Best Friends

Chapter 5

Neon and Kira were both nine now.

Yoshio and his second wife had taken Kira to live with them during this timeframe. Again, they were still in Yamato, but now Kira was in a different neighborhood than Neon was.

Kira sat with her Dad and Stepmom one evening, eating dinner, and talking to them occasionally. Fujioko had lavender hair that she kept long and had bangs that were parted in the middle. She had dark purple eyes.

"So, Kira, do you have any friends?" Fujioko asked.

"Yeah. One." Kira said, then took a drink of water.

"And who's that?" Fujioko asked.

"Her name's Neon Saki."

"Ah...Mei and Taichi's kid." Yoshio said from across the table as he took a bite of his mashed potatoes.

"You know this Neon kid, dear?"

"Kind of. I'm more familiar with her parents."

Yoshio turned his head from Fujioko and looked at Kira.

"Speaking of which, have you met Neon's parents, Kira?"

"Yeah. I met her Mom, but I haven't met her Dad. She's only told me stories about him." Kira replied, looking at him and then looking at her plate.

"Why haven't you met Neon's Father?" Asked Fujioko.

"She told me her Dad always came home late." Kira replied as she cut up some more of her steak.

"Do you know the time?"

"Like 9 PM."

"Ah. I see." Yoshio said. Fujioko nodded.

Without a word, Kira ate another piece of steak. She wasn't sure what to say.

And with that, the conversation seemed to end.
********
Neon was in her parents car as they were driving that night. They were going out to eat at a restaurant they had picked before their drive.

Taichi was the driver, Mei sat in the passenger seat, and Neon sat alone in the back seat.

Just in case if you were wondering who sat where.

"Are we almost there?" A hungry Neon asked, earning a chuckle from her parents.

"We're close, sweetie." Mei said.

The trio stopped at a red light, but someone pulled up rather close from behind them.

In fact, it was too close for comfort. Mei looked in the rearview mirror, and then looked in the mirror outside the passenger seat.

"Is it just me, or is that car close to us?" She asked, staring at the outside mirror.

"It's not just you, Mei." Taichi replied.

Taichi kept a close eye on the car behind them, but the car stayed closely parked behind them and did nothing that could cause a worry or two.

Yet.

Once the light turned green, Taichi continued to drive to the chosen destination. Once there, he pulled up in the parking lot and parked the car in a good parking space that didn't have a lot of cars surrounding it.

The car that had stopped behind them earlier parked next to them. The family didn't think much of it until a masked person, who appeared to be male, tapped on Mei's car door.

Mei, keeping her door closed, looked at them from her car door window. She had a bad feeling about the situation and kept her door and window closed.

Her gut feeling was right. As she saw the person bend down, she saw that the guy was reaching for a gun.