Unfathomable

2.

Madara:

I ran into our living area, flustered, panting.

"You're late."

"Sorry, sorry, dad!" I pantered and threw my skiing jacket off along with my goggles.

"We said twelve pm! It's one."

"I said I'm sorry."

"Unacceptable, Madara! Our guest-"

"Is probably perfectly fine on his own for an extra hour."

"He requested breakfast at twelve."

I stopped dead. "Who eats breakfast at twelve?"

"We don't ask the questions. We just do what our guests request."

"Couldn't you just have brought it yourself?"

My father pointed at the clutter on the desk in the salon. "I'm paying bills. Your mother is taking care of the other guests. Izuna is studying."

"Fine! Where is it?"

"Sonia made it in our kitchen. It's on a tray."

Still clad in my red thermal trousers and hoodie, cheeks red and flustered, I went to our kitchen to pick up the tray. It was heavy, and my stomach rumbled as I felt the smell of Sonia's pancakes with butter. My heart sang when I saw she'd made a stack that was on the counter, a note with my name on it. She knew me so well, like a grandmother that lived with us. I couldn't wait to be back to ravish them! Oh, and bring some to Izuna, too. I honestly hated it when we had special guests. They were always so full of themselves, making the strangest requests and expecting my hard-working parents to make them happen. It disgusted me, really. How they thought the world revolves around them.

I walked though the luxurious corridors with the tray, still wearing my skiing boots which made my walk enormously funny. The suite where the guest was staying was at the far end of the hotel and on the top floor whereas our living areas where on the first and second floors. It took me ten full minutes to reach it. I tentatively knocked on the door.

There was no answer.

I knocked again.

Still no answer.

"Hello?"

No way in hell I was walking back with all of this in my ski boots!

I tried the door, and to my surprise found it was open. I walked into the hallway.

It always baffled me how well-made this suite was. Our living areas were luxurious, but it was nothing, absolutely nothing, compared to this. It was more modern, with glass tables and steel utensils in the kitchen area, but mixed in with the old dark wooden floors and oriental mats and antique mirrors. The ceiling was ginormous, and there was a huge Christmas tree with red and gold glass baubles in the salon. The cost of staying here even one night was astronomical.

I walked tentatively though the vast salon with the Christmas tree. I saw the lights were on in the office area that was open to the salon.

And on the desk was a ginormous figure of a man slumped over the desk.

I walked slowly towards him. Was he dead? No, his back was softly rising and falling. He had his arms on his desk, and leaned his head in them. His long, dark brown hair, probably not much shorter than mine that reached my waist, was cascading around him and was immaculately clean and smooth, whereas mine was wild and ragged. On his desk was a clutter of pens, papers and a half-full (if you asked him) or half-empty (if you asked me) coffee mug.