Sailor Moon Fan Fiction ❯ Sailor Moon's American Dream ❯ Part Two ( Chapter 2 )

[ T - Teen: Not suitable for readers under 13 ]

Precious Spore






Sailor Moon's American Dream

A Sailor Moon fan fiction by Thomas Sewell.

<......> = thought quotation
Okasan, Kaasan = mother
Otousan = father

Chapter 5: Precious Spore

CHIBI-USA HAD COME on Friday night, but Usagi had to work the
next morning. But Chibi-Usa did not want to be left alone again,
so Usagi took her with her. Neither one of her foster parents
objected, not that Usagi expected them to. When would they object
to having one of their foster kids out of their hair for a day?
Unless, of course, the kid got into trouble . . .

But Usagi didn't worry much about that. In fact, she didn't
worry at all--taking Chibi-Usa was something she felt was right
down to her bones. Maybe some of her future self had leaked back
to her, or maybe some of her own mother, but she wasn't going to
let Chibi-Usa be left alone and scared one second more than she
had to. And her boss for that day, an assistant manager who was
actually a little younger than herself, seemed to get two shades
paler when Usagi told him that Chibi-Usa would be hanging around
for her shift. Not asked. Told.

Usagi did begin to wonder as the shift went on whether or not
Chibi-Usa would grow bored and wander off, something she had done
many times--something she herself had done many times, she
realized--but she did not. There wasn't time to think much about
that or anything else besides work; it was almost summer now, and
her place was very busy. A couple of the big summer movies had
just opened in that mall, and there were lots of kids grabbing a
meal between seeing one and the other.

She thought she might be able to talk to Chibi Usa about how
she had come here--finally--over their own lunch, since no
one else understood Japanese--but she was wrong about that. As
she began talking with Chibi-Usa, an old gentleman who had always
given her mean looks suddenly came up to them and said "You
actually speak Japanese?" In Japanese.

"Hai."

The old gentleman said, "I thought you were making fun of
me, the way you talk."

"It is my English that is not so good," said Usagi.

"She will never really learn kanji,"
interjected Chibi-Usa.

Usagi turned and was about to get angry--but she leaned over
and kissed the top of her daughter's head instead. "I
suspect that is true. But I can speak well enough not to disgrace
myself."

"Goodness! You sound like a Tokyo girl."

"Juubangai . . . I think I lived there once. But I
have lost my memories--" she squeezed Chibi-Usa's
hand--"And my sister is too young to remember our parents.
We live in a foster home now. They say they cannot find our
parents. I think maybe they won't let us know what really
happened to our parents."

"How awful! Was your mother Japanese?"

"Oh, yes, I do remember that," piped in Chibi-Usa.
"She would wear kimono on Sundays, and take us to Hikawa
Shrine." Chibi-Usa squeezed back--that had been something
Chibi-Usa had nagged Usagi into doing. "But grandma and
grandpa would stay behind. That was the only time we were all out
of the house. I think they would make their love then."

The old gentleman chortled as Usagi blushed. Chibi-Usa was
probably right about that . . . Then the old gentleman joined
them and went on about his younger days in Tokyo and how he had
come to be living in Silicon Valley (he had three sets of
grandchildren living in various cities around the Bay). He was
still talking with Chibi-Usa when Usagi went back to work.



Usagi usually rode her bike to her Saturday job, but Chibi-Usa
didn't have one, so she had taken the bus. Waiting for the return
bus, she once again began to speak with Chibi-Usa in Japanese
when Jimmy came up on his own bike. He also had a job at the
mall, but it was far from the place where Usagi worked, so they
usually did not see each other--except riding home. She had
forgotten about him.

"Who's your new--Jesus, she looks like you! Is that your
sister?"

A few hours before, she had easily lied to the old gentleman,
but now Usagi found she couldn't lie to Jimmy--whom she had quite
forgotten about since Chibi-Usa had appeared. But if her faith in
the truth of her memories had been restored, that still left
Jimmy . . .

"Hey, Sue! It's me! Remember? Aren't you going to
introduce her?"

Chibi-Usa was looking at her, too, and not liking what she
saw. "Okasan, you haven't . . . with this man?"

"No, no, Chibi-Usa . . . Usagi, no . . . but he is
a good friend." She switched to English. "Jimmy,
please, go home. I cannot talk to you now."

"But--" Jimmy started to say.

"Go home, my friend. Please?"

His shoulders slumped, but he got wordlessly back onto his
bike and pedaled away.

"Oh, kaasan . . . you broke his heart," said
Chibi-usa.

"Yes. I think I did . . . but I warned him. Now, tell me,
how did you get to this place. No, wait, I must warn you first .
. . did they put you in a place with crazy people?"

"Yes, okasan, they did."

"They did that to me too . . . " She took out a comb
and brush, and began to undo her odango. "You and I
know the truth, but we must not let them think we believe it or
they may put us back with the crazy people. So, we cannot be odango
atama while we are in this world."

"World?"

