Tomioka was surprisingly neat and tidy. Moriko eyed the other girl's side of the room, taking in the way she had her blanket tucked in and her clothes arranged on her shelf. She had thought that Tomioka's things would have instantly been strewn across the cabin, creating a messy maze, but apparently she wasn't quite as inherently chaotic as Moriko felt she would be.

The first day had been spent mostly in silence. Neither of them had wanted to extend an olive branch. Moriko certainly wasn't going to be the first to do so. Since their communication hadn't improved, according to Nakime, they hadn't been allowed to do anything outside of the cabin. At least they had managed to clean the cabin. They were no longer inhaling clouds of dust every time they disturbed something, and all of the spiders had been chased away.

Tomioka sighed and rolled over onto her stomach. She had been laying on her back, throwing a softball up and catching it before it hit her face. A strangely dangerous game since she came very close to breaking her nose a few times.

Eyes that were the same color as her own met her gaze and narrowed. Moriko didn't look away. It was strange, honestly, that they looked so similar. People at camp were always commenting on it. Moriko had decided to ignore those comments after the first few days, but now that she had been stuck looking at the other girl's face for a full day, it was difficult to pretend to be ignorant.

"I'm going outside." Tomioka shoved her hands against her mattress, getting up.

"We're not supposed to go anywhere."

"I'm not," Tomioka said, rolling her shoulders. She picked up the softball. "Not really. But I can't look at just these walls or you anymore, I'll go crazy. No offense."

"Very offensive," Moriko said. "I'm taking offense." She continued playing the string game she had started, twisting her fingers around the string the best she could. Truthfully, the game was supposed to be played with two people. If she was back home, her mom and aunts used to play this game with her. Even her uncle and his brother would sometimes join in, and she was teaching Mitsuri.

Tomioka sighed. She threw the ball up into the air and caught it with her other hand. "Sorry. I'm getting cabin fever. I can't stay in here anymore."

The string slipped off Moriko's finger. Snarling, the string tangled and twisted together like it had a life of its own. "We're supposed to stay inside."

Tomioka stared at her, blinked once, then turned on her heel to walk out the door. She flicked the latch and slammed the door open. With her back rigid, she stood there, the door open.

"What?" Moriko redid the string, putting it back around her fingers.

"Come on. You're getting cabin fever, too. I've seen how much time you spend outside." Tapping her foot on the floor, Tomioka gestured to the porch. "We'll sit on the steps."

"You were watching me?"

Tomioka rolled her eyes. "Not intentionally. But since people keep mixing us up, they would yell your name at me and then I would have to help them find you. You were almost always outside. And you hate crafts, you're never there."

"Oh." Moriko had experienced the same issue, but she hadn't helped anyone locate Tomioka. She wasn't a personal Google Maps app. Hesitantly, she put her feet on the floor. The cabin did seem smaller than it had the day before, and it was pretty outside. All sunshine and birdsong. "We won't go any farther than the steps."

"So, you didn't want to steal a canoe and row to the next camp over? Got it." Tomioka grinned at her and waved her hands at the open doorway. "You're letting in bugs."

Hurriedly, Moriko got up and rushed out the door, her string curled between her fingers. She slipped on her flip-flops at the last second. The door slapped shut behind Tomioka as she released the edge of it.

Tomioka sat down on the steps and Moriko followed, sitting a few steps below her. A breeze brushed through Moriko's hair. Two squirrels scampered up a tree, rattling the branches. Far in the distance, the lake glimmered in the late afternoon sun.

"Do you want me to help with that?"

Moriko sighed. "Thank you, but no, I don't need help. I mean, well, it's just a game, not something to help with."

"I know," Tomioka said. Her bare feet slid in few as she scooted down a step. "I've played that one."

"No, you haven't."

Tomioka laughed. "Geez, you're so prickly. Like a hedgehog."

"If I'm a hedgehog, you're a chipmunk," Moriko shot back, "A bouncy, chatty one."

"Good, I love chipmunks. They're super cute." Tomioka scooted down another step. "I have played that game, though. Want me to prove it?"

Moriko pressed her back against the step. All right, this could be amusing. "Yes, actually, I do."

"Fine by me." Tomioka slid down to the same step as Moriko and nodded to Moriko's hands. "Go ahead and start."

Moriko's fingers danced through the looped string, wrapping it back in the correct pattern. She held her hands out to Tomioka, the smallest smirk on her face as she prepared to watch the overconfident girl fail. Most likely she would go for a Cat's Cradle—

Tomioka snagged the right two string lines and pulled up and then twisted, moving the string. Her fingers zipped around the string as she plucked it off Moriko's fingers and deftly moved it to her own in the correct form.

