Stealing was wrong.
Mob knew that stealing was wrong. Nobody had ever had to sit her down and tell her that stealing was wrong, she just knew, so she knew that it would have been wrong to steal shaving cream and a razor from dad. He was the only one in the house who shaved and she knew that she was free to get her own…but then people would know that she had hairy legs and other people could not know that because then they would make fun of her….so she had no other choice….
Well it was more like borrowing than stealing.
Stealing was when you took something and kept it forever. When she had been little, when she and Sho had been little, they'd only had one ipad to share between them. Mob had been playing…well she had no memory of what game she had been playing but she knew that she had been playing on it….and then Sho had gotten very mad at her and accused her of stealing it. He had said that because he had wanted a turn with the ipad right then and there at that moment…and Mob had been a bad big sister back then because she had told him that he could have it after she had been done with it…and then he had gone to mom and told her that Mob had stolen it…
And then mom had explained about sharing and borrowing.
When you intended to give something back that was borrowing. When you were a family then you always had to borrow and lend and share because that was a part of being a family. Mob knew that mom had been talking about ipads and toys and stuff because she and Sho had been so little back then…but maybe that applied to other stuff too. She didn't know. Mom hadn't told her about this stuff. She had never asked to borrow mom's razor before…so she had no idea if this was ok…but this was dad, not mom, and he was ok with just about everything. He loved her and he let her do whatever she wanted. That was how he showed love…well that and the smothering and the cuddling and the belly rubs. Those were new. In his sleep he seemed to think that she was a cat or something….or maybe mom since he had called her by mom's name….but she isn't going to wake him up and ask. She also isn't going to wake him up to ask if it's ok to borrow his razor either. She just…isn't going to wake him up.
She does NOT need her DAD to know about this.
She doesn't even know if dad knew about things like this. When she had been little he had been gone for most of the year. He had probably never even known that mom shaved her legs and stuff. He had always been working in his office when he was home and he and mom never hung out, certainly not when she had been getting ready, and then when she had gotten sick she had just….stopped getting ready. She spent most of her day in pajamas…so dad probably didn't know about this stuff and she didn't want to have to be the one to teach him….she didn't want that at all….
And also he would know.
She didn't want dad to know anything about this part of her life. The personal part…and this felt very personal. More personal than anything else that had ever happened to her before, that she had ever had to do before, and dad…well he was dad. It would have been nice to have had someone to show her how to do this, though, but she didn't have anyone to show her. Minori would probably end up making fun of her and mom was gone…and Minegishi probably didn't do this since they didn't do a lot of girl stuff….but she could figure this out on her own.
She had no choice.
Mom hadn't thought to show her this…and she has no anger inside of her heart towards mom even though she left and never told Mob that she would get hair on her legs and under her arms…and also places that she didn't want to think about….and were you supposed to get rid of all of that hair too? She eyed dad's razor. It looked sharp. She nudged it away with her powers like it was going to jump off of the sink and attack her or something. She knew that it wouldn't come for her but…it was sharp.
She didn't trust it.
It was sharp. It had three very sharp blades and it looked like it would have taken off layers of her skin, like peeling an onion, if she gave it half a chance. She knew that people shaved their legs…and also under their arms…but she had no idea if people got rid of…all of the other hair that they had…and she didn't want to try. That was NOT a place where she wanted to put a sharp blade. Not…there…or under her arms, either. Mom had a machine for there, anyway, Mob remembered…and she wished that mom had explained what she had been doing back when Mob had been little…little enough to be able to watch her get ready. Back before she had gotten sick and stopped getting ready all together….
She didn't have a mom anymore.
She just had herself. She had herself and…and she could do this. She reached over and took dad's razor in her hand. She could do this. She could do this and this was ok. She was…she was just borrowing and…and if he had known that she had been borrowing his razor he would have been ok with this since he was ok with just about everything. She was his Daughter and he loved her…and he would not wake up and come right up to her and ask her what in the h-word she thought that she was doing holding his razor in the bathroom so early in the morning that not even the birds had woken up yet.
She had no idea what she was doing.