"Yes, my Usagi. It cannot be the world we knew. And call
me 'Sue,' please. We will have to pick out a good American name
for you soon."

"Will we ever get back?"

"Yes . . . I thought I was crazy sometimes, that I had
never been Sailor Moon or even Usagi, that Mamo-chan was just a
cartoon . . . but you have come to me . . . here, let me help me
take your odango out . . ."

"Kaasan?"

"You must not call me that around the other people at our
home . . . but thank you for calling me that now . . ."

"Okasan, would you have . . . with that man?
Jimi?"

"He is my age, Usako . . . I really don't know . . . when
Mamoru was killed--"

"Killed? Which time?"

"By Galaxia . . . but the ginzuishou brought him
back again . . . you don't know of that? It was more than two
years ago." Among Galaxia's many powers had been time
travel, so Chibi-Usa, who was from the future, might know nothing
of her, since her future had been saved . . .

"No, kaasan . . . but that may be why it
happened."

"Why what happened?"

"Crystal Tokyo is gone. Maybe like it never was . . .
"

"Then how did you--"

"I went to the timegate, like otousan and okasan
. . . like you told me. Everyone and everything was fading,
including me, like when Neherenia almost destroyed Mamo-chan . .
. just before I went in, everything was gone."

"Destroyed?"

"No . . . no, there were buildings and stuff there, and
people--but not our buildings and our people. I
don't remember anything more, until I was wherever we are now . .
. I'm going to miss my odango . . . okasan, how
will we get back?"

"I don't know. But I have you again, and that gives me
hope."

"I do not have the future ginzuishou. I cannot
transform."

"I have lost mine . . . but if we cannot be senshi,
we are still the Moon family, and we will find a way. We always
do . . . there. My, your hair has grown. You've grown. You
look--have your periods started?"

"Yes. I just had my first one. Kaasan-you-were so
happy that I was growing up at last . . . "

"You look older than I was when . . . almost as big as I
was when Luna first showed me how to transform."

"Am I pretty?"

"Very . . . In fact, you are going to have to be careful.
Boys here don't have manners like in Japan, except for a few like
Jimmy-san . . . I've gotten into about as many fights as Mako
used to. But you must be careful not to hit too hard. With your
training, even if you are not transformed, you could hurt someone
very badly."

"Auntie Minako warned me about that. And Auntie Haruka,
too."

"Really?. . . " Usagi found herself crying,
remembering Haruka crying, so long ago now . . .

Chibi-Usa held her, and began crying herself. People around
them stared. Usagi almost missed the bus home.



Chapter 6: Jimmy

USAGI NOTICED AFTER AWHILE that Jimmy wasn't really trying to
get as close as he had been, most of the time. The last days of
the school year meant finals, and she wanted to do as well as she
could--she had been very surprised that even her old lazy self
had been a better student than most of the American students.
Between that and worrying about Chibi-Usa, she didn't give Jimmy
or anyone else much thought. He would sit by her when they had
classes together, or at lunch, but said little.

But at the end of classes, the last Friday before finals week
began, he took her hand and led her away from the bus stop. She
started to protest, "Jimmy, I have to get home."

"We need to talk," Jimmy insisted.

"I need to get home, Jimmy. Chi--I have to go home."
She gently removed his hand from her arm.

"Why? Why don't you have any time for me?"

"I am sorry . . . " Usagi saw people, mostly other
kids from her school, staring at herself and poor Jimmy, who was
at the point of tears. She heard a smart remark and turned back
with a wicked glance. Turning back to Jimmy and seeing him start
to walk away, she ran up to him. "Do not go away like you
are now. Please, I am still your friend. I am sorry."

"Sorry . . . Do you know what I feel? Do you know how
much . . ."

She kissed him on his cheek. "I need to go home now,
Jimmy-chan. But come with me."

"Why? Why should I?"

"If you are my friend, come . . . the bus is
coming!"

Usagi ran to catch it. It was very crowded. In fact, she did
not know Jimmy had followed her until after she got off at her
stop and had started walking home. She heard footsteps behind
her, and there he was, still saying nothing, still with pain in
his eyes she would do anything to take away--anything but what he
really wanted.

But those thoughts were washed from her mind when she saw
Chibi-Usa running toward her. As much as she had grown, she
seemed very much like the scared little sprout Usagi had first
known when she melted into her arms. <This must have been a
bad day,> Usagi thought, as she kissed and comforted.
Usagi noticed that her foster mother come out and stand in front
of the house, arms folded. <Very bad day. Vera-san is very
angry .>

Her foster mother said lowly as they came up to the house,
"You, git inside. Who're you--Oh, you're that Jimmy. You'd
better--"

Usagi found she could think very fast, and before her foster
mother could get back into the rant she had started, she held
trembling Chibi-Usa closer and said, "Jimmy-chan has
invited us to stay over with him tonight. I think that would be a
good idea."

Vera-chan stopped speaking, and stepped back, shocked. It was
the first time Usagi had ever done something like this. After a
moment, without looking at Jimmy, without looking away from
Usagi's eyes, she mumbled, "Uh, yeah, I guess . . ."

