A/N: Sadly, I do not own Yu Yu Hakusho.

Spirit Detective Saga
Chapter Eight - Girls' Night In

Plans had been made. Supplies had been gathered. All conditions had been met. Every guest had gathered, all except for one.

"Who are we going to meet?"

To Sayaka's question, Keiko replied, "Teijō Ami." She was cautiously optimistic about introducing those two. Their stories shared many of the broad strokes. As former sickly heiresses with an chronic case of loneliness, she hoped they could find common ground and help each other heal at least a little bit. "I think you'll like her. She'll understand what you went through better than anyone."

Despite the skepticism Sayaka held, she agreed to give Teijō a chance. Not that she had much of a choice. The only other option, really, had been to stubbornly sulk in a corner or ignore Teijō, but Keiko didn't bother to point that out.

The pair landed in the square containing Teijō's bench. Sayaka clung to Keiko's school blazer as they walked the short remaining distance. Just ahead of them, they found Teijō in her usual place as always. She and Keiko greeted each other, whereupon she asked for an introduction to their new friend who'd inserted herself between them.

"I'm Sayaka. I'm three hundred years old, so you'd better not—" Sayaka froze as Keiko's fingers brushed over the tip of her ear. She faked a cough. "I was only joking. I need to work on my delivery."

Fortunately, Teijō was a nice woman who demurely laughed at the back and forth. "It's a pleasure to meet you, Sayaka. I'm Teijō Ami. Be sure to treat your new big sister here well, okay? She's really very kind."

Sayaka harrumphed softly but agreed with a plain, "Obviously."

"So," Teijō asked, "any fun plans for the weekend with Maya, you two?"

Keiko nodded as Sayaka said, "We're having a girls' night in. There's going to be movies, and games, and everyone's invited."

"Sounds fun," Teijō said wistfully.

This was the point where Keiko pointed out the obvious. "That includes you."

"Oh! Oh, thank you, but I couldn't."

Keiko sighed. She hadn't wanted to do this, but she didn't see any better way to get Teijō to at least move on with her death, if not with her afterlife. The worst thing that could happen, Keiko figured, was that she would wind up with two ghosts haunting her instead of one.

"Come on, Teijō," Keiko said, reaching down to clasp hands with her. "It'll be good for you, I promise."

And then, without ceremony, Keiko pulled Teijō from her seat. Pure, unadulterated shock crossed her face. She stuttered out, "W-w-what? W-wait," and tried to pull back to her bench, but Keiko held her fast. "Keiko, I'm flattered, b-but I c-can't. I—"

"Will have fun with your friends. That's what you want, isn't it?"

"Y-yes, but—"

Keiko cut Teijō off again. "Nope. No buts. Sayaka?"

With a smirk, the girl in question leapt onto Teijō for a piggyback ride. Or ostensibly so, at least. Right now, Sayaka pushed her along from behind to help guide her away from her accursed bench. Together, Keiko and Sayaka managed to pull her out of the square against her ghostly instincts, compulsion, or emotional baggage (whatever force held her captive) and led her toward Maya's home.

There came a moment when Teijō suddenly fell limp as though someone had cut her strings. She stopped resisting, defeated. Sayaka hadn't reacted nearly so strongly to leaving home, but Teijō recovered quickly enough. Certainly, by no means did she not appear utterly terrified to be away from what she knew. She looked like Keiko imagined she would if she tried to take her entrance exams this very moment with no prior warning. But Teijō kept abreast now of her own volition, which Keiko counted as progress.

Still, Keiko felt it prudent to ask, "Are you feeling okay?"

"I… Yes." It almost sounded like a question. "May I ask where we're going?"

Keiko eyed Teijō for a moment, worried over how she'd already forgotten, but then replied, "Maya's home on the east side of town," Fortune had smiled upon them, for her parents would be away for the weekend. That gave them the run of the house.

With Teijō cooperative, if still shaking, they made the journey across town in mere minutes. When they arrived, they were met with a warm welcome. Botan even only rolled her eyes at Keiko absconding with another fixated ghost before greeting Teijō. Those two had a bit of a history together, but Botan politely informed her, "I'll take you to Spirit World whenever you're ready, but we both have more important things to be doing than listening to me badger you about it. For instance, Maya mentioned a movie we might all get a kick out of."

