Suzuki Shigeko did, in fact, have a father.

Her Dad was named Suzuki Touichirou. He was forty seven years old, he had red hair, and a really bad temper. He liked eggs and ketchup, and hated jello, and one time she swore she saw him drinking ketchup right out of a glass. That must have happened when she had been really little, though, since the memory wasn't that clear. Also because Dad had been home long enough for her to learn something about him. Dad must have been home more when she was young, after all he must have spent time with Mom at some point, though he wasn't really home that often.

He was home now, though.

Dad wasn't around a lot, he was always really busy being the president of his company, but when he was he was kind of…Dad. Kind of distant. Kind of quiet. Kind of scary sometimes. Shigeko even sometimes felt like he didn't like her. Maybe it was because he didn't seem to like anyone…or maybe it was because she had never given him much of a reason to like her.

But at least, before, she had never given him much of a reason to dislike her…not like now.

"To think that he would accuse me of cheating! Wait, you just wait, wait until my Dad hears about this!" said Minori as she walked beside Shigeko. Minori's car was following them, creeping along the road slowly. She had offered a bunch of times to give Shigeko a ride home but she always said 'no' to the offer no matter how long the walk back to the castle was or how badly her school shoes pinched.

She wanted to put as much distance between her and the castle as possible. Between her and her parents as possible.

"But Minori, we kind of did-" said Shigeko

"I mean the amount of homework we get is criminal! How is a normal human being supposed to have a life if they're chained to their desk all day working on pointless math problems?" said Minori

"We, I mean I-" said Shigeko

"Wait, sorry, I didn't mean you." said Minori with a laugh. Shigeko laughed too even though she didn't really feel like laughing. Her shoes felt like they were full of water, like she had stepped into the ocean with her shoes on and now she was being weighed down. Every step felt like she was treading water with wet shoes. Every breath she took felt like she was trying to breath underwater and kind of could but not really because the air was thick with water or…or something….

Going home had never been this hard before.

"You're a totally normal human being or whatever, I'm just more normal and I have more of a life. mainly because my Dad's normal and doesn't have me under house arrest. I mean not right now, of course, but he gets these weird ideas in his head." Said Minori

"Dads can be kind of mean sometimes." Said Shigeko quietly

"Mean and totally nuts! I mean, seriously, he's got this weird idea in his head that something bad is going to happen to me or whatever. He's always talking about how he can't lose me too and blah, blah, blah." Said Minori. Shigeko nodded and kept her eyes trained on the ground in front of her. It felt like she was treading water with wet shoes even though she was walking on the sidewalk and her shoes were totally dry. She didn't want to go home…she glanced backwards.

What was that way?

What would have happened if she had just run away? What would have happened if she just…if she just didn't go home? But where would she have gone? Disneyland popped into her head and she had no idea why. She had never been to Disneyland before. She had never been anywhere before. Just school and home, day in and day out. She could have just left. She was an adult now, practically.

She turned around. She was still just a kid.

"What?" asked Minori

"Nothing." Said Shigeko

"What were you staring at, weirdo?" asked Minori. Shigeko looked around, her eyes darting around so fast it kind of hurt. Minori already thought that she was weird. What would she had thought if she knew that Shigeko had been thinking about running away? Would she had thought she was crazy or….or worse…

Would she had wanted to run away, too?

"Just the…the birds, that's all. There are a lot of birds out today." Said Shigeko. Minori scoffed.

"There are a lot of birds out every day. This place is so fucking gloomy, I don't know why Dad moved us out here. I don't know why Dad does a lot of the things he does." Said Minori

"Because he loves you." said Shigeko without thinking. It was true, Minori's Dad loved her a lot. Why else would he have spent so much time with her, and also why would he have had her followed and stuff when he wasn't around? Sometimes it felt like, to Shigeko at least, that she didn't exist to Dad unless he was home. That would have made sense, like why he never called or wrote or anything like that. Sometimes she wanted a Dad who spent time with her, sometimes she even thought about it, but then also sometimes she thought about it and got a feeling like she was being smothered. Like this but worse.

