“Umm…okay.” Kousei Tachibana’s doubtful agreement transmitted into Shou’s ear through the telephone receiver. “Remember don’t play too late. If that will be all…” The other side reminded once more and put down the phone.
After Shou put down the telephone, Ei’s voice called from the kitchen, “Shou, you ready yet? We’re by the kitchen.” Shou turned a few corners and found the Ogasawara mother and daughter seated by a delicate white French sidewalk-cafe style coffee table. Beside the iron frame table, a glass wall takes in the crimson sunlight from the backyard. Shou sat himself beside Ei in a white floral-patterned iron frame chair with cushions and looked around. He complimented, “Your house is very beautiful, Mizuki-neesan!”
Mizuki smiled as she poured tea for the children, “This is all the work of Ei’s father! He is an interior designer.” Shou raised his eyebrow to show interest, even though he had no idea what an interior designer was, and added several cubes of sugar after giving his tea a sip.
Mizuki changed the topic toward the two children. “Ah yes, what’s the occasion today? I usually don’t see you come this way?”
Shou laughed dryly as he embarrassedly explained, “Heheh…well, today Ei was…”
“Shou!” Ei flushed madly as she stopped him.
Seeing her daughter’s reaction, Mizuki grew even more curious, and asked Shou even more intensely, “Shou, what happened today? Mizuki-neesan wants to know…” Faced with two opposite requests, he hesitated a while before following his own preference — Tell everything in blunt truth, no matter the consequence!
“Oh…well, I sort of annoyed Ei today, so she really wanted to teach me a lesson. But then, who would just stand there and let someone beat yourself up? So I didn’t bother waiting for my sister and decided to make a run back home. At that time she tripped and fell…and I just happened to find your place. I guess that Ei must be very angry at me now.” Shou summarized the afternoon to Mizuki, ending with an apologetic nod..
She appeared to remain calm, “Ei was beating people up for no reason again?” This was when Ei became frightened, for the accusation was now obviously pointed in her direction.
“No! I was…because…” She uttered in defiance, losing the energy as she realized that the argument was against her favour if she said ‘because he tore up my note in class’. She cowered and spoke not another word, nibbling on a cookie slowly like a rabbit. Crying inside, she condemned Shou for being heartless.
Shou noticed her silent anger: After all, she is one of my own best friends! The more he thought about it, the more uneasy he got. “Well, as for why Ei wants to hit me, it’s probably because I saw the sensei noticing her passing notes to Jyun in class. I didn’t wanted them to be consequenced, so I took it away…”
You’ve just made things worse, Shou!
“…But I took a peek at what they were writing before throwing it out, so Ei was angry about that. I suppose that it’s also my bad, so can Mizuki-neesan forgive her for this time?” Ei stared at Shou, surprised, as he continued to speak in her defence, a new sense of gratitude now convoluted with the original feelings of guilt.
Shou also originally expected Mizuki to scold her daughter, but not only did that not happen, she instead laughed and asked, “Ha~…I wonder what they were talking about then, since Shou stopped them?”
Shou and Ei both started to speak, but then stopped upon noticing the other. Then they spoke together again, “You go first.” The two grew confused stared blankly at each other, not knowing who should start.
Some sounds came from the front door as the door opened and a beautiful tenor sang out, “Mizuki, I’m home~~” Mizuki and Ei both stood up and headed for the door, and Shou followed them to take a look.
A handsome man in his mid 30’s in a dark green shirt, white pants, burgundy necktie and indigo wireframe glasses was gracefully taking off his leather shoes by the front hall. Mizuki brought a pair off slippers for him and said, “Welcome home, Takakage my dear.” Ei echoed the greeting, “Welcome home, Dad!”
Shou bowed toward the man, “Good day to you, Mr. Ogasawara!”

