UFO catchers were hard.
Mob had never been good at these. Not like Sho. He won these all the time and he always swore that he never used his powers so he must have been really good. Mob wished that he had been there to help her but he wasn't. He hung out with Fukuda a lot these days. She hung out with her friends too but she did miss him a lt. he was probably still mad about how she went to sleep next to him without asking and they ended up switching beds. He hadn't really talked to her since. Not like how they used to talk before. He hadn't even asked her to play since, either, though they had been playing together less and less as they had been getting older.
Maybe this was just a part of getting older.
Fukuda said that he didn't like her as much because she was getting older. That was why he called her Suzuki-san, now, instead of Shigeko or even Little Lady, which was close to being called Her Ladyship but not close enough that it bothered her. She didn't mind being called a Ladyship that much anymore. OR Suzuki-sama. Or even Little Sister-sama. She was just happy that people still wanted to talk to her. Dad was still mad at her. He didn't hang out with her or ask her to come to work with him or anything. He was just so…there but not there. This was Mob's fault because she had complained about the love that dad had shown her. You either got all of dad's love or none of it and she had chosen the 'none' option…and now she had to pay for it.
At least she got to hang out with her friends again.
Dad had been weird about her leaving the HQ to go anywhere with Minegishi. He had said that she had to stay by his side at all times and that if she wanted to see someone she had to stay in the HQ. Well now that rule was lifted and she and Minegishi could at least hang out again. That was good because she had been running low on new manga to read. That was why they were at the manga store now. Mob had already picked out and bought the ones she wanted. Now she was waiting for Minegishi and playing the UFO catcher game.
And losing.
How did Sho DO this? The prizes were in these round pokeball things and the side of the UFO catcher were square so it had trouble catching the prizes and, in Mob's opinion, that was a bad choice of design. How did they expect people to win at this game if the catcher couldn't catch the prizes? She wasn't going to give up, though, because she wanted to win that cat bracelet. She didn't wear a lot of jewelry but she did like cats. Also she and Sho could share it because he liked cats too. Well he liked cats but not as much as he liked hamsters. There was a tiny hamster phone keychain that Sho would have liked. She hoped that she won that too. She had no way of seeing what prize she would get. They were all in these mystery ball things. Still, though, she was happy to just win anything.
But she did hope that she won something that Sho liked.
His birthday was coming up. Mob had already gotten him a present, wrapped it, and hidden it to where he couldn't find it. She had gotten him more art stuff. He went through it quickly. He was always filling up sketchbooks and wearing down his pencils and stuff like that so she got him more art stuff. She got him art stuff most years so she knew that it was a good gift for him. He would be so happy…but also she wanted to win him something now just to make him happy. Maybe if she won him something then he would want to spend time with her and play with her. She had lost mom and now she had lost dad. She couldn't lose her little brother too. What was the point of having a family if everyone was gone? Mom had run away from home and dad didn't even like her anymore…and she didn't know what the point even was of being Suzuki's it they weren't going to BE Suzuki's….
Lots of people in the world were called Suzuki.
But they were all Suzuki's from the same family. What was the point of being Suzuki's from the same family if they weren't going to act like it. This was probably all her fault, what had happened, all of it. Mom leaving and dad not liking her and Sho wanting to spend time with her. Maybe she should just quit now. Quit playing the UFO catcher game and quit trying to keep her family together and then just…quit. She didn't know what she would do if she quit but she was trying and trying and trying to make things better but…but there was nothing that she could do. She had been trying to play with Sho and she had been trying to get dad to even look at her and she just….she had been trying for a while.
So maybe she should just quit already….
But she had already spent twelve hundred yen trying to win this game so she had might as well keep on trying. She pulled another hundred yen coin out and went back to it. She was already in too deep to stop playing this game just like she was already in too deep with her family to quit. She had been trying for as long as she could remember. She had been trying to be a good person and a good daughter and just…had been trying and trying and trying for her whole life. Since she had already sank her whole life into this she had no reason to stop now.
If she did then everything that she had invested would have been a waste and dad said that one of the worst things that a person could be was wasteful.
"Mob, are you seriously wasting your money on that stupid game?" asked Minegishi. So this was where Mob had gone off to. Right along the side wall were numerous crane games. Ones with candy and toys and also for some reason expensive fan merchandise. Mob was standing in front of the mystery ball machine trying her best to win even though she had more money than God and could just buy whatever she wanted. Not to mention the psychic powers….though Mob had very strong views about using her powers to cheat…and that would be the last time they ever played Jenga as a group…fucking Ryou….
