Ch 5
Opening the door to the hot springs area, Keitaro looked around carefully as he announced himself. "Is anyone here? It's Keitaro, I need to look around." Hearing no response, he opened the door completely and entered the scrub room.
As he had previously thought, inspecting the Hinata-sou property had taken most of the day. Starting at the attic and working his way down, he had gone through every room, closet, storage cubby and storeroom, and washroom he could find. By mid-day he had reached the basement and wound up inspecting the hot water boiler, which thank the gods appeared to be fairly new and in good condition. Keitaro had been half-afraid of encountering some turn of the century monstrosity when he had first come down the stairs.
After that, he had gone to the kitchen to get something for lunch when he had encountered Kitsune. He had seen her throughout the morning lounging in the living room, cheering for her picks while watching the horse races on TV. They had not said anything to each other since she had been too engrossed by the action on TV to notice him walking through the room behind her, so they had only greeted each other when Keitaro found her digging through the refrigerator.
Walking into the kitchen, Keitaro's first view of the resident fox girl was a nicely rounded rear covered in jean shorts and long bare legs below them in front of the open fridge doors. He could hear dishes clinking inside the appliance, so it was not a hard deduction to make to figure out what she was doing.
"Good morning, Konno-san," Keitaro announced himself as he looked down at his wristwatch and noted that it was just before noon.
Kitsune's head popped out from behind the open fridge door, her cheeks puffed out, presumably because her mouth was full of food. Chewing rapidly, she swallowed the food and responded, "Morning, Manager-san! What brings you here?"
"The same thing that brought you here, I guess. Hunger pains." Keitaro walked over and stood next to Kitsune, noting she was wearing a loose light blue top, with a very large neck opening that resulted in the shirt being off one shoulder and almost down the swell of one of her breasts.
"Well, there's leftovers here from Shinobu-chan's breakfast, so have at it, Manager-san. And I've told you before, call me Kitsune." She pushed her chest out slightly and cocked her hips to one side, going for a more sexy look.
Peering past the ash-blonde tenant, Keitaro could see that the plastic wrapped plate from this morning was now in disarray, the hard boiled eggs and pickled vegetables gone, with only the rice left and spilling off the plate. Keitaro had left half of the large plate from breakfast in the fridge to eat for lunch, but it looked like the resident fox had gotten to it first.
Looking from the plate and the few other items in the fridge back to the nervously smiling girl, Keitaro instead turned and walked over to the breadbox on the counter. "I was in the mood for tea and toast anyway. Could you please get out the butter, Konno-san?"
Kitsune winced at the polite tone of voice the manager had used. That and the continued formal use of her last name did not bode well for her.
Pulling out the box of butter, she watched as the new manager took four pieces of bread and dropped them into the toaster. Picking up the tea kettle from the dish rack, he filled it and stepped over to the stove. Putting it on a burner and turning it on, he stepped back and opened a cabinet, pulling out a cup and plate. Placing those on the counter, he looked over to Kitsune, who was standing there holding the butter with an uncertain look on her face.
Taking the butter and putting next to the dish, Keitaro asked, "Where does Shinobu-chan keep the tea?"
"In the pantry, through that door, on the right." Kitsune gestured to the side and Keitaro was able to find a couple different tins of tea. Selecting the green tea, he stepped back into the kitchen, seeing that the fox girl was standing there biting her lower lip before she asked, "So, why do you call Shinobu '-chan' and keep calling me '-san'?" (1)
Digging through a couple of drawers, Keitaro was able to find a small bell-shaped tea strainer. Carefully measuring a teaspoon of loose tea leaves into it, Keitaro closed it and placed it into the waiting empty tea cup. Sealing the tin of tea, he looked back at the tenant. "Because Shinobu reminds me a lot of my sister, back when she was younger. She used to be painfully shy too, but she got mostly over it before I finished school and had to leave home. Her name is Kanako, she's about 16 years old now. You'll meet her eventually." More than eventually, he was planning on calling home either tonight or tomorrow. "Plus, it doesn't seem to bother her, and it will help get her confidence up."
"So why don't you call *me* '-chan'?" Kitsune step up close to Keitaro, well within arm's reach, almost to the point where the taller male was able to feel the girl's breath on his face. As a matter of fact, he *could* feel her breath – as well as detect the slight smell of alcohol on it.
"Because it would not be polite, and I'm sure it would not be proper, especially in our positions." Keitaro could see that Kitsune was slowly getting closer. He could feel the body heat radiating from her chest through his t-shirt. However, just as he was going to pull away from her, the tea kettle started to whistle.
