9. Celestial Resort
Prompt: Ignore
Ignorance is bliss.
Work was everything for Oshiro. Not only the reason he died but the reason he didn't realize he had died.
Unironically, he was too busy to notice. He had to be ready for when guests arrived and have everything on spot. But why have the hotel so impeccable if there were not guests to attend?
"Well maybe if you finished your job for once this place wouldn't be so empty!" His mind told him.
"Oh, yes! That must be! Look at this place! So much to do and here I stand like a fool!"
It may be overwhelming for some. Oshiro was no exception. He could be so busy someone could have put a workaholic badge on his chest and still not notice.
Ignorance to ignorance.
When the Celestial Resort still was full with people, not much had changed in Oshiro's routine. Be the first to wake up and the last to go to bed; Not to mention of the times when he didn't.
But in the times he did his room was not a walk in the park, despite how lifeful it could appear at first glance. His room may be many things, but on top of them, it was a mask. The room said his name like an elegy. Dozens of pictures hanging in the wall, echoes of the former life he used to have and be. Shelves full of items from the gift shop the hotel had. A room full of history in the walls, but not his own. The hotel's history that Oshiro mistook as his own.
Ignorance to ignorance.
His mind being so full of the hotel ocasionally led him to remember many of his coworkers and friends he made through the years. How even though he cherished many of them he always put his work first.
Among all of the pictures, none were about him, none but one. One picture of him and Charlotte. Oh dear Charlotte…his source of resilience and warmth in cold and hard days. If only he had put his work aside and had the courage to ask her out that last night after taking that photo...
While she and the staff pleasured themselves with the sights of the mountain in a night without parallel with the company of years-long friends, almost considering themselves a family, Oshiro was busy checking the heater system worked properly for one last night. He struggled in doing so and it would take him hours to deal with.
Since he had the intention in just staying one last night, he supposed it wouldn't do him too much harm to sleep without heather. He had all the blankets he could ever ask for and a pillow to hug.
The usual tiredness that accompanied him from the bed for overworking himself didn't help him fall asleep at all. No amounts of blankets and huggable pillows eased his bone-chilling cold.
The next day, the first thing popping up in his mind was his routine he followed like a ritual. From awaking to bathing. From dressing to breakfast.
His everyday routine avoided him to notice how his body became lighter like a feathera. How it was no longer freezing through the rooms and neither warming for nearby fire in chimneys.
The memory of freezing and shivering as he tried to sleep that night flashbacked to his mind every now and then. The first day he woke up as a ghost, the next day, the day next to that one, and the years coming up pilling up alongside with a solitude imposed on Oshiro. An unaware solitude like many of the mistakes in his life he either played down or distracted himself from.
Ignorance to ignorance.
One would think Oshiro having the whole hotel for himself to work with would make his workload as bigger as it would make it manageable. After all, he had everything for himself. But truth be told sooner than later Oshiro made his job one hell of a mess.
He left every task unfinished when another one "more urgent" required his attention.
He had to check the plumps to get water to wash the bedsheets and had to clean the dust off the rooms and shelves and the spider webs in the corners and he had to make sure the bathrooms were well-supplied, but he had to organize the basement to get the tools and everything he was looking for, but he had to get countless amounts of boxes and bags stored in the basement to make space, but he had no space nowhere because he had not taken care of the rooms and halls and suddenly he had to scare off birds invading his hotel, and before he knew it–!
DING!
A costumer had arrived.
He had to drop everything to attend him and chose to turn a blind eye to all his chores for this one noisy costumer.
"Welcome! May I help you?"
Ignorance to ignorance.