What would she have done if I hadn't come?

"Konoha, hurry...my stomach is collapsing in on itself."

A gurgling noise from her stomach followed her feeble voice.

I pulled out one page I had just finished writing and held it out to her.

"I'm not done yet, but here. I picked some appropriate prompts before I started. You can't complain, no matter what it tastes like."

"Thank yooooooooou."

Tohko took it in both hands and promptly sat up on the bed. She read it voraciously, tearing off edges and taking bites.

"Y-yummm."

She closed her eyes and whispered with a face totally at peace, then started in crinkling again dreamily.

"It's like clam chowder with plenty of clams and bacon in it. It has the taste of sweet milk. A kidnapped girl makes friends with her kidnapper and goes to visit her estranged mother, right? And the two of them get on a hot-air balloon. Ahhhhh, I can feel it seeping into the walls of my stomach, so waaaaaarm..."

Well, five-alarm spices dumped onto an empty stomach would've been too harsh.

Even so, as I wrote the second page, I murmured matter-of-factly, "That's because the prompts are 'kidnapping,' 'hot-air balloon'...and 'destruction.'"

The piece of paper Tohko had been trying to swallow caught in her throat, and she started coughing.

"No! Konoha, why would you go and make this fantastic soup spicy or bitter?! I like it the way it is."

I ignored her, beginning to tremble in terror at the thought of whatever horrible flavor it was going to transform into and kept on writing briskly.

In fact, there was going to be a sickly sweet resolution where the evil spirit of the criminal who'd plotted to make money with the kidnapping was destroyed, but I wanted Tohko to get a fit retribution for summoning me into the mountains out of the blue.

I saw her eyebrows knit together, and she shook with fear, which made me feel a little better.

The suspicious behavior of the household bothered me, but if I prodded at it ineptly and Tohko stuck her nose into something strange again, it would just come back to bite me, so I'd stay quiet.

The next day, Tohko was engulfed in a huge amount of lace, like a French doll.

Her hair was loose again and hanging down her back.

There was lace at her collar, lace on her sleeves, lace on her skirt, and even the bonnet on her head was frills and lace all over.

"See that, Tohko? Konoha's here now, so try to be a little nicer."

From behind the canvas, Maki admonished Tohko, who was hugging the back of a chair and sulking.

I had been at the window listening to their conversation, disgusted.

"The hat is too heavy. It's giving me a headache. And the corset is laced too tight."

"Then why don't we have Konoha loosen the laces on your back? And really, I wouldn't mind if you went from there and took it all off."

"Wh-what are you suggesting?! I'm a modest and virtuous book girl, unlike you."

"My, my. And which book girl was it who decided to show up in a slip in front of Konoha?"

She brought up how Tohko had stripped right down to the limit before in exchange for information, and she grinned.

"I was surprised actually. I wondered if you'd purposely brought Konoha along because you wanted to show him how flat your chest was."

It was true...covered in her bra and slip, Tohko's chest had been pitifully flat.

"M-my chest doesn't have anything to do with it! Just because you're a little bit bigger, don't get a big head about it. And the reason I had Konoha there was because I didn't know what you would do once I took my clothes off if I was alone with you!"

"True. If it had just been the two of us, I might have lost all reason and attacked you."

"There! You've revealed your true intentions! I'm serious. I'm normal! I'm not going to reveal my naked body to someone who looks at me so creepily."

"Oh no. I should have kept my intentions hidden and then made my advances on you."

"Impossible. Your eyes have been hounding me ever since you first spotted me at the welcoming ceremony at school."

"That's because I fell in love with you at first sight. Ah, I thought, I wish I could get her uniform off and draw every detail of her in her natural state."

"Any high school girl who thinks like that first thing is messed up! It's not demure! It's not love. It's weird! It's perverse!"

My head started to hurt and I stood up.

"Konoha, where are you going? Stay."

"This has nothing to do with me."

If I kept listening to them talk, it would probably warp my view of women.

"Konoha, no! Don't leave me with this pervert!"

Tohko's shriek met my back as I left the room.

For crying out loud.

Feeling a faint fatigue, I descended the stairs and went out to the garden. The grass and branches of the trees grew freely, and weeds were growing in the flower beds. It looked as if the garden wasn't tended very often...Why was Maki staying at this villa? It would be hard to call it comfortable. Even though she could've been living it up with a high-end hotel for her house. And things had been unnatural in the first place, given how Takamizawa was talking.

