[fiction] foster care: the apnea (wish i was)
Picks up directly from here. Because Yoshiko needs a bit of time to process what Kaiba-kun has just told her. PG-13 for implied drug abuse & sex (but then this is Foster Care XD)
“You…think?”
“She’s…” He’s getting embarrassed, “…late. And she says she’s not. Usually.” He’s flushing, the only hint of colour Yoshiko’s seen on his face in far, far too long. “And we usually use condoms, too, but…” He gestures meaninglessly with his hand as he trails off, and Yoshiko reminds herself that behind all his worldly polish, Kaiba-kun is very, very young.
“And you think this is true?” Yoshiko doesn’t bother to hide the skepticism in her voice. She’s seen the types of girls the Kaiba Corp. PR gurus set him up with. Nearly twice his age and all with the dream of being Mrs. Kaiba Seto in their heavily mascara-ed eyes.
“Yes.”
“Kaiba-kun, it might come as a shock to you, but you’re - “
“She’s not a liar.” Because it takes more than being freshly discharged from the hospital after a near-death experience to dampen that off-the-charts intelligence. He knows where she was going with the conversation, all right. He glares at her suddenly, that impassioned glare he gets when he cares. She’s only ever seen him use it in reference to Mokuba before, and so she files this moment away for later examination and reflection. “She’s not a gold digger either.”
***
Mazaki Yoshiko loves her job. Really. For all the pains and heartache, she really, truly loves her job.
She tells herself this as she tries her hardest to keep herself from shaking silly the boy sitting next to her.
She can’t keep people from digging their own graves, Kennosuke’s found of telling her, and it’s true. It really is. She can’t help people who aren’t willing to help themselves, but children sometimes can’t see the graves they’re digging, and that’s why she does what she does.
Yoshiko first met Kaiba-kun at the inquest over Gozaburo’s death. Suicide, it was ruled, but that didn’t stop the rumours. And it didn’t help that Kaiba-kun hadn’t cried at all. She’d suspected shock, at the time, because it wasn’t everyday that one’s adopted father threw himself out of a window while you looked on.
Of course, a week or so later, his lawyers had greased all the appropriate wheels of the political machine and had obtained Kaiba Seto’s emancipated minor-ship, complete with sole custody over his little brother Mokuba.
Yoshiko had had one more audience with Kaiba-kun shortly thereafter, and no matter how hard the lawyers tried to hide it, it had been obvious that the boy was already nursing a full-blown addiction to something. She had laid out the government’s terms for Kaiba-kun’s independence: namely, that he meet once a month with her, as she was the case officer for the district.
She had pressed a narcotics anonymous pamphlet into his hand before leaving, told him child services just wanted to help him and they could be very discreet. And he had sneered and told her never to expect him darkening her office door. And that had been the last she and child services had seen of him. Or at least, it had been until the old political machine of Domino Gozaburo had ruled with an iron fist had been replaced with slick, new civil servants from Tokyo who had decided that their careers could be made by going after such a high-profile boy as Kaiba Seto to the exclusion of every other marginalized child in Domino. And without a damn thought to the repercussions.
And now, it appears, there’s more in Kaiba-kun’s closet than just the heroin. And she wonders - not for the first time - how any of rather sick political exploitation is supposed to be helping either of the Kaiba boys. Because it’s not. At all.
***
“Kaiba-kun wants to go into detox,” she tells Kennosuke that night, after Mokuba and Anzu have gone to bed.
Kennosuke looks up from his paperback. She can see the surprise in his face: she’s been mentioning it - on and off again, mostly when Kaiba's on the evening news - for years, but right now, she sounds so unhappy about it. “I’m sensing there should be an ‘but’ right about now,” he says finally.
“He thinks he got a girl pregnant.”
Even now, hours later, it hits closer to home than she thought it would. She deals with pregnant teenagers all the time, and the only thing being one herself has given her is perhaps a sense of empathy. But with Kaiba-kun…he’s already so damaged, and she doesn’t her degree in child psychology to know that he is no-where near ready to be a father, no matter how mature a face he is putting on this recent turn of events.
