Useless Notes: Despite his terrible luck, Ganju Shiba is forced to take over his sister's store while she goes off to renew the stock.
Disclaimer: Bleach doesn't belong to me and neither does the song Stay Beautiful. They belong to Kubo Tite and Diggy-Mo.
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Shining Velocity
6. Even Lady Luck's abandoned him for his looks.
It wasn't a little-known fact that Ganju Shiba was as unlucky as a losing gambler. He was born without knowing his parents and grew up with only an older sister to watch over him. Unlike him, his sister was unbelievably pretty, which led most people to believe that they were either: born from a stellar-looking mother and a not-so-stellar-looking father, or that Ganju was simply adopted.
He was doomed from the start. When he was six, he climbed up a tree when his sister wasn't looking, to prove he wasn't as unlucky as people thought he was. It was just too bad Kuukaku, his sister, caught him just as he had successfully made it to the topmost branch. Her panicked and angry shout startled the young Ganju so much, that he fell off from the tree, breaking his nose and altering his looks forever.
When he was nineteen, he started a small gang of his own, with a few loyal followers (the same boys who cheered him on as he climbed up that tree). They did what they thought big-shot gangs did all the time and were always caught. Eventually, Kuukaku got so fed up with bailing them out of jail, that she made the younger Shiba get a job of his own, just so that they could earn some extra money without getting on the bad side of the law.
But even then, Ganju's luck wouldn't let up. He was fired five times in a row from seven different jobs, forcing him to remain unemployed for a long time. Kuukaku, being the dutiful big sister that she was, allowed him to help out at her shop part-time, as long as he didn't break anything, piss anyone off or do some other unlucky thing.
For a few months, it seemed Lady Luck took pity on the unlucky Ganju Shiba, as the siblings didn't have any unfortunate incident happen in their shop. Ganju put his muscles to good use by getting rid of shoplifters and carrying the heavy supply boxes into the supply room.
But all good things had to come to an end sooner or later, and this didn't exclude Ganju's sudden luck turn-around.
The news hit him one day, when he found out his sister had to go out for a few days to replenish some of their supplies. That left him to watch the shop by himself, luck be damned. But as the days went on, Ganju found himself pretty capable of doing this by himself and even considered putting up a shop of his own when the time was right. There was only one day until his sister's return and he could only imagine her surprise if she found out that nothing unlucky happened during her absence. He smiled contentedly behind the counter and fanned himself lightly.
"Hey mister, you got any soda left?"
Ganju looked up from his daydream and looked around. No one.
"Huh," he muttered, scratching his head. "I coulda sworn I heard someone."
"Psst," came the voice again. "Down here."
He looked down obediently and saw a small girl (she couldn't be more than thirteen, he thought), her arms crossed and her eyes looking fierce.
"Yeah, sure I got some," he answered. "Lemme get 'em from the back for ya." And putting down his fan, Ganju stood up and went inside the supply room to get her soda. "She's too young to be drinkin' soda, but hey it's hot, what you gonna do, huh," he muttered to himself good-naturedly before disappearing in the back.
As soon as he opened the fridge door, Ganju perked up and heard three different sounds happening simultaneously: a loud cry of "Now!", the sound of breaking glass and the doorbell clanging loudly against the door. He rushed outside and saw not just the small girl from earlier, but two other accomplices, running out the shop as fast as their feet would carry them. He growled loudly, grabbed the baseball bat behind the counter (Kuukaku was an avid fan of the sport) and ran outside the shop, giving chase.
"Hey, you three! STOP!" Ganju roared, swinging the bat in the air.
They had made off with quite a number of goods and the tallest of the three giggled loudly. "Looks like we got quite a lot, ne Hiyori? Ne? Ne?"
"Shaddap and just run!" the short girl from earlier yelled back. "He's gaining on us!"
"I'unno," the shortest of the three (who didn't look older than five) remarked, a loaf of bread in her mouth. "The ug'y man seems kin'a slow."
Tall Girl giggled again. "Aw Nel-chan, you're so cute when you talk like that!"
"Mashiro!" Hiyori ran, almost falling over a loose stone. "Focus will ya?"
Despite their current condition though, Nel found she couldn't stop laughing. "It's jus' like we ru'in inna race!" The loaves of bread that fell from her hands lay on the ground, forgotten. They didn't have time to pick them up after all. "Nel comes in fi'rt place!"
Behind them, Ganju was starting to lose steam, his bat not swinging around in the air anymore, but almost being dragged along the rough sidewalk. He stopped and gasped for air. But just as he did, the girls had beaten the red light and made it across the street with his goods.
He sighed, straightened himself and slowly made his way back to the store, giving up the chase. After a few paces in the store's directions, the unlucky Shiba stopped dead in his tracks, realizing that he had left the store open and unguarded. Realizing his mistake, he groaned loudly and slapped his forehead.
"Jesus, my sis's gonna kill me!"
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A/N: Even in here, poor Ganju gets no luck.