It was hard to make people happy.
Everyone just had their own idea of what would make them happy. Mob wished that there was something that everyone would agree on, then it would have been a lot simpler, and cheaper too. Dad was upset about money. She didn't know why, they had plenty of money. Minegishi had told her, once, that Claw had more money than God. Mob didn't know why a God would have needed money for things but then again she didn't know a lot about praying and religion and stuff. Maybe God did need money. People thought that Dad was the avatar of a God so they sent him a lot of money, well they sent Claw a lot of money, and Claw did need the money.
For fun stuff, though, not boring stuff.
"Some-someone else is coming, Miss Suzuki. Should I let them in?" asked Serizawa, clutching his umbrella in his hands. He was jumpier than usual today, probably because of all the people who had been coming in and out of her office. They usually spent their days together, sometimes with Hatori, though he didn't normally get up before noon if he could avoid it. Serizawa did a little better when he was with Hatori, two friends were better than one, but she could take care of him on her own.
After all, that was what friends were for.
"You can." Said Mob. Serizawa reached out with his powers and opened the door. She could have done it herself but she knew that he needed the practice. Practice made perfect and his powers, and she knew that this was mean, but his powers were less than perfect. He didn't explode as often as he used to but that didn't mean that he had good control. Fine movements were the key to good control, Dad had said, and he knew what he was talking about. He may have been mean, and kind of a jerk sometimes, but he did know a lot about powers.
Not a lot about being a Dad, though.
But that was normal for him. She didn't even know why she even cared. She loved Dad but…but she should have known better than to expect him to say something like 'Happy New Year' or 'thank you for taking care of Tokyo for me' or even 'I'm so sorry that I treated you so badly and I love you, also I'm breaking up with my girlfriend because I have Hatori now and four kids is enough' or anything like that. She knew Dad, she had known him for the full thirteen and a half years of her life, and she knew better than to expect things like that from him…but she still expected them anyway…
She was too old for things like that.
The door opened. She sat up straighter and tried to smooth down her hair. She had to look older, now, like a vice president was supposed to. She had to look like she was in charge, Dad would have liked that. She didn't want to be bossy, of course, but she had to look like she was bossy. That was management, it was very complicated sometimes…and mean. Dad thought that you had to be a little bit mean, and he had a weird definition of a little bit, to be in charge. If he had been there he would have yelled at that Awakened for daring to intrude into his office, for daring to talk to him, and for daring to dare to think that what he had to say mattered. He would have told him to get out, to turn around and leave, and other mean things like that. Well Mob wasn't like that. She let him walk right up to her desk.
Even if it did kind of take a long time.
"Miss Suzuki, we have a guest." Said Serizawa. She could see that but it was good for Serizawa to get used to talking to people that weren't her, that weren't their friends, that he didn't know. Talking around people was the first step to talking to them, she thought, though she didn't know for sure. Sometimes she worried if everything she was doing to help him was actually hurting him. He was fine when he was with her but when they were apart he got scared so easily…even when he was all alone with Hatori, his second best friend…
She was going to worry about one person at a time.
"Thank you, Serizawa." Said Mob, smiling at him. He smiled back. He had a really nice smile. She just wished that she could have seen it more often, or for longer, but she had things to do besides watch him smile.
It was a mean thought to have but part of her kind of wanted to be alone with her friend for a little longer.
"Hi, you can talk now." said Mob. They didn't normally talk unless she gave them permission. She didn't know why they were like that, she had told them that they could talk to her whenever they wanted to about whatever they wanted to, but they still always waited for her to give them permission. Maybe it was just another holdover from when Dad was in charge here.
She was always cleaning up after him…but that was just how it had always been.
"Are you sure?" asked the Awakened
"Yes." Said Mob
"Really?" asked the Awakened
"Really." Said Mob
"Are you sure it's ok?" asked the Awakened
"Yes, Now please talk." Said Mob. She had said please so that was ok…right? Maybe she shouldn't have said 'now'…though she did want him to talk now…talking to people was hard, sometimes…she couldn't blame people for having trouble knowing when to talk.
