Stones and Glass Houses

Author’s note: Japanese pumpkin has the color and consistency of butternut squash but with much more meat like the North American orange variety.

Koharu rubs her bruised posterior gingerly, wincing from the contact, then takes a sip of her coffee kindly supplied by her new roommate. It’s a plain black coffee with a drip of sugar syrup and a drop of cream. A smirk stretches a side of her lips while remembering her superior easy coffee skills, a long purple tail swishes back and forth.

Charlotte is unimpressed by the kitty girl seated beside her who seems to be in another world and smirking to herself. A dainty sip is taken from her special mai mug, an expensive handmade regional mug navy in color featuring cute little white snow bunnies dancing to the moon. “Are you enjoying the coffee?”

The cat is brought back to reality with a jolt. “Yeah, it’s good.” She lies.
Koharu looks around the inner house.

Both women sit at a wooden dining table fit for 6 located on the left central side of the house in an open dining room partitioned by 4 fusuma sliding doors. In the corner sits a cabinet containing dishes and utensils. From the dining room the kitchen can be viewed in the left corner of the house with an exit to the wood porch overlooking the garden. There is a big toaster oven, rice cooker, 2 pad heating element, and finally a wood cabinet topped with a metal sink with extending metal section for drying dishes and food preparation.

Within the dining room the fusuma are doubled on each side to allow an open air view to a large living room containing a large kotatsu heating table with beanbag chairs around it, a short height couch, and television sitting on a small entertainment center.
The 2nd floor loft overlooks the living room with staircase on the right side.
The stairs begin at the right corner of the house with the tv in front of the wooden staircase, itself being a storage closet.

“So, about your duties..” Charlotte takes another sip. The purple cat counts off her fingers. “Cooking, cleaning, gardening, grocery shopping, laundry..”
A la perla hand suddenly interjects. “Just towels.”
Koha nods, thinking of undies flapping in the breeze like flags. 

“Can you cook?” Asks the rabbit girl quizzically.

The cat girl abruptly stands, arms crossed. “Not only can I cook but a good variety too!” She grins confidently.
“Egg toast, fried chicken karage, cream stew, meatloaf, pumpkin kabucha curry, kabucha soup, kabucha salad, kabucha tempura, kabucha koroke croquettes..”
Charlotte places her thumb and forefinger to her chin. “That’s a lot of pumpkin.”

Koharu washes off their mugs and places them on the drying rack.
“I suppose we’re going shopping next?” Charlotte disappears and returns with an old t-shirt and shorts. “Let’s get you something new to wear.”

Once again the duo takes to the streets in order to obtain garments for our violet haired woman. It’s a beautiful, sunny day and yet again our hero is stunned by the differences between here and the home she knows. Stepping out into the tiny one-way street is a familiar row of buildings however that familiarity ends here.
Instead of black concrete the street is made up of white solar panel plating which pulsates a gradient of colors whenever a vehicle putters across.
Vehicles themselves are of the same material plating and seem to change color to the whim of the driver while brandishing squishy yet solid tires of many different colors from aqua to blush.

Businesses and homes near the dorm are a mishmash of traditional machiya, modern(?) and futuristic style. The futuristic buildings make use of the same plating as on the cars and roads but on a larger scale and structured into a polygonal design. Some of these places stick with a plain white palette but others go as far as to emulate brushed metal. Even the machiya and modern-y homes have some sort of a waterproof material sprayed upon them to maintain a spotless appearance and reduce corrosion. Rooftops are covered in lush greenery and colorful vine flowers from henry ivory to wisteria, likely to combat the heat island effect.

Following the rabbit along the busy street, a shotengai shopping arcade is found just ahead, however, this shotengai is rather different than what Koharu is used to.
“Wow it’s so clean and sharp.” ‘Usually these shopping arcade districts are crusty and falling apart..’ but instead of a line of struggling shops, one can see a variety of lively stores with pretty, quaint displays. Two cafes, butchers, fish monger, rice shop, cookware, greens grocer, bakery, patisserie, fruit stand, candy shop, kids clothing, teens clothing, adults clothing, special occasion clothing, and more are what can be found in view. Charlotte drags Koha towards the adults clothing shop and they both enter past the entrance bellowing compressed air downwards.

This kitty girl is mesmerized by the many styles of clothing. “Like a mall in here.”
The rabbit busily sifts through clothes as though it were any other normal day.
Oddly, however, there’s only one size and specifically one item per style.
“Hey, how do I try on something?” The brunnera haired woman stops and squints her eyes, thinking. “Do you not have a phone?” A weird piece of plastic is suddenly brandished being of two peach colored symmetrical mirrored hands-length handles at the width of a centimeter brought together with small buttons on the top edge. Koharu has never seen such a phone before.
“Nu-uh.” She actually left her phone at home back in the nowhere-near-here place.
Charlotte pulls the handles apart without a sound and a hologram display pops to life. Within the display a little chibi bunny moves around and speech bubbles ask if it should look for the weather. Koharu’s stomach drops, her hands sweat and fingers jitter around the amazing device.
“Sweet Jesus, what the-“ the remainder of her sentence fails to be uttered. The rabbit girl is visibly perplexed that the other person has never seen a “phone” before, then sighs. “That should come first, I’ll prorate it from your pay since you need a phone to make purchases and communicate.”

Koha happily skips back to the clothing store, shiny new device in hand.
She chose a pink color and already customized the helper character to be a chibi cat.
Apparently it can play music, check emails, shop online, and even translate!
Now that shopping has once again commenced this violet haired woman can now try on clothes by scanning the codes and picking up her size from the register.
A few good outfits were found such as a mixed blue peplum blouse with blue-grey scalloped shorts, a pink hooded jumper dress, a polka dotted white babydoll pajama set, and also regular t-shirts and pants.

Koharu inspects a huge variety of underwear. “Charlotte what do you think about..”
Upon looking up it is noticed that the brunnera bunny was staring intensely while holding a sexy pair of black thin lace panties over her shorts. They have a beautiful rose design embroidered in silk. Her gaze is noticed.

The panties were quickly dropped and a more standardized everyday pair was now being held up in the air. The cat awkwardly turns around and coughs like nothing happened and rifles through more undies. She settles on a multicolor pack with a variety of cute designs like stripes, polka dots, and paw prints.

Charlotte declines to judge her childish choice of underwear.

----ENDCH2

Don't judge my taste ok.