and they had to be friends, he was just getting tired of playing what she wanted to play. He didn't' dare try and make her play something that he wanted to play, no, because then they might get into a disagreement, which was like a fight but not a fight, and then mom might have gone back to her room.
And then they'd be all alone again.
"No, I'm alright. You two play. Keep it an even number." Said Masami
"Three is an even number." Said Sho
"No it's not. It's an odd number because two is an even number. Mom said so, before." Said Mob. She wished that mom would play with them but she was still sick. Fukuda said there were things in this world that even he could not fix. That made no sense. He was Fukuda, if he could fix the big white thing that had been on her leg then he could fix anything. He had called it a scald. Mob just called it painful, the most painful thing that she had ever felt.
But she, at least, was better now.
So was Sho, too. He hadn't been that hurt but he had still needed to be seen to. That was the worst, knowing that she had hurt Sho. Mom too. She loved her family so much…and she had almost hurt them. She had hurt them just because she had not been able to control her powers. Dad was right. Power was nothing without control. She should have practiced more, been better, that way she would not have lost control no matter how much pain she had been in.
She wasn't a little kid anymore.
"Mom, is three really not an even number?" asked Sho
"Well…let's see….half of three is one and a half so unless we're cutting people in half then I'd have to say 'no'." said Masami with a smile that she knew did not quite reach her eyes. She just…she couldn't. She could and she couldn't. This whole thing just felt so…pointless. Pointless and…and trapping. This house trapped her. These children trapped her. She had trapped herself. She couldn't…not that she wanted to leave. Was it right for her to even think that?
She knew what she was getting into.
He hadn't set out to be cruel. He never set out to be cruel. He just did not understand…anything. He understood books, learning, things like that. He understood love as a…as a chemical process. As something that happened in people's minds so that they could reproduce. That was what he saw marriage as. Their marriage. She saw their marriage as…it was about love. Love was…love was something in and of its self. Everything else, the marriage and the family, were a byproduct of love for her.
She had known what he was when she married him.
So she had no reason to feel the way she felt.
"You always take her side." Said Sho. Masami shook her head. She never took any sides when it came to…to them. She…she loved them both equally. They were both her children.
"No she isn't. Math doesn't have sides, it just has numbers." Said Mob simply. Sho just didn't get it because he was a whole class behind her…not that she was that great at math either to be honest. Mom said that she was getting better, though, so that was good even though it seemed like she liked Sho better sometimes.
"Well she does always take your side." Said Sho. Mom was always taking Shigeko's side. She was always making Sho play games that big sis liked to play and told him not to run and climb and jump and stuff but if big sis had done that stuff then she wouldn't have gotten punished. Sometimes it felt like both of his parents liked her better. It made sense for dad to like her better, they both had powers, but mom….that didn't make as much sense.
"No, she takes your side all the time and dad takes mines. We each get one of our parents." Said Mob
"Shigeko-" said Masami
"I guess that makes sense." Said Sho. Mom was his and dad was Shigeko's. That made perfect sense. It even made him feel a little bit better. At least he got one of his parents.
"It does. That's the way I see it, anyway. You get one and I get one and that's how we share. Like how you have a tablet and I have a tablet or like how you get a bed and I get a bed. Things like that." Said Mob
"….that's how you see it?" asked Masami. That was…that was dangerously close to something that she would have expected to come out of Touichirou's mouth. That made sense….she was his daughter too after all. That didn't mean anything though and she had no reason to feel this way. She could feel it coming back, the feeling she'd had that night…the one that made her run to her son and ignore her daughter. That was not the feeling to have. It was…it led her to do the worst sorts of things. Shigeko was her daughter. She was…she was also her father's daughter.
She was also a six year old girl in pigtails.
She was not capable of the cruelty her father was. Her father was not even a cruel man. He had not chosen to be the way he was just as Shigeko had not chosen to be the way that she was. She had not chosen to see her parents as just…people. There had been no love in the way she just parceled up her family like that. A parent for each child. That was how Shigeko saw her family. Her mother and father. No warmth, no love, nothing.
Just that same flat affect.
The flat fact of the situation as she saw it. Cruel in it's callousness but not cruel in it's intent. The words of a child who did not yet know the power of her words. Not the words of a man who was more than old enough to know what his words could mean. But he couldn't know just as Shigeko couldn't know because…because neither her husband nor her daughter could control the way that their minds were inherently wired. She knew what she had been getting into when she married Touichirou, when they had Sho, and she had known something was not right with Shigeko from almost the very beginning. She'd made her own bed and now she had to lay in it.
