Forgotten Truths Arc (pt.4)
Chapter 1: Sisters, sarcasm and swearing)
Also Titled Home
Naori's P.O.V
By Hannah-chan
"This place is freakin' huge." Rica's sister said, gapping at the fence.
I blinked. "This is just the fence. The house will be farther back, down."
"Oh, come on. If it has a fence that's positioned far enough away from the house so you can't see the building, it's huge. Trust me on these things."
I arched an eyebrow at her, and pushed on the gate. It swung open with a rusted creak.
"No one's lived here for years." Rica stated.
"How do you know that?"
"The gate's rusted. Look at the overgrown weeds and flowers around the path. And the path itself. No tire marks or anything."
"She very perceptive." Her sister said proudly. Rica beamed.
In the end, it took a five minute walk to the house.
"Ho-ly Hell." I whistled.
"That's blasphemous. And that's one big house." Rica said.
"I noticed that."
"You're ganna need a car just to drive to the house." Her sister added.
"No shit."
The three of us where openly gaping at the house. It was the size of my gym back in America. With three floors. Including the pools. Yes, pools. Plural. Two.
"Holy Hell." I repeated.
"Well, come on. Don't just stand there, let's go check out the inside!" The younger girl proclaimed.
A thought occurred to me. "I don't have a key."
The girl blinked repeatedly at me. "Huh?"
"I. Don't. Have. A. Key."
"Oh. That sucks.
"Just break a window or something." Rica said from behind us. "It wouldn't be breaking and entering after all."
"Well, maybe there'll be a key under a flowerpot or something. Let's go see."
The three of us trounced up to the door, and Rica and I started looking around the potted plants on the doorstep, and under the hand railings.
"Guys?"
"What?" Rica asked her sister, who was leaning casually against one of the double doors.
"There's a letter."
I blinked, and straightened. "What?"
"Letter." She extended a white, unaddressed envelope to me that was attached to the door.
It read simply:
Make sure your companions do not go into the room behind the kitchen's pantry.
XX
I blinked. Wasn't that... My memory flashed back to the night in the hospital. The username of the Messenger was XX. I twitched.
"What's it say?" The younger girl asked impatiently.
"Nothing." I said, hurriedly. I upturned the envelope, and a key slid into my palm. "Key." I extended it to her. She took it happily, and unlocked the doors, handing it back to me. Pushing them open, she went into a violent fit of coughing.
"What is it?" Rica asked, worriedly.
"You were right. No one's been here in ages."
The two of us walked inside, and had to cover our noses and mouths with sleeves.
"Oh yeah." I agreed. Everything in the house was covered in a fine layer of dust.
It took us a few seconds to get used to the dust, and we all went our separate ways to explore. Rica started on the ground floor, I was on the second, and her sister was on the third level.
There were eight rooms in all on the second floor. Three on the right side of the hall and two on the left were bedrooms, obvious by the fact that they were all completely furnished. One on each side was a bathroom, both completely stocked. The third room on the left was a lounge with a bar in the right corner. Under no circumstances was this floor interesting enough to continue exploring through the dust. I headed back downstairs. Rica was poking around in the kitchen.
"Amazing. It's completely stocked. Granted, the food's like... a hundred years old. But still, it's amazing. Like this house was a summer house or something." Currently, she had her head in a drawer filled with spices. "These are good. Spices never go bad." I glanced to her right. There was a door leading out of the kitchen. Curious, I opened it. It was the size of a bus, and had a glass door leading outside.
"What's that?" Rica asked.
"Mud room."
"Ah. Hey, look, I found a pantry! God, the thing's the size of my bedroom!"
I blinked, remembering the note, and followed the sound of her voice to a door beside the refrigerator. She was examining the dishwasher and sink.
"Hey, that's neat. All the appliances are in here."
Behind her, there was an ancient tapestry, frayed and worn. I pushed it aside to find a door. It was made out of Redwood, and 5 Gaelic symbols glowed in the center of the door. The center was red and the others that circled it where orange, white, black, and green. Something at the back of my mind itched. I knew I should know what it meant, but I couldn't. I let the drape fall again.
"Hey, what's that?" Rica said, noticing the drape for the first time.
"I don't know. Pretty old though. It has a neat feel to it. I think I'll keep it, actually."