“Hey, are you guys really staying inside to clean and not going out to play?” Shortly after the two started cleaning, Jyun asked Shou as he passed by the doorway.
“If we’re not, then may I ask what do you think we’re doing here?” Shou raised an eyebrow.
Forced silent and unable to reply, Jyun laughed in embarrassment, “It’s your loss then! Hohoho…” and walked away.
“Oh, I can’t brush up this piece, I’ll just pick this in the pan …” Yuki put down the pan in her right hand and reached for a thin piece of the remainders of the porcelain vase.
“HAND, SHARDS, NO TOUCH!” Shocked, Shou screamed his warning, all sense of grammar completely out the window.
A feeling of shock electrified through Yuki’s nervous system, freezing her ice-cold for a split second, and she screamed as her right hand jerked in reflex to the pain. The brush on her left hand also fell on the ground from the shock. “Ow! It…hurts…” On the tip of her index finger opened a fine but long wound, and blood gathered at the apex like morning dew, forming drops of chalcedony, falling in its ripeness onto her pink wool blouse and seeded itself into the woven material.
“Oh no, this is bad…” Shou hurriedly dumped the pan of shards into the garbage can, and then took Yuki’s hand to examine it. Suddenly, Shou pressed his fingers together, and squeezed the base of her index finger. Another large drop of blood was forming on the fingertip like a ripening fruit about to fall. Without second thought, Shou sucked the droplet away with his mouth.
Shocked, Yuki asked, “Shou, what are you doing?”
“I’m sorry, did I press too hard? We should go to the infirmary! Don’t just stand there!” Shou apprehensively grabbed Yuki’s small hand and headed for the door as he continuously mumbled something. Being dragged across the hallway by a boy in force, Yuki’s face flushed to a peach red as several students and teachers gave strange looks at the odd couple.

A while later…
After careful inspection from the infirmary staff to ensure no remaining fragments are left in the finger, they bandaged her up and sent her going. When Yuki stepped out of the infirmary, she timidly thanked, “Shou, thank you…”
Shou stared blankly at her, and blinked several times. He reflected to himself, I just panicked and dragged her halfway across the school for a minor cut. Why should she be thanking me, when I should be apologizing to her!?
“Shou? Did I say something wrong again? I’m sorr–“ Seeing Shou’s troubled expression, Yuki corrected herself. Shou impulsively wanted with all his heart to take Yuki’s body to his embrace, while silencing her with a light touch on her lips with a finger, but his sense of moral reasoning fought with him fiercely, limiting his hands to stop on her shoulders. He shook his head, “You don’t have to apologize…besides, it’s me who went overboard.”
He then wanted to hold her right hand, but hesitation made his hand land on her wrist instead. “Does it still hurt?”
Yuki shook her head as her reflexes shot back a little, as if too embarrassed to shake off Shou’s manacle grip too obviously.
 “Looks like recess is ending…” she changed the subject. Taking a peek on Yuki’s grip, Shou noticed the time and concurred with her feelings in a sigh, and let go of her after he realized where his hand was fixated to doing

 The sound of children playing and laughing outside faintly echoed along the empty hallway. Only two children, aged about ten years, strolled along the hallway’s ultraviolet-resistant glass windows. “There is going to be a market fair in the quay shopping district this Saturday! By then there is going to be a lot of shops, selling many different interesting things…” Yuki sighed.
“If it’s a fair, you should be happy, so why are you saying it so…” Shou asked caringly, noticing a touch of regret in her nuance.
Yuki lightly tilted her head to one side, closed her eyes and sighed again, “My parents have work to do and cannot tend to me. In other words, I can’t go. Looks like I may even have to follow them around at work again. It’s really meddlesome, them working all the time.”
 ”What are you going to do then? Or should I say, isn’t there someone you can go with as a group?”
 ”My dad doesn’t trust me going out without an adult along, and there isn’t anyone else around we can rely on. It’s actually still our first year in this city, so…”
 ”What about us, say with Jyun and Ei?” Shou offered.
 ”Adults…?”
 ”My parents are almost always free. They can probably go, I can ask. So will you come with us?”
 ”…I will have to ask, but I can think about it.” Yuki uneasily conceded.