Well she knew what to do. She had seen mom with her leg up on the edge of the bathtub a thousand times before. You did the shaving cream and then the razor part and then you wiped whatever was left off with a washcloth and then you were done. Well Mob…she was not going to borrow any of dad's shaving cream since there was no way to give it back. What if he got up that morning and then noticed that some of his shaving cream was missing and then he figured out that Mob had taken it, since Sho was too little to shave so he wasn't a suspect, and then he asked her why she took it? Then he would know and the last thing that she needed was for dad to know. If dad knew then…then she wouldn't be able to face him again…
So she was not going to borrow any of dad's shaving cream.
You didn't need shaving cream….right? In the commercials there wasn't always shaving cream….but none of the ladies in the commercials had legs like Mob's. She pulled her socks down with her powers…nope. Nobody in the whole world had legs like hers. She had started off with legs that were a little itchy, and then very itchy, and now she had itchy werewolf legs. She could see so much black…and the black stood out against her skin…and maybe if they had been white they would have been easier to live with…but she knew nothing about bleaching hair. Well, no, she knew some things. Minegishi had taught her how to bleach and color hair before but the whole thing was complicated and hard to remember and Mob was not about to start messing around with bleach at four forty five in the morning. They had bleach by the washing machine…but that was clothes bleach…and also she had enough to worry about when it came to figuring out how to shave. She had to figure this out and then…and then once she figured this out then she would be ok….
She could do this.
She tried to make her hand stop shaking as she put the razor to the middle of her leg…well she picked it up and put it more towards the bottom because you were supposed to start from the bottom and move up…she had seen mom do that before….so that was what she was going to do. Any minute now. She had to get on with this. Dad was going to maybe get up soon, he got up between five and five thirty to go to the bathroom and then he went back to bed until six, so she had to get on with this before she had some explaining to do. She could do this. She had done harder stuff than this. She managed to get Sho into the bathroom every night, get him to eat at least one green thing a week, and also she had managed to teach him all the kanji she knew…she could do this. This was easy. This was so easy that anyone could do this…
Anyone but her.
"Mother f-wording h-word!" hissed Mob. She dropped the razor and started to jump around. She hissed over and over again, she wanted to yell but she knew better than to wake up the whole house, so she just hissed and jumped and tried to keep her powers under control-
And the laundry hamper tipped over.
The laundry hamper tipped over and now there were clothes on the ground. Mob ended up slipping on one of dad's white button down shirts and wound up on her back. She was careful as she got up. She wasn't good at getting blood out of things, Sho's blood anyway, and she figured that her blood was the same as his blood since they both had dad's blood….and she knew that he did not want his blood back so she was very careful not to drip it onto his shirt. She laid down on the ground and grabbed her leg with both hands. She could feel the blood seeping out between the cracks of her fingers…
She knew what the shaving cream was for now.
She turned her head to the side and saw that she had gotten some blood on her Olaf nightshirt. It was right there in the middle of Olaf, it looked like someone had stabbed him in the chest, and that made no sense because Olaf was a good snowman and he liked warm hugs and nobody would stab someone who liked warm hugs. She almost wanted to apologize for bleeding on him but she didn't because she was not a little kid. She was an eleven year old…who wasn't smart enough to know that the shaving cream was a necessity. Now she had blood on her Olaf nightshirt…but better her nightshirt than one of dad's every day shirts.
Dad could not know about this.
If he were to come in and he ended up seeing all of this blood he would freak out. He would pick her up and carry her to Fukuda, which he should not have done because then he would end up hurting his back, and then Fukuda would see that she had cut herself and then he would know what she had done. Also he would see her legs, which still had hair on them, and then he would probably make fun of her for them. If he made fun of people for having little breasts than he would probably also make fun of people for having hairy legs…and also he would see her breasts since she was only in her Elsa nightshirt which was sort of tight on her…and then he would have an opinion of her breasts, which was to make fun of them most likely, and she didn't want him to make fun of her breasts….or to form any opinion of them at all.
So she needed to get up.
She needed to get up and…and she needed to use her powers to clean this mess up. Cleaning the mess up was the easy part, she just put everything back in the hamper without organizing it. She would do that later since she was the one who washed all the clothes. That would be easy too. Anything would have been easier than getting up. Getting up involved moving and moving involved making sure that her blood didn't get everywhere…and also moving her bleeding leg….and it hurt so much…it hurt enough to make her curse, almost, inside of her head…
But she got up.
