Just when Ranma thought the night would never end, the last customer walked out and Izumi flipped the sign on the door to the CLOSED side and locked it. Not since the last time her father had made her lug boulders up a mountain for some stupid training thing had Ranma been so tired.
Izumi came up behind her, putting an arm around her shoulder with a little squeeze. “Hey ladies, what do we think of Ranko tonight?” Izumi whooped and clapped, and Mei enthusiastically joined in. Yui and Hana were still in the back, where they had been mired in more conspiratorial conversations since just after last call, but they emerged at Izumi’s prompting. Both were smiling, and Yui gave her a little round of applause as well. Hana was all smiles, but did not clap because she had a clipboard in her hand.
“Hey, hon, great job today,” Izumi said warmly. Ranma smiled up at the brunette, feeling at least a little accomplished, but still worried about whatever it was that Yui and Hana were up to.
As Mei finished wiping down the bar top with a clean rag, Hana motioned to an empty table. “Hey, Ranko, c’mere a second?”
Ranma stood and followed. Her nerves were getting the best of her now, and she fidgeted in her seat a little.
Hana looked up over the clipboard, and she must have seen the poor girl jittering. “Take it easy, kiddo. I just gotta get some information from you for the employee file.” Ranma gulped. This was even worse.
“Okay, let’s start off. Real basic stuff. Name’s Ranko… you said your last name was Tendo, right?” Ranma nodded.
“Got it. Birth date?” Ranma gave a date of November twenty-fifth, remembering to subtract three from the year at the last possible second. A whoop came from behind the bar.
“Yui! Friday’s the new kid’s birthday!” Mei giggled.
“Alright. I take it you’re a Japanese citizen, so no worries there?” Ranma nodded meekly and Hana’s pen moved some more behind the clipboard. “Great. And what’s your address?”
Ranma froze. How would they react, knowing she’d been sleeping in parks and stuff the last few weeks? Would they think less of her? Would they even want her? She sunk into her chair. “Well, I, ah…”
Hana nodded sadly. “Yeah, that’s pretty much what we thought.” Ranma looked up, puzzled. “Don’t blame me,” the proprietress continued. “Yui spotted it first.”
The blonde had made her way out of the back without Ranma having noticed, and was now standing behind Ranma’s chair. “Leaves all over your back, carrying a camping backpack with a sleeping mat thing, and you felt the need to bring it here with you. If you were trying to hide it, you kinda suck at it.”
Ranma wanted to crawl under the table. She wished she could say she’d never been so humiliated, but lately that seemed to just invite a new low to lurk just around the corner. Hana sighed, putting the clipboard down on the table. Ranma’s eyes darted to it and found that the top page contained a crossword puzzle, with a little abstract doodle off to the side.
What had been nerves became panic. Clearly this was going to be an issue for them if they had made such a big deal about it. Her eyes wide, she racked her brain for anything she could do or say to salvage the situation. If she couldn’t even do a job like this, she was well and truly sunk.
It was then that Hana reached across the table, covering Ranma’s hand with her own and patting it to force her attention. “Hey, hey, hey. Ranko. Look at me. Look at me. Everything’s okay, honey. Relax.” Something about the woman’s voice, her presence, reassured her, and she quieted herself at least somewhat. “Listen, the girls and I have been talking. You really impressed us today. We think you’re going to do great here. But, baby, we can’t have you out on the streets like that. It’s not safe for you.”
Ranma nodded, following along. While she was pretty sure she could handle the odd pervy vagrant, and had had to do so more than once since she left Nerima, she appreciated her boss’s concern nonetheless.
Hana continued. “So, anyway. I keep a little studio apartment upstairs. It’s not much; I mostly just use it for quick changes and if I need to crash for a while after a long night, but nobody lives up there. If you like…” Ranma noticed that as Hana spoke, Izumi, Yui and Mei had formed a semicircle behind her chair. “You’re welcome to use it for a while if you want to.”
