note: this one's not linked to any of the previous chapters!
Where Cupcake's parents move the whole family to San Fransokyo when she's seventeen and she gets a job at the Lucky Cat Café.
He first meets her when she's telling his little twelve-year-old brother a story.
Hiro's told him that he's much too old for baby stories and fairytales. He tells his big brother that Santa Claus doesn't really exist because there's no way he can travel around the world in one night (and he's got the calculations to prove it). He tells his big brother that the Tooth Fairy can't be in a million places at once because lots of kids drop teeth at the same time. He tells his big brother that the Easter Bunny can't possibly paint and hide billions of eggs in a single day (especially because eggs are perishables). And he tells his big brother that the Sandman's just a myth, that golden, glittering sand can't really give you good dreams.
Tadashi's sad that his brother's taken it upon himself to grow up so fast. But Hiro laughs it off and tells him he's not a baby.
(Well, of course he isn't, considering how many grades he's skipped.)
He's coming in late one night – he hasn't realised just how much work he need to do at SFIT – when he sees the girl with pink streaks in her hair and in a pink shirt and dark jeans, seated across Hiro at one of the booths in the Lucky Cat Café, waving her hands animatedly as she tells him a story.
"Who's that?" Tadashi whispers to Aunt Cass as he weaves his way to her, leaning on the counter and smiling at them.
"Oh, that? That's Cupcake," Aunt Cass says, vaguely. "She's our new part-timer."
"And – what's she doing? I thought Hiro had homework – "
"Oh, he finished it," she says, and then she turns and catches the look on Tadashi's face and smiles suddenly: "You're jealous, aren't you?"
"Me?" He blinks at her, and then glances over again. "Jealous? Of what?"
"Of the fact that she can make Hiro smile and laugh so much!" Aunt Cass pinches his cheeks. "Oh, my little college man – you know it's not your fault, right? She's still in high school, she doesn't have that much to cope with, and she keeps Hiro entertained. He likes her a lot, but he still likes you best."
"What?" Tadashi's voice goes up an octave as he glares at his aunt indignantly. Of course he's not jealous about the fact that she can make Hiro laugh like how the younger kid hasn't laughed in ages, or the fact that she's here talking to him at 10.30 at night which is usually his time with Hiro. "Aunt Cass, I'm not jealous – "
"Tadashi!"
His head whips around at that, and there's a wide grin on his face because yes, that is his little brother who has finally looked away from that girl with pink streaks in her hair, and he is standing on the seat, waving excitedly and beckoning for Tadashi to come over.
"This is my older brother! You know, the one I'm always telling you about at his nerd school." Hiro pulls a face as he turns to the girl, and is promptly whacked over the head by Tadashi. "Tadashi, this is Cupcake. Cupcake, this is Tadashi."
"Nice to finally meet you," the girl says, smiling brilliantly up at him, and there is something in her smile that makes Tadashi smile back without even thinking. He wishes he could say the same thing to her, but how can he when he doesn't even know who she is?
"So – Cupcake, huh? That's an unusual name," he says, shoving Hiro further into the seat and sliding in next to him.
She laughs. "Everyone's called me Cupcake since I was a kid," she explains, and Tadashi thinks that she has a nice laugh. "My real name's terrible."
"Can't be as bad as Hiro," his little brother chimes. "People think it's spelled H-e-r-o, and then it rhymes with zero – "
"Hey, c'mon, I think your name's pretty cool," Cupcake says, and she punches him lightly on the arm as he grins at her.
Suddenly Hiro whirls around to face Tadashi: "Tadashi, you seriously need to hear her stories. They're so good! And I found out how the Tooth Fairy can collect all those millions of teeth – she has, like, a billion tiny tooth fairies that fly all over the world for her, and then the Easter Bunny, he actually lives in this Warren and the eggs are all painted there, they actually grow legs and come alive and everything, and the Sandman – "
"Whoa, wait, what?" Tadashi holds up his hands. "I thought you didn't believe in all that stuff!"
Hiro scratches the back of his head sheepishly. "Well, yeah," he admits. "But then Cupcake told me her stories, and – dude, did you know that Santa Claus is really Russian?"
Tadashi looks over at Cupcake. She shrugs. "He's got tattoos, too."
"A tattooed Santa Claus," Tadashi repeats.
