JPOP Housemaid

Chapter 9 - Picture perfect

I threw the egg in the air and caught it behind my back.

"Ohh, the famous, the fabulous Kimiko gets the egg in the hand, I repeat, the egg in the hand!" I yelled, dancing around. I cracked it and let it drip onto the dusty flour I found after searching around. Fishing out some shell, I squinted at the recipe.

"Now, you're going to want to add in your sugar," I said, putting on a robotic tone like some cooking-show presenters. I threw some sugar on top of my mixture, roughly guessing the amount. "Then add in the other ingredients, it doesn't matter if you forget something, I personally just like to sprinkle it on top after cooking."

Turning around to the oven, I wiped my dirty hands on a towel I had wrapped around my waist and poured my mixture into a cake-tin.

"Lucky I know how to work ovens after my time spent in the army, if you are without an oven you can always cook your cake on an open fire but sometimes you get an unwanted smokey taste," I drawled, lazily flicking a strand of my blonde-brown hair out of my face which came out of my bobble. Oh no, I'm like Yaito with this attitude! I realised, slightly horrified.

Shoving the cake in the heated oven, I turned and peeked into the fridge as if the magical fridge fairies had restocked it with nice things. They hadn't. Do your job right, fridge fairies. You only have one.

"Some minutes to go, then my creation will be marginally more edible than before." I clapped my hands and looked back at the list Isei had given me. "Okay, so far I've made dinner," I looked at the delivery number written on my hand. "Check." I crossed it out on the list and continued. "I've cleaned up the kitchen," I looked sheepishly at the messy counters and shrugged. "I cleaned it and then uncleaned it. Oh well. Check!" I crossed that one off too.

"Hoover the stairs... That's easy enough, I know where the hoover is from searching the kitchen for ingredients. Let's roll; chicken roll." I paused. "That rhymes if you have imagination."

~

Twenty minutes later I was singing along to music, my earphones in and blocking out the obnoxious sound of the vacuum cleaner. Even I'm shocking myself, I thought as I heaved the hoover up another step. I'm actually cleaning something - wow.

I shook my hips and pretended the hoover loved me.

"But darling I can't stay!" I cried, getting down on my knees and using the hand-held sucker of the vacuum cleaner. "I know you want, ah - me-e-e-e-aaayyy, so tell me, yeah tell me, umshk umshk," I head banged to the instrumental. More hair fell out from my messy bun but I let it frame my face, one strand even almost getting sucked into the hoover.

Before I even know it myself, I had hoovered the steps and now was lost as what to do.

"I guess Isei didn't plan for this situation," I said, pulling out my earphones. I stood at the top of the stairs, looking down them and admiring my efforts.

After putting away the hoover, I checked my cake.

"Looks ready," I guessed, slightly annoyed that I couldn't find something good to poke into the middle to check if it was cooked through. I yanked on oven mittens and pulled out the golden-brown cake, almost dropping it after banging it on the oven-shelf. It's probably poisonous anyway; doesn't matter if it falls on the floor.

I looked at the time.

4:27 pm

I groaned. So little time left of freedom. Sighing, I left the cake to stand and walked out into the lounge. I still have time to explore the house I guess, I decided with a steely demeanour. Walking up the staircase, I realised how little the hoovering actually did. It was clean anyway, so why did Isei want me to waste time hoovering it? I smirked - probably to stop me exploring. Too late, mate. That rhymed too. I'm on a rhyming spree today.