Chapter Seven
Written: 11 September 2005
Re-written: 14 June 2007
Edited: 22 July 2012
"I'm Kayti. What's your name?"
The twins were sitting side by side at one of the tables in their classroom, waiting for the last of their classmates to sit, when a little girl sat down across from them and introduced herself as if she was taking prisoners. She was tall for her age, and pale, with arrow-straight white hair that was loose around her shoulders. Her eyes were ice blue, but her manner was warm, if a bit pushy.
Nishiki was busy being grumpy about going to school, so Nishiko decided to talk enough for the both of them.
"Hi!" she said cheerfully, then introduced herself and her twin with their English names. "My name is Nicole. Her name is Nicola. We're twins!"
Kayti giggled, "Wow," and probably would have gone on, but the other children had finally made it to the tables, and shortly afterwards the teacher called everyone to attention. She was the same young woman that Anshii had spoken to earlier, but speaking in English now.
"Good morning," she called to her eight students, and with that class began.
Since it was only the first day of school, there were lots of papers and things to take home, lots of introductions and getting to know their classmates and their teacher, and much playtime between short 'lessons' meant to develop motor skills and cooperation, among other things. Nishiko was a bit grumpy at having been separated from her twin for the duration, but was having a grand time trying to assemble a foam puzzle, aided by one other girl and two boys. At three years old, their conversation skills were limited – Nishiko's more than the others', like any bilingual child. Still, they managed to work together without too much fighting.
Nishiki wasn't faring even that well – her group had a similar puzzle to put together, but one of the boys kept trying to smash together pieces that wouldn't fit, hammering on them with his fist as Nishiki and the other two children tried to do it properly. Finally the purple-haired girl had had enough, and yelled at him to stop it. He ignored her and kept smashing, which was what started the shoving, which was what ended in tears all around, after he shoved her into another student, who landed on his bottom and started wailing.
It was an eventful first day back at school.
In the meantime, Anshii was getting over her heart attack at her own school. Chie had gone on to tell her about how her friend had supposedly seen two of their teachers, Yamaguchi-sensei and Hida-sensei, kissing in the school parking lot before classes began.
"I knew that they were having a super-secret affair! I mean, I've seen them together so many times!"
Another girl spoke up from the back of the classroom, "You also thought you saw Yamada Kuon-san getting picked up from school by her thirty-year-old American boyfriend who turned out to be her father."
Chie turned and stuck her tongue out at the girl, then turned back to Anshii with a sniff. "Anyway, I really knew it. They always seemed too close, you know?"
Anshii nodded and smiled, her pulse slowly falling back to something like normal. First she chided herself for her panicked reaction – nobody would kick a student out of school for kissing, that was just foolishness on her part. Then she wondered, very quietly and to herself, if perhaps the lack of outrage towards the teachers might signal just a smidgen of acceptance on the parts of the students. Then again, she thought, sorting through the books in her desk to get them in order for the day ahead, Kikukawa-san has to be accepting, if she's able to pass on those wild rumours without being bothered by the contents.
As far as the teachers' relationship being true or not...well, when Chie's information didn't come out of her own wild imaginings, it was largely accurate. Not that Anshii had anything to say.
That afternoon, as those students belonging to the going-home club streamed from the school in rivers, Utena dawdled around in her classroom until Anshii arrived, closing and locking the door behind her. Within seconds of the door clicking shut, they were wrapped in each other's arms and kissing as if they'd been separated for months, finally breaking away after several moments, flushed and breathing hard.
"I missed you at lunch," Anshii explained huskily, and Utena laughed and held her close.
"See? I told you. If I tell myself I won't get to see you all day, then not seeing you at lunch isn't so bad when it happens. What did happen, anyway?" Utena tilted her head to one side, looking curious.
"It's a little embarrassing, really," Anshii murmured, but the curious look didn't fade, so after a minute she gave in with a little laugh, "You know Kikukawa Chie-san?"
"The school gossip," Utena answered with a laugh, then wondered aloud, "What does she have to do with it?"
"Well, in class today she almost made my heart stop. She was squealing about who she saw kissing in the school parking lot this morning, and I thought that somebody had seen us and that we might get in trouble," she explained, feeling vaguely uncomfortable with keeping their relationship a secret but understanding the very real and logical need to do so, "But it turned out that it was two of our teachers that they saw."
"I can see how that would be upsetting, love," Utena said thoughtfully, "But... what does that have to do with where you were at lunch?" Anshii laughed and popped her prince on the shoulder with one hand.
"Absolutely nothing at all, you silly girl. During lunch, I ended up helping one of the teachers that Kikukawa-san was talking about. Her name is Hida-sensei, do you know her?"
Utena thought for a moment, then nodded slowly. "She's an art teacher, right? I've never had a class with her, but I heard that she was really nice and really pretty. I thought she was married, though."
"I don't know, she might be. It's not as if that changes anything." They were both silent for a moment, uncomfortably aware of things that other girls their age probably hadn't even thought of. The facts were that women in Japan had, for the most part, no choice but to get married. They were paid inferior wages for the same work and were unequal in the eyes of society, so they could often never make it on their own. Some landlords would even refuse to rent to single women, forcing more and more unmarried women to continue living with their parents, or at least supported by them. Even lesbians were forced, either by their families, society, or the simple economics of it, to marry men and live in secrecy.
