MAID IN TOKYO: Chapter 4

Chapter 4

Monday was Cosplay Day, where we would all dress in costumes inspired by a popular comic or cartoon series.  Today it was Mega Fighter Squadron Venus, an animated TV series concerning the exploits of a group of female pilots in giant robots… at war with other giant robots.  I was dressed as Silky Fair, pink hair and a rather tight pink and white Lycra flight suit.  The costumes were made for us by a specialist in Akihabara – she was the top of her field and produced flawless garments.

I turned up for work in my jeans and denim jacket and almost fell over when I saw my pink suit with the inbuilt padded bra and strange sockets all over it.  I had to breathe in as I zipped the suit up.  Because the material was so skin tight panties weren’t an option.  I zipped up the knee high white boots and donned my long pink wig.  When I saw myself in the changing room mirror I thought I actually looked pretty good.  The only downside was my glasses… I couldn’t wear the pink contacts, thankfully.

            When I walked into the café itself half an hour before opening I saw the other girls in their similar outfits.  Even Miss Namikawa was dressed in a sexy outfit, although for some reason she wore a lab coat over it.  Having never seen the series I had no idea who she was meant to be.  All I knew was what was written on the note that came with my costume.

We got to work setting up the tables and I rushed around making sure our manga-like portraits were straight and in full view.  I was represented by a very cute character with big glasses and a sweet smile.  Yuri’s was sickeningly cute, giving a peace sign with a little heart.  The otaku who drew them for us is apparently now a famous comic artist.

“Right girls, open up!” Miss Namikawa called from the back room, reluctant to be seen in her costume.  Yuri and Akiko stood by the door and waited for the first of the customers to rush in, while Rei went outside and stood at the corner, handing out packs of tissues and menu sheets to passers by.

Two hours in and there was a steady stream of customers, normal for a Cosplay Monday.  We used these days to promote the café, while the animation studio’s PR company would pay us a fee for advertising their productions.  It helped to keep the place afloat and pleased the punters no end.

It was just after one-thirty when the policewoman appeared.  Akiko trotted up to her and I could see them looking at me.  I touched my nose and the policewoman nodded.  I felt a stabbing pain in my chest and my stomach knotted.  She bowed and asked me to go out to the car waiting outside the building.  I removed the pink wig and followed her out, noticing how silent the café had become.  I could feel the eyes on me as I left.

I left the air conditioned building and stepped into blazing sunlight and oppressive humidity.  Another policewoman, younger than the one with me, eased the passenger seat of the Nissan March mini patrol car forward so I could clamber into the back seat.  Moments later we pulled away from the kerb and headed away from Akihabara.

I was sitting in a concrete room with a metal table and two chairs, a cup of coffee before me and a uniformed policewoman standing to one side.  She looked to be my age, and looked smart in her sharply creased blouse and skirt.  Eiji would love this, I thought.  I took a sip of the hot sweet coffee and stared down at the table top.

The door opened and in walked Kuroda and the woman Toyama.  Both looked serious, although Kuroda greeted me with a small nod of his head and shoulders.  Toyama’s expression never changed.

I began to tremble as Kuroda sat down opposite me and placed a folder on the table.  He seemed to gather his thoughts for a moment before opening the folder and sliding out a photograph.

“Suzuki-san… do you recognise this man?”

He slid the photo towards me and I got up and stifled a scream.  It was Eiji, his face still bruised and battered from where the women had beaten him.  He was lying in what appeared to be a hospital bed.

“Th… that’s my friend…. Eiji Watanabe.  You met him the night of the murder.”

I swallowed hard as the uniformed policewoman guided me back to the chair.  I closed my eyes and pushed the photo away from me.

“Is he…?”  I couldn’t complete the question.

“Watanabe-san is in the police hospital with gunshot wounds to the chest, limbs and stomach.”  This was from Detective Toyama, standing with her arms across her big chest.

I burst into tears.

“As far as we can tell he was asking a group of men what they had seen on the night of the murder when a van stopped, men got out and shot him with automatic weapons.  Your friend received eight separate injuries.  Luckily no major organs or arteries were damaged and the doctors say he should pull through.”