She got up and she pulled her socks back up to keep the blood in. They were white but…but they were all she had. She didn't have any bandages in the house. Sho was the one who was always getting hurt and when he got hurt he went to Fukuda. Mob…she let herself heal naturally when she got hurt…and she almost never got hurt in any serious way. When she did get hurt enough that she needed help she went to Minegishi. They had a whole first aid kit for when they hurt themselves gardening…and they had always been ok with helping Mob…but if she asked them for help they would KNOW and…
She felt her bracelet.
Minegishi was not the same sort of friend as Minori. They were not the sort of person who made fun of others. They told people when they were being stupid, and Mob knew that she had been stupid, but they never made fun of people…so it would be ok to…to ask them for help. They were friends after all, best friend, and it would be ok to ask them to help them stop bleeding and stuff….even if it wasn't even five in the morning yet….then again they maybe wouldn't be happy about being woken up so early especially when they had trouble sleeping…..but…
Mob could wait.
She could wait. She would rather have waiting in their house on their bedroom floor for them to wake up than to have dad or Sho wake up and see what she had done to herself. Sho would freak out, maybe as bad or even worse than dad, and then they would both try and take her to see Fukuda…and she didn't way to see Fukuda. She would rather have dealt with this all on her own with only socks to keep her leg blood in than t have had to see Fukuda and explain to him…and then have him think stuff about her….and stuff…
She made her way to Minegishi's house.
Walking was hard, putting on shoes was harder, and taking them off again was hardest. Doing all of that without making a sound was even worse. She had her powers, she used them to take off her shoes, but she had to keep her voice in as much as she could. It was very early and everyone was asleep…and she didn't want to wake them up. They were all boys and she did not want to explain this to a boy. Minegishi…was not a girl…but was the closest thing Mob had to a girl who could help her. They were a they but they had also not been born a boy and…and Mob just felt more comfortable with them knowing than anyone else in the whole world. If mom had been around she would have helped…maybe. She didn't know. Sho…Sho had been for mom and she had been for dad…and she had no idea how mom would have treated her if they had still been in the Castle. If she had still be there with them and…and stuff. If she had been there she could have made sure that this had never happened….or maybe she would have been too busy with Sho. Mob didn't know. All she knew was that she didn't want her mom right now, she wanted Minegishi, and Minegishi was actually there.
They were there and they were asleep.
Mob felt their aura as she slipped her shoes off in the genkan, well the space that they had made a genkan out of, and they were asleep. Mob was careful to face her shoes the right way with her powers. Just because she was in pain didn't mean that she got to be impolite to her friends. She decided to face everyone's shoes the right way while she was there. Shibata's had been the only shoes facing the right was. Minegishi's had been facing the wrong way, Hatori's had been on top of one another, and Shimazaki's had been pointing towards Minegishi's. She left his shoes where they were, she just turned them, in case he forgot where they were. Even in pain she could not do something so mean to one of her friends…
Even if she caught him doing something mean.
She made her way into the living room from the genkan as best as she could. She had expected everyone to be asleep, it was very early, but she felt the familiar shift of energy that showed Shimazaki was awake and teleporting…and she was glad that he was blind. He couldn't see the blood on her sock…and also he already knew what her legs looked like. Well felt like. He had felt them that time when they ate the acid covered sugar cubes…and he had been trying to read them…and stuff…and thinking about that, about how his skin had felt against hers, it made her stomach feel all…sort of like when she thought about Hatori only not as bad…
And the feeling went away just as fast as it came.
Because she had walked in on him doing something mean. Mob could sense him with her aura and see him with her eyes. There wasn't a lot of light in that room, just the TV that Shibata left on, and she could see that he was still in his sleep clothes…if shorts counted as sleep clothes….and she could see that he was trying to steal the waffle maker from Shibata. Shibata slept clutching the waffle maker in his hands now because Shimazaki kept on taking it to melt caramels in even though he knew full well that caramel waffles were not made that way….
Five in the morning and already there was going to be a fight.
"Shimazaki! Stop that!" whispered Mob. She did not want there to be a fight. This day had already started off badly enough. She did not need a fight on top of what she had done to herself. Shimazaki stopped what he was doing, He still had his hands on the waffle maker but he had stopped pulling. Now his aura was on hers. He was paying attention to her. He wasn't facing her, he didn't have to, but he was still paying attention to her.
