Jingle Bills

Ranko spit the last mouthful of toothpaste into the sink, rinsing her toothbrush and resting it on the counter. She yawned loudly as she made her way to the open closet. To her dismay, no new options had appeared while she was in the shower; she was going to have to find some time to do some laundry soon. She pulled out a red knee-length skirt and a light gray t-shirt with a large pink heart on the front, beginning to get herself dressed. She was going to freeze in the outfit, and she wasn't looking forward to it. As soon as she had some spare money, she would need to get herself some warmer clothes. Cologne's curse had made her skin terribly sensitive to heat, but even more so to extreme cold, and she acutely felt the December chill every time the front door of the bar opened at night.Pulling her hair into a loose ponytail, she looked herself over in the mirror that hung from the closet door. Not amazing, but it'll do, she thought to herself, pulling on her black slip shoes and heading downstairs. She was downstairs far earlier than usual after a slow Sunday night, but she didn't have any other plans and wanted to get a head start on the day. Izumi was neck-deep in planning her wedding and Mei… come to think of it, Ranko didn't know what was up with Mei, but she hadn't been working as many nights the last week or two. But in any case, both of them being distracted meant Yui and Ranko had been running the place largely on their own. Hana had been there every night, but she'd been a little distant, and Ranko wasn't sure why. She hoped it wasn't some lingering disappointment over the thing with the Americans and the revelation that she hadn't finished high school.Ranko pulled up a stool to the prep counter, reaching into the pantry and producing a large bin of citrus. She sat down, grabbed an orange, and reached to her right, her hand grasping at air over the knife rack. She sighed and rolled her eyes; she couldn't believe she'd forgotten that she ran them all through the dishwasher last night. She stood, making her way toward the back bar area. She popped open the dishwasher with her foot, letting its drawer slide out to meet her, and drew a long chef's knife from it with a ringing sound not unlike the unsheathing of a sword. She giggled for a moment, imagining herself as some samurai warrior from a Kurasawa movie. "I, Ranko Tendo, swear on my honor that I will purge the earth of all vile, corrupt fruits!" She laughed as she walked back to the kitchen, but stopped halfway, noticing something strange. The door to Hana's office was partially ajar.Spinning the knife in her hand into a more defensive posture, she carefully pushed the office door open. As she did, she found Hana slumped over on the threadbare couch along the far wall. An empty tequila bottle lay on the floor, not far from where her left arm loosely hung. She was quietly snoring. Ranko sighed, putting the knife down on the cluttered desk next to a pile of papers. "Mama, this isn't good for you," she said quietly to herself. She picked up the brown leather jacket that was still draped over the back of Hana's chair, covering her up with it as best she could.As she did, Hana stirred with a loud groan. "Huh? Wha.. oh, hey, Ranko."Ranko could tell just from her breath exactly where that tequila had gone. "I'm sorry, I didn't mean to wake you. Are you okay? If you need to rest, you're welcome to use the bed upstairs."Hana waved her off, her coordination clearly not fully online yet after having just woken up. "I'm fine, fine. You don't fret about me."Ranko sighed, shaking her head with an amused smile. "We take care of each other here, remember? Can I make you some tea?"Hana shook her head, a grimace and four fingers to her temple indicating that she had immediately regretted that particular gesture. "Coffee. Black."Ranko smiled. "Coming right up!" She had tried to put on as cheerful a demeanor as possible around Hana lately, and now she was just using her "customer service voice" as if Hana were one of the bar's patrons and not its owner.The redhead disappeared from the office and returned a few moments later with a steaming mug, handing it to the older woman. Hana downed half of its contents quickly, making a little grunt in reaction to the still-scalding liquid coursing down her throat. Ranko pulled the tattered wheeled chair around the desk, sitting in it and facing the bar's matriarch. "Hana, is there anything you want to talk about? You've seemed kind of… off lately. I'm worried about you."The bar's proprietress shook her head, more gently this time. "It's nothing you can help with."Ranko sighed quietly. "Maybe not, but I'd like to try. You've done so much for me.""I don't want to talk about it, okay?" Hana's voice took on an irritated tone that took Ranko by surprise."I… yes, ma'am."Hana sighed, downing the rest of her coffee in one gulp and standing, heading toward the office door. As she did, a letter-folded piece of paper fell off of the couch, from where she had been laying on it. Ranko bent down and picked it up. "Mama, you dropped your…" As she held it up, she caught a glimpse of what was written on it. She wasn't trying to pry, but the words FINAL DEMAND FOR PAYMENT stamped in red across the top were hard to miss. Hana turned as Ranko spoke, but could not react fast enough to keep the paper secret.Hana sighed defeatedly, sitting back down on the couch. "So I guess you know now. We're in some trouble here."Ranko looked at her in surprise. "But… we've been doing so well lately, I thought. The bar has been full almost every night."Hana nodded. "Since you started singing, yeah. But we were behind long before you got here, honey. And I just don't know what I'm gonna do. Thirty years of my life I've poured into this place." She rocked back on the couch, holding her head with her hands.Ranko looked over the bill in her hand, assuming it wasn't the only one. Her mind raced. Not only would she be out of a job and a place to stay, but what would it do to her new family? This would not stand. It could not stand. These people had helped her when no one else would, and she would not allow any misfortune to come to them. She swore it."What we're gonna do is fix it."Hana scoffed dismissively. "Yeah, how? We owe too much, and there just isn't enough time, especially with Christmas coming."The teen sighed, thinking about last Christmas at the Tendo house, and how different things would be this year. If Akane had only known what she was starting when she forced her fiance to dress up and sing with her…Ranko's eyes lit up. "That's it!"Hana looked at her with a befuddled look on her face. First off, the teenage girl was being entirely too perky for nine in the morning, second, her head was killing her, and third, how could she have a solution in minutes when Hana had racked her brain for months? And, fourth, her head was really killing her."You said it yourself. The bar started filling up when I started singing. So that's what I'll do."Hana groaned. "Didn't you hear me? We couldn't possibly sell enough drinks to catch up the bills before they're due."Ranko nodded, grinning with pride in her sudden epiphany. "Which is why we're going to sell tickets, too. We're going to have a Christmas concert."Hana looked up from her hands. "You can't be serious."Ranko nodded. "There's room for what, about two hundred seats in the bar? If we charge three thousand yen a person, that's…" She searched through the loose papers on the desk for a scratch pad and a pencil, writing out the math problem, and taking a painfully long time to complete it. "600,000 yen, before drinks and food. Would that be enough to get us out of trouble?"Hana sat up. "No, but it would be a pretty good start."Ranko nodded. "And if we have to, we can always do two events."Hana sighed. "Yeah, but let's be realistic. This is way too much to put on you. You're already working so hard, and you're just a kid. This is why I hid all this from you girls in the first place."Ranko stood up, closing the gap between them and offering Hana her hand. "In the two months I've been here, you and Yui and Izzi and Mei have been there for me more than my blood family did in eighteen years. You've invested in me, and now it's time for that to pay off."She squeezed Hana's hand reassuringly. "Please, let me do this, and help my family?"Hana looked up resolutely, a tear forming in the corner of her right eye. "Okay, kiddo. Let's have ourselves a party."Ranko beamed. "I promise, Hana, I won't let you down!"Hana stood tentatively, wrapping an arm around Ranko's shoulders both in affection and to steady herself. "You couldn't if you tried, honey."