"Yes!" Maya cried. She excitedly leapt over the kotatsu in the living room and then pulled a VHS from a small collection beside the family television. With a knowing smile, she asked, "How's your English?"

"Decent," Keiko answered, though Maya already knew that from class.

Teijō replied, "Good," now noticeably calmer than she'd been on the flight over.

"Bilingual." Sayaka sounded out the word a little clumsily but to some surprise all around.

And Botan spoke her response in some unintelligible nightmare. A moment passed before she cracked a smile and said, "Oh, you meant Modern English. Fluent," as if either point hadn't been obvious enough.

Thus satisfied with everyone's answer, Maya presented the VHS in her hands for all of them to read the title. It was a subbed version; that much was obvious at a glance. And Botan clearly recognized the movie by sight alone, for the very moment she caught eye of it, she broke into a fit of hysterics. Teijō tittered and mentioned that she'd seen it while she'd been alive but wouldn't mind watching it again. Sayaka was too young to have any idea what it was but at least understood the irony.

Keiko, personally, wasn't sure if she should take offense or join Botan in laughter. Either way, they would be watching Ghostbusters tonight.

After the movie ended and Sayaka got the urge to sing its theme song out of her system (though they often caught her humming it), Maya pulled out a deck of cards. The only one here who didn't have some ability to touch the physical was Teijō, but Sayaka offered to hold her cards for her. In fact, Sayaka went one step further and took the deck still in its box from Maya to shuffle.

"Watch and be amazed!" Sayaka said, a natural showman. She raised her hands dramatically, and the box rose with it. Her power focused there until the top popped open. Then the cards flew out, but they also exploded all over the room into a chaotic mess without the slightest hint of control. In the aftermath, she only managed a stunned, "Why?"

Keiko, equally confused, turned to their local expert in poltergeists.

"Sorry, Sayaka," Botan said, "but brute force is no longer an option for you. You'll have to study hard with Keiko to get back to where you were."

Alarmingly, Sayaka tried to fire off one of her death beams. Thankfully, nothing happened. A very displeased hum came from her as she struggled to bring the entire dispersed deck back to her all at once. When that didn't work, she resorted to picking up each card up one by one and refusing anyone who offered to help.

Keiko nudged Botan. She leaned closer and whispered, "What happened? Is she just tired? There's nothing wrong, right?"

"Not at all," Botan whispered back. "She's just happy. She can't fuel her power with loneliness and anger anymore."

"Ah." That was an unfortunate trade-off, but Keiko wouldn't have things the other way around.

Regardless, Sayaka hadn't gone completely back to square one. She still could, with concentration, manipulate single objects well enough. She could move a card or pick up a hand, and that was really all she needed right now. They left the shuffling to Maya and cobbled together a card holder for Teijō from a box of cassette tapes. Botan, who they all expected to take things easy, managed just fine but only picked up cards when she had to. As for Keiko, she tried not to grumble over how Sayaka still made things look easy. That was natural talent at work, she supposed, but she got by.

Their game was Go Fish. It kept things simple both for Sayaka and for those who had trouble handling physical objects. It also didn't distract from conversation.

"Oh, Keiko," Teijō began, "I've been meaning to ask how your day among the living went."

As no one had yet remembered to clue Sayaka in on Keiko's situation, the shocked, "Her what?" came as no surprise. Botan tugged her sleeve to draw her close and whispered a few things into her ear.

Keiko, meanwhile, snorted at the memory of her miserable day in long-term care pretending to be comatose. "Let's just say I have a strong incentive to grow my pool of spirit energy as much as possible." She was going to have to deal with muscular atrophy no matter what, but she'd much prefer to have the spiritual strength to get back onto her feet right away and let her day-to-day walking take care of that. Volleyball would fix the rest once she felt up to it.

"That bad?" Teijō asked.

"I may be exaggerating a bit, but yeah. And I'd so looked forward to the taste of food again, too."

Teijō breathed out a wistful little sigh. "What I wouldn't give even for something as humble as a bowl of ramen."

"You know," Maya said, speaking to anyone listening, "I've grown a little envious of your freedom. You don't need sleep, or food, or shelter, or money, or anything, really. You're free to go wherever the wind takes you. I suppose it's not all sunshine and rainbows, though. What do you miss most about being alive?"