It made her feel weird.
He could tell, probably, that she had hurt herself. She wasn't worried about him making fun of her. They weren't like that. The only person he ever made fun of was Hatori but that was just because Hatori had confessed to both being in love with the love of Shimazaki's life and also wanting to cook them and eat them, and Minegishi was probably the love of Shimazaki's life since he had spent a lot of their sugar cube time trying to tell them he loved them, so it was understandable that Shimazaki would have had sort of a problem with Hatori…a problem which Mob would fix as soon as she figured out how to. She didn't feel weird because he knew that she had gotten hurt, or that he was going to tease Hatori later, no she just felt….weird. Not as bad as when Hatori was near but just….that same sort of feeling….but less…
Maybe because he had kissed her.
Well he had put his hand over her mouth and then kissed his hand…which was not the same….and also he'd told her not to tell Minegishi and she didn't see why she had to hurt her friend like that…if that would hurt them….it hadn't been a real kiss and Mob hadn't felt like this at the time, because of the sugar cubes, but now when she thought about it…and about how Shimazaki had said that he would kiss her for real when she got older….well she didn't want that. She didn't want to kiss him or be his girlfriend or steal him from Minegishi, best friends did not do that to each other, she just felt sort of….
Warm and slightly tingly inside.
But that feeling wasn't that strong and the pain in her leg, mixed with the annoyance she felt at the fact that he was going to break another waffle maker even though he knew for a fact that it bothered Shibata when he did that, chased that feeling away. She was mostly just…well it was there but not as bad as it could have been…and she mostly just focused on the pain in her leg. It hurt. It hurt and she could feel the sock sticking to her cut…and she didn't know how she could have had that much blood in her body…but there it as seeping through her sock at about five in the morning while she stopped one of her friends from breaking her other friend's waffle iron.
This was not at all how she had seen her morning going.
"Hey, you want some waffles?" asked Shimazaki. People had always said, for as long as he could remember, that he had no sense of tact. Stupid people said that. Well stupid people and Toshi, who could never be stupid, said that. Well he did have a sense of tact. He smelled blood. At this point in his life he knew exactly what blood smelled like and he smelled it, fresh blood, on her. Someone without tact would have been all 'oh my fucking God you're bleeding'. Well he had more tact than to draw attention to when he smelled blood on someone who could have ketchup packet times. That didn't smell like ketchup packet blood, and actually once he focused on her he could sense a very nasty cut on her leg, and he was glad he didn't say anything.
Because he had more tact than that.
And also if that had been ketchup packet times he would have been an asshole to draw attention to them. He had learned years ago never to bring that up. He wondered if he should bring up the cut on her leg. He knew how to dress a wound, he had done it before, but also he wanted waffles…but wounds were worth more than waffles….but once Shibata woke up it would all be over…but also caramels melted into the shape of a waffle and then dunked in pudding were delicious…..
He needed a minute to think.
"No thank you…because I know that you're just going to melt caramels together. Please don't do that. You know that it bothers Shibata when you do that…and also he'll make you waffles if you ask nicely enough." Said Mob. She watched him as he sighed and let go of the waffle maker. She watched his tattoos move as he sighed. She had never given much thought to them…but she liked them, she decided. They were pretty…and also she didn't taste black pepper when she looked at them…anymore. She had back when they'd had sugar cube times….and those had been good times…even if her brain had decided that she missed her little brother so much that it had to invent a new one for her. She wondered what other stuff her brain would come up with if she did that again….
She had promised Minegishi that she would never do that again.
Not without them around, anyway, and that was…she wanted to do that with her best friend. To see what they saw and to have them see what she saw…she got the feeling that was what had happened even though she knew that her mind was hers alone….it had still been a nice time. She wanted to do that again…and stuff. But she wasn't going to because she had made a promise…even though she had felt more scared, more confused, and also more safe and more loved then in that bed with Shimazaki holding onto her and telling her to look at him, shouting at her to look at him, then at any other time….well it was in the top ten times of her life.
It had been nice.
But it was not going to happen again. She was in pain and she was bleeding and she needed to do something about the fact that she was in pain and she was bleeding…and she also had to save the waffle maker…and also everyone's sleep because if he tried to make a caramel waffle then the whole house would fill with smoke again and everyone would be tired and grumpy and stuff…and she did not want that…she did not want that at all….
