The Aftermath
Hitori felt mentally drained after that whole debacle. As Hitori entered her world of anxiety, Kita ran downstairs to get her father who was very worried when he was told his daughter had turned into a gloopy mess all over her bedroom floor. Once he came upstairs and saw that Hitori was having a mental breakdown, he just told Kita to go home for the day and tried to get his daughter to calm down to almost no avail. Then that’s when Nijika made it over.
Hitori changed, tried her best to cool it, and maintain her somewhat calm mask in front of her. Hitori just barely made it longer than the hour that she was over. Apparently, Nijika’s maid had given an excuse to why she couldn’t come today, apparently the death of a pet, and rescheduled her first day to sometime next week. Hitori was thanking the heavens through the storm of thoughts she had that she didn’t have to meet two strangers in one day.
After all that had happened, Hitori stripped her uniform off, not even bothering to put her tracksuit back on, and immediately shut down. There was no dream that came that night, just a listless slumber that didn’t help her exhaustion at all.
-
The next day played out almost the exact same excluding Nijika trying to come over. Hitori was left with a little more energy when she got home rather than being the dead man walking she was yesterday. Mentally, she was still worse off but her body felt a bit lighter and it managed to get her home. After arriving home, she paused outside the door leading in. Her father had another note for saying that the new maid would be coming again today so to try and maintain her composure. Hitori took a deep breath and entered, being met immediately with her maid’s beaming face.
“Welcome home, Master!”
It took everything inside of Hitori to not shield her eyes from the light that was metaphorically streaming from the face of her maid. “Thank you, Kita-san. Please come with me.” Said Hitori. Kita bowed and followed Hitori upstairs to her room, stopping outside before Hitori asked a question.
“So, Kita-san, w-were you trained?”
“What do you mean, Gotou-sama?”
“I mean, did someone tell you what this job requires you to do? And what you must do for me?”
“Yes, of course. I was told to be at your beck and call and to take care of all your personal needs.”
Hitori remained silent. She really wanted to ask her why she took this job in the first place. She seemed like she was well off and very outgoing to boot. Why would she offer to take care of someone like me? Hitori opened her door and told Kita to come in and close the door behind her. Now what? Hitori started to beat herself up in her mind. Why did she tell her to come in? What did she need her to do?
“Gotou-sama?”
“A-ah, yes?”
Hitori snapped out of it when Kita called her name and turned to the new maid. Before she could react, Kita was already on the ground in a dogeza*.
“I’m really sorry about yesterday! I didn’t mean to catch you by surprise! I contemplated for a couple minutes before knocking on your door since I saw you were practically running in there but I didn’t know that was your alone time!”
Hitori was taken aback. The last thing she expected was an apology, but she rolled with it.
“N-no, don’t worry about it. I knew that you were going to be here yesterday but was not thinking about it. I apologize for my unseemly display.”
Kita straightened her back from the pose she was in. She was sitting straight up on her feet now.
“But-“
“But please, try to forget what you saw yesterday.”
Hitori walked over to the maid, who shrunk at her shadow, and leaned over to where she was standing right next to her ear. It hurt her to talk to the obviously very sorry maid like this, but she still went for it.
“And please, don’t tell anyone. I have a reputation to uphold. I’m sure you understand, right Kita-san?”
“Y-yes master. I won’t tell a soul.”
“Good, now please stand outside my door until you are needed.”
After Hitori stood up, Kita straightened herself out, bowed and left. Not even five seconds later, Hitori collapsed on the ground, tears almost bursting from her eyes. She hated doing stuff like that, it was the one part of her training she wished she didn’t go through. Intimidation, a very important trait in her class of people, was one of the first things that was drilled into her mind when she was at the age of only five.
She did not use this trait often as she hated confrontation and did not like making people feel worse, but she felt like in order to keep the new maid silent about what she saw, she had to do it. Her tears silently started rolling down her cheek. Hitori felt more miserable than she had in a long time. She almost wanted to call out to Kita and apologize again immediately for how she was acting but opted to stay silent. Hitori had enough already. She changed into her tracksuit and immediately crawled under her covers and silently cried, hoping her new maid didn’t hate her guts.
-
“…-sama. Gotou-sama? Wake up please.”
Hitori stirred again, then immediately shot out of her covers and looked towards her window. It was pitch black. What time was it? She looked for her phone then a hand held it out for her, it was Kita. Hitori flinched but managed to mutter out a thank you and looked at the time. 9:00PM. She was confused and looked at Kita when she grabbed her hand.
“Gotou-sama. Please come with me for a second.”
Hitori gulped but allowed her maid to pull her gently out of bed and lead her to her own roof. Hitori was very confused but saw two chairs that were right in the middle which prompted Kita to let go of her hand and motion for her to take a seat. Hitori took a seat and fidgeted a bit as Kita sat down next to her.
“Gotou-sama, look up.”
Hitori listened and was surprised by what she saw. It’s crazy that she hadn’t seen the amount of stars before considering she lived here but was amazed with the view. It’s like she could see galaxies.
“Do you like the view?”
“Yes. It’s very pretty.”
Hitori mindlessly answered as she couldn’t take her eyes off the stars. Her mind felt clear for the first time in the two event filled days. It’s like she could finally process her thoughts and emotions and teared up again. She looked back at her maid who was also admiring the stars and tried to speak, but choked up. Hitori felt spurred to do something, so she uncharacteristically embraced her maid and buried herself in her shoulder.
“Gotou-sama? What’s wrong?”
“I’m sorry.”
Her tears just started flowing and she cried, full blown sobbing. Kita, taken off guard, just returned the embrace and started petting her new master. The time started to pass, and seconds turned into minutes as Hitori continued to sob. The comfort that Hitori received felt good, even if it was artificial. Fifteen minutes later, Hitori separated from Kita.
“Do you feel better, Gotou-sama?”
Hitori could only nod and look down, ashamed of how hypocritical she was. Just a couple hours prior, she was threatening Kita to stay silent about her unseemly display but now she was crying her heart out to this girl that she just met.
“Do you want to know why I brought you here? I promise I won’t keep you too long. I know you have school, but I guess I do too hehe.”
Hitori looked at her and nodded a bit harder this time.
“Well, I looked in your eyes and saw regret after you scolded me. You seemed like you had a lot on your mind and have gone through a lot lately. I was up here thinking about how I could alleviate that as your maid then it hit me, stars! It’s nice, peaceful and beautiful to boot! Maybe this will help?”
Kita took a breath and continued while looking back up at the stars.
“Then, I woke you up and brought you here. I was hoping that you would be able to calm down and ease your mind and it seemed like it worked.”
Hitori just sighed. How could this girl already have such a read on her?
“What if you were wrong though?”
Kita smiled at her. Her smile pierced Hitori’s soul.
“That was a chance that I was willing to take.”
Hitori took a deep breath, exhaled and put her mask of composure back on, still not willing to show Kita every part of her being even if the mask had already been chipped.
“Thank you, Kita-san. I’ll try and do my best as your master from now on. Please take good care of me.”
“Yes, I will do my best, Gotou-sama.”