"Um…Miss Vice President Suzuki?" asked the Awakened in front of her. He was one of a long line of Awakened that had come to her office today. It was the New Year now and that meant that she had a whole year to plan a lot of fun stuff for everyone to do. Also at some point they were going to try and take over the world but that wasn't as important. That was Dad's dream, not hers.
"You can just call me Mob, or Shigeko, or just Suzuki if you want. Saying all of that with my name just takes too long." Said Mob. The Awakened turned red and started to stutter.
"I-I-I could never! I mean I don't know you and I have no right to talk to you like that and we aren't even friends-" said the Awakened
"This is Claw, we're all friends here." Said Mob. Dad ran Claw in the meanest way possible. His idea of being in charge meant that everyone had to treat him like the boss, well he was the boss, but they didn't have to kowtow and stuff like that. Mob much preferred to have people treat her like a friend. It just felt better. They were all in this together, of course, so they all should have been friends. There was no sense in treating her any different just because she was on this side of the desk.
"We-we are!" said Serizawa quickly. He didn't look up. She wished that he had, it would have been more polite, but just talking was more than good enough for her. She let her aura rest on his for a little bit, just so that he knew that she was there for him.
"We are, so what is it? Did you have an idea for something we could do this year?" asked Mob
"I…I thought, I mean some of us downstairs were thinking, that…um…it would be cool if we…if we could all…um…" said the Awakened. Mob smiled, it was important to smile, even though she knew that her smile wasn't that great. When she had been little, back when she had been little enough to go to school, the other kids had told her that her smile was weird and creepy. It might have gotten better now, she had been smiling through a lot of these sorts of mini meetings, and it was probably getting even better right now. It was important to keep on smiling no matter what, it made people feel more at ease around you. She wasn't Dad, she wasn't going to rule through fear. She didn't even want to rule at all. It was much better when they all got along as friends.
"Take your time. We have all day." Said Mob
"But Miss Suzuki, don't you have a Skype meeting with the head of the Third Division? And what about your daily phone call with Sho? And three of your shows update today." Said Serizawa
"Thank you for remembering all of that, but none of it is more important than hearing what people want and care about and stuff like that. I can always reschedule meetings and watch my shows later…can't really ignore Sho….but everything else can wait. Everyone in Claw is important, from the Division heads to the Awakened, and I love each and every single one of you." said Mob, making sure to do her friendliest smile. The Awakened in front of her turned even redder…and started to sway where he stood. She used her powers to push a chair next to him but he didn't sit down…even though he really looked like he needed to sit down.
"Miss Suzuki…you're such a good person." Said Serizawa
"Thank you, you're a good person too. We're all good people here." Said Mob. She didn't know what she had done that was so good, she hadn't said anything that any decent person wouldn't have said, but she had been a part of Claw for her entire life. She knew how mean people could be.
"No, Miss Vice President Suzuki Shigeko, you're a good person and…and…um…ok. Downstairs we were talking and we were thinking that…that we could have a make your own sundae bar in the cafeteria and, um, also we wanted to start a hamster café!" said the Awakened
"Don't you mean a cat café?" asked Mob
"We…we like hamsters. I mean because Sho likes hamsters and you like hamsters and…and he gave some of us hamsters and…and hamsters are the key to salvation so we wanted to start a hamster café." Said the Awakened. Mob shrugged.
"Ok, sure. Those sound like good ideas…I don't really know how a hamster café would work but that's still a good idea." Said Mob. Sometimes you had to lie to make someone feel better. A hamster café sounded like a terrible idea. Hamsters were small, very small, and it was easy to accidentally step on them if you weren't careful. Also they had babies like crazy so you had to make sure that the boys and the girls didn't fall in love with each other, or maybe they were all friends with benefits or something, either way they loved to do all the things with each other and had a bunch of babies every few weeks…and also they ate the babies and that wasn't nice to see…and also they ate each other sometimes, too, when they got stressed…and they kind of smelled bad if you weren't fast about cleaning up after them…this really wasn't a good idea at all…
But Mob wasn't going to be mean.
