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Kaoru loves his job.
He has complete autonomy over his little square of S Street’s Metropolitan Mall, having been manager of the Shower & Skin Works for almost a year now. The ladies he works with are all classy and intelligent people. He is constantly surrounded by the warm glow of bright bath bombs and embraced by the endless scents of lavender and peach cream. The pay isn’t the best, but who is Kaoru to complain when he gets to spend 11 months of the year without any stress beyond catering to the demands of a typical retail customer.
Yes, 11 months, because October is always an exception.
Kaoru hates October, and right now he hates the last week of September too because his store has the unfortunate luck of being next door to the only unit that gets leased to the ever-loathed seasonal shops. Most of the time, this is fine. There was once even a beautiful florist who took up the unit around Valentine’s Day—the perfect complement, even if it did take away some of their clientele.
Currently, SOULS HALLOWEEN’s cursed logo emblazons the shop window, along with a flurry of sale signs, ghosts, ghouls, and goddamn spiders.
Who would want to walk past that to buy vanilla pumpkin hand lotion?
There are always young children running out from the store play-sword-fighting with lightsabers and loud automated screams echoing in the hall. From the window, poorly coded pop-out clowns and shaking skeletons can be seen reacting to passersby. It’s a wretched place, but that’s not the source of Kaoru’s stress.
It’s the absolute ogre that must be their VIP employee because Kaoru is forced to see his ugly mug and his seaweed hair every time he opens, every time he closes, and all the times in between that they spend standing outside their shop doors and greeting potential customers.
Nanjo Kojiro, or as his nametag says, simply “Joe”, is the bane of Kaoru’s working life. He’s setting up the shop, and Kaoru’s rarely spoken to the man, but even just the simple act of seeing him wipe the window to hang another cobweb boils something wicked under Kaoru’s skin.
“Who buys Halloween costumes in September? Ridiculous.” Kaoru scoffs out loud, and Joe must hear him because he furrows his brow and comes down the ladder wiping his hands with a Happy Halloween! hand towel.
“Like most holidays, you have to plan in advance. And sometimes the decorations start going up before it’s even Fall, so September isn’t early at all. In fact, we’re putting up the shop a little late this year, Cherry.”
Kaoru pointedly ignores Joe and the little nickname he’s come up for him (pink hair = cherry blossoms? wow, how original!) as though there’s a fly buzzing in his ear making useless noise. He puts on his professional face instead, a warm honeycrisp smile and soft rosewater gaze as he waves over a group of giggling girls.
“Hello, are you in need of a new candle? Our Fall collection is on sale! Come in and try any of our scented hand sanitizers as well.”
One of the girls looks up to glance at him, and he tries to brighten his smile, but his face falls when the entire group’s attention shifts toward the entrance of SOULS.
“Looking for something cute to wear this All Hallow’s Eve? We’ve got you covered.” Joe flicks cat ear on his headband and muscle monster that he is, the motion causes the veins on his exposed forearms to shift under his skin. Kaoru forces himself to look away, fixating on adjusting a crooked gift basket ribbon instead.
The girls flock to Joe then, surrounding him to ask questions about their stock items and body makeup, and Kaoru has the sudden urge to gag on the sickly sweet smell of his own sweater weather body soap.
He catches the smug look on Joe’s face and rolls his eyes. It seems like it’ll be the longest holiday season ever, but Kaoru consoles himself with a small reminder. Come November, and all the green ogres will be out of sight, out of mind.
🌸
When one hears loud noises in a mall, one might assume a group of rowdy teenagers is just having some good-natured fun, maybe teasing someone who made a Freudian slip or encouraging the second-lead to ask out the shoujo protagonist, love at first sight and pockets lined with new allowances. Instead, Kaoru’s mind immediately supplies him with Joe the Moron must be making a fool of himself out there.
And Kaoru can’t have that happening within a five-meter radius of his perfectly decorated storefront, so he promptly heads to the door to investigate and shut things down before they can get out of hand.
