Mob know nothing at all about makeup.

Minori had called her that morning and told her that they were going shopping. Mob had assumed that they were going clothes shopping, Minori was always talking about how she hated all of her clothes, but they weren't. No, they were at a makeup store. It was big and bright and the music was loud and there were people everywhere and Mob really wanted to go to the Disney Store down the street, she could always use more merch and clothes, but Minori had said that the Disney Store was for kids and that they were here to buy makeup…

Even though they were only eleven.

Well Mob was almost eleven. She would be eleven soon. But still, they didn't really need makeup. Mom had told her, back when she had been very little, that makeup was for adults. Mom said that adults wore makeup to hide all the ways that they were getting older and stuff. Mom had also said that makeup was so that girls could look pretty for boys and that Mob wouldn't have to worry about that until high school. Well Mob was never going to go to high school, she hadn't gone to school since the first grade after all, so maybe it was ok to wear makeup…

She didn't know. She mostly just wanted to go to the Disney Store.

"Give me your arm." Said Minori. She didn't wait for Mob's answer, she just reached over and took her by the arm. Her nails were kind of sharp but Mob didn't say anything about that. She didn't want to make Minori mad at her. She got mad sometimes and then she could be sort of mean…but that was ok. Sometimes people got in a bad mood. Besides. Minori wasn't a friend that she had to see that often anyway. They'd move soon, too, and then so would Minori. Mob had no idea where she would be moving too but she knew that Minori would be going back to Japan soon. Her school's year started in June so she would have to be heading back soon…and Mon should not have been as relieved as she was.

That was not being a good friend at all.

Minori was just trying to be nice to her in her own way. She was trying to show Mob how to be normal, like everyone else, that was why she was drawing a line in pale white cream on her arm and then rubbing it in. That was also why she had told Mob that she looked like she was five when her hair was braided and that she looked like she was six when she wore her Frozen t-shirts and dresses and skirts. Minori was trying her best to be nice. She just wasn't very good at it.

But that was ok, Mob could be sort of clueless about stuff too.

"Thank God. Good news, I finally found a foundation that's pale enough for your skin tone. You need more sun, Suzuki, like all the sun." said Minori as she tossed the foundation into her basket with a shake of her head. Suzuki was so lucky to have had someone like her to guide her through this stuff. It was hard when you didn't have a mom or a big sister to help you, she and Suzuki were in the same boat like that, so she had better have been grateful.

Not everyone would do this for their friend.

Especially one as weird as Suzuki. She was such a project but an Asagiri never gave up, dad had said that. There was no project too big for an Asagiri to take on….and Mob was one hell of a project. But progress was being made. She had stopped braided her hair and she was painting her nails in the lines and she wasn't wearing one of her Frozen outfits so, yeah, progress was being made. She was in a Tangled shirt and purple tutu skirt…but that was still progress. At least he stuff was purple, which was a better color for her than blue, but pink was her best color. Minori already liked purple…but she would maybe let Suzuki like it too. Maybe.

She had to be a good friend.

"I don't get suntans or sunburns. I'm just always pale…sorry." said Mob. She had no idea why her skin never turned any color either than this one. Mom had told her, before, that being pale was a good thing. That women would have killed for her skin….which was just…weird. Skin was skin. Hers was just so pale that she could see her veins if she looked hard enough.

"Seriously?" asked Minori. Well she could work with that. God, when they needed to get back to Japan already. If she wheedled hard enough she could get dad to let the guards take her up to Harajuku and then she could get Suzuki into something that matched her style better. Then they could really up their Instagram game. Then everyone would see that she had moved on and she didn't need any of those other friends she'd had before.

Those bitches.

Well, those traitors. That was Suzuki's word for them, traitors, and she was right. What kind of a friend just up and left you? No kind of a friend. Suzuki knew a lot about being a good friend. She always did what Minori said because she knew that Minori knew best and also she brought something to the friendship, too. Minori's friends had mostly just hung around her for her house and her playground and her pool and her home theatre and all of that. Suzuki wasn't like that. Her dad was just as high up as dad was in his company, whatever they did, and Suzuki didn't need to use her for her money or whatever. Also she had weed, a lot of it, and she always had something to drink too.

So, really, this was a very good friendship.

"Yes…sorry." said Mob. She felt her arm, where the cream was. She could hardly see it. That was good. She remembered what foundation was for. That was what Minori put on her skin to hide…well her skin. She had said that you wanted to make sure that none of your skin showed when you put on your makeup. Mob didn't get it but that was what you were supposed to do so she wasn't going to question it.