Silently blessing the gods, Keitaro stepped away from the suddenly wide-eyed girl and over to the stove. Picking up the steaming kettle, he poured some of the water into the waiting cup. Hearing the bread pop out of the toaster, he grabbed the toast and quickly buttered it before putting it on the plate. Taking the butter and replacing it in the fridge, Keitaro picked up the cup of tea and the plate of toast and put them down next to his clipboard on the kitchen table.
Sitting down at the table, Keitaro looked over at the still motionless fox girl. "Is there anything else, Konno-san?"
Kitsune blinked once or twice before she shook her head. "No, Manager-san. I guess I'll see you later." Turning unsteadily, she walked out of the kitchen back toward the living room.
Keitaro sat still for a moment, not moving until he heard the TV come on in the living room. Then moving slowly, he pushed his clipboard and plate of toast on the table before off to the side before he closed his eyes and began to softly bang his head against the table.
After his mid-day meal and ritual head-clearing, Keitaro continued the inspection. Deciding to go outside for a spell, he started going through the various outbuildings around the property. The sheds containing gardening and construction supplies were not too bad. However, the old Annex building, which if he could remember correctly had been part of the resort, was in such bad condition that he was starting to genuinely fear for his safety.
The cold and creepy feeling as soon as stepped into the dark and decaying building was one thing, but having his foot break through rotting floorboards six feet from the doorway was too much. Luckily he was wearing his boots, so his foot was not injured. Keitaro resolved to leave the building locked up until he could return with better safety equipment and a buddy to make sure nothing really bad happened and he would have no way to call for help. Recalling some of the stories Seta had told him about when he and Aunt Haruka had gone exploring back in their school days, he was sure he could convince Haru to come along, at least so he would not plummet to a horrible lonely death.
Finishing the outdoor inspection, all that was left was the occupied tenant rooms and the hot springs. The five tenants were all concentrated in the second floor of the one of the two wings of the building (the rooms of the second wing were all empty and locked). There were six rooms to the floor, but for some reason Kaolla Su was occupying and paying for two adjacent rooms, which had a double adjoining door installed just for her. Keitaro had noted in the tenant book that Su was paying the highest rent of all the tenants, triple the rooms and meals rate. That she had a double room explained part of that, but after seeing MechaTama in action and the way that Su ate at their first dinner together, the notions in Su's entry for 'food bills' and 'damage repairs' made a lot more sense. Plus, Su's rent was paid on the first of every month by automatic draft into the Hinata-sou bank account by an entity called 'the Embassy of the Kingdom of MolMol', but as long as the drafts cleared, there was really nothing to argue about there.
Keitaro wished it was that simple with the other tenants. Rents for the tenants were set at two different rates, one called 'basic room occupancy' and the other 'room occupancy and meals'. No one was paying only the basic rate set at 35,000 yen (equivalent to US $350) a month except for Shinobu, who because of her cooking duties got credited for the higher room and meals rate, set at 60,000 yen (US $600) a month. However, Keitaro was displeased to see that Shinobu had been marked down in the tenant book as only having cooking and kitchen duty as a condition of the reduced rate, and not laundry duty for the other tenants, which he has seen her in the middle of doing when he literally ran into her that first unfortunate day. He was going to have words with the other tenants, especially a certain fox girl.
Mitsume Konno was looking to be the problem tenant of all the borders. Keitaro was not sure how much being a freelance magazine writer paid, but it did not look like it was enough. He had seen in the book notations that Granny Hina had given her rent extensions and let her make partial payments on occasions that she had not had enough for the full room and meals rate she was supposed to pay. However, it now looked that Kitsune was owing the equivalent of two months rent as well as the regular rent payment that was shortly coming up.
Motoko Aoyama looked like she was going to be less trouble than the fox girl, as her rent was also paid by automatic draft on the account of the Aoyama family with the Bank of Kyoto. Naru Narusegawa paid in cash every month, occasionally a day late in making the payment, but nothing to really be concerned about.
Carefully stepping around on the wet stone floor of the main hot springs area, Keitaro could see small pieces of debris floating in the water, as well was what looked like algae growing on the rocks surrounding the pool. While having moss growing on the stones around most pools and ponds did lend a certain esthetic appeal in Japan, it was really a safety hazard in the already slippery areas around the spring.
Seeing a doorway at the rear of the springs, Keitaro opened it to find cleaning equipment and biodegradable cleanser. Now knowing what his next job was, Keitaro sighed and closed the door.
Turning toward the scrub room, Keitaro had only taken a couple of steps when he heard the door open. The sound was barely audible among the sounds of the hot spring bubbling, so Keitaro made a mental note of putting some kind of bell above the door. Any occupants in the springs would then know that someone was coming in, so hopefully the misunderstanding and the running flight and battle he had been involved in the first day back would not be repeated.