 “Is it really OK? Everyone?” Shou asked again happily.
“That’s right. Oh, also, feel free to buy whatever you like on that day. I’ll pay!” Kousei promised with a pat on his sons back. “Just don’t break my budget with some ridiculously expensive thingamajig.”
“Father’s the greatest! Banzai!” Yuu cheered.
 “It’s going to be a beautiful 26 degrees and sunny all day on Saturday! Kousei-kun, remember to bring water bottles for you and the kids, extra spare change and sunglasses!” Shou’s mother reminded her husband with a tone of endearment, calling directly by name. Obviously, she too was excited, in an almost-childlike anticipation.
 “Don’t worry, Suiryuu-chan. We all know how to take care of ourselves. The kids will grow up soon and have their own lives. It’s rather you who seem to be a kid in a candy store!” Shou’s father smiled meekly in reply. Once again, the family burst into a hearty laugh…
 But the joyful polyphony lacked one voice.

 In Yuu’s room, Shou held his school agenda with his left hand and the telephone receiver with the other, his eyes rolled in pendulum along with the calm “doo…doo…” of the waiting signal . Finally, upon hearing the receiving end respond, he tensely asked, “Hello, is this the Utsuki residence? May I ask if Yuki is at home right now…?”

 Shou shut the door behind him as he entered the privacy in his own room, slipped off his backpack on one shoulder, gave a jump and catapulted the mass across the room, effectively knocking down half the items placed on the end of his bed. Drawing out a plastic sword placed behind the door, he began to strike up a whirlwind of destruction as he targeted the most breakable objects in the room, as well as leaving dents in all the wooden furniture.
 ”Wha–” Yuu opened the door and began, when Shou let out a scream of rage and flung the sword straight towards the interloper on his wrathful fest. The rounded tip of the toy sword smashed right on Yuu’s chest, knocking her off her feet with a heavy cough.
 ”MOM!”
 Shou stood frozen in the afterpitch pose as his mother asked in a cold tone, “Shou, did you just hit your sister?” She picked up the plastic sword in the middle of the doorway, tip pointing outward and towards Yuu, still sitting on the ground and shaken up from the impact.
 ”I’m taking away this now.” Suiryuu picked up the sword and continued, “You should know better than to destroy things at home and to hurt your sister! What should you say to her?”
 Shou remained silent.
 ”Apologize to her!”
 ”Sorry!” He yelled.
 ”Yuu, leave us alone now, would you?” Suiryuu helped a silently muttering Yuu get back up and motioned her back into her room. She then told Shou to sit down and sat beside him on the bed, with the plastic sword in her left hand. She began, “What’s the matter? Did something bad happen at school?”
 A silent Shou bobbed his head sideways once as he gave a slight shrink on the shoulders.
 ”Did your school friends upset you?”
 Again, a shrink.
 ”You’ve got to talk about it.”
 ”I don’t want to.” Shou spoke the only prepared phrase. Why should I tell her that I got criticized by my teachers that my writing is ugly? It’s not my fault that the 2H pencil I chose happened to be ‘too light’ for you to see, and that I don’t press as hard on the page with it! Then, sitting right in front of me, is this girl who gets praised as a genius in art class and the most clean-cut writing I’ve ever seen, just as if she is there, placed there by fate, to mock me! He recalled the moment during recess, he snuck back into the classroom as everyone was outside, and pondered whether or not to sneak a peek at Yuki’s paper. He had one hand on Yuki’s desk and as his morality took its last stand with the prevailing forces of curiosity, a girl in a cardigan and grey skirt appeared in the corner of his eye as she asked in a flat tone, “Tachibana-kun, what are you doing beside my desk?”
 Shou shook his head violently to shake away the memory.
“OK, everyone listen up!” The teacher called to her students without much success, as the students expressed in their riotous ways as much as possible in the slim timeframe that was between classes. Not only does this cacophony become one of the most feared noise pollution in the school, it is also the unstoppable type once it has begun! “Looks like there is no other way, then…” she shook her head. This is the final straw, she thought to herself.
She gathered her breath and began to howl the short pejorative command:
“SHUT YOUR MOUTHS!!!”
The classroom went dead silent from the flash thundering of off-scale decibels, making every syllable take its toll as it drilled into every student’s inner ear. The windows shook in echo as a pencil dropped from a shocked student’s frozen hands.
“All right, you’ve all quieted down now, right?” The teacher recovered her default smile and continued, “Today in language class, we will go to the second-graders as reading buddies…” At this point, several students gave a cheer, while some others immediately grimaced at the thought. “…Allow me to continue. Before you go, you will find a partner and select two books from this box, then wait in line in front of the door.” The quick bunch of students already stood up and went for the bookcase as soon as the teacher had finished her sentence.
Shou took a quick glance towards Yuki, and then towards Jyun, Ei, then back at Yuki again.
“I guess I’ll go with Ei then…” Jyun proposed.
As soon as he finished Ei resisted, “Why must I go with this impudent, happy-to-see-people-die smart aleck?”
Jyun challenged, “Ah, But ever since the last story writing bet, don’t you want to know who is the best storyteller in class? Let the kids be the judge this time. Unless you are too much of a wimp to bet on this! Hey everybody listen up, Ei Ogasawara is a…”
“What are you talking about, I won last time! Fine, if you lose, this time you treat me to afternoon tea! I want a big tart with three layers of fruit and jelly on top!” Ei hastily accepted the challenge and defined her bet while extending the sound on the word “big”. Her enthusiastic eyes shone like stars in greed and wrath of imaginary retribution.
Shou thought to himself: Who’s the more impudent one now…?
He turned to Yuki and asked in a careful and quiet tone, “Utsuki-san…”
“It’s fine if you just call me Yuki.” She callously cut off his sentence. “Hmm, I’ll work with you then…Go pick some books for us, but please don’t pick a book that’s too long.” and Shou obediently complied.

