It was weird being in the office without Master Reigen around.

The office was quiet, too quiet, and it smelled weird too. Stale incense. Stale green tea. It was weird. Usually Master Reigen was at her desk or in the exorcism/curse removal/massage/nap room and Serizawa was either at his desk or doing something. Rei's absence was also felt. Had she been around she would have been playing music or crafting something or working on homework or even talking about how much she liked Ritsu.

Mob would have even taken hearing how much Rei liked Ritsu, she always denied that she LIKED him but it was obvious, over what she was hearing now.

"Seriously?! In what universe is that something I like?!" shouted Tome from the exorcism/curse removal/ massage/nap room. Mob closed her eyes and shook her head. Tome had, thankfully, put some music on. Not that Mob didn't have a good idea of what was going on…

She did. She really did.

She didn't think that it was a bad thing or anything like that. No, she was glad that Tome had found love, she just wished that she didn't have to hear it. She couldn't just leave, either, because she was the one with the key.

The water stopped running in the bathroom.

Also her boyfriend was there.

Mob knew that they weren't going to do the things that Tome and Inukawa did…not for a while…if ever…but she did want to do…something. Kiss him. Kissing Teru was the best feeling ever. Better than getting a rare coin machine toy or dodging the blue shell in Mario Kart or getting to braid Master Reigen's hair. She wanted to kiss Teru, and often, but she wasn't sure about all the things that came next.

Not that she was one hundred percent opposed to those kinds of things.

"Well I suppose that this is as good as it gets." Said Teru as he came out of the bathroom. He said that he had to freshen up, which apparently meant clean off the dirt and sweat and stuff, which was nice of him…not that Mob had minded. But he minded, he liked to be clean like that.

He sat down next to her on the office couch.

She had been sat next to before. She had even had Teru sit next to her before. There was something here, now, that was different. The atmosphere was different. There was an expectation hanging over them, here, in this atmosphere. At least that was how Mob was reading it. Mob knew that she was notoriously bad at reading the atmosphere but here, it seemed, with the music floating in from the other room in an attempt to cover up what was happening in there, what could have been happening to Mob…

Teru ran a hand through his hair.

Mob wondered, then, if she should have freshened up too. Was her hair messy? Did she smell weird from working out in during club? She sat up a little straighter as he flopped down next to her. They sat there for a moment.

Mob straightened out the pleats in her school skirt.

"I…I think you look nice, Teru." Said Mob softly. The moment had dragged on for too long, it seemed, and she had to say something. She wanted to tell him that she liked him all sweaty and covered in dirt but he wouldn't want to hear that. He liked to look nice and stuff. He cared so much about how he looked and Mob just did not get it. Of course he looked good no matter what. He was Teru.

"You too. You look so pretty, Shigeko. So damn pretty…" Said Teru. He brushed a lock of her hair out of her face. His hand lingered in her space. She began to shift in place. She could feel his eyes on her. Blue. His voice trailed off at the end. Low and deep and slow as syrup but so good…

His hand met hers.

She closed her fingers around his.

"So…this is what it's like in here during afterhours." Said Teru

"I don't know if it counts as afterhours if I didn't have any work today…I could always ask Master Reigen…but not now. I don't want to bother Master Reigen right now….I want to be here with you." Said Mob. Teru scooted closer to her. She let him. She tried to remember how to breathe. He was so close.

He smelled like bathroom soap.

"I want to be with you too…" said Teru. Mob nodded. He said it, again, in the deep and low sort of way. Mob could have gotten lost in him, in his voice, in his presence. He drowned out what was happening, it seemed, and she dove right into him. Or at least she wanted to.

She had asked him to kiss her, before, and that had been so hard…

"Is this alright?" asked Teru. He let go of her hand and put it around her shoulders. Mob nodded. She needed to remember how to breathe. He had been close and now he was even closer still. She swallowed, her throat was getting tight. He was so close, so very close, and she wanted him to be even closer still…

She shifted in place.

"This is alright…but you can be closer if you want to be…" said Mob. She wondered if she had said the right thing. She often said the wrong thing, often embarrassed herself, and the thought of embarrassing herself around Teru would be just awful…just the thought of it would be awful. If she had actually embarrassed herself, well, that would have been something terrible beyond all measure.

"Like this?" said Teru. He was pulling her closer, now. She nodded again, not trusting herself to speak. She could smell him, now, the way he really smelled. Underneath the smell of bathroom soap. Underneath the smell of stale body spray. Underneath all of it, like getting to the bottom layer of an onion…or a cake. Cake was better. She liked cake better. Cake batter. Warm cake batter. That was how he made her feel, like her insides were full of warm cake batter.