So, really, she had no idea what she wanted so she was going to make more of an effort to keep her mouth shut.

"Yeah, whatever. If he loved me then he wouldn't always be so…so Dad." Said Minori

"Uh, I guess so. I mean he does a lot for you and-" said Shigeko

"That's just what dads are supposed to do, weirdo. They give you money and rides and get you out of trouble and stuff like that." Said Minori

"I don't think that my Dad would ever do anything like that for me." said Shigeko

"Well, yeah, your parents are complete and total weirdos. I mean my dad can be weird too but he wouldn't, like, let someone accuse me of cheating. He's all about the Asagiri name not being tarnished or whatever…or at least not by me…asshole." Said Minori

"My Dad doesn't want the Suzuki name to be tarnished either, I mean he never told me that I wasn't allowed to cheat but I don't think that this is something that he would be ok with." Said Shigeko

"We didn't cheat, you just helped me with my homework, that's all. There's nothing wrong with giving a friend a helping hand." Said Minori. Shigeko nodded. A black bird flew above them and cawed. Even the birds agreed, it was alright to help your friends out sometimes…even when that help looked a lot like cheating…though she didn't think that Dad would see it that way. At least it seemed like he wouldn't. She felt like she didn't know a lot about him, just what made him mad.

Bad things happened when Dad got mad.

"Yeah, I guess that it's good to help a friend out. I mean I've never had a friend before but I know that you're supposed to help your friends out and stuff like that." Said Shigeko. She got the feeling that Dad wasn't going to see it that way…or maybe he was. She honestly didn't know. She could and couldn't picture her Dad ever having a friend in his life but also she got the feeling that he must have. It was a weird feeling, the kind that prickled at the back of her neck, at the sides of her mind. It felt kind of like she had a loose thread in the back of her school shirt and if she pulled at for long enough-

A bird cawed again. It was loud but not as loud as the thoughts, the worries, in Shigeko's head.

"Exactly. And I know that you're going to be a good enough friend that you would never think of tarnishing the Asagiri name." said Minori

"No, of course I wouldn't." said Shigeko

"Good. I knew I could trust you." said Minori. Shigeko hadn't been thinking, she had just said the first thing that came into her mind, and apparently it had been the right thing to say. Minori stopped walking and actually smiled. She smiled and then took one of Shigeko's braids in her hand. She got the feeling, a flash of fear really, that Minori was going to pull her hair. That had been crazy. Nobody had pulled her hair since…

School?

It must have been in school. When she was younger, a lot younger. Yes, that made sense. It must have been in school. She had never had a friend over but…but there had been something about a doll. Something about dolls and Frozen and…and someone she cared about a lot…she didn't know. She couldn't think about this right now. She had enough going on in her head as it was, so much that she thought that she was going to explode. Like there was this…humming? Like a sort of humming under her skin, like she was a shook up bottle of carbonated milk, like she just had to…had to…

Conceal, don't feel. Power is nothing without control.

"Of course. We're friends." Said Shigeko

"God, I can't believe I ever thought that you would betray me." said Minori

"Betray?" asked Shigeko

"Yeah, stab me in the back and shit like that. You know, tell people what really happened." Said Minori. Shigeko wasn't dumb, she knew what it meant to betray someone, but she would never have done that, and not just because she didn't want to spend the rest of her life in a traitor hole.

"I…helped you. That's what really happened." Said Shigeko. That was the truth, even though it wasn't, but sometimes you had to stretch the truth. For your friend. You had to do a lot for friendship, a lot of things you didn't really think that you could.

"Good…at least I can trust someone…" muttered Minori

"Huh?" asked Shigeko

"Nothing, nothing. Just, uh, yeah. One of these days I'm going to fix your hair, you know. You look like a first grader." Said Minori

"I know. You said so before." Said Shigeko

"Did I?" asked Minori, her eyebrows coming together.

"Yes." Said Shigeko

"When?" asked Minori, her eyebrows still coming together. They looked like a couple of caterpillars, sort of like Dad's, but not as bad. Shigeko tried not to smile. It was kind of hard. The idea, the mental picture, of Dad's eyebrows coming together and him being all confused…not that she had ever seen that before, no, but if she had it would have been really interesting.