“Tachibana-kun, this book…it’s not bad, but why do you want us to act out everything in it?” Yuki frowned as she asked Shou.
“Well, I thought it’d be fun, competing with Jyun and Ei, and think about it, a prize by the teacher for the most cooperative and creative group?” Shou said while he thought to himself: How terrible a result it would be if the prize were given to either Jyun or Ei, who already monopolized most of the class’ glory!
“I think you and the two are all trying too hard to outdo others. Of all, one should only need to compete with themselves.” Yuki quietly said, letting the din of the bustling fourth-graders muffle her words in static.
“What?” Shou asked.
“No…nothing.” Yuki emotionlessly replied and returned to her state of silence.
Not before long, they arrived in front of the second-graders’ classroom. The teacher divided the second-graders to their fourth-grade partners. Because the second-grader’s class is smaller than the fourth-graders, some fourth-grade groups had only one partner, such as Shou and Yuki’s group, and settled down in the classroom’s sofa nook.
Yuki began, “Hello, this is Shou-kun, and my name is Yuki. What’s yours?”
“Shuuichi, 8 years old.” The little boy reported back.
She gave a smile. “You’re an honest little boy, aren’t you? All right then, let’s begin?”
The three of them held the book together, as the little second grader sat in between the two older children, and Shou began reading the first narrative lines:
“Today, our story takes us back to a time long, long ago, to a historic land called China…”