Kennosuke’s low whistle sums up her feelings entirely.
<< previous | next >>
“You…think?”
“She’s…” He’s getting embarrassed, “…late. And she says she’s not. Usually.” He’s flushing, the only hint of colour Yoshiko’s seen on his face in far, far too long. “And we usually use condoms, too, but…” He gestures meaninglessly with his hand as he trails off, and Yoshiko reminds herself that behind all his worldly polish, Kaiba-kun is very, very young.
“And you think this is true?” Yoshiko doesn’t bother to hide the skepticism in her voice. She’s seen the types of girls the Kaiba Corp. PR gurus set him up with. Nearly twice his age and all with the dream of being Mrs. Kaiba Seto in their heavily mascara-ed eyes.
“Yes.”
“Kaiba-kun, it might come as a shock to you, but you’re - “
“She’s not a liar.” Because it takes more than being freshly discharged from the hospital after a near-death experience to dampen that off-the-charts intelligence. He knows where she was going with the conversation, all right. He glares at her suddenly, that impassioned glare he gets when he cares. She’s only ever seen him use it in reference to Mokuba before, and so she files this moment away for later examination and reflection. “She’s not a gold digger either.”
***
Mazaki Yoshiko loves her job. Really. For all the pains and heartache, she really, truly loves her job.
She tells herself this as she tries her hardest to keep herself from shaking silly the boy sitting next to her.
She can’t keep people from digging their own graves, Kennosuke’s found of telling her, and it’s true. It really is. She can’t help people who aren’t willing to help themselves, but children sometimes can’t see the graves they’re digging, and that’s why she does what she does.
Yoshiko first met Kaiba-kun at the inquest over Gozaburo’s death. Suicide, it was ruled, but that didn’t stop the rumours. And it didn’t help that Kaiba-kun hadn’t cried at all. She’d suspected shock, at the time, because it wasn’t everyday that one’s adopted father threw himself out of a window while you looked on.
Of course, a week or so later, his lawyers had greased all the appropriate wheels of the political machine and had obtained Kaiba Seto’s emancipated minor-ship, complete with sole custody over his little brother Mokuba.
Yoshiko had had one more audience with Kaiba-kun shortly thereafter, and no matter how hard the lawyers tried to hide it, it had been obvious that the boy was already nursing a full-blown addiction to something. She had laid out the government’s terms for Kaiba-kun’s independence: namely, that he meet once a month with her, as she was the case officer for the district.
She had pressed a narcotics anonymous pamphlet into his hand before leaving, told him child services just wanted to help him and they could be very discreet. And he had sneered and told her never to expect him darkening her office door. And that had been the last she and child services had seen of him. Or at least, it had been until the old political machine of Domino Gozaburo had ruled with an iron fist had been replaced with slick, new civil servants from Tokyo who had decided that their careers could be made by going after such a high-profile boy as Kaiba Seto to the exclusion of every other marginalized child in Domino. And without a damn thought to the repercussions.
And now, it appears, there’s more in Kaiba-kun’s closet than just the heroin. And she wonders - not for the first time - how any of rather sick political exploitation is supposed to be helping either of the Kaiba boys. Because it’s not. At all.
***
“Kaiba-kun wants to go into detox,” she tells Kennosuke that night, after Mokuba and Anzu have gone to bed.
Kennosuke looks up from his paperback. She can see the surprise in his face: she’s been mentioning it - on and off again, mostly when Kaiba's on the evening news - for years, but right now, she sounds so unhappy about it. “I’m sensing there should be an ‘but’ right about now,” he says finally.
“He thinks he got a girl pregnant.”
Even now, hours later, it hits closer to home than she thought it would. She deals with pregnant teenagers all the time, and the only thing being one herself has given her is perhaps a sense of empathy. But with Kaiba-kun…he’s already so damaged, and she doesn’t her degree in child psychology to know that he is no-where near ready to be a father, no matter how mature a face he is putting on this recent turn of events.
Kennosuke’s low whistle sums up her feelings entirely.
<< previous | next >>