"Really?! You mean it? Wow, I can't wait to tell everyone! Thank you so much, Miss Vice President Shigeko Suzuki, I mean Miss Vice President Mob Suzuki Shigeko, I mean Miss Vice-" said the Awakened. Mob smiled through every single version of her name he came up with, she was nice like that. She couldn't afford to be mean, she wasn't Dad…she didn't want to be Dad…but sometimes she was a lot like him.
Like now.
The energy around her shifted. She knew what that meant…and she was kind of grateful for the interruption. Dad would have been happy, too, to have someone cut a meeting short for him. Fukuda did that sometimes. Sho had said that they were such good friends that Fukuda just automatically knew when Dad needed to be saved…even though it was so weird to think of Dad as someone who needed to be saved…or Fukuda as someone who actually cared enough about someone to save them…it was mean but true. Fukuda was a jerk, and a weird person too, but Dad liked him…another way that she was like Dad.
Not that Shimazaki came anywhere close to being as mean or jerky as Fukuda was.
"Mob, got you something." Said Shimazaki as he put a milkshake down in front of her…a pretty one. There were marshmallows on sticks, little pieces of candy, cotton candy, and the whole thing was dusted with edible glitter…it was beautiful…but how did he know? How could he tell that it was something so pretty? And why had he gotten it for her? Well, actually, she knew why. He liked her.
But only as a friend now.
"I-bye!" shouted the Awakened before he ran out of her office. She didn't want him to be scared…but she'd been pretty tired of that mini meeting. It was nice, now, she could breathe a little better…she didn't know why. Three people wasn't enough to suck all the air out of the room, at least not one this big, and anyway her door was opened. She was so weird sometimes.
So clueless.
"Thank you, Shimazaki. It's so pretty!" said Mob. She wasn't so clueless that she didn't know to say thank you. She took the milkshake with her powers. It was bright pink, strawberry, and…ok, now she really needed to know how he had gotten her this.
"How did you-" said Mob
"How did you know to get strawberry? I mean strawberry milk is Miss Suzuki's favorite and…and it's pink and you don't know what pink is. I mean, um, that was mean! I shouldn't have said anything!" said Serizawa. Mob patted him on the shoulder gently. It was ok, she had been thinking it too. He had just beat her to it. She didn't think that it was mean…she hadn't thought that it was mean…but now it kind of might have been mean, if he thought that it was…if he felt that it was mean and…wait, she knew better…but now it felt like she didn't.
"I was hanging out at the mall tripping people with my cane and I felt a lot of people concentrated around this one place, and it smelled like milk, so I figured it was something that Mob would have liked. Also I know what strawberry is even if I don't know what pink is." Said Shimazaki in that tone he used when he talked to Shimazaki, the one that even she thought was kind of mean…she didn't know why he had to be so mean to Serizawa. They were both very nice people, Serizawa showed it better, and they could have been very good friends if only Shimazaki could have just been as nice to him as he had been to her. In a friend way, of course, because that was what they were now.
They were just friends now…even if this had been the kind of thing that he'd done when they'd been more than friends.
"That's…that's not nice at all…" said Serizawa. Mob agreed, though she knew to be nicer than that.
"Serizawa means that when you trip people then they could get hurt and that's not nice, um, and I know that you're nicer than that." Said Mob. Shimazaki just shrugged.
"I'm as nice as I want to be. Anyway, what are you up to? Listening to the Awakened stutter their way through their life stories?" asked Shimazaki
"I'm taking suggestions for what we should do this year. Fun things we can do, I mean. They want a hamster café." Said Mob. Shimazaki laughed and shook his head.
"What are they on and where can I get some?" asked Shimazaki
"I don't think that they're on anything. I mean I never said that they weren't allowed to take anything but I think that it's best that they don't." said Mob
"Well then maybe they should if that's the best that they could come up with." Said Shimazaki as he reached over and took a sip from her milkshake. She didn't mind. They'd shared germs before, and in worse ways than that. Serizawa didn't seem to see it that way, though.
"That-that belongs to Miss Suzuki. I mean you got it for her…you know that." Said Serizawa. Shimazaki tossed a piece of hard candy at him.