I decided to head over to the stone shrine Uotani had been praying at the day before. This little shrine didn't mesh with the Western style of the mansion, either. What was it memorializing?

Huh?

I got an uncomfortable feeling on my back and turned around. There was no one there.

But the buzzing feeling didn't go away. When I stared intently at the building I'd just exited, I noticed something odd.

The roof, the color scheme, and the window frames on the right half of the mansion were subtly different from those on the left half.

It had been dim the day before so I hadn't noticed. It was unbalanced, like clothes sewn with different buttons on either side.

Why, I wonder...?

Suddenly a dog ran toward me, baying.

Ack! It was back! Apparently the shepherd named Baron was left loose on the grounds as a guard dog. Even if he was well trained, a dog that big was dangerous.

Baron was looking at me with his coal-black eyes and barking wildly. It seemed as if he would come leaping at me any second, and I retreated in a panic. As I was wandering near a storage shed at the back of the house, I caught the sound of a strange song.

A snake is in the swamp there.

Rich old spirit's little girl Get you up and set a trap A bead of water 'pon her neck, Golden shoes upon her feet, Call me this and call me that To the mountain or the field, go, go, go...

What was this song...?

When I peeked behind the shed, Uotani was sitting under a large tree, leaning back against its trunk.

She was hugging an old ball covered in faded scarlet thread to her chest protectively, as if cradling a baby, her eyes closed, her lips moving ever so slightly.

A snake is in the swamp there, in the swamp there.

The interlaced tree branches cast dark shadows over her tiny face.

Her voice, too, was desolate, as if she was weeping.

I stood there, knowing I should leave but unable to, and Uotani noticed me. She tightened her grip around the scarlet ball and glared at me coldly.

"I'm on my break. Can I help you?"

"Sorry. Baron was barking at me, so I came this way, and then I heard a voice..."

At that, Uotani started and pointedly asked me, "Did you try to leave the grounds?"

"Well...I thought I might go for a walk..."

"You should give up on that idea."

"Huh?"

"There's a pond out there. It's dangerous."

"A pond?"

I was confused as to why she was mentioning ponds all of a sudden. Uotani fixed me with a piercing stare and went on.

"Yes. It's very deep, and if you sink in, you'll get tangled up in the weeds and be totally unable to resurface. People have died in the pond. So please stay in the house."

Why was she giving me such a tense, grim look? It was as though she was warning me that if I left the estate, I was guaranteed to fall into the pond.

A sudden chill went down my spine, and I broke out in a sweat.

"Okay. The wind is picking up, so I'll go back to my room."

When I told her that, Uotani's gaze slid away.

"I'll bring you some tea soon."

"Thanks. Some cold tea would be great."

With a bow, Uotani left; I watched her go, bathed in the assault of the summer sun. The scarlet ball she hugged to her chest looked like a bouquet of spider lilies taken to a grave.

When I first caught sight of her, I thought she was like a flower.

The cool wind gently rustled the ends of her silky hair and the hem of her skirt. The air around her was the only thing that felt peaceful and kind, that looked totally different from everything else around it.

I wonder how long I gaped at her that day.

Standing rooted to the spot, as if time had come to a halt.

When she barely lifted her long lashes and our eyes met, I thought my heart would stop.

Her cheeks colored a faint crimson, and immediately after she broke into a gentle smile. I watched it happen, feeling as if I was in a strange dream.

I believe that I've been dreaming ever since.

This mansion really is odd.

A lot of time went by while I was shut up in my room writing Tohko's improv story for lunch, thinking over various things.

When it was almost noon, Tohko appeared with a sullen frown on her face.

"You're terrible, Konoha, turning your back on your president. How much do you think Maki sexually harassed me after you left? You're gonna payyyyy."

"That really makes you sound like a goblin."

"Urk...I-I'm not a goblin."

She was whining, but when I held the story out to her, her attitude instantly improved, and she started eating joyously.

"This is sooo good. It tastes like a freshly fried croquette sandwich! The prompts are 'a camel,' 'memorial,' and 'summer vacation,' huh? What a cute story. Even the bread is lightly toasted and crunchy. I forgive you for calling me a goblin. I'm so glad you came, Konoha!"

You're sure in a better mood...

"Mmph-mmph. I have to eat fast, or Maki's gonna come and call me for lunch."

"Wouldn't it be better for your digestion to eat afterward, slowly?"