She just wanted everything to work out ok.
"Fine, you win. You're lucky that it's too early for me to argue with you. Anyway, you want me to dress that cut for you? It feels like a nasty one." said Shimazaki. He teleported over and felt her leg…well the wet sock the covered it. What the fuck even was this? Had she gotten into a fight with a potato peeler or something?
"Um….no thank you. Minegishi…they know how to fix my cuts….um…but thank you for your offer. I'm just going to….to go and see if Minegishi is up yet. Good morning." Said Mob. She felt….weird. She felt weird and she didn't know what to do with this weird feeling so she went off to Minegishi's room. She knew that she had been rude there, she would say sorry later, but she really….needed to get this cut looked at.
So that was what she did.
She knew that she was not supposed to let herself into Minegishi's room unless it was an emergency…and maybe this was an emergency. She had no idea what she was going to do about this, and also she had no idea how much blood she could safely lose and still be able to be alive, so this maybe counted as an emergency. So it was ok for her to let herself into Minegishi's room, close the door of course because they liked their privacy, and then make her way across the room, and then gently shake them awake so they could help her fix their bleeding leg.
At least that had been the plan.
Minegishi kept the blinds shut when they slept. Also they didn't have a nightlight, not that she and Sho had a nightlight, sometimes Sho just needed to have a light on to sleep for reasons that had nothing at all to do with being scared of the dark. He wasn't, he just needed to be able to know where he was when he woke up sometimes, and he thought that needed a light for that was worse than being afraid of the dark. Well that was just something that made no sense….but Mob didn't argue with him. Having a light on was better than being in the dark.
Especially when you had to cross a room with piles of books on the floor.
Mob had almost made it to Minegishi's bed when she tripped and fell. She fell into the mattress and the bedframe….and that ended up being the opposite of what she had wanted. She had wanted to wake Minegishi up gently so they wouldn't be mad, and also they didn't react well to being woken up suddenly for reasons that they had said they would tell Mob when she got older, but now they had woken up suddenly….
And Mob was all tied up in vines.
It had happened so fast that Mob hadn't even had time to react. One minute she had been dealing with the pain of falling and the next she had been all tied up in vines…and they sort of hurt. She could hear Minegishi getting up and she knew that they were not going to be happy with her…because they had told her a bunch of times before that they didn't want her to just walk into their room….but this was an emergency! Or at least really important.
"Mob? What the hell? It's not even dawn yet!" said Minegishi. They spoke in a normal tone of voice even though they knew that people were trying to sleep. They didn't care. They had been trying to sleep. Mob knew that sleep did not come easy and then she had just let herself in and…and Minegishi let her go. They had reacted without thinking. She was Mob, not a threat at all, and she probably had a good reason for waking them up at this godawful hour of the morning.
Hey, maybe Suzuki had died and everyone could walk away from this madness…they were probably not so lucky.
"I-I'm sorry. I didn't mean to wake you….but I cut myself and…and usually when I cut myself you fix it." Said Mob. She hoped that they weren't mad at her. They didn't feel mad….at least their aura didn't. Mob didn't know. She turned on the light so she could see them better…and now they felt upset…but that was probably because of how she had turned the light on just now….and she hadn't been thinking….but she hadn't been doing much thinking at all this morning.
"Mob! Fuck! Warn a person when you're going to do that!" said Minegishi as their eyes burnt in ways that they had never thought possible. This was not how they had planned to be spending the wee hours of the morning. They had planned to have been sleeping like all of the other sane people in the world. Well now that dream, like so many others, was dead and buried….but that was fine. Mob had cut herself….somehow…and she needed help and she didn't want to go to that healer and Minegishi could not blame her. That guy was a two day old microwave reheated French fry with no salt. They were amazed that Suzuki kept him around considering how much his favorite kid disliked the guy.
But they were not awake enough to try and understand the mind of Suzuki. It was too early for that shit.
"Sorry! I just….I'll go. I wasn't thinking and I haven't been thinking all morning and I'm sorry for waking you up and also for that thing with the light and…and I'll just go now." Said Mob. She turned around but a hand around her arm stopped her. She heard the bed creak and then Minegishi turned her around.
