Reigen hadn't been expecting this call for another three or four years at least.
"You can't hold me! I have rights!" Reigen sighed. She heard Tome's shouting the second she walked through the police station doors. This was not how she imagined this night going. Originally she had planned on watching some bad TV and trying her best to fix the damage all of that salt caused to her hands. She had even gotten a new moisturizer set and everything.
Seven steps to smoother hands! Money back guarantee!
"You have the right to remain silent. I'd suggest you exercise it." Said Reigen as she was led to the back of the precinct where two chairs, two kids, one police officer, and a bright green suitcase with a UFO sticker 'Property of Kurata Tome, do not touch, that means you' written on it awaited her. She had thought that they had been keeping Tome chained up by her ankles in a rat filled dungeon cell based on how loudly she was yelling. Nope, no cell, not even any handcuffs. Just her sitting in a metal folding chair next to a boy who looked like he was ready to pass out.
So this was the famous Inukawa, huh?
"Auntie Taki! Hey!" said Tome. She made a 'just play along' motion with her hand and Reigen rolled her eyes. Right. Now she was Auntie Taki. She wasn't going to say anything, though. Everyone got one and this was Tome's 'one'.
"Are you this girl's aunt?" asked the police officer that had been glowering over Tome and her very embarrassed boyfriend.
"Unfortunately. What's she done now?" asked Reigen trying to get into her best 'aunt' voice. She wasn't old enough to be an aunt yet. She wasn't even thirty yet. At least she wasn't supposed to be playing the part of Tome's mother…or grandmother.
"Ma'am, I am sorry to tell you this but I caught your niece and this boy in a compromising position atop the roof of the…um….Good Times Lie With…Inn…." Said the police officer turning a shade of red that Reigen thought might have been the harbinger of a stroke. Reigen could feel herself turning a similar color. Not that she was squeamish about these things, no, she knew what teenagers were like. She was not so far removed from her own youth that she had forgotten what it was like to be a teenager. Good for Tome, too, for finding someone. Yes. Reigen had no problem at all with what Tome had been doing.
The problem lay with where, exactly, she had chosen to do those things.
"Seriously? In public?" asked Reigen as she gave Tome her best 'what in God's name is wrong with you' look. Not that Reigen hadn't been guilty of the same thing when she was Tome's age but at least Reigen had an excuse back then. She knew for a fact that Tome's parents worked long hours, that was why they were so ecstatic when Reigen let Tome 'work' at Spirits and Such. So that Reigen would supervise her.
Fat lot of good that did.
"I-It wasn't what it looked like!" ah, so he speaks. That poor kid was sweating bullets and looked like he was about to pass out and die. Reigen wondered why he even bothered. There was no way to talk their way out of this.
"Yeah, we were just sky watching." Said Tome. Reigen rolled her eyes. Right. The skies. They just happened to be watching the skies together on top of an overpriced love hotel. Right. Sure.
How Tome thought she was going to get out of this one Reigen did not know.
"The charges could have been quite serious, ma'am, quite serious indeed. They were trespassing as well as engaged in…public indecency. Since this was a first offence, and they're so young, we've decided to release them to their families with a warning. This time. Next time we won't be able to be so lenient even though they're only juvenile offenders." Said the officer
"Oh, believe me, this is never happening again. Come on, Tome, let's get you home." Said Reigen. She motioned for Tome to follow her. Tome crossed her arms and got up with more stomping than was necessary.
"W-Wait! What about me!?" said Inukawa
"Yeah, Auntie Taki, what about…cousin? Inukawa?" asked Tome. Reigen shook her head. Nope. She was helping out one kid and only one kid. That night. Everyone got one, not two.
"She's kidding. Such a kidder, this kid. Oh Tome, come on. Auntie Taki has things to do this evening. Say goodbye to your boyfriend while you can, I'd imagine his parents will have a thing or two to say about this later. Step lively now dearie." Said Reigen. She pinched Tome's cheek for good measure. Tome glared at her and then shrugged at her boyfriend. Reigen felt for the kids, she really did, but she did not condone what they did. They were just kids, now, but they needed to know that this was not ok. This was something that could catch them some very adult charges down the road.
Reigen really hoped that Rei's prediction would not come to pass.