"I don't remember." Said Shigeko

"Then I didn't. God, Suzuki, you're so weird sometimes." Laughed Minori. Shigeko did her best to laugh too even though she really didn't feel like it.

"Yeah, I…I am." Said Shigeko

"But you're a good friend, too. We should hang out or something, you know." said Minori

"But we're in the same class, we hang out all the time." Said Shigeko

"No, I mean after school or something." said Minori

"But my mom-" said Shigeko

"Who cares what she says. Just because your parents are really weird that doesn't mean that you have to be." Said Minori

"Oh…um….alright, I guess…" said Shigeko. She turned and looked down the road. It was long, very long, and kind of winding and misty and foggy and….and she had no idea what was down that road. She had lived here for her entire life but it felt like she had only been to school and home. There was a part of her, a part that felt really far away, that wanted to go. To just get into a car or a train or a plane and just see what there was to see…but she had never been anywhere and never would go anywhere.

Especially out with a friend.

"But not today! I have a lot to do today with my friends-my OTHER friends, so yeah. See you later, Suzuki, and remember what we agreed on!" said Minori before she jumped into her car and slammed the door. The driver drove off so fast that the car's tires squealed. It wasn't a good sound. Shigeko shivered and held her arms close. It was cold out, suddenly much colder, but maybe she just felt like that because she was alone. People made a lot of body heat so maybe that was it…or something. She didn't know. She should have been used to being alone by now so why did it feel so…so different now? So much like-

A bird cawed.

Shigeko got back to walking. She wasn't that far from the castle. She could see it, it took up so much of the block, the house and the wall around it. She didn't know why she had to live in such a big house if it was just her and mom and dad. She wished…part of her wished that it had just been her in the house. Her own house…she could have filled it with whatever she wanted. Whoever she wanted. If she'd had her own house then she could have lived there alone with all of her friends. So far her only friend was Minori but if she could make one friend then that proved she could make others, collect them, like she collected her dolls…

But her dolls weren't real.

People weren't dolls. People could make their own choices and she had no idea why one would choose to be her friend. She was weird and boring and…and she should have been grateful for what she had. She wasn't anything special, nothing about her set her apart, so why did she think that people would have been drawn to her? Drawn to her enough to not only be her friend but to live in a big giant, house with her….

She was such a kid sometimes.

She wanted to go home and play with her dollhouse, like a kid would have, but she doubted that she would get the chance. Dad was back and that meant that Mom had probably told him what happened and that meant that she was about to walk into so much trouble…Dad was so scary sometimes. He was so much bigger and stronger than she was. If she could just have been as strong as him…but that was never going to happen. She was just a kid, just a girl, and she would always be this way. She didn't know why she kept on thinking that…that there was some way that she could take him, or at least get him to listen….

This was real life.

She opened the door of the gate wall slowly, quietly, maybe even thinking that if she was quiet enough her parents wouldn't know that she had gotten home. Maybe if she crept through the house quietly, like a ghost, for long enough then her parents would even forget that they had a daughter. She pulled her arms in close and her…she didn't know what she had been trying to do there. Tightening something around herself….something that both was and was not there….so weird. This whole thing was just so weird and worrying and…and she just….she had to keep going.

She closed the gate.

The walk was a long one, longer than she remembered. The house was taller than she remembered. It seemed to jut out into the sky tall enough to block out the sun. She shivered, wishing that she had worn a thicker coat. It was colder out than the North Pole, the one that pretended to be the North Pole, not the real ones. The ones with the tiny houses and the Santa theme park and-

Something she had seen on TV?

She closed her eyes and opened the front door. She wasn't going to open the door and find a cozy little cabin house that smelled like hot cocoa and had a bunch of noise, but loving noise, inside. A bunch of friends and family, people who loved her…well the house did have her parents in it but she really wasn't sure if they loved her. She had never given them a reason to love her. She had never given anyone a reason to love her in her entire life…or even to like her. She had always just kind of been there…

But she had never given anyone a reason to hate her before, either.

