Chapter 9:

The Pillowest of Cats

Why Get One Girlfriend if You Could Have ̶F̶i̶v̶e̶ ̶F̶o̶u̶r̶ ... Three?


Right in the middle of a bedroom with two beds, one on either side, in the home of someone who up until a few days ago had been a total stranger, Aito found his own sister sitting tied to a single wooden chair positioned on top of a round carpet with a perfectly symmetrical floral pattern, right in the middle of the room and at least a metre away from any other piece of furniture. Maybe not too odd if the upper half of the sister in question hadn’t been tied to the chair using thick rope.

But she had been.

“Sana?”

Sana — Aito’s sister — looked up at Aito upon hearing his voice. Another girl stood behind her, and looked to be about the same age, with an appearance eerily similar to Yuki except smaller in stature and dressed differently. She wore an outfit that hid most of her features yet had a distinct tint of femininity through the headband she wore and the way she wore her hair and the fact that she wore a skirt.

The girl in question paid no mind to Aito, but looked towards the space behind him and saluted.

“I’ve kept watch over the hostage while you were away!”

Aito gave Yuki, now standing behind him, one rather pointed look before turning his attention back to the object in the middle of the room.

“Sana, what are you doing?”

“I’m being a hostage.”

“Yeah, I can see that, but why? Did that other girl promise you something in return, or…”

“Ah, no. You’re getting the wrong idea. I wanted to do this. For… practice.”

“Great. If you’re done now, why don’t you come with me back home. Not now, but when I’ll leave. Not leaving now, I’m definitely not leaving now, alright? Just in case I mistakenly gave someone that impression.”

“Sure. As long as you can wait until I’m done being tied up.”

“Couldn’t we just, you know, untie you now?”

“What? No! We can’t do that. It would ruin the immersion.”

Aito felt a tap on his shoulder from behind, making him flinch as his focus on trying to get a grip on the somewhat bizarre situation before him broke.

“Aito, can I ask you something?”

“What is it, Yuki?”

“How come you’re not acting concerned about this whole situation, Aito? Seeing your sister tied up in a stranger’s room?”

“Oh, that’s all? Well, then that’s easy. First of all, you aren’t strangers. I've spent at least a few hours together with you. I do have to admit that I only met your little sister for the first time just now and this kind of thing might not lend itself to giving the best of first impressions, but I can assure you that I do not judge a situation by appearances and thus I’m sure there are good reasons for all of this. Secondly, only her arms are tied up so Sana could get up and walk away together with the chair if she wanted to, making her the one to commit a crime by stealing and not you by kidnapping. And finally, there’s no way you guys would kidnap someone or my sister would let herself be kidnapped by you two. She’s better than that.”

“How do you get good at not getting kidnapped?”

“I don’t know, practice?”

“I guess I did overhear something about wanting to do whatever it is they’re doing for practice for something. I guess you must be doing this kind of thing with her all the time then? Aito?”

“No! Just FYI for the rest of you, I have absolutely no idea what she’s talking about so you’d better not get any weird misunderstandings from this, alright?”

“I will take you at your word and make sure my misunderstandings are entirely of the normal sort, don’t worry.”

“Seems like we’ve come to an understanding of sorts. But Yuki, never mind me, are you just ok with this? No concerns on your part or anything?”

“I do have some doubts about this situation myself too, actually.”


“Thank god, because I was starting to think I was the only one. Elaborate, please.”

"I don't know if you're staring at my little sister because she's your type or because you find her an object of curiosity, but I feel like you’ve been starting a little bit too long for me to consider it quite reasonable and not just, you know, creepy.”

“I can assure you I’m staring in a decidedly non-creepy way, and if any weird thoughts were to come of it they would also be of a non-creepy kind of weird. And Yuki, is it just me or are you acting a lot more confident compared to earlier today? I don’t feel like you would have said something like that to me a few hours ago.”

"I don’t think it’s just you. I think I’m a bit braver now too. I’ve gotten to know you a little bit better, and I feel more confident at home. There's also no other people here. No witnesses in case I want to kill you. None that count, at least."

“Yuki, whatever secrets you think I might have seen, I promise I won’t tell anyone.”

"That was a joke. At least an attempt at one. A bad one, I admit, but at least I tried. Do I really look like the type of person that could do something like that, even if I wanted to? Definitely not with my bare hands, and there isn't even anything that remotely resembles a weapon in here."

Yuki paused for a quick glance aside at a rather heavy-looking box at the corner of the room.

"Correction, nothing weapony I could reasonably lift."

“Maybe if you get help from your sister?”

"Ah, yes, you're saying that me and my sister will painstakingly lift something that weighs more than the two of us combined off the ground, wobble over to where you're sitting one slow step at a time, hope we don't have to take a break and put it down before we get there, all while you wait for us to kill you with extreme tardiness. Do you know how heavy that thing is?"

“What’s even in it?”

“Let me be your girlfriend for long enough and you just might find out? I think? But for now? Not saying.”

Somewhat because he didn’t want to delve deeper into something that Yuki clearly didn’t want to say, and somewhat because she seemed just as unsure herself, Aito chose to table the matter for now, even if some curiosity remained regarding the possible contents and suspicious weight of the box in question.

Aito didn’t have much further time to think about it before his sister distracted him from his previous conversation by calling out to him.

“By the way, brother… Aito! How did your date go?”

“I think you can tell most of it just from what you overheard just now.”

“Sounds like it went a lot better than your last date. I’m happy for you.”

“Well, I did some studying to prepare for this one after the spectacular failure that was my previous date.”

“Ah, so that’s what you were doing when I saw you… umm… actually, let’s just drop that for now.”

