Season 1, Episode 4 - The Microwave XXXII - "The Bumpy Road Ahead"

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“You told this man you were an INCEST SURVIVOR?!” Domino roared.

Reed quietly looked back and forth between Domino and Dave. “...well, when you put it that way, it sounds kind of bad.”

Reed's jaw slacked when she heard Domino refer to himself as her father. Shen then nearly dropped the VHS tape in her hands when Dave straight up tried to shoot him. Fortunately, Domino’s Rddhi moved faster than Dave’s trigger finger, and an electric field caught all the shell fragments before they could hurt anyone, depositing them harmlessly on the far around Domino's sneakers.

Domino felt more impressed by a man trying to shoot him than he felt angry about a man trying to shoot him. When an explosive Dave explained the incest survivor story, Domino blinked, then looked at Reed with a defeated look on his face and spoke softly.

“...Reed, you're not serious, are you?”

Reed swallowed and realized the jig was up. ”...no. I’m not. I admit it.” She looked at her feet. “I lied.”

Domino and Dave thought it over, then Domino screamed with the above question.

Reed’s off-handed explanation didn’t do her any favors. “What’s wrong with you, woman?” Domino yelled. “What could have utterly possessed you to say such a thing?”

Reed looked at Dave.

Dave sighed, but his reaction confused Reed.

“I’m not mad,” he finally said. “I’m just disappointed.”

Reed took a step back.

What’s this inside me? Reed wondered. There’s like this knot in my stomach. What is this? Is this...one of those feeling things people talk about? And if it is, what sort of feeling is it? Dave's been nice to me, and I did something that wasn’t very nice to him. I mean, it benefited me a lot...but it didn’t benefit him. It hurt him. I feel like a...I feel like a...

A donkey brayed in Reed’s mind.

Like a big jerk!

“I’m sorry,” she said. The arrogance and dull fire was gone; she just sounded tired and displayed a hint of remorsefulness she usually never appeared. “I guess...Dave, outside of Sensei, you were only person in here I really could talk to when I first moved here. I didn’t have any friends or family or anyone. I was keeping everything down, because talking about personal stuff is hard, so when I finally tried to talk about personal stuff for the first time ever, I froze. I just told the first lie to come to mind because telling the truth feels embarrassing. The whole incest survivor just came from a dumb joke I heard in a television show before coming here."

She looked down at the tape in her hands. “I’m sorry. I owed you the truth but I was too embarrassed to tell you. Then I took advantage of your kindness.”

Dave gently took the tape from her hands and rang it up. “Alright, Reed. I think I understand now. What you did was wrong. But I’m glad you finally owned up to it. It took over a year and me shooting a man for you to own up to it, but at least you finally did.”

The tape’s cost was at full price. “But in the future, you need to trust your friends. There’s no reason to feel embarrassed about personal things. That’s what friends are for.” He placed the tape in a bag. “How about this? We’ll call it even if you tell me the original truth you wanted to say.”

Reed slowly nodded. “Alright...I can do that.”

“I want to hear as well,” Domino said, his arms crossed. “I almost got shot to death because of your lie. And I’m your Sensei. We originally became teacher and student because we both talked to each other.” His voice grew softer. “And I want to help.”

Reed agreed to that as well. That just left Isaac, who had been watching the whole thing with a mixture of curiosity and horror (and some leftover giddiness from returning the VHS tape on time (and some sorrow for forgetting his rewards card in his apartment)).

“Isaac...” Reed said. “Can I...can I tell you in private later? I owe them explanations, but I kind of want to be alone with you when I tell you about it.”

Isaac understood. “I understand. Take your time, I’ll be watching that television at the other side of the store.”

Reed felt sorry to kick him out, but baby steps, after all. Funnily enough, Reed probably wouldn’t have told that same lie today. It was thanks to Audrey's efforts during that Ring Ding night that she could open up a little more now, and she felt glad that someone like Isaac would listen to her. It’s not like she had really come a long way or anything, but she was slowly walking across the room.

Or something like that.

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Isaac occupied himself by watching the special features of Juli Erinnerungen, a German drama film made during the recovery of the Berlin film industry following the end of the European Exchange. The more recent German films, Neo-Expressionist ones, were made as a response to these kinds of movies, which were slow, plodding, and full of melodrama (the final straw to the era of Altes Schauspiel was the box office bomb One Week in Vienna). There was so much angst in these kinds of movies, teenage and otherwise, for crying out loud! Too much angst for Isaac. The gunfights and action and color in Neo-Expressionism, that’s what he was there for.

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But the special features of the tape, already popped into an old television in a back corner of store, did kill a few minutes. The current feature displayed black-and-white film from the rebuilding Berlin, topped off with the successful reopening of the Brandenburg Gate by cheering gray clouds.

“Oh, I see you’re watching Juli Erinnerungen.”

Reed had silently arrived next to him, taking in the same sights of Berlin.

“You can recognize this just from the special feature?”

Reed nodded. “Of course. Juli Erinnerungen is a classic.” She raised a finger. “Let me paint you a sad picture, Isaac. 1914. Mira is a poor Bosnian Serb working as a maid, just struggling to make ends meet. Gunther is a Croat working for the Hapsburg royal family, sent to monitor the security of Sarajevo ahead of the Archduke’s visit. What happens when the paths of these two star-crossed lovers meet? What happens when Mira falls into a rough crowd, a rough crowd of terrorists if you will, with the Archduke in their crosshairs? What happens when Gunther catches wind of the plot? He loves this girl, but he’s loyal to the Archduke, but he has sympathies for his own idea of Croatia, but he wants to rise high in service of the monarchy that gave him everything. Oh, what will happen?”

