Post by "Lady Luck" Fujiko Mine on Aug 1, 2015 16:30:27 GMT -5
Marcia Gardener awoke with a start. The terrors of a nightmare danced on the edge of her memory, fading quickly as her pulse and breathing returned to regular levels. She remembered something about Katharine, the darling daughter she’d reconnected with, being strapped onto a stretcher, and hastily packed into an ambulance. By the context, she guessed it had something to do with that wrestling nonsense that she insisted on being involved with.
It frustrated her to no end that she insisted on it. Why wouldn’t she find something safer? She’d already lost one, she wasn’t trying to lose Katharine.
"Hey, you okay?"
Marcia looked over and saw Katharine...or Fujiko, as everyone insisted on calling her, standing over her, her hand on her shoulder. She seemed to recognize that there was something wrong, as a look of concern reflected back at her.
"Hm?"
"I said, are you okay?"
Marcia nodded slowly, but with little conviction. She sat up on the couch, gently breaking away from her daughter. The concerned look didn’t do away, and Marcia knew she was going to have to further elaborate.
"Just a nightmare, I suppose."
Fujiko’s eyes widened just slightly as she took in the answer for a moment, and then came around the small coffee table that separated her from the couch area. She sat down next to Marcia, and responded.
"I am sorry. I was halfway between dinner and a phone call with a friend when Hiro told me something was wrong."
Marcia couldn’t contain the eyeroll the was unleashed as she heard. That infernal Mr. Nagashima. She’d not yet gotten used to him visiting the small home she was given by his employer. Mr. Nagashima was prone to ‘checking in on her’, which would bother her more if not for the odd circumstances which brought her out of hiding, and into the United States. She still, however, was not used to it.
"I was unaware that he was here, Katharine."
Marcia could see her cringe that the mention of her birth name. It made her mother’s heart ache, but she could not dwell on it for long. She had to move on to another topic, or it would depress her further. She tried to reason in her head that she was still getting used to it, but she wasn’t really sure that it would ever be something her daughter would be okay with.
"Honestly, I’m kind of surprised that you haven’t figured it out, but someone’s always here. Besides me, on occasion."
The response caught Marcia off guard.
"What do you mean, Katharine?"
Fujiko bit into her lip a little bit, but answered the question all the same.
"It’s...the nature of the situation."
It was a canned, predictable response, and had all the true emotion that carried with that sentence being spoon fed to her by Hiro for as long as she could remember. For a while, she thought it was his favorite phrase. It was the ‘right’ answer for whenever Fujiko asked him about what she was currently going to explain to her mother.
"You may see Hiro, visiting every once in a while and such, but chances are if you think you’re alone, you aren’t really."
Fujiko watched a drift of panic overcome Marcia’s face. She tried to put a bucket of cold water on that fire quickly.
"N-not in like a bad, creepy stalker kind of way! I-I mean like, someone is keeping an eye on the house, in case anyone gets any bright ideas; incase...someone comes."
Her daughter’s vague statements did little to dampen the shock she’d just received, but she wasn’t so vague as to have to ask a follow up question. Outside of the nightmares making a wicked home for her concern over her eldest daughter’s safety, they also harbored twisted versions of her memories of having to leave the small home, the small village she’d come to miss. Bullets, blood, tears, adrenaline, and anger were left in that home, and there was little to be done to mask it.
"I...I understand, dear."
Fujiko didn’t show it on her face, but she was slightly relieved to hear her being called something other than Katharine. It wasn’t that she hated the name, but she knew herself, everyone knew her as Fujiko. It wasn’t a name she liked much as a child, but she’d grown into the identity, and oddity of having a new one, an empty feeling one forced on her was just jarring enough to cause issue.
"It’s a safety thing, I have to go with it, too. It doesn’t bother me much at all, though. I guess I’m just used to it."
Fujiko paused, remembering the large pizza that was probably beginning to cool in the other room. The reminder was forced on her by the rumbling of her tummy, grumpy over not getting anything to fill it in the last hour. She put up a sheepish smile, her cheeks flushing a little.
