Nebula

prologue//new york city

UMIKO;

 

Umiko Mai was described on her report card as an awfully bright girl. Sure thing, she had her A’s when she didn’t skip school to work on the farm or when her classmates didn’t tease her about being a few years older than all of them, except that the instant she woke up and glanced at the clock on the wall, her mind deemed her as anything but awfully bright, because being twenty minutes late definitely wasn’t one of the attributes of a person described as that.

As she brushed her teeth and scrambled around the house in an attempt to find her shoes, Umiko Mai tried not to blame herself. Yes, she overslept, but that was only because she worked later than usual the day before. After all, she could actually munch on something whilst running now, and that was the price she had to pay for oversleeping.

Her boots kicked the puddles of mud as she sharply turned a corner. The rain was pouring over her small japanese town, situated in between two peaks. The cloak of darkness that enveloped the street didn’t make it too easy for her to navigate her way around. She observed the little huts around her that looked exactly like her own.

Umiko turned another corner and stopped for a moment, just to catch her breath, as she raised her hand in the air for the two strangers on the other side of the street.

Actually, they weren’t strangers at all.

The old woman with gray hair and the young, laughing girl were, respectively, her neighbour and sister.

“Suzume!” she shouted.

Her sister got up and crossed the street, as the old lady turned around and went the other way.

“Did you know her son’s in town?” Suzume asked.

“I didn’t actually,” Umiko replied, feigning disinterest. It was clear to half the population of her town that Umiko and the baker boy had something of the fling.

Except that Umiko was an awfully bright girl, and she didn’t have flings.

Actually, on second though, she might have been an awfully bright girl just on paper. She forgot to bring her umbrella, and it was pouring like the clouds were spilling their darkest and loudest sorrows. The school might have to reevaluate her.

Once they got home, Umiko opened the door and set her sister on the only chair in the house. She lit a candle and set it on the counter as she prepared to make scrambled eggs. This was quite the king’s meal that she was about to make because, to people like Umiko, even bread was queen-standart. Suzume Mai set on singing a sad japanese song, stopping at times to let her voice rest to the beat of the falling raindrops, the sizzling of the pan and the rashness of Umiko’s breath.

They waited a long time for their parents, who Suzume assumed were working, which Umiko knew they definitely weren’t doing. The eggs were already cold and Suzume was already freezing when Umiko gathered her courage and asked her sister to wait for her as she set out on searching for her parents. It wasn’t really much of a search, because she knew exactly where to find them.

Umiko Mai was described as an awfully bright girl, which is why she knew what she was about to do wasn’t awfully bright of her. The Roasted Duck, one of the most dangerous inns in her little town, was not the appropriate place for a young, beautiful girl like her. Umiko Mai, however, wasn’t afraid of men with arms that were too long. Which is exactly why she set foot in that inn.

The Roasted Duck, like the majority of inns, was a filthy place filled with even filthier people. The main attraction of this place (if you could call it that) were the roasted duck, of course, and the infamously good gamblers that stood at their table every night, in the far left corner of the main room. These gamblers, known as Itsuki Mai and Moriko Mai, weren’t as good as they were cheaters. They also happened to be Umiko and Suzume’s parents.