"No, it's fine, you can stay…and you said something about a cut?" asked Minegishi. They checked the time on their phone. Five something in the morning….how had Mob managed to hurt herself at this ungodly hour? Heh. Maybe she and that brother of hers really were related after all.
"This cut." Said Mob a she nodded and put her leg up on the bed. She rolled down her sock and showed Minegishi the cut on her leg…and it looked worse now in the light. She could see the strip of her skin where she had tried to shave….and at least the hair was gone….along with the skin….
It was gross looking.
She knew that Minegishi thought so too. She knew that her leg was all bloody and gross and now she would have a scar and then not only would people think that she was gross because she had werewolf legs but also because she would have a scar there too and this….this was the worst! Minegishi probably thought so too. That was why they sighed and got up from their bed. They probably thought that she was so gross and-
Oh, they were just going to their messenger bag.
"Mob….do I even want to know how that happened?" asked Minegishi. It looked like someone had tried to peel her like a carrot…and for a moment they wonder if her brother was back to being a little monster. He had never done anything that bad before but he was getting older and bolder and he had it out for anyone Ryou showed positive attention towards…and at some point Ryou was going to have to do something about that….and if her brother had done that then…well…Minegishi didn't know what they would do since that was not their way, hurting kids, but they were not just going to let that slide….if it had even been that kid in the first place.
"I…tried to shave my legs." Said Mob quickly. Minegishi was staring at her now. They had their first aid box in their hands and Mob wished that they would come over and help her already. She knew that she should not have done any of the things that she had done, she knew that she had been really dumb, and she knew that she had made a mistake…and now she just needed her friend to help her, that was all.
"With what? A butcher knife?" asked Minegishi. That was….well first of all Mob was eleven and should not have had to worry about that and second of all somebody needed to teach Mob that you were supposed to shave off your leg hairs…not the skin they grew out of!
"…my dad's razor. Can you fix it and…and not tell me that I was being dumb? Because I knew that I was being dumb when I did it…and I know now that I was being dumb…so please don't tell me that I was being dumb." Said Mob. She closed her eyes and drew her knees up to her chest. She felt Minegishi's aura getting closer and closer until she felt a dip in the bed and a hand gently pushing her legs down below her waist where they belonged.
"I'm not going to tell you that you were dumb. You messed up, that's all, happens to everyone." Said Minegishi. They had to be nice…even though she really wanted to know how someone got that bad of a cut shaving. They hadn't shaved their legs since….well since they had been about sixteen or seventeen…but even then they had never made quite such a mistake….but then again they hadn't been eleven years old shaving with whatever crap razor Suzuki used. Mob was just a kid and she needed guidance and understanding and….and Minegishi was the closest thing to an adult with half a brain in her life…so certain responsibilities fell to them….
Like teaching Mob how to shave, apparently.
"It does? This happened to you, too?" asked Mob. She felt….better. She felt better and Minegishi hadn't even started to clean her cut or anything yet. It felt….good…to know that someone else had messed up as badly as she had. She couldn't ever picture Minegishi worrying about people making fun of them for the way they looked, they didn't care what most people thought actually, and she couldn't picture Minegishi at her age borrowing their dad's razor and cutting themselves on accident…but she didn't need to picture it to know that Minegishi was telling the truth.
"I've cut myself shaving before….but not this badly…but it happens. Come on, I'll get this cleaned up for you and then after we get some sleep I'll show you how to shave. Alright? Sounds good?" Said Minegishi. Yup. They were going to teach Mob how to shave before she skinned herself alive on accident. Even though they hated shaving…it was for Mob. It was for Mob and for Mob they would do…a lot of stuff that they hated doing.
"Minegishi…thank you. I would like that a lot." said Mob. She had messed up but…but Minegishi was going to show her what to do…and she wished that she had just gone to them in the first place. They were her friend and…and she didn't care if they knew that she had gross, hairy, werewolf legs. They would never be mean to her, they were her friend, and they would always be there for her. They would never be mean to her and they would teach her the things she needed to know.
She was so happy that she had a friend like Minegishi.
She was happy that she had someone who was there for her, who would teach her how to do things, and who…who would always be there for her. If she needed to know something then Minegishi would teach her and…and Minegishi would always be there for her whenever she needed to know something or just….just needed someone. She wouldn't wake up one day and they would be gone and she would be all alone to figure stuff out….
Minegishi would always be there for her. They were her best friend.