I finished sweeping, ran into the inn ad helped clean the rooms. I run in and out of rooms, cleaning along with the other staff members, stopping once in a while to look out the window to look at the statue.

“Chiara, I need help in the kitchen!”

I spun around towards the voice, “Coming!” Then I took off running towards the kitchen; I worked with everyone on staff. In the kitchen, I stirred a pot of sauce while the others would grill or chop or something for the meals we need to prep for the guests’ dinner. I spent the entire afternoon and into the evening working around the inn. By the time I was “allowed” to leave the inn for the evening, I was so exhausted that I ended up wobbling outside. I’ve done so much cleaning, serving, and running in the inn for multiple people than what I would have normally would have liked to have done.

I wonder out in front of the inn, and started to make my way to the main house, the long way; mostly because I wanted to see the statue again, but also to get some fresh air. When I walked outside and went to the statue, I just had to smile. The way the moonlight looked on it, gave the appearance that the stone was glowing; like the warrior’s spirit was showing itself to me. I sat on the ground next to the base and starred up at the clear night sky.

I sat there for a few minutes, maybe an hour, before my grandmother called me into the house for the evening. I walked to the main house’s front door and looked back, and, for some reason, I felt sad to leave. Maybe it’s because of the story grandmother told me.

As I entered the house the smell of my grandmother’s cooking, hit me like a soft pillow; barbecued pork bun, sweet rice, miso soup, and grilled vegetables. She doesn’t cook like this often, but when we’re short-staffed at the inn, she’ll cook our favorites to say “thank you for all the extra work you do”.

“Smells good,” Grandfather gruffed as he entered the dining room from the downstairs bathroom. Then he makes his way to his seat at the table and sits down without saying anything else.

Grandmother laughed, and grandfather grins up at her when she places a plate of food in front of him. They’ve been together since their high school years, and still, I’m taken back at the sight of their love for each other. They were always together after high school, even going as far as to elope right after graduation; or so I’m told.

From what I’ve been told by other family members, staff at the stores we visit, and our gossipy neighbors: that they ran off and got married because grandmother was pregnant in high school, or grandmother’s family didn’t approve of grandfather, so when they eloped grandmother’s family disowned her; something along those lines. Then again, everything I’ve heard has been mostly gossip and rumors. But I never felt the need to ask grandmother and grandfather how they met, and I never asked my folks when they were alive how they met; I just didn’t see the need to ask. If they loved each other, who cares how it happened.

After we ate, grandfather helped my grandmother clean up the table, while I went upstairs to take a bath. As I walked up the stairs, I could hear them talking and laughing like they might have been back in the high school days. They sound so happy together; however, if you just looked at them from the outside, and not as I have since I started living with them, you’d never have been able to tell that they loved each other this much.

I got upstairs and turned the bathwater on till it filled the tub; after which I got undress, leaving my clothes in the hamper next to my white fluffy robe, and went into the bathing area. As I sat in the tub and started to think about everything that has happened the past few days: the odd dreams, the spirits or monks or whatever they were, and then the weird gifts.

“Ha, ha. This is enough excitement that’ll last me a lifetime. Ha, ha”, I laughed to myself. Then I slouched lower in the tub, to where my knees just broke the surface and the water was just at my nose. I started blowing bubbles as I began to talk in my mind; “Still…I don’t understand why this is happening to me, of all people.” I slouched deeper into the water until my head was completely submerged; while under I continued to blow bubbles with every passing thought.

After soaking for a while, I got out of the tub and sat on a little stool next to it and started lathering my hair with shampoo and conditioner before rinsing off with a portable shower head. As I rinsed off the soap, I hoped that I was also “washing away” everything that I thought about and everything that had happened over the past few days. After this, I got back into the tub for another soaking.

I always feel calmer when I bathe, I never really stopped to think about why that was. Maybe I just like the feeling of the hot water against my skin, or the feeling of running my fingers through my hair with the conditioner treatment, or the fact that is quiet when I’m in the tub; I don’t know for sure, but I enjoy this time to myself.

After five more minutes of soaking, I got out of the tub, dried off with the folded bath towel that was on the counter, put my robe on, then I wondered to my bedroom. Once in my room, I threw on my nightgown, sat at my desk and started on my homework; which there wasn’t much of since I did most of it before our trip the other day.

I spent a good two hours on whatever work I still needed to do for tomorrow. Then after a long large yawn, I closed my textbook and notebook, turned off my desk lamp, and crawled into bed. I laid there I the dark with a wondering mind; thinking about tomorrow mostly, and trying to forget about the previous couple of days. Eventually, I just let my mind go blank, and I fell asleep.