Mov. 3

Easy now, easy. Right, that’s it…… I’m the generous, mature one here. That’s right, very good.

After a few seconds of silence, Zoe, who’d puffed out her cheeks, exhaled a slow breath and smoothed her chest as though she were some saintess granting a magnificent pardon.

She’d just recalled that in the southern continent where Mr. Eisenhaum’s ill-mannered grandson had grown up, hair as vividly red as hers was uncommon.

Zoe sighed deeply enough to sink the floor, pitying the provincial boy.

Right, if he finds it unusual, what can you do.

‘Still, even so……!’

What kind of person says something like that?

Partway through admiring her own generous, mature character, Zoe lit twin fires in her eyes again.

Red hair was common enough in the north, but Zoe took particular pride in her own hair, which was an unusually dark shade, closer to red wine than anything else.

So, couldn’t he have used a more dramatic expression? Passionate red, romantic and fiery, something like that. But instead……

‘Your head looks like it’s on fire!’

She flared up once more, then calmed herself down again.

She’d rationally recognized that getting angry accomplished absolutely nothing.

It wasn’t as though she could smash the door open to see what color his hair was and yank out a fistful of it. Zoe rationalized it that way.

‘Easy. He’s definitely uglier than me.’

That’s probably why he won’t open the door and just stays shut up in his room.

She’d been turning over the reason the boy wouldn’t come out from behind the door, and her thoughts drifted there. Zoe propped her chin on her raised knees, leaning against the door.

‘It must hurt quite a bit. Probably swollen.’

Truthfully, Zoe had a vague idea of why the boy was talking to her yet wouldn’t open the door and come out. She simply hadn’t said it aloud.

Mr. Eisenhaum had been wearing leather gloves, and even without having been hit herself, she could tell that the corner of the boy’s cheek that had taken the blow must be stinging badly. Naturally he wouldn’t want to be seen.

The boy would certainly have guessed that she’d heard all of that commotion. That wounded, lofty pride. Zoe understood it, faintly.

And yet……

‘What does it matter to me?’

Whether it hurt or not, whatever his pride. Whatever he felt inside.

It wouldn’t leave any visible mark. Not on the surface.

Zoe still believed there was no such thing as ‘deserving to be hit,’ but she could wholeheartedly nod along to the point that Mr. Eisenhaum’s ill-mannered grandson was the type to invite a beating with his mouth.

Never mind.

He talks back rudely but answers everything he’s asked.

Paradoxically, Zoe felt a momentary inclination to keep talking to the boy with just one door between them.

If the first reason had been thin sympathy, the second was a fleeting curiosity she still couldn’t explain even to herself.

“Do you know my name?”

You’d better not.

“What does it matter if I do. It’s not like we’ll see each other again.”

Hah, Zoe snorted at the slightly cynical reply that came through the door.

Actions and words didn’t match. Even when she tried to engage with him, he made it difficult. The boy’s voice was coming from a little closer than before, as though he’d leaned against the door the same way she had.

Zoe pressed the point with a furrowed brow.

“Why won’t we see each other again? How can you be so sure? I might come here quite often.”

She naturally left out the part about having reasons, needing money. She also left out the part about needing to play the role of his friend for a while, whether he liked it or not.

“I’m going back to where I used to live.”

“……”

“I’ll see my friends again, play piano again, and I need to go back to school.”

“……”

“And…… it’s unbearably cold here.”

The boy kept talking, as though nothing about this place suited him. His voice was quite flat for someone expressing pure grievance.

Zoe’s face brightened at the word ‘school,’ then tilted with a question at his last words.

She didn’t know whether that ‘cold’ meant what she thought it meant.

The white land was a frigid place. Snow fell for nearly the entire winter.

She couldn’t be certain whether he meant the weather was ‘cold’ or the situation was ‘cold.’ But that ‘cold’ sounded to her a little closer to ‘lonely.’ Maybe it was her imagination. Or maybe it was both.

Zoe decided to read it as carrying both meanings. So she asked casually, as though it were nothing.

Better to pretend not to notice the loneliness.

“School? What school did you go to?”

“Imfaharte Imperial Academy of Arts, composition major. My mother went there too.”

