~~~

Endless fields of snow, furtive kisses, less furtive gropes, Yuki performing the weakest ever handstand, her hands completely untroubled by the icy touch of the ground, all of that was wiped out in a flash by a loud knock on the wall next to the door panel.

Miho rolled off the futon and muttered, ‘thunder coming,’ before opening his eyes and remembering where he was.

Gods in a lighthouse, what time was it?

There was no light coming through the gap in the balcony panel, and there were no melodies coming from the birds stupid enough to still be outside during winter.

Another knock, this one even louder, followed by a sharp voice saying, ‘new worker guy, get up.’

Throwing on the brown yukata that Himiko had given him the previous night, he walked with a slight stagger towards the door panel. On the way, he did a quick check on Akira, saw his chest moving up and down, and thought, good, he’s still alive.

Though he still looked a bit pale.

Maybe more of that herbal tonic would help?

He slid open the door panel a tiny bit, and then let out a panicked ‘wah’ when a hand on the outside yanked it the rest of the way.

‘Took you long enough,’ said Aya, her eyes looking surprisingly alert for whatever horrible time of morning it was.

‘Sorry.’

‘But at least you’re dressed.’

‘What time is it?’ he asked, stifling half of a yawn then just letting it rip when his eyes started to water.

‘Time for work, obviously.’

‘Oh.’ He looked back into the room, even though he couldn’t physically see much inside it. ‘Do I need to bring anything?’

‘Your bag of stones,’ she replied, deadpan.

Miho opened his mouth to reply, but then turned it into another yawn when he realised there was no realistic comeback. He’d had all his coins robbed, and he still didn’t know how. Or when.

‘Come on, we’re expected in the kitchen. Chef Amo doesn’t like it when people are late.’

~~~

Aya was right, Chef Amo didn’t like it.

In fact, Chef Amo didn’t appear to like much of anything.

Within the first hour of breakfast prep, Miho had already received four clips on the ear, two kicks to the back of the calves, and one accusation of having nothing but a dead mouse and training wheel inside his skull.

It’s just like being back at home, Miho thought, remembering the abuse his father used to give him when he didn’t do something right.

Even things that weren’t his fault, like the time his father decided to balance a cup of boiling hot green tea on his stomach and it, inevitably, toppled over and spilt out over his crotch.

And now he had the same sensation, as Chef Amo was shouting at him for chopping the celery too small.

‘And don’t tell me that’s how your mother used to do it,’ he yelled, giving Miho a swift kick to the side of his calf, ‘cos I’ve heard it a thousand times before, half of those from that idiot over there.’

He stopped yelling to point at Aya, who looked up from the pan of miso soup she was stirring and smiled.

‘Hey, what are you smirking at?’ he barked, switching targets like a true professional, ‘you’re still stirring the wrong way, after I showed you four fucking times. Gods on the shitter, what is wrong with you kids?’

Marching over to the pan, he shoved Aya aside and took control of the ladle, stirring the exact same way she’d been doing it, only slower. ‘Don’t stand there like a yaya tree, go and help the new idiot chop the rest of the vegetables. Quickly, breakfast is starting in twenty minutes.’

Aya nodded and walked over to Miho, who was standing on his tiptoes, trying to see if anyone was sitting down in the breakfast room yet.

‘Don’t bother,’ she whispered, pulling him back down by the sleeve. ‘There are only five guests. And only three of them bothered to come down yesterday.’

‘Aren’t we making too much then?’ asked Miho, looking at the mass of ingredients on the counter in front.

‘It carries over to lunch in the winter season. Though he still makes us come back in the kitchen.’

‘For what?’

‘Performance. The guests need to see us looking busy. That’s what he says anyway.’

Miho looked at the chopped celery on the counter and yawned, which turned out to be a mistake.

‘Hey, idiot, stop drooling on the food,’ shouted Chef Amo, leaving the miso soup and storming back over.

‘Sorry, I was just tired.’

‘Don’t talk back, boy, just stop fucking yawning. Understand?’

Miho kept his mouth closed.

Chef muttered something inaudible to the knife rack, then turned and knocked a bowl of freshly diced ginger onto the floor. Luckily, Aya was standing nearby, so he grabbed her by the sleeve and clipped her on the side of the head.

‘Idiot girl, I spent an hour doing all that ginger, and you put it there, right on the edge of the counter. Don’t open your mouth, clear it up. Now. And put that ginger into a new bowl.’

Instead of pleading innocence, Aya bowed slightly and said, ‘yes, Chef Amo,’ though Miho did notice her left hand forming a very compact fist at the bottom of her apron.

‘And curb the clumsiness from now on,’ Chef yelled at her scalp as she bent down to pick up the ginger. ‘What are you gawping at, boy? Chop the vegetables.’

Miho didn’t form a fist, but he did frown.

‘Are you deaf? Chop. Now.’

‘I’m sorry, Chef, but that wasn’t her fault. You were the one who put the ginger bowl there. And the one who knocked it over.’

‘What are you saying?’