Ranma blushed. She could not believe the kindness being shown to her, but she couldn’t be a freeloader again. Not after how things ended with the Tendos. “Thank you,” she squeaked, “but really, I’m fine. I don’t mind. It’s not so bad.” As she finished her sentence, the walls of the bar shook with a loud peal of thunder from outside. It had been so loud and so busy throughout the evening that none of the women had noticed it was storming.
Hana pursed her lips. “Okay, and now I’m not asking. Come on.”
She stood and offered Ranma her hand, but before Ranma could get out of her chair, Yui stepped forward. “Mama, let me get her settled?”
Hana nodded. “I think that’s a great idea. Good night, Ranko.”
With cheery assents from Mei and Izumi, Yui put her arm around the shorter girl’s shoulders. “C’mon, hon.”
Ranma blushed furiously at being catered to like this after weeks of living rough. She felt terrible as she remembered how distrusting she had been of Yui and Hana’s conversations, and horribly guilty at the idea of living off of someone else’s generosity again. On the other hand, she did have a job there. She wasn’t freeloading; it would be no different than when Ukyo offered her a place to stay above her restaurant. Maybe she’d just stay tonight, so she wasn’t stuck out in the rain. It hadn’t really stormed much since Ranma left home, but the thought of having to walk, let alone sleep, in a deluge made every cell of her hypersensitive skin stand on end.
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Her backpack slung over her shoulder, she followed Yui up the narrow stairs. The door at the top wasn’t locked, and Yui pushed it open. “Well, here you go. Make yourself at home.” Yui stepped forward to allow Ranma to enter and take in the space.
It was indeed a small apartment, probably not much bigger than the Tendo guest room, and it was fairly sparsely decorated. A tiny cooktop, a microwave and a half-sized refrigerator were crammed into one corner. Two narrow doors took up most of the east wall. Centered on the window directly ahead and sticking into the center of the room stood a twin-sized bed with a fairly plain purple comforter, two small pillows, a headboard made of hollow aluminum painted white and bent into a few basic but dainty patterns, and a footboard to match. A small, white-painted nightstand and a round pine table with two chairs rounded out the furnishings. The air smelled faintly of flowers.
Ranma’s eyes widened. She couldn’t believe her good luck. What had she done to deserve all this? Did Hana and the others want something from her? Was the other shoe going to drop? She tried not to get too excited in case things went south, but she had to admit, she couldn’t wait to try out that bed. Her feet ached in ways she didn’t know existed, and honestly, she couldn’t remember the last time she’d slept on a mattress. She kicked off her shoes and set her backpack on the floor next to the front door, which Yui closed behind them.
Yui motioned to the two doors on her right. “The one on the left is the bathroom, the other’s the closet. There’s a few outfits in there that the girls and I have left here over time; if anything fits you, you’re welcome to borrow it.”
Ranma looked up at her. “Are you guys sure about this? I really...”
Yui shushed her with an open palm and a smile. “You heard Mama Hana. If she says you stay, you stay.”
Ranma sat on the bed, stifling a giggle as her butt sank into the soft mattress a little. “Well, thank you. All of you. I hope I’m going to do you all proud.”
Yui smiled more earnestly than Ranma had seen thus far, and pulled up a chair next to the bed. “Of that, Ranko, I have no doubt.”
Ranma fidgeted with her hands a little, not really sure what to do from here. She didn’t exactly have a lot of experience at the whole girl talk thing. “Why do you call her Mama Hana?”
Yui smiled a little sadly. “Well, kiddo, here’s the thing. Where you’re sitting right now? All of us were there at one time or another. Hana took us all in and helped us find our way. We all had something to run from, and she refused to give up on any of us. She’s the mother none of us really ever had. She’s good people – the best. Over time, we’ve kind of become a little family, the five of us. Oh yeah, there’s Ayako too – you’ll meet her one of these days. She’s the oldest of us, but she got married a few weeks ago and moved out to Yokohama with her husband. That’s why we had an opening – which reminds me, tomorrow, make sure you take that sign out of the window, okay?”