She didn't throw Tome to the mercy of her parents, though, because, well, it was kind of touching that Tome called her of all people. Not that Reigen knew what other adult that Tome could have called in this situation what wouldn't have gone running right to her parents. Reigen knew that the responsible thing to do would have been to call Tome's parents and tell them what happened….but she couldn't throw Tome to the wolves like that.
Next time, yes, if she didn't learn her lesson this time.
"Well, thanks, I'll see you when I see you. Later!" said Tome as they left the police station. If she thought that they were just going to part ways then she had another thing coming. Tome was not Mob but Reigen knew that if Mob had ever been in this situation…oh God….then Reigen wouldn't have just let her walk away. She would have told Mob exactly how dangerous what she had been doing was. She wouldn't have been mean, no, because really this was what the adolescent years were for, making mistakes like this…
But she would have talked to Mob about all of this.
And Tome really wasn't that much different from Mob. Ok, she was older and louder and wouldn't know shyness if it walked up and introduced itself but, really, they weren't that different. They were both dumb kids in love and growing up whether Reigen liked it or not. The only difference was that Mob did her growing up in Reigen's storage room and her boyfriend's apartment….yeah, she and Mob were going to have to have a talk…right after she and Tome had a talk.
That neither of them wanted to have.
She grabbed Tome by the collar before she could get away. The suitcase that she had been dragging behind her fell to the ground with a clank.
"Hey! Let go! That was expensive!" said Tome. Reigen let her go but kept her within arm's reach in case she tried to bolt, as she tended to do. She didn't try to bolt, no, instead she just tended to her suitcase. She turned it over. On the other side it said 'Telescope. Do not touch. That means you, you moron.'
"Shhhh….it's ok…mama's here. Mama's got you. It's all over now." Whispered Tome to her suitcase. She patted it and whispered to it like it was a wounded animal or someone she was trying to talk down from jumping off of the Seasoning City Unity Bridge. Reigen tapped her foot as this went on for another minute. People going about their business stopped and stared for a moment before returning to that business. Reigen kept on tapping her foot. The effect would have been better if she had been wearing real shoes. She was just in an old pair of flats. Tome had caught her at the end of the day. She hadn't shown up in her pajamas, of course, she had thrown on some jeans and a clean shirt even though it was long past the time in which Reigen had to dress like a functional human being.
It was way too late in the day for this.
Her phone vibrated. That was probably Serizawa. He had been showing her pictures of a model that he and Sho had built, well he had built it and Sho had 'supervised', whatever that meant. She wondered if Sho ever gave Serizawa these problems. That kid certainly looked like a handful.
And Reigen knew a lot about handfuls.
"Ok, I think that you've averted your telescope's mental breakdown. Now come on, let's get you home. Your parents are probably worried sick." Said Reigen. Tome shook her head.
"They aren't home right now. They're both working overnights this week so unless you want to wake them up early in the morning or stay up all night until they get off I guess you won't have any time to tell them. I mean, you're so busy after all-" said Tome
"Relax, I wasn't going to say a word to your parents." Said Reigen
"Really?" asked Tome, her eyes lighting up with hope. Reigen shrugged.
"Everybody gets one…and only one! Ok, this was your 'one'. If this happens again, well, I'm going to have no choice but to tell your parents." Said Reigen
"You Judas." Said Tome glaring at Reigen like she was trying, and failing, to spontaneously develop heat vision. Reigen shrugged.
"It would be for your own good, ok? Now come on. It's late and I'm going to assume that you haven't had any dinner yet, right?" asked Reigen. On cue Tome's stomach grumbled loudly. Tome glared down at her stomach and muttered at it for 'betraying' her. Reigen didn't say anything to that, she just motioned for Tome to follow her. Reigen didn't have any particular place in mind, well she knew what was good around here but she was not going to take Tome anywhere that was so close to the…mature…district.
Besides, all roads led to fast food anyway.
Fast food wasn't good food but Reigen wasn't after good food. She was after the kind of food that filed you up for cheap. Normally she would have gone for ramen but it was late and she had to get home at some point. Besides, it wasn't like Tome was complaining for anything like that. No, she ate her burger and fries with gusto that made even Reigen jealous. That was good. If there was one thing that Reigen couldn't stand it was seeing a kid go hungry.
Plus dinner was the most important meal of the day.
Dinner as the time of the day when people could really sit down and talk. It was important to talk about things that needed to be talked about. Like why one of her kids, not literally her kid but one she hung out with and had some responsibility for, had gotten herself arrested with some very serious charges. The kind that could ruin someone's adult life.
