“What’s in a name? That which we call a rose by any other name would smell as sweet.”
Ranko peered over her book at the middle-aged woman approaching her with a paper coffee cup in her hand, squinting at the mid-afternoon sunlight still streaming through the double doors at the front of the Phoenix as they slowed to a close behind her. “What in the freeze-dried fuck are you talking about, Mom?”
Hana laughed, motioning to the book in Ranko’s hand. “Romeo and Juliet. An old favorite. I’m proud of you for getting started on your homework before the show for once. But I guess there’s not much time to wait now, given that after this week you’re on school break - and you’ll be awfully busy!”
Ranko chuckled with a soft smile. Somehow, she never pictured the Metallica-loving matriarch of her strange little clan to be into mushy old love stories. “It’s not homework.” Ranko sighed, closing the book and tossing it to the bar counter dejectedly. “It's this damned song. It’s killin’ me!”
Pursing her lips in furtive understanding, Hana rubbed Ranko’s back through her red school uniform pinafore. “It’ll come to you, little star. You’ve still got time. What’s giving you so much trouble? You tell Akane you love her all the time.”
Ranko hung her head in exasperation with a low grunt. “Time? The wedding’s in four fucking days, Mom, and I’ve got diddly-shit! And tellin’ Akane I love her… that’s the problem! I tell her all the time that I love her, and this has to be… I don’t know, more special than that. Better. And I just can’t find words big enough for it all. I hoped I could get inspired off’a some of this crap, but…” She motioned to the stack of seven books off to her left, each with a white Yusue High School library sticker wrapped around its spine. “All it’s doing is telling me I’m supposed to talk like friggin’ Kuno. I even asked friggin’ Fred for ideas, and he’s got nothin’ too.”
Hana sighed, hopping up on the stool next to her youngest daughter. “It’ll come to you when it’s supposed to, baby. Try to stop worrying about it and let it happen naturally. Come on, let’s get your mind off of it for a few minutes. I’ve barely gotten to talk to you in days with everything being such a whirlwind around here. How you doin’, kiddo?”
Because I’ve been avoiding you, Mom, Ranko thought guiltily. She gave a light shrug, answering in a hollow voice. “Just busy as hell. Excited. Scared as fucking hell. You know, usual bride stuff, I guess.” And I am anything but a usual bride.
“I wouldn’t know.” Hana smiled lovingly at her daughter. “I’m getting the sense there’s something else you’re not telling me, though, Ranko. You may be a performer, but you’re a terrible liar sometimes. You know you can talk to me about absolutely anything, right?”
“Not this,” Ranko said with a dejected suspiration. “It’s too personal.”
The old barkeep chuckled, bracing Ranko’s forearm with her left hand. “Honey, I’m not sure anybody except maybe Akane knows you better than I do, so I don’t know what you could possibly have going on that’s too personal for me to know about.”
“It’s not that.” Ranko grimaced a bit. “It’s personal… about you.” She lowered her head into her hands, her elbows supporting it against the polyurethane bar top. Gods, I’m such a jerk.
Hana’s face became a frown of concern. “Well, then you definitely need to tell me, so I can fix whatever’s wrong. Come on, kiddo. You’re too close to getting married to let yourself get all bummed like this. Let’s get it off your shoulders?”
Hanging her head lower in her hands, Ranko inhaled sharply. We’re really going there, aren’t we, Mom? “It’s… nothin’ you did. It’s just… Remember when I got that comb at the shower? From my… from her?”
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A quiet nod came in reply from the elder woman. “I suspected it might be something to do with that. You don’t have to wear it if you don’t want to. You’re under no obligation. But somehow, I doubt it’s the comb you’re referring to, but the note it came with.”
Ranko turned on her stool to face her mother, a guilty expression in her eyes. “You promise you won’t get mad?”
Hana took Ranko’s hand in her own. “I promise I’ll do my best not to, and I promise it’ll be easier for both of us to deal with if you’re up front about whatever this is.”
“So, Nodoka… showed up at my place a couple nights ago. Unannounced. And, she told me she was just there to say goodbye, but… we actually had a really good talk, and I got a lot of shit off my chest, and she hugged me and told me she loved me and everything.”
With a beaming smile, Hana squeezed her daughter’s hand tight. “Honey, that’s wonderful! Why would you think I’d be upset about that?!”
Ranko slumped to her side, leaning against Hana, wrapping herself in the comfort of her mother’s arm around her. “Because it felt good, and ‘cause I actually let myself consider accepting her.”
“Ranko, sweetheart, that decision is entirely up to you, and I’ll support you either way. I must be really dense today, though, because for the life of me, I still can’t fathom why you think that would bother me.” Her left hand still holding Ranko’s, she rubbed Ranko’s shoulder firmly with her right, trying to instill a little confidence in her young ward.
Ranko pulled out of the embrace, sitting up straighter and looking into Hana’s eyes, her own a roiling chasm of shame. “It’s… I’ve already got the best mom ever. She wasn’t ever there for me, but you were, always. You took care of me, and you loved me when nobody else would, even her. You saved me, Mama. Forget getting married, I’d be layin’ dead in a ditch right now without you and my sisters. I love you, and I owe you everything, and the idea that I even thought for a second about allowing somebody I just met to take your place like that…”
Hana laughed quietly. “Oh, baby… no. No. Don’t be silly. Of course you’re allowed to let her in if you want to. Mei still talks to her parents sometimes, even though she doesn’t talk about it much with you girls because it hasn’t really been an option for you, and likely never will be for Yui and Izzi. And Aya…” She sighed, leaving the secret that only the two of them shared to remain unspoken.
“Nobody’s ever going to replace me, Ranko. I’m gonna be your mom until the day I die, and I’m too damned proud of you to let anybody try to tell me otherwise. But that doesn’t mean your biological mother can’t be a part of your life too, if you want her to be. If you ask me, the more people you have who love you and support you, the happier I am. The only way I’d have a problem with it is if she kept on hurting you, like she did the first few times you saw her.”
Ranko let out a quiet chuckle. “I think I’ve made my position on letting that happen pretty clear.”
Hana cracked an amused smile. “Oh, I heard. Yui said it was worse than Not Yours, Don’t Touch.”
The songstress shrugged with a smirk of her own. “Must’a been, because it got through to her, I guess.”
With a small roll of her eyes, Hana opened her arms again. “C’mere, kiddo.” Ranko leaned over the gap between their stools, sighing happily as her mother wrapped her forearms around her back.
“You’re always gonna be my little girl, Ranko. Always. I love you so much, little star, and I’m so, so, so proud I get to call you my daughter.”
Ranko squeezed the elder woman tight around her torso, inhaling deeply. She drank in the smell of old leather, as it always made her feel safe and loved. She’d come to associate it with her true mother’s hugs, thanks to her ever-present jacket, and almost nothing in the world felt better than those. It did mean some interactions with Shinji and Crash felt a little awkward sometimes, though. “I love you too, mom. Always. Thank you for listening, and, ya know, everything else, too.”
“You don’t have to thank me, baby. You’ve been an absolute blessing since the day I met you, Ranko.” Hana rubbed her daughter’s back firmly. “I do have one condition for this whole, letting her be your mom thing, though.”
Ranko sat up from the hug, a quizzical expression on her face. Conditions weren’t really Hana’s style when it came to her daughters. “Mm?”
With a knowing smile, Hana ruffled her daughter’s loose, wavy hair with her hand.
“I want to meet her.”