That was a no-brainer for Keiko. "Socialization. You girls are great, but I miss my family, my friends, and people only not seeing me metaphorically."

The jest, for all that it had a pinch of truth, got a fair bit of laughter from the others.

Teijō answered next. "I know this may sound strange, but for me, it's work. I feel so idle every day."

It didn't sound strange at all to Keiko. She would have gone mad if she'd tried to sit on a bench alone for an unbroken year.

"Food," Sayaka responded simply. "Good food."

Given Sayaka's age and, even adjusting for it, how little of a chance she'd had to experience what the world had to offer, that checked out. It certainly didn't hurt that she'd not been a ghost for long and happened to be a naturally gifted poltergeist. Keiko imagined that most of the changes in her death had been for the better.

"And you, Botan?" Maya asked. "Anything tempting you to join the living?"

Botan shrugged. "I've worn a physical shell before. I can't honestly say it was a pleasant experience, but then that had more to do with the circumstances than the breathing, eating, and such." She trailed off into a thoughtful hum before giving up and throwing out an answer. "Swimming, I guess. It's not that I can't, just that there's nowhere convenient to do it in the Spirit World besides the Styx, and that would be…unwise." She declined to explain why. "How about you, Maya? Morbid question, I know, but you asked it."

"Nah, I'm used to it. Comes with most of my friends being dead."

Keiko commented, "Technically, I'm alive."

Botan added, "And I'm a spirit."

"Not important." Maya dismissed them with a wave of her hand. "So what would I miss most? Hmm… Dreams, I think. Not sleep, just the dreaming. Now what's the best part about being a ghost? I propose it's the aforementioned freedom."

"Not being stuck in bed," Sayaka groused, her arms folded together. The sourness turned to delight, however, when she found a match for a card in her hand from the pool.

Teijō provided a more poetic answer. "The night has grown on me. I know it's somewhat contrary to what I said before, but I enjoy the peace and quiet when all the world stills. On occasion, someone or something disturbs the silence. Then you can devote your full attention to wondering why."

"People-watching can be fun," Keiko agreed. She'd done a bit of that herself. "Though for me, I think it's spirit energy. It's useful now, but I can have more fun with it when I get back into my body." In fact, she had a small prank in mind for Yūsuke. The mere thought of it had a mischievous smile growing on her face.

Maya and Botan both booed Keiko's answer. "Doesn't count," Maya added. "I have spirit energy, too, even if I don't know how to use it. It has to be something unique about being or your time as a ghost."

"Hmm… Fine then. I really enjoy being intangible. I don't look forward to the first time I run face first into a wall once I'm corporeal again." The image evoked brought a few smiles and snickers out from the others.

As a group, they turned to the only person who'd yet to answer. Although not actually a ghost, Botan obliged and threw in her own two bits. "Eternal youth."

A moment passed before Maya admitted, "Boring, but fair."

"And to address the spirit of your question," Botan continued, "ghosts lingering in this world tend to have interesting stories. I love listening to them."

"So glad we can entertain," Keiko remarked dryly.

Maya spoke next. "Question. Is that why you're a ferrygirl or because you're a ferrygirl?"

"Well, because, of course. I washed up on the shores of the river Styx like all ferrygirls, oar in hand and ready to serve."

To give credit to Botan's delivery, none of them could actually tell whether or not she was joking. None of them knew the first thing about how spirits were born, not even Keiko, so who could say one way or another? If animals, dolls, and such could spontaneously develop souls as Botan had once claimed, then there was no reason why a river possessing a soul of its own couldn't occasionally give birth to more as well.

"You four are so fun to tease."

And there it was.

"I used to be a healer," Botan continued. Her lips pressed into a thin line as she pored over memories and considered what precisely she wanted to reveal. "I will spare you the gruesome historical context, but I was born into a dark age for both our worlds. I specialized in the spiritual rather than the physical, although I'm sure Keiko can attest that I'm no slouch there either."

Keiko nodded. She'd had no complaints during the brief day she'd been properly alive aside from the inevitable ones she couldn't avoid, none of which she could hold Botan responsible for.