"Hungry again, I take it?"
The motherly tone caught Fujiko’s ears, and she took it in stride, the smile growing a little more sheepish. She’d heard that comment millions of times in her life, the result of her incredible, nigh on legendary appetite and metabolism.
"My daughter, the black hole in which all food disappears."
Fujiko giggled, half out of shock at the joke. That being that it emerged from her mother’s mouth. The scarcity of such a statement, combined with her expression, told her it had to have been a joke, but that didn’t make it any less of surprise.
"So then, you’ll let..."
She stopped herself. ‘Why not’, she thought. ‘It wouldn’t hurt.’ She amended her statement before Marcia could ask why she’d stopped.
"Actually, why don’t you join me? It’s a lot of pizza for one person."
Fujiko tried not to look like she was blatantly lying. It was a lot of pizza for a normal person, but she was not a person with a normal pizza tolerance. Marcia seemed to think it over, and gave a simple, short nod as her answer.
"I guess I’m feeling a bit peckish."
Marcia herself felt like the statement might have been a lie. She frowned internally at how radically her diet had changed, and how she’d changed as a result. America’s refined sugar, chemicals she’d never heard of, and processed...everything hit her figure hard. As such, she’d gained something like ten pounds in her short time here. Still, it seemed like an effort was being made to bond, and take it she would.
"Certainly, darling."
Fujiko smiled, stood, and offered up a hand. Marcia took it, and allowed her daughter to pull her to her full height. She then turned, and led the way into the dining room, the strange smell of various foods mixing together in the air capturing her senses.
"Tell me, Katharine...about this man."
Fujiko didn’t have to mask her expression this time.
"About Hiro?"
"No. About his employer. This...Mr. Jones, as he’s called."
Fujiko moved past the door into the dining room and made her way to the table, where the pizza waited. Taking a seat in front of the large pie, she combined her thinking with the motion of grabbing a slice.
"Thomas? He’s interesting. Nice, maybe sometimes too much so, but strict and firm when he needs to be. He used to wrestle a lot himself, but he’s taken some time away to raise his kids."
"He’s a parent himself?"
Fujiko nodded, half the slice she’d grabbed already ticketed for her tummy.
"Three. Triplets."
Marcia’s eyes bulged a bit. Three? And at once?! She couldn’t imagine.
"He must be quite the stay at home father."
Fujiko bobbled her head a little bit, swallowing the rest of her slice before explaining.
"He has his two sisters, his wife, and me to help."
Marcia nodded in appreciation.
"Family man, I suppose?"
"Yes, I suppose you’re right."
A polite smile, although marred in pizza sauce, punctuated her statement. Marcia felt she needed to ask the follow up question.
"He’s why you want to do this...fighting thing?"
Fujiko stopped herself from reaching for another piece. She felt like while her mother nagged at her for her choice of career, this time the question seemed to grow out of genuine curiosity. As such, she was less annoyed by it. A refreshing change.
"In a way, I guess. Hiro asked Thomas to help teach me self defense, incase I ever was in a situation that required it. I felt...I feel, empowered knowing that can defend myself."
Marcia continued the line of questioning.
"There’s a difference between defending yourself, and actively...fighting, Katharine."
Fujiko gave thought to her answer.
"Yes, I suppose you’re right, but it’s like..."
Fujiko tapped at the table, and then continued.
"This guy, Sebastian Stone. He saw me as just some eye candy, not a powerful woman with a brain behind her eyes and force behind kicks and punches. Or this other guy..."
Fujiko recalled her recent match with Jimmy Page. She felt disgust over the outcome, but her overall feelings showed through.
"This big guy named Jimmy, he told everyone he was going to ‘victimize’ me, like I was some helpless doll. But I almost beat him. Beat him, mom...and he was a champion of the world. Me. The supposed helpless little doll. Or, this guy I’m facing this week..."
Fujiko was excited now, Pizza be darned. She had passion behind her reasoning, and wanted her mother to see it.
