I am SO. SORRY. My muse kinda ditched me on this one and finally showed back up again. Late as all hell, but here ya go.

Liz led them all to the symmetrical car and opened the trunk for all their bags before they all got in. Maka found herself shoved to shotgun while Patti and Tsubaki sat in back.

"Alright," Liz said as soon as the car started. "Girls' Night Out starts now! First order of business, the most fattening, cholesterol-laden food we can find 'cause we don't have to care tonight. Girls, we're going to McDonald's!"

Patti cheered from the back seat and Tsubaki laughed, agreeing instantly. Maka smiled, liking this group already.

One trip through the drive-thru later, they ended up at the largest, most elaborate house Maka had ever seen. She stood and stared a bit while Liz and Tsubaki moved to the trunk to grab their bags. Patti was playing with her happy meal toy while munching on a couple fries, and grabbed her bag when it was given to her without breaking her concentration on the small piece of cheap plastic. Maka was snapped out of her staring when Tsubaki handed her her bag, which she shouldered and followed her and the sisters inside. Tonight was likely to be interesting, if she could stop staring at the house like a freaking tourist.

"Maka! In here!"

She glanced up at Patti waving at her from a door off to the side, and realized she'd been hanging around the foyer staring while the others had moved on. Embarrassed, she shook her head and followed Patti into a sort of recreation/game room that had four air mattresses already set up with sheets and pillows on the floor. From their somewhat haphazard setup, she was pretty sure that Kid had no part in it. Or in this room. From what she had seen of the mansion so far, every single room down to its very last millimeter was perfectly symmetrical. The room they were in now looked a little less… rigid.

"Kid's not even allowed in here," Liz spoke up from behind her as she looked around, seeming to know what she was thinking. "Patti and I had to have at least one room to ourselves."

Maka nodded and tossed her bag on one of the mattresses before flopping down on it. Patti was digging through a closet and came back a few minutes later tossing blankets at everyone. Maka picked up the one that had landed on her head and cocooned herself in it, facing the others who had followed her example.

The conversation started out neutral, basic girl stuff from Liz, and what her current fashion magazines had claimed to be "in." Patti had snorted at some of them, and when Liz had gone to grab one to show pictures, Maka couldn't help but laugh out loud at how ridiculous some of them looked.

Eventually conversation turned to what they all did for a living and how their respective weeks were. Patti apparently worked at a day care center, and took great delight in listing off how many monsters had been slain and how many tea parties had been held that week. Liz was a makeup girl at a department store in the mall, and had a couple interesting stories about some rather stuck up valley girls she'd had to deal with. Tsubaki was a receptionist at a dentist, and told stories of how she was able to calm frightened children and even some adult patients before they were called in. Maka could easily see her doing so. She had a very calm and caring demeanor, and felt like someone you could tell anything to or go to her for comfort.

Eventually the question of her occupation arose, and she grinned and responded calmly, "I'm a martial arts instructor."

She had expected the silence, but not the looks of awe and respect. She usually just got odd looks.

"Wow," Patti beamed. "So you could like, kick all our asses huh? That's so cool!"

Liz smirked. "I thought there was an air of 'don't mess with me' about you. What do you teach?"

"Karate, kendo, aikido, taijustu, judo, kickboxing, tai chi, wing tsun, and krav maga."

Liz chuckled a little. "I don't even know what half those are, but wow."

Tsubaki smiled. "Don't tell Black Star what you do. He may challenge you."

Liz snorted. "So what? I say let him get his ass kicked. It'll be fun to watch. The kid takes one year of karate and thinks he's Mr. Miyagi. It'll be nice to see him taken down a peg."

Patti laughed and quickly agreed. Tsubaki chuckled nervously but it was pretty obvious she would find it entertaining as well.

The conversation went on for another hour, until Liz learned that Maka liked to play pool and immediately dragged her to the pool table in the corner and challenged her to a game. Maka won, and the rematches and random other games that also involved Patti and Tsubaki went on for a while before they finally got tired and went back to their air mattresses.

After a while of comfortable silence, Liz glanced over at Maka. "You've probably seen this coming all night, but Soul never told us how you two met. I know at the club, but what happened exactly?"

Maka looked up from her fifth cream soda of the night and sighed. "To be honest, nothing really. The seat next to me at the bar was empty and he sat there. He bought me a drink, but didn't say a word to me for a while until he started complaining about the music. A conversation went on from there."

Liz nodded. "Sounds like him. He was complaining about a headache when we left that night. He has a rather eclectic taste in music, but there are some things he just can't stand. Dubstep and certain trance songs drive him insane."

"It was weird though," Maka mumbled, looking down at the floor.

Liz raised an eyebrow curiously. "How so?"

Maka blinked, not realizing she'd said it out loud, and looked up at Liz. "I usually wouldn't even give a guy the time of day, but it was so easy to talk to him. It was just... surreal.

To her surprise, Liz nodded in understanding. "Patti and I weren't exactly the most outgoing either, but even when we first met him and he was like, twelve, he had a certain charisma about him. He's not the most outgoing either, but if he feels like talking to you, it's so easy to do. You're right, it is kinda surreal, but it's an interesting quality to have, I guess. Shame he never really puts it to use, but hey."

Maka cocked her head to one side in curiosity. "Why do you say that?"

Liz snorted. "Look at him! Composer, poet, good listener... He could easily get any girl he wants and he still insists on living like a hermit. If it weren't for his high school years and some of his lyrics, I'd think he was gay."

Maka shrugged. "Maybe he's just more interested in his work than finding himself a girlfriend right now. Nothing wrong with that."