The house was warm, Mom liked it warm, but it was quiet too. Nothing, not even the TV. She took her shoes off in the genkan, making sure that they faced the right way. Mom's were there, not that they ever moved, and Dad's were beside hers. She had almost tripped over them, not being used to them being there. A pair of big, black shoes…boy's shoes. There weren't usually boy's anything in the house. She slid Dad's shoes closer together and then reached over…to nothing.

There were no other shoes in the genkan.

Definitely not a pair of scuffed up green sneakers, high ones, with doodles all over them. Shoes that she wished she'd bought another pair of because they must have been much too small by now. Shoes that she knew that she needed to wash, should have washed a while ago, but also knew that she couldn't have ever washed them because then the doodles would be washed off and then the shoes' owner would be so mad at her…the shoes' owner…

There was a spider in the corner.

There, where the house's floor rose up above the stone of the genkan, in that corner was a spider. She jumped back and held out her hand…nothing happened. Of course nothing happened, it wasn't like she was going to do something gross and squish the spider with her bare hands or anything like that. She picked up her shoe and went to squish it before it could escape and find some place to lay it's eggs.

She was too slow.

As soon as she turned around the spider was gone. Nothing was left of it, not even a web. Shigeko frowned. Now she was going to be dealing with spiders for the rest of her life. The house, no, probably the entire city was completely infested with bugs…arachnids? Yeah, that was right, spiders were their own thing. Well, whatever they were, she didn't want them in the house. She put her shoe back beside her other one and looked up.

Oh.

"Look who decided to finally come home." Said Mom. She was standing there, at the very edge of the floor, where the house met the genkan. She was in her pajamas still and robe. Her arms were crossed and she was tapping her foot. She was barefoot, too, not even socks. Mom could be kind of weird like that sometimes. She didn't even rinse off before getting into the bathtub. Shigeko used to be that way too, back when she had been little, back before….something had happened. Something about Mom. Something she would try and remember later. Right now she had to deal with Mom in the present, not whatever Mom had done in the past, and present Mom looked really mad.

It was actually nice, in a weird way, having Mom care about her this much.

"Sorry Mom, I was just…um…I got caught up walking home with a friend." Said Shigeko as she hung her school bag up on the hook. She had to take her eyes off of Mom to do that. She may not have been able to see Mom with her back turned but she could still hear the tapping of Mom's bare foot against the wood of the floor.

"A friend?" Asked Mom. Shigeko nodded and took a step forward. Mom didn't move, she just still stood there tapping her foot. There was no room to actually enter the house. She was stuck there in her socks in the genkan.

It felt very wrong.

"Uh-huh, she's in my class. Her name is Minori, well Asagiri Minori, but she likes people to call her by her given name even though she calls everyone by their family name, and she um…she wanted to walk home with me. I mean it was only part of the way but…but that was…that was why I'm so late coming home." Said Shigeko

"A friend from your class?" asked Mom

"Um…yeah. She's from my class and…and can I come in the house? It's weird standing here in just my socks. I kind of want to put my shoes on, actually….but I won't because that would be weird." Said Shigeko

"And why should I let you in the house with the way you've been behaving?" asked Mom

"The way I was…what?" asked Shigeko

"I got a call from your school today. Apparently you've been cheating?" said Mom. She was asking a question even though it didn't really sound like it. Shigeko pulled at her braid. Mom was mad, well and truly mad, if she had an aura…like in anime, not in life, then it would have been all red and angry or maybe yellow because Mom loved yellow. Her nightgown was yellow and so was her robe and headband.

Shigeko had no idea how someone wearing so much yellow, so much of such a cheery color, could have possibly looked so angry.

"I was, um, I mean I wasn't cheating. What happened was-" said Shigeko

"Don't lie to me!" said Mom. She had been practically shouting…Shigeko had never heard anything like that before. Mom shouting. She was usually so quiet…that wasn't like her, that wasn't like her at all. She wracked her brain and couldn't come up with a single memory of her mom ever yelling at her….not a single one.

Something moved out of the corned of her eye. The spider was back.

