| It’s been a hell of morning, it’s nearly noon… | |
| “So….?” | |
| Claire just hums, questions me. It’s just us again, her mom left, I assume to finally sleep, and Catherine is finally taking her walk. | |
| “How are you doing?” I ask her in turn. | |
| “How am I doing? How are you doing? Mother didn’t… say anything unkind did she?” | |
| “What? No…. No she was… taking it better than I thought she would, we swapped numbers and she gave me a credit card.” | |
| “Oh?” | |
| “Yah, I… I’ll save it for later or something, but umm for getting caught… um… y’know… she didn’t want to kill me…” | |
| That gets Claire to laugh, good. | |
| “So yeah… not too bad. She seems nice. But seriously. How are you doing Claire? That was a lot. You… said she was…” | |
| Claire’s pupils wander to the corner of her eyes, lost in a thought. She looks happy and solemn at the same time. Finally she sighs, “That was a lot, it’s not how I wanted it to happen, but I am glad you were there.” She lets out another long breath, “That was terrifying, I thought I was going to lose everything but I had to tell her. I can scarcely believe I talked to her again… it’s been so long for me, so long. I was a child, it was my sixth birthday and the last words I told her was that I hated her because she and Father had to miss it on account of business. I always wanted to tell her sorry… and I did.” Her voice catches, and she is blinking quickly. | |
| That’s all I need, I hug her, I didn’t even fully realize it till I was holding her. She just leans into it. | |
| “Thank you Rei, I’m glad I did, finally. I told her. It’s real this time… it’s her, I’ll see her again. I… I’m… still trying to wrap my head around it… but it’s good. It finally happened and it needed to happen.” | |
| “Your mom is nice. I’m glad it went the way it did… that could have… gone worse in… so many ways.” Between finding us in a bed, or sending her away to a psych clinic. | |
| We got lucky. | |
| “You're not upset that I told her, are you, or about us?” I can feel her arms tighten around me as her voice wavers a bit. | |
| “Of course not! I was worried but I trust you. And umm… what would you even tell her… you were ....” | |
| She groans, “Don't remind, heavens I thought nothing could phase me after all the times our girls would interrupt us. Having to explain that Mother only hits Mama when she wants it and… that's was your fault by the way , you said they were asleep and that you could be quiet.” She glares at me but quickly breaks into a suggestive grin. | |
| God I would let her do whatever to me… | |
| “I do feel better now.” She finishes. | |
| “Great!... um so now what?” | |
| Claire’s eyes dart to her bed. | |
| “Claire?” I don’t know if I can survive another… session. | |
| I don’t care. | |
| “Oh… I still want to spend the day… if that’s alright, with you. I completely understa-” | |
| “No! No, I'm totally fine. To spend the day.” | |
| Claire grins, “ Good , but… umm don’t worry… I wont…” She smirks, “ Ravage you again, for today at least.” I can’t help but whine, she at least is blushing a little from the comment. | |
| But god I wouldn’t say no. | |
| Shut. Up. | |
| “Umm, I do hope you… enjoyed it at least… before our interruption.” | |
| “YES!” God, why can’t I sound normal, “Yes, that was… god that was great… I… was I okay? I… it felt like…” | |
| I feel a finger on my chin, and it tilts my face back up, I didn’t even register how much I was looking down, but Claire is smiling, “It was wonderful Rei, truly, just relax, it's only the beginning , it’s definitely not a race.” | |
| Oh God. | |
| Oh God. | |
| “I look forward to it again, like I said, even if we start small there is much we can do, afterall restriction breeds creativity .” Oh fuck, that’s a sinful delicous smile. | |
| “Ahhhh, ah, oh wow. Um good, great. Super. Yes… more. Later.” | |
| “Excellent.” | |
| “Okay, soooo, um what now… I… it’s still the weekend… did you want to study more?’ | |
| “Spirits no!” | |
| “Huh?” Spirits? | |