I wept like a child, my face buried in my hands.

I had warned Eiji not to get involved – no, I had pleaded with him.  And now he was lying in a hospital bed having been shot down in the street.

“Suzuki-san.”

It was the uniformed girl speaking softly to me.  I looked up and she handed me a snow white handkerchief.  I thanked her and blew my nose.  The soft cotton smelled of roses and cherry blossom – so fragrant and sweet.  I thanked her again and apologised for messing it up.  She smiled and said it was okay before returning to her position, the smile fading as Toyama gave her a surprisingly cold look, which she then turned on me.

“Suzuki-san… why was your friend asking about the murder?”

I took a deep breath and explained all about Eiji’s obsession with the police and how he had said he wanted to make Kojima safe again.  I left out the part where he said that he said the police could even be involved. 

Kuroda leaned back and folded his arms, closing his eyes and giving a low growl.  Toyama started to pace, looking at a report of the attempted murder.

“Can I see him?”

Kuroda opened his eyes and looked at me.  They were so dark and penetrating… I could imagine any criminal, no matter how vicious weakening under his stare. 

“As soon as we’ve asked you a few more questions, Suzuki-san.  Does Watanabe-san have any enemies in the criminal fraternity?”

“You mean gangsters?”

Kuroda nodded, pressing the top of his pen a few times.

“No.  He’s the most gentle man I have ever known, and he’s afraid of his own shadow.  He would never get involved with gangsters.”

“How about loan sharks?”  This from Toyama, now standing next to me so that I had to look up at her.  I shook my head.

“Then the target must have been the men he was talking to… but none of them were injured.”

Kuroda stood up and walked across to the slatted window, the bars of sunlight catching the lines of his face.  All at once I suddenly felt self conscious of the fact that I was wearing nothing but a pink lycra bodysuit.  I unconsciously pressed my thighs together and looked down at my still-shaking hands.

“I think we’re finished here, Suzuki-san.  I will have a car take you to the hospital.”

“Can I ask you to have him stop at my flat?  I want to change out of this.”

There was that smile again, and this time I noticed warmth in his eyes.  I wanted to melt in that warmth.

I shook myself and stood up, giving the deepest bow I could in the suit.  The policewoman opened the door for me and I turned to walk away.  I could hear Kuroda clear his throat.

“Yes, I think a change of clothing would be appropriate.”

I gave an embarrassed smile and tried not to imagine what my backside would look like.

Dressed in my black jeans and a loose blouse I stepped from the lift and headed for the reception desk on the third floor of the police hospital.  A nurse pointed down the corridor to where a police officer was standing with his hands behind his back.  I thanked her and set off towards the room, my sandals clopping on the polished floor.

I gave the officer the pass that Kuroda had issued for me and the policeman opened the door for me.

Eiji’s room was in semi-darkness, an overhead lamp casting a pool of soft light onto his face.  Next to the bed were banks of equipment and plasma bottles and bags, some connecting to him by cables and tubes.   As I approached the bed I could smell the surgical fluids and the antiseptic the medical staff had used.  It was overpowering.

He lay there like a hunk of bruised meat.  His face was more swollen than before and the bruising was more pronounced.  I was sure these were new injuries, but Kuroda had said his injuries were confined to his arms, legs and bodies.  Someone had beaten him again.

I sat next to him and placed a trembling hand on his forehead.  I was shocked when he opened his eyes, so red and bloodshot.

“Momoko-san,” he croaked.  I choked and I could feel the sting of tears running from my eyes.

“Eiji…”

“I’m sorry, Momoko-san… you were right.”

I shook my head.

“Not now, Eiji… just promise me that this is an end to it?”

He nodded and I could see that it hurt him to do so.

“Get better, please… I need someone to feel superior to.”  I smiled through my tears and stroked his hair.

“Eiji… who beat you up”

He shook his head. 

“These are new bruises on your face…”

“Please Momoko… “

I nodded, understanding what he was wanting – he wanted me to drop it, like I had asked of him.

