Momona lies prone on her bed, burying her face into her pillow. Her thoughts in turmoil.
I can't believe that I just blurted out that I'm from a mirror world in front of mom! Oh God! She must think I'm deranged now! But I was just so angry! Still am! How could that idiot just run all the way to my place from Kawashima's butt naked like that?! What the hell was he thinking?!
"Momona?" Her mother called as she knocks.
"What is it?!" She stated while looking up with a weary expression.
"Can I come in?"
"Fine!"
Her mother opens the door and enters, she is carrying a bundle in her arms.
"Where's Dasutin-san?" Momona asked as she gets up and sits on the edge of her bed.
"He's using our toilet now," as her mother walks up to her, "but he will be taking a bath afterwards."
"Oh really." As Momona's expression turns wry. "And I suppose you want me to help him."
"Do you?" Her mother asked mischievously.
"No!"
"Just asking. Now then, Momona." As her mother's tone changes to concern while sitting down on the bed alongside her. "You got really angry down there. I've never seen you get that angry before."
"Sorry," Momona answered sheepishly. "It's just that so much has gone on. My hospitalisation, then having to deal with that weirdo out there after he kept dreaming about me. Dasutin-san has affected me the worse since he's been doing it with my friends. What's really got me that angry is how he just ran here! He could have ran elsewhere and attempted to get dressed, then return to that hotel. But no, he just ran straight to our place and stormed right on in!"
"Maybe because he was thinking of you?"
"Why would he do that? And don't say love," as Momona sneers, "because if he did fall in love with me, he wouldn't be getting it on with my friends!"
"Could it be that he is also from that mirror world you raged at him over?" Her mother asked, causing Momona to gasp with pie eyes and shrunken irises.
"Ah . . . I . . . Ah," was all that Momona could muster, though her thoughts were more articulate.
No, she's going to think that I lost my mind! That the fever has wrecked my brain!
"Maybe it's about time that I revealed the truth," her mother said as she picks up Momona's cellphone and types through it, then shows it.
It is about Dustin.
"I had the intuition to search online for his name and this came up," her mother said. "At first, I thought that maybe he was mentally ill, then I saw how well he was able to function and wondered about it. Then when you made that declaration downstairs at him, I finally understood."
"Y-You mean to tell me," Momona ventured while looking at her mother with a bewildered expression, "that you actually believe me?!"
"Yes," her mother answered with an assured expression.
Momona lets out a sigh with a relieved expression.
"You have no idea how relieved I now am," she said. "I feel as if a great weight has been lifted from my shoulders!"
"I'm glad, Momona," her mother said with a comforting smile as she gives her a hug, then pulls back with a worried look. "But what does this mean for us? I mean, am I still your mother since the other Momona was actually my daughter?"
"I'm still your daughter and you're still my mother. That also goes for dad and Big Sister."
"You're right, Momona. You're just a different version of your other self; and to you, we are different versions of our other selves."
"As for that mirror world I switched from," Momona said. "It is a world where the men act like the women and the women act like the men. A world where it is us women who get sexualised instead of the men. The men lust after us instead of us lusting after them."
"Wow, I can't imagine a world like that. Then again, I bet you couldn't imagine a world like this back before you . . ." At a loss over what to call it.
"Got switched," Momona added. "Listen, I really don't want to go talking about this."
"I understand."
"Furthermore, Urisugi got switched too."
"So that's why he was so eager to prostitute himself!" Momona's mother stated with a eureka expression.
"Yeah, Urisugi-san was like a kid in a candy store. Dasutin-san too. Also, you remember Amamiya Nanami? That girl who dropped off a box of cookies for us last week when we first met Dasutin-san?"
"She's like you and Dasutin-san?!"
"No, but her mother is, which happened twenty-three years ago."
"Eh?! For that long?!"
"Whatever this phenomena that has caused me, Dasutin-san, Urisugi-san, and Amamiya's mother to switch over into this mirror world, it has probably been going on for hundreds, if not thousands, of years. And all over the world too. That also reminds me, now that you know the truth about me . . . Can you remember if anybody you know ever got sick to the point of hospitalisation?"
Her mother stares at her daughter for a moment, then gazes upward in thought.
"I do remember various relatives getting sick and having to be hospitalised," she finally answered.
"Did any of them ever come out of the hospital with a completely different personality?" Momona pressed. "Like they had a completely different attitude in regards to intimacies and such? Just like I did?!"
"Can't say that I have," her mother admitted. "If they did, then they must've hid it well."
"I'll assume no such thing happened," Momona said.
"Now then," as her mother gets up and picks up the bundle that is Dustin's clothes, "I'm going to launder Dustin's clothes while he takes a bath."
Dustin has his eyes closed while slathered in suds.
Ah! Managed to clean myself from head to feet. He thought. That took some time. Still sore and tired. I think I'll soak in their tub. As he looks through one eye at the small tub.
He fills up a bucket of water and pours it over himself. He repeats this a few more times. In the light, it is revealed that his body is covered in hickies, and even some teeth marks.
There. That should do it. As he checks himself over. Now to soak in that tub.
There is a knock on the door.
"Dasutin-san!" Momona's mother called through it.
"Yes, Mrs. Ichikawa?!"
"I just put your clothes in the laundry. Was that okay?"
"Ah, yeah, sure! I guess it's gonna be a while before I can put them on, right?"
"Yes, it will."
"Good, because I would like to soak in your tub!"
"Oh yes, by all means do!"
