"Andrei!" Maiko called out, all but flying through the air.
Finding himself wrapped in a bear hug, Andrei stumbled backward a couple of steps before regaining his balance, all the while managing not to drop the sign he was holding that read Haruka Sakimoto in Kanji.
"Maiko?" he asked, extricating himself. "What are you doing here?"
"I couldn't let Haru have all the fun!"
"I would have told you, but she wanted to keep it a secret and I never would have heard the end of it," Haruka interjected as she came up from behind.
"Sakimoto-san! Hisashiburi! Furanssu yokosou!" Andrei said, bowing.
"Thank you," Haruka replied, matching his bow.
"So where are we going first?" Maiko asked. "Wherever it is, let's start with some food, I'm starving! You should have seen the stuff they were serving on the plane..."
_
"Why do I have to be the one to sleep on the floor?" Maiko whined, again. Haruka had lost track of the number of times she'd complained. Haruka had also lost track of the number of times she'd explained that since Maiko had wanted to keep the fact that she was coming a surprise, there was no way Andrei would have been able to make the extra reservations.
It had been a long enough day as it was. Haruka had hardly slept on the plane, and after landing they'd had a whirlwind sightseeing tour, finally arriving at the hotel in the late evening. With the excitement of their arrival in Paris finally wearing off, exhaustion was hitting hard. Although there hadn't been any scheduled plans set for the day of their arrival, the tournament started tomorrow. As part of her role of Cultural Ambassador, Haruka was scheduled to hold a demonstration exhibition of both kata and tameshigiri— cutting of rolled up grass tatami mats— before the competitions started in earnest. She would also be holding some masterclass sessions over the next couple of days. While she had put in her time and earned her rank as one of the top competitors of her style, she still wondered if she was really good enough to be teaching special classes or taking on the role of judge, as she was scheduled to do for the final division's rounds of the Iaido portion at the end of the three day tournament.
Maiko stopped mid-complaint when she realized that the reason Haru wasn't answering was that she had fallen asleep on top of the bed. She hadn't even crawled in under the covers.
_
Haruka woke up feeling disoriented. At first, she thought she'd overslept and that it was midafternoon, but the complete and utter darkness of the room was evidence against that. She could barely make out the shades over the windows, and the lack of light around the edges said it was still nighttime. She felt cold and realized that she was only half covered by the blanket. She tried pulling the covers over herself, but when she couldn't move them, she noticed that her sister had crawled into the bed alongside her and had them trapped under one arm. Haru felt around the stand next to the bed until she found her phone, and pushed the small button on the side.
Three a.m., according to the readout on her phone's screen. Haru let her head drop back onto her pillow. She felt exhausted, and yet somehow wide awake at the same time. She lay back and tried to get back to sleep, but her brain was having none of it. So this is jet lag she thought, quickly followed by when did I change into my pajamas? Giving up on sleep, she got up silently and slid over to the window, pulling the blind far enough away to peek outside.
A layer of cloud covered the little sliver of moon in the sky, the darkness making it difficult to make out much in the way of details outside. She let the blind fall back over the window and made her way to the bathroom, blinking and squinting in the blinding light that came on when the door opened.
A few minutes later, she rummaged around the dark hotel room until she found her bag. Pulling out her small diary and a clip-on reading light that she used to study when her roommate at university was asleep, she made her way to the chair in the corner of the room and started to catch up on the journey so far. When Maiko awoke the next morning, Haruka was curled up asleep in the chair with the book lying open and upside down over one leg.
_
"I was so jetlagged," Haruka said between bites of pasta. She was sitting with Andrei and Maiko in a small restaurant down the street from the hotel. "It's all just a blur. I'm surprised I didn't stab myself at some point."
"Your performance was great!" Andrei mumbled around a mouthful of bread.
"I totally flubbed that one cut." At one point during her performance, the rolled up tatami mat had come flying off the stand on an upward strike.
"That wasn't your fault. It wasn't very tight on the post. Happens all the time in practice." Indeed, several of the competitors had lost their rounds doing the same thing. "Everything else was great, right Maiko?"
"Hmm? Oh, um, yeah!"
"You weren't even there, were you?" Haruka asked.
"Of course I..." Maiko began, but then seeing the look on Haruka's face, thought better of the lie, "wasn't," she finished sheepishly.
"You left the tournament?" Andrei asked.
"Well, I got bored. You know I was never into that stuff like you guys are. I can only watch people make the same five cuts for so long."
"Seven," Haruka interjected.
"You shouldn't have gone off on your own."
"It was fine! I walked along the river for a while, then I found a little coffee shop."
"This isn't Japan, it's not safe to go wandering around on your own here."
"It was fine! I didn't have any problems!"
"There's never a problem," Haruka started
"Until there is," Maiko and Haruka finished in unison, one of their father's old sayings.
"Just promise you won't go off alone again," Andrei pleaded.
Maiko stared pointedly at Andrei. "Oh, so you DO care about what happens to me? It's been so hard to tell!"
"Maiko, don't," Haruka started.
"It's been three years..." Andrei commented.
"Forget it. I'm not hungry anymore," Maiko said, dropping her napkin on the table and standing up. "See you back at the hotel!"
"Maiko..." Haru called after her, but her younger sister wasn't in a mood to listen. "Should I follow her?" she asked Andrei.
"I know we were just telling her not to go off alone, but the hotel's right up the street, and she's starting a conversation I really don't want to get into."
"Do I dare ask?"
Andrei sighed. "It's going to come out sooner or later."
"What is it?"
"When I left Japan, my father was ill. Very ill. He passed away not long after I got back."
"I'm sorry."
Andrei shook his head. "He'd always been stubborn, overbearing, controlling, manipulative... he nearly disowned me when I left for Japan, and he used his illness to set his hooks in me again. As his only living son, he made me the head of the family business upon his death, which I wasn't completely adverse to, but... let's just say "the business" has some... odd... entanglements that are not entirely of a financial nature. It's as much politics as it is business, and that includes making certain alliances."
"This is starting to sound like a Yakuza story."
"Probably not too far off. Long story short, part of taking over his mantle was conditional upon securing some alliances. I was the victim of an arranged marriage."
"What?"
"Yeah, I know, in this day and age, right? But the circles my father kept are very traditional and old fashioned. And it could have been much worse. You know, I first met her at our wedding ceremony. At first, to my relief I found that she wasn't an old crone. She's actually quite stunning. It was later, to my surprise, that I found she was actually quite progressive in her outlook, we share a lot of views, and she's quite brilliant! She'd been as reluctant as I was, if not moreso, to agree to the wedding, but her parents were as manipulative as mine. I quickly grew to admire and respect her, and I dare say even love her."
"Sounds like a fairy tale romance."
"Oh, trust me, it's not all been easy, we've had some moments that make a fight with Maiko look like a trip to Disneyland, but I think the worst is behind us. Though Maiko being here is going to make things awkward."
"She excels at that," Haruka commented.
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