The door opened behind me and a nurse walked in with a covered tray.  She bobbed her head when I stood up and I looked down at my friend.

“I’ll go now, Eiji.  Is there anything you want me to get for you?”

He shook his head slowly, but then seemed to change his mind.

“Nana Kitade CD….”

“Please… he needs to rest, young lady,” the nurse said softly but forcefully.  I apologised and gave a little bow before giving Eiji one last look.

I got back to my flat and ran the bath before phoning the café and telling Miss Namikawa what had happened, and that I would like a few days off to visit Eiji and to get over the shock.  She told me to take as long as I needed to call if I needed anything.  I could feel the emotion bubbling up again, threatening to explode in a torrent of tears.

I put the phone down and took a deep breath, exhaling slowly in an attempt to calm my shattered nerves.  I stripped off and entered the bath… where I cried my eyes out.

I had fallen asleep after my bath and awoke around eight that evening.  I made myself some instant Miso soup and ate an onigiri pickled plum rice ball that was in my fridge.  Feeling a bit better I switched the TV on… trying hard to avoid news programmes, but in the end I settled on the NHK news bulletin.  It was on about a corrupt pop producer and a small earthquake out in Nagoya, but there was nothing about Eiji’s shooting.

I found that strange.  Shootings always made headline news, and someone to be shot in the street, and in broad daylight had to be a major news story.  Maybe Kuroda had ordered a news blackout?  Did he have that sort of power?

I shrugged to myself and thought back to Eiji lying in his bed, bruised and badly wounded.  I wondered if his parents knew, but then I remembered that they were overseas, avoiding the intensity of a Japanese summer.  Before my own parents died they did the same.

I thought back to how I felt when I was told that they had died in a bus crash in Italy.  I was told three days after the event because the recovery teams had to get down to the bottom of the ravine where the bus had fallen.

I shook myself out of these thoughts and remembered the Nana Kitade CD that Eiji had mentioned.  I was surprised he was a fan of such an eccentric rock star – she dressed like a Lolita-Goth but played rock music.  I didn’t like her – I preferred boy bands.

I grabbed Eiji’s spare key from my bag and took the lift down to his flat.

The room was the same size as mine, but seemed only half the size.  There were model cars on every horizontal surface and DVDs scattered in the corners near the window where they had apparently fallen over.  Next to his CD player was a tower full of plastic cases.  I looked down the column of names until I had found the sole Nana Kitade CD – a 2007 album.  I pulled it out and looked at the cover, and frowned.  Stuffed between the sleeve and the case was a slip of paper.  I pulled it out and had a look.

On the paper was a mobile phone number, and scrawled underneath it in hiragana was the name Kiyomi Kawahara.  Was this a message from Eiji to me?  To call this Kiyomi?

I sat on his bed and stared at the note, taking the room in out of the corners of my eyes.  I turned to look at the wardrobe in the same place as mine.  I slipped the paper into my pocket and wandered over the wardrobe, sliding it open.  The first thing I saw was the dark blue of a police uniform.

Without realising what I was doing I pulled it out.  It was a summer uniform going by the cut and lightness of the material used.  On the sleeve was the shield shaped patch bearing the word ‘Tokyo’.  On the chest was the metal badge of the local Ueno police.

I stared at the uniform for several minutes before coming to a decision and leaving Eiji’s flat with the suit over my arm.

Once back in my flat I tossed the uniform onto my bed and sat opposite, staring at it.  What was I thinking?  What was I planning to do?  Ask questions disguised as a police officer?

Everyone in the area knew me on sight – people tend to notice when you dress as a maid.  I chewed on my thumb then pulled out the slip of paper.

What had Eiji done to me?  Had this all been a set up to get me to take over his investigation while he recovered?

I broke down again, not knowing what to do or where to turn to for help.  For the first time in my life I was utterly alone.

