The nap I just took was immaculate. Despite only taking care of four hours of my massive sleep deficit, I still felt a lot better than I did earlier. It wasn't a very good thing to do as a host to leave Miia on her own to explore while I sleep, but I think she could understand just how strapped for some good sleep I really was and, arguably, still am.
That did, however, leave me waking up at about 5 o'clock in the evening with really nothing nice to put forward for dinner and twice as many people to feed than usual. One of them was a carnivore, too, so I would have to think something through pretty quickly. Before even leaving my art studio I get on my computer in the room and quickly pull up the nearest restaurants with decent takeout. Preferably I want to find one with something easy like steak, but I wasn't sure how reliable that would be as an option. I hadn't really looked into it before and, frankly, I'm surprised how much I need to so quickly.
Despite that, though, a good handful of options immediately populate my screen the moment I hit enter. A lot of them are more expensive than the others and the two or three cheap ones don't look particularly enticing, to say the least, so I think I'll just have to invest in a frying pan and a dutch oven and cook the cheapest cuts I can find for a while after this. At the very least my part-time work actually starts up tomorrow and, while that wouldn't exactly help me tonight, it will help a lot going forward if anything like this comes up again, which, call me a pessimist but, I fully expect it to.
I quickly decide on a place to order from that mostly serves boring American diner food and also doesn't have mediocre reviews plastered all over it in both Japanese and English. As soon as that's decided, I choose a food order for myself that's at least a few hundred yen below the expense bracket of the steak I'm also putting in for, then quickly put in the notes section that the steak is for an extra-species person who is a carnivore so they should probably leave out all the other stuff that would come with it. I'm well aware Japanese restaurant portions are notably smaller than those in America, so it would probably harshly cut the satisfaction, but there's only so much I can do other than...
The thought entering my head alone was enough to make me break down and put a second steak on the order. I changed my order to just a hamburger and nothing else. Maybe this whole homestay thing wasn't a good idea but I've got the distinct, or dare I say justifiable, feeling that Smith wasn't going to be very responsive to my stresses so I just place the order for delivery and forget about it. Their website spits me out a receipt page and I quickly close the window and put my computer to sleep, leaving it there as I head out the door into the quiet hallway right outside.
"Miia?" I call out, more of just the thought of needing to find her coming out of me than anything really intended for an answer. Sure enough, I don't get one, so I continue on and peek through her door, which I found to be about halfway ajar. She wasn't in there, but as I lean further in to look into the room, I hear a noise come from the lower floor, sounding almost exactly like it had come from the kitchen. It didn't sound like someone dropping something, more like someone had bumped the table, and as such I didn't rush myself, but with how short the distance to get there was, it almost looked like I was rushing anyway.
"Koruto?" I hear her ask, whirling around. One of the chairs had firmly been knocked over from under the table, but nothing else in the room is wrong. In fact, it looks like Miia hasn't really touched many things yet as a whole. "H-how was your sleep?" She adds as she realizes I've just woken up, a touch of timidness coming back over her when I move to set the chair back upright.
"It was... good, actually. Better than I usually get out of napping," I comment, trying to push an air of friendliness with any amount of natural feeling to it.
She smiles at me, but enthusiastically rather than the more sensitive one I vividly remember from earlier. "Good! Not a lot has happened, though. I've gotten mostly unpacked and I've gotten a feel for most of the house. The halls and doorways are a little smaller than I'm used to, but everything else is really nice!"
I can't stop a laugh hearing her so excited about the place, especially given how little attachment I have to it. Regardless, that laugh leaves me smiling, and by the look of it, she doesn't take it negatively. "I'm glad you like it," I speak after realizing I should really say something instead of just standing there silently. "Unfortunately I don't really have anything to eat for you that'd fit your diet on hand right now, but I'll take care of that tomorrow. I've ordered delivery for tonight instead."
Her eyes sparkle a little bit at the end of my little update. "Really? Oh, thank you! What did you order for me? Or is it a surprise?" The wide grin on her face purses a little at her lips as she finishes her question, as if what she's asking me to tell her is some kind of gossip.
"Well, I didn't really know what else to go for you, so I just put in for steak," I respond, rubbing the back of my neck.
A second, even brighter sparkle shines in her eyes and her smile widens out into excitement again. "Oooh! Now you've got me excited! When will it get here?"