| “I know we still have a lot to cover… and Mother is expecting me to meet a level… but I am at my limit for the week. Trust me, we need to take a break or we won’t last. I have seen too many students push themselves too much.” | |
| “Ohh… uh, I meant… nevermind. Yes a break is good, but yah, we will have to start covering more stuff if your mom wants you to take a highschool exam later. Even if it’s soft balled, it’s still going to be a lot…” | |
| “Soft balled?” | |
| “Oh… it’s a base… ball… term…” | |
| I can already see she is completely lost. | |
| “Okay, short version, baseball is a sport slash game, someone throws a ball, the other player wants to hit that ball with a bat, that’s like a club, and send it flying. They are competing against one another so the person throwing the ball, the pitcher is trying to make it hard to hit. Soft balling is when the pitcher makes it easy, I guess if there is a big difference in skill to make it more sporting, or help teach.” | |
| “Oh, okay, that makes sense. I don’t believe we had a sport like that. Hmm, there really are a lot of turn of phrases that I have no basis for. Mother even mentioned a moon landing. Was that also an expression? What is that for? Wait… let me guess.” | |
| Oh she is going to hate it when I tell her… | |
| “It’s not a turn of phrase Claire.” | |
| “Huh… what do you mean.” | |
| “It’s literal, we landed on the moon. We have pictures.” | |
| She can’t help but look out the window, even though it’s midday at this point and the moon is for sure not in view. “What?!” | |
| “Yah… oh boy, yah. We have done a lot. Long short of it, we built a machine like a plane, it flew to the moon. We put a person up there, and they came back. It was very hard, it’s not something we do often, or for a while. Space is not friendly or easy to travel.” | |
| “...Space?” | |
| Oh boy… we were going to get to this eventually. | |
| “The universe is massive, and has a lot of empty space, like a void. Our planet, Earth, the ground we stand on… it’s a ball of rock that’s floating in space. It’s circles around the- | |
| “I’m aware the world orbits around the sun, as does the moon around our world… I just wasn’t aware… it’s… nothing exists outside… if you just go up?” | |
| “Yah… right… god there is so much that you need to build up a model of the universe from what we figured out… so gravity? You understand the basics of gravity?” | |
| “I believe so, things fall, the rate is consistent, from what I understood things theoricall all fall at the same rate, but it’s observed that some things can elude that which is probably due to… you said air pressure right?” | |
| “Yes, exactly, thank god. Yes you have gravity, it’s basics understood. So yah a feather floats slowly because it has a lot of air resistance, because it has a lot of surface area and very little mass. Gravity is pretty important in the universe. Big objects have gravity, the bigger they are, the more gravity they have. And the Earth is big, so it has gravity, it keeps the air here too. We call that the atmosphere. But when you go high enough. There is no air. There is nothing, just empty space. Space.” | |
| Claire nods slowly, good she doesn’t look too confused. | |
| “Gravity is what keeps the moon orbiting around the Earth. It’s floating in space far enough away that it doesn’t crash, but it is also a big rock, just much smaller than earth. The Sun is very far away…. But it is very, very big compared to the earth…” | |
| “Big enough that… Its gravity is what causes the world… Earth to orbit around it?” | |
| “Exactly!” | |
| Claire looks pretty pleased with herself, “So other planets also orbit for that reason as well?” | |
| “Yup, stuff in space likes to attract to bigger bodies, otherwise it just spreads out slowly, less so if it’s a solid but yah. Also space is really cold.” | |
| “Fascinating… we will have to get into it more later. There were conjectures about the nature of the world but this has been enlightening. It’s really impressive what you… we I suppose have done here. Oh… I suppose I do have one other question. Do you know what the sun is?” | |
