"Hey dad?"
"Bulma!" Dr. Briefs said with a smile, stubbing out his cigarette and twisting away from the microscope he had been using to look at… well, Bulma wasn't sure what her father was working on. With him it could have been a thousand different things. People tended to forget that while his first degree was in Physical Science he had, in his long life, earned a multitude of others. Couple that with his mind working so quick at times that he tended to solve problems before he even finished studying them and it was common to find him with multiple projects going at once.
'If it weren't for mom's laser focus I probably would have been just as hyper erratic as he gets!' Bulma thought to herself as she moved into his workshop. "Are you busy? I can come back…"
"Nonsense!" Dr. Briefs declared, patting a chair. "How many times have I told you that you are welcome to interrupt me at any time?"
Bulma, knowing that he wasn't speaking hypothetically, instantly stated, "28 times."
"Exactly."
"Its just… I know you are busy and I'm probably being silly-"
Her father raised a hand, cutting her off. "Bulma. There is nothing you could say that is silly." He paused. "Well, unless you were TRYING to be silly. Are you?"
"No dad," she said with a smile.
"Then you aren't being silly." He reached up and rubbed his beloved cat Scratch under the chin. "My inventions… they are just lifeless things. You. Your mother. Our pets. They are what matter. People tell me that what I create will stand the test of time and that's why I should focus on them… I say that's why I shouldn't. Because they will last forever; all of you will not. I only have so much time with all of you and I don't want to waste a second of it. I set this down-" He picked up a bit of metal, a device of some kind, Bulma wasn't for sure, "-and it will be there when I get back, exactly the same. But I blink and suddenly you aren't babbling at my ankles but rushing off to school." He smiled at her and Bulma found herself managing to smile back. "So… what is it you want to talk about?"
"Well…" She shifted, wringing her hands together. "I guess it… kind of has to do with what you were just talking about. People not being around forever."
"Ah," he said, leaning back in his chair. "Is this about Yamcha?"
"It is," she admitted.
"Feeling bad about breaking up with him and now he's dead."
Bulma winced at that. Her father was being rather direct, yes… but considering they were literally waiting to bring Yamcha back why dance around the subject of death?
"That's the thing, dad… I don't feel bad."
Her father stared at her for several long moments before finally nodding. "Of course. You feel as if you should feel worse and you don't."
"Exactly!" She threw her arms up in the air and rolled back in her chair a few feet. "And what's worse is I don't know how to feel about not knowing how to feel! I mean… should I be more upset because the two of us dated and while I had decided to break up with him because we were having issues he was still my boyfriend up til right now and I should be mourning him? Or am I trying to force myself to mourn him more because I feel like I should but I really don't? Am I too sad or not enough!" she made her chair spin several times. "I just don't know! And its driving me crazy because I feel like everyone is looking at me expecting me to feel worse and sometimes I think they are right and other times I feel like they should lay off and… and…" she suddenly stopped herself. "And now I'm dizzy."
Her father pushed away from his desk and patted her on the knee as Bulma hung her head. "Well, I'd ask if you wanted to know what I think but I think the answer is pretty obvious." She gave her dad a watery smile at that. "Bulma, there is no wrong way to grieve. Anyone who tells you otherwise is a fool. We aren't machines… I should know, I've built enough of them!" She chuckled at that, weak and soft but it was still a chuckle. "We all deal with life in our own ways. We approach everything differently and so long as you aren't breaking some law… then its fine, no matter what we do."
"I know, but-"
Her father cut her off before she could go any further. "Bulma, just look at me and your friend Goku. We are completely different and I don't just mean in terms of how we handle threats. He punches them and I design lasers that burn them up. He married that girl Chichi before he was 20 and I waited till I was in my late 40s before I married. Does that make either of us a bad husband or father?"
"Of course not," Bulma said at once. "Both of you are great. You're… well, you know." She smiled and he nodded once in acceptance of that. "And Goku… oh if you saw how he was with Gohan…"
"That's my point, Bulma. We all live how we wish. And it is different from everyone else and we have no right to judge others for how they live. You mourn how you wish to mourn, sweetie."
"…right," she said, taking a breath. She didn't know if she believed her father but she did appreciate his kind words.
"Now then," he said softly, squeezing her knee, "with that settled can I tell you something that might upset you or might make you feel a bit of relief?"
"Ooookay," she said slowly, unsure just WHAT her father might be getting at.
"You and Yamcha were never going to last."
"…oh," she said, surprised by that rather frank announcement.