"Twenty, twenty-five minutes max," I estimate. I didn't take off the time between placing the order and now, but I've always preferred underselling and over-delivering. "After we eat I need to work on my schoolwork, though. I've got something due tomorrow and I've-" The vivid image of me punching holes in my drawing from this morning flashes in my head. "... I've basically gotta start over."
"Oh," she says with a sort of disappointed uncertainty in her voice. It taints the aura of her smile just a little bit, but that little bit is enough to make me feel like I've spoiled something in a way.
"I promise this Sunday I'll show you around the town, though," I throw out. It was a sporadic idea and it honestly kind of just spilled out when I heard her respond that way, but upon second thought, she is here for cultural exchange with an entirely different species. If anything, doing that would just be good practice.
Regardless of whether it was intended or not, though, it gets her to smile again in that warm way, so the prospect that I may have not meant to ask completely leaks from my mind. "If you're sure, I'll look forward to it!" she replies.
A slightly shrill but otherwise gentle metallic chime rings at the front entrance of the house. It strikes me for a moment that the same sound was what started today's madness in the first place, but, upon providing additional thought to the matter, I realized that was all something entirely unplanned. Meanwhile, as I make my way to the door, I have very good reason to believe I know what it is this time. Sure enough, it's a young man, no less than four years younger than me, holding a bag of your average takeout containers. "Thank you," I say awkwardly, taking the containers from him with both hands. He nods wordlessly and retreats from the door, heading back to what appears to be his bike gently propped up on the street. I shrug and return inside. I have more than enough to think about at the moment, I didn't need to start questioning things this small again.
Miia was highly grateful for the steak, and not just because I'd spent my own money on it. That weird reptile phase my elementary school friend had was paying off a lot right now in the absolute weirdest conceivable way. I can tell, I haven't thought about the fact that the guy had one in literal years. Still, with how big a wrench in the gears this was on such short notice, it probably wouldn't hurt to crack open a few Wikipedia pages later and research a bit more. That has to wait until later, though, as after Miia went to bed to recover from the stress of immigration, I immediately put myself back into my little makeshift art studio. It's a pipe dream that I'll recover this project after the damage I've done to it, but I've decided I just can't give up all at once.
Sitting back down in front of my drawing board, I reluctantly begin scanning the drawing I'd left here, rips and tears of various sizes rifting the cheap paper apart in the foreground of the random figures I'd scattered around the page with only basic light sketch lines. Only a few of the torn spots really centralized on the empty wall behind them. I put my head in my hands and take a deep sigh, rubbing at my eyes. The idea of just giving up again passes through my head, but as I remove my hands from my view and let my eyes adjust to the paper again, the wheels in my head lurch a little. It's not a full idea of how to recover from this, but it's a hell of a lot better than what I had in mind prior, which was absolutely nothing.
I grab my 2B pencil and begin to gently trace jagged edges over the torn spots. The first five or ten minutes of trying to put this bizarre half-idea into practice get spent questioning if I'm wasting my time or not, but as I finish all the ones lining the loosely drawn figures, it starts to look like these mysterious blank forms were in the middle of some kind of serious conflict, exactly the idea that had come into my head initially. Only one or two ways to actually connect this with the project's topic come to mind at all, which isn't ideal, but I can at least see where attempting those few ideas might just push this into passable territory and that's better than nothing. With that vision slowly starting to peek out on the page's surface, I keep going until all the marks are given a distinct, viscerally jagged outline, not lifting my head up to look at the whole thing until I've gotten them all. That's when the rest of the idea starts piecing together slowly as the whole thing sinks in as one picture again... My 2B pencil hits the desk to my side and I swipe an HB pencil from it in exchange. Finishing this tonight felt possible again and I wasn't about to let that opportunity go without a fight.
It took me a good couple of hours to get the drawing into a state where it'd be acceptable by any measure, but I was also able to keep myself awake until then. Almost immediately after, though, I dragged my numbed body and mind to my actual room and got into my bed to properly sleep through the night. That was now over, though. It's now seven in the morning and the sun is pouring through my windows in thin strips where the blinds can't keep it out, one of which is basically shining straight into my eyes. It's an annoying way to wake up, but it certainly will do it, so rather than questioning and complaining I decide to roll with it and push myself out of bed. A stretch of my shoulders and arms fills me with a number of different sensations, but as all of them mix together into one experience, it dawns on me that I actually feel decently rested, at least for now. There's no telling how long it will last, though.