"He’s done everything he can to try and diminish who I am. He’s cost me matches, against himself and others. He’s told everyone who’ll listen, like a broken record, that I am a distant second place compared to him. And he’s promised that I will just not be good enough when the time comes. Sure, I have fun in the ring, putting my talent level up against people who have been established as some of the best in the world. But above all, I love it that there are people who have called me their hero, said that I inspire them. Me! Some girl who came from the little we had, inspires others. And that is more than enough motivation for me to just tell people like this Johnny guy that ‘No, I can win. I can beat you, and I will.’"
Marcia felt a begrudging sense of understanding through the speech. She wanted to tell her again how she was worried for her safety, how she didn’t understand, but she couldn’t. She couldn’t stand in the way of her dreams. She understood that now.
"Well, miss Fuj...Fujiko...I think you’ll be great."
Behind the accepting smile was shock. Shock at hearing her mother call her that. She thought it was never going to be. But it was. So Fujiko got up from her seat, and wrapped her arms around her mother in a big hug. Marcia’s heart swelled at the gesture, and she returned it.
"You don’t know how much this means to me. Thank you."
"One day, I hope to."
Fujiko, after separating from her, lingered for a moment, searching through her mother’s eyes. It brought her confidence, and hope that she could do what she’d planned to do on Saturday, when she faced one of her biggest challenges to date. But what she didn’t see was the faint memory that lingered there, in Marcia’s eyes. A new thought entered Fujiko’s brain, and she let it out.
"Do you mind...uh...coming along with us to California? It would be really nice to have you there."
Marcia remembered the last time she’d attended one of her daughter’s events. It was brutal, but began her on the journey to accepting what Fujiko was willing to do for her dream. With a prayer that she wouldn’t have to endure the senseless brutality she witnessed last time, she nodded.
"I would be happy to."
Fujiko beamed with happiness. She clapped quickly, and jumped once in place.
"EEE! Great! I’ll go tell Hiro!"
Before Marcia could say anything, her daughter dashed out of the room. She almost wanted to amend her previous sentence, but it was too late. With a sigh, she looked around the room that now consisted of her and a large...overloaded pizza pie. Her face fell as the memory that lingered in her eyes transformed into a question.
If she could be found; Could her youngest daughter be, too?
It frustrated her to no end that she insisted on it. Why wouldn’t she find something safer? She’d already lost one, she wasn’t trying to lose Katharine.
"Hey, you okay?"
Marcia looked over and saw Katharine...or Fujiko, as everyone insisted on calling her, standing over her, her hand on her shoulder. She seemed to recognize that there was something wrong, as a look of concern reflected back at her.
"Hm?"
"I said, are you okay?"
Marcia nodded slowly, but with little conviction. She sat up on the couch, gently breaking away from her daughter. The concerned look didn’t do away, and Marcia knew she was going to have to further elaborate.
"Just a nightmare, I suppose."
Fujiko’s eyes widened just slightly as she took in the answer for a moment, and then came around the small coffee table that separated her from the couch area. She sat down next to Marcia, and responded.
"I am sorry. I was halfway between dinner and a phone call with a friend when Hiro told me something was wrong."
Marcia couldn’t contain the eyeroll the was unleashed as she heard. That infernal Mr. Nagashima. She’d not yet gotten used to him visiting the small home she was given by his employer. Mr. Nagashima was prone to ‘checking in on her’, which would bother her more if not for the odd circumstances which brought her out of hiding, and into the United States. She still, however, was not used to it.
"I was unaware that he was here, Katharine."
Marcia could see her cringe that the mention of her birth name. It made her mother’s heart ache, but she could not dwell on it for long. She had to move on to another topic, or it would depress her further. She tried to reason in her head that she was still getting used to it, but she wasn’t really sure that it would ever be something her daughter would be okay with.
"Honestly, I’m kind of surprised that you haven’t figured it out, but someone’s always here. Besides me, on occasion."
The response caught Marcia off guard.
"What do you mean, Katharine?"
Fujiko bit into her lip a little bit, but answered the question all the same.