What he finds instead is a group of teenagers, but they seem to have crowded around what looks like a middle schooler, a boy in a sailor uniform and a beret—a real fashion icon as far as Kaoru is concerned—except what’s really concerning is this situation he’s stumbled upon in his mall.
He’s about to break up the group, chastise them for being so loud, and for presumably picking on a younger kid when he catches a string of conversation.
“C’mon dude that was rigged, you’re totally some prodigy or something and you tricked us!”
“Yeah, totally! Not fair at all!!” Another agrees, and Kaoru sees him hand the shorter kid a wad of colorful bills. Cash, Kaoru realizes.
“This was everything my parents gave me for the week! What am I supposed to do for train fare now? My school is four stations from my house.”
The kid smirks, tucking the money into his shorts pockets. “Should have thought about that before you challenged me.” He shakes his handheld game console at them, rolling from side to side on what looks like a penny board. That cannot possibly be allowed indoors.
Kaoru has a better picture of what’s going on now, and it’s still something he needs to put a stop to. As he opens his mouth, a voice that isn’t his—deeper, gruffer—breaks the chatter.
“Look, kid, you can’t do that kind of thing around here, give these guys their money back,” Jo says, stepping in and placing an arm between the black-haired kid and the taller boy about to breach his personal space.
“I won this money fair and square.”
“I watched you act like you didn’t know how to play before goading them all to bet their allowances on 1-v-1s with you. Now I may not know much about video games, but I know that wasn’t a fair fight. Wouldn’t it be more satisfying to win in a fair battle? Give them their money, and all the other stuff you pickpocketed off them in the meantime.
The boy on Joe’s right starts checking his pockets before realizing he’s missing something, eyes wide as he looks back at the younger boy.
He scoffs, grumbles something insulting under his breath before emptying his pockets and doling keys and cash and personal items back to the group. “Stupid mall cop.” It rings loud and clear for both Kaoru and Joe to hear.
“Not a mall cop, kid. But you better be careful or next time you won’t be so lucky.”
“Yeah, yeah,” he says with a wave of his hand, already rolling off on his penny board, “And stop calling me ‘kid’. I’m fifteen.”
“You can’t ride that in here,” Kaoru says, face turning red at how silent he’s been the whole exchange, finally finding his voice. The boy promptly ignores him, and Kaoru yells after him, “You! What’s your name!”
He cranes his neck back and sticks out his tongue, rudely lifting a middle finger at them.
“That’s Chinen Miya,” one of the girls in the group pipes up. “He’s like, famous for skateboarding, or something. Who knew he was good at games too.”
“He’s not,” the guy with his arm around her protests, “He just got lucky we let him pick the game.”
“Yeah well you’re lucky we’re looking out for you,” Joe says. Kaoru startles at the use of we, but quickly clears his throat.
“Yes, he’s right.” It’s the only time Kaoru will admit to uttering those words. “Now go be a nuisance somewhere else before your luck really runs out.”
🌸
Kaoru dares to think that first encounter was a one-off. There was something vaguely familiar about the Miya boy, a flitter of his facial features in the echoes of Kaoru’s memory, whether because he frequented this corner of the mall or Kaoru was having some misplaced deja vu. He figures it’s nothing important until he starts seeing that face everywhere.
What should have been an isolated ordeal cascades into a chain reaction of events.
The first move begins with the release of over a dozen dancing skeletons into the linoleum-floored corridors of the mall. They manage to terrorize at least three babies in strolled before Joe carts them back to SOULs. Kaoru laughs at him behind his back, but also to his face. If he sees Miya skating out of the shop, whizzing so fast past Joe that the man nearly loses his footing, then it’s too hard to say so around the snickers he’s half-heartedly holding back.
"What? Can’t handle customers half your size, dimwit?” Kaoru lets go, laughing so hard that his glasses nearly slip from the bridge of his nose.
“Shut up, four-eyes.” Joe grumbles, readjusting his grip on the crate.