I don't like looking a gift horse in the mouth too much, especially when it comes to chronic issues, so instead of wasting time trying to figure out how I got here, I throw on a shirt and pants and start on my way down the stairs to the kitchen. A gentle stream of images and words began to trickle into my mind as I navigate the hallway silently, leaving me uninterrupted until a particular scene from one of those memories jumps out to me. It dawns on me again everything that happened yesterday, and more so, it dawns on me that I should probably check to see if Miia is awake. I stop in front of the stairway and check over my shoulder to see if her door is open and, while it's only slightly ajar, the answer is still yes, so I continue onward and make haste for the kitchen.
Despite the signs that might indicate otherwise, the kitchen is empty of everything but me and everything I had already put in there. Giving myself time to dwell on things has never been a good idea, so I quickly jerk the door of the refrigerator open and start looking for something that I, or even more hopefully, both Miia and I, could eat for breakfast. In terms of my own diet, I still have four out of a dozen eggs left, but outside that, there really isn't anything to work with within that particular drawer. Cursing under my breath, I abandon that drawer and start rooting through the other crevices I'm yet to get to.
At the very back of the refrigerator, behind a half-drained container of orange juice, lies an untouched package of bacon. As I mentioned a chapter or two ago, bacon in Japan is slightly different than in the US. Namely, bacon in Japan is pre-processed and cooked instead of being sold raw, so it takes on a consistency closer to ham when it's cooked out of the packaging. Still, it's better than nothing and just because it's processed doesn't mean I couldn't at least try and crisp it up a little bit. The package feels slimy in my hand like it had been sitting in its own skin for too long, but turning over the packaging for the expiration date clears up any worries. This stuff is still good for another month and a half.
Taking the eggs that were still left and the long-lost package of bacon, I grab two pans, one from the dishwasher and one from the drawer beside it, and turn on the two front burners of the kitchen stove. I give both pans a handful of moments to heat up as I turn my attention to quickly filling my usual kettle full of water. Instead of adding a third flaming burner to the mix, though, I set it behind the heating pans on the cold stove top and focus on the ones I have for the time being, gently separating a good two or three portions of the bacon in one and cracking the eggs into the other.
The sounds of heat on unheated food crackling and splashing begin filling the room, vaguely taking my mind out of the stress of the moment. I focus on the sound absently in my head as I work the broken eggs in a way almost autonomously pulled from the same place as yesterday morning, my only deviation being my attention towards the bacon, which I make sure to turn over after a minute or so. Before I can really process anything outside my little bubble at the stove, the room, along with likely a few rooms beyond it, has filled to the brim with the combined smell of the meat and eggs, a smell that would likely call Miia to see what was going on in here.
If she is aware of the smell now, though, she must just be noticing it, because I'm yet to hear her nearby, although I can't say I'm carefully checking for it. As soon as I figure any more heat will burn them, I yank the bacon from its place on the stove and scoop the individual half-sized slices onto their own plate, cushioned by a thin layer of paper towel I grabbed to catch any excess grease. That's probably more a necessity in raw bacon, but old habits die hard and I'm not going to experiment with whether they need to die or not right now.
For my own plate, I pile a large portion of the eggs I scrambled onto it in one large pile, followed by commandeering myself two slices of the bacon, which had crisped up pretty decently. As I carefully grasp both plates by their rim and transfer them to the plain, empty kitchen table, I notice Miia's slit eyes trained on me from just beyond the doorway. At first, I can feel my torso's lower organs lurch uncomfortably as if they're waiting for their moment to truly make my next fearful experience a party, but as soon as it connects in my head that her expression is more hesitantly curious than anything my nerves ease up on me. "Good morning," I say, trying my best to give her a smile that doesn't make me look like I feel like shit.
"G-Good morning," she returns, her tail pushing herself forward into more direct view. "Did... Did you make breakfast for me?"
"Wh-"... It strikes me for a second as I try to respond, but then I realize that this is still a very new situation for both of us. "Yeah... I found some bacon that could work for your diet and all, so..." Despite the simplicity of my possible responses, I still run out of words only halfway through my thought.
"That works," she assures me, grinning and pushing herself forward to the table.