The story began with the people of the earth find that the moon is slowly falling down onto them. In panic, the Emperor desperately searched for an emissary to the moon. Min-Yo, the lightest little girl in the land, boldly risked herself by climbing up the old fragile silk ladder to the moon. There, she met a lonely moon dragon, with opal skin and eyes of lapis lazuli, claws and teeth of silver and wings of gold – and became friends with him.
Each person took turns to read the pages, occasionally letting someone else pick up the dialogue. As the story progressed, Shou automatically looked to Yuki as her sunshine voice played out little Min-Yo’s character, and gets looked back when the gentle moon dragon let out his words.
Shou’s facial expressions came naturally as he became as the lonely moon dragon, expressing his frustrations and feelings of emptiness as lunar dust storms rolled in his eyes. Yuki acted as the soft-spoken girl, bringing forth a natural naïveté and lovingness, as if the layers of clouds in the sky finally show a beam of sunlight, shining down on spots in the green plains dotted with yellow sunflowers.
The girl gave presents from the emperor and her own. The dragon took delight in the colourful and sweet vegetables she brought, for he ate nothing but bland stewed moonflowers. However, he had no surprise or joyfulness when she presented a large diamond, meant as a present from the Emperor, and showed her an entire cave full that contained an ocean of similar gems.
Shuuichi at this point began to grow a little dazed from the sunlight shining from behind, and fell onto Yuki’s shoulder. She gave a surprised look for a second, then continued with the story, not minding his actions.
I want to do that too, Shou’s inner voice cried as he gave a look towards Yuki. Within his body, something pulled his breath down from the bottom of his throat and jabbed like a dull dowel towards the back of his heart, giving the organ a startling pulse.
When their eyes slowly and unnoticedly met, their thoughts pass through the two pairs of eyes, filtered by shining pools of tears. Completely fused in with the story, Shou was a half-unconscious thirsty lost traveller in a desert, gratefully absorbing the clear, nutritious brook flowing from Yuki’s eyes with an indescribable euphoria.
“Yes, Shou?” Yuki seemed to notice his change of expression.
“Hmm? Nothing.” Shou replied.
The two figured out together that the moon is falling to the earth because of the precious jewels and items he collected over time, and the intelligent girl suggested throwing the items into the sky, so the moon will not be as heavy. Through determination and hard work, they managed to throw all the jewels to the sky, shining as a dazzling display of stars across the celestial canvas. The moon also soon returned to its normal distance with the earth, and the moon dragon was grateful with his newfound friendship with the little girl.
 As the story ended, Shou gave a sigh of relief as he finished the last of his lines and looked at Yuki again. As if a large fish broke off a hook and somersaulted back into the ocean, and her empathic brilliance vanished with the mythical jewels in the night sky, the oceans…the lands…
“I…I’ll go return the book…” Yuki finally stood up from the sofa, her voice slightly shaking. “Oh…I’ll go too…” Shou unnaturally mumbled. When Yuki went to return the book, Shou’s hungrily traced her face for her eyes, hoping for any traces of the gentle feeling left.
“Aiee~~!”
“What’s going on?”
“CRASH!” A series of sounds clashed behind the two children, and Shou finally snapped back into this reality, heavily flushed.
Behind them, there was trouble.

 Yuki…
 A perfectly normal and common name…
 Why did it become such a beautiful and nostalgic name, as if seen from somewhere before…

 “Utsuki? As in April in the old Japanese calendar?” Jyun’s air of hostility immediately dissipated as he asked in earnest. Shou’s mind immediately cursed him for asking such a useless question, while his eyes self-consciously searched for something on Yuki’s expression.
 Yuki replied, “Yes. To add that I was born in April, it’s really a coincidence and convenient to remember…from what I’ve heard, on the day I was born, the sky suddenly started to snow hard. That’s why I’m called Yuki (snow in Japanese).”
This time the person amazed was Shou, who followed Jyun’s inquiry, “April? That’s already spring, and there is still snow? Which day were you born, Utsuki-san?”
 “The twenty-ninth of April.” She answered as-a-matter-of-factly.

