If Reigen wanted to date Serizawa it seemed that she would have to win over an overprotective thirteen year old boy first.

Sho had appeared in the office that day. That was…unusual. Reigen knew OF Sho. Serizawa spoke of him sometimes, Rei spoke of him often, and according to Mob he was practically living in her brother's room. She had never spent that much one on one time with the kid, or any at all, but she didn't have anything against him.

He seemed like a nice enough kid.

And he seemed like more of a kid since she had met him. She had first seen him after the mess with the 7th Division of Claw when he kicked that weird bald guy's ass. The second time she had met him they were all running for their lives. He was different now. A lot calmer. He even looked younger, now, sitting there in Mob's chair staring at her…though she didn't know what to make of the staring…and it was a little disconcerting. The kid was just staring at her as she pretended to be busy at her desk.

"What are you doing?" asked Sho

"Hm? Um…just going over some old E-Mails…." Said Reigen. Serizawa was getting them lunch and she wished that she had gone with him. She was regretting how lazy she had been that day. The kid had been more animated, before, when Serizawa was there. Lots of jumping around on the furniture and jumping around from conversation topic to conversation topic. Now he was silently perched on top of Mob's desk and he was just…staring…

"Is it hard?" asked Sho

"No, not really…it's just something that I have to do. Do you…want something to do? You seem bored, kid." said Reigen. She had always thought that she was good with kids. The girls liked her. Maybe because this was a boy and they were, well, boys. The girls had this sort of fascination with her, it seemed, because she was an adult woman. They liked to not only hang out with her but come to her with their problems and ask advice and try on her clothes and shoes, too. Sho seemed to have a fascination with her, too, but instead of going through her things and trying on her shoes he was just staring at her.

"I'm not bored, I'm just watching you." Said Sho

"Ok…why, though? I can't possibly be that fascinating." Said Reigen with a laugh. Who knew, maybe she was fascinating to him. Serizawa said that the kid didn't have that great of a relationship with his mother so maybe he was just looking for that in someone else. Reigen didn't consider herself to be un-nurturing but she considered herself to be more of a big sister/ cool aunt type.

"You're not that interesting but I guess that I'm just trying to figure you out." Said Sho

"You could try just talking to me instead of watching me delete old E-Mails. The only thing you'll learn from watching me do this is that I give out my E-Mail address way too freely. Do not make my mistakes, always use your junk E-Mail for mailing lists and rewards cards." Said Reigen

"I know that I won't get to know you that well like this, I'm not dumb, but I like to watch people first. People I don't know that well…and I want to get to know you better I guess. I mean if you're going to be Serizawa's girlfriend and stuff I should get to know you…and I guess that you're going to marry him to and all of that other stuff that girls like to think about, too, because you're a girl and I know girls. I mean I don't know that many girls but I think that I understand them. Well I try to, girls can be really weird sometimes." Said Sho

"Whoa, who said anything about marriage?" said Reigen. That was the portion of his little monologue that rang in her head. Marriage was…she had nothing against marriage but she hadn't been planning for her own marriage since she was a kid. She wouldn't say no but….but she had no idea if she was capable of saying yes…and she did not want to get into that now.

"Isn't that what you're supposed to do when you like a girl? Marry her after you make her your girlfriend? And then you bang and have a bunch of kids? Said Sho

"Swear jar." Said Reigen without thinking. Teenagers! Everything was so….much…with them! She felt like she was talking to Rei or Mob for a moment, there. Marriage, children, true and never ending love…she did not envy teenagers.

"I didn't swear. Bang isn't a swear word." Said Sho

"No it's not but don't…you are too young to say that." Said Reigen

"I'm thirteen now. My birthday was last December." Said Sho with a huff. Reigen smiled and shook her head.

"What?" asked Sho

"Nothing, nothing at all." Said Reigen still giggling a little.

"You're laughing." Said Sho

"Ok, ok, I'm laughing a little." Said Reigen. That got her a glare…but not one with any bite behind it. She had already seen what it looked like when the kid was truly pissed at someone.

"Well how old are you then?" asked Sho

"Twenty nine, but never ask a woman her age." Said Reigen

"Why? You're not old. Serizawa's older than you are and he's not old. You're not as old as my mom, though, she's forty two. She just had her birthday a few weeks ago." Said Sho

"Thanks, you're a sweet kid, now don't ever say bang again." said Reigen. Thirteen year olds were going to be thirteen. She was not going to be a hypocrite. If she wouldn't let the girls get away with that then she wouldn't let Sho get away with it either. That was the trick with kids, you always had to treat them equally.

"Why not? I don't get it. That's what people do when they're in love. They bang and then have a kid or two or three or ten, even, like this family I saw on TV with ten kids and counting. That's a lot of kids, I think, but I don't know I'm an only child. How many kids are you and Serizawa going to have?" asked Sho

"What? I don't…slow down, kid, its not even been a week yet!" said Reigen. Kids. She hadn't thought about…well she had…and she loved the girls but…but she herself having kids? She had spent the last fifteen years of her life trying not to have kids. That was…she was somewhat responsible for the girls but at the end of the day they went back to their own parents. She didn't know if she could do that…raise a kid on her own….well not on her own because Serizawa didn't seem like the type who would just up and leave her if she…if THEY were to….this was not the time to be worrying about this.