She was happy to have a friend her age who knew what she was doing.

Because Mob didn't. She had never been in a makeup store before. This was a place where people her age went to get makeup and makeup was something that people her age were supposed to wear. She could see other people her own age there. Girls her own age with their friends or maybe their sisters and some women there that might have been their moms or maybe their friends like Minegishi was her friend. Not that she could ever see Minegishi setting foot in a makeup store. They never wore makeup or dresses but they still made themselves look nice. They had pretty hair and pretty nails and they wore pretty t-shirts with flowers on them and stuff….but they still never wore makeup.

That was fine. Mob had someone to teach her about this stuff now.

"Stop apologizing. It's good to be pale….well not as pale as you are but pale is still good. It'll be better once we get back to Japan. They'll have more stuff that works for us. I don't like how they do the makeup back home though but it's whatever." Said Minori as she dragged Suzuki over to where the fun stuff was, the eyeshadow palettes. Eye shadow was the easiest and most fun to by. You didn't have to swatch and swatch and swatch. You could just find colors you liked and then mess with them when you got home.

This was going to be a fun day.

"Um….I don't know if we'll be going back to Japan at the same time…because we move all over the world and stuff…but if we're in Japan at the same time I would love to hang out with you and go shopping and do our makeup and stuff." Said Mob as Minori put little things of eye color in her basket. Mob decided to grab some too. She took some blue stuff. Minori barely looked over as she took the blue eye stuff out and put some pink stuff in.

"You look better in pink and purple, Suzuki." Said Minori. God, she was so lucky to have someone like her. She needed to stop dressing like Elsa. She was too pale for that blue. It just brought out all of her veins and it looked so weird. She needed to look like a person, not a ghost.

"Oh…thank you." Said Mob. She liked blue a lot…but if she didn't look good in it then she didn't look good in it. She was glad that Minori had told her that. She was glad but….but she also used her powers, when Minori wasn't looking of course, to sneak some Elsa blue stuff into her basket….but then she put it back. If she didn't look good in blue then she didn't look good in blue.

"You're welcome. Anyway whenever you get back to Japan you had better hit me up. America is nice and all but the best stuff is in Japan, Makeup, clothes, shoes, everything really. Well the best stuff is in Korea, actually, but I've already been this year." Said Minori

"Um….sure. I mean if we're in the same part of Japan, I mean. Usually when we go to Japan we stay in Tokyo. Dad built up the Tokyo office so we spend a lot of time there." said Mob

"We go to Tokyo a lot too. If I wheedle hard enough dad'll let me come and visit. We can hang out and stuff…and bring your friends for once. Especially that yakuza guy. He seems fun." Said Minori. She knew hot guys. Why not hang out with the hot guys she knew? She wasn't gay, and having a gay friend would have been cool she didn't have any gay friends and if she had one then people could stop thinking that she didn't like gay people, Suzuki just didn't like guys or something yet. Well she liked guys. She had about a million pictures of some geeky looking guy taking up valuable space on her phone. Suzuki had no idea what she had right there under her nose. Well that was ok, Minori would help her see what she could have had. You had to help out your friends.

"Um….I don't think that he would like to come. He mostly hangs out with my brother, technical his job is to keep Sho safe, so…um…he might not want to come with." Said Mob. She didn't want Shimazaki to come because Minori liked him…or at least thought that he was attractive, and Mob…she didn't want to see what she would be like when she was with him. Also Sho went where Shimazaki went and she didn't want to see Sho and Minori together since they had kissed before and it would be awkward.

"Well ask him. What's the point of knowing someone like that if you're not going to bring him with?" asked Minori. She didn't care if he was older than her, he was hot, and she'd kiss him or whatever. All of that stuff that Suzuki had probably never heard of. This was why they worked so well together. She didn't need her friends, any of them, because she had a new friend and, yeah, she was a fixer upper but she had drugs and booze and hot guys and her guards weren't nearly as annoying so, yeah, they were going to be best friends now.

"Um….I don't know….um…do you really think that I don't look nice in blue?" asked Mob. She knew that it was impolite to change the subject like that….but she really wanted to change the subject.