"We will get some things and go. All right,
Vera-san?"

"All right."

"Thank you. Jimmy-chan, you come?"

It wasn't until they were all on another bus and well over
halfway to Jimmy's home that either Jimmy or Chibi-Usa spoke
again. Jimmy was first.

"I can't believe this is happening . . . I never even
told my folks about . . . who are you, anyway?"

"She still doesn't speak much Eng--" Usagi began.

"Usagi," said Chibi-Usa. "My real name
Usagi. Is Usagi. But call me Sarah, you like. If you
like. Nice American name." She turned to Usagi and switched
to Japanese, " Oka--I will use my American name. I do
not think he understood me."

Judging from Jimmy-chan's puzzled look, Usagi agreed with
Chibi-Usa. She still found it very hard to tell Jimmy a casual
lie, so she was very careful about what she said next. "She
is much as I was. She has even more trouble with English. Worse
when things are bad. But she is part of my family, Jimmy-chan. I
remember that. I am sure. It is precious to have her again."
She saw that Chibi-Usa understood, because a sudden tear
appeared. Taking Chibi-Usa's hand, and Jimmy-chan's, she said,
"Family . Sarah is all the family I know I have
now."

"Is she your sister?" asked Jimmy.

"Family," repeated Usagi. "But we will
tell your family she is my sister?"

"Uh . . . yeah."



Jimmy lived in a blended family. Usagi had known this, but it
was a surprise to meet them all at home. She had met his mother
once, and his sister and one of his stepsisters, but there were
two other stepsisters, a stepbrother, a half-sister, and a half-
brother, who was only a few months old. In the confusion of
meeting them all, Chibi-Usa blurted out something in Japanese.
"That is one more than Auntie Naru . . ."

"What?" asked Usagi.

"Nothing . . ." Chibi-Usa--or Sarah as she must be
called now--would say no more of it. There was so much of the
future she knew of but would not tell--annoying as ever, but
comforting for being a familiar old annoyance.

Usagi forced herself to return her attention to Jimmy's
family. Fortunately they were all distracted by Chi--Sarah--as
she took the tiny baby in her arms and gently played with
him--she had always had the same magical knack with babies as
Ikuko, Usagi's mother; perhaps that had skipped a generation. She
wiped the corners of her eyes before she really started
streaming; it worked.

"I think we've found another sitter," murmured
Jimmy's mother. Usagi heard it--or had she heard what she was thinking?
Things were getting strange . . .



Usagi was able to talk with Chibi-Usa in one of the bathrooms
for a few minutes later that evening. "What is happening?
Why does Jimmy's family like you so much so soon? It's as
if--"

"As if I had Luna-P to hypnotize them," said
Chibi-Usa.

"But you do not . . . are you doing this? How?"

"Maybe . . . I don't know how, if I am doing it. I just
wanted to fit in . . . "

"Why not do that at the foster home?"

Chibi-Usa shrugged. "I think they are too mean there. But
I will try."

"How can you do it without Luna-P?"

Chibi-Usa looked at Usagi for a long time before answering.
"After they took away Luna-P, I asked . . . She told me that
Luna P was just a teacher, and that I had to learn to do on my
own now . . . Oka--"

"Careful, someone might hear. If you call me okasan all
the time, someone might tell Watanabe-sama about it someday, and
he speaks Japanese."

Then two more girls pounded on the door.



Usagi really had planned on having that long-postponed talk
with Jimmy that night, but she fell asleep on a chair. Chibi-Usa
shooed everyone away from her, told Jimmy to get a blanket, and
put it over Usagi after Jimmy had brought it.

Usagi woke up needing to pee at about the usual time, judging
from the faint light in the windows. She took a moment to
remember where she was, but when she remembered enough to find
her way to a bathroom, she thought of little more until she had
completed her business. When she was washing up as quietly as she
could manage, she began to hear voices from outside. Noticing
that the bathroom window was open a tiny crack, she stood on
tiptoe to peer out, and saw that Chibi-Usa and Jimmy were in the
back yard, talking. This time, whatever special power that had
allowed her to hear Jimmy's mother wasn't working; she could not
make out what they were saying.

But she could hear that Chibi-Usa was getting more and more
upset, and she could see what was beginning to happen . . .



"James!" cried Jimmy's mother, running out to him.

"What in H-E--" Jimmy's stepfather began to say as
he stumbled out a few steps behind his wife. Lights began to go
on in the other houses.

"I'm sorry. He fell. He's not hurt bad," said Usagi.
We were just--"

"I think I can see what you were doing," said
Jimmy's stepfather. "Cover yourself and get back in the
house."

Usagi pulled her shirt closed, wishing she'd had time to open
it without ripping the buttons--she might not be able to find
them all to sew them back on. As she walked in the house, she
glanced up, without lifting her head. Chibi-Usa was peeking over
the top of the roof. All the other children were out in the back
yard now. Usagi stuck out her tongue at Jimmy's step-brother
Eric, an eight-year-old who reminded of her of Shingo. Then she
went in, and quickly went to the front door, hoping that no one
would notice. Once outside, she looked around to see if anyone
seemed to be watching, and then whispered, louder and louder,
until Chibi-Usa came down. "Get inside and change
back!" she said to her daughter, "before anyone else
sees!"