"Yeah, it does look pretty cool. I wonder what it's origi-"
"Guys!" Rica's sister called into the kitchen. We both hurried out. She was standing in front of a door. "Come look!"
Rica and I exchanged curious glances, and walked over to her. She pulled open the door to reveal a small lift.
"Hey. That's cool."
The girl nodded. "You won't believe the rest. She hurried us into the lift, and closed the door, punching the button for the third floor. Rica and I exchanged another puzzled look as the lift came to a stop. "Look at this!"
We had emerged into a room that looked like it covered the entire floor. Yes, it did, I could see the stairwell in the bottom left corner. Stretching across the right wall was a complete bar, equipped with refrigerator and sink.
"Somebody in this house liked bars. There's one on every floor." I said, wandering over to it.
"It's a ballroom." Rica announced.
"Meh?" I said, looking up from where I was examining drinks under the bar.
"It's a ballroom." She said again, and pointed to the chandelier at the ceiling.
"Well, one thing's for sure; this person was grand." Her sister said.
"I agree. So." I stuck my hands in my pockets. "Let's go back to the apartment."
They blinked. "Why?"
"Because I'm going to look in the phone book for a cleaner, silly."
"Oh. But before we do that, let's look at the grounds?" Rica's sister asked cutely.
"Oh, alright."
We pilled back into lift, and went down to the main level. But before we had a chance to do that, Rica tugged on my sleeve. "Hey, Naori?"
"Yeah?"
"What's down there?" Her sister turned to listen as well, and looked to the door her sister was pointing at.
"I think It's the basement."
"Let's take a look!"
So we ended up going down the steps into the basement.
"Holy cow!" Rica stated grandly.
"That's an understatement." Her sister pointed out.
An entire three-quarters of the basement was covered in pool. A tunnel led off of the right side of the pool. Rica's sister was the first to notice it.
"What's that?"
"I think it may lead outside."
The three of us exchanged looks, and raced back up the stairs.
Rica's sister was the first one to make it outside. I could hear her breath let out in a long hiss.
"My. Freakin'. God."
Rica blinked stupidly over her sister's shoulder. "I'm inclined to agree."
I peered around them both, and nearly had to hide my eyes from the bright masses of wildflowers that covered the entire garden/backdoors area. Off to the right a pool was twinkling merrily in the sun, surrounded my more wildflowers.
"Hey, Naori. You're defiantly ganna need a gardener." Rica said.
"....Oh yeah." I said, still too stunned by the about of flowers.
"Well," Rica's sister piped up, "It'll be spectacular for parties." She wandered out onto the patio, peering into bushes.
I blinked stupidly once more, and edged over to the pool. "Ok. Well, you were wrong. Someone's definitely been here. Look." I pointed to the pool. Rica trailed over, and blinked.
"It's a pool. Go figure."
Her sister sighed. "It's been cleaned, dimwit. There'd be leaves, and blossoms and all that in here."
"...Oh. Right."
"And I thought you were supposed to be the perceptive one." She said under her breath.
I rolled my eyes. "But seriously. I wanna know who owned this place. And why they're just giving it to me."
Rica blinked. "Hey, I wouldn't be complaining. Look, let's just go home, and we'll call a cleaner."
I nodded as we trekked back into the kitchen, and I pulled my sleeve over my nose. "The sooner, the better."
Rica, her sister and I were sitting around the table. Both of them were poking absent-mindedly at their lunch, and I had the cordless phone pressed tightly to my ear.
"What the hell do you mean, you can't come until Wednesday?" I screeched into the phone, in nearly incoherent Japanese.
Rica and her sister watched in mild amusement. "Hey, Naori. Calm down. These people have lives, you know."
I paused. "Oh.... Right." And to the phone, "Sorry about that" I laughed nervously, "Just a little irked by now. The address is 1521 Black Willow Lane."
"Black Willow lane," Rica's sister said mildly. "That's awfully poetic, really."
I blinked at her. "...How, exactly?"
"Black Willow Lane. Rolls off the tongue. Romantic."
"...Sure." Rica and said. "Once you find yourself a boyfriend, I'm sure she'll let you visit." She added, giggling.
"Hey! It's not... totally impossible." The girl said huffily, crossing her arms.
Rica cackled.
I shook my head, and disappeared into my bedroom. Sisters. I knew the breed all to well.