"Quick question." Said Reigen as casually as she could. Tome looked up from her food and raised and eyebrow.
"Ahm eedin'." Said Tome through a mouth full of food.
"Chew and swallow then." Said Reigen. Tome gave her a look but then did as she had been told. That gave Reigen some time to go over this in her mind, what she would say and how she would say it. She didn't want to sound like her mother. Reigen's or Tome's. Because lecturing and moralizing never worked on anyone, especially teenagers, and especially teenagers like Tome. She was a lot like a young Reigen…and that was not always a good thing. Tome could be very hard headed, headstrong, and nobody could ever make her do something that she didn't want to do, which was good…
But nobody could convince her that what she was doing was a bad idea, either.
"If you want to yell at me then go ahead and do. It doesn't matter so long as you don't tell my mom." Said Tome
"I'm not going to yell at you, we're in public and I don't really like yelling at people. I'm going to talk to you like a normal person." Said Reigen
"Why would you talk to me like a normal person? That's boring." Said Tome
"How would you have me talk to you then?" asked Reigen
"I don't know, talk to me like I'm Mob I guess." Said Tome with a shrug. Reigen nodded. That would make this a hell of a lot easier. Mob would have never gotten herself into this sort of predicament, though, so Reigen would have to suspend her disbelief for a little bit. Just a little bit.
"Like you're Mob?" asked Reigen
"Yeah, just like I'm Mob. Be all worried about me and give me wisdom and stuff like that, you know, like you do for Mob." Said Tome
"Ok. I'll talk to you like you're Mob…you dummy." Said Reigen. She called Mob a dummy plenty of times in her mind, not as much now as she had when Mob was a kid, but she didn't mean it in a mean way. She had never meant it in a mean way. She had always been amused when she thought it, like when Mob had tried to cut her own bangs or when she had tried to color her hair with lemon juice and baking soda.
This was not amusing.
Ok, it kind of was. This was the sort of thing that they would look back on and laugh, just like Reigen laughed at her own adolescent foibles. Yes, in ten years of so this was the kind of thing they'd laugh about over coffee or takoyaki or something.
"Hey! Who are you calling a dummy?!" said Tome slamming her hands down on the table and jumping to her feet. Reigen motioned for her to sit down as the people around them began to stare and whisper. Tome glared and sat down while muttering something about how if those people are at a MobRonald's this late at night then they had no right to judge anyone.
She had a point.
"You, you dummy. You're lucky you got off with just a warning, damn lucky. You could have gotten some beyond serious charges for what you did!" said Reigen
"I was just watching the sky!" said Tome
"From THAT love hotel? Really?" asked Reigen with a snort. Tome glared.
"What would you know about where I was? Huh? Unless you want to confess to going to shady places like that….but I know you wouldn't. What would Serizawa think? You'd be ruined if he-" said Tome. Reigen raised her hand in the universal gesture of 'shut up'.
"I'm an adult. Yes, I'm familiar with the adult district and not that it's anyone's business but my own but I haven't paid that area a visit in a while….and I am not ashamed about doing things that ADULTS do. You. Are. Fifteen. You're too young to even set foot in that area! And no, I'm not shaming you, I'm stating a fact. There isn't a single business on that street that allows anyone under the age of majority in." said Reigen being as diplomatic as possible. She wouldn't have yelled at Mob or shamed her, she would have stated the facts of the rules of the situation. Mob respected rules, she understood rules, and she felt good about rules.
Tome was not Mob.
"Well I feel like I'm being shamed. How can I not when you're telling me that it's wrong for me to-" said Tome
"I have no problem with you and your boyfriend having se-…expressing your feelings…in a physical manner. That's fine and normal and all of that. What I have a problem with is you and him doing…things of an adult nature…in public…and don't tell me that you both were watching the skies. I know what you can see from that roof…and how did you even get on that roof in the first place?" asked Reigen
"….the utility doors weren't locked…" muttered Tome
"Well then they should do something about that. Really…and you two should not have had the idea, even, to take advantage of that. OK? Trespassing is a serious crime just like everything else's you've done. I care about you and I don't want you to end up in prison one day, ok?" asked Reigen
"I could have talked my way out of that…I did talk my way out of that! I'm here, aren't I?" asked Tome. Reigen could have sworn that she was staring into some kind of Twilightzone-esque mirror into the past. Reigen wondered if the universe was preparing her for when she had a daughter just like her…as her mother had been happy to threaten her with…
'Arataki, one day I hope that you have a daughter just like you! Then you'll see what I have to go through every single day with you!'