"It's not much, but I'll make a proper, like... grocery shopping run after I'm done with working today," I add, still playing the modesty angle entirely on impulse.
"This is okay for now, though," repeats Miia, pulling the chair on the opposite end of the table out and politely sitting down in it. "You even made eggs with them! I love cooked eggs! Although a lot of my kind do." The excitement oozes from her voice, despite the simple thing sourcing that feeling, as well as the clear effort she's making to contain that excitement.
I look over to the nearly empty pan of eggs and then over to the empty plate in front of her, all the thoughts in my head freezing. I wasn't aware that snakes could eat eggs. I can't say I've ever needed that information until now, but it comes completely unexpected. Still, there's around a full portion left in the pan and, even if I was planning to eat that, too, it strikes me how wrong it would be not to give her the rest now. With that decision having been made, I grab the pan again and empty the rest of its contents onto her plate, followed by the remaining bacon from their little drain plate. "There we go," I comment awkwardly.
As her eyes fall to the unremarkable pork slices and scrambled eggs in front of her, she seems to fall into thought. "What is..."
"Huh?" I vocalize, looking up from where I'd just sat down across from her.
"What's that Japanese saying?" she finishes. "The one you're supposed to say before eating?"
"... You mean "Itadakimasu"?" I put forward. I can't blame her for forgetting, even if it's been portrayed in everything far more than the saying you're supposed to use after you finish eating.
"Yeah! That one!" she confirms. "Itadakimasu!" The smile that grows on her face as she calls it out could make a man believe in God. She doesn't waste time gently picking up one of the thin slices, though, and she daintily drops it into her mouth, the opening of which reveals two thick fangs on the roof of her mouth briefly. It's natural she has them, of course, but it was still fascinating to see them so close up. A sparkle flashes in her eye momentarily as her senses are hit by the salted pork and she eagerly continues eating what's in front of her, this time with much fewer inhibitions to her approach.
It finally dawns on me that I'm just kinda watching her eat like a total weirdo, so I start actually consuming the food I made for myself. The pile of eggs, at least the one on my plate, is a little overcooked and under-seasoned, just enough to notice it, but it's a hell of a lot better than eating nothing on the morning where I have to start working for my dollar... er... my yen, I guess. A low, unobtrusive chuckle slips out of me as the consideration for just how much has happened makes another round in my head, but that train of thought is quickly plucked off its tracks as Miia swallows a mouthful and speaks up again. "Is this really just store-bought?" she asks me as if she does expect me to have some kind of secret addition to it to reveal.
"Yeah. It's not bad, is it?" I pose in return, genuinely wondering what she thought.
"It's wonderful!" she reacts with another soft giggle. "I mean, Lamia have much more dulled senses of taste and smell than humans do, but I still like it a lot."
"Good, then I'll keep buying the stuff just in case there are more meat emergencies that need to be solved," I joke gently. It's just enough of a joke to get another laugh from her, too. In between our small talk, my eyes eventually drift back towards the analog clock hung on the wall above the kitchen's entrance doorway. It's already become eight, although I've always felt like time moves a lot faster when you're well-rested. It's a questionable trade-off, if you ask me, but I don't have time to get hung up on that now, so I look back to Miia who's finishing up her food. "I've gotta get moving pretty soon, I think I need to be there by nine," I speak, partially to tell her and partially just parsing the information myself.
"Oh, then I shouldn't keep you too long," she responds, her thin split tongue teasingly lulling from a mischievous smile. "Even if I really want to talk more."
The blood in my body starts getting weirdly cold, which is even more odd to feel in addition to the feeling of my face getting hot, and I gently cross my legs to hide the fact that I've never had anyone flirt with me that blatantly before. On previous occasions, trying to play off my inexperience and tendency to flare up as if I've never seen a woman before has been met with a response that made me feel like I was getting by, but this time the laugh Miia lets out is somewhere between her usual enthusiastic giggle and the cackle of finding something hysterically funny. It's frustrating to get that as a response, at least typically, and although I still feel my anxiety pulsing through to meet the adrenaline in my system, I also at least feel that she's enjoying herself, and that certainly makes the numbness in my legs back off a little bit. "I guess it's a good thing we now live in the same house," I spill out, the dead air finally connecting past my panicked reaction.