"It’s...the nature of the situation."
It was a canned, predictable response, and had all the true emotion that carried with that sentence being spoon fed to her by Hiro for as long as she could remember. For a while, she thought it was his favorite phrase. It was the ‘right’ answer for whenever Fujiko asked him about what she was currently going to explain to her mother.
"You may see Hiro, visiting every once in a while and such, but chances are if you think you’re alone, you aren’t really."
Fujiko watched a drift of panic overcome Marcia’s face. She tried to put a bucket of cold water on that fire quickly.
"N-not in like a bad, creepy stalker kind of way! I-I mean like, someone is keeping an eye on the house, in case anyone gets any bright ideas; incase...someone comes."
Her daughter’s vague statements did little to dampen the shock she’d just received, but she wasn’t so vague as to have to ask a follow up question. Outside of the nightmares making a wicked home for her concern over her eldest daughter’s safety, they also harbored twisted versions of her memories of having to leave the small home, the small village she’d come to miss. Bullets, blood, tears, adrenaline, and anger were left in that home, and there was little to be done to mask it.
"I...I understand, dear."
Fujiko didn’t show it on her face, but she was slightly relieved to hear her being called something other than Katharine. It wasn’t that she hated the name, but she knew herself, everyone knew her as Fujiko. It wasn’t a name she liked much as a child, but she’d grown into the identity, and oddity of having a new one, an empty feeling one forced on her was just jarring enough to cause issue.
"It’s a safety thing, I have to go with it, too. It doesn’t bother me much at all, though. I guess I’m just used to it."
Fujiko paused, remembering the large pizza that was probably beginning to cool in the other room. The reminder was forced on her by the rumbling of her tummy, grumpy over not getting anything to fill it in the last hour. She put up a sheepish smile, her cheeks flushing a little.
"Hungry again, I take it?"
The motherly tone caught Fujiko’s ears, and she took it in stride, the smile growing a little more sheepish. She’d heard that comment millions of times in her life, the result of her incredible, nigh on legendary appetite and metabolism.
"My daughter, the black hole in which all food disappears."
Fujiko giggled, half out of shock at the joke. That being that it emerged from her mother’s mouth. The scarcity of such a statement, combined with her expression, told her it had to have been a joke, but that didn’t make it any less of surprise.
"So then, you’ll let..."
She stopped herself. ‘Why not’, she thought. ‘It wouldn’t hurt.’ She amended her statement before Marcia could ask why she’d stopped.
"Actually, why don’t you join me? It’s a lot of pizza for one person."
Fujiko tried not to look like she was blatantly lying. It was a lot of pizza for a normal person, but she was not a person with a normal pizza tolerance. Marcia seemed to think it over, and gave a simple, short nod as her answer.
"I guess I’m feeling a bit peckish."
Marcia herself felt like the statement might have been a lie. She frowned internally at how radically her diet had changed, and how she’d changed as a result. America’s refined sugar, chemicals she’d never heard of, and processed...everything hit her figure hard. As such, she’d gained something like ten pounds in her short time here. Still, it seemed like an effort was being made to bond, and take it she would.
"Certainly, darling."
Fujiko smiled, stood, and offered up a hand. Marcia took it, and allowed her daughter to pull her to her full height. She then turned, and led the way into the dining room, the strange smell of various foods mixing together in the air capturing her senses.
"Tell me, Katharine...about this man."
Fujiko didn’t have to mask her expression this time.
"About Hiro?"
"No. About his employer. This...Mr. Jones, as he’s called."
Fujiko moved past the door into the dining room and made her way to the table, where the pizza waited. Taking a seat in front of the large pie, she combined her thinking with the motion of grabbing a slice.
"Thomas? He’s interesting. Nice, maybe sometimes too much so, but strict and firm when he needs to be. He used to wrestle a lot himself, but he’s taken some time away to raise his kids."
"He’s a parent himself?"
Fujiko nodded, half the slice she’d grabbed already ticketed for her tummy.
"Three. Triplets."
