Author’s notes
The shinkansen is the Japanese bullet train.
Kyoto is a city in Japan which is famous for being a place where you can “meet old Japan.” It is slightly more rustic than Tokyo, though it is certainly modern within its inner city; I think it’s the only place in Japan where there are still a few feudal castles. (Six if I recall). The views there range from fascinating to absolutely fucking breathtaking. It is, of course, southeast of Tokyo. Incidentally, who remembers where Sachiko is going to school?
Wow. I didn’t realize how heavy I had laid the innuendo on until just now.
Napoleon is a 5-player Japanese card game which is apparently very different from its European counterpart. It is a game of taking tricks, a little like Spades, I believe. Essentially, each round, the dealer is “napoleon.” She calls out a card (usually a good trump card) and the bearer of that card secretly becomes her “adjutant,” or team. She places a bid for how many tricks she can take, and play commences. The goal is to take the correct number of tricks without going under or taking all the tricks.
It’s all right / I’m just the dream from that time that you erased / forgot / something isn’t here.
Remember the Hill
But you can’t really complain, can you? After all, you said it. You said, I can do that like it was no big deal. Sure. Just call the head of the Ogasawara Group—daddy, if you would, but you would not— and let him know you’ll be taking off for a couple of days with a psychotic driver and a bunch of your
friends
classmates from the Yamayurikai, and your petite soeur. Where? Oh, we’re not sure yet. We thought we’d just sort of…drive, you know, until we ran out of gas and had to draw straws to see who would be the hooker for gas money. No, no worries, I won’t take the checkbook. I’ll make sure to bring my nicest, shortest skirt, too; I’ve always been pretty unlucky when it came to drawing lots, but not when it came to being a
filthy whore
breadwinner. Pretty good at that, made top grades, didn’t I? Isn’t that enough? Doesn’t that merit me one trip? Just one? I just sort of thought that this once, I could leave and not think about the consequences because I promise my womb will be undamaged and that’s what you really need off of me, isn’t it, is a little fellow in there, well I promise to
BAM.
What is this? The world is shaking around me…rumbling like an engine, only expanded to eclipse the sun, an engine to tear apart the planet underneath me and
BAMBAMBAMBAMBAMBAMBAMBAM
“Damn, these are some lousy roads.”
“You shouldn’t use such coarse language, Onee-sama.”
“Oh, come on. You’ve heard worse.”
“From you.”
Muffled laughter. “She kind of has you there, Sei.”
“You know, I could have had any number of girls as petite soeurs. Can somebody tell me why I picked the disguised smart-ass?”
“It sounds to me like she simply had a very good disguise.”
“Are you calling her pretty, Rei?”
“I—”
Cut off: “Onee-sama!”
“I wasn’t—”
Cut off again: “A very curvy disguise, if you will. A pert, firm, nicely-developed disguise. A very womanly disguise. Maybe even two disguises.”
“Sei—”
Cut off a third time. Almost giggling: “Onee-sama!”
And then, a voice which was not quite distressed, but getting there: “Come on, Sei! Onee-sama is trying to sleep.”
“Hey, why am I the only one who gets yelled at? Yoshino is practically pounding on Rei’s arm, crying, onee-sama! Onee-sama!” A fairly good impression of Yoshino’s voice.
“I do not sound like that!” Thump thump thump.
“You are pounding on my arm, though.” Finally able to finish a sentence.
“I—”
“You’ll wake Onee-sama up!”
Yumi. She sounded anxious, unpleasantly so. That would not do. Not at all. If only something could be done. Something radical, but contained. Something decisive, but not unnecessarily brutal. You’re not planning a military strike. I think father did once. No, that was just a rumor. Corporate business isn’t that brutal.
A warm, comforting arm slid around her shoulder. The arm was small and a little tense; unsure of how much it belonged where it was, like a cat cautiously creeping its way onto the lap of someone who was mostly asleep, ready to flee if that someone so much as jerked in the wrong direction.