Chibi-Usa did that, but both of them were dismayed to find
that her pajamas had did not rematerialized. Chibi-Usa was still
naked. Usagi grabbed the blanket Chibi-Usa had put over her hours
before and wrapped it around Chibi-Usa. "Go back out and say
you just woke up!"

"What about my pajamas?" asked Chibi-Usa.

"Ne-e-eh . . . Say you didn't like wearing them!"

Actually, no one paid Chibi-Usa much attention, except for
Jimmy--and he was careful not to stare at Chibi-Usa for too
long.



JIMMY'S PARENTS weren't really that upset once they knew Jimmy
wasn't really hurt, and, in fact, they let Usagi and Chibi-Usa
stay another night--in one of the girl's rooms. Usagi thought
Chibi-Usa might be using her powers to make that happen, but
Chibi-Usa wasn't sure. The two oldest girls had had boys over
before, and one of them had been caught making love--the other
hadn't been caught. They seemed to think it was a great
joke. Usagi and Chibi-Usa let them go on thinking what they
thought.

There wasn't any trouble when they came back to the foster
home on Sunday, but neither Usagi thought that had anything to do
with powers--the foster parents had short tempers, but also short
memories, and they were busy making the lives of some of their
other charges miserable.



Usagi felt better about leaving Chibi-Usa alone to go to
school on Monday than she ever had--because she knew Chibi-Usa
would at least be safe, now. After that, there was the
first day of finals to tackle; all too soon after that, the
second . . . and before Usagi thought any more deep thoughts at
all, it was the last day of school. She was riding home with
Jimmy on the bus, and realized that this was the last ride they
would be taking together for awhile. So she asked, "Will you
come home with me?"

"Sure." One-word answers seemed to be all he could
manage since that night . . .

But, as they walked very slowly toward her foster home, he
managed some complete sentences. "This is so weird. And I
can't tell anyone . . ."

"Why would you want to? They would think you were crazy
as me or Chibi-Usa--Sarah, we must always call her that
now."

"No, that's not what I mean . . ."

"What?"

"I mean, everyone thinks we did it. Everyone .
I wanted that to happen so much, and now everyone else thinks I
made it happen . . . but it didn't."

"That is Oh-Kay, Jimmy-chan. Just tell them all I was
very good, no?"

They were close to the house now, and Chibi-Usa/Sarah had come
outside, but she waited on the sidewalk, at least plausibly out
of earshot. Something made Usagi stop then. So did Jimmy-chan.

"I'm going away for the summer," said Jimmy.

"Going? Where?"

"I enlisted in the Marines. I do boot camp this summer,
then I go back in after graduation. My dad was a Marine, you
know--my real dad. I always wanted to do at least one hitch,
and--"

"You enlist because of that night?" At least she
hadn't switched into Japanese.

"Yes, I did . . . It was stupid, I should have stayed
here for the summer."

"When do you leave?"

"Tomorrow."

"Well . . ."

Chibi-Usa came up to them, but still said nothing.

After a long moment, she wiped the wetness from the corners of
Jimmy's eyes. Then she put one hand on his chest, and the other
behind his neck, and kissed him full on the mouth for a long
time. Then she pushed him back a little bit, surprising him and
herself with her quiet strength. "I am very good,
Jimmy-chan. But my heart is my Mamo-chan's. You know that. I
trust you. But if I could . . ."

He kissed her on the cheek, and then he went to Chibi-Usa and
did the same, and hugged Chibi-Usa for a long time. "Take
care of your mother," he said very quietly. "You're not
the only one who loves her." And then he jogged back to the
corner, and around it, and was gone.



Chapter 7: The Dusty Day

AFTER TWO WEEKS of summer vacation, Usagi was miserable for
several reasons.

First, her foster parents were mad more often, with everyone
out of school and at home more. They usually didn't start out mad
at her or Chibi-Usa, but they were snappy almost all the time,
and anything might provoke a tongue-lashing or worse.

Second, she never had enough money--now she was prowling the
thrift stores, flea markets, and garage sales for not only
herself, but for Chibi-Usa. They wouldn't let her work any more
hours at the fast food place, and they said Chibi-Usa/Sarah was
too young. <If only they knew how old she really
was . . . >

Third, she was lonely again. Of course, there was Chibi-Usa,
but there was only so much they could take of each other, no
matter how desperately important each was to the other. They
began to bicker over tiny things, and spend hours not talking.

Fourth, she missed Jimmy. She realized he was the only
friend she had made after coming to this world, and that made her
feel lost, no matter how much she told herself that it was better
Jimmy had gone away.

Fifth, she was bored so much of the time, which
probably went a long way to explaining the third point. She felt
like reading all the books okasan and otousan had
always recommended, but her foster home had no books, and the
neighborhood library had a very poor selection in Japanese.
English was still too much work to be a pleasure to read.

