In which Saki's dad suggests ~boarding school~

Saki's dad opened the door to a blasting stereo. She was slung over the couch, scribbling furiously in a notebook which she slammed shut when she saw him approach. He turned down the volume, and she growled through grit teeth.

"Do you mind? I was /listenin'/ to that."

"Oh, come on," her dad sounded hurt. /Good/, she thought. "Is that any way to greet your dad?"

"You're around? I didn't fuckin' notice."

"Language!"

Saki threw her pen across the room, growling in her throat. "So fucking what! What are you gonna do, ground me? You'd have to come home to ground me!"

"Saki, you /know/ that the new show has me really busy, I-"

"Whatever! I hate you anyway!" Saki sprung up off of the couch - her martial training shining through for a moment - and ran for the door. "I'm gonna leave, see how /you/ like it!"

She opened it, ran through, slammed the door in his face. She took a shuddering breath, smoothing her lips into a thin line. /No, Saki, you're almost eleven now, you can't go fucking crying over your dumb dad./ She ran up the stairs, plugged the code into the door, threw herself out onto the penthouse roof. She looked up at the sky, and screamed.

And when she was done screaming, she was still the same dumb ugly girl in the same dumb ugly body. She still didn't fit her skin. She still hated herself for how shitty a person she was. Why the fuck would her dad throw babysitter after babysitter at her if not because she was broken? Of course he didn't fucking want her. She didn't even want herself. Born to the wrong kind, ugly and mean and cold. She curled up in a little ball by the wall, crying into her knees.

She heard the door open, eventually, but she didn't bother looking up. She turned her face away when she heard someone sitting beside her, and curled up her lip when she felt a hand on her shoulder.

"Go away."

"It's really hard on you, isn't it..? I'm sorry, Saki."

"Yeah, whatever. I don't," here her traitorous breath caught in her throat and she sniffled, "I don't care."

"I've been doing a lot of thinking. I think... you probably fell into my lap at the worst possible time in my life. I mean, when I was a kid, I was always fussing over everyone, and..." Sora shook his head. "Look, I've found a really nice boarding school. They've got a martial arts club, so you don't even have to give that up. And a theatre club! You were always saying you wanted to try acting, right?" He had that sort of painful forced sincerity all parents manage to shit out when they're trying to sell something but they're nervous as hell.

"I don't wanna go to boarding school," Saki huffed, because her father suggested it, and like hell was she accepting anything he held out unconditionally.

"Everyone's really nice. I went to go and scope the place out, and the facilities are really top-notch!" He paused for a moment, and sighed. "... I just think you might like it. You could make some new friends. And the stability would be good for you."

"I'm just gonna punch someone and get kicked out anyway," Saki grumbled. It'd be just like the incident which got her dad to enrol her in a martial arts course. To learn 'discipline' and 'control', he said. Load of good that did.

He patted her shoulder, in the sort of way which made her think he was probably smiling at her, not that she'd give him the satisfaction of looking. "Hey, no, think positive. If you go in thinking you'll get kicked out, you've already lost."

"Never said I wanted to go."

"Okay, but what if I left the docs with you and you gave them a read? You're smart enough to see this stuff on your own."

"... I guess. Whatever."

"That's great," Sora said, in his stupid happy dad voice. "Do you wanna come back down and make nachos, or are you gonna chill out here for a while longer?"

"Stayin' out here. I'm still mad at you."

"I can't really blame you." He clapped his hand on her shoulder again, and then the touch left. She heard him standing up and going for the door. "I'll be in all evening if you ever decide to forgive me."

"Piss off," Saki grumbled, but under her breath so he wouldn't really hear.

She did end up going inside, once the sun set and the stars came out. She declined his offer of nachos to stalk into her room, as if she might wound him more than he hurt her, but she took the pamphlets for the school with her. They really didn't sound terrible. Like, bad, but bad in the same way that anything in the world was bad.

She decided to go just so he'd end up missing her.