That’s not right. I’m not going to lash out at you if I wake up, Yumi.
So thinking did Sachiko open her eyes with a sharp intake of breath, and, just like the metaphorical cat, Yumi’s arm retreated immediately. She blinked, bleary-eyed, for a moment, lamenting the loss of the warmth, and then looked around, finding more or less exactly what she had found just before she had blinked so heavily about...two hours ago. (Checking the clock on the radio a row ahead of her). Then, they had been more or less in the middle of a dense Tokyo roadfuck, trying desperately to get onto the tollway that would take them more or less anywhere. No longer crowded, they could spread out two or to a row, grouped by soeurs: Rei and Yoshino in the back row, Yumi and Sachiko in the middle row, and Sei and Shimako in the front. Somehow, Sei had wormed her way into the driver’s seat again, through what trickery, Sachiko knew not.
Now, they were on the open road; there were perhaps three other cars in view, none of which could possibly be driving at legal speeds—Sachiko knew this because she knew that their van was being passed, and Sei was driving. Looking out the window, Sachiko could see a currently empty rice paddy to her left, and a run of shinkansen track that extended as far as she could see off to her right.
“Yumi.” Sachiko blinked hard, trying to get rid of a strange glare that seemed suddenly to invade her sight from all directions. “Where…” she put her hand to her mouth reflexively and yawned, trying as hard as she could not to bare her tonsils to the world, or even to her palm. “Where are we?”
“I think we’re headed southeast on the tollway right now, Onee-sama,” Yumi said.
Sachiko frowned. “Southeast?” We’re not in Tokyo anymore; not even on the outskirts. What could possibly be southeast any farther? “Where are we going?”
“Thought I’d take us down to Kyoto for starters.”
Kyoto? What could there possibly be in Kyoto?
Castles?
Scenery?
Oh—
Almost reflexively, Sachiko turned to face Yumi, who was sitting comfortably in her own seat, only about half a meter from Sachiko, in spite of the ample space they had on their bench. Yumi did not seem to have reacted to the mention of Kyoto. Did that mean she had forgotten? Sachiko could only hope so.
Sei hadn’t, forgotten, though. Simply from the tone of her voice, Sachiko could see this. It made her cringe, very slightly.
Yoshino turned around in her seat and took a quick look at Yumi, who was sitting on her side with her arms pressed a little too close to herself, and Sachiko who she noted looked a bit overly distressed, though she could only guess at why. (In reality, she could guess very well at it, but she did not know that at the time.) “Hey, instead of sitting there looking awkward, why don’t we do something productive?”
Yumi blinked and relaxed without trying to. “Productive?”
Sachiko frowned, suddenly worried. “You mean…like knitting?” I don’t know how to knit.
At this, both Yoshino and Yumi burst out laughing, though Yumi’s was more of a set of confined giggles, whereas Yoshino laughed outright for a moment before Rei clapped a hand over her mouth without actually looking up from whatever it was that she was doing. “Yoshino,” she said with a touch of amusement that utterly destroyed the disapproving tone she was going for. Then, to Sachiko, “I’m sorry about that.”
“It’s your fault,” Yoshino said when Rei finally removed her hand. “You’re the one that is knitting.”
“You’ll be grateful for it later.” Rei said. “When it gets cold.”
“That’s not the point! And besides, when is that going to be? Did you not notice the air conditioning in this car?”
Rei shrugged helplessly, and Sachiko thought privately that she looked more and more like a mother every time she saw the two of them—Yoshino and Rei—together.
A mother, or something else.
Sachiko fought down her blush successfully by reciting that poem that she could not quite get out of her head.
(All-gone all-gone)
Something else like you and Yumi?
(Cattail fish is all-gone)
Something like that has no business making you blush. What are you doing, idiot girl?