"No, it brings out how pale you are. You need soft pinks and purples, like me." Said Minori

"But I thought that being pale was good….you said." Said Mob

"It is but not when you're pale as a ghost." Said Minori

"Ghosts aren't really pale, though, a lot of the are green actually." Said Mob. She wondered if that had been the right thing or the wrong thing to say. Minori must have known that she was an esper….right? She must have known because her dad a big financial backer for Claw and stuff…but even if she did then Mob shouldn't have been rubbing her powers in a normal person's face.

"Whatever. Green then. Well whatever. You still look like that girl from the ring." Said Minori. She hoped that Suzuki wasn't going crazy on her or anything like that. She didn't need a crazy friend. Ghosts weren't real. She knew that ghosts weren't real. Dad had pissed away enough money trying to get to the other side. Mom was gone, gone and dead, and there was no other side. It was whatever.

"Oh…I'm sorry." said Mob as she brushed her hair out of her face. She had seen that movie. She wished that she could have braided her hair or something. That way he would have looked better and stuff.

"It's whatever. Come on, I'll get you the same stuff I'm getting and then we can work from there. After this we can get some new clothes…from the real store. Not the Disney Store." Said Minori with a wrinkle of her nose. Suzuki would never be hot but she could be cute….which was why she was going to get some of the stuff that dad liked her to wear. She'd show Suzuki how to make actual outfits. Not just putting on clothes with the same color or character. She was eleven, not one, and she could have been really cute if she tried harder. Then they could have gone and found some guys. God, it had been so long since she'd been out with a guy….Suzuki needed to bring her brother around. He was cute.

"Oh. We can be twins, then, even if we aren't going to the Disney Store." Said Mob. She wanted to go to the Disney Store….but she could go on her own later….or maybe not. She needed a new Elsa dresses, she needed new costume dresses for all of her characters, but maybe….maybe she was too old like Minori said. She had been dressing like that since she had been little…and she wasn't little anymore. It was almost her birthday. She was going to be eleven and she had never been eleven before….so maybe she should take advice from someone who had been eleven for a while now.

"Yeah, and you can be the evil one." said Minori with a laugh. Suzuki laughed too, it took a second but she laughed. Minori liked that about her. She didn't take things too personally. Everyone was always taking things so personally.

"That's funny…how you were kidding. Because there's no such thing as evil twins…right?" asked Mob. That seemed sort of mean but Minori could just be sort of mean. That was just how she was. Mob was bad at talking too. That was something that they had in common and that was good, really, because the more things that they had in common the better. They would be better friends and stuff.

"Oh my God, I don't know Suzuki. Maybe I've been replaced with my evil twin. Maybe the Minori you love is gone." Said Minori. She didn't know if Suzuki was just doing a bit or if she was this clueless. Either way she was entertaining.

"Um….can you show me how to pick an eyelash stuff again? One that won't make my eyelashes all crunchy?" asked Mob. She didn't know if she was being made fun of or if Minori was just trying to be funny. Either way she wanted to talk about something else, anything else, so she had might as well steer the conversation to something that Minori would have wanted to talk about. She liked to talk and she liked to show Mob things, she was a good friend like that, even if sometimes well….

She could be sort of mean.

But she could also be sort of nice. She was nice enough to tell Mob what was wrong with her and nice enough to try and make her better. More normal. She wanted to be normal. She knew that Minegishi had said, before, that trying to be normal wasn't worth it. That she was fine the way she was. Well she still wanted to be who she was just….just a better version of who she was. She felt, sometimes, like she had gotten stuck as this person, this version of herself, when she had been little. She had liked Frozen since she had been little and she had been wearing her braids since she had been….she didn't even know how long…

So maybe it was time for a change.

Maybe it was time to try something new. Maybe it was time to be who she wanted to be….once she figured out who she wanted to be. She liked Frozen and her Frozen clothes but there was a whole world of other things that she could like, too. Like how she hadn't had a single sip of coffee before she had met Minegishi. They had started going to Starbucks together when she had been eight and back then she hadn't liked coffee at all but now she liked it just fine. She liked makeup now, too, and she never would have known this about herself if Minori hadn't taken the time to show her how makeup worked.

And what did and did not work.

Mob liked the eyelash stuff, the mascara, in the big pink tube just because it looked pretty and the end looked like a magic wand. Minori told her that her eyelashes were too thin for that. She was right, she knew about this stuff, and she may have been mean sometimes but that was just how she was. Mob was glad that she had a friend who knew about this stuff, who knew about all of this normal stuff, and she liked hanging out with Minori.

They went to fun places together, like the makeup store.