"Yes." said Mob as she tried, and failed, to win again. She frowned. She could just walk away now…but she had already put too much of her money into this. Besides, she had a lot of money and if she needed more she could just got and get more so it wasn't like she had to worry about using all of her money here and not having any more to spend on more fun stuff…like more UFO catcher games.
"How much have you spent so far?" asked Minegishi. A ten year old and her money were soon parted. That was the basic economic model of any and all arcade games.
"Thirteen hundred yen so far." Said Mob. Was that a lot of money? She didn't know. She had more money though so it didn't matter and if she ran out of money, there was a first time for everything, she could always go and get more.
"Seriously? You spent thirteen hundred yen on this game?" asked Minegishi. They wondered how Mob could be so…well she was ten and this sort of thing was important to a ten year old. Minegishi had played these sorts of games when they were ten and had figured out how to trick coin slots into letting them play. They hadn't been the most morally upright ten year old in the world. They weren't going to be telling Mob that, though, she'd have a heart attack. She had very, VERY strong views on using your powers for the purposes of cheating.
"Yes. Well it's fourteen hundred yen now." Said Mob as she put another coin in. She was happy to get rid of the coins, they made her bag kind of heavy, but even if she ended up using them all up she could just get more from the change machine.
"How much money do you even have with you? Because that is a LOT of manga by your feet." Said Minegishi. They had been curious for a while now as to how much money Mob even carried with her. She had always spent it without any thought at all to what things costed…and while Minegishi was on the subject they wondered how much the whole Suzuki family was worth. World domination did not come cheap after all…
"This much." Said Mob. She opened up her cat bag and showed Minegishi the pile of coins and bills she kept in there. Also there was gum in there somewhere too but it was buried somewhere under the money.
"Mob, close your bag. You do not want to go showing off that you have that much money…and also you need a credit card….or at least a wallet." Said Minegishi. Those were large bills in there….too large to just leave your ten year old with. Also maybe it wasn't entirely safe to be walking around Tokyo with a bag of loose money. Thank God that Mob had them to look out for her.
"I can't have a credit card because I'm ten, dad said, and it would look suspicious if I had one." said Mob. She knew that people had wallets but she had never really gotten the point of that. It was easier to get your money out when you just had a big bag of it.
"Sure, a ten year old with a credit card is suspicious but a ten year old walking around with hundreds of thousands of yen in her bag is perfectly normal." Said Minegishi. She was carrying A LOT of money. Minegishi wasn't exactly living on a prayer but they did keep their money in their wallet, they didn't have a lot of cash, but mostly in the bank where it belonged. Who the hell let their kid just walk around with that much money? And those had not been small bills in her bag.
"Yes. Dad said so." Said Mob
"Well….at least you get one hell of an allowance." Said Minegishi
"What's an allowance?" asked Mob
"The pocket money your parents give you…wait…your dad didn't give you that money? Mob, what have you been up to?" asked Minegishi
"I haven't been up to anything but playing this game…and also dad doesn't give me money he just says that I can take it if I need it. He has a lot of money in his desk drawers and stuff so I just filled my bag up with money." Said Mob
"Well that's some grade 'A' parenting right there…." muttered Minegishi. You were supposed to teach kids the value of money and about being responsible and all of that…right? Minegishi had no idea since they had never been anyone's parent but they did think that just setting your kid loose with a bag of money wasn't going to teach them good fiscal responsibility…and also maybe that was something that Suzuki should have been teaching his kids since he planned on ruling the world and all of that shit. Ruling the world seemed like that sort of thing that required a degree of basic responsibility.
"What?" asked Mob. She wished that Minegishi wouldn't say things so quiet like that all the time. It made it very hard for her to follow the conversation.
"Nothing. So, can we get going or are you going stand her all day like a businessman in a pachinko parlor on payday?" asked Minegishi
"Um….I've never been to a pachinko parlor before but I am going to stay until I win. It's ok, though, because Starbucks is opened all day and it's not even dinnertime yet." Said Mob
"So you're just going to keep on spending money on that game until you win?" asked Minegishi
"Yes. I've been playing for too long to stop now." Said Mob
"Fair enough." Said Minegishi. They decided that they could add 'gambling problem' to Mob's list of future possibly life ruining vices. At least they could safely say that they were not responsible for this. Minegishi had never been a big gambler. Even if it was boring they preferred to know the outcome of things before they happened. Also they liked not pissing their money away like that. Having money in the bank, and also hidden in the lining of their suitcases incase the shit hit the fan, always made them feel good. They had been without money, without anything, for too long during their formative years. That might have had a bad effect on them. That might have made them the person that they were today.
