Author's notes: So I kind of was busy for a while, but then one of my readers kicked me in the butt and the muse started working again. So here it is! Enjoy.

Reviews:

MangekyoMasta510: So thanks for the virtual kick in the butt! Otherwise I think it would have been updated only next month.

Black Seconds

The search for Marron Chestnut continued with full force. They would find her! A child couldn't just disappear in thin air. A child was laid down somewhere, partly or completely hidden. Somewhere in the district where she lived. They expanded the search area and found the most wonderful stuff which they collected in plastic bags. It was the police's job to determine what was important and what not. People who had before barely spoken to each other, began to know each other. Marron's disappearance was like a net that was tightened around them. A feeling that was both good and fearful. They did something together. And all the while there was someone walking around who knew the truth. They thought of a man, or maybe two. They thought that, in the worst case, it would be someone they knew. Someone who was sick, of course. Someone who wasn't in the right head, and dangerous. Maybe searching for other children. Now and then the anger flared up and they became consumed by fear. But in the first place they had something to talk about. The conversation deal with the government or the weather, but it went about Marron's murderer.
If there were kids close by, the adults tried to dim their voices, but that didn't always work. They were full of it and they were flooded by news on the television, raido and papers. If the kids showed up on school, the teachers took over. They couldn't escape and they didn't want to either. They could barely remember how their existence had been before the earthquake, which this disappearance was, had happened.

Bra Briefs was eating breakfast. She put the spoon in the jam jar and stirred carefully through the raspberries. Everything went so slow. Her thoughts were somewhere else, the spoon acted on its own. Bulma glanced at her with bowed head and felt a numb pain inside. What could she say? How much coudl Bra handle? I don't know, she thought. I don't what happened to Marron. Still, she couldn't keep acting like nothing had happened. It was important word the things. And Bulma had words. She was afraid to use them, though.
Bra felt her mother's gaze. Finally, she was content with the distribution of the raspberries. Why won't she look at me, Bulma thought. Why are we afraid to talk? We should yell and scream, we should cling to each other. Cling to the fact that we still have each other. And that's not something for granted. And what did Bra think? It had happened to Marron, so it can also happen to me? Bra chewed slowly and washed away the bread with some milk. She was a slender girl with blue hair and blue eyes. She looked a lot like her mother.
Bulma looked at the face of her daughter. Her bangs rippled up and fell on either side of her face, sleek and shiny. One of her eyes was a little more layered with make up than the other, but Bra didn't want to redo it.

'How is it going, Bra', Bulma started. 'Do you talk a lot about Marron at school?'

Her daughter stopped chewing. 'It's becoming less,' she said softly.

'But you still think about it?'

She nodded with bowed head.

'And the teachers? What do they say?'

'Some talk a lot about it. Others say nothing.'

'But what do you think? Do you not want to tlak about Marron at all? Or do you want to talk about it a lot? If you could chose?'

Bra thought about it. Her face became red out of awkwardness. 'I don't know,' she said.

'But if I ask you what you think?' Bulma said. 'About what happened? What do you say then?'

Bra waited longer. Bulma didn't dare breath out of fear that her daughter wouldn't dare to voice her thoughts.

'I think she's dead,' Bra said softly. She sounded so guilty that Bulma's heart shrunk.

'I also think so,' she said.

Now it had been said. What everybody knew. Everyone but Eighteen, Bulma thought. Eighteen was forced to keep hoping, otherwise her body would collapse and all her bones would break. Her blood would stop flowing and her lungs wouldn't expand anymore. She would fall to the ground as a sack full of broken bones. Bulma held in her breath when she thought about it. She had seen it so clearly in front of her and she had the feeling she had to hold onto her body tightly in order to keep her organs in place. Otherwise they would let go, she feared, and would land beneath her body. Only her heart would be left, hanging, beating arduously.

'I get such a bad consience,' Bra said. 'Because then it seems as if I've given up on her. But I haven't. It's just that it takes so long! Because they have searched everywhere.' She pushed away her plate and bowed her head. Her face was hidden behind her hair. 'And I haven't given up after all,' she said. 'If I go to bed at night, I haven't given up. But then I wake up and the light shines, and she still isn't found. Then I think she's dead.'

'Yes,' Bulma said. 'Because we hope that a wonder will happen while we are sleeping. That others will take it over from us while we rest and make everything right again. But it doesn't happen.'

Bra pulled the plate towards her again. Bulma looked at her red cheeks and had the feeling her heart almost burst from love. It was so big, that she almost broke from grief when she tought about Eighteen. If she would lose a child, she still would have one left. But Eighteen didn't have a man nor a child anymore. Only her own restless body.

'Trunks cries at night,' Bra said suddenly.

Bulma widened her eyes. What did she say? Trunks of eighteen lay crying during the night?

'Why?' she blurted out.