So she went back to bed.
Just to have a lie down. Not to lock herself away again and leave her children to their own devices for days and days as she had before. Not to let them live in filthy clothes surrounded by snacks and cereal, the only foods that they could eat. She was planning on getting out of bed at some point, she had dinner to make after all, and she was not letting the children live on cereal again.
She was just resting.
"I think mom's sick again…" said Sho as he sat on the couch where had just been sitting. It was still warm, even. He laid down. Big sis sat next to him. He made sure to lay out so that he was the only one who was where mom had been sitting. She was his mom after all. He got mom and she had dad and now they were even.
"She said that she was just resting." Said Mob as she tried to get some couch too. She wanted to sit where mom had been sitting. That was almost as good as sitting with mom. Mom loved her and she loved mom but Sho needed someone to love him, too, so she would gladly have given him mom if he got love that way. Dad loved her the most anyway, because they were so alike, so it made sense then that Sho got mom. He looked more like dad but he acted more like mom.
"Resting is just something that she says when she's sick. She's going to be sick and be in her room for days and days and days again. I can feel it." Said Sho. He reached for the remote control but it was too far away. Big sis picked it up with her powers and handed it to him.
"She promised me that she wasn't going to do that ever again." said Mob. She let Sho pick the show or whatever, she was bored of videogames anyway and she didn't want to fight with Sho about what he wanted to put on. Mom hated it when she and Sho didn't get along. It was better for everyone if they got along. That way the family ran smoother.
"Did she say that she promised?" asked Sho
"Yes. She said that she promised that she would never let anything like that happen to us again." said Mob. Mom couldn't control when she got sick…but she could be sick out in the living room with them and that was better than how she had been sick before. They needed at least a mom. Dad was still far away….so they at least needed a mom around.
"She just said that, then, because you made the bathroom explode." Said Sho
"No. She meant it." Said Mob. She pulled her braids down because they were trying to float away. Mom had meant what she said and she had said what she meant. Mom was not a liar. Moms did not tell lies. They couldn't. That wasn't how they worked.
"No, she just said that because you made the bathroom explode and she got scared." Said Sho. Mom had been really scared that night. He saw it. That was why mom went to see if he was ok when he so obviously was. She had been afraid of big sis…which made zero sense. She was a girl and girls were not scary. They never hit you. Big sisters never hit you and moms never hit you. Not like dads. Dads hit you a lot.
"….do you really think so?" asked Mob. She wanted to yell at Sho and tell him that mom was not afraid of her…but that made sense. That mom would be afraid. Mom didn't have any powers. Dad said that normal people didn't trust what they could not explain and that her powers would make people scared or mad…he said that even other espers would be scared of her powers…and that was why she had to have perfect control at all times like he did. Mom was a normal person…
Her mom was afraid of her.
"Yeah, it makes sense. That's why she's being sick in her room instead of out here with us. Maybe she's just…scared of powers or something. Maybe that's why she won't let Fukuda fix her even though she's sick. Maybe she's just going to get sicker and sicker and sicker until she has to go to the hospital." Said Sho
"….but dad said that none of us are ever supposed to go to the hospital." Said Mob
"He did but that's where sick people go, to the hospital." Said Sho
"They do." Said Mob. She was quiet, then, and Sho was quiet. The TV wasn't quiet but she wasn't watching it. Mom was sick and she was scared and now she was just going to let herself get sicker and sicker…Fukuda had said that there were some things that even he couldn't fix…but maybe mom just wasn't letting him fix her…
"Hey Sho?" asked Mob
"What?" asked Sho. He hadn't been watching TV, not really, but he didn't want to talk about mom anymore. If she was gone back to her room then there was nothing that they could do…unless there was and he just hadn't thought of it. But thinking about it was making him sad. He didn't want to be sad. He wanted mom back. Mom was his parent after all. Big sis had dad and he needed someone too or he'd be all alone.
"I'm worried about mom." Said Mob
"And you think that I'm not!?" asked Sho
"No, I never said that. We can both be worried about her the same…ok? We're both worried about…I'm worried that she's going to just get sicker and sicker and sicker because she won't let Fukuda fix whatever it is that's making her sick. I'm worried that she's going to be so sick that she's going to be in the hospital…or worse." said Mob
"But if she goes to the hospital then dad'll be mad at her…" said Sho. if dad got mad at mom…Sho had no way of protecting her from dad. Mom was a girl and she'd get really hurt and sad because that was how girls got when they got hit. He never wanted mom to end up going through that. Ever.