"Sorry if I still smell like soccer practice. I would have gone home to take a shower but this opportunity…to be with you! That's all I want is to be with you. I would never push you to do…anything. Even what they're doing…I mean if you ever…but of course you don't…so really we don't have to do anything. We can just sit here. I wouldn't mind just sitting here with you and talking about whatever." Said Teru. Mob frowned. She wasn't one hundred percent opposed to…that…or even the things that were adjacent to…that.

She didn't want to do it right then but she had nothing against it. The idea of it.

"We can…we can sit here and talk if you want to…or we can…um…" said Mob. She saw Teru's aura flare out and she mentally begins running through all of the ways that she could take back what she said. Oh no. She had probably said the wrong thing and-

"Whatever you want! Sorry, I'm sorry. I mean that we can do whatever you want. We can go forwards or backwards or just stay in place. I am not pushing you to do anything, anything at all. I mean I don't want you to think that I'm pushing you…because I'm not. I'm not that kind of guy anymore." Said Teru

"You're not pushing me at all, Teru, but I don't want to push you either…" said Mob softly. He traced circles on her shoulder. She melted into his touch. She wanted…she wanted a lot of things.

"You? You could never push me into doing anything that I didn't want to do. I mean, ok, you make me work for who I am but in a good way. I mean you make me a better person than I used to be and I am just so...thank you for that. For making me work for who I am…who I want to be. That's a weird way to put it but that's just how I…feel I guess. I mean you make me feel a lot…a lot of things. Good things. Just…the way I feel about you is so…it's so much more than I have ever felt before and…and…" said Teru softly. He spoke so softly and quietly that Mob could barely hear him. She had to lean in close, so close, to hear him. She was close enough that she could feel him breathing as he talked…

"And?" asked Mob just as softly

"And I really want to kiss you right now." Said Teru. Mob leaned in closer. She waited for him to close the gap between them. He had been so close to her, before, and he had just said it but…but she didn't like to be the one to make it happen.

She liked it better when he led.

And he did.

He leaned in and kissed her. it was a quick kiss. Not long and sloppy and noisy like she could hear Tome kissing her boyfriend. Not super long and deep like she had seen on TV. Just quick and short but so nice and perfect and she wanted so badly for him to do it again-

And he did.

Just as quick but just as nice.

Then again. Again and again and again over and over again until her face was red and the entire room was floating and she could feel a giggle rising in her throat and it seemed like the more she tried to stop it's ascent the stronger it got until it managed to jump out in the space between kisses…but it wasn't a bad thing because he laughed too. He laughed with her, not at her, and that just made her laugh more…and then he laughed more…and it was the best sound ever when he laughed…

But it was broken, soon, by the sound of a door slamming opened.

"I can't believe your stupid cram school…so what if you skipped one day? It's not like it'll kill you…" muttered Tome. She stomped her way out of the storage room, Inukawa trailing behind her. Mob tried not to notice just how disheveled they both were. Tome tucked her school shirt in as she stomped her way through the room.

"I know…I'm sorry but my mom says that I have to go home right now and-" said Inukawa. He didn't even try to make eye contact with Mob or Teru, something of which she was grateful for. She disentangled herself from Teru and began to smooth down her hair. She tried her best, too, to put down everything that she had picked up with her powers.

"Fine. Whatever. I see where your loyalties lie!" said Tome as she pointed out the door. There was a moment of silence.

"Call me tonight, ok?" asked Tome. Inukawa nodded and goodbyes were said. Tome walked him down the stairs and out the door. Mob sat next to Teru but did not dare kiss him again. Some people could kiss with an audience but Mob was not one of them.

"So…" said Teru

"Yes?" asked Mob

"That was…I mean you were really good." Said Teru. Mob blushed and looked down at her shoes.

"Do you mean it?" asked Mob. She knew that he had kissed girls beside her. it hurt to think about that but it was something that she knew and she knew that she would have to learn to live with. He liked her, he was her boyfriend, and she shouldn't have been worried about some other girls that she didn't even know the names of…and did not care to know the names of or anything at all about them. Master Reigen was lucky, Serizawa hadn't ever had a girlfriend besides her. That was if she and Serizawa were even becoming boyfriend and girlfriend. They probably were. Trips like that always ended in a relationship upgrade in manga and anime and stuff.

"Of course I do." Said Teru. He leaned in to kiss her and Mob hesitated for a moment. Maybe Tome had decided to head home and get caught up on some games or homework or something like that…

But she hadn't.

Tome practically stomped up the stairs and across the room. She paid Mob and Teru no mind as she crossed the room and tossed herself down into Master Reigen' chair. She spun around a few times but didn't look that happy. Mob looked at Teru, then Tome, and then down at her shoes. She wanted to keep kissing but…how did it go?

Sisters before misters?

At least that was how Master Reigen put it. One time they were out on a job and some guy that Master Reigen knew, but not a real boyfriend she said, had wanted to spend time with her. Mob offered to take the bus home but Master Reigen told her that it went sisters before misters and then they finished the job and got ramen on the way home.