Bra shrugged her shoulders. 'I hear him through the wall. But I don't want to ask it.'

She finished her breakfast and went to the bathroom to brush her teeth. Went downstairs and pulled on a denim jacket and grabbed her rucksack. Bulma was pondering at the kitchen table. Had she misunderstood her son entirely? Was he in reality a sensitive soul who hid behind a indifferent facade? She wouldn't be the first one to be mistaken. Still, something kept bothering her and she didn't understand what. It was situated in a depth for which she didn't have clearance. Or was afraid to have.

On that moment she heard Trunks stumbling down the stairs. She stood up quickly to stroke Bra's shoulders before she went to school. She always had to do that, that last touch from now on meant the difference between life and death. If she forgot she would lose Bra. She tried to understand this strange reaction of her fear and decided to forget about it. This was most surely an exception.

'You ring at the door of Helena, right?' she said.

Bra nodded.

'You have to be together with at least two of you at all times. You aren't allowed to be uncareful.'

'We aren't,' Bra said seriously.

'If Helena is sick once, you come straight home and I'll bring you with the ?'

'Yes,' Bra said. 'Can I go now?'

She left. Became smaller and smaller while she walked through the street, just as Marron had become smaller and smaller, seen through the window of Eighteen's house. Trunks came out of the bedroom. She herself she walked over to the counter and began busying herself with bread and jam.

He went to sit without a word and grabbed a pack of milk. Again he drank from the pack itself, but this time she didn't say anything. Instead she dived into the refrigerator and took out a packet of sandwiches she had prepared, lovingly, the night before. He bought something to drink on school. She rather he didn't drink coke with his food, but had decided not to care much about it. There were so many things that could happen to young people. So many temptations, so many difficult things. Were they seen as nice and friendly, did someone want to be around them? Did he get the girl, a house and a job?

She laid the packet of sandwiches next to him and bumped his shoulder in a friendly matter. She had to find out about what Bra had said, that he cried at night. He didn't react to her touch.

'Will you come home immediately after school?' she asked nonchalantly. Because he couldn't use the car, he had to take the bus to school and he didn't like it.

'I have to pass by Yajirobe,' he said, as nonchalantly as she.

'Again? And what about your homework?'

She was immediately sorry about the whining for the homework. He did reasonably well on school and she hated herself when she harped about it. Especially after what had happened.

'We have to finish him,' he said. 'I don't get how I could ever have lived without it.'

He smeared some butter on a slice of bread, but didn't get much further. He smeared and smeared and then scraped it off again.

'Have you called Goten recently?' she asked.

He fumbled on his chair. 'I'll call. But first we have to finish the car.'

'And what about Sharpener?' she went on. 'Do you see him often?'

'Yes. Sometimes.'

'And your car?' she asked. 'Will it be as beautiful as before?'

If you wanted to reach your kids, you had to empathize in what was important for them, Bulma thought, and that car was important.

'The paintwork will be the most difficult part. It's something Yajirobe has never done before.'

'I get it.'

'Luckily he's black,' Trunks said. 'We have to get the colour right on the spot. Black is black.'

'That's true,' she smiled, but because he didn't lift his head to look at her, he didn't see the friendly smile.

'You have at least one comfort,' she said. 'you learn from everything. You'll see that you'll drive accident-free for years now. From that sort of stuff you become careful. Your father and I also have ended up with a dent sometimes. I three times. Twice it was my own fault,' she admitted.

He nodded and stood from the table. The bread lay untouched on his plate.

'I know you like the fact that Yajirobe repares that car for you,' Bulma said. 'But I don't like the fact you spend a lot of time with him.'

'I know that,' Trunks said numbly.

'Not that I don't trust you. And it's been a long while since he was involved in that theft. But you can chose your friends,' she said. 'And then I prefer you chose Goten. Or Sharpener.'

'Yeah, yeah,' Trunks said irritated while he shoved his chair underneath the table.

'So when the car is finished, you can stay away from him, right?'

'Yeah,' he mumbled, 'I can.'

He grabbed his backpack and walked into the hallway, quite a bit too fast, Bulma thought. She went after him. What Bra had said, she wanted to ask about it, but he shut her out. There wasn't even a small crack through which she could put her foot. He grabbed his coat from the hanger and put it on. Glancing at the clock, like he was on the late side. He wasn't.

Why don't I ask, Bulma wondered. Why don't I stop him and ask him? She felt her own cowardice and was ashamed of it. Walking back to the kitchen on her own and stared out of the window. She saw Trunks small back go through the gate. Everything was so hard. Marron, she thought, poor little Marron. Then she started to cry.

Author's notes: After this there will be at least two weeks of no updates. Because next week is full of tests for school and the week afterwards I'll be going on vacation (to the Dominican Republic!) So yeah, I'll try to write on my vacation but it will take a week for me to convert it into a word document which I can upload.

Take care and Review.