"Don't lie to me, Shigeko, I'm your mother." Said Mom, this time a lot more normally. Quietly, kind of sadly, or maybe just tiredly. Shigeko blinked. Had she imagined that? Had she been daydreaming? But why would she have wanted to daydream about something as horrible as her mom yelling at her? Shigeko saw something else move…something was there, right there, in the corner of her vision. She glanced to the left.

The spider was gone. If it had ever been there in the first place.

"I wasn't lying I just…that's what happened. I wasn't cheating. I just helped Minori, I mean she helped me, I mean we helped each other! That's what happened. We just helped each other." Said Shigeko

"Is that what really happened?" asked Mom. Shigeko nodded. The words had felt heavy and clumsy in her mouth, like she had stuffed her mouth with way too much popcorn and now she was trying to keep it all in so she didn't look really dumb. Mom was her mom, her mother, her parent and you weren't supposed to lie to anyone but especially not your parents….but Minori had asked her to…and they were friends….

You were supposed to be there for your friends even if it meant doing things that you normally wouldn't have done…like telling lies.

"It is. I helped her and she helped me and that was why our homework looked so much alike. Honest." Said Shigeko. Mom stepped down. Now she was right there in the genkan with Shigeko…and she still didn't have any shoes on. Being barefoot in the genkan was weirder than being in your socks in the genkan. Not that Shigeko should have thinking things like that, that her mom was weird. She had already lied to her mom and that was enough meanness for one day,

For one lifetime.

"You swear?" asked Mom

"I'm not supposed to swear." Said Shigeko. She had heard someone say something like that before, she just didn't know from where, but she knew that it had gotten a laugh…that it had cut through the tension. This tension that she could feel in the air around them. Well she must have seen that on TV or something because in real life it didn't work at all.

Not one bit.

"If this is the truth then you can go and explain it to your father." Said Mom

"To…to Dad?" asked Shigeko quietly

"You have a father I don't know about?" asked Mom

"No, I mean I wouldn't know if I did, because he would be a father I didn't know and…um….I know that I'm not adopted and that you would never cheat on Dad so-" said Shigeko

"Just go, Shigeko, go to your father's office right now and take that smart mouth of yours with you." said Mom, pointing behind her. Shigeko pulled at her braid. She understood but also she just…she didn't. Mom had never told her that she had a smart mouth before, she wasn't even sure what that meant. Wasn't she supposed to be smart? Wasn't that why she went to school and stuff like that for?

"But Mom, don't you want me to be smart?" asked Shigeko

"I don't want you to be a smart alack." Said Mom

"But what's a smart alack? I've never heard that before…is it an English thing? I mean an American thing?" asked Shigeko. She knew that Mom had come from another country, or at least one of her parents had. She wasn't sure which one, actually. She had never asked Mom about that. She had never asked Mom a lot of things about her life…and suddenly she wanted to. Suddenly she wanted to know everything that there was to know about her mom before time ran out.

Time?

She looked over Mom's shoulder to the clock in the hallway. It was just a decoration, there weren't even any numbers on it just lines, but…but she felt like the clock was ticking. Like she was running out of time…but the clock wasn't ticking at all. It was still and had been for a long while now. Long enough for cobwebs to cover it…

And spiders.

"It means that I don't want any lip from you, now go." Said Mom

"But what does lip mean?" asked Shigeko

"You know what I mean." Said Mom

"I don't, though, that's the thing. I don't know what you mean and…and I don't know you." said Shigeko

"I am your mother, you know me. We've been together since the day you were born." Said Mom rolling her eyes…something else Shigeko had never seen Mom do before.

"What was it like when I was born?" asked Shigeko

"What are you talking about?" asked Mom

"When I was born. What was it like? Were you excited to meet me? Did it hurt? What's it like to have a baby? What's it like to be pregnant? When did you know that you were going to have me? Were you excited or scared? If I had a baby I would have been so scared because…because they can be kind of scary sometimes." Said Shigeko. She got another feeling…it was like drowning. She felt something heavy in her arms. She looked down. Nothing was there…nothing was there and she was fine. Everything was fine and normal…normal-ish.

"I don't have time for all of these questions." Said Mom before she turned around and took a step up…and away. Mom was going away. She was leaving. Shigeko reached out and grabbed her hand without thinking.