“……”

Oh no. She shouldn’t have brought that up.

Zoe hiccupped and went quiet, recalling her mother’s firm warning that she must never bring up the boy’s late mother.

This is awkward, she thought, but strictly speaking it wasn’t her fault. She hadn’t known it would go this way. Rationalizing it like that, she answered naturally.

“That must have been wonderful.”

“……What about you?”

“Oh, I went for a little while but quit. It was the only girls’ school around, and…… the Southern Empire language teacher read ‘busy’ as ‘buzzy.’ So I left right away.”

“Definitely the right call.”

“What about you. What did you learn at school?”

The part about the teacher being somewhat dim was true enough, but she set aside the fact that around that time the family had gone completely under and there’d been no money for tuition. The Avril family’s ruin was well-known enough that he’d find out eventually anyway.

Above all, Taren was a conservative place. Unlike the southern continent, it didn’t educate women well.

Hiring a governess was naturally out of the question, and she’d walked out of the only girls’ school, so the only studying Zoe could do was to take books from Mr. Eisenhaum’s study and read and memorize them indiscriminately.

Paradoxically, that approach had given a thirteen-year-old girl knowledge on par with any boy who’d received a quality education in the Southern Empire from an early age.

After a brief pause, the boy answered.

“I wanted to become a court musician, like my mother. I learned for that, practiced, and learned more.”

“……So now?”

“What do you mean, ‘so now.’ Obviously I’ll never play piano again. I’m going to spend my life doing stupid money games under my grandfather’s thumb. He said he’d throw the piano out. I’ll live like that, and die like that.”

“……”

“My father at least had somewhere to run. I don’t. And I don’t have the courage to run either.”

What’s stupid about money? What a thing to say when you’re so fortunate. Zoe exhaled a short, incredulous laugh and furrowed her brow.

The boy who was set to inherit a shipping company ranking in Taren’s top ten, yet talked about chasing clouds, irritated her.

Conservative Taren, unlike the southern continent, looked down on artists. A court musician or painter, or an artist exclusively employed by a noble, might receive decent treatment, but becoming a capable businessman was better than being dismissed as a dauber or a performer like most of them.

Who knew, maybe if he charmed some naive young noblewoman from a declining family, he could even aim for a rise in status.

It was an extraordinarily worldly grand scheme for a thirteen-year-old to be drawing up, but they each had their own circumstances. So there was no way she could share the various practical problems clinging to her, and the thoughts they’d produced, with the boy.

So Zoe decided to simply accept it. Each of their circumstances.

He seems to have gotten quite gloomy, so let’s reassure him first.

In a bright but somehow quite convincing voice, Zoe made a bold declaration.

“Don’t worry. Your grandfather absolutely cannot throw that piano away. I’m staking your honor on it, so you can believe me.”

“Why are you staking my honor? And how can you be so sure.”

“You don’t need to know.”

The boy seemed to have long since lost his patience with her shamelessness, yet his voice sounded a little brighter somehow. There was a reason, but Zoe chose not to reveal it.

‘You fool. That’s your late aunt’s keepsake.’

That’s why your grandfather can never throw that piano away for the rest of his life.

The piano of the woman who stole his son, and the piano his dead daughter had cherished in life.

The two women’s pianos were plainly different things, yet looking at the single ‘piano’ that still stood quietly inside the house, the old man would feel conflicted emotions for the rest of his life.

Rage and longing, loneliness and memory. Perhaps until the day he died. That piano was nothing less than a grave inside a desolate estate. A dreadfully strange and lonely curse.

Zoe began gathering herself to leave and offered the boy what she considered her own form of goodwill, offhandedly. A gift, if it could be called that. That much was enough.

“You’ll be able to keep playing piano. Maybe not as much as before.”

“……What, how?”

“Use me as an excuse.”

He’s terribly slow to understand. Brushing the dust off the hem of her muslin dress, Zoe rattled off an explanation.

“I’m saying only play when I’m here. Two hours a day, make up some excuse that I begged you to play and you had no choice. Mr. Eisenhaum has a soft spot for me. He probably won’t say a word.”