MAID IN TOKYO: Chapter 2

Chapter 2

My alarm woke me at eight the following morning.  I threw a plush teddy at it and succeeded in knocking it off the dresser and into a small pink waste bin.  I fell out of bed and staggered to the bathroom, turning the bath taps on and shrugging out of my T-shirt and shorts.  I patted my flat tummy and returned to bathroom.  I washed myself thoroughly before stepping into the bath and sinking up to my chin in hot water.  It was then that I was suddenly struck by how lonely an existence I had.  I hadn’t been with a man in over two years and was beginning to wonder if I was over the hill in my mid twenties.

What was I doing with my life?  Other girls my age were working in offices or shops, or married to nice men and living happily ever after.  Of course I knew that most Japanese wives were unfulfilled, and their overworked husbands sometimes sought the comfort of other women. 

My hand had strayed between my legs and I began to massage myself slowly.  I stopped as I realised what I was doing.  I could feel my cheeks flush.  This wasn’t the place for that, I chided myself.  I closed my eyes and did it anyway.

Dressed in my other maid uniform I closed my door behind me and locked it, popping the keys into the little bag I always carried.  It was just after nine and old Mr Sato was on the landing, looking out at the high buildings of Taito-ku and beyond.  He turned to look at me, a big smile making his wrinkled face resemble crepe paper.

“Oh you look so pretty, Suzuki-san,” he called.  I bowed and when I straightened up I gave him the stock welcome for our guests.

“Welcome, master,” I said in a girly voice, giving him a peace sign and a big grin.  Mr Sato applauded me and gave me one of his shiny red apples.  His son would always bring him a bag of red apples every week, and I always seemed to have around half of them.  Mr Sato was my oldest fan.

“Thank you, Sato-san,” I cooed and bowed deeply.

Work that day was pretty slow.  It was a Sunday and I think most of our customers had forsaken us for the sights and shops of Akihabara’s main shopping area.  Certainly the few that we did get were laden with bags full of PVC figures, soft toys and more merchandise than a normal human can cope with.  It was my belief that the average otaku, if there was such a thing, possessed an almost superhuman ability to acquire more… stuff than they could possibly keep.

Take for example my friend Eiji.  I’ve already mentioned his habit of collecting anything to do with the MPD, including requesting a copy of the report filed on him when he was arrested… well, I know for a fact that he has model police cars scattered everywhere in his flat, and he keeps buying more.

They are indeed a rare breed.

It was a little after two in the afternoon and I was playing a card game with one customer when Eiji came into the café.  This was the first time he had ever come here.  Akiko welcomed him and I saw him talking animatedly to her.  She turned to catch my eye and I apologised to the man at the table and trotted up to where Akiko and Eiji stood.  Akiko bowed and went to the man I had just left, adopting a cute voice and adding “ne?” to the end of every sentence.  We had to know how to talk in a cute voice – it was all in the training manual.  Yes, maids these days have to be fully trained to work in restaurants and cafes. 

“Momoko-san, can we talk somewhere?”

Eiji looked a little worried and I took him to one of the more private areas of the café.  He sat down and looked at his hands.  I brought him a cup of café latte and sat down opposite him.

“What is it?  You look like you’ve seen a ghost, Eiji.”  I never used an honorific with Eiji, we were closer than that.  He used it, but more out of respect for me than anything else.

“Our shop was robbed last night.  Someone broke in and stole some of the replica guns from the top floor.”

I stared at him, my hand covering my mouth.

“Oh no.  How many did they steal?”

Eiji counted off on his fingers.

“Two Colt 9mm pistols, an Uzi and two AKMs.”

I stared blankly at him: I had no idea what he was talking about.

“They’re guns, right?”

He nodded and looked around.

“They’re only plastic but they look real.  If the robbers were to hold up a bank or another shop no-one would know the difference.”

“But they can’t fire, right?”

Eiji shook his head.

“They can fire BB pellets but nothing else.”

Okay, I thought.  I knew what BB guns were.  We had a boy in school who took pleasure in scaring the teachers with such a weapon one day.  The police were called and he was so afraid that he went off the deep end, waving it around and acting like a yakuza hit-man.  A jittery police officer shot him, killing him instantly.

He was only fifteen.

Eiji reached across and help my hands in his, which seemed unnaturally clammy. 