This was much harder than it ought to have been, because as she was doing this, Yumi was inching closer again, a little like a
(scorned lover trying to)
cat again. And just like a cat, Sachiko knew that again, if she shifted too quickly, Yumi would retreat almost soundlessly, unnoticeably. She knew that there was more than one way to catch (or skin) a cat, however, and so Sachiko, in a moment of self-indulgence and near superhuman speed, reached out and caught Yumi around the shoulders. “Yumi,” she said, intending to say something reassuring so that the girl wouldn’t try and pull away. Before she could even begin her sentence, however, Sei shouted from up front with timing that seemed almost precognitive:
“Shall we do something productive?”
Yumi jerked in her seat and her face turned a bright shade of red.
Oddly enough, Sachiko did something very nearly the same. Out of habit, she nearly shouted, (really, her voice only rose a notch or two, but it was a stretch for the girl) “Rosa Gigantea!”
Two voices responded from the front seat, nearly at the same time with a simple, “Yes?” One of them was inquisitive. The other was nearly snickering.
“Ignore her,” Rei said shortly, not looking up from her knitting. “It’s the best way to make her be quiet.”
“It’s the only way,” Shimako said from the front.
“You two have absolutely no respect for your sempai,” Sei said. “I find that in almost unbearably poor taste.”
Something funny happened. Sachiko opened her mouth to say, You two need to be more respectful of your sempai, even if she is being fairly lewd, with a scolding tone. It was almost reflexive, the same as how her leg jumped when the doctor tapped on it just right with a little rubber hammer.
Then she shut her mouth.
What is going on in this trip? It’s like we left all our manners in Tokyo. What does that say about our characters? If we, as graduates and students of Lillian, become raucous as soon as there is nobody around to see us, what does that make us?
Fake?
My dear, what do you think manners are?
They are signs of good character! This she believed most vehemently. Good breeding and good character are displayed first and foremost by proper manners!
And what about a good life? How do you display to the world that you are capable of enjoying yourself like a normal human being?
Sachiko found that she had no acceptable answer to that.
Yumi moved under her and her attention left herself. “What is it, Yumi?”
“Oh,” Yumi said in a voice which was entirely relaxed. “I’m just shifting, onee-sama.” And then, a little bit more nervously, “You’re very comfortable.”
What kind of a sentence is that? Am I a pillow? What would mother think if she heard that?
I think that right now, you kind of are.
As Yumi moved into a more comfortable position just over Sachiko’s breast, Sachiko felt that denying entirely would be useless, and hypocritical of her since she was essentially the one who had put Yumi there. Besides…admit it. It’s comfortable. The gentle pressure over your heart, the small warmth that seems to seep into your breast; it’s nice.
Sachiko would admit to no such thing, of course. Still, it was a nice thought.
How do you display to the world…
Very nice.
That you enjoy yourself?
I enjoy myself.
When?
Now.
Another compelling argument.
Compelling indeed.
How do you show the world?
When they sat back down, the game became 5-player Napoleon. It was an odd sort of free-for-all, which was not really a free-for-all at all, since each round, the dealer formed a secret “alliance” that she did not know until the card which signified the alliance was played. Yumi was not particularly useful when she was made the dealer’s “adjutant,” since as soon as the card was called, her face lit up, revealing itself to be bearing a neon sign which read, I’m this round’s adjutant! Careful of letting me take anything!
Sachiko, however, more than made up for that. Her intuition was sharp, but more than that, she was very good at guessing how many tricks she could take; mostly she did this by estimating conservatively, but she often was able to entice her opponents into giving up their trumps early.
If only the same could be said about your life.
What trumps, exactly?
Your own.
That makes no sense.
And yet, in a strange sort of way, it did. And when she admitted that to herself, something funny happened to her: She started to laugh a little bit more.
How indeed.
Of course she was. You were a tremendous burden on her today. You are always a
Shut up.
You are always. Always.
Shut. Up.
Sachiko found that she was increasingly gaining control over some of these thoughts which seemed to swell and pop in her head without warning, destroying her self-assuredness, and that they influenced her less as a result. She put her hand on Yumi’s head and let her breath out slowly.