Television was ruled by her foster parents when they were
around and by the meanest foster kids when they weren't. Usagi or
even Chibi-Usa could beat up any of the mean ones, but they
wouldn't do it just for that.

Movies took money, unless you sneaked in, which was something
Usagi wouldn't do.

And if she just sat around looking bored, one of her
foster parents would nearly always come up with yet another chore
to fill her time. And Chibi-Usa's. They were the only foster kids
who really did any work around the house now.

Besides, the weather was bad. There hadn't been rain for a
long time; the weather was hot; the smog was bad; every time she
and Chibi-Usa rode their old bikes somewhere, they were covered
in dust by the time they got there. Because of the dust, there
was twice as much laundry to do. <And guess who does all
the washing and ironing now,> Usagi thought as she saw two
other foster-girls sneaking out, as Usagi started ironing the
skirt one of them had worn the day before. Any "permanent
press" had long ago been washed out of the secondhand
clothes they all wore.



Dr. Watanabe came to see Usagi and Chibi-Usa a month into
summer. He showed up unexpectedly, along with a social worker, a
woman Usagi vaguely remembered. They spent a long time talking to
their foster parents. Then Dr. Watanabe spent a few minutes with
Usagi, and asked to speak with Chibi-Usa alone. The social worker
led Usagi away, and then went back into the room, where they were
doing their interviews.

The interview went on for a long time. Her foster parents
started to tell her to go outside, but she shushed them without
thinking much about it--it was Chibi-Usa on her mind. Again, she
could hear no more than a word here and there, but she could tell
that Chibi-Usa was getting more and more upset . . . as Usagi was
herself . . .



ALEX BOGARDUS and his shotgun Betty Black (who was black, and
a "betty" as well as a Betty) arrived on the scene to
find a cop car already there. "Must be a donut shop around
here," he said, joking but irritated nevertheless--he prided
himself on beating the cops to a medical 911 call, and did, more
often than not.

"Must be," Betty drawled. She usually talked slow,
but moved fast when she had to--very fast. They were at
the door in no more than fifteen seconds. "All right, ladies
and gents, what do we have?" he called out, and then coughed
as soon as he took in a breath. When he managed to stop he said,
"What in the name of . . ." and he began coughing
again.

"Sorry, sorry. Vacuum creaner go bad. Dust everywhere.
Sorry, we have not creaned up yet." "Yes, big mess,
stirr crean," said a couple of very dusty girls--one of them
was wearing a bathing suit. <A bathing suit?>

The cops were coughing, too, but also laughing. "Well, I
guess Bogie and Black Betty must be off their feed . . ."

Bogardus said, "Bite me, Peng. Is this our guy?"

Officer Perez said, "Yeah. Head bang. I think he's okay,
though."

Black said. "Well, thank you for your consultation . . .
Sir? Sir? What is your name sir."

"He's--"

Betty Black snapped, "Let us do our job, Peng, will
you?" She had gentler words for the patient. "Sir? Can
you tell me your name."

The patient finally responded: "Watanabe. Harold Watanabe
. . . I think I know you. Betty, is it?"

"I'm unforgettable. Could you answer my partner's
questions?" she said, slipping the blood-pressure sleeve
over him.

The police went back to interviewing everyone, but they saved
the girls for last because they were cleaning out the damnable
dust--no one else in the house seemed to be lifting a finger.
Officer Peng was interested to find one of the foster kids was
one she had busted for shoplifting just three months before. She
talked her into returning the Doctor's wallet before she did
anything official--a bust would just be more paperwork.

By the time she and her partner got to the dusty girls, the
EMTs had already taken Dr. Watanabe away, and it was so apparent
that all the stories matched that they asked only a few
questions. The girls who were doing all the work did their best
to brush the dust off their uniforms before they left.

Vera Gant waited until the police left to start her own
inquisition. "How the hell did you managed to screw up a
vacuum cleaner?" she asked the Kino girls.

"Not our fault. It just blow up," said the little
one. "I take out back and throw dirt on it. Afraid it start
fire."

"Jesus H--Do you know how much it cost?"

"No," said the bigger one. "Maybe I call Mrs.
Farb now?"

"Why would you do that?"

"You borrowed vacuum cleaner from Mrs Farb, many month
ago," said the little one, quietly.

"Oh, I forgot . . ."

"You want me to call Mrs. Farb now?" asked the big
one again.

"No, no . . . I'll do it later . . . Don't say anything
about this to her . . . I remember--"

"You had a very bad dream, Vera-san," said the
smaller one. "You took a nap and had a very bad dream. That
was when vacuum cleaner blow up. Do you remember dream?"

"Some . . . "

"Maybe better forget bad dream," said the little
one.

"It was only a bad dream, Vera-san," added the big
one.

"Vera-san, what you want me cook for dinner?" asked
the small one.



Chapter 8: Jimmy Returns
"JIMMY-CHAN!"

