Don’t be so edgy.
Relax, okay?
✦ ✦ ✦
The third morning of our life on Wet Crow’s Feather Island was just greeting us. I awoke in a daze, trying to distinguish between the dreams I had just had and the reality yet to come.
The high, rectangular window admitted just a bit of light, so the room still remained dim. Since the room had no lights, I would just have to wait for it to get brighter: the sun had only just risen, and it was maybe around six a.m., judging by my internal clock. I suspect this way of determining the time has no more than a fifteen-minute margin of error. But even supposing I was an hour off, it’s not like it would be a problem.
“Getting up,” I mumbled, and slowly rose from bed.
The room was mostly empty, its only furnishings a chair and a futon. Aside from that, it was completely bare. Its high ceilings gave it an even more spacious feel—and that hollow, dead atmosphere that evokes so vividly images of solitary confinement or something. I couldn’t help but feel a little bit like an inmate on Death Row.
It was the second time in my life I’d woken up with that feeling.
But while this was in fact not solitary confinement, neither was it originally a bedroom. It was formerly a storage space. When I asked Akari to show me the smallest room in the mansion, this was where she brought me. The smallest room. Even so, it was infinitely bigger than my room at the lodging house. Boy, was that ever depressing.
“Nah… it’s way beyond depressing,” I said to myself.
Now then. I switched my cognitive channel from Death Row Inmate Mode to Routine Mode.
Wondering what time it really was, I glanced at my wristwatch, but the LCD screen displayed nothing. Maybe the batteries had died while I was sleeping. But wait, I’d changed them just a little while ago. There had to be some other problem. Well, I could always ask Kunagisa to fix it.
Clearing my sleep-fogged mind, I did a couple of simple stretches and then left the room. I walked around for a while. The carpet was thick, bright red, and looked like (and most probably was) super-high quality. It eventually led to the spiral case, which is where I bumped into Rei-san and
Akari-san.
“Oh, good morning. You two are up early.” It was only common courtesy to greet them, but they simply passed by with no more acknowledgment than a silent head-bow.
“Guess they’re the quiet type,” I muttered to myself.
But to be fair, they were probably working, and I wasn’t exactly a “guest,” per se, so I just had to live with their lukewarm response. If I expected anything more out of them, I’d have to throw my arms out wide and cry out, “How you feelin’, my freaky people?!” And, frankly, I just didn’t have the energy.
Handa Rei-san and Chiga Akari-san were maids employed at the mansion. Rei-san was the “head maid,” Akari her subordinate. And there were two other maids at the mansion, of the same rank as Akari-san. A total of four maids.
Considering who owned the mansion, and the size of the mansion, it seemed as if a staff of four maids would be too small. But these women carried out their duties with the swiftness and skill of true specialists.
The mistress of the mansion, and the person these maids served, was Akagami Iria. She was the proprietress of the island, as well as the mansion. And furthermore, she was the one who had invited me and Kunagisa here.
“But wait, was I actually invited?” I asked myself.
Now just how old was Akari-san? You could tell just by looking at Rei-san that she was probably in her late twenties. It’s not easy for kids like me to tell exactly how old a woman that age is, but that’s definitely the impression I got from her. Akari-san was the real challenge. I didn’t think she was younger than me, but still, she looked ridiculously young. She was one of those women you see downtown who can get away with paying half-price for everything when they’re actually adults. As I went up the spiral staircase and headed down the second-floor hall, my mind tilled with nonsense. Maybe she has a thing for young guys. Yeah, just babbling.
I was headed for Kunagisa’s room. Two days ago, when we arrived at the island, a room had of course been prepared for Kunagisa, but not for me. This was to be expected: even I had had no idea I would be visiting this weird little island until that very morning, when Kunagisa called me.
Akari-san prepared a room for me at the last minute. But I’d politely refused it. Why? The reason hit me as soon as I opened the door.
I knocked once, then went ahead and opened it.
The interior was vast. Pure white carpet and pure white wallpaper complemented pure white furniture. Even I knew that white reflects light. Kunagisa was crazy about the color white, so somebody had decorated this room this way deliberately. In the center of the room was a luxurious sofa and a wooden table. A chandelier hung from the strangely high ceiling. The bed was like something straight out of a movie set in medieval times; it even had a canopy.
“Yeah, I’d never get any sleep here.”
And so I had Akari-san show me to the storage room on the first floor. Meanwhile Kunagisa, lacking my more delicate sensibilities, lay there drowsily on her pure white sheets.
Looking at the enormous, antique, mechanical clock on her wall (also ever-so-thoughtfully selected in white), I saw that it was, in fact, six o’clock, just as I’d guessed. Pondering what to do now, I sat on the side of her bed, enjoying the feeling of the thick, fluffy carpet beneath my feet.
Kunagisa rolled over. Her eyes opened, just slightly. “Hmm? Oh, Ii-chan?”
Somehow she had sensed it was me, but at any rate she seemed to be awake. She pushed her mussed, I Hawaiian-blue hair away from her face and regarded me with sleepy eyes. “Oh, ahhh, Ii-chan… ummm… You came to wake me up, didn’t you? Thank you.”
“Actually I came here to tuck you in, but what’s this? Tomo sleeping at nighttime? That’s pretty rare. Or did you just get to bed?” If that was the case I’d have to apologize.
“Uh-uh.” She shook her head.
“I think I slept for three hours. Cuz y’know, yesterday, well, some stuff happened, Ii-chan. Give me five more seconds…