“Wait, Sana, you saw me?”

“I mean, yeah? You were in the middle of the kitchen, so”

“I suppose that makes sense. I will choose to address that topic later though, when we’re at home and there aren’t as many other people around to hear. Now, could someone explain this whole thing to me, straight from the beginning in a way that makes sense even to the most stupid of idiots, without phrasing it in a way that will leave everyone here with any weird assumptions, at least provided those weird assumptions won’t be to my benefit?”

“I think we pretty much told you everything you need to know already? I wanted to know what being held hostage would feel like so I called my friend here and she agreed to help me.”

“Would you mind enlightening me as to where this mysterious desire to be held hostage came from?”

“I felt like it.”

“Surely there must be more to it than that?”

“Why did you decide to date five different people, then?”

“I felt like it.”

“See? We’re the same. I’m living up to your example.”

“I’d argue dating a bunch of girls and wanting to be tied to a chair are slightly different in levels of both scope and ambition.”

“Now that I think about it, I suppose that holds true. I will just have to follow your example more literally then and prove I am a worthy inheritor of your mission. Fear not, for I too will prove myself perfectly capable of dating four girls and one guy.”

“You don’t exactly sound convincing.”

“So you may think, but I assure you that I’d be able to fool more people than you think. I agree though. I can’t make myself talk like that and still sound genuine, even when I really do mean what I am saying.”

“Then why do it?”

“I tried reading one of your books and it was written in that style and I thought it seemed fun and I thought it would maybe seem kind of cool or at least funny if I could pull it off well. Clearly I did not. It’s not really my style, is it?”

“I don’t know, maybe with some practice?”

“Guys, how long am I going to have to stand here and listen to the two of you talk?”

A jab from Yuki’s sister interrupted Aito’s conversation with his own, with Yuki soon chiming in as well.

“My sister has a point. I don’t know about her, but personally I guess I’ll just make myself comfortable.”

Yuki went over to one of the beds at the sides of the room and threw aside a pillow that had been lying in the middle of it, a gesture notable enough to draw Aito’s attention away from the conversation with his sister.

"Why throw the pillow on the floor?”

Yuki grabbed it from the floor and held it up in front of her with both hands in response.

"Look at this.”

“I’m looking. It’s a pillow. Roughly modelled after a cat’s head, as far as I can tell. And for some reason it has this weird smirky expression on its face.”

"Yeah! You get it. See that smirk? It just looks so arrogant. So I throw it on the floor sometimes so it won't think too highly of itself. And it's also a bit scary, so there's also how throwing it on the floor means I don't have to look at it."

“That’s kind of cute, actually.”

While he had intended to lay on the flattery harder, Aito soon once again found himself pulled out of one conversation and into another, this time addressed by Yuki’s sister still standing behind the chair Sana sat on.

“Aito? That’s your name, right?”

“Last time I checked, yeah. I can look again if you want me to make sure though.”

“Huh?”

“Oh, you want me to check again? Alright, just give me a minute.”

“Wait, no, I don’t need you to recheck your own identity. You can do that later if you still feel the need to, I guess… I don’t even want to imagine why the hell you even felt that was necessary in the first place. Let’s set that aside for a moment. Yeah, let’s… let’s do exactly that and talk about something else. You see, there’s this thing I’m just dying to know.”

“Koike Aito, renown saver of lives, at your service.”

“That conversation you had with my sister just now? Have you two been like that, like, all day? Or only just now?”

“I’d like to think we spent most of the rest of the day in approximately the same manner. Probably? I can’t really tell myself either.”

“Seriously?”

“Is there a problem with that?”

“Of course there is! It’s just so, so… so flirty.”

“It was?”

“You didn’t realise either?”

“I don’t know if this is a good time to interrupt, but I didn’t notice anything out of the ordinary about our interactions so far either.”

“You too? You’re idiots, both of you.”

“Hey, I may not always be the best at some things, but I’m still your sister. No need to be rude. I think? Anyone else want to chime in on my potential for stupidity?”

Yuki’s sister - her name still unknown to Aito - raised her hand where she stood at the back of the room, before starting to speak with her attention directed back at Aito again. .

“Aito, if that’s your name. If you’re clueless to realise the chemistry that’s already there, maybe I should take her for a date instead. I’m confident I couldn’t do worse.”

"You're her sister."

"Yeah, but you're an asshole."

"Good point."

"You're willing to admit it?"

"I'm not smart enough to think of any way of making things better. So yeah. You're not even the first person to tell me that this week. Quite a blow to the ego, isn't it?"

Aito accompanied his statement by a sigh and slumped shoulders for increased effect. Taken aback by the sudden honesty, Yuki’s sister let up on her previous somewhat antagonistic attitude.

"Sorry, I've been feeling frustrated a lot lately. I don't want to, but I end up lashing out at people that haven't done anything, yet."

“Don’t worry, I can take it… I would appreciate any advice you may have on avoiding making you irritated in the future though.”

"Hmm, yeah. That’s probably going to happen, isn’t it? Something tells me you're the type of person that will do something worth getting mad at."

"Any advice for when I do?"

"Just own up to it and apologise and I won't stay mad forever."

Just as he suspected he may actually get to finishing discussing one topic before being forced into a discussion of a different one with a different person, Yuki called out from where she sat on a bed on one of the sides of the room.

“Hey! Everyone!”

This, suffice to say, caught the attention of both the person literally caught where she sat and the two with more freedom in their mobility.

“I tried to say this before and got interrupted, so please actually listen this time, alright? You can continue squabbling or falling in love or whatever it is you’re doing later, but before that I want to ask something. It’s getting kind of late, so I… have a proposal.”

muishiki
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Koyomi
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