"Don't go!" said Shigeko

"Shigeko! What do you think you're doing?" asked Mom. She tried to pull her hand away but Shigeko didn't let go. The lights above them dimmed. Mom tried to pull her hand away but Shigeko held on with strength that she didn't know that she had. The lights got even dimmer until the room was just filled with a glow…some kind of….

Blue?

Pink?

"You can't go! You can't leave me! Not until you tell me…tell me everything! Tell me why! Tell me why you….why are you like this? What makes you so tired and sad and…and what's your favorite color?! Is it yellow?" asked Shigeko pulling on her mom's arm as hard as she could.

"Let go of-" said Mom as she nearly pulled her arm free. Shigeko just held tighter. The whole room was cast in a weird glow, pink and blue, but she didn't care. She just had to keep mom there, she had to stay there forever, she had to stay in the castle. The castle was their home and mom wasn't allowed to leave it!

"I think that your favorite color is yellow because you always wore, you always WEAR a lot of yellow but you never told me! Like how I think that your favorite movie is the Aristocats because you have a plate with Marie and Toulouse a-and the black one on it….I can't remember the other cat's name but you must like that movie or…or do you just like cats? Did you have any cats when you were a kid? Did your parents let you have pets? What about friends? Did you have a lot of friends when you were my age? Did you go to school? Did you wear a uniform like mine or…or one of those other kinds that looks like a real suit and not a sailor suit? Did they make you have a dress code or was it like in anime where everyone's got makeup and jewelry and colored hair…did people ever make fun of you because your hair is blonde? Did you make fun of other people? Were you popular? Were you-" said Shigeko, practically gasping to get all of the words out. She just needed to know everything about her mom but her mom was being so…so…

Like this.

Mom pulled her arm away. She pulled as hard as she could and…and it hurt. Not Shigeko's arm or her hand or her skin but something else. There had been black and red and…and now the room was normal. The lights were on like normal, the normal pale sort of yellowish white they cast on everything. Everything was back the way that it should have been…she was back the way she should have been….

Had things ever even changed? Or had she just gone crazy there for a second?

"I've had quite enough of this!" said Mom as she held her arm close to her chest. She looked…tired, maybe, or sick. Her skin was this weird pale-ish color and her eyes were kind of red. Shigeko felt like she had swallowed an entire glass of spoiled milk. She had done this to her mom. She had made mom sick and tired…she knew how tired mom always was and…and she had made the entire thing worse…

First the lying and now this.

"Mom-" said Shigeko

"I've had enough of you. Now go and tell your father what happened at school, and about your little outburst just now! Maybe he can give you an attitude adjustment because I am just not up to it right now, Shigeko, I am just not up to dealing with your nonsense." Said Mom before she turned and walked away. Shigeko reached out but didn't grab her. She just watched her mom walk away. It was like her feet were stuck to the genkan floor, like she was glued down, like she had stepped into quicksand.

But she hadn't.

The floor was stone and wood, not glue and quicksand, and she was perfectly capable of stepping out of it and into the house. So that was what she did. She took one step out of the genkan and then another and another. She let her feet carry her all the way to Dad's office. He was in there, she knew he was, she could hear the clicking and clacking of his type write-keyboard. Electric word processor. The thing that people did business on these days. Not like the typing classes she had in school…did she still? Didn't they have a…

The door opened on it's own.

It just swung opened and…oh, no it didn't. Dad must have opened it and then sat back down. Dad couldn't open the door from his desk, it wasn't like they had remote controlled doors. They weren't that rich, or even rich at all. Mom had said, when she had been little, that they were comfortably wealthy…that was a clear memory of mom. So it had actually happened. So she wasn't going crazy.

But then again if she had been going crazy would she have actually been able to tell?

She didn't know if she would have. It was like how when you drank a lot it took you a minute to know that you were drunk. You just felt normal, a better version of normal, until you weren't normal at all anymore. Not that she even knew…she must have been losing her mind. That was it. She was completely losing her mind and there was nothing that she could do about it. Her or anyone else.