"That would be bad…" said Mob. Dad had never been mad enough at anyone but Sho to punish them…but she didn't want him to start now.
"Ok. I'm calling Fukuda." Said Sho
"How? Mom has her phone in her room." Said Mob
"From my tablet, duh." Said Sho getting off the couch. Big sis followed him even though he didn't need to be followed. The house wasn't scary until the sin went down.
"You have his phone number?" asked Mob. She hadn't ever called anyone from her tablet before but she'd never had anyone to call. School friends were for being at school with. The same went for park friends and library friends. She had never called Dad, either, because mom said that they weren't supposed to bother him while he was working.
"I have skype and it has every phone number that mom knows." Said Sho. Big sis was still following him. Maybe she still got scared when they were separated. He was a big kid now, he was only afraid of the castle when it was nighttime and it wasn't nighttime yet so he was not at all afraid. Not of the hallway, not of his room, and not of how mad mom would be if she knew that he was using his tablet without asking. They had rules about screens and stuff, rules that he did not understand, but he wasn't afraid of mom. She never punished him for real. Not like how dad punished him.
"Mom might be mad…" said Mob
"Who would you rather be mad? Mom for me calling Fukuda or dad for mom letting herself get super sick?" asked Sho
"Mom." Said Mob quickly. There was nothing to think about. Mom getting mad was not nearly as bad as dad getting mad. Mom never hurt Sho when she was mad but dad did. Sho was her little brother, of course she would do anything for him, even endure the world's longest time outs and getting her tablet and videogames taken away for the rest of her life.
"See? I knew you'd come around…now help me read." Said Sho. He could read. At school they said that he read just fine for a five year old. He just needed someone who read just fine for a six year old. Kanji was impossible, hiranga was hard, and English was a whole other thing entirely….and big sis was a better reader than he was because she was so much older than him. That was fine. He was braver than she was, anyway.
Brave enough to risk mom punishing him, anyway, which was no risk at all.
She might not even punish him, no, not when Fukuda came over to make her all better. He did not and could not begin to understand her. Girls were a mystery. That was just how the world worked. It was fine, though, because he didn't need to understand anything right then and there besides the fact that his mom was sick and she needed help and he was going to, he had to, be the one who got her help. He wasn't afraid of being punished like big sis was. That was because she was a girl and didn't know the meaning of the word 'punishment'….and he did and he knew that if mom ended up in the hospital then dad might be mad enough at her to punish her…
And that would have been bad.
So he didn't let that happen. They called Fukuda. He picked up after the first ring, which was very good, and then he asked them a bunch of questions. He asked them how long mom had been in her room for, if they'd had food that day, if dad was home early. Stuff like that. Too many questions, in Sho's opinion, and he made sure that Fukuda was well aware of his opinions.
Big sis was a better questions answerer than him.
And, eventually, Fukuda showed up at their house like Sho had told him to. He didn't come very fast, in Sho's opinion, because two episodes of his show had gone by. With commercials that was one hour. Mom could have died in that hour! Sho had no idea where he lived but he knew that adults could get around very fast. Not only could they drive but they had very long legs and big feet as well. Also Fukuda had showed up with shopping bags! His mother could have been laying thee dying and Fukuda had time to go to the store!?
"Well since it's around dinner time I thought that you kids would be getting hungry." Said Fukuda after Suzuki's son finished giving him the third degree. Yup, that was the President's offspring. Shigeko may have looked the part, that same weird non expression that the boss seemed to wear no matter what the circumstances were, but Sho was certainly just as demanding as his father.
"The sun's still up. We don't have dinner until after the sun goes down." Said Mob. She used her powers to open the curtains so that Fukuda could see.
"And we have food in the house! We have two different kinds of cereal!" said Sho. He grabbed Fukuda's hand and tried to drag him down to mom's room. She needed help right now! Right this minute!
"Sho, that's not polite. You have to ask people to follow you, not drag them around." Said Mob. She reached over and tried to pull Sho's hand off of Fukuda's. Sho wasn't as strong as she was. She could have dragged Fukuda around with her powers if she wanted to…but that would not have been very nice at all.