 April 29th… In Shou’s mind, a voice echoed the date repeatedly as if he knew nothing else.
At the same time he replied in monotone with the words, “Oh, I was born on the sixth of May.” What the heck happened to my words…? Shou’s thoughts scattered like marbles dropped onto a large silver platter. Exactly why would this girl in a red hairband, born in a blizzard during late-spring, early-summer interest me so much? He shook his head to clear his thoughts.
 Ei laughed and said, “I’m already ten years old, born on March 25th.”
 Jyun waved his fist in frustration, “I can’t believe I’m younger than you all! Darn it.”
 Ei asked, “Then, when is Watanabe-kun born?”
 Jyun snorted through his nostrils, “August. Not like you can celebrate it during the school year, so no need for me to say.”
 ”Now just a minute, what kind of bull–”

 “All right! Time’s up! Who’s willing to come up and introduce their friends to the class now?” The teacher asked as she clapped her hands.
Shou’s mind snapped clear. Names. “Oh no, if I had known earlier that this was going to happen I should’ve written that all down!” Except Yuki, he quietly asked his classmates to write down their names on paper.
Jyun commented when he was asked, “What’s with that? Didn’t we just tell you our names and stuff?”
Shou replied as he forced the names into his brain, “Sorry, I just can’t remember people’s names…well.”
 And he barely survived through his first fourth-grade challenge.

 Shou calculated his next moves as he ran: He will first pull open the sliding door and while still grabbing it, use the inertial force to slingshot himself to turn towards the teacher’s podium, and stop himself dead short in front of it. If there was too much speed, he’d give an extra spin after the turn and shake it off. He gave a grin when he pulled open the door and his hand held onto the ledge, and gave a full spin as planned, but to his surprise there was no teacher’s podium, and he lost balance, crashing and tumbling over a couch from the back.
 “Sorry! I’m late!” Shou panted. It did not even matter if he was late or not. The pairs of eyes from the entire class of twenty-and-some students and a teacher all focused on the gasping Shou, his face burning up in embarassment.
 The teacher rose from her desk on the far side of the room. “Oh no, oh no. You’re on time. Please find a seat and sit down.” She said with a default smile. Getting up while panting madly, Shou’s legs wobbled gave in, again collapsing onto his knees to the ground. The entire population of the class stared with amazement and a few people lost control and burst out laughing, as their new classmate clumsily and humorously got back to his feet.
 After reporting his name, Shou noticed a boy waving his hand at him. The desks in class were grouped together in groups of four, and the boy who waved sat with two girls. A girl in a ponytail sat across from the boy, shifting uneasily in her seat, while the girl who sat next to him sat back silently, with her eyes closed. From closer observation, the girl with the ponytail’s height is about half a head taller than Shou, and made all the student desks and chairs seem short and clumsy for use. The other girl, in a cherry pink V-neck cardigan over a cream-coloured shirt and a crimson headband, while seemingly immobile, was twirling a mechanical pencil with her slender but strong-looking fingers. At that time, the bell rang its final tones. Unable to do much else, Shou headed towards the empty desk.

 A “hand” grabs at the icy cold door handle and pulls with force. With a quick flash of the body, “I” enter the structure. Three banyan trees stand in a straight line. At the other end of the “hallway” illuminated in some orange colour, a glass-walled elevator silently awaits for passengers with its blue-white fluorescent lights.

 “I” am waiting, searching.
 Stepping into the elevator, it rises slowly from “ground level”…
 When the door opens, a group of white robed “middle-aged people” are discussing something. They stare at “me” with a surprised look. They all think that I went in the wrong direction, so they tell me to take the left corridor to “go back”. Their mouths are moving, but no sound comes…or is it that their voices are all as loud only as a mosquito? Oddly, “I” can clearly comprehend what they are saying. “I” gently push them aside, following the right-hand corridor and pacing quickly, when suddenly a longhaired female appears in front of “me”, running parallel to my direction. “I” innately try to catch up, intending to intercept her and talk to her. She keeps running and running…and disappears before one of the hallway’s rooms. “I” make a left turn and follow her to that classroom, seeing only a few young “fellows” talking. Why is it that I never hear anything, yet can “hear” and understand their meanings…?