| “I’ll show you,” a few quick types at my phone… and volia, “Here.” Claire takes a moment to look at the image I found of the sun, it's a decent one I think. | |
| “It’s on fire…?” She sounds a bit in awe… “Of course, it’s a candle… and since it’s so big….” | |
| “I think it’s like a hundred times the size? At least three hundred, thousand times the mass.” | |
| “Ohh… Ohh, how does it… you know what. Another day. This will go one forever if I keep asking questions and I can already see I have no intent to stop. My goodness.” | |
| “Did I never say anything about this before? You know, in the past life?” | |
| “Nothing major, you always claimed you didn't want to spoil stuff. Well more than you or… hrmm. More than things had already been spoiled.” I guess that makes sense, science has a way of complicating things doesn't it? | |
| “Well it’s cool either way, and like with stuff like this we can do things that's fun but also can help build context… we have so many movies about space… like fictional and not everything is going to be accurate but like these are also culture stuff, so like two birds with one stone.” | |
| “Much like Persona?” | |
| “Uhh, yah?” | |
| “Very clever, well… I suggest we do a bit more of that… and perhaps later …” | |
| You have your way with my body. | |
| She smirks, she knows exactly what she is doing to me right now, this isn’t fair. “How about you let me have something to read, I still would like to read your-” | |
| “Veto!” | |
| She pouts, “Rei, surely it’s not-” | |
| “Veto!” I emphasize it by making an X with my arms. | |
| Her pouting continues, oh god please just hold out Rei, don't lose. This is the only time it matters. | |
| “ Fine ,” She exhales, “Something though? I wouldn't mind having a book again, perhaps Pray Love?” | |
| “Sorry, all my copies are at my parent’s.” | |
| “Oh Mel and Van?” | |
| Huh? “Who?” | |
| There is a look of confusion on her face, “Your parents?” | |
| “No?” | |
| “Oh…” She gets lost in thought. | |
| “Was that my parents then? My parents are Ai and Takashi Oohashi. Here.” | |
| “Their… completely different aren't they? Your father isn’t really large and tall?” | |
| Dad? Tall? “Please, he’s barely an inch taller than me.” | |
| “Oh… I… yes, you were adopted there I suppose, your situation… It was unusual in the least.” She remarks. | |
| I can't help but shrug, “I couldn’t tell you.” | |
| She is racking her mind, “Well they were your only family, until me of course, and then the girls.” | |
| Daughters… huh… “Oh well I have a bunch of family here, don’t really talk to them much I suppose, but there is my brother. He can be a brat-” | |
| “You have a brother!?” | |
| Oh was not expecting that, “Uh yah…?” | |
| “Sorry… Hells! I knew that. You’ve told me all this. You just never talked too much about them, and I am just so used to Mel and Van… It’s coming back to me a bit… your brother…. Younger?” | |
| “Yah, his-” | |
| “Shush! I can remember this!” | |
| She is concentrating very hard, maybe I can tease her a bit… “I can give you a hint-” | |
| “Rei hush!... He is younger, his name is… Masao…?” The focus dissolves and she grins. | |
| Huh, yah, that’s still weird. “Wow.” | |
| “I told you.” She gives a good laugh… oh god I love her. | |
| “Yah, well he’s a brat. Anyways I can pick up some books when I’m making a visit.” Oh god Claire is adorable, I can see she is really trying to hold back form asking, she wants to come. “Umm, maybe you could meet-” | |
| “I would love to!” | |
| “Cool. Umm, but yah no books. Yet. I can show you stuff to read on your phone. I read a lot of manga on my phone.” | |
| “Manga is… the picture novels?” | |
| I can’t help but laugh, “Sure.” | |
| “Rei…” She warns, “It’s very dangerous to make fun of your wife.” | |
| Yah, she might punish us. | |
| “I’m not! It’s cute… Yes, it’s like a novel, but it uses a lot of pictures too, and most of the text is just dialogue. Let’s do that, after some Persona.” | |
| “Perfect, sounds like a plan… I really need to unwind after this weekend.” | |
| “Same.” | |