Marcia’s eyes bulged a bit. Three? And at once?! She couldn’t imagine.
"He must be quite the stay at home father."
Fujiko bobbled her head a little bit, swallowing the rest of her slice before explaining.
"He has his two sisters, his wife, and me to help."
Marcia nodded in appreciation.
"Family man, I suppose?"
"Yes, I suppose you’re right."
A polite smile, although marred in pizza sauce, punctuated her statement. Marcia felt she needed to ask the follow up question.
"He’s why you want to do this...fighting thing?"
Fujiko stopped herself from reaching for another piece. She felt like while her mother nagged at her for her choice of career, this time the question seemed to grow out of genuine curiosity. As such, she was less annoyed by it. A refreshing change.
"In a way, I guess. Hiro asked Thomas to help teach me self defense, incase I ever was in a situation that required it. I felt...I feel, empowered knowing that can defend myself."
Marcia continued the line of questioning.
"There’s a difference between defending yourself, and actively...fighting, Katharine."
Fujiko gave thought to her answer.
"Yes, I suppose you’re right, but it’s like..."
Fujiko tapped at the table, and then continued.
"This guy, Sebastian Stone. He saw me as just some eye candy, not a powerful woman with a brain behind her eyes and force behind kicks and punches. Or this other guy..."
Fujiko recalled her recent match with Jimmy Page. She felt disgust over the outcome, but her overall feelings showed through.
"This big guy named Jimmy, he told everyone he was going to ‘victimize’ me, like I was some helpless doll. But I almost beat him. Beat him, mom...and he was a champion of the world. Me. The supposed helpless little doll. Or, this guy I’m facing this week..."
Fujiko was excited now, Pizza be darned. She had passion behind her reasoning, and wanted her mother to see it.
"He’s done everything he can to try and diminish who I am. He’s cost me matches, against himself and others. He’s told everyone who’ll listen, like a broken record, that I am a distant second place compared to him. And he’s promised that I will just not be good enough when the time comes. Sure, I have fun in the ring, putting my talent level up against people who have been established as some of the best in the world. But above all, I love it that there are people who have called me their hero, said that I inspire them. Me! Some girl who came from the little we had, inspires others. And that is more than enough motivation for me to just tell people like this Johnny guy that ‘No, I can win. I can beat you, and I will.’"
Marcia felt a begrudging sense of understanding through the speech. She wanted to tell her again how she was worried for her safety, how she didn’t understand, but she couldn’t. She couldn’t stand in the way of her dreams. She understood that now.
"Well, miss Fuj...Fujiko...I think you’ll be great."
Behind the accepting smile was shock. Shock at hearing her mother call her that. She thought it was never going to be. But it was. So Fujiko got up from her seat, and wrapped her arms around her mother in a big hug. Marcia’s heart swelled at the gesture, and she returned it.
"You don’t know how much this means to me. Thank you."
"One day, I hope to."
Fujiko, after separating from her, lingered for a moment, searching through her mother’s eyes. It brought her confidence, and hope that she could do what she’d planned to do on Saturday, when she faced one of her biggest challenges to date. But what she didn’t see was the faint memory that lingered there, in Marcia’s eyes. A new thought entered Fujiko’s brain, and she let it out.
"Do you mind...uh...coming along with us to California? It would be really nice to have you there."
Marcia remembered the last time she’d attended one of her daughter’s events. It was brutal, but began her on the journey to accepting what Fujiko was willing to do for her dream. With a prayer that she wouldn’t have to endure the senseless brutality she witnessed last time, she nodded.
"I would be happy to."
Fujiko beamed with happiness. She clapped quickly, and jumped once in place.
"EEE! Great! I’ll go tell Hiro!"
Before Marcia could say anything, her daughter dashed out of the room. She almost wanted to amend her previous sentence, but it was too late. With a sigh, she looked around the room that now consisted of her and a large...overloaded pizza pie. Her face fell as the memory that lingered in her eyes transformed into a question.
If she could be found; Could her youngest daughter be, too?