EE Chapter 6

# Chapter Six - "Sisters"

    "...saw what?"

    "At the table. You snuck Chiyo's cup too."

    "...she wasn't going to drink it. It's rude to waste good food…"

    "Still. A girl your age shouldn't-" Kanon, now more awake than I'd seen her all day, started laughing at my commentary. How rude to treat her senior like that.

    "Junko, how old do you think I am? I know I'm the baby, but I turn sixteen in like a month..."

    "I know, I know. I do know, really. I'm not used to this big sister thing. It'll probably take some time to figure it out."

    "Oh…"

    A long pause in our conversation hung over the room, melting away to the nearly complete stillness of the garden outside. Of the two rooms, I'm pretty sure Kanon and I had ended up with the less premium accommodations. The room across the hall, from which the occasional laugh or giggle could be heard, overlooked the main courtyard of the ryokan, complete with the still-lush foliage of the autumn-wilted gardens and trees. Ours seemed to be designed for - or at least the landscaping had happened to facilitate - a sense of privacy, the windows looking out onto a mass of trunks and branches. Most likely, were we back in Tokyo, another building would have been less than ten feet away, relying on a thick fence to give the appearance that the greenery was much denser than it actually was. But with many of the trees bare it was clear that there was nothing like that here. Laying on the tatami mat next to our futons - I wasn't yet quite ready to sleep, still enjoying the pleasant glow of Oba-san's generosity - the sky was visible in bits and pieces through the boughs and branches, complete with the stars I love so much.

    "You really think of me like I'm your…"

    My temporary roommate, who had parked herself back under the kotatsu in the center of the room, pulled herself up on her elbows. Looking over my shoulder awkwardly, her face was much closer than I thought from her quiet voice, and I nearly jumped a little from the sudden closeness. I probably would have if I hadn't had a second cup with dinner too.

    "Well, yeah. I guess. You kind of remind me of me when I was your age. Well, actually a good bit younger than your age. When I was about twelve or… Not that you're twelve. I know you're not twelve. You're almost sixteen, but you remind me of me when I was twelve, so I just…"

    "...huh?” Kanon waved a hand in front of my face. The light of the stars streaming through her tiny fingers was very pretty. "And you're mad at me for drinking two cups?"

    "I'm not mad. I'm just… The floor is kind of cold. Are you cold?"

    "Ok, come on onee-san. Under the blanket."

    I giggled. Normally I'd hate to be called something like that, but right now, coming from Kanon, it was kind of cute. Kanon pulled at my arm until I got up off the straw mat and joined her under the thick, fluffy warmth of the heated table. It was a pretty snug fit, but I wasn't going to complain in my current frigid state.

    "You called me onee-san."

    "S-Sorry. You said that…"

    "'It's ok. *You* can call me that if you want. Just not anyone else..." I had only made it about halfway under the kotatsu, but that was enough since Kanon had been keeping it nice and warm. Even though she could easily fit completely under the blanket, she stayed only partially covered, letting me cuddle her like a stuffed animal. Rinko and I used to do this all the time in the winter when we lived at our own place. In fact, she was pretty much a serial cuddler, always crawling underneath whatever I had covered myself with, finding it more efficient to steal my warmth instead of generating her own. I suppose Rinko had been the first little sister I'd adopted, despite being both older than me and someone I wanted a somewhat unsisterly relationship with. But it could work. I've seen basically the same thing in an anime about stepsisters, and we aren't even that.

    This is nice too though, especially without the ambiguity of what was going on. Maybe especially *because* of that lack of ambiguity. It was ok to cuddle under the kotatsu with Kanon, because she was already dealing with confusing feelings of her own.

    Tiny hands pushing against me made me aware that I was perhaps cuddling my new imouto too securely - another growing pain I would need to remember as I came into this new responsibility - and so I relaxed, letting her face pop out from underneath the blanket. Once she took a deep breath or three, Kanon spoke more forcefully than I'd ever heard.

    "Junko, *you* only get one cup tomorrow…"

    "Ok, Kanon-chan. You too." I'm pretty sure she said something in the way of an objection, but I was getting too comfortable to pay attention. Cuddling really is nicer in yukata… "Do you think Rinko would look good with red hair?"

    "Huh? Where did that come from?"

    "What? It's nothing. I was just thinking about… Never mind. It's not important…"

    "We should probably go to bed…" A large yawn proved contagious, getting an immediate response by way of one of my own.

    "But the kotatsu's warm…"

    Kanon didn't raise an objection - at least none that I could hear with my eyes closed - and I spent my first night with my new little sister.

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