Especially not Dad. Especially when he got like this.

"I know for a fact that I never taught you to lurk in doorways, Shigeko." Said Dad as he looked up and his eyes met hers. Had his eyes always been so…like that? Something was wrong, very wrong, but she didn't know what. The whole thing just felt…off. Different.

Different but the same.

"I-I'm not lurking." Said Shigeko

"Then what do you call this?" asked Dad

"I'm…waiting for you to invite me inside." Said Shigeko. Dad raised an eyebrow and then waved at her. She flinched, suddenly, and grabbed her braids with one hand and held her other hand out. She had been trying to….she didn't know. She was going to stop being weird now. She walked quickly over to Dad's desk and…and how had he gotten over there so fast?

He had always been there, of course.

He had opened the door but also been at his desk and…and it made sense. It had to make sense. Even though Dad's office was huge. It had always been huge, so many steps from the door to the desk, with tall shelves and tall windows. A desk big enough that she could have used it as a bed. If it had been her office she would have put more furniture in, places for people she liked to sit down, and also maybe people she didn't like because it was kind of mean to exclude people and the last thing she wanted to be was mean.

Being mean was even worse, in her opinion, than being a liar. Not that she wanted to be a liar either.

"So." Said Dad as Shigeko came to a stop in front of his desk. He had his hands folded in front of him and he was leaning forward almost like he expected something. Seemed a little weird for Dad, normally he seemed kind of bored with everything. Bored or annoyed. Now he just seemed kind of like…kind of like Dad but not-

An ant ran across the desk.

"So?" asked Shigeko, her eyes tracking the ant as it made it's way across Dad's desk. Past the plain red coffee mug, past the stack of papers, past the electric type writer, over the touch tone phone. It went fast, like the tiny dots that made up the snow on the TV when it lost signal. She couldn't help but be completely entranced by it.

Dad cleared his throat.

"Your mother tells me that you're causing trouble at school." Said Dad. Shigeko looked up. Now he was back to normal. He was leaning back in his chair doing that thing where he didn't exactly look at her, no, he was looking past her. Like there was something very interesting happening just above her shoulders. If he wanted to see something interesting then he should have looked down at the ant running around his desk.

It was weird. The spiders really should have taken care of the ants.

"School is, um, something did happen…but it wasn't trouble. Not exactly." Said Shigeko, her eyes still following the ant. It didn't seem to be running in any particular direction or to have any kind of goal. It was just sort of moving. Maybe it was looking for sugar, ants liked sugar, though she knew that it wasn't going to find any. Dad hated sugar. He always made a grossed out face when he tried anything sweet-

How did she know that about him?

"Don't be vague." Said Dad. That she remembered about him, that he didn't like having his time wasted, that he liked people to get straight to the point. The only problem was that the point was liable to get her in trouble. Things were already weird with Mom, she didn't want to see what would happen if she made Dad mad at her too.

She crossed her arms and braced herself. She didn't know why.

"That doesn't mean be silent, Shigeko. I want an explanation for what happened." Said Dad

"I…um….it's not what it sounds like?" said Shigeko. She didn't know how she was supposed to lie to her own Dad. He was scary and mean and…and also she loved him. That felt worse, lying to someone she loved, even if that person didn't always act like he loved her. Didn't ever act like he liked her.

At least that she could remember.

"So you didn't cheat on your school work and drag the family's name through the mud?" asked Dad

"I…no? I helped my friend out and she helped me and…and that's what happened." Said Shigeko

"Is it?" asked Dad

"Um….yes?" asked Shigeko

"Very well. But if I find out that you've lied to me-" said Dad

"What'll you-you do?" asked Shigeko

"You'll have taken my already low opinion of you to new depths, Shigeko." Said Dad

"New…depths?" asked Shigeko

"Yes. Somehow my opinion of you will have sunk even lower. Disappointment will cloud our relationship forevermore." Said Dad. She didn't know, hadn't known, that he had thought so little of her or…or that he could have thought so little now or…or that he even could have said something like that. It didn't make sense but also it completely made sense.

In a very painful sort of way it completely made sense.