The last laugh is not his, however, as he finds out the very next day. Kaoru is setting up a new LED candle exhibit to showcase their sparkly bath bombs. They light up in a beautiful pattern that alternates between spelling the store name and listing the week’s discounts.
“Carla, it’s showtime,” Kaoru says into the microphone on his cell, watching the screen open to an app of his design and auto-adjusting the setting to one of his presets. The shop window comes to life in a dazzle of purples and blues, an astral winter wonderland of hues that has Kaoru beaming with pride. “Brilliant, as always.”
That is, until they start sparking and fizzling out. There’s a big burst of white light, and some eerie music is playing from somewhere. One customer panics, giving a high-pitched shout, and that’s enough for the whole store to empty out. People pushing past people, knocking over harmless body soaps, until someone’s foot gets caught on a wire and suddenly they’re toppling over one another and Kaoru rushes to turn off the system.
“Stop, stop! Calm down!” Kaoru raises his hands placatingly, but three people brush by without a word. He becomes blinded by strands of his own hair, and there are still white sparks from the wires running through the overhang. He spots Jo rushing over to help a young girl to her feet and Kaoru glares as if to silently accuse him. Did you do this?!
Joe raises his arms in a gesture of innocence and mouths Wasn’t Me!
Kaoru whips around then, tangles twisting tighter around the collar of his apron, and catches the culprit crouched by the main extension cord, an empty bottle of shower gel in his hands. Miya. He speaks the name in his mind with vitriol, and yells it out loud with rage, “Miya!"
The kid’s eyes go wide at being caught, but he sticks out his tongue and disappears when the next set of legs obscure Kaoru’s view, fleeing the scene as if he was never there.
Kaoru is forced to send his employees home and spend the remainder of the day filling out paperwork to send to HQ, detailing the accident report. He decidedly leaves Miya’s name out of it, if only because that would mean another day’s worth of paperwork, and Joe doesn’t even laugh at him as he watches him lock up.
🌸
The next incident is unavoidable.
“Hey, you, stop right there!” The bellowing voice that echoes through the halls is high in pitch but low in timbre.
The resident mall cop, Hiromi-kun, is who Kaoru derogatorily refers to as “the flower boy” because he probably couldn’t hurt a bumblebee despite his macho man persona. Joe has taken to the same nickname for him, albeit affectionately. Hiromi-kun himself prefers the nickname “Shadow” and even got it printed on a pin from one of the kiosks to use as a nametag.
Hearing him yell means one of two things, there’s some serious danger roaming the mall halls, or some kids have stopped taking his perpetual scowl seriously.
A peek into the halls reveals Miya has returned, not so subtle in the way he skates through the halls, doing little ollies against the uneven flooring.
Part of Kaoru immediately panics. What is he doing? Doesn’t he know he can get in serious trouble?
But then he flashes back to his youth, guileless days of meandering through classes before hitting the streets with his friends. And he sees Miya, always alone. Always aimless. And part of him feels cold.
Then the panic returns, and he glances to his side to see Joe has emerged with the same look on his face.
Their eyes meet, for not more than a fraction of a second, but there’s an unspoken word passed between them. Ruby flints against Fool’s Gold and it's the kind of understanding that they must both share, having not only seen this kid through his lost days but remembering what being lost and being a kid is like.
What passes between them then is a moment of recognition, and Kaoru holds onto that brief moment for a heartbeat before the world speeds back up again.
They move forward at the same time.
“Shadow!!”
Confused and perhaps delighted to hear his chosen nickname being used in place of some vague insult, Shadow whirls toward Kaoru, momentarily forgetting his pursuit of Miya. Out of the corner of his eye, Kaoru sees Joe charge the boy, using one arm to grab him straight off the board and throw him over his shoulder.
Kaoru’s mouth nearly drops at the sight, a blush rising to his cheeks, but he schools his features into something more stoic and unaffected as Joe shoots him a wink and disappears with Miya into his shop, the boy’s blood-curling screams fitting right in with the Halloween decorations.