Her hair is so soft. It’s nice.
Not like
Not thinking about that.
Them.
Not thinking about that.
Sachiko shook her head sharply, violently. She thought nobody noticed, but in reality, not one of them didn’t notice. What she didn’t see could have filled a book:
Yoshino nudged Rei, who glanced briefly over to indicate she had noticed too. Underneath the blanket Yoshino had found (with the air conditioning that Sei insisted on pumping, it was actually fairly cool in the car—cool enough for a blanket, anyway) Rei squeezed her cousin’s hand reassuringly. Don’t worry about it. It’s nothing; she’s more or less under control, and if she’s not, we can deal with it.
Yoshino squeezed the hand back, and thought, It’s not Sachiko I’m worried about. It’s the girl who passed out in her lap the second after she lost at Napoleon. Yesterday, Yumi was energetic and practically frothing at the mouth, she was so excited to see her onee-sama. She got a good night’s sleep, and had a good breakfast this morning, and it’s been less than ten hours since she woke up, but she looks like she hasn’t slept for a week. This is fucking killing her; maybe faster than it’s killing Sachiko.
That wasn’t entirely fair, and Yoshino knew it, but she didn’t care. She squeezed Rei’s hand again, looking at Sachiko, and Rei shook her head sharply. Don’t you dare. You know it’s nothing like that.
It’s not fair, Yoshino thought.
Neither are you.
Neither is anything. Get used to it, sister.
In the front seat, Sei glanced in the mirror just in time to see Sachiko’s sharp, violent shake, as though she was trying to wrench her head off in a single go. Shimako, by the same chance, noticed it in the same way. They glanced at each other, and Shimako mouthed, “I’m worried about the both of them back there. Do you think stopping somewhere for the evening would be a good idea? I think that if we give them a good chance to rest, it would do them a world of good; giving them some time alone wouldn’t be a bad idea either; I think the two of them need some time to work things out in private.”
With a shit-eating grin, Sei mouthed back, “I can’t read lips.”
Shimako pursed her lips and Sei winked at her, and Shimako knew that Sei had understood. As they rounded a bend, a sign came into view: Lodging: 13 KM.
Sounds good to me, Shimako thought.
Sei thought so too, but she said it a different way.
Yumi was awakened as Sei raised her voice, not turning around but not for lack of trying—Shimako was keeping close watch over her to make sure she kept a close watch on the road. “Alright, everybody. We’ve been driving for something like 3 hours now, and we’re about an hour and a half from Kyoto. I think we’ve all gotten to know each other a little better now, so let’s be honest.” The sound of attention being gathered is so sweet. “Whose bladder is full?”
Silence filled the car in much the same way molten lead might.
“Come on, admit it, show of hands.” Sei would not be cowed so easily.
Grudgingly, slowly at first, and then quickly towards the end (as though to avoid being recognized in a small group of close friends) hands went up—in the end, not a single person had not admitted to at least owning a bladder—Sachiko included, which verily shocked her.
As far as your guests and friends are concerned, you have no bladder, no stomach, and no sweat glands. You will in no way trouble your guests nor your hosts for anything so trivial.
Looking back on it, Sachiko had received that lesson when she was quite young, and it had actually been a trick to keep herself from giggling—mostly, the thought of the hard, unkind slap she would receive if she so much as breathed hard during something that a normal child might perceive as funny kept her in line.
I guess I have a bladder, huh.
Huh.
“There’s a hotel coming up in about five minutes. I vote we stay there the night, and get a fresh start tomorrow. Who else is in?”
“That sounds like a wonderful idea, Sei,” Rei said, her voice leaving no room for dissention. Not that there was any.
Staying at a hotel.
What a strange thing—I’ve never even done it once. Not with friends nor with family. Isn’t it supposed to be a fun thing to do? Certainly that disqualifies family, then, but what about friends?
Friends.
How do you show the world you can enjoy yourself like a normal person?
Sachiko had the feeling she might find out soon enough.
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