"That's…that's a lot…" said Shigeko

"If you find this to be intolerable then don't force me to be disappointed in you." said Dad

"I….I won't…" said Shigeko

"Good. Now leave me to my work." Said Dad. He waved his hand again and she knew that she had to leave. Even though that had hurt. That had hurt more than if he had picked her up by her hair and thrown her through a wall. Not that he had ever done that before….that she could remember…or imagine. It was such a weird thing to even be imagining now and she had no idea how her brain came up with these things.

Maybe she secretly wanted Dad to hit her.

Maybe that would have been better. Hitting her was better than not loving her anymore…not that he had ever shown her much love. She wanted…she didn't know what she wanted. When she imagined Dad loving her she got a heavy feeling in her chest, like someone was sitting on her, but the feeling got even worse when she imagined him hating her…hating the person she had become…

I hate the person you've become.

The words ring through her head. She stopped right there, right in the middle of the cold and empty hallway. Dad had said that, she knew he had said that, but she had no idea when he had said that. She turned on her heel and practically ran back to Dad's office. She needed to ask him…no, to tell him. She needed to tell him that she remembered. That she wasn't crazy. She needed him to know, she needed to know for herself, that she wasn't losing her mind. She ran back to the office and tried to open the door.

It was locked.

"Dad, please, let me in!" said Shigeko as she did her best to knock and not pound on the door. She knew that Dad was still in there. She could feel it…she knew because it hadn't been very long and she would have noticed if he had followed her out. He was in there.

He had to let her in.

"Dad, please." Said Shigeko, trying her best to sound calm and to keep her voice level. She knew how much Dad hated it when people got too emotional. He had been telling her for her entire life that she needed to control her emotions…another memory. Being out in the yard and trying to do…to do something. She was smaller then, the walls were much taller than her, and she had been frustrated and…and something else…she just…why couldn't she remember?

Maybe she was, in fact, going crazy.

"Dad, please, just open the door!" said Shigeko. She heard some shuffling and then silence. She held her breath and waited. Dad was going to open the door. He had to. He had-

"Go away." Said Dad

"But-" said Shigeko. Dad had never told her…well he had but…but there was a time, there must have been, when she had been his favorite. His favorite? She was the only kid he had, it wasn't like there was any competition. She had been by his side but…but when? When she had been a baby? When she had been too little to remember, clearly, any of this?

She needed to know.

"What did I just tell you?" asked Dad, his voice getting both deeper and louder. A bad combination at any time.

"I know what you said, you said to go away but-" said Shigeko

"Why can't you ever do as you're told?" asked Dad

"I-I do! I do as I'm told all the time and I just…I just need to talk to you! I feel like I'm losing my mind and-" said Shigeko

"Obviously you're losing your mind if you even think that I'm going to let you get away with being this disobedient! Now leave!" shouted Dad. Shigeko stopped knocking. Dad was…she knew this part of Dad, this side to him. She knew that he'd hit her before, now that she thought about it, and she knew that he could do it again whenever he wanted to.

And she knew that she was too weak to stop him if he wanted to.

"Yes Dad…I'm going now." said Shigeko. She walked away from the door slowly, part of her wondering if he was going to change his mind. If he was going to invite her back into his office and make her sit in a chair right next to his desk, if he was going to talk to her about things he cared about and she didn't, if he was going to listen for hours about the things she cared about even though she knew that he didn't. If they were going to watch Frozen together…

That was truly the craziest part of all.

Dad didn't want to spend time with her and he never had. He didn't like her, Mom didn't like her, nobody liked her. Nobody had ever liked her and nobody would…somebody did…but to keep that person liking her she had to make things so…so difficult with the people who loved her. The people she wished loved her…of course they didn't. She had never given them a reason to. Now she was losing her mind and they didn't even care…she had never given them a reason to care. Without anything to make her special, without anything to make her into a person, she was just…this. Someone with so little inside of themselves that her mind was making things up to fill the void where her life had been. Someone who…someone who was better off in the background. Someone who should have stayed in the background…someone without a life…

Well she did have a life, a life as a mob character, but she wanted more than that…and it was driving her crazy.