Welcome!

To put it simply, Misuzu Kagari was a loud woman.

It wasn’t about decibels or pitch. The things she said were just plain loud. Nearly thirty percent of my responses whenever she talked to me consisted of, “You’re loud.”

If Japan had a national team for obnoxious loudmouths, I was certain she would make the roster. And if she somehow didn’t, I would personally recommend her with everything I had.

Kagari swung her ponytail wildly from side to side.

“Hey, hey, Roku-kun, my hair’s gotten longer, right?”

“I genuinely could not care less.”

“Huh!? That pisses me off! Take this—ponytail slap!”

She approached with a light step, spun around, and whipped her head. The bundle of her ponytail smacked my left cheek.

It didn’t hurt at all, but it irritated me beyond belief. What was this?

“And now, a normal slap!”

“Like I’d let you.”

I easily caught her right hand. She probably hadn’t seriously intended to slap me with it anyway. It had been ridiculously slow.

“Hey… seriously, just take us to the house. I’m so tired I feel like I’m going to collapse.”

“I feel great.”

“I’m gonna knock you flying.”

“Ah! This guy just told a girl, ‘I’m gonna knock you flying!’ Hey, don’t you think he’s awful, Yūha-chan?”

“Um…”

Yūha looked utterly troubled. She glanced at me as though asking me to do something, but sorry. As you can see, Kagari was an even worse monster than Keiji Nitta.

“Hey, Kagari. I’ll deal with you, so at least let Yūha rest first.”

“Fair enough. Come on, you two. Grandma made dinner and she’s waiting for us.”

Apparently, I wasn’t getting away from her either. This was exhausting from day one.

We followed Kagari as she led us onto the property belonging to her grandmother. It was too dark to see clearly, but the house was a fairly large single-story home, old and impressively built.

“It looks kind of amazing.”

“Yeah.”

I agreed with Yūha’s low-IQ assessment. Compared to the apartment we lived in, this was literally on another level.

Kagari slid open the front door and called out, “I’m home!” as she entered.

““Excuse us.””

Yūha and I followed her inside.

There was a stone-floored entryway and a long wooden corridor. The living room was immediately to the left, while the kitchen and dining room were at the far end. The private rooms lay farther down branching hallways.

I had lived in this house when I came here two years ago. The scent of the mosquito coil drifting past my nose stirred up a sense of nostalgia.

“Roku-kun, leave your luggage in the living room and come to the dining room. You don’t need me to show you around the house, right?”

“Yeah. Honestly, I didn’t even need you to show me the way here.”

“This guy always has to add one unnecessary comment.”

Still muttering, Kagari headed to the kitchen ahead of us.

Left behind, Yūha and I took off our shoes and entered the living room near the entrance. Yūha blinked several times at the sight of a proper tatami room, something rarely seen these days.

“Hey, Rokurō.”

“Hmm?”

“Is this what a grandma’s house feels like?”

“Maybe.”

“I’ve never been somewhere like this before, so why does it feel nostalgic?”

“It’s probably one of those primal landscapes people carry inside them. Like an image of what ‘home’ is supposed to look like.”

The smell of mosquito coil, the distant chorus of insects, the cool breeze passing through the screen door. Everything felt somehow different from the town where we normally lived.

After putting down her luggage, Yūha stared off into the distance.

She had never met her grandparents. Because she had been born from an affair, they had kept their distance from her. Of course, she didn’t know that.

Ever since she was old enough to understand, she had been told, “Your grandparents have already passed away. Your father and mother are both only children, so you don’t have any cousins either.”

…Though as someone whose life had begun with being adopted, I had never had anything like that in the first place.

I hoped her experiences in this village might help fill that empty space inside her.

“Let’s go to the dining room. We need to greet Fuzuki-san.”

“Fuzuki-san?”

“Kagari’s grandmother. She owns this house.”

“She was born in July, then.”

“You got that right?”

“We learned it at school.”

Naming someone after the month they were born in was a fairly common convention. Fuzuki was the traditional name for the seventh month, so Yūha was correct.

We left the living room and headed farther down the corridor. Passing through a noren curtain, we were greeted by the warm aroma of Japanese food.

Fuzuki-san was standing by the sink. She was a small, adorable old woman with beautiful white hair. She turned around, lifted her reading glasses, and spoke in a gentle voice.

“My, my, Roku-chan. You’ve grown so much.”

“Believe it or not, I haven’t grown even a single millimeter.”

“Oh, really? You looked bigger to me.”

“It’s been a while, Fuzuki-san. I’m glad you’re doing well.”

“Yes, it has been a while.”

After washing her hands and drying them with a towel, Fuzuki-san walked over to us. Kagari had taken over the cooking behind her.

“Is this your little sister?”

“Yes! I’m Yūha Sanjō. Thank you for having me.”

Fuzuki-san brought her face closer to Yūha’s and narrowed her eyes.

“You two don’t look very much alike. But somehow… I can still tell you’re Roku-chan’s family.”

“People tell us we don’t look alike quite often.”

“That’s perfectly fine. Appearance doesn’t matter all that much. Family, you see, is about the heart.”

“Is that so?”

Yūha’s expression tightened slightly as she answered.

I wanted to avoid the topic of family if possible too, so I joined the conversation.

“Fuzuki-san, can I use the same room as last time? There are two of us this time, so it’d help if we could borrow another room too.”

“The room next to it, separated by a sliding partition, is empty. Use it however you like.”

“Thanks. That helps a lot.”

“Don’t mention it. I’m happy the house will be livelier too. Right, Misuzu?”

“Of course!”

Still facing away from us, Kagari agreed as her ponytail smacked against her back.

Come to think of it, wasn’t she already twenty? I was one school year above her, but in terms of age, we were basically the same. It felt incredibly strange.

“Now, you two sit down. You must be exhausted today, so eat dinner, take a bath, and get some proper rest.”

“Roku-kun is going to talk with me.”

“No, Misuzu. Roku-chan looks extremely unhappy about that.”

Apparently, my desperate use of every facial muscle had worked, because Fuzuki-san rescued me.

She was a lifesaver.

“You’ll have time tomorrow, right? Let me rest today.”

“Fine, fine.”

I pumped my fist internally.

Kagari obviously wanted to consult me about something called the Snake Husk Festival. I didn’t mind listening, but if she expected me to actually think hard about it, today was impossible.

“Now, let’s eat. I made plenty, so both of you eat as much as you like.”

Faced with a spread of Japanese dishes arranged on large platters and small bowls like something from an inn, Yūha quietly asked me,

“There’s this much because it’s a welcome dinner today, right?”

“No. It’s this much every day.”

“I’m going to gain weight…”

“Then we’ll work enough to burn it off.”

“Okay.”

It all looked delicious, but perhaps that was exactly why she was worried.

Girls were complicated.