Keiko and the others ought to just be starting *Return of the
Jedi* now...
Yui(T): I wonder if they're watching the original version or the remake?
Botan: Yui, think about timeframes. The remake hasn't been remade
yet.
Yui(T): I really had some quarrels with that. The guy who they got to do
Darth Vader's extra lines had a really crummy voice -- he sounded like
rich fat guy ordering the chauffeur to bring the car around.
Botan: Yes, and WHY did they add that scream when Luke jumped? He chose
to jump. A warrior faces death bravely. And it was a HOKEY scream, to
boot!
[pause]
Narrators: OFF-TOPIC ALERT! OFF-TOPIC ALERT! EEAAAAAAAAAH!
Miaka pirouetted in front of her brother. "Do you think I look all
right?" she asked.
"It's a family reunion, not a dinner party!" Keisuke told his little
sister. "I'm not even going to wear a tie!"
"Yes, but do you think I look *all right*?"
Keisuke sighed and put down the calculus book he had been staring at in
the hope that it would suddenly miraculously reveal all its secrets. "Why
don't you ask Tamahome? He's waiting downstairs."
It was now Miaka's turn to sigh. "Oniichan... remember that awful
splotchy dress that made me look fat? You said it looked like some
kindergartner had thrown paint at it while it was handing from the
ceiling?"
"Yeeess..." Keisuke prompted uncertainly, wondering what this had to do
with the prior conversation.
"Tamahome thought I looked just fine in it."
"Oh."
Yui(T): <giggle> Tamahome would probably think Miaka looked just fine if
she stripped naked and painted herself blue!
Botan: Don't you mean *red*?
Yui(T): Huh?...oh! Oh, yeah!
Narrators: <howling laughter, that decreases and then crescendos again as
one or the other is re-reminded of the joke>
Botan: <sigh> I wish I had a guy like that.
Yui(T): I wish *I* had a guy like that.
Botan: You have *Nagi*...
Yui(T) (flabbergasted): NAGI?! If I have Nagi, you have Koenma!
Botan: KOENMA?!?!?!
[pause]
Botan: We need cute boyfriends.
Yui(T): We need a *life*.
Botan: That too.
"You look very nice," Keisuke reassured his sister.
"You're just saying that to make me feel better."
"Go ask Mom if you don't believe me."
"Mom will just tell me about all these relations again," Miaka
complained. "Aunt Atsuko, one kid. Aunt Rumi, one kid, one stepkid. Uncle
Ayanosuke, three kids. Uncle... what *is* Mom's other brother's name?"
"Uncle Mukoyoshi*? All I know is that he married into some rich
important family."
*mukoyoshi: adopted son-in-law.
"He's got to have a name SOMEWHERE..."
"Maybe he lost it in a card game," Keisuke suggested dryly.
"And there are all the Yuuki second cousins," Miaka went on, "the Kurata
ones, the Ayanokouji ones, and don't forget the Hoshino relatives,
they're coming too."
"Hey, remember how we all used to speculate why they never talked about
Great-Uncle Kentarou?"
"You thought he was a pirate," Miaka giggled.
"Well, YOU thought he'd perished in the jungles of the Amazon trying to
get the golden idol from the temple of Whoozis-sama."
"And Miki-chan thought he'd murdered someone..."
"While Shinnosuke insisted that no, he'd been murdered *himself* by
Great-Grandfather and buried under the kitchen floor."
"And Akira-chan was positive that he'd been kidnapped by slime-dripping
aliens and the government was covering it up."
"I think I liked Ayame-chan's one best."
"Oh, yes... she said he was really a superspy and that nobody mentioned
him so the KGB and CIA wouldn't find out."
The two siblings laughed, remembering cousins they hadn't seen in years
and games they'd played.
"We certainly had fun with that," Keisuke reminisced.
"I wonder what *did* happen to Great-Uncle Kentarou, anyway?"
In the small apartment, three people sat around the table drinking tea
and waited for the fourth to finish with his toilette.
"Are you done in there yet, Ken-chan?" Hasegawa Ryuuen called.
"I'm still brushing my hair," Hoshino Kentarou said in response to his
lover's query. "I want to look well at this affair."
"Of course you'll look well," Ryuuen-sensei reassured. "You're so
beautiful it's scary."
"I know."
Kurama and Hasegawa Noriko looked at each other for a moment, and then
burst out laughing.
Botan: Modest, isn't he?
Yui(T): I gather he's always been that way.
Botan: Kurama's almost as bad sometimes.
Yui(T): Well, *he's* better-looking.
Botan: Don't let Kentarou-san hear you...
Kentarou eventually emerged from the bathroom, his newly-washed hair
brushed to perfection.
"I beg pardon for taking so long," he said as he automatically stopped
within the room at just the point where the light glinted off him to his
best advantage.
"Oooh.." Hearts appeared in Ryuuen's eyes.