Any fears he had about Sue forgetting him were erased as she
ran up and hugged him. He thought about trying to kiss her, but
if he had to think, it wasn't the right moment.

"Oh, my . . . you are taller!" said Sue.

"Thanks. It's less than an inch, though . . . Damn,
you're still taller than me. More than before."

"I grew too. I did not have to work for it . . . you feel
so strong now."

"I imagine I'm in fair shape." <Probably the
best in my life.> She didn't seem to get his little joke,
but she beamed anyway.

"What have you been up to? I wrote you a couple of times
. . ."

"I am sorry." Her smile utterly vanished. "It
has not been a good summer for me."

"How's Chi--how is Sarah?"

"She is in school . . . finally in school, again. It is
so silly to have school out for so long. Everyone forget--forgets--what
they learn."

"Maybe so . . . but I wish I had had this summer. No more
after this one. We're official grownups in nine months . . .
what's wrong?"

"A very long story, Jimmy-chan. I am not sure I should
tell."

"What could you tell me now that would surprise me? You
killed someone?"

She didn't answer with words . . . but her eyes made it clear.




Jimmy wouldn't have made it through the rest of that day at
school if Sue--Usagi--hadn't pretty much led him
everywhere. How could he think about anything else? He'd just
about convinced himself that what he'd seen that night must have
been a dream. But it wasn't . . . he was in love with a girl who
should be a cartoon . . . except she wasn't. She had a daughter
who was somehow much older than she should be--and could turn
into an angel and fly. And now his sweet love had killed someone
. . . who? Why? What he had no question about was that it had
happened, because, for better or worse, he was sure she could
never really lie to him.



"You're pretty late tonight," said Jimmy's
stepfather.

"I was with Sue."

"Oh."

"And Sarah. I took them too the movies. And then I went
to their place for awhile."

His sister Nancy was still up. "Do they still live in
that creepy foster home?"

"Yeah . . . you've been there?"

"Once," said Nancy. "Like I said, creepy."


Jimmy said, "Well, we stayed outside mostly, or in their
room."

"Right," said his sister, sounding more doubtful
than their stepfather.

He let her think what she thought. He let them all think
that--his mom had come down, and most of his steps and halves.
"I'm really tired . . . would you mind if I just went to
bed?"

Jimmy was tired enough, but it took him a long time to get to
sleep.



Chapter 9: Dr. Watanabe's Mystery

DR. HAROLD WATANABE was quite used to seeing police, since he
did so much work with them. But he was very surprised when the
unfamiliar detective sergeant began asking him the wrong sort of
questions. "When? Ah--weeks ago. Let's see--can I look at my
calendar?"

"You don't remember without it?"

"I live by my calendars; my life is too complicated to
carry around in my head . . . here it is, see?" He brought
up the page on the screen of his largest monitor.

The detective wrote something down. He had known enough
detectives by now to know they often wrote down nonsense, and his
hunch was that nonsense was what this one was scribbling. Before
Dr. Watanabe could put together a question of his own, the
detective had another. "Can you tell me what you did that
day?"

"Well, what my notes say. I visited several group
homes."

"There's not much on each case"

"That would be in my case files. They are confidential.
You know that, of course. What is this about?"

"Just let me ask all my questions first, Okay? Can you
tell me what happened after you finished your last visit?"

"Well, I had an accident. Slipped on something in a
bathroom and conked my head. That I certainly haven't
forgotten. It must be in your files; I remember police there.

"Yes, it's in the files . . . but what about Ms.
Chilicothe?"

"Why, she . . . Hmmmmm . . . she wasn't there. She wasn't
at that last visit."

"Really? Wasn't she supposed to be? It says so in your
notes there."

"Yes, she was . . . I'm sorry, I don't remember why she
didn't come . . . " In fact, he realized he remembered very
little about the woman at all--yet he had recognized the name.
"I don't remember . . . I don't really remember much about
that day at all, even looking at this. Maybe that concussion took
a little more out of me than I thought . . ."

"Well, that's possible . . . when is the last time you
are sure you saw her? . . . Doctor?"

"Sorry . . . I'm sorry. I don't remember seeing her that
day."

"You're saying she wasn't with you at all?"

"No, I'm saying I don't remember . . ."

"Your notes say-"

"Yes, they do. I must have uploaded these from my Palm
Pilot. But nothing about that last visit, except this . . ."


"What does that mean? 'mtwsaa?'"

"I don't know. I make these abbreviations all the time,
but I forget them sometimes. I don't know what I meant . . . all
a blank." He turned back to the cop and read his face.
"Has something happened to her?"

"Maybe."

"Don't stonewall me, Arteminski. I can find the story
with one phone call. All you'll do is annoy me."

The cop flipped shut his little notebook. "She hasn't
been seen since that day, Dr. Watanabe. Now that I've seen your
records, you are the last known person to have seen her."

<Seen her alive>, Watanabe almost responded. He
didn't say it aloud, but the cop could see that he wanted to say
it. Arteminski struck him as a smart investigator; he wondered
how he couldn't have met him before. But of course, they would
send someone he hadn't worked with, if they could.