"Of course I do, Mob doesn't mind sharing. Do you, Mob?" asked Shimazaki
"No, not really. That's what friends do, they share." Said Mob
"Um…ok…but Hatori told me not to let you do anything weird to Miss Suzuki or be weird and…and that just seemed kind of weird…sorry! He just told me, I mean, not to let anything weird happen but he didn't tell me what counted as weird…or maybe I should have asked him…or maybe-" said Serizawa as Shimazaki threw another piece of hard candy at him.
"Fuck Hatori, literally. He needs it." Said Shimazaki
"Shimazaki! That's…that's not…please don't say things like that and please don't throw things at people. It's not nice. I don't like it when you do things like that." Said Mob. Shimazaki shrugged.
"Yeah, I know you don't. Enjoy your milkshake, I've got things to do today." Said Shimazaki. He took another sip of her milkshake and teleported away….she knew him. She knew what it meant when he teleported away like that, and when his voice sounded like that. She knew him…and she knew that, if they had been together, and she had gone after him then he would have wanted to kiss her and stuff….and they didn't do that anymore.
She didn't want them to do that anymore.
It was just too weird. They were broken up now and she didn't want to get back together. It had been weird, mostly, them being like that and she'd made a big mess, too. One that she was still trying to clean up. Minegishi still wasn't back…they were with their boyfriend…but it had been a while now. Not that she was going to make them come back, not that she was going to make the mess that they were in any worse. They weren't mad at her now and she didn't want that to change…she had to keep things good between them…she didn't need another mess to clean up.
She had enough messes as it was.
"I'm sorry about Shimazaki, I don't know why he does the things he does…I guess he was mad about something." Said Mob as she cleaned the pieces of candy up that Shimazaki had been throwing. Serizawa raised his arms so she could get them all off. She hadn't even had to ask. That had been nice of him.
"I didn't mean to make him mad….I was just doing what Hatori told me to do. He's worried about you." said Serizawa as he put his arms down. Mob held the pieces of candy with her powers. They weren't that dirty…but she wasn't Mukai, she knew better than to put them back into her milkshake. She put them in the trash…but now her milkshake looked all mess up….
"He doesn't need to worry, we're broken up now, and even if we hadn't been he wouldn't have had to worry. I don't even know what everyone is so worried about, sometimes…it's not like I meant to cheat, I mean to be a part of cheating." Said Mob as she used her powers to rearrange her milkshake. She put all the remaining pieces back in a way where it didn't look like any had been taken out…but the level was a lot lower now. It had been so pretty when she had gotten it.
"I think, um, I don't know. it just seems kind of weird because he's a lot older than you…that's what people say, I mean. I mean that's what I've heard, I mean. I mean it just seems kind of…um….not usual…I mean. I mean I don't know what's usual and what isn't, I mean." Said Serizawa. Mob finished fixing her shake, now it looked pretty again…if only other things in life were so easy to fix. She put her shake down and turned to face Serizawa. He wasn't going to explode…but he was shaky a little bit. She put her aura over his.
"You don't have to worry about me, none of you do. I don't think it's that weird, people have boyfriends and stuff all the time. I don't know why it would be so weird to think of someone wanting to be with me. I mean I know that I'm weird and clueless-" said Mob
"You're not! You're not weird or anything! You're nice and smart and pretty, too, you're…you're really nice and I'm sure that a lot of people would have wanted to be with you. You're really pretty and nice like…um…like that shake!" said Serizawa pointing to her shake.
"I'm not that pretty…or even pretty at all." Said Mob. She didn't think that she was pretty at all. She wasn't ugly, she just wasn't pretty. Not like other people. Minegishi was really pretty even though they never wore makeup. Minori had been pretty, too, even when she hadn't been wearing makeup. Tsuchiya was pretty, too, even though she didn't use any makeup to cover up her scar. Mob didn't look pretty or ugly…she was just kind of…there.