"It's all right," Kurama smiled. "Beauty takes time and effort to
maintain, but its preservation is a duty to the world; there are enough
ugly things out there already."
"I like this young man," Kentarou said. "He'll go far."
"Careful," Ryuuen warned. "I'll grow horns." He looked at his watch.
"We're running late!"
"The train ride takes ten minutes," his sister told him, "and *leaves*
every ten. The affair begins in forty-five."
"Yes, but we still need to get moving *now*."
Yui(T): I think there's a Men Gene that controls such things as obsession
about lateness, alternate work and holiday personalities, and inability
to be sympathetic about a month's worth of forgotten homework.
Botan: There are women like that, too.
Yui(T): And there are men who have two X chromosomes. It's called
Klinefelter's Syndrome.
Botan: Where did you hear that?
Yui(T): In the stupid biology class I had to take last year.
Botan: What will they think of next...
In an office about the size of a largish closet, three women were
bustling about.
"Look, the grand prize for this contest is a two-week vacation for four
in Hawaii!" the plumper of the three women said. "Whom else would we
invite along?"
"You're not planning on *entering* it, are you?" the thin woman said as
she counted off trays of sushi on her fingers, making sure she had
enough.
"Why not, Hanako?"
Hanako turned to look at her coworker. "Because you won us a gross of
refrigerator boxes of sweet fried tofu the LAST time you entered a
contest, Sachiko! What are we supposed to do with it all?"
Yui(T): What's a refrigerator box?
Botan: It's like a portable full-size refrigerator, except it doesn't
have shelves or drawers so you can fit even more stuff in it.
Yui(T): Boxes that size of fried tofu? No wonder they call it gross! How
many are there?
Botan: No, no, a gross is an old word for a dozen dozen.
Yui(T): A HUNDRED AND FORTY-FOUR REFRIGERATORS-FULL OF FRIED TOFU? Nobody
human eats that stuff anyway.
Botan: *I* eat it.
Yui(T): I rest my case.
Botan: So do all the Reikai Tantei. Except maybe Hiei.
Yui(T): Hn.
"We'll take it along," the third, older woman said.
"To this 'Yuuki Reunion,' Mineko-san?" Hanako asked the head of Three
Catalpas Catering.
"Yes," Mineko said with a wry smile. "We'll take it to the reunion and
hope some of the guests are foxes in disguise."
Botan: Huh?
Yui(T): I don't believe it! I-know-something-Botan-doesn't.
Botan: Tell me, tell me!
Yui(T): Nope. It's a spoiler.
Botan: YUI!!
Outside the newly-remodeled Jimpei Hotel, three young humans and an
invisible youkai looked up and down nervously.
"We shouldn't go in too early," Asako said. "We'll be noticed."
"Well, we do sort of have a right to be here, according to the
narrators," Ushio pointed out.
"Yes, but do you think any of them would *believe* that?"
"Rip their heads off if they don't," Tora suggested.
Ushio whacked him (lightly) with the butt of the Beast Spear.
About ten yards away from the four, two groups of people met suddenly.
"Oneesan!" one of them yelped. "I haven't seen you in years!"
"Ha-chan!" the woman being addressed replied. "Are you here for the
family reunion as well?"
"Certainly! I can't wait to see all the Yuuki and Ayanokouji cousins
again."
"Neither can I."
"This must be your daughter, Oneesan. My word, she's grown so *tall*..."
"Hai. Soo desu."
"And this is..."
"My pimp!" the daughter (who couldn't have been more than ten or so)
replied cheerfully.
The "pimp" sweatdropped, and everyone in the other group fell over in
shock.
"He's your manager, dear," the girl's mother told her. "A pimp is
something else."
"I give him all my money, and he runs my life and schedules my
appointments. What's different?"
Asako asked the others, who were watching wide-eyed, "Isn't she the girl
on that program, the one on Channel 26?"
"I never watch that channel," Ushio told her.
"I think so," Mayuko said.
Botan: Yes, she is.
Yui(T): Isn't that the 'Marmalade-Boy-on-speed' one?
Botan: Yes... <giggle> Good description!
Yui(T): It isn't mine... wish I remembered whose it WAS so I could
attribute it...
[long pause]
Mayuko: Follow me, guys.
Narrators: Oops...
The three teenagers filed in behind the other people as they entered the
hotel.
"That woman," Tora said, "has a *squirrel* sitting on top of her head."
"So?" Ushio asked. "I have a large invisible youkai sitting on top of
*mine*. Mind the door."
As Kurama walked out of the train station, the wind blew a piece of
paper into his face. He reached up and pulled it off.
"I think it likes you, Minamino-kun," Noriko teased.
"Now THAT'S what I call 'aggressive advertising,'" Ryuuen chimed in.
"What's it for?"
"An opera," Kurama said, looking at the piece of paper. "Iru Baabiere de
Sebirya."
"I was in that, once," Noriko contributed.
"You were?" Hoshino Kentarou said.