He made a call.

"Judge Yamamoto?"

"Harold?"

"I need a favor . . ."

"Well, what?"

"Can you recommend a good defense attorney?"



Going over his files late at night, he began wondering if the
police had already been through them--suddenly encryption didn't
seem like such a paranoid idea. His computer records for the last
group home were gone--just an empty folder. He went through his
hardcopy and found most of what he was looking for--but he also
noticed something else. He was a stickler for aligning his folder
tabs, but there were some gaps now . . . three. One of them had
to be the file on his doings with Ms. Chilicothe--though he
couldn't seem to remember much about it, or the woman. <The
other two . . . What?>

He mused about the concept of the blind spot. He felt there
was something he should be seeing in his mind's eye, but
couldn't--it was where he just couldn't see it.

<The judge,> he thought. <The judge has
something to do with it . . . > but calling her again
wasn't a good idea. He had just used up his favor. If he called
again, expecially so soon, she would have to tell the police . .
.

He shrugged. <Go back to that last foster home.>



Dr. Watanabe sat in his car outside the Gant home for awhile
before getting out. There didn't seem to be any police watching,
but he wouldn't be able to spot them if they were good < . . .
Is it paranoia when they are really after you?> He
smiled at the wry thought. But he waited a few minutes longer,
listening to the loud voices through the open window. He began to
remember the Gants . . . a good record with fairly tough cases.
They had to be turning a profit on their operation, but the
system wasn't going to begrudge them that unless they got on the
wrong side of some administrator.

As he waited for the yelling to stop, a car pulled up. The
driver looked like a teenager, but the car was no street machine;
it was a nondescript hatchback, more than ten years old, with
some primer patches showing some body work that hadn't been
repainted. There was a fresh bumper-sticker that read
"USMC." Three girls and another boy got out. He
recognized the boy and the girl who headed directly into the
house: they were in his case files. The two who stayed by the car
to talk with the driver for the moment, he couldn't place--but he
he was sure he had seen them before.

After the old car drove away, the two girls waited for another
few moments, talking with each other. The taller, older one,
attractive with long blond hair put a hand on the smaller,
younger one's head--that one had strawberry blond hair, almost
pink, and resembled the other one. <Sisters?>

Then the older one began looking at him. He waved, rolled up
his windows, and got out of his car. "Are you staying with
the Gants?" he asked as he crossed the street.

"Yes . . . Don't you remember us?" the older one
asked. Was she mocking him? She seemed to have a heavy Japanese
accent.

The smaller one spoke--in Japanese. "You are the one who
fell and hit his head." She had light brown eyes, but with
the epicanthic folds of an East Asian. But aside from the color,
they were set the same way in her face as the older girl's cobalt
blue eyes--and both girls had eyes that seemed a little large.

The smaller girl spoke again. "Why have you come here
again?" This time it was in English, with an even thicker
accent.

"I just want to check up on things here. Did I ever see
you two as patients?"

The older one answered, "I saw you a long time ago."


"Why?"

The older girl answered, "I lost my memory."

"You did--yes, I remember something about that . . . I'm
afraid that bump on the head did more damage than I
thought."

"You sent Sarah here hoping I would remember her. I do .
. . I do not remember everything, but I remember her."

"Oh . . . that's good."

The younger one spoke again, in Japanese. "You do not
remember that, do you?"

"No . . . no, not really."

The younger one said, "I am so sorry . . . If you come
inside, I can make some chocolate for you."

"Thank you." He accepted the offer. They led him
inside to the kitchen, and the smaller one made hot chocolate
while the bigger one talked about what was going on at her school
and the smaller one's school--girlish gossip, the sort of thing
his daughters could go on about for hours. Then they left him to
talk with the Gants.



The Gants were nervous to have him dropping in unexpectedly.
He asked them about all their charges, and they told him what he
expected they would, except for the two odd ones he had talked to
first--the Gants were very happy having them. Then he got to his
real point. "Do you remember Ms. Chilicothe being here with
me on my last visit?"

"Who?" asked Mrs. Gant.

"Ms. Chilicothe. A social worker. She--" he realized
he had entirely forgotten exactly what her function was.
"She worked with me on occasion."

"No, I don't remember any such woman. Vic?"

"Doesn't ring a bell with me, Doc. Maybe she was here
some other time--we get so many of them coming here, it's hard to
keep them straight."

"Vic's got that right. I've seen kids go through five,
six different case workers. Why do you want to know?"

Dr. Watanabe said, "I can't remember much of what
happened on my last visit here. Probably because of the
concussion. Anyway--you're sure neither of you remembers Ms.
Chilicothe?"

"What did she look like?" asked Mrs. Gant.

"Ahhh--rather short, brown hair, blue eyes. I'm afraid
I'm not very good at physical descriptions. I think she liked to
wear brown. And she wore glasses." Dr. Watanabe was really
describing the one photograph of the woman his research had
uncovered.

"That could be a dozen different women I know," said
Mrs. Gant.

"Why are you asking?" inquired Mr. Gant.