That…maybe that was a lucky guess. Moriko took the outer string lines and shifted them, her pointer and ring fingers doing the work as the string moved back to her hands. Surprisingly, Tomioka did the next step purposefully. As Moriko began to trust that Tomioka knew what she was doing, the game picked up, the strings going back and forth between them. Their concentration was only broken when a nearby crow cawed, startling them.

Tomioka grinned as she started to untangle the string from around Moriko's fingers. "I told you I knew that game."

"But…" Moriko slid her fingers out of the strings. "My mom and her older sister made that up when they were little. It's called the Butterfly Estate. It's not—no one else knows how to do it besides people in my family."

Looping the string back in the correct pattern around her fingers, Tomioka shrugged. "My dad taught me. Maybe it's not that secret?"

Moriko bit her lip as she looked down at the string perfectly wrapped around Tomioka's…Akemi's fingers. "Maybe not."


"She seems awfully nice."

Giyuu scrubbed at a plate and ignored the tone Makomo had decided to use when delivering that compliment. His older sister leaned against the counter, drying off a cup with a calm expression on her face. Outside, the rest of their family were sitting around the fire pit, talking with each other and hopefully not interrogating Saika.

It seemed like the forced family dinner had gone well enough. Saika had handled his family's questions deftly and calmly, only becoming somewhat flustered when Sabito had asked about her own family. She had lived abroad and was no longer close with her parents, which Giyuu had already known about her.

Makomo set the cup into one of the cabinets. It wasn't the right one. Giyuu would have to put it away correctly later. "Terribly nice."

"Is there something wrong with her being nice?" Giyuu asked, handing the plate to her.

"No," Makomo said, her smile gentle while her eyes watched the middle distance. "Not particularly."

Giyuu plunked his hands back into the scalding dishwater and glanced out the window over the sink. Outside, Saika laughed at something, covering her mouth politely.

Makomo picked up another dish to dry. "She doesn't have a great deal of fire in her."

"That's a good thing," Giyuu said. He found a small dessert plate and started washing it. "She's steady."

"Of course." Makomo picked up another dish to dry.

"I like that she's predictable."

Makomo nodded and kept drying the dish. The usual comfortable silence that rested between them grated against Giyuu for some reason.

"There's nothing wrong with being consistently polite," he said, the washing rag dropping into the water with a splash as he turned toward Makomo. "And I prefer predictable over passionate." Less fighting, less arguing.

"Do you? You haven't always." Her voice was gentle as she poked at his memories.

"I'm not in my twenties anymore," Giyuu said, "I don't need spontaneousness or excitement. I have a daughter to think about."

"Daughters."

Giyuu's chest tightened, and he felt like a rope pulled taut. "I don't need you to remind me." He flinched back as Makomo put her hand on his arm.

She pulled back. "I know." Makomo picked up the washcloth. "Go outside and send Sabito in here. He's the one who wanted to have a family dinner, so he can help clean up the mess."

Giyuu wiped his hands off on another cloth. "What do you really think of Saika, Makomo? Without comparing her to anyone." Without thinking of dark hair highlighted with purple, without thinking of a soft smirk or banked anger or a teasing glint in violet eyes.

"I think she's…exceptionally nice. I don't know. I can't put my finger on it, Giyuu, but…she's just nice."

"All right," Giyuu said. That wasn't exactly what he wanted to hear, but Makomo was a good judge of character. Maybe Giyuu needed to ask a few more questions of Saika. But at least his sister thought she was acceptable.

As Giyuu stepped outside, Tanjiro poked a stick at the fire, making embers flare against the shadows. Beyond the porch and the yard and the dock, the moon shimmered on the lake.

The moon is beautiful, isn't it?

Giyuu sucked in a breath and walked over to sit down beside Saika. She leaned against his arm. "I wish you would've let me help with the dishes…"

"You're our guest," he said, "But Sabito, you're not. Makomo wants you to go help out."

"Harsh," Sabito said, making a face. "Tanjiro, she probably meant you."

"Okay!" Tanjiro smiled. "I don't think she did, but if you don't want to—"

"No, you go, 'Bito," Nezuko said. She pointed at Sabito. "You've weaseled out of doing the dishes for the last three family dinners, it's your turn."

Sabito huffed even as he stood up. "You kept count?"

"Yep," she said. Grabbing her phone, she started to pull up an app. "I marked it in my calendar, want to see?"

"No, shrimp, I don't," Sabito said. As he passed her chair, he ruffled her hair, messing it up. "I trust your calendar skills."

"As you should," Nezuko replied, pushing his hand away.

"Your family is funny," Saika whispered to Giyuu. "They've been very welcoming."

"I'm glad they haven't run you off."

Saika's smile was bright in the darkness. "I'm not that easy to chase away."