‘My mother always told me, there are too many dishonest people in this world, don’t add to their number.’

‘You’re babbling about your mother, in my kitchen. Gods on a goat, why am I lumbered with such fools? Where’s Sachiko and frog face?’

Chef Amo seemed to be addressing the ceiling, so Miho didn’t respond. Instead, he moved to help Aya pick up the pieces of bowl. Another mistake. The sight of comradeship among the workers made Chef Amo go even redder, and this time words weren’t enough. Grabbing the nearest thing to him, a decorative shōchū decanter, he growled like an overworked bear and launched it towards Miho’s head.

Either due to poor aim or luck, it missed, sailing an inch past his left ear and smashing into pieces as it hit the wall.

‘Gods without papers, now look what you’ve done…broken my favourite decanter. Where was your head, idiot child? Why didn’t you stay where you were?’

Miho had no idea how to respond, so instead leaned in close to Aya and whispered. ‘You put up with this every morning?’

‘I’d go back to chopping if I were you,’ she replied, eyes on the ginger.

‘But this wasn’t your fault.’

‘Doesn’t matter.’

Chef Amo bent down to assess the damage to the decanter, then glanced back and saw them chatting. Or conspiring. Just as he was about to burst into another tirade, a cough came from the kitchen entrance, trailed by a stern female voice asking what all the commotion was about.

‘Incompetent staff,’ Chef Amo replied, getting back to his feet and keeping a spotlight style glare on Miho and Aya.

‘I see,’ said Himiko, doing a scan of the mess in front of her.

‘Next time, send them to get ingredients, keep Sachiko and frog face here.’

‘Your suggestion is noted.’

Entering the kitchen properly, Himiko poured out two cups of green tea and then sipped one of them. Chef Amo seemed unsure about what to do, so he returned to the miso soup, mumbling to Aya to hurry up with that ginger as he walked past.

From that point on, things were quieter.

And almost pointless as only two guests bothered to come down for breakfast - the painter and her model from the previous day - and all they had was a bowl of soup and a cup of green tea. To share.

Chef Amo’s reaction to this was to hit the counter with the ladle then storm off outside, leaving Aya and Miho alone to clear everything up.

Pouring out two cups of green tea, Aya handed Miho one and smiled.

‘It’s over?’ he asked, finally free enough to yawn again.

She nodded, sipping her tea.

‘I don’t know if I can take a month and a half of this.’

‘You get used to it.’

‘How long have you been here?’

‘A while.’ She sipped more tea, looking at the broken pieces of the shōchū decanter still scattered on the floor. ‘I’m curious. Did you really get all your coins replaced with a bag of stones?’

Miho sipped his own tea, at first thinking of excuses, then just letting out impromptu laughter in three quick bursts.

‘What?’

‘I suppose I did.’

‘A con man?’

‘That or the purple smoke demon.’

‘Huh?’

‘A joke. To be honest, I don’t know. Last time I remember having them, the coins I mean, I was paying for a chicken bun. Which may not have been chicken.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘It was a weird colour, kind of blue and grey and…ah, doesn’t matter. After that, the only person I met was the old woman in the chair, who just said ‘ohayo’ as I walked past, and the belt salesman just outside of Kōfu. But it couldn’t have been him, he was really friendly. He even gave me a free bowl of husked rice.’

Aya stopped the cup just below her lips, staring back at Miho with an expression somewhere between pity and disbelief.

It took a moment for Miho to register it, and another moment or two, for him to interpret its meaning.

‘You think it was him?’ he asked, frowning.

‘Did he make you try on a belt?’

‘Yes. Several.’

‘And did he hold your original belt while you did that?’

‘He did.’

‘Then it was him.’

‘But he was so…’ Miho paused, his cup almost tipping over as his brain caught up. ‘Gods on other gods. I’m a fool.’

‘To an impressive degree.’

‘All my coins gone. To a trick that simple.’

Aya drank more green tea, looking at all the leftover chopped vegetables…

‘I didn’t even want a new belt.’

…and then the tea shot back out, Miho saying, ‘hey, my uniform’ as Aya bent forward and tried to stop laughing.

‘I’m sorry,’ she repeated a few times, turning the laughs into a coughing fit.

‘No need to apologise,’ replied Miho, wiping the tea from his sleeve. ‘It’s probably deserved.’

‘It is. But I need to stop laughing before Chef Amo comes back in…or he’ll throw another decanter at us.’

‘At me.’

‘Or something worse.’

‘There’s worse?’

‘The knife rack. If he’s in a really bad mood.’

Miho gave up on the tea stain and stared at the seven blades sticking out of the rack near the sink. Then sipped more tea. Aya eventually stayed crouched by the floor long enough to regain her composure, then straightened up, checking on the kitchen entrance just in case.

Why do you stay here crossed Miho’s mind several times as he watched her go back to vegetable duty, but he didn’t say it out loud. Instead, he joined her by the counter and started cutting more ginger.

She probably wouldn’t answer truthfully anyway, he thought.

Not to a stranger like him.