Chapter 2 - Fan Mail

Stupid! Dumb. Ridiculous. Impractical. Cute, but I already have it. Why would I possibly want that? Do I actually have fans who think I'd be caught dead shopping at, let alone spending that much, at a Shima-"

    "Yoink!" I plucked the card from between Eimi's weak little fingers like taking candy from a baby. Which, we'd also been stealing. Strictly for her benefit, since she's complained so much about calories.

    Eimi has been at this for at least an hour already. Today was meant to be time to practice ironing out the kinks in our newly assigned subunits. Instead, we've sat around watching the beautiful blonde go methodically all the way through an enormous bag of fan mail, then start in on the second. Cards, kept with the envelope so some poor sucker can send out mass printed thank you cards, unless Eimi thought highly enough of the gift to tuck it in her bag for a personal, handwritten reply. By which, it's clearly evident, she means it's a hugely expensive gift. Cash, in a pile directly in front of Eimi. Jewelry, in a basket off to her left unless it was something she approved of, in which case it went in the basket on the right, and the left basket is far more full. Sweets and other edibles sent with holiday wishes were put into one of two boxes - a plain cardboard box for the store bought, prepackaged kind and an identical box with a large, poorly rendered skull and crossbones drawn in black ink for homemade sweets. Gift cards went with the cash, unless they were also considered useless, in which case they went into a significantly larger pile so she could… do something with them, probably. Then again, maybe they're just going to go to waste?

    "Akira! Hey, give that back!"

    "But… why? You were just complaining about how you'd never ever shop there. If you won't use it, I'll be more than happy to. Where's your holiday spirit?! Some of us don't have access to a trust fund, ya know."

    "Not that I need to touch Daddy's money anyway, but that would be a whole lot more convincing if you hadn't had access to one of the biggest bank accounts in Japan a few months ago." She stuck her tongue out at me just to be extra grinchy.

    "That was then, Eimi! This is now! And now it's practically Christmas, so you should be overflowing with generosity!" My right hand made a big show of waving the gift card right above her head. When she swatted at it, my left nabbed another matching card for the department store off the top of Eimi's reject pile.

    What? She already said she wasn't gonna use it, so it's basically just recycling. Anyway, it's for her own benefit. We're her unit partners, so we need to look super cute or it'll reflect badly on her.

    "Yeah, Eimi, you need to be nice to us or I'll tell Santa directly. Then you'll get nothing but a shoe full of rocks for Christmas."

    "Psh. That's baby stuff. Who needs Santa when you have…" She tossed an expensive looking jewelry box into the basket on her right and flipped over her current envelope. "Akira Nagafuji in Nagoya." Her lips buzzed in disappointment. "What a dumb name." Rinko and I couldn't help but laugh, even if she tried her hardest to turn her gaffe into a jab at me. "You can't keep all of that you know."

    Rinko, decked out in a half dozen necklaces and easily twice as many bracelets from the reject bin, clutched her hands to her chest in defiance. I did my part as well, shoveling another cookie into my mouth and chewing voraciously.

    "At least gimme the personalized stuff. That's absolutely useless to you."

    Rinko doubled down, hurriedly unclasping the cheap necklace whose focal point was the letters E I M and I covered in gaudy rhinestones and shoving it down the front of her sweater. A spray of dry gingerbread crumbs fell from my mouth as I laughed. Eimi looked much less amused, and I would judge that she only narrowly decided against going in after her purloined property.

    "It's absolutely no use to you, but fine. If it means that much to you, you can consider it a Christmas gift. But that's all you're getting!” Eimi's red face betrayed her attempt to sound calm and collected. She reached out and grabbed a gingerbread man, shouting "And don't eat all the good ones!" before biting its head off. "And you, Ms. Hoshino…"

    Knowing what was coming I decided Rinko's method was the best and easiest, and the gift cards were quickly hidden away under my workout shirt, where I was reasonably certain Eimi would once again decline to go after them.

    "I swear, I work with children. Fine. At least buy something suitably feminine to wear. I can't afford my fans getting us confused with Kerberos."

    "It's your own fault for flaunting your fame. Consider it a tax. You know what taxes are, right?"

    "Of course I- HMPH! A popularity tax. It figures." Eimi opened the next piece of mail and shook it, checking twice to make sure it contained nothing but a Christmas card before flinging it into the pile. She grabbed another handful of letters, reaching into the middle of the bag and dragging them out - maybe to keep up the sense of surprise, or avoid monotony? She hurriedly shoved one of the letters into her bag unopened and tore into the next.

    "Hey, what's with the sleight of hand? That one special?"

    "Excuse me? What're you talking about?"

    "You put one away without even opening it. The little black one. What's so special about it?"

    "Maybe Eimi has a boooyfr- Ah! Wait! Eimi, you don't have a boyfriend, do you?" Rinko sat forward on her chair, practically leaning off of it, having startled herself with her own accusation.

    "Are you crazy? Of course not. And the letter's none of your business."

    "But Eimiii now we've gotta know!"

    "Yeah, we're your friends, right?" The blonde shot me a look that called that into question. "Well, we're your unit anyway, which means we're probably even closer than friends, right?"

    "...fine. Since you absolutely have to know - and you'll probably learn yourselves if you ever get any fan mail of your own - some fans can be gross or weird. If you ever suspect something is odd about a letter or package you don't open it until security can look at it more closely. Don't they teach you new girls anything in your training anymore?" As emphasis she pointed at the box that was already half full of homemade treats.

    "Wha?! Well don't worry, Eimi! If you have a deranged fan, we'll protect you!" I flexed my arm so Eimi could see my bicep. She's so jealous.

    "You idi… Sigh. That's what security is for! If you're that desperate to beat someone up you can go ask 'Santa' for your own weirdo."

    "Too late! I already asked for a new set of ankle weights. Want my old ones? They're too light for me now. You could use them to tone up a little."

    "Gross. Why would I want used foot weights? They probably smell like your sweaty feet."

    "Nuh-uh. They're fully washable, and they smell like… Well, whatever weights are supposed to smell like!"

    "I'll take 'em!" Rinko, who I could swear had added to her collection of Eimi's castoffs, raised her jingling hand enthusiastically.

    "What are you going to do with Akira's used ankle weights?"

    "Our window has a leak and sometimes the wind tries to blow over our Christmas tree. I could use one to hold it in place." In imitation of one of Eimi's trademark moves, Rinko stuck out her tongue at the blonde, evidently confident that she had won whatever competition was happening.

    "Well, then you couldda asked 'Santa' for a better tree. I bet you didn't think of that, did you Rinko?"

    "That would've been silly! You only get one Christmas wish, and mine was really really important."

    "Oh yeah?" Eimi stopped rifling through her mail bag for the moment and gave Rinko her full attention. "What's so important that you absolutely have to have it? This should be good."

    "I can't tell you! If it's not a secret then it won't come true."

    "Aw, come on Rinko. You know what I asked for, and that Eimi's probably on the naughty list."

    "Well… Ok, but you have to promise not to tell anyone else! So, do you Pichi Pichi promise?"

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