In such a world, they were more appreciative with each passing day of the autonomy that wealth gave them, and the freedom, if they wished it, to emigrate to America once they were old enough. Anshii's English had become much better in the past three years, so they held onto that plan as a desperate backup. Still, there was just something about home, and neither girl was eager to leave it.
While the pair were lost in thought, buses began noisily pulling away in the parking lot, shaking Utena and Anshii out of their contemplation with the reminder that they'd be late to pick up the twins. Neatening their clothes quickly, they dashed from the room and down the stairs, stopping in the entry to change shoes as quickly as possible before jogging for the kindergarten. They arrived with what appeared to be the last few parents and their already-waiting taxi, and announced themselves by waving to the teacher on duty where she stood by the door, calling children to come out or for teachers to bring out the younger ones.
"Penguins Class, Marcus, it's time to go home! Marcus, it's time to go home! Seals Class, Nicole, Nicola, it's time to go home! Nicole, Nicola, it's time to go home!"
The twins called, their parents waited among the handful of other parents out front. They were ignored for the most part, except for one Japanese husband taking his wife's hand and pulling her to the other side of the group. The foreigners seemed largely unbothered.
Stepping forward, the prince knelt down just in time for Nishiko to dash into her arms, and scooped the little girl up with a laugh from the parent and another cry of delight from the child. Nishiki was a little more sedate about it, much like her mother, and simply gave her a shy smile as Anshii bent to pick her up and cradle the child against her chest briefly. Sucking quietly on her thumb, Nishiki let her twin go through the business of chattering about their day as they slid into the taxi and headed for home.
"We made a puzzle! I wanted to climb tree, sensei said 'no'. I was sad. English is fun! Kayti..." And Nishiki, already well aware of the details of the day, simply curled up in her mother's arms and smiled, content to lay against Anshii's chest until they got home.
Dinner was a quiet affair, Nishiko finally having worn herself out with chatter while Utena put together a simple meal, Anshii having long been content to leave the cooking to her prince, for a variety of reasons.
Of course, after dinner the twins were less than pleased to discover that it was bath time, and simultaneously went limp as a gesture of resistance, forcing their parents to carry them to the bathroom. Utena and Anshii shared exasperated looks as they attempted to undress an extremely stubborn Nishiko, who refused to hold her arms up to let them remove her shirt. Every time they would lift her arms, she'd let them drop again as the shirt came up, until eventually they gave up on her.
"When you're ready to have a bath with Mama, Papa, and Ki, you can join us."
Nishiki was less than pleased, but calmer about it, allowing the young women to strip her down and wash her thick purple hair. It didn't take long for Nishiko to feel lonely, sitting by the door of the bathing room, and in short order she had shed the rest of her clothes and insinuating herself into the group with a little grumpy face that was soon washed away by her bath toys.
Once the twins were clean, Utena and Anshii accepted their 'help' washing their own hair, then rinsed off and moved to the tub. As Utena picked Nishiko up to set her in the water, the little girl clung to her papa and shook her head.
"No, it's hot! I don't wanna!" Looking over at her love, Utena looked a bit trapped, until Anshii led by example, picking Nishiki up and climbing right into the tub with the child. Following Anshii's lead, the young prince stepped into the tub and set her daughter down. Nishiko immediately grabbed for the side of the tub, standing on Utena's lap and looking rather unhappy, until her mother spoke up.
"It's only for one hundred seconds, dear. It's not that bad."
But Nishiko continued to be grumpy for a few more seconds, until her twin got a sly look on her face and proceeded to splash her with a little giggle. Shocked, Nishiko turned and splashed Nishiki back, much to their parents' amusement. Utena flicked a bit of water at Anshii, who responded with a full-on splash.
Not a centimeter of the room was dry after that water fight.
After the battle died down, everyone trooped to the little 'changing room' area, and Utena and Anshii wrapped their hair and bodies in towels before drying off their now-sleepy children and stuffing them into pajamas. Held in her mother's arms once more, Nishiki gave a little sigh and promptly went to sleep, and didn't even notice when they were carried upstairs to their bedroom. A faint little snore escaped her lips as she was handed briefly to her papa, and again when she and her twin were laid down together on the bottom of their bunk bed. She flailed a bit when a soft kiss was pressed to her forehead, then went back to sleep.
Anshii gently slid the door shut on the two sleeping toddlers, turning to smile at Utena, who took her hand and led her down the stairs.
"It's like they switch personalities at times. This morning, Ki was being difficult, and then Ko."
"Yeah, I know. But you know what I know that you don't?" Utena's voice was neutral, but her expression was pure mischief. One slim purple eyebrow popped up.
"What?"
"The twins are asleep, you can't hear downstairs from upstairs, and ice cream was on sale at the store yesterday. Also, you're it." And while Anshii was still processing, Utena pinched her bottom and took off running down the stairs with a laugh, Anshii hot on her tail less than a second later. One movie and ice cream feast later, they checked on the twins and then relocated to their own bedroom for a bit more celebration and finally sleep.
END CH.7