She nods. Hiro bounces up and down in his seat eagerly.
"Hey, c'mon, knucklehead," Tadashi says to him. "You gotta sleep and get to school tomorrow."
Hiro makes a face. "Aw, c'mon, Tadashi! Cupcake was just telling me about Jack Frost, she says he's the most important Guardian of them all – "
"Guardian?"
"Your brother's right, pipsqueak." Cupcake leans over the table and ruffles Hiro's hair, and there's a strange pang in Tadashi's chest when Hiro doesn't protest, and only grins at her cheekily. "You gotta get to sleep. I'll tell you about Jack Frost tomorrow."
"You'll be here when I get back from school?"
"I'll tell you the story once you finish your homework."
"Promise?"
Tadashi blinks. Hiro's twelve, and he likes to act a lot older than he is – but right now he's sounding like the kid he is, like the kid he should be. Something that Tadashi's almost never been able to do, not for a long time.
Cupcake considers this. "And a donut."
Hiro grins, leaps to his feet and hurls himself up and over Tadashi, who only blinks. "Set! G'night, Cupcake – Tadashi – Aunt Cass!"
He's up the stairs before they can say anything else, racing up and disappearing into the house.
"Unbelievable," Tadashi says. "He's never gone up to bed so eagerly before."
Cupcake just laughs again. "Your brother's really cute. He's an amazing kid."
"He is," Tadashi agrees, and there's a strange, empty feeling in his chest as he glances over at Cupcake and clears his throat: "So, uh – a tattooed Santa Claus?"
"A tattooed Russian Santa Claus," she corrects, now getting to her feet and slinging a dark bag over her shoulders.
There's a catch in Tadashi's voice as he says: "You're really close to him, huh? He gave up on all that stuff when he was eight or nine."
She sends him a curious look, and he's aware of wide, brown eyes staring at him. "He spends a lot of his time doing his homework down here in the café," she says. "And, well – I had an interesting childhood." There's a soft smile on her face. "It makes it easier to tell the stories and get people to believe."
"Believe?"
"In Santa Claus, Jack Frost, the Sandman – everyone." She smiles at him again.
Something about that smile unnerves Tadashi, so he clears his throat again and says: "Uh, so, uh – you're heading back now?"
She makes a face. "Yeah. Kinda late, but – it's not that far."
"I could give you a lift."
He doesn't know where the offer comes from, but it's out of mouth, just like that, and he can feel the heat creeping up into his face. To be fair, it's late, and it's really dark, and the streets of San Fransokyo can get really shady at night.
"You sure?" she asks, uncertainly. "You just got back, I don't want to – "
"It's fine," he assures her. "If you can keep Hiro under control and make him smile like that – well, you at the very least shouldn't walk home alone. I've got a bike."
Cupcake looks at him, and she smiles, slowly. "That'd be great."
He finds himself with strong hands with lanky fingers gripping onto his shoulders, heading to the address that Cupcake gives him. She takes his helmet almost warily, and he can't help but laugh when she stuffs it onto her head, but he tells her not to worry and to just hang onto him tightly.
She tells him she's not scared, but she hangs onto his shoulders tightly anyway.
"Thanks," she tells him, when he drops her off in front of a bright house. "Really. You didn't have to."
"Of course I did," he says, automatically. "So – I'll see you tomorrow?"
She blinks at him. "You're gonna be back early?"
"I – what?"
"You know." She shrugs, almost uncomfortably. "I've been working at the Lucky Cat for nearly three weeks now, and this is the first time I've met you. I mean, Miss Hamada talks about you all the time, and Hiro too, but, you know – you're always busy at college and all that."
Something drops in Tadashi's stomach, a hollow, empty feeling. Three weeks? He's been practically missing from the house and the café and what remains of his family for three weeks?
Sure, college is important, and the workload can get overwhelming. But three weeks?
"I didn't realise," he says, almost softly.
Cupcake just smiles at him. "He misses you a lot, you know. I think that's why he spends so much time with me."
Tadashi's head is in a whirl. Has he really been missing from Hiro's life that much?
"Thanks," she says again, and she's heading up into the house before he can even say goodbye.
The next evening, it's eight o' clock when Tadashi sails into the café, and he sees Cupcake and Hiro sitting at a table, sharing what looks like a plate of Aunt Cass' spicy chicken wings.