"Nah, it's ok Little Lady. You're both just worried about your mom, I get it." Said Fukuda. The house looked a lot better, the kids looked more well cared for than they had before, and nobody was bleeding. This was a good, good, good sign. Masami hadn't…she hadn't backslid. She needed help, though, a lot of it. She…he understood her. How trapped she must have felt. Fukuda did not care for the president as a person. He was a combination of bizarre and terrifying…and he could only imagine what it must have been like to be married to a man like him.
A man who would be so cruel as to tell his wife that the act of making love was pointless.
Fukuda would have never said those words to Masami…to anyone! That was beyond the pale. No wonder Masami had gone spiraling so terribly. This being the last straw and all of that. He got it and he…his job was to help the Suzuki family. So that was what he was doing. Easing her burden. Not that these two could ever be a burden. He didn't understand what the President was always griping about. These were great kids and any man would have been happy to have them. Even Sho, the little firecracker that he was.
"Are you worried about our mom, too?" asked Mob. Fukuda could heal people so if he was worried then it must have been really bad, whatever it was that was wrong with mom. Whatever it was that had her in bed almost all the time.
"I'm…concerned for her. Your mom is going through a tough time right now, ok? And I need you two to remember that none of this is your fault." Said Fukuda
"We're not the ones who made mom sick. We hardly ever get sick." Said Sho crossing his arms. Mob nodded.
"We're fine, the one that you should be worried about is mom." Said Mob
"So go on! Do the thing you do and make her feel better already!" said Sho
"I will, I will…but you two know what?" asked Fukuda
"What?" they both asked at once
"I accidentally picked up some extra food at the store and then I got to thinking….I shouldn't let all of this go to waste so how about I have dinner with my favorite family." Said Fukuda
"How do you know if it's extra yet?" asked Mob
"I just do." Said Fukuda
"Well you can go have dinner with them later, right now mom needs you." Said Sho. So Fukuda had another family he was friends with, huh? Well then that was fine. Who needed him?! Well, them, obviously….but if he couldn't stay and play then…then that was fine, too. Sho was a big kid now and he wasn't going to cry or yell or anything.
"We won't keep you very long at all." Said Mob. She wanted Fukuda to stay and play but if he had another family then…then that was fine. There were a lot of people in the world and obviously Fukuda knew others besides her and Sho and mom and dad….
"You two…." Said Fukuda. He tussled their hair as he made his way to their kitchen. These kids…these adorable, perfect kids. He knew for a fact that he must have been overstepping…but he was the only healer in all of Claw. Suzuki could be a right bastard to his subordinates but he would never seriously harm someone he needed. The man was not invincible. He took his hits, too, in those fights he was always getting into. He never lost those fights, of course, but occasionally a phone call would come in at some odd hour of the day or night telling Fukuda that a plane was waiting to take him to God only knew what corner of the world because the boss had gotten a cut or a bruise and could not be seen like that.
Nobody could know that the great Suzuki Touichirou was just as mortal as everyone else.
It would lose him followers. Cultists and Claw members alike and that could not be allowed to happen. Fukuda wondered what it would be like when the kids got older. When they didn't need him there all the time to sort out their childhood accidents. What it would be like then, when he had to be chained to the boss' side twenty four seven…well maybe not. He had said, before, that Claw was no place for Masami. That she needed to stay at home. That her place was at home with their children. That she was happy at home. Fukuda wondered, sometimes, if Suzuki even knew the meaning of the word. Happiness. Happy. Suzuki was not a happy man. How could he have been when he had left all of this behind?
This family.
These were great kids. Fukuda…he had always wanted kids but it had never happened. He was not going to bring a family into the kind of life he led. He'd known Suzuki for years, decades even, and he knew that Suzuki would never let him get away. He was too valuable to lose. Back in the day his grand dreams had just sounded like, well, dreams. The kind of thing that someone thinks about when they're out there wishing for something different than their ordinary lives. That was then and this…this was now. Now he had people calling him President. Now he had people worshipping him like a God. Now he was out there full of ambition, trying to get everything that he had ever wanted.
No matter who it hurt.
The whole thing would crash and burn eventually. It had to. No one man could rule the world. For as long as they had known each other Suzuki had been planning on ruling the world. Like a ten year old who never grew up. Now he had children of his own and a wife and he was leaving them all alone to live the kind of life he had always wanted to…
And leaving his family behind.
Why would anyone want the world when they could have had this? Two little people in the kitchen with them, helping them cook, telling them their little stories about their lives. Things that may or may not have happened. Things that they cared about. Their world was so small. This house. Father, mother, brother, sister. Why would you want the whole world when you could have their world? Why would you want anything more than this?
It just didn't get any better than this.