Master Reigen was full of all kinds of wisdom like that.

"Tome? Are you ok?" asked Mob. Tome shrugged but kept on spinning slowly in Master Reigen's chair. Mob wanted to say something about that being Master Reigen's chair and her not liking people messing with it but she decided that then was not the time. After all they were using the office for things that were definitely not safe for work so what was one more bad thing?

Mob would go to Costco with her mom and pick up an apology cake later.

"I don't know what's with him sometimes…" said Tome softly as she spun around. Teru cleared his throat.

"Well I'll just leave you two ladies to…this. I'll text you later…or call…or facetime. Whatever you want, Shigeko." Said Teru. Mob was sad to see him go, and was about to tell him to stay, but her friend needed her and she needed to be a good friend…

It was hard being a friend and a girlfriend at the same time.

But Mob managed.

"Inukawa loves you, I think, or at least he really likes you. I mean you guys do a lot of stuff so he must care about you a lot. I mean I heard that boys did would do things like that with anyone but that always seemed like it was kind of mean…and Inukawa doesn't seem like that anyway." Said Mob. Tome just kept on spinning slowly. Mob was worried, a little, that Tome was going to make herself motion sick.

"We're barely ever alone together and then his mom calls and he just goes running…" said Tome

"Well if he didn't go back to his mom then he'd have gotten in big trouble. I mean we have to listen to our parents…they're our parents and we're just kids. You'll see him tomorrow though! In club or in class, your class, and maybe you could even go to the empty science classroom on the third floor. I think if I asked Ritsu not to patrol by there-" said Mob

"Don't ask your brother to do anything. He won't listen to you anyway and he'll probably just patrol there specifically to catch me." Said Tome

"Yeah…Ritsu cares a lot about his job…" said Mob

"He's a vindictive little shit." Said Tome. Mob frowned. She knew that Tome didn't always get along with Ritsu but there was no reason at all to be mean to him.

"That's mean, Tome." Said Mob trying not to sound as mad as she felt. Tome was just hurt and sometimes when people were hurt or cornered their mouths ran away from them. That was how Master Reigen explained it after they made up from that awful fight that they had.

"Yeah whatever…" said Tome. She kept on spinning and spinning faster and faster until she bumped up against the desk and fell out of hair chair. Mob caught her before she could hit the ground. Tome may have said something mean but she was still Mob's friend and Mob would not let her friend get hurt.

Mob sat Tome down on the ground and fixed Master Reigen's office chair. She expected Tome to sit in it and get back to spinning but instead she was rooting around under Master Reigen's work desk. Mob was about to tell her that Master Reigen didn't like it when they went through her things but Tome beat her to it.

"Don't say something like 'Reigen hates it when we snoop' or anything like that, ok? I'm not going through her desk…just under it…" said Tome

"Ok, I guess that's ok…what are you looking for?" asked Mob

"Whatever's down here….like…these!" said Tome as she pulled out a dusty pair of high heeled shoes from the dark void that was the underside of Master Reigen's desk. Mob recognized those shoes. Master Reigen had kicked those off in anger one day because the heels were uneven and they pinched her toes really badly.

"Master Reigen says that those shoes are terrible." Said Mob. Tome waved her hand and tsked before she kicked her own shoes off and slipped Master Reigen's heels on.

"You shouldn't wear those, Master Reigen might get mad." Said Mob. Also shoes were only supposed to be worn by their owners.

"Eh, whatever. She's got a million pairs of shoes here anyway." Said Tome as she tried to walk. She was taller, then, which Mob didn't think was totally necessary. Tome was already taller than her by a few dozen centimeters. Mob didn't understand high heeled shoes at all. Master Reigen said that they hurt her feet and left little marks on the backs of her heels. She said that they took some practice to get used to walking in, too, which Mob didn't get. Why would you wear shoes you needed to practice in? Regular shoes were very user friendly.

Judging by how much Tome was teetering those shoes were not at all user friendly and she needed more practice. Mob tried to steady her with her powers.

"Mob, cut it out. I've got this. This is easy." Said Tome. Mob knew that she needed to help Tome but Tome said that she didn't need any help…so she stopped helping…even though Tome needed help…

"Really, I don't know what Reigen's always complaining about, this isn't that bad. I am not a kid anymore." Said Tome. Mob nodded. She knew that feeling. She didn't feel like a kid all the time either. That didn't matter much, though, because until the law said that they were adults they were kids and at the mercy of adults.

"Really, Mob, this isn't that…BAD!" said Tome. She began to teeter even worse than before and Mob tried to catch her as best as she could. She kept Tome from falling down, which was good, but before she could fully steady Tome there was a loud cracking sound…and then Tome started to go down. Mob saved Tome, of course, but Master Reigen's shoe on the other hand…

"Aw….fuck." said Tome. Mob agreed with the sentiment but did not curse.

They were in enough trouble as it was.