“What’s wrong, Sakurayashiki-san? I've never heard you yell so loud.”
“Oh it's horrible! There’s this kid who’s been making a whole lot of trouble around here lately.” Kaoru pulls a fan out from his apron pocket and bats his eyes at Shadow, pulling out his most concerned local-Soccer-mom voice.
“The short black-haired kid with the green hoodie. Yes, I know! I just about had him!”
“No, no, no you’re mistaken.”
Barely paying attention while he scans the premises for Miya, Shadow nods along, “You’re right, I’m mistaken."
He snaps his attention back to Kaoru once he realizes what he’s said. “I”m mistaken?”
“It’s a boy with, uh, red hair and a yellow sweatshirt!” He makes something up on the spot and hopes it doesn’t match anyone’s real description. “That black-haired kid isn’t to blame. I think the other one put him up to it. Don’t worry about him. It’s a diversion and as our protector of justice, it’s your sole responsibility to find the real culprit, don’t you agree?”
“Protector of justice,” Shadow echoes dreamily. His face grows stern with resolve. “Yes, of course, I can't believe I almost fell for their tricks! I will find the real troublemaker at once. Thank you for the tip. Have a good day, Sakurayashiki-san!”
Once he’s bounded down some other direction, Kaoru lets out a sigh of relief and thanks whoever made Hiromi-kun so gullible and easy to please, before hesitantly popping into SOULs to check on the situation.
Miya’s seated on the counter and Joe’s slung an arm around him in a death grip so as to keep the kid from running. He groans, exasperated, but he doesn't seem to put up much of a struggle.
“Did that satisfy your savior complex enough? I didn’t need you to do that, you slimes.”
“Slime is a new one,” Joe huffs, tugging at his green strands with his other hand. Kaoru smirks, before growing serious.
“We told you that you wouldn’t be so lucky the next time. Did you want something stupid like this on your permanent record? Because Shadow could definitely make that happen. Foolish of me to expect gratitude from a half-baked skater boy.”
“You act as if you could do better.”
“I could do better and then some."
“Alright, let’s calm down.” For once, Joe is the voice of reason, a placating smile and raised hands mellowing the mood. “Wanna see something, Miya?”
He lets go once he’s sure Miya won’t turn tail and pulls out a tray of Halloween-themed sweets and chocolates. “New shipment, you won’t find this sort of thing at the big department stores.”
Miya eyes the candies warily, looking back up at Joe like he’s pulling a trick.
“Go on, pick one. They’re not poisonous, I promise.” Joe encourages. Miya reaches for a black cat cookie and nibbles on its ears. He must decide it’s delicious because he then starts taking big bites and the large cookie is gone in a blink.
He’s like an actual cat, Kaoru muses to himself. “Don’t you think you’re spoiling him?”
Joe shrugs, “Does it matter if I am?”
“Where are your parents,” Kaoru finally demands, “Do you just come here by yourself all the time?”
Miya’s face falls and Kaoru flinches. He supposed he could have worded that better.
“What do you care?"
Joe puts a gentle hand back on Miya’s shoulder. “We do care. Can we call someone for you?”
“Hmph,” Miya shrugs his hand off before pulling out his smartphone and handing it to Kaoru. “Call my Mom, you’ll get the same response anyway.”
Kaoru hits the dial button and notices Miya pout as the line rings.
A woman with an unimpressed voice answers, obviously in the middle of something else because she instantly snaps, “What now?”
“Hello, this is Sakurayashiki Kaoru from Shower & Skin Works. Am I speaking to the mother of Chinen Miya?”
“Whatever he stole, he has my card so just make him pay for it. And tell him to be home by 10, he has a competition coming up and dark circles are not good for the camera.”
She hangs up before Kaoru can even reply. He lowers the phone and looks over at Joe, whose frown is mimicking his own.
“See, doesn’t matter what I do, right?”
“That’s not true,” he instinctively replies, but Kaoru hands Miya back his phone knowing that his words must come off weak.