Liz sighed at that, and Patti and Tsubaki looked a little subdued as well. "That's not it," Liz replied. "I wish I could say it was, though."

Maka frowned in concern. "Then...?"

Liz looked at her for a moment, conflicted, before she sighed again. "It's not really my story to tell, but... In a nutshell, a lot of girls used him in high school. They'd hang out with him, or make out with him or something, but if he tried to pursue a relationship, they'd never speak to him again. He wanted something real, none of them ever wanted anything more than a fling. Eventually he got tired of it and just... gave up. He hasn't had so much as a close female friend other than us ever since. I'm pretty sure he only considered Tsubaki 'safe' at first because she was already engaged to Black Star when he met her."

"Which is why you can see we're so interested in you, Maka-chan," Tsubaki added.

"Hell, I was interested in you before he even went to you. He saw you when you walked in with... Blair, was it? And watched you turn down guy after guy before... oh damn." Liz chuckled to herself. "That was probably why he even went to talk to you in the first place. You intrigued him, and as a bonus, you weren't interested in anything."

Maka grinned a little sheepishly "I... kinda gave up a while back too. Not as long ago as he has, but yeah."

Patti blinked and spoke up for the first time since Soul was mentioned. "How come?"

Maka sighed. "I guess it started really with my papa. When I was little... perhaps even before I was born, I don't know... he cheated on my mama almost constantly. When I was 10 she finally couldn't stand it anymore, filed for divorce, and left. She took me with her, but I still had to spend time with him. Custody was alternating every four months during the school year and all with my mama during the summer. He always claimed he loved me and mama more than anything, but... I never saw it proven.

"The day I turned 18, I moved out on my own. Mostly to not have to pack up and move every few months. Blair and I both got the apartment I live in now and I've pretty much been there ever since. I've always been into martial arts so I got myself some training and a few certifications and me and an old friend of mine opened up a studio together.

"As for... giving up on dating, while papa is somewhat to blame, he's not the only reason. I've had a few boyfriends. None of them were worth it. They either wanted my body more than me, or tried to change me or get me to stop being a martial arts instructor 'cause... hell, I don't even know. Maybe they felt emasculated because their tiny little girlfriend could kick their ass. And a couple... were no better than my papa. A few years ago I finally said 'screw it' and stopped looking. Even so, Blair keeps trying to set me up with someone, and you can imagine all the hell I've been getting since I've met Soul."

Liz smirked and Tsubaki and Patti giggled. "Probably about the same amount of hell Soul's been getting from us."

Maka sighed. "Leave him alone, Liz."

"We like seeing him happy. He's an expert at moping around. Whether he sees you as anything more than a friend or not, he's happy when he's with you." Liz poked Maka in the forehead at that. "Is that so wrong?"

"I... well... no, but..."

"Then what's the problem?"

"Neither of us are interested."

"Right now..."

"Liz!"

"Alright, alright," Liz laughed. "I'll back off both of you. But don't expect me to shut up entirely. You have no idea how much fun it is to watch him squirm."

Maka rolled her eyes. "On the subject of relationships, I'm curious..."

"About us and Kid?"

"Yeah... I'm not judging you or anything, it's just... how do you do it?"

Surprisingly it was Patti who answered. "Sissy and I have shared pretty much everything growing up. It's not too hard for us to share Kiddo."

"And he loves us both equally and gives us both equal amounts of attention and affection. He'd have an aneurysm otherwise."

Maka stared. "He's that OCD?"

Liz raised an eyebrow in response. "You saw his breakdown over the sugar packets last week. And have you seen this house? Patti and I spend most of our time either in here or his room 'cause God forbid we leave anything in any other room even a hair off."

Maka blinked. "That sounds stressful."

"We've gotten used to it. Sometimes it's an annoyance, but now it's kind of endearing. He's loosened up since we started dating. Black Star says he used to be much worse."

Tsubaki nodded at that. "At least he's come to terms with his hair. He used to have a breakdown at least once a day over it."

Maka blinked. "His hair is natural?"

"Do you honestly think that with his psychotic devotion to symmetry he'd purposely dye his hair that way? It's an odd genetic quirk he inherited from his dad. The stripes are natural. If he tries to grow them out, they pop back up later. About every four inches or so his hair on the left side streaks white. He dyes it sometimes but his hair doesn't hold dye well either and it washes out pretty quick."

Maka blinked. "Interesting. Never heard of anything like that."

Patti grinned. "Soul's terrified of the dentist!"

Maka blinked at the seemingly random piece of information before Tsubaki elaborated. "You have seen his teeth, right Maka-chan?"

Maka nodded, still not understanding the connection.

"It's a rare genetic anomaly. It runs in his family but it's skipped three generations, so he's the only one with it. His dentist... kind of views him as a rarity and frequently mentions wanting to get a blood or tissue sample and sometimes even mentions dissecting him. What that will do, I have no idea. But Soul's always held at the dentist longer than most other patients. Soul's not the only one who's terrified of him by a long shot, but he's... a decent person."

Liz snorted. "Be honest, you've worked for him for five years and you're still creeped out by him."

Tsubaki scowled at her. "He's not that bad once you get to know him, but yes. He is a little... unnerving. He's still the best dental surgeon in the state."

Liz nodded. "True. My wisdom teeth surgery healed much faster than anyone else I know."

Patti grinned rather creepily. "Bet he's still got Soul's in a jar or something!"

Liz shuddered. "Probably."

Conversation died shortly after that, and they all decided to call it a night. Liz muttered something about hoping Black Star wasn't too wasted when they went back to Soul's in the morning to pick the boys up before she finally passed out.