"You-you are! You're…you're really pretty and I didn't mean it like that. I just meant that…I don't know what I meant…sorry. Sometimes I don't know what I mean, I just kind of say things. I was just thinking that you were pink and, I mean that you liked pink, but um…I guess that you like blue better…but um...It just felt like you were…I mean I thought that…I mean I don't know what I thought." Said Serizawa, tripping over his words. It wasn't annoying when he did it, not like when the Awakened did, though she shouldn't have thought that they were annoying. She shouldn't have thought that anyone was annoying.
She should have been nicer than that.
If he thought that she was pretty then she was pretty…even if she didn't feel like she was…but what she felt didn't matter. If she spent all of her time focusing on what she felt then she wouldn't have any time left over to focus on how her friends, how the people around her felt, and that would have been so selfish. She was done being selfish. She was done being a bad friend.
She was done making messes for herself to just end up cleaning up later.
"That's ok, you're right. I am…I'm very pretty. I'm as pretty as this milkshake. See?" asked Mob. She picked the milkshake up and got her phone off the charger. She took a picture with it, like she and Minori used to do when they had been friends and went places together. She made sure to make the right kind of smile and to get her hair out of her face, that way she wouldn't look like a ghost. She could almost hear Minori's voice, the ghost of it, in her ear.
'You look like you're going to climb out of a well, Shige.'
She did kind of look like the girl from the ring movies…she made sure that she didn't. She smiled right and got her hair out of her eyes…this was a good picture, actually. She kind of liked the way she looked in it…it felt weird, liking the way she looked. She felt kind of like she was doing something wrong, like she was telling a lie that only she could hear. She looked pretty…but it wasn't a lie, was it? Not if someone else thought that she was pretty…right?
She posted the picture.
She hadn't posted anything in a while, that was all. She and Minori used to post things all the time. It was important, Minori had said. There was no point in having fun unless other people knew that you were having fun…she didn't get it…but it was kind of nice to be…she didn't know. Maybe it was nice to be normal, to do the things that other people her age did…it was such a random thing to be worried about, to care about…thinking about being friends with Minori was weird, too…
Maybe because she was posting such weird things.
She had a picture of a cupcake with ants on it. It said 'happy pointless birthday'. Mob scrolled down…nothing else from her…that was weird for a lot of reasons. She didn't know what that post had meant, it had been weird for a birthday post, and she hadn't posted anything else…this was so weird for her…but they weren't friends anymore. Did Mob even get to worry about someone who wasn't her friend anymore?
She didn't know.
There were a lot of rules that she didn't understand, especially when it came to friends. Normal people friends. She knew, mostly, what to do with her esper friends…maybe she just needed to worry about her esper friends…her actual friends. Minori didn't want to be her friend and if someone didn't want to be her friend then she didn't want to be friends with them…like Dad had said…though he had said that about not wanting to be married to Mom anymore…
She didn't know how to be like that.
They weren't the same. She may have come from him but she wasn't as mean as he was…she didn't know how to be that mean. She didn't know how to be mean at all…not on purpose. She wasn't going to be mean to Minori but…but was ignoring this weird stuff being mean? Or would it have been mean to bother her when she didn't want to be friends with Mob or see or hear from her? Or maybe it would have been mean to-
This was complicated.
"You…you look nice there, I mean….I mean I don't know a lot about taking pictures but I think that you look nice." Said Serizawa as he leaned over. She clicked her phone off. She felt someone, another aura, coming towards her office. She pushed her milkshake to the side of the table, towards Serizawa. She didn't think that she'd have time to drink it before it melted…even though she had made it look really nice.
"Thank you, Serizawa, that means a lot to me that you feel that way…um..do you want the rest of my milkshake? I don't think that I'll have time to drink it, another person is coming." Said Mob
"But…but it's yours, Miss Suzuki….it's for you." Said Serizawa. Mob shrugged and pushed it even closer to him with her powers.
"No, you can have it." Said Mob. She wanted it but she didn't have time to drink it…but that was ok. She was happy, of course, that her friend was happy. She didn't even care that she didn't get to finish it even though it had been really pretty and…and strawberry, too, which she loved. She didn't care if she didn't get to finish it. Serizawa liked strawberry milkshakes and she liked it when he was happy, she liked it when he smiled, and she liked being the person who made him happy.
And, really, what could have been better than making one of her friends happy?