Well Reigen was not going to go home and scream into a pillow before finishing off a bottle of wine and cursing the day that she had been born. She was going to listen, going to be nice, and going to try and see where Tome was coming from even though she'd rather climb up on that chair and preach about the dangers of doing things in public like that.
She had left her soapbox at home.
"You are. By the grace of God you are. Just…it's hard being your age." Said Reigen
"What would you know? You're an adult. You can do whatever you want. You probably don't even remember-" said Tome
"I remember. Believe me, as much as I would like to be able to delete the memory of that period of my life from my mind forever I can't. I remember what it's like to be your age and to be in love and to want to express it…but to not have a place. I get it." Said Reigen
"Sure you do." Said Tome crossing her arms and sullenly drinking her drink even though, based on the loud and rather annoying sound it made, and Reigen was going to pick her battles.
"Believe me, I do…though I never went to the roof of a love hotel. I'm probably still banned from the park, too." Said Reigen. A yes. There we go. Tome was smiling a little, a quirk at the corners of her lips, one that she was trying to suppress.
"The park? Really? Please, I've been over the park since second year." Said Tome
"Hey, necessity is the mother of invention." Said Reigen
"You're telling me." Said Tome
"Why was this even a necessity? I mean your parents aren't home-" said Reigen
"My neighbors are a bunch of snoops. They watch my house for my parents and tell my mom and dad if I have anyone over or even climb up on my own fucking-" said Tome
"Language." Said Reigen
"My own freaking roof. I really was watching the stars. If I happen to point my telescope in the direction of the purple palace and SOME PEOPLE forget to close their curtains then it's not my fault if I see something that I wasn't meant to see. I mean if SOME PEOPLE are too dumb to close the curtains what am I supposed to do? Not look?" asked Tome. Reigen busied herself eating her fries while she waited for her heart to stop pounding. She thought, distantly, that maybe she should have been eating something with less sodium if she wanted to keep her heartrate down. She couldn't help but feel like she was being called out. That was her love hotel of choice….not that Tome had any reason to know that…unless she happened to be 'sky watching' while Reigen was doing what she used to do for fun on a Friday night…and other such crazy thoughts. There was no way that Tome could have kept that to herself if she had seen something that she wasn't meant to.
Right?
"Watch the stars, kid, not other people. Ok? Even if they left their curtains opened they still had the expectation that they wouldn't have a stranger with a telescope watching them doing….private things. Ok? How would you feel if someone was looking in on you with a telescope?" asked Reigen
"Let them. I have nothing to hide." Said Tome. Too fast, much too fast, and with an effort at being disaffected that didn't suit Tome. Reigen shook her head.
"Don't bullshit a bullshitter." Said Reigen
"A thief thinks everyone steals." Shot Tome. Reigen shrugged. Reigen didn't much want to start verbally sparring with Tome, she hadn't cleared her social calendar through to next summer.
"Can we at least agree that it's wrong to invade people's privacy without their consent?" said Reigen
"….fine…" said Tome
"Good. At least we got through that. Ok, no more spying and no more public indecency. I get it, it's hard when you're young and sometimes you feel desperate but…but don't commit crimes, ok? Trust me, it's not worth it when you get caught…..by someone other than me." Said Reigen
"You know from experience?" said Tome
"Yup. Hard as it is to believe I was once your age." Said Reigen
"So then if you're going to lecture me about this then you're a hypocrite." Said Tome
"Maybe, or maybe I'm trying to keep you from catching some serious charges when you get older. Ok?" said Reigen
"Yeah, I get it, don't go to prison. Well, Reigen, thank you so much for dinner but its late and I have to go home and get my six hours-" said Tome
"Don't forget, everybody gets one." said Reigen. Tome nodded. Good. She got it. Reigen chose to believe, then, that she had made a difference in the course of Tome's life. The last thing she needed was one of her kids in prison for something so avoidable. These weren't her kids, not really, but she was partially responsible for them. They were her kids in a way…and she did care about them….so she had to save them from themselves sometimes. Like these times…yup. That could have gone much worse.
And she handled this whole thing very well.