"So you don't love Serizawa enough to do all of the couple stuff that you're supposed to do?" asked Sho

"No, I'm saying that it hasn't even been a full week yet. Relationships are slower when you're an adult, ok? There's a difference between being thirteen and being thirty." Said Reigen

"You said you were twenty nine." Said Sho

"I know, thirteen rhymes better with thirty than with twenty nine." Said Reigen

"It does….I guess….but I don't get why? I mean….Ok, I don't think that you're a jerk." Said Sho

"Thank you…?" asked Reigen

"No, not to be mean to your or anything. I just mean that I don't think that you're going to be a jerk to Serizawa. Just…he really likes you and I don't want him to get all…sad…again…because he's my friend and stuff…" said Sho

"You don't have to be afraid of that, Sho, ok?" said Reigen. She wondered how to proceed with this. She understood what the kid was worried about. She understood, well she thought that she understood, what it must have been like from his point of view. From what she could gather, from what Serizawa had said, Sho had not had a lot of positive relationships in his life. He was similar to Mob in that respect. The only difference was that Mob had been more worried, it seemed, about being replaced whereas Sho was worried about Serizawa's wellbeing.

"I'm not! I mean….I mean you don't seem like a jerk but I know that people aren't always together forever and that sometimes people think that they've found the person that they want to be with forever but it turns out that they aren't good for each other…at least that was how my mom explained it…and I know that Serizawa would be really sad if it turned out that you didn't love him and stuff and I just…don't want him to be sad…so I figured that I'd see if you were a good person or not….I mean I guess that you are. Ritsu's big sis says that you are and you saved a bunch of people….so I know that you aren't a bad person but…" said Sho

"If you want to get to know me, if that'll put you at ease, then you can get to know me. I'm not going to lie to you, less than a week of being in a relationship is not long enough to be able to tell if we're going to spend the rest of our lives together or anything like that but I will answer, or try to answer, any questions that you may have. Ok?" asked Reigen

"I can ask you anything and you'll just…answer me?" asked Sho

"Provided that it's not too personal or not something that you don't need to know about then yes." said Reigen. She decided to treat him like one of the girls. If they had a question, any question, she always did her best to answer them. Unless it was a question that they did not need to know the answer to. That was different. There were parts of her life that they just did not need to know about at their age. Maye when they were older…or she was deader. Yeah, there were somethings that they could not know about until she was long dead. Sho was just another kid and she would treat him just like one of the girls. Yeah! Gender fairness!

"So no personal questions? But how do I know which ones are personal and which ones aren't?" asked Sho

"I'll tell you, ok?" said Reigen trying to be patient. The kid had been raised by wolves, practically, and she had to wear Mob gloves when it came to him.

"Ok…." Said Sho. Then he closed his eyes in thought. Reigen worried, for a moment, about the fact she had just given a teenager carte blanche to ask her just about anything.

"What's your favorite animal?" asked Sho after a while. Reigen let out a breathe she didn't realize that she had been holding.

"I like dogs best, what's yours?" asked Reigen

"I like hamsters the most but I love all animals….even cats that scratch all the time. I love that cat even if it hates me and everyone else." Said Sho

"You have a cat?" asked Reigen. From what she knew of Sho, mostly from Serizawa, Sho had some kind of menagerie going and it was spilling over into Serizawa's apartment. According to Rei Sho was super loving and nurturing and loved to take care of animals.

"I have one third custody of a momma cat and her babies. Ritsu and Ritsu's big sis have the other third." Said Sho

"Mob has a cat? Huh….she didn't tell me…but I guess my information on Mob is a little dated." Said Reigen. So that was where Mob had been. Well it was nice to know that Mob's dreams of cat ownership were coming true…even if she had been gone all week.

"She has a third of a cat. A family of cats. They're a family and we can't split them up." Said Sho. Reigen nodded. There was a lot to unpack there, it felt like, but she decided not to go digging too deep into that too soon.

"That's important…keeping families together is important…but I'm not sure that it works the same with cats…" said Reigen

"It does." Said Sho

"Right…also I know for a fact that Mob's mom hates animals in the house…and I think that it was either her mom or her dad that was allergic…" said Reigen. Well Mob seemed like she was in for a world of trouble. Usually she was such a rules follower…it seemed that love did conquer all, even the fear of one's mother's wrath.

"They're living in her wardrobe right now. Well sometimes they live in Ritsu's room but I like it better when they're in her wardrobe because then her friends stay in her room…I mean they're ok! Her friends…they're ok I guess…I just like it better when they're in her room and not Ritsu's. They're nice and all…whatever. It's whatever. Do you like cats? Do you want a family of cats?" said Sho. He got a far off sort of look there. Reigen thought that there was something there, actually, that went beyond him just not wanting to hang out with a bunch of girls all day.

"Um….not really…not that I have anything against cats, I just can't take care of an entire family of them right now." Said Reigen

"….I guess that makes sense. It's hard to take care of things I guess…." Said Sho

"But you're good at it, Sho, a hell of a lot better than I would be. Not only one cat but a whole family of them? I could not do it, let me tell you…." Said Reigen. That seemed to be it, the thing that got her into his good graces, and for that she was grateful….and not only because he had stopped the suspicious staring.

Which was not like Mob's staring. Mob just sort of…stared…sometimes but not like that. Well at least the kid liked her, now. Serizawa had already won over the girls and now it seemed like it was her turn to win Sho. Heh. Like blending families, almost…

She felt like a step mother…and neither of them had any kids!