"I guess so. And we'll have even more time in town this weekend," she adds, almost like she's deliberately ignoring my reaction despite clearly having noticed. I could still feel her eyes on me, though, her slit pupils gently widening out as her infectiously bright smile started to take on a slightly smug tone. With that aura now having been firmly communicated to me, she slowly rose from her chair on the body-end of her tail and began slithering off back to her room. At least that's where I'm assuming she's going. Although, as I start to get up and retrieve her plate, she quickly turns her body and calls back to me, "Oh, and by the way, thanks for the food!"
I look up to tell her it's no problem or it was my pleasure or, frankly, whatever found its way out first, but as soon as she's in my line of sight she's already turned back around. "I'm glad you liked it," I call back anyway. It would start to bother me if I didn't at least try. I grab her plate from the far side of the table and gently put it and my own plate in the sink in a neat double stack. A deep breath sinks its way into my lungs and I gently place my head in my hands, leaning against the counter next to the sink. I'm still really processing a lot of the things that have happened since yesterday morning and yet I don't really have time to let any of those worries get to me in any significant capacity. Hopefully, part-time work would go a lot more normally than just trying to live life at home has been. College classes themselves have been plenty normal, so it's gotta be possible, but as I rub the tension from my closed eyes, I turn around and head off to get ready anyway.
I've never actually done formally-paid work before, that much I'll admit. The particular shop I'm working in is a mellow little place that's been family-owned for a few generations, so the woman I was told to report to is very lenient, or so I've also been told. As I enter the shop through its plain sliding door, the collective scent of all manner of art supplies starts to hit my senses from just about every angle. The most prevailing smell, though, is that of the numerous kinds of paper being sold, from woven cotton rag paper and newsprint to traditional washi. Maybe my mind is projecting the intensity of the scent itself, but whatever was doing it, it calms me a little bit, if only by the vague familiarity.
The woman I talked to when I first came in here, Mayumi Asakusa, stands behind the main sales counter, neatly lining up bottles of beginner-quality calligraphy ink along the front display and making sure each label faced out at roughly the same angle. Her hair is precisely cut at her shoulders and the large frames of her glasses alongside her easygoing semi-casual dress under the store's uniform apron make her almost look like she could be my mother, but reportedly she's not even thirty yet. She clearly didn't hear me come in, but when I start stepping forward anyway she notices the sound of my footsteps. "Masuda-san, good morning. Are you ready to begin?" she asks, eyeing me like my nervousness is physically dripping from my face.
"Yeah," I confirm. "I'm still kind of lost on a lot of what I'm going to be doing, but-"
"Don't worry about it!" she interrupts, waving her hand like she's shooing away my anxieties herself. "It's a weekday, it's a morning, it's going to be very slow. You'll have all the time in the world to figure it out. You likely won't be given any sort of weekend shift for a while, in fact."
I take what is likely a narrowly audible deep breath. "Thank you. That actually takes a lot off my mind."
"Don't mention it, Masuda-san. We only need so much additional help around here as it is," she explains. "My son is currently working part time in college and he's mentioned how much it can get to be, so I'll start you very easy. If you'd like to come back with me, I can get you into your apron and show you around a little bit better." With a loose wave of her hand, she gestures towards a doorway without any separator behind her, a few straight steps forward from the swinging door to get behind the counter itself. I waste no time with an answer and make my way behind the counter, to which Mayumi escorts me into the back.
Over the following hour or so, I'm shown the most basics of the ropes, from simple register function to actual tidbits about security and best practice for unruly situations. I pay particular attention to the latter, as should be natural for someone who struggles on recovery time when things start going poorly, and by the time the explanations are over, I can't say I feel totally clueless anymore, although I still hesitate to say it feels like I actually belong here just yet. That's a feeling I figure takes more earnest time, though, as it tends to with everything else. The idea of getting used to things reminds me of Miia and sparks the question in my head of what she's doing right about now. It makes me feel bad that I have to abandon her for multiple hours a day in an entirely different society, but she doesn't seem like the necessity of my absence would be lost on her, at least.
As my considerations of what could be going on at home pass, I find myself manning the register counter. Mayumi takes the time mostly to organize the store in a little more detail so I'm not left alone, which I will say distinctly helps my feelings, but when the door opens and a pair of figures walk in, the feeling like I'm a fish out of water blooms in me again before I've even looked at who came in.