He slides into the seat next to Hiro and snags one of the chicken wings.
"Tadashi!"
"Hey, knucklehead." He nods at Hiro, then glances across the table at Cupcake, who is smiling at him with a knowing look in her eyes: "Hey, Cupcake."
"Glad you could join us," Cupcake tells him, and holds out her glass: "Milk?"
"A necessity with Aunt Cass' chicken wings," Tadashi says, and he takes the glass from her, and he can't help but smile.
He's there when she tells Hiro about Jack Frost, about the winter spirit who was never believed in for three hundred years until the Boogieman tried to rid the world of hopes and dreams and light.
"And Jack? He was the one who truly understood Pitch, because, you see, all Pitch wanted was to be believed in," Cupcake tells Hiro, her voice solemn, her eyes wide. "But you know what the difference was? He didn't choose to be Jack Frost – it was thrust upon him. And you know what? He ended up being a pretty good winter spirit and Guardian of Fun."
Tadashi can't remember the last time Hiro's been so absorbed in a story like this. He knows most people don't believe in things like this once they hit ten or eleven – for Hiro, the genius that the younger Hamada brother is, it was even younger, and Tadashi hasn't believed in Santa Claus or the Easter Bunny since his parents died.
But with Cupcake, it's like it doesn't matter. He can feel himself start to believe in Jack Frost, in the Tooth Fairy and the Sandman and the children's tales he'd given up on long ago, and he thinks the same thing's happening to Hiro, too.
"And Jack – Jack taught an important lesson to all the kids that day, to all the kids who were just starting to grow up," she tells Hiro, but there's something in her voice that makes Tadashi lean in too: "That it's important to keep believing."
"Wow," Hiro breathes.
"Unbelievable," Tadashi finds himself saying, and Cupcake's eyes flicker up to meet his, and the older Hamada swallows slightly as the seventeen-year-old gazes at him: "Unbelievable."
He ends up sitting in a lot of their dinners, listening to the two of them banter and joining in himself. And when he's got the time, he listens to the stories that Cupcake tells Hiro, and sometimes, he and Hiro end up telling Cupcake a lot of their own stories, too.
One Friday evening, he asks her: "Do you want to go grab a coffee or something?"
Cupcake blinks at him. "Coffee?"
He grins sheepishly, nods. "Yeah. Coffee. Or whatever you want. I mean, you've done so much for Hiro – "
He shrugs.
It's true, Cupcake's done a lot for Hiro. Tadashi's always been the big brother who's taken care of him; Cupcake doesn't have any obligation, but she makes him smile and laugh and to be honest he hasn't really seen Hiro smile or laugh like that for a long time. Hiro's had to grow up too fast. Cupcake lets him be a kid again, even if it's for a short while.
And he knows, and he's eternally grateful for her, that she once beat up a couple of guys from Hiro's school who'd cornered him in the park once. He can still remember the evening he came back to find Cupcake pacing along the café, kicking at the ground and glaring out the windows and muttering to herself about bullies and picking on people and other things he didn't really pick up on.
"Coffee sounds great," she says. "But I can't get back too late – "
"I'll drop you off," Tadashi offers immediately. "That'll be okay, right?"
She smiles at him, that same brilliant smile she gave him the very first night they met. "Yeah. That'd be okay."
"You come from Burgess?"
"Yeah. It's a town, really. Not a city like this. We all sort of knew everyone."
"It sounds nice."
"Not really. When people grow up thinking of you in a certain way, it's hard to get them to change their minds."
There's a wry smile on Cupcake's face as she gazes down at her hot chocolate.
"You miss your friends?"
"A lot," she admits. "My best friend, Jamie. And Pippa and Claude and Caleb and Monty."
"You've got friends here," Tadashi says, encouragingly. "And San Fransokyo's not that bad."
She grins at him: "Yeah? How would you know about my friends?"
"I know I'm your friend," he tells her, and his face flushes red slightly: "And Aunt Cass, and Hiro, of course."
Cupcake smiles at him over her cup of hot chocolate. "Thanks, Tadashi."
"Of course," he adds, "sometimes I think I need to reconsider my friendship with you."
She sticks out her tongue at him, kicks him under the table. "Don't ruin the moment."
Tadashi thinks, though, that this is a pretty good moment.