"Oh, I'm a nitpicker. I was going through my records and
found some contradictions. I'm afraid I don't remember much more
about the last time I was here than getting taken to the
hospital."

He had all but forgotten about the odd pair of sisters by the
time he was ready to leave, but they met him again outside.

"Watanabe-san, we would like to ask you a favor,"
said the blond one in perfect Japanese.

"Yes? What?"

"Our records have been lost, and we have no proof we are
sisters. Could you have someone do a DNA test? We don't want to
be taken away from each other."

<Taken away. Something-->

The little one stared at him very intensely. "Please, it
is so important. We are all the family we have in this world. It
would help keep us together. Please keep us together."

"Well, I suppose . . ."

"Please, Watanabe-san?" said the little one.

"I'll see what I can do."



DNA matching was expensive. But Stanford University was a
center of genetic research. He made a few calls. Finally an old
friend told him he could have one of his graduate students take
care of it. She could work in the tests as part of an advanced
class.



Ateminski the detective didn't return that week, or the next,
or the next. But he did pay a visit to the Gant home one school
day, long before Usagi or Chibi-Usa came home. He remembered what
he did there. Dr. Watanabe didn't find about it until another
month had gone by.

By then Dr. Watanabe had almost stopped worrying. But he made
up for lost time, because he found his contacts in the police and
the courts would tell him nothing about Ms. Chilicothe.

But he had found out a little more about Barbara Chilicothe.
She had family, although out of the state. He actually called
them, using a false name and a false story, from a public phone.
They hadn't heard from her for some time, but weren't
particularly worried--she wasn't much of a writer, and seldom
called. They mentioned an ex-husband, but he turned out to be a
dead end. Dead, in fact, for a couple of years. No children of
her own . . .

Taking a closer look at his cases and other records, he found
scattered references to her going back for at least three years.
Yet she remained behind that blind spot in his mind's eye . . .
he could summon no direct memory of what she had looked like, or
sounded like. The photograph he had found was of a woman of
ordinary appearance--pleasant-looking but nondescript. She didn't
look like someone with whom he was likely to have had any
romantic involvement. But he had walled off that part of his life
since his wife had passed away. He had never let his daughters
know about any of the women he had been involved with since their
mother. He'd trained himself not to think of them, or of other
disruptive things in his life, while he was with them. Was he
walling off something from his own consciousness? He'd seen that
often enough, though he didn't really believe that truly divided
personalities existed.

His daughters. He had quite forgotten about them in his latest
late-night research. He looked in on them. He found that
Stephanie, his youngest, still in her day clothes, asleep on her
bed amid a pile of Japanese comics, manga. She had left
the lights on. Rather than wake her up and scold her, he removed
the manga from her bed and put the quilt over her. He gathered
the rest of the scattered manga up, and decided to take
them with him--she really shouldn't be staying up so late. He
shut off the last of the lights just before he closed the door.

He was going to lock them away in his files for a few days,
but as he got back to his study, the scene of so much worrying
about the detective and his lost memories, he wondered if he was
being too severe. He began to look through them. They all
featured mostly girls, drawn with that large round-eyed look
peculiar to most Japanese cartoons. Many had absurdly-colored
hair, probably to help differentiate the characters, since the
faces were mostly done very much in the same, conventional way.

Most of the comics he had gathered had the same character on
the cover, a silly-looking thing with two long blond ponytails
descending from two buns on the top of her head--she usually had
some red things in them. Looking inside, he began to follow the
stories . . . and began to grow concerned. They were far more
sophisticated than he had imagined, when the fantasy and rubber
science were stripped away. They weren't hentai, the
sexually explicit cartoons he knew of (and found disgusting), but
they were really far more adult-oriented than he had imagined.
And while there was far more romance, there was violence, and
even death. The girl with the ponytails and her friends could and
did kill.

He spent far longer going through the manga than he had
thought he would; in fact, he read every one of the manga
featuring the ponytailed girl, Sailor Moon, some more than once.
It was dawn when he realized how long he had taken . . .

Instead of locking the manga up, he put them on the kitchen
table, and began making a pancake breakfast. It was a school
day--and a workday--but it was a day off for his
housekeeper/nanny. The girls wandered down one-by-one when they
smelled their favorite breakfast, but they didn't say much to
him, or even each other.

He realized he had grown distant from them. This thing with
the obscure social worker was a blight on his life. And what
about the missing case files? Who had they been? They were hiding
behind that blind spot . . .

He noticed that all his daughters were reading the manga while
they ate, despite his rule against reading at the family table.
He almost scolded them, but thought better of it. Then he looked
at the cover of one of the manga . . . it was the pony-tailed
girl, Sailor moon, and a smaller girl who looked quite like her,
except the hair and eyes were a little different--the hair was pink,
and the eyes were red. She was supposed to be the daughter
"from the future" of the blonde one, Sailor Moon. A
peculiar sidekick, one of the wierder elements of the storyline.

What did that remind him of? Who did that remind him
of?


Next: The Grey Lady


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