Disclaimer: Generationally not mine.

A/N: Written for Challenge #34 'Generation' at ygodrabble.

Homecoming

© Scribbler, April 2011.

Domino City wasn't home anymore. It was a part of another life, like Heathcliff's moors or Mrs. DeWinter's Manderley. Despite that, crossing the intersection brought back a slew of memories. A timeless strip of land created a buffer zone between the business district and suburbia. It was a quiet neighbourhood proliferated by family-owned stores, thrift markets and eateries for diners with porous pockets. Bits of past decades stuck to the place like broken Styrofoam. You could walk down any street and think it was ten, twenty, or even thirty years ago.

She'd settle for four. Four was less than a blip on the Radar of Ages, but had certainly rocked her life. Four years ago she wouldn't have bought a street map, paused every ten minutes to turn in circles, tried to figure out where she was and finally, arms aching from carrying a deceptive amount of weight, give up and ask directions.

"The Game Store?" echoed the man chosen at random. He had a kind smile and liked ruffling hair. What was it with ruffling hair? Everybody did it. Sometimes she felt like dolloping in jam just to see their faces when their fingers came back goopy. "Turn left at the corner and you can't miss it."

"Thank you."

"No problem, little lady." Another hair-ruffle. They never asked if that was okay first. You asked whether it was okay to stroke dogs. Didn't people get the same consideration?

They always used to hang out at the Game Store. Besides school and the arcade, she didn't know where else to check first. Knowing her luck, Yuugi no longer lived there, or his grandpa had died and they'd put Yuugi into care, or some global corporation had bought the place and turfed them out, leaving her with no other trail to follow, since she was stupid and hadn't ever gone to her friends' houses when they offered so she didn't know where they lived and high school was over now anyway andandand…

Stop. Breathe. Calm down.

It was nearly closing. She needed to do this soon if she was going to do it. She stood outside the store and adjusted her shoulder-bag. Bottles chinked. Something squeaked like a dying moose. Since leaving home she'd survived on welfare money and whatever work she could find, none of which let her buy stuff new. Maybe she'd search the thrift market after… whatever came next.

Courage, girl. Woman. Girl-woman. You.

The bell jingled. Did it always jingle like that, or was that a global corporation kind of jingle? It sure smelled the same: pine floor cleaner, food from the living quarters behind the store and some kind of muscle liniment favoured by old people. Someone turned behind the counter.

"Hi there, welcome to…" Yuugi blinked behind hair as bizarre as she remembered.

They were still staring like caffeinated owls when the back door opened. "Yuugi, you gotta close soon or you'll miss the start of the movie. Anzu already made the popcorn and –" Jounouchi stopped to join the staring. "But…" He yelled before anyone could stop him. "Guys, get out here! Right now!"

"What?" Of course Anzu was first out. She always ran towards danger instead of away if it involved her friends. Four years hadn't changed that.

Neither had it changed the ridiculous point of Honda's hair, which appeared before the rest of him, just as she remembered. She wondered whether he looked that shocked when she disappeared.

She hadn't left a note. How could she? She was going to be a successful… something-or-other. Not a wash-out before she finished school. Not living on hand-outs. Not running away from home and the sugar daddy whose generosity only stretched to appointments at a certain clinic. Not crawling back when loneliness finally eroded her so much she couldn't stay away any longer, risk of seeing her father's randy colleague be damned.

"Miho?" Honda croaked.

"Um, hi," she said softly, shifting the toddler on her hip. At least none of them immediately ruffled her daughter's hair. "Long time no see."

Fin.

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