Dustin fills up that small tub with hot water and gets into it, letting out a loud groan while in the process of sitting down.
Just like in that bathhouse! Though it is a little cramped in here. As he is forced to fold his legs up closer to his chest. Ahh. I can feel my troubles and worries melt away. But I must be careful not to doze like I did in that bathhouse . . .
Dustin is next started by the sound of somebody calling him while knocking, making him splash water.
"Dasutin-san!" The call came again.
"Ah, y-yeah! Is that you, Momona?!"
"Yes, it is! Your clothes are dried and by the door! And mom's making breakfast!"
"R-Really?! I-I'll be right out!"
Dustin carefully gets up and out of the tub with a bewildered expression to match his thoughts.
What the hell?! Did I really fall asleep?! And for how long?!
He dries off, then peeks outside to see his clothing in a neat and folded pile atop his jacket. He pulls them in.
Dustin, now dressed and carrying his jacket, enters the kitchen where Momona is sitting at the table while her mother is standing at a counter.
"Good morning, Dasutin-san," Momona's mother said to him with a pleasant expression.
"Good morning, Mrs. Amamiya. Momona," Dustin answered as he hangs his jacket over the edge of a chair, then sits.
Momona merely glares wearily at him.
"Ah, l-listen," Dustin explained as his expression becomes one of embarrassment, "I cannot express how sorry I am that I subjected you ladies to the sight of my naked form, but I was desperate to get away! This place was all I could think of at that terrifying moment!"
"You really couldn't run anywhere else?" Momona sneered.
"No really," Dustin admitted. "I couldn't run back to that hotel because it is in a more crowded section of this city; also it is further away from Ayu's place than your place is! I was in too much of a panic to find an appropriate place to hide and dress!"
"Breakfast is served," Momona's mother said as she serves them such. On each of their small plates are rice accompanied by a bowl of miso soup. To drink, there is a glass of milk.
"What, no sushi?" Dustin quipped.
"I'm sorry I was not thinking of having that, Dasutin-san," Momona's mother said apologetically.
"I was only joking," he stated with a light-hearted expression. "You Japanese are stereotyped over in America as eating sushi."
"And you Americans are stereotyped here in Japan as eating hamburgers and pizza," Momona countered.
Let's eat, is intoned by Momona and her mother, then do so. Dustin picks up a pair of chopsticks and uses them.
"I didn't think you would be able to use chopsticks, Dasutin-san," Momona remarked.
"I did learn how to use them before I came here," he answered.
"Except that you're still holding them wrong," Momona's mother said.
"What can I say," Dustin sighed with a shrug. "We Westerners simply do not have a history of using two sticks as utensils."
"So how long are you here in Japan for, Dasutin-san?" Momona's mother asked.
"Another week," he answered. "I will be returning to America a week from today."
"What will you be doing here in the meantime?" Momona's mother asked.
"I get the feeling you shouldn't be asking him that question, mom," Momona said with a glum expression.
"Oh yeah," her mother said while leering at Dustin. "I guess this version of Earth has a lot to offer you, Dasutin-san."
Dustin has a startled expression with bulging cheeks while eating.
"It's okay, Dasutin-san," Momona said. "She knows about our predicament, and understands."
"That is amazing!" He said afterwards at Momona's mother. "You just accept that statement while I had to endure a month in a mental hospital!"
"That's too bad," Momona's mother said. "Given how you are getting along with Momona's friends-"
"And Ayu's mother," he added.
"But I wonder about my other Momona?" As her expression turns to concern. "How is she adapting to such a world?"
"Urisugi-san told me that she calmed down after her encounter with him," Momona answered.
"Then there's also Mrs. Amamiya," Momona's mother noted.
"Okay, Mrs. Ichikawa, you need to listen carefully," Dustin said with a serious expression. "I am pretty sure Momona has told you this, but just let me reinforce that you cannot mention any of this to anyone else. Not even to Nanami's mom."
"Dasutin-san's right," Momona agreed wholeheartedly. "She told me that I was the very first person she admitted it to."
"Yeah, so by now she has gotten used to nobody else knowing," Dustin concluded. "So I do not think that she wants any more people to know the truth about her."
"It must've been lonely for her," Momona's mother said with a sad expression.
"She told me that she coped by throwing herself into her schoolwork and taking up hobbies," Momona said. "Just like I'm doing."
"So that's why you started getting better grades!" Her mother said with a bemused expression. "And why you took up fishing and took your nephews out on stag beetle hunts! The old Momona was having problems with her grades and would have never taken up hobbies nor go hunt for stag beetles."
"Well now there you go," Momona said with a faux guilty expression.
Momona has nephews? Just how old is her mother? Dustin winced thoughtfully.
They finish their breakfast.
"So what are you going to do now, Dasutin-san?" Momona's mother asked him.
"First of all, the graduation assembly is at twelve o'clock, right? Because I want to witness what Japanese high school graduations are like."
"Yes," Momona's mother verified. "But Momona and the others have to show up at eleven-thirty."
"Understood," Dustin said. "Now then," as he gets up while taking his jacket, "as much as I would like to hang out here some more, my arrival has no doubt given you all unwanted attention; meaning if the police show up, it is best they find me somewhere else."
"Good idea," Momona noted.
"Thank you for the meal and the bath." As Dustin gives them an awkward bow, then puts his jacket on. "And see you and your friends at noon, Momona."
"Yeah," she answered.
Dustin goes to put his sneakers on and leaves.