[open]

[hadippa]

Summary: Latika has figured out what the pillar does. And she's trying to decide whether she should use it.
Characters: Latika, Chiyo Sakamoto, tba
Status: Open

Comments

[hatesgion]

A young girl of about eight years of age shuffled forward and stopped, warily watching Latika with blue-gray eyes. She was dressed in the threadbare gray kimono of an indentured maid from 1930s Kyoto, massaging a gnarled left arm with her fingertips, and looking, for lack of a better word, terrified.

Chiyo was trying to decide which direction she should run in. All she knew was that she should run away.

[hadippa]

Turning at the sudden movement, Latika smiled, but came to an immediate pause and wrinkled her forehead, her eyes locked on the young girl's arm. She pulled herself away from the pillar and drew closer to Chiyo, this time reaching for the girl instead.

"Your arm looks hurt," she said gently. "How did that happen?"

[hatesgion]

A plaintive silence. And then...

"I broke it when I jumped off the roof of the okiya, ma'am."

[hadippa]

"Okiya?" Latika repeated, unfamiliar with the word. She did not touch the little girl, but knelt down to at least get a better look at the arm. So it was broken. Then they needed someone who could help them mend it. Latika was not that person...

"Where are you from?" Latika asked. The girl looked Asian, yes, but not Indian. Her clothing looked like the stereotypical attire Latika had seen in old Chinese (or was it Japanese?) woodprints.