 To the wall on the right hangs a large blackboard, which faces some long tables and chairs. Looking outside the window, all one can see is a navy-blue “night sky”, drifting a ceaseless snowstorm…
 “I” search for a name on the blackboard. It is not long before the neat, fine chalk marks that seems to be written by a young girl that lead me to instinctively acknowledge “her” existence. At the same time, the group of youngsters are about to leave the room. “I” keep asking them: “Where is she?“ and they reply with something I cannot remember.
 In a flash “we” are in a different part of the structure, heading towards a thick iron door. The grey-blue, wave-pattern sheet metal walls, in coordination with the lighting, generate an atmosphere that screams the message of hopelessness into the mind. Unknowingly the door opens, and “we” exit the building to a piece of ground. “I” instinctively know that we are on asphalt ground, for the snow is comparatively thinner here. Aside from two high lamps shining their orange light on two or three “automobiles”, all else are shadows of darkness to the eye.
 “I” hopelessly stand behind the “automobile” at about three or four steps’ distance, glancing at the group of people hurrying to get inside, and slowly disappear from my visual senses. All that is left is “me”, standing in the storm under the orange lights…

***

At the same moment as Shou Tachibana awoke from his slumber, the door creaked open. A girl of around 13 or 14 years of age poked her head in, and said to the boy still lolling on the bed, “Get up, you’re starting school tomorrow! You can forget about going to half of your day’s classes if you don’t get used to waking earlier!”
Shou checked the digital alarm clock that read Twelve-fifty-six Post Meridian on its stern face. “Ugh, I get it. I’m getting up…keep talking, and I’m gonna start chopping people with my sword!” He paused for a moment, then retorted, “Wait a minute! Today is Sunday! What am I getting up so early for?”
Nonetheless, he was literally dragged out of bed shortly after falling back down trying to sleep again.
“Ugh…so what if we get up earlier? Everyday, and it’s the same old studying, playing with toys and video games…this is boring!” Shou walked into the kitchen and complained to his mother as he stretched.
 “Why don’t you find a few friends to come play with?” Shou’s mother Suiryuu patiently replied as she placed a plate of desserts into the refrigerator.
 Shou was about to reply when Yuu mocked, “Mom! You already know what he’s about to say! Oh there is no one worthy to be friends with, it’s the same old every day, it’s boring! It’s boring! It’s…”
 “Oh put a sock in it, will you, Yuu?” Shou angrily cursed his older sister. “I have my own mouth, so I don’t need you to speak for me!”
 “Shou, you…” At that instant, half the living room air ionized with violent intentions as the siblings stared down at each other.  
“All right, all right…stop arguing now, you brats…or else there will be no green tea jelly for you!” Their mother dissolved the situation with a gentle tone.
 But then…
 “Green tea jelly? Why didn’t you call me sooner?” Shou and Yuu’s father called from the study next door, and excitedly rushed to his wife with all due speed.
Suiryuu sighed with a smile, “Oh dear, look at yourself! Looks like we have three brats in this house…” and they all burst out laughing uncontrollably.

While I may not be anywhere near the Dao, indeed a spurt of an idea gave the beginnings of this blog to record all writings of my past and present not related to research or information to Hanist propaganda. (See my main site “Accounts of the Lutenist from Beaver Creek” on Blogroll)

The primary purpose of this blog is to record my work “The Snowing Clear Skies on April 29th”, originally written in Chinese in 2004 under the title 《四月二十九日的下雪晴天》, in its most updated and revised version. It is my hope that with enough support,  the novel can be published in paperback format.

On the side, my previous poems, couplets, and paintings may also be shown here. While I try to keep the English readers informed on the other languages via providing a translation, I prioritize with transmitting the original text in its most original context.

I hope that you will enjoy my writings, and support the process of the novel in its creation.