One of them was a man roughly Mayumi's age, all the hair on his head neatly trimmed despite the clear attempts at defiance from the stubble on his face. His clothing is entirely casual, with no more complexity than a t-shirt, jeans and sneakers. He looks relatively lost in this particular environment, but the girl that came in behind him looks like she's enthralled by the sheer amount of opportunity she sees. Her piercing steely eyes peek out from behind a messy raven-black fringe of hair which her hands quickly brush out of the way to take in more of the room. That reaction only helps articulate what's on her back, with just a tinge of excited fluttering to the large, black feathered wings attached to her. They seem similar in appearance to the wings of a normal crow, but they have a span that would almost rival her arms if they weren't retracted close to her shoulder blades. "So much," she mumbles to herself, clearly trying to figure out where to begin with looking.
Instead of watching her continue to struggle, I hold up an alerting hand and call out to her, at least attempting to be a respectable shop employee. "Hey! Welcome! How can I help you guys?" It sounds corny to be saying that, which almost physically makes it hurt the big anxiety node in my brain, but both of the entering pair look my way and the winged woman, despite her now clearly-apparent reservations, cracks just enough of a smile to see.
The man beside her is the first to step toward me. "Tenma-san mentioned being interested in stuff like drawing, so I figured I'd see what the rate on basic supplies is," he explains. He lacks any enthusiasm, seemingly even bothered to be here at all, but I figure that much isn't my business.
"Oh, basic drawing supplies are actually really cheap," I tell him, although trying not to sound like I'm overselling it. "Drawing on its own is one of the cheapest art methods in terms of supplies, I'd say."
"Really? So if I got her, like, a few pencils and an empty book, that'd be it?" he continues, raising an eyebrow.
"Yeah, more or less," I shrug. "I mean, there's options for basics kits available. Those come with pretty much all the supplies anyone needs to start with."
In direct contrast to the way me and the man were exchanging, the Liminal girl, Tenma, had begun to roam slowly around the meagerly-sized shop floor and has now emerged with the exact package I was thinking of when I mentioned 'basics kits'. Her smile had grown to roughly double its size now, too, really bringing home how happy this is already making her. It's even enough to crack the cold expression of the man with her for a moment. Despite all of that excitement, though, as she approaches the counter her demeanor retreats a little again. "I don't really know how I'd practice, though," she admits in the same way a child admits to not doing their homework.
I laugh openly at a volume nobody has gotten me to in weeks. That is arguably the most relatable sentence I've ever heard and it came from someone who's not technically categorizable as 'human'. "Just draw stuff how you see it," I suggest. "Don't worry about doing things 'correctly', just try to get used to drawing the outline of something the way you see it with your own eyes."
Her expression slowly morphs into confusion and apprehension as she looks down at the little case of supplies in her hands. "Is... Is that really it?" she asks solemnly.
"More than you'd expect," I assure her. "There's more to it you can add from there, but I'm in college for traditional visual arts and they started us with drawing in the same way. Just worry about the outlines, then worry about the lines that add detail to the outlines. After you've started to get those a little better, then you can start worrying about stuff like lights and shadows and trying to make those look right. But all that stuff is a matter of practice."
Her eyes sparkle as she looks at me, almost like I'd just given her the ancient secrets of the medium. "But... there's so much to try."
"Yeah, but that's why starting with just the outlines is important, it captures a lot more than you'd expect with a lot less than you'd expect to need." I could see from Mayumi's head peeking over one of the back shelves to look at me that I was actually saying something useful, but somehow doing that only makes me feel more out of place.
Regardless of how I may be feeling, though, Tenma turns to who I'm left to assume is the one running her homestay and he quickly steps up and fishes his wallet out from his pocket. "Alright, then, how much?"
"Well, it's time to find out," I utter, trying to keep any amount of confidence in my voice as we switch abruptly to the part I couldn't be less familiar with. Tenma hands me the items in her grasp, consisting of just the store-concocted beginner's kit and standard-quality blank sketchbook roughly the size of a regular spiral notebook. Putting it together into the system comes out with a total that is, at least by my best metrics, a little under twenty dollars in USD. If there was one thing in all of this that seemed to make the man paying look content, it's that price point.