It makes a little more sense now. All the pranks and hanging around their stores. Even now, Miya seems reluctant to actually leave, and Kaoru sees this for what it is. There’s no one paying attention to the real Miya, not his parents and none of his friends.
Joe nods at Kaoru, like he’s come to the same unspoken conclusion.
“Say, Miya, I need to close up shop. Would you mind helping me restock some items and straighten out the place?” Kaoru asks, gentling his tone.
Miya’s eyebrow rise, “You want me to help you? Even after everything I’ve done?”
“Please, you haven't done anything that special. We pulled much better stunts in our days,” Kaoru realizes he’s speaking about Joe as if he knows him, but Miya won’t know the difference. “What, you think you’re too good for it, brat?”
He bites the inside of his cheek, considering. “Okay, I’ll help.”
They walk the short distance to Kaoru’s shop, and he doesn’t say anything when Joe follows. He and Miya even wait for Joe to pull the metal gates across his storefront, locking up for the night.
They spent maybe an hour parading through the Skin & Shower Works, the neon signs all turned off the alert people that it’s closing time. Kaoru only has to scold them about keeping the conditioners with the conditioners and the lip scrubs with the lip scrubs twice before they get the memo.
At one point, there’s a shelf that Kaoru can’t reach, and Joe whistles, “I thought there wasn’t anything those legs couldn’t do.”
Kaoru flushes and splutters, but the moment passes as Joe picks Miya up again, this time sitting on his shoulder, and the boy laughs warmly, perhaps the first time Kaoru has heard it so full of joy, and slots the wrapped set onto the top shelf with ease.
For that one hour, Kaoru doesn’t feel like a manager or an employee, or even an adult. He just feels warm and content.
Miya is unpacking boxes on the other side of the store while Joe is sweeping the floor when one of the last straggling customers—a couple, likely newlyweds—check out with Kaoru at the cash register. After their transaction is over and Kaoru is handing them the receipt and wishing them a good evening, the woman says just loud enough for Joe to also be able to hear, “You have such a lovely family. I hope we can have something like that one day.”
Her husband smiles at her, and they leave the store arm-in-arm while Kaoru watches, too stunned by the implication that the three of them look like a family to even say his rehearsed farewell.
Kaoru meets Joe’s gaze again, and there’s something incredibly fond about it that terrifies Kaoru, so he snaps his fingers as if he’s expecting Joe to make fun of him, even though part of him knows the other wouldn’t do that, not now at least, and scowls, “Not a word!”
Once the gate to Shower & Skin Works is locked, Kaoru turns to Joe and Miya.
“How do you usually get home?” Joe asks, eagerly.
Kaoru narrows his eyes, suspicious, “The bus.”
“And you?” he asks Miya.
The boy shrugs, “Hitch a ride. Or skateboard.”
“That can’t be safe!” Kaoru and Joe say at the same time and then glare at each other.
“Alright, it’s settled. You’re both riding with me.” He grabs onto both their arms and tugs them both toward the employee parking lot, leaving no room for protest. Kaoru is hyperaware of the other man’s grip on his wrist, reminding himself that it’s not unexpected that Joe would have such a hands-on personality. He’s just not used to this side of him, that’s all.
They’ve always kept things professional, at times arguably hostile even, so to see this side of Joe, one that’s considerate, and carefree, and has his hands all over the place, well, it’s just new, that’s all. Kaoru convinces himself, the tingling sensation along where their skin meets cannot possibly have any greater meaning.
They’re driving to drop Miya off first since he lives the closest, and Kaoru tries to ignore that Joe will soon know where he lives, when Miya, perhaps trying to extend this time, or maybe just genuinely hungry, asks if they can stop for dinner.
“You haven’t eaten yet?” Kaoru asks, incredulous. The weak grumble Miya’s stomach gives is answer enough.
Joe is almost crazy enough to drive them to a Michelin-star restaurant (who knew he was such a foodie? Kaoru supposes with that body it shouldn’t be a surprise…he quickly shakes off the thought) but Miya insists on Fish & Chips.