She sighed. “I’ll tell you what happens. Love dies, Isaac. Sometimes, love dies.”

Isaac whistled. “They should put you in charge of advertising these movies. You’d definitely get some part of the population to watch a movie like this.” He paused the special feature. “Not me, though.”

“I’ll whittle you down, don’t worry,” Reed assured him. “One day you’ll see the light of European arthouse cinema, and on that day, you’ll get on your knees and apologize. I guarantee it.”

“That’ll be the day.”

Reed looked around the aisle, seeing hundreds of tapes from all the countries of Europe with film industries, which numbered to around eight. “You gonna get anything while we’re here?”

Isaac shook his head. “Nah. In fact, before we had this big dojo-microwave adventure thing, I was gonna have a big marathon of my own tapes. Since there’ll be a curfew tonight and probably no school tomorrow, I guess it can still happen tonight.”

Reed snapped her fingers. “Sounds great, Isaac. I hope that chili dog guy is still near our apartments. Chili dogs and tapes, tapes and chili dogs. What a night.”

Isaac raised an eyebrow. “Who said you were invited?”

Reed looked blankly at him. “Who said I wasn’t?”

Isaac sighed. “Fair enough. Buy me a chili dog, then. You owe me a quarter for the vending machine still.”

“Chili dogs are more than a quarter, Isaac. Ten bucks at least, potentially more depending on your toppings. Chili Dog Man can make a mean thing of onions. Don’t look at me like that. Yes, you could say his overpriced dogs are a tourist trap, and normally I’d agree, but these fucking chili dogs, you gotta try them...”

As Reed rambled on, the two headed back across the store to the front counter.

Reed finished her train of thought, then collected himself. “Sorry to make you step aside, Isaac,” she said, her voice much more serious and perhaps even gentler now. “I don’t know. I still get this real tingly feeling when I talk about myself. I’ve talked about private things enough with Audrey that the feeling goes away now, and I had to ignore it back there when I talked to Dave and Sensei...but, for you...I’ll tell you soon, Isaac. Baby steps, Audrey’s told me. Baby steps.”

“Yeah, yeah,” Isaac said, not a hint of anger or disappointment in him, only a deep layer of sarcasm that can only be found between friends. “I get sick to my stomach when I see you, too.”

Reed rolled her eyes. “I’m serious. I had a lot of fun this weekend. You really are a good friend, Isaac. Almost like a brother, except I don’t want to throw any potential stumbling blocks into our relationship by throwing around words like that.”

“That’s alright. I see you more like my goofy sidekick, anyways.”

“Sidekick? If anything, you’re my deuteragonist, Isaac.”

“Not a chance. I’m the protagonist, Audrey’s my deuteragonist, and you’re...what do you call it? A tritagonist. Maybe I’ll even demote you down from main character to major character.”

The two arrived back at the counter. “Thanks for listening, you guys,” Reed said again. She looked fondly at Dave and Domino. “I wouldn’t call my Isaac my brother, but...my father didn’t really care about me growing up, but now...it’s like you’ve both been a father to me. Isn’t that nice? Most people only get the one dad, but I have two. Two dads, that’s fantastic.”

Domino and Dave looked at each other.

Dave offered a fatherly smile.

“...well, time to go.” Domino turned toward the door.

“Sensei!” Reed scolded. “This past month I’ve been on a kick revealing these vulnerability things and being honest. You gotta be honest, too.”

Domino sighed. “Emotions aren’t one of my strong points. But...you’ve been one of my most interesting pupils, Reed. And there’s a reason I gave you the Domino Sword.”

“Because I’m a badass motherfucker, right?”

“...you could say that,” Domino said, smiling. “It really is time to go, though. I need to help Shokahu with his patrols so I can back to the dojo in time for my shows.”

Domino and Reed paid for their tapes – at a full, honest price – and waved goodbye to Dave as they headed out the door with Isaac.

Domino groaned. “I told them to meet me here,” he complained. He pointed a finger at the sky and made an explosion noise with his mouth.

A stream of lightning shot upwards, cracking and rumbling in the night sky.

A minute later, Mogami’s Model Litoral slid in front of Dave’s Rentals. Shokahu glared at Domino from the passenger seat. "How many times have I told you that you can’t do that! We just had a major raid on the district, too!”

Domino laughed. “The only person who can ever get Shokahu to yell is yours truly.”

Shokahu simmered, then sighed back into his seat. Domino entered the backseat, then thought about the two kids.

“Hey, hop in, you two,” Domino told them. Kelb and Dimitrij also sat in the backseat; they squished together, along with Domino, but since they also had to deal with a big bulky radio, they could only make a sliver of space available.

“It’s a three person backseat, but there’s five of us,” Isaac summarized. “Isn’t that illegal?”

“You must be fun at parties,” Domino snorted.

“It’s alright, Isaac,” Kelb informed him. “The police can overlook this, just this once. It’s to keep you safe from walking home in the dark.”

“And I’m a very safe driver!” Mogami added. She then slammed her foot back down on the brake as the car started rolling down the avenue.

Isaac and Reed looked at each other, then immediately competed for the seat. After some wrestling and horse-trading, Isaac ended up with the seat, Reed on his lap, their spat closing the door behind them so neither of them could adjust their positions.

Isaac realized the enormity of the situation at hand.

Mogami put her shades back on and revved the engine. “Jeez, look at the damage the State Police did,” she observed, pointing at all the pot holes on the street ahead of them. “Hang on, you guys, bumpy road ahead!”

Isaac started sweating.