Ranma rocked back. She couldn’t believe what she was hearing. She wasn’t sure if her gloom despite this incredible turn of events was because she felt guilty for being pitied like this, because she pitied her coworkers for having all been through similar situations to the one she found herself in now without the benefit of a childhood spent living out of a bag, or if it was just the sea of pent-up fears and worries that had finally begun to crest. Maybe all three.
“What brought you all here, if I can ask?”
Yui blushed a little. “Well, Izumi… she got pregnant at her 18th birthday party, and the shitbag guy bailed on her. She was alone with a newborn son when she first came. But now, she’s seeing a great guy named Kaito, and he’s amazing with little Hoshi. She’ll probably be the next one getting hitched at this rate.” She chuckled. “As for Mei, it was drugs, real bad. Man, the first month, she was so sick, but mama stayed with her through the whole thing, got her clean, and she’s been able to stay that way. We’re all super proud of her.”
Ranma nodded softly, the new context for the compassion her coworkers had shown her crashing into her like a wave of sledgehammers. “And you?”
Yui blushed, nervously rubbing her wrist through her sleeve. “Me? Pshaw. I was fine, Mama just needed somebody cute to tend bar.”
Ranma smirked. “Fine, fine. Keep your secrets.”
Yui turned to her, and while her expression turned more serious, it was painted with compassion and care. It reminded Ranma a lot of Kasumi. “More importantly, what about you, Ranko? You don’t have to tell me if you don’t want to, but I’m here if and when you do.”
She’d only known this girl for a few hours, but she wanted to tell her everything. Jusenkyo, the love hexagon-or-however-many-sides-it-had, Shampoo’s kiss of death, the Cat Tongue thing, all of it. She wanted somewhere to put it all, even just for a minute, but there was no way Yui would believe her. She thought maybe she could say enough without saying too much.
“Jeez, where do I start? Um, well, my pop was like, super strict about wanting me to… take over the family business. I mean, I wanted to and everything, but with him it was like, all training, all the time. We left home when I was like five, and he started taking me all over to… ya know, show me parts of the business and stuff. I haven’t seen my mom since.” She fidgeted a little, not sure how to broach the next part. “Thing is, Pop had this best friend, see, and they got the genius idea that one of Pop’s kids and one of his should get married, and, well, I’m an only child. So, that pretty much settled it for me.”
Yui cringed. “An arranged marriage? People still do that? Ugh. Well, I hope he was decent, at least.”
Ranma gulped hard. He? That was not a conversation she was prepared to have, not yet at least. “Ak… my fiancee… was really sweet sometimes, and really cute sometimes, and really violent and untrusting sometimes. It was… complicated. We might’ve been able to make it work, maybe, but then I… got hurt, and everything started changing for me. I wasn’t sure what to do, I was confused and scared and depressed and I needed time and I needed help, and Pop and his friend and everybody just insisted that I keep on like nothing ever happened and I just couldn’t do it. I tried, Yui. I swear I did. I couldn’t do it anymore. I…”
The touch of Yui’s hand on hers interrupted her train of thought. Her slender fingers curled around Ranma’s left hand and wrist, sympathy filling her eyes. “You don’t have to say anything else, honey. I understand.”
Ranma’s eyes welled and she turned away slightly, hiding her black eye from her humiliation at the dojo. How could she allow herself to be so vulnerable like this? Was she just that relieved to have somewhere to go and someone to talk to? Her body quaked slightly as she fought to stem the tide, and Yui squeezed her hand.
“Ranko, it’s okay. You’re okay now. You’re safe here with us.”
Ranko. The name she’d chosen so she could bury her male half, or at least try to. But Yui didn’t know she’d ever been a boy. To Yui, she was just another girl. And girls were allowed to cry.
Ranma clung to her arm, and the dam broke.