Summary:
The MC heaves the garbage into
the bin. She still feels guilty for hanging onto the dropped picture from
earlier. She decides to stash it in her room in the company dormitory. As she
walks outside to head there, she spies the man in the white hoodie who looks
just like Rion again. He is behaving similarly to the last time she saw him,
pacing and checking his watch. She runs after him while calling out to him and
trips, falling to the ground. He finally notices her and helps her up. His
voice also sounds very much like Rion’s. As he pulls her up, the photo falls
out of her pocket. He picks it up and asks her why she has a photo of his
house. He grabs her by the shoulders violently and asks if she knows his big
brother – Rion.
They go to a park adjacent to
the hotel to talk. He realizes that she scraped herself when she fell and
offers his handkerchief for her to wipe up the blood. She refuses at first
since she has her own, but he forces her to take his. She takes it and tells
him that she will wash it and return it, but he says to throw it away. She looks
at him again, remarking that he does indeed look the same except for the color
of his hair and eyes, but his personality is totally different. She asks him his name.
It is Alphonse Hatter, but he tells her to just call him Al. She tells him that
his Japanese is very good, and he reveals that their mother was Japanese. She
asks him if they usually reside in Japan, but he tells her that they usually
live in the UK. She wants to know if he’s on a trip; he says that he’s here to
look for Rion. He only knows that his brother has been missing for 4 years and
that he might be working at Très Spades. He forcefully asks her to bring him to
his brother. She knows that she can’t exactly tell him the truth that she’s the
exclusive housekeeper for him, and she was bought by him in the Black Auctions.
She realizes that it is likely that when she told Rion about seeing Al before,
he knew who it was. There might be some reason that he would not want to meet
him. Al then asks if he’s still holed up and wearing those fancy costumes. She
doesn’t respond so Al takes that as a yes. He then quietly leaves.
The MC heads back to the
basement, her knee still hurting. She thinks back on all of the events of the
day. As she approaches the tea room, she suddenly smells something burning. She
sees dark smoke coming from the kitchen and rushes in. Rion looks dejected and
like a child who’s just been caught making mischief. It turns out that he had
tried to make dinner for them but failed miserably. The MC is touched that he
tried so hard for her. She then frowns, thinking that she is actually happy
living with Rion here, and she is afraid that Al will take him back to the UK. She
doesn’t want him to worry, so she says that everything is okay when he asks her if
something is wrong. She then asks him if he wants to go outside of the basement
with her. She thinks that maybe if he goes out he can figure out about Al on
his own. He seems worried at first, but he agrees to do it “for Alice”, placing
a hand on her cheek as he says this. She is surprised that he agrees, but
secretly hopes that he will change his mind. He agrees to go as long as it’s somewhere
within the hotel. He takes her hand and decides that they should go right then.
My
commentary:
Alphonse (Al) is definitely the
opposite of Rion in personality. Rion is delicate and childlike, but Al is
brusque and almost rude. You can kind of tell that he’s had a rich upbringing
when he tells her just to throw his dirty handkerchief away. I was surprised to
see that Al already knew about Rion’s strange “hobbies”. I think it’s also
interesting to know that Rion and Al are hafu
(half Japanese). It does help explain the coloration differences.
I feel for the MC when she doesn’t
really want him to leave the tea room. She’s trying to help him because she
knows that will be best for him, but her own desires are starting to show more
and more. She is trying to put him first, but it’s giving her a lot of anxiety.
Songs to
listen to while reading this chapter:
“Wake Me Up”
by Avicii
“Airplanes”
by B.o.B.
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