A Firefly's Glow

Chapter Seven: Part Two

My idea seemed very imaginative and clever.

I silently cheered. If I dress up like a maid, no one will recognize that it’s me! This is a surefire plan!

But once I stepped out into the room, I was nearly trampled by a mob of screaming maids. I collapsed face first onto the floor.

I found my balance and used it on my hands and knees. I quickly crawled back towards the staircase with the marbled floor aching my knees.

“I guess standing in place and simply walking across the room won’t do.” I murmured, clutching my aching back.

I watched the maids and chauffeurs run around the house, brandishing their fists into the air. I let out a long, slumped sigh. “It can’t be helped.” I muttered, rubbing my shoulders into my hands.

I threw my hands into the air and let out a monotonous yell as I ran back out into the field of panicking maids and chauffeurs, flailing my hands around my head like a monkey.

Though once I entered that battlefield, I realized what everyone was doing.

Once I attempted to run throughout the panicking mobs, something strongly nudged me in anxiety. “Hotaru-sama has disappeared!” a maid cried.

“Uh . . .”

“Hotaru-sama has disappeared!” a chauffeur flung his arms into the air.

I noticed that every person running through the halls, rooms, and doorways of the mansion were shouting the same announcements over and over.

“Hotaru-sama has disappeared!”

“Hotaru-sama has disappeared!”

This is so creepy, I silently remarked, pausing my monotonous bellowing and wrinkling my nose in bemusement. It seemed that the word that I had escaped my room and the clutches of that hallway labyrinth had gotten around the house pretty fast.

“Excuse me, fellow maid!” a nervous voice chirped. I felt thin fingers clutch my arm.

“Um,” I began, shielding my face tightly around my shoulders. I felt my voice raise an octave. “Y-Yes? W-What is it?”

“What’s the matter? Turn to me and listen!” the maid’s anxious voice insisted as her nails tugged on my arm.”

“E-Erm . . .” I stuttered as I was forced to inch my gaze towards the maid.

“What’s the matter?” the maid repeated, wrinkling her eyebrows.

Doesn’t she recognize me? I wordlessly pondered, opening my mouth slightly ajar.

“N-Nothing,” I answered, returning my voice from its ear-piercing version.

“Have you seen Hotaru-sama?”

They don’t recognize me, after all.

“N-No,” I weakly fibbed, slowly shaking my head. “I-I’m sure she’s just happily sitting in her room.”

“That’s the problem! Her assigned maid went into her room and she wasn’t there!”

I narrowed my eyes. My assigned maid most likely referred to the mauve-toned glare of the evil maid. I silently wondered why she went into my bedroom and what she planned to do if she found me.

“O-Oh, is that so?” I asked through gritted teeth.

“Yes!”

I wandered my gaze throughout the room. The maid clutching my arms and I were the only people merely standing in place throughout the room. Everyone else was continuing to flail their arms throughout the air and scream “Hotaru-sama has disappeared!” repeatedly over and over.