"Hello, it's Keitaro! I'm back here in the spring!" He called out. Keitaro had learned the hard way that his voice did not really carry any long distance and still be understandable, so he had been taught how to project his voice using his diaphragm instead of just his lungs when he wanted to be heard. It worked splendidly, but it had the unfortunate side effect of making him sound like some of the drill sergeants from American military movies he had seen.
There was a squeak and a clatter in the scrub room as something fell to the floor. Sliding open the door, Keitaro saw that Shinobu was picking up what looked to be used towels from the floor.
"Hey there Shinobu-chan. What're you doing?" Keitaro asked cheerfully. She really did remind him of Kanako, and he had decided to start acting more casual around her. The blush on her face looked cute the first couple times, but she did need to learn how to be less embarrassed around people.
"Hello, Keitaro-sempai. I was just collecting the hot springs towels so that I can wash them." Shinobu finished filling the basket and started to pick it up, but Keitaro could see that it was a little too heavy for the small statured girl.
"I got it." Gently bumping her aside with his shoulder, Keitaro tossed his clipboard on top of the basket and picked it up with little effort. "I didn't know you did the hot springs laundry, Shinobu-chan."
"Well, I was going to do the laundry right now, so I decided to get as much done as I can." Shinobu looked slightly anxious as she trailed the new manager carrying the basket out of the scrub room.
"You know that you don't have to do any laundry except your own, right Shinobu-chan?" Keitaro waited for Shinobu to open the door to the hallway, which she rushed to do.
"It's not a problem, Keitaro-sempai. I was going to wash anyway." She followed the manager into the laundry room down the hallway from the entrance to the hot spring.
"I see." Keitaro put the basket down on the counter next to the washer, which was already running. Looking at the stacks of unwashed clothes on the counter, he figured from the styles that there were clothes from Narusegawa and Su there. He could also see a smaller stack of clothes off to the side that looked to be Shinobu's. "Who's clothes are those in the washer?"
"Kitsune-sempai's…" Shinobu's voice trailed off as she saw something pass over his face. For a moment, it looked like Keitaro's squared off glasses had flashed white, but when he turned to look directly at her, everything looked normal.
"Do me a favor, Shinobu-chan. As soon as Konno-san's clothes come out of the wash, do your own clothes. I'll come back and do the hot springs towels after that."
"But Keitaro-sempai! The other sempais need their clothes washed…" Shinobu would have continued her protests, but Keitaro's glasses flashed white again, but this time his head did not seem to move. "I can't just leave their laundry there."
"You just worry about your own laundry, Shinobu-chan." Keitaro cocked his head slightly to the side before continuing to speak, only this time in English. "Let the Devil take the rest."
"I'm sorry, Keitaro-sempai, I don't understand spoken English very well." Shinobu watched as Keitaro straightened his head before speaking again in Japanese.
"Don't worry, Shinobu-chan. We'll sort this out later." Keitaro smiled gently at her before looking down at his wristwatch. "It's time for me to meet my aunt at the tea house, could you let the other tenants know the room inspections will start shortly? Everyone's here, yes?"
"Yes, Naru-sempai arrived just before Motoko-sempai, Kaolla-chan and I did."
"Please let them know that Haru and I will be back in about 10 minutes." Keitaro picked up his clipboard from the laundry basket and started walking out of the laundry room, his voice floating back. "I'll see you in a little bit, Shinobu-chan." The dark-haired schoolgirl stood there for a moment before rushing out of the room and toward the stairs to tell her fellow tenants.
1 - Honorifics - The Japanese use honorifics when referring to other people, either by name or not. San is the most common suffix, equivalent to Mister or Misses. Used with both given and family names, it is used in formal or semi-formal situations to show respect, or when the person being addressed is not close to the speaker.
Chan is an affectionate suffix, normally used only for very young children, or for young girls or women, if the speaker and recipient are on friendly terms. It is also used by romantically involved couples in an intimate setting. Kun is the equivalent term for males.
Not using any suffix, especially when addressing someone by their given name, is considered very intimate, either romantic or not, and if used by someone who is not in that position, considered very insulting.
Shinobu tends to refer to people at the Sou with the suffix sempai, which refers to upperclassman or those of a higher rank than yourself. It is used mostly in a work or school setting, but Shinobu uses it as a means to show respect to her fellow housemates. She does use chan when referring to Su, however. The companion term to sempai is kouhai, which means underclassman or junior in rank, and is rarely used.
Teachers are referred to as sensei, which means 'one who has come before'. The term is also used to refer to mentors at work or school or to medical doctors.
Sempai and sensei are considered titles as well as suffixes, so the terms alone can be used to refer to someone.