"Sebirya no Kamagirisha," Noriko translated.
"Figaro-kun," Ryuuen amplified at the same time.
"You sang in opera, Hasegawa-san?" Kurama asked.
"Oh, yes, for years and years. I never got the leads, but I was in the
chorus a lot."
"Noriko-san is too modest," Kentarou declared. "She sang named parts
several times."
"Usually when the upper chorus all had names," Noriko pointed out.
Kurama folded the flier and put it in the pocket of his uniform jacket.
"Whatever," Noriko inquired, "possessed the school board of directors to
make the uniforms *pink*?"
Ryuuen shrugged. "Maybe one of them liked the color?"
"But so few people can *wear* that color," Kentarou interjected. "You
and Noriko-san are among the only ones I've met."
"You didn't look too bad in it yourself, Ken-chan."
"That is because I do not, as you put it, 'look too bad' in *anything*.
It still required much of my natural credit merely to make it look
passable."
"Ooooh, Ken-chan..." Ryuuen pretended to swoon into his arms.
His sister and student burst into laughter, in which they were soon
joined by Kentarou and Ryuuen himself.
The four were still laughing as they came to the mouth of the alley
behind the Jimpei Hotel. The voices of two women, raised in anger, could
be heard from within.
"... so he goes off to loiter around while your Aunt Tsuya has her baby,
and *now* who's going to help us finish unloading?"
"Something will turn up."
"'Something will turn up.' That's your problem, Sachiko; you always go
on, blithely confident that 'something will turn up,' and it *doesn't*!"
"Ah -- pardon me," Ryuuen said, looking down the alleyway, "but we
couldn't help but overhear your conversation. May we be of some
assistance?"
"Certainly," the plumper of the two young women said. "If it wouldn't be
too much trouble, would you mind helping us unload these boxes of food?"
"Sachiko!" her companion hissed.
"Not at all," Kentarou said. "We must of necessity always be at the
disposal of two such lovely ladies as yourselves." He walked over to
them.
The Hasegawa siblings rolled their eyes, but followed, Kurama trailing
them.
"I'm afraid we have nothing to give you -- " the thinner lady began in a
voice a full octave higher than the one with which she had been scolding
her companion
"Nonsense!" Kentarou and Ryuuen said in unison.
"But we do," Sachiko said. "If you would accept some sweet fried tofu,
you would be doing us a favor."
"Sweet fried tofu?" Kurama asked eagerly. "Where?"
"It's in the truck with the rest of the food," Sachiko smiled. She
turned to her companion. "See, Hanako? Something *did* turn up!"
Kurama hastily helped Sachiko manuever a box out of the back end of the
truck and in through the loading dock to the back hallways.
"My name is Azusa Sachiko of Three Catalpas Catering, and my partner
being helped back there by the polite gentleman and the lady is Azusa
Hanako-san. No relation."
Kurama looked back to verify that, indeed, Hoshino-san and Hasegawa
Noriko were assisting the sharp-tongued Hanako.
"I'm Minamino Shuuichi of Meioh High School. Doozo yoroshiku."
"Minamino-kun, please excuse Hanako-san's actions. She doesn't mean to
be so... so... it's just that her life hasn't been very happy..."
"Oh, no, I quite understand." Kurama smiled. "I have a friend who's just
the same."
Sachiko beamed up at him. She was, after all, a small woman.
"Over here," a taller woman commanded as they entered one of the hotel's
many reception rooms, gesturing toward a row of tables.
"We found some people to help, Mineko-san!" Sachiko carolled.
"So I see," 'Mineko-san' observed dryly as Hanako, Noriko, and Kentarou
entered.
"Where do I put this?" Ryuuen asked as he followed them in. He was
balancing a large, heavy-looking box on his shoulder.
"Sensei!" Kurama gasped, moving to help at the same time as Hanako.
"It's all right," Noriko told them as she pointed her brother to the
correct location. "Oniichan's been weight-training for years. He's *much*
stronger than he looks."
"This is Minamino Shuuichi-kun," Sachiko chirped brightly, turning
towards the older woman.
Hanako frowned reflexively at the "-kun."
"The strong one is my teacher Hasegawa Ryuuen-sensei," Kurama took over
the introduction, "this is his younger sister Hasegawa Noriko-san, and
that one there is Hoshino Kentarou-san."
"Hajimemashite," the tall woman responded. "Azusa Mineko desu."
"She isn't any relation either," Sachiko confided, "but she got us
together and started Three Catalpas and suggested the name because of our
last names -- she's the president, you see -- and --"
Hanako elbowed her partner in the ribs as unobtrusively as possible.
"And I took her for / The proprietor / Of a Ladies' Seminary!" Noriko
sang in English under her breath.
Mineko-san's sharp gaze fell on the older woman. "And if you can quote
from *Iolanthe*, we shall all get along quite splendidly. Come, there is
much more to unload; Hoshino-san, please take charge of the tables."