"Anyway, we inevitably ran into ghosts. Lots of them. Our ferrygirls were overwhelmed. Helping them move on was part of the job at the time. Then once the dust settled, I got shuffled away from field work. I enjoyed it. Don't get me wrong. But I missed being out here in Human World. My chance to return came when Spirit World predicted that your population would explode. We'd need vastly more ferrygirls to keep up with you, so I threw my name into the hat. And ta-da! Here I am!"

Sayaka slammed her hands onto the kotatsu table, or at least she tried to. They went right through it while her momentum comically carried her rolling forward. Nonetheless, she recovered quickly, now standing upright in the center of the table, and thrust a finger toward Botan. "You're a — a hi — hyp — hypo…"

"Hypocrite?" Teijō provided.

"That!" Sayaka said. "Why do we have to go to Spirit World, huh?"

Keiko coaxed Sayaka from the table with the temptation of getting to sit in her lap. Once she had a captive audience, she spared Botan the hassle of arguing with the girl again and tried her best to explain. "I once asked the same question. Bad things can happen to ghosts here if we're not careful. And lucky. Botan risks herself every day to guide us to Spirit World. She's like…a lifeguard."

By the confused, "Huh?" Sayaka uttered, she had no idea what that was.

"A firefighter?" That got instant recognition. "Imagine there's a wildfire off in the distance. It's coming toward us, but we don't know when or even if it'll arrive. Botan is here to get us to safety before it can."

Sayaka hummed doubtfully and then asked, "Couldn't she just put out the fire?"

Keiko groaned. "It's not a perfect metaphor." She'd had a much better one in mind with tides, and sharks, and drowning, and such.

"And it's a really big fire," Botan added.

Sayaka obviously wasn't convinced enough to move on, but she dropped the subject so they could continue their game.

As evening progressed into night, the group of five shifted between a half-dozen games or simply spent time talking with one another. When Maya had to break for food, they all joined her in the kitchen to offer suggestions and advice. That hadn't gone over nearly so well as the rest of the party, and she ended up throwing the extra four cooks out.

Then at last came an event without which no sleepover would be truly complete. Maya turned off the lights and closed the curtains on the light pollution shining through them. Atop their kotatsu, she lit a single candle.

"Ghost stories!" Maya proclaimed. After a moment, she flatly added, "And they can't be your own."

Keiko volunteered to go first. Kuwabara had told her a few interesting real ones after she'd finished helping him study for his science exam. For whatever reason, the poor boy attracted the worst sort of ghosts.

The party wound down not long after Maya finally collapsed, exhausted from staying up the entire night. At some point, Teijō had broken off from the group to watch the sunrise from the roof. The remaining three had settled in to play Final Fantasy with Sayaka at the controls and well and truly engrossed in the game.

"Don't ween her off of you with another addiction," Botan teased, whispering in Keiko's ear.

Keiko could honestly say that hadn't been the intention in the slightest, but it was an idea to keep in mind for when she wanted some privacy. She'd have to find a way to procure a console and a few games of her own.

Eventually, Botan, too, wandered off to check on Teijō. Neither of them returned until well over an hour after dawn broke. It occurred to Keiko then, when she saw Teijō smiling and laughing, that she'd never seen the woman look nearly so happy before. The heavy aura of gloom she'd used to carry around her had diminished over the night until it'd vanished entirely without notice.

Keiko had a bittersweet feeling that they'd be saying goodbye just as soon as Botan recovered her oar. Such was the price of befriending ghosts. As she watched Botan joke and laugh with Teijō, Keiko wondered how she did it. Reaching out to lost souls every night, hearing their stories, befriending some only to say goodbye, and everything all that entailed had to be emotionally exhausting. How many of them did she even remember? Keiko doubted Botan would ever forget her, but how would she be remembered? Would it be as a unique and interesting case to crack or as a genuine friend she kept in touch with long after their business together concluded? Would the latter even be allowed?

"Keiko?"

A distracted but questioning hum emanated from the girl in question.

"You feel…weird."

And that was the downside of spirit energy: it radiated emotions. That included more than just the darker spectrum that ghosts so typically harbored. Anyone sufficiently sensitive to such things could pick up on them.

"No need to worry," Keiko said idly. "Just thinking deep thoughts."

But regardless of those thoughts and what had sparked them, on the whole, Keiko declared that this party had been a great success.