The sort of person who hung out with a ten year old and enjoyed it.
Mob had been down lately, hence this trip to the biggest manga store within reasonable travelling distance, but that was not the full reason why Minegishi had brought her here today. Also it wasn't just for the reasonably priced manga of an adult nature, either, though that was a draw. They just…they liked Mob and they wanted her to be happy. They had very few people in their life who they cared about and Mob was one of them. Minegishi didn't know how they had let this happen but it had happened. They had gotten attached to Mob.
Eh. Could have been worse.
She was a great kid, a good person, and someone who they weren't ashamed to say that they cared for. Though they were not a fan of the feeling of fear that they got when they looked at her. The fear that they had ruined her life, that she would end up like them, the fear that she would end up worse. Minegishi had never been as naïve as Mob. They had never cared about another human being until very late in their life. They had always been concerned with getting to the next day, that was all, and they had just never had room for another person in their mind or in their life. Well now they did.
They could handle this.
There was a reason that they never wanted to have kids. Even if Ryou went on and on about how great kids were and how great it would be to have them, he never thought things through and also that was more commitment than they were willing to make to one person, they knew that they did not want kids. Not if being friends with Mob was anything like having a kid. They had messed Mob up. Well her dad had messed Mob up but in trying to help they may have made the whole thing worse. They had lost control of the situation and now Mob…she had learned some very bad coping mechanisms….
But there was nothing that they could do about it now so they might as well just make what they could of this friendship.
"I almost had it that time." Said Mob. She had managed to sort of pick up the mystery prize ball. It was closer to the hole at least. Maybe if she tried a few more times she could get it in. Maybe.
"You sure that you don't just want to find a store that sells this stuff?" asked Minegishi. They wondered how long Mob could keep this up for. She had one hell of an attention span. They had watched a Frozen marathon, the other day, which was exactly what it sounded like. That movies over and over….and OVER again. If Minegishi had been in the habit of making armchair diagnoses, which they weren't, they would have said that Mob was engaging in an unhealthy form of escapism because she identified heavily with the main character. Emotionally distant parents, a difficult relationship with a younger sibling, powers that were way too big for her to fully control…but Minegishi was not in the habit of psychoanalyzing their friends. Maybe Mob was just a ten year old girl who loved movies with singing and princesses in pretty dresses and stuff.
"No. I've already been playing for this long so I might as well just keep going." said Mob
"Uh-huh…and I guess that telling you that using your powers is always an option wouldn't be taken well?" asked Minegishi
"No. Well I wouldn't be mad at you but I would be sad that you thought that I was the sort of person who could cheat." Said Mob
"I know that you're not the sort of person that would cheat. That's why I didn't remind you ages ago that you had psychic powers and that you could easily win every single prize in this machine if you wanted to." Said Minegishi
"Oh. Ok. I feel better now. Don't worry. I have to win eventually. If I keep on playing then I'll get better and better and then I'll eventually win." Said Mob. You just had to be persistent, like dad said, and then you would reach all of your goals. Not that Mob had any real goals beyond winning this game and also putting her family back together.
"So you're going to train in the art of claw machines until you get good enough to win?" asked Minegishi
"Yes." said Mob
"And how long is that going to take?" asked Minegishi
"I don't know. Hours, maybe." Said Mob
"Yeah, well, I don't want to stand here for hours and hours while you learn the art of crane games." Said Minegishi
"You could sit down and read? I think that they let people sit on the floor here. Well they let me sit on the floor when I was reading manga from the bottom shelves so it must be ok." Said Mob
"Or you could let someone with decades of experience take a shot." Said Minegishi
"But I don't know anyone with decades of experience. Well I know Sho, he's good at these, but he doesn't have decades of experience because he's not even a whole decade old yet." Said Mob
"I mean me. Now move over because I am not standing here all day." Said Minegishi
"You know how to play UFO catcher games? You?" asked Mob. She had never imagined Minegishi would have been the sort of person to do things like this…but even after being friends for two whole years now she supposed that it was normal not to know everything about another person. They were almost twenty years older than her after all.
