KAORU

“You again,” sighed Riki at the girl in white dress to her knees. The girl was eating an apple. She turned to Riki.

“What’s wrong? You don’t like me here?” asked her with sharp looking look.

“Mm…” mumble Riki. He puts down the brown shopping bag at the kitchen table.

“This is your groceries,” told Riki to a guy wearing an apron. He’s mixing something at the pan on the stove. The guy turned around and smile.

“Okay, thanks,” Riki walked out from the kitchen. The girl followed him.

“Where are you going?” asked Riki. The girl stills.

“I want to see Kimi,”

“Don’t bother him. Kimi doesn’t like to be bother when he’s reading,” 

“I won’t bother him. I want to read too,” the girl showed her tongue to Riki before running away. Her steps were so light, making her looked like floating.

“Hey! Don’t run inside the house!” scold Riki.

“You sound like her father,” said Hirokazu, the apron guy.

“What?”

“I’m just kidding. You are like a father to all of us,” Hirokazu laughed and quickly get back to the kitchen. Riki doesn’t feel to reply him. He looked at the direction where the girl was heading and took a short sigh.

The girl’s name is Kaoru. She suddenly came to the house with Abe, the house owner. Without saying anything, Abe let Kaoru to explore the house and met the house members who were all boys. When Riki demanded an explanation, Abe just answered it shortly.

“Let her be,”

“Well, I understand the reason though,” mumble Riki.

Riki went to second floor. He heard cheerful laughter. On the second floor, Riki saw Kimi who was reading a book while listening to music by his big headphones. He seemed didn’t feel bother with the cheerful laughter coming from Kaoru and Tohru. Both were playing video games.

“I thought you were reading,” said Riki passing away. Kaoru watched Riki until he enters his room. She pull her tongue at him again.

Riki wanted to continue his work that was interfered before when Hirokazu asked him to do shopping. He’s looking at the wooden clock he was trying to repair.

“Still repairing the clock?” asked Kaoru coming closer.

“It’s broken, it can’t be repaired. Just throw it away,”

“It still can be repair,” said Riki without looking away from the clock in front of him. Actually the work to repair the clock has taken much more time than he has expected. Riki was about to work, he took a screwdriver, but suddenly Kaoru took it away.

“I’ve told you to throw it away! It’s useless! The clock is broken! It can’t be repair!” shouted Kaoru. Riki was staring at her. Kaoru breathed in rush. She tightly held the tool to her chest.

“Kaoru,” called Riki gently. Kaoru looked at him in guard. Riki gives his hand, asking for the tool. Kaoru was just looking at him.

“You won’t know if you don’t try to repair it,” said Riki.

“If you still can’t?” asked Kaoru.

“I will keep trying, and trying, and on,”

“You’re just wasting your time to repair something that clearly can be back to normal,” Riki lifted his shoulders.