He softly exchanges the money in bills into my hand and I promptly let the machine do all the work of figuring out how much change there is to give back. I can't help but glance back up at the young woman's smile, though, her wings having returned to excitedly twitching and fluttering behind her. I push her new obsessions back towards her and she doesn't hesitate to snatch them back into her arms again. "Thank you so much, mister!" she exclaims, giggling.
"I hope you enjoy it," I say back, in part just trying to be polite but also seeing that spark going off inside her is making me remember my own first sketchbooks again.
"I don't think you'll have to worry about that, she's been excited about this since she got here," the man chuckles, pocketing his wallet again. "Something about her kind not having a lot of room for artists or something." Her expression softens a little at the eyes and she nods slowly.
"Well, as far as I'm concerned, we can never have too many," I counter in an attempt to go against that negativity. Almost immediately after saying that, the girl bows politely and they begin slowly returning out the front door of the shop.
"You made that young lady's day quite quickly, hmm?" Mayumi spoke up, stepping back towards the front of the store. "I suppose it makes sense, given you're in the same trade, but for someone who says they're not very social, you certainly thrived in that exchange."
"I just... I saw the passion, you know? She had the passion," I sputtered, trying not to blush immediately upon hearing her praise. "It's hard not to wanna help that."
"I know, I know," Mayumi waves off, adjusting her glasses lightly so she can lock her gaze to mine. "But you've identified yourself so much leading up to this as reserved and unsure about so much, I just wasn't expecting you to take such a charming lead there."
"Ch-Charming?!" I repeat. That isn't a word I hear, at least outside my parents' more condescending compliments. "I don't... think that's the word."
"I don't know, Masuda-san," she retorts. "I think given enough time with a helpful spirit like that, you could be quite the catch to most girls, especially at your age."
"Alright, okay, yeah, I-I-I get the picture," I stammer, trying to get her to stop. The last thing I needed to think about was suddenly getting drowned in women just by virtue of trying not to be an asshole. In fact, that prospect made me feel weird in more places than my pants.
"I'm just teasing you, don't worry," Mayumi clarifies, although not without another quiet laugh to herself. "But with how many of these poor Liminal folk are being treated, I'm sure you could make any homestay feel... well, at home! You'd be surprised how many people in this world just need one person to make them feel normal."
The look that quickly occupies my face must be pretty vacant because I hear Mayumi quickly address me again, but it's kind of hard to pass her statement through my head without wondering what god is trying to tell me something and why. I haven't told Mayumi that I suddenly got paired with a homestay meant for someone else, after all. Maybe that's just me being a paranoid bastard, though. I shake my head out of my thoughts and put them to the side for now, though. "Is it really that easy?" I ask, almost trying to tempt whatever is pushing this.
Mayumi looks at me confusedly for a moment, but her warm, motherly smile returns. "To start off, it can be. It never stays that way, though, that much goes for everything. Even if it gets to be too much, though, persistence and patience certainly help at least show your feelings, and while they can't fix everything, staying true to how you feel will ensure you're never alone to face what's ahead of you." That blank stare emerges on my face again but even more potent than before. "... Oh my, I sound like an old woman, don't I?" Mayumi asks, her cheeks tinging red.
"Huh? No, no, that's all really good advice, I just... Heheh, it's a bit... uniquely-timed, let's say it that way." I don't really know how to explain it all at once, especially with all of what she's said still sinking in. For the entire past day or so, I've been nervously trudging forward through all of this life stuff, especially Miia's sudden move in, all in the hopes that it might get easier. Maybe it's all a fool's errand to expect it to get easier, and even more so, maybe I should just stop looking at how 'easy' or 'hard' any of this is. It's all worth a shot, and even if I get no way to practice or truly prepare at all, maybe there's some truth to the cliche ideal of sticking to my feelings. Thinking about it, it almost makes me excited to see just where things go next... Almost.
A/N: At first I was considering cutting this chapter a scene earlier and starting the next chapter with it, but then I realized that I'd rather just lump the work scene in with this chapter and I don't have any publishers to whine at me about doing otherwise. THIS IS MY STORY, BITCH, YOU CAN'T TELL ME WHAT TO DO!
… Sorry, that was unnecessary.
Besides, I'm still a chapter or two off from the part where shit really picks up, so welcome to the world of 6k+ chapters, enjoy your stay, and I promise we are going to get to some proper monster girl T-and-A soon!
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