It’s a little out of the way but Joe doesn’t mind and there’s a drive-thru so they don’t even have to get out of the car. Kaoru gets full control over the stereo so it’s all the best music and it shouldn’t be this much fun, getting late-night food with two people he wouldn’t have ever pegged himself hanging out with after hours, but it is. It is so so much fun, and Kaoru starts thinking it wouldn’t be so bad to do this again. It wouldn’t be so bad if this night never had to end.
But it does, and after they’ve dropped off Miya with a wave, and a “Come back to see us anytime!” and a few “Study hard”s and “Stay out of trouble”s for good measure, the mood sobers.
“Think he had fun?” Joe asks eyes on the road and one hand on the steering wheel.
“He better have. That kid is high maintenance.” He replies, cheek propped against his hand as he stares out the passenger window at the city lights passing by.
“Isn’t kind of nice though? Things becoming so lively.”
“Things are lively enough as it is,” Kaoru grumbles. But he’s smiling. It hadn’t occurred to him that life had become tedious up until recently. If he was really truly being honest with himself, he might admit that he was starting to look forward to this time of year.
“I forgot you like things to be routine, you Robo-freak.”
Kaoru rolls his eyes. “At least I know how to have civilized fun, Gorilla Brain.”
“Idiot.”
“Dimwit!”
“Cyborg!”
“Simpleton!”
“Scrawny!”
“Furry!”
“Pffft,” Joe rolls over laughing and Kaoru reaches for the wheel, panicked, but Joe waves him off, putting both hands on it tightly, flexing his fingers against the steering wheel and easing off the gas to reassure Kaoru’s he’s fully in control.
Kaoru slumps against his seat. “You scared me, dumbass.”
“You get so wound up,” Joe says, but not meanly. “I guess that’s why I was surprised today. It was thoughtful of you to give Miya something to do to make him feel needed.”
“I was just following your lead. New shipment, my ass, you made those sweets yourself, didn’t you? You looked so pleased when he liked them.”
“Haha, you caught me! Not as stupid as I thought then.”
“Who’s the stupid one,” Kaoru smiles. A comfortable silence washed over them as they pull into Kaoru’s neighborhood.
The car crawls to a stop in front of Kaoru’s apartment complex and Joe turns to him, looking a little sheepish.
You know, you’re pretty when you smile and fun to be with when you’re confident and relaxed. It’s a good look on you.”
Kaoru’s eyes widen and he looks back out the window to hide his expression.
“What are you saying?” he hisses.
“I’m saying,” Joe pauses, considering his next words carefully, “I got to see a different side of you today and I’d actually really like to get to know you better. Maybe you’re interested in that too?”
Kaoru trails his eyes to Joe’s face, earnest and open, studying it for any sign that this is a cruel joke, that there’s a lie behind those soft words. What looks back at him must be unnerving, because it causes Joe to look away, clearing his throat.
“Ah, never mind, this was a bad idea, huh? You can just forget i—”
Kaoru quickly reaches for his arm and clutches onto his shirt sleeve. “No, I,” he swallows, “I would like that.”
Joe holds his gaze, “Okay.”
“Okay,” Kaoru repeats, slowly letting go of Joe’s sleeve before suddenly slapping his bicep, “Now ask me properly.”
Joe’s smile grows lopsided, “Okay, Cherry, I really think I might like you.”
Kaoru’s heart stutters in his chest, pounds in his ears, and his hand carelessly resting on the door handle ends up tugging at it in panic, opening it behind him so that he nearly falls out of the vehicle. Joe reaches forward, hands sliding down Kaoru’s arms and gripping him by the elbows to prevent his fall. He continues onward, like nothing’s happened, half-hovering over him as he says, “Would you want to have dinner with me sometime?”
“Yes,” Kaoru replies breathlessly, straightforward, suspended in the space between the cool night air and Joe’s warm gaze.
He loves his job, 11 months of the year, and he thinks he might just start to love it in October too.
🌸🌸🌸