"I've played a few crane games in my time." Said Minegishi. More like they had cheated at a few cranes games in their time but Mob didn't need to know that. Once they had learned to make vines, well, arcades were warm and they could hang out there for a while. They figured out how to trick the coin slots and the crane games and also how to part inattentive fools from their money, too, when they had been younger. But Mob didn't need to know all of that.
She just needed one of these damn mystery prizes.
Minegishi didn't even end up needing to use their powers. Maybe it was the difference in height that made it easier but they managed to use the crane to knock one of those prizes down the hatch for Mob. There. Now Mob had a prize and it had only taken almost three thousand yen to get it.
"Wow! You won that on your first try. You're amazing, Minegishi." Said Mob as she was handed her prize. Well technically it was Minegishi's prize but they had been nice enough to win it for her. She held it in her hands and smiled. She felt…happy. She always felt happy when she was with her friend…but she also felt extra happy when nice things happened to her. This really was more Minegishi's prize though. She attempted to hand it to them but they just reached a hand out and pushed it back towards Mob.
"Nope. That's yours. I don't want it." Said Minegishi
"But you won it." Said Mob
"Yes, but I won it for you. Besides, that's kid's stuff. Which one of us is the ten year old?" asked Minegishi
"I'm ten and a half." Said Mob
"Then open your prize and enjoy it, too, because I am not winning you another one. You get what you get and you don't get upset." Said Minegishi
"I won't get upset. Whatever it is I won't get upset. I promise." Said Mob. She opened her prize up and…oh. It was two prizes! Wow, a two for one deal. That was lucky. They were two blue bracelets made of plastic with a dangling blue pendant on the end. They said….that was English for some reason…oh. One said friend and the other said best. Mob put the ends together, they fit like puzzle pieces, and then she got the whole message.
Best friends.
"Hey, look at that. A twofer." Said Minegishi as Mob held up the prize she had won. Cheap best friend bracelets that looked like they had stepped right out of the nineties…that was the thing now, right? Nostalgia for a decade that the kids hadn't even been born in. They thought about maybe winning something else for Mob. They knew that she was not a jewelry person, or even an accessory person, something that they could understand. All of that was just too much extra work plus you'd be screwed if you were even in a fight and someone just reached out and grabbed you by the whatever.
"Here, you can have one of the halves." Said Mob holding out each half so that Minegishi could see them.
"No thanks. You can keep those. I don't wear jewelry." Said Minegishi. It wasn't that they hated jewelry, it looked nice, they just didn't like to wear a lot of things that could be easily grabbed. Same reason they preferred short hair.
"Me neither but there are two of us and two of them. So which one do you want to be? Best or friend?" asked Mob
"Mob…." Said Minegishi. They really didn't want to take that, they would never wear it, but Mob looked so damned earnest. How could anyone resist her looking so damned earnest? Minegishi had never been a jewelry person, or a friendship bracelet person, but they would do this to make Mob happy. So much of her life was shit they had might as well do what they could to make her life just a little bit better.
"You can be friend because you're my friend or you can be best because you're the best." Said Mob helpfully.
"Give me friend. You can be best." Said Minegishi. Mob took their hand, they tensed but did not flinch at the sudden contact, and slid the bracelet onto their wrist. They would have to get used to the dangling pendant and the feel of something cutting off their circulation…but they would deal. They pulled their sleeve down and tucked the pendant into it. There. Less annoying but it also couldn't be seen. No matter, no matter. They knew that it was there and Mob knew that it was there.
"Thank you for winning this for me…and for being my friend…and stuff." Said Mob
"You don't have to thank me for that, now come on. We've been here long enough." Said Minegishi
"Ok." Said Mob. She followed behind Minegishi. Her powers kept on fiddling with her new bracelet. She never wore a lot of jewelry, she had some that came with her costume dresses and she wore it sometimes but not that often, but she could get used to it. She would eventually get used to it being there even though she couldn't see it under her sleeve. She got the feeling that this was not the sort of thing that you could just take off. This seemed special and important, like a way to remember who her best friend was, sort of like how married people had rings….not that she ever wanted to be married to Minegishi or even liked them like that…but it was sort of the same thing. You could love your best friend, Mob knew that she loved Minegishi a lot, so maybe it was the same sort of thing.
Something to wear so you remembered how much you loved your best friend and how much your best friend loved you…and also so she could remember how good Minegishi was at UFO catcher games.