“……”

“If even that’s too difficult, you can come to our house. The tuning’s a bit off so the sound is a little rough, and one pedal is missing, but…… anyway, there is a piano. My younger sister plays quite well. You could teach her a little.”

“……”

“Well? Not bad, right?”

“……That’s true.”

The ready answer that came through the door made Zoe curl her lips into a satisfied smile.

Time to actually go now. She turned away without hesitation and took several brisk steps, then came back to the door.

She kept sticking her nose in for some reason. Even she felt she was doing something out of character.

“Even if it’s cold, try to get used to it. I’ll tell you right now, you’re never leaving this place. Not before you’re grown. Your family, your fortune, everything is here now, so this is your home.”

“……”

“Snow falls all winter but the scenery is quite pretty. The winter is long, so the brief summer is even more beautiful. The people are kind, and if you look around, there’s actually quite a bit to do. Have you ever skated? Around now, on the frozen lake, it’s perfect. Come out with me when the snow stops. Next time.”

“……What’s that?”

“Wow. You’re really provincial.”

He didn’t know what skating was. Zoe let out a sound of pure, genuine wonder at a level of provincialism she’d never imagined in her life.

I thought someone from the Southern Empire would know everything, but apparently not. Maybe I’m actually the more cultured one here.

“Quiet.”

The boy grumbled behind the door, clearly embarrassed at being called provincial. ‘It’s true though,’ Zoe mouthed silently and giggled.

After a brief pause, Zoe added one more thing.

“This is just my opinion, but……”

“……Now what?”

“For now, do what your grandfather wants. At the very least, you’re going to outlive him. Surely he won’t make it past a hundred?”

Talking about a grandfather’s lifespan in front of his grandson seemed rather inappropriate, but this was a special case. This much should be fine.

“Honestly, I don’t think inheriting the business is a bad thing. It’s not an opportunity just anyone can get. Some people are born poor, some rich, some have their family go under halfway through, and that’s not something you can choose. Still, if you really don’t want it…… you didn’t get to choose either, so it can’t be helped. So wait until all the Eisenhaum assets fall into your hands. Until then, I’ll take responsibility for making sure your hands don’t get rusty.”

“……”

“Once you’ve inherited the assets, you can sell them off and gamble, throw yourself into helping the poor, or dedicate yourself to art. That’s all your freedom. Well, someone in the afterlife might be clutching their chest, but you’ll have done your part, won’t you?”

“……”

“You might not be a beloved grandson, but being a reliable heir isn’t a bad deal for you either. Understood?”

“……That’s a fairly persuasive alternative. Practical.”

The boy gave a short laugh through the door. A capable businessman seemed to suit this side of things rather well.

Quite satisfied with her magnificently disloyal plan, Zoe curved her eyes with a scheming look.

“Then I’m going now. I’ll leave the basket, so help yourself. The pickled limes are quite good. I’ll come back for it.”

“……You’re coming back tomorrow?”

“Probably.”

The boy leaned against the door and asked, and Zoe answered briefly as she turned to leave.

That he’d asked whether she’d come back was somewhat unexpected. Maybe next time she’d get to see his face. With any luck, she might even learn his name.

Zoe went down the stairs in that characteristic ‘always-flitting’ walk he’d mentioned.

She didn’t forget to stop by Mr. Eisenhaum’s study and pick up three or four books she’d wanted to read. And to finish things off without a flaw, she gave a courteous farewell to Mr. Eisenhaum and Mr. Clemens as a matter of course.

“……”

The clicking of Mary Jane heels faded quickly and dissolved into nothing at the edge of her hearing, as though it had never existed. The boy was still sitting with his back against the door.

***

And then, all week long, snow fell again as though the sky had a hole punched through it.

The weather made it a struggle for anyone to so much as poke their head outside, unless they wanted to become a snowman.

He held out on pride for three days, and on the fourth day the boy turned his head and looked out the window. His gaze landed on the old Avril estate and then crumbled away. That girl, who’d even gone and hung curtains in the meantime, was infuriating.

For a whole week the boy couldn’t catch so much as a glimpse of that red hair that looked like it was on fire, and he couldn’t bring himself to lay a hand on the piano gathering dust.

Boring, white, pure snow.

The longest week of his life. The boy came to dislike snow even more than he already had.