“We’re shutting the shop early because the police want to carry out a full investigation.  They say it’s because it was replica guns.  They even threatened to close us down if they were used in a crime.”

I thought at that point Eiji’s love affair with the police had come to an end.  He looked me straight in the eye.

“There was a female detective with them, Momoko-san.  She was so cute.”

I snatched my hands away as he blushed.  There was I thinking he had come to me for a shoulder to cry on, instead he was mooning over a pretty policewoman.

“Baka!” I hissed, and then looked round to see if anyone was looking.  Luckily the other girls were occupied playing various games with the customers.  I think I even heard Yuri singing a theme song in an annoying little girl voice.  It was all so easy for her… and she was wearing those fake glasses again!

I turned back to Eiji and told him I would see him after work.  We agreed to meet at the corner of the road, just at the entrance to the mobile phone shop which occupied our ground floor.

*          *          *          *          *

The hours passed quite quickly as the trade picked up after a while and I left the café exhausted, hot and annoyed at Yuri again.  As I had Monday off I decided to go for a late night drink with Eiji, so that he could tell me all the details of the robbery – and no doubt about the delicious female officer.

I met Eiji as agreed and we set off for home.  There was a nice Yakitori place not far from our block that served up the best meals this side of paradise.  The chicken was to die for.  Some glasses of Chu Hi and a good meal would relax me, and Eiji could tell me all about his day.

We had just reached the Satake indoor shopping street entrance when Eiji suddenly stopped, gasping.  He dropped the bag of beer cans he was carrying.  I followed his gaze and stifled the scream that threatened to rip itself from my throat.  Not more than four metres away was a body.

Even in the darkness we could see it was a young man.  He was lying propped up against the shutters of one of the shops, his head on his chest.  He was wearing a cheap pair of tracksuit bottoms, Nike trainers and a t-shirt.  A large dark patch was spread over the shirt and the upper portion of his tracksuit, puddling around his backside.  At his outstretched hand was the dark ugly shape of a handgun.

I grabbed Eiji’s thin arm for security.

“Is he dead?” I asked, pointing and stammering.

“I think so.”  He pulled out his mobile with trembling hands and dialled 110, the number for the police emergency line.  I could only stare at the body of the young man, recalling the nightmare from my school days.  When Eiji hung up he started to move backwards, pushing me with him. 

In the distance we could hear the siren of a police car and when I looked down towards Ueno I could see two officers from the police box down there rushing towards us on their bicycles.  When they reached us one of them took us up to the main road, just opposite the big hotel there, Villa Fontaine Ueno.  The other policeman bent down, then knelt before the body.  He touched a gloved finger to the throat.  He stood up and said something into his radio; his voice was drowned out by the siren of the big Toyota patrol car that ground to a halt nearby.  Two officers dashed out and rushed up to the officer with the body.

The whole thing was unreal.  Here I was standing in a maid costume, late at night with my friend, red light bathing the scene of what could only be a murder.  By this time people had started to come from their flats, and I could see open curtains in the hotel windows.  The only sounds seemed to come from the radio in the car.  It was like some weird dream.

Pretty soon a mini patrol car had turned up and the two policewomen inside had set up a traffic diversion and were directing cars away from the scene with their red illuminated batons.  Detectives had arrived in a huge black Nissan: a cool looking man who was surprisingly attractive, and a woman in a skirt and sleeveless top.  I looked at Eiji and he had a half smile on his lips.  I assumed this was the female detective who had questioned him earlier in the day.

            Since we had found and reported the body Eiji and I were kept away from the crowd that stood silently around the area, held back by thin yellow and black tape.  I watched as a forensic officer knelt down and, using a clear plastic rod picked up the pistol by sticking it up the barrel.  He called to the male detective as he stood up.  All the while there were flashes from a police photographer’s camera.

            The forensic man talked to the detective, indicating the gun, which he eventually placed in a clear plastic bag.  The detective then approached us, pulling off his rubber gloves.  He reached inside his jacket and offered Eiji his card, flashing me a toothy smile.  Close up he was so very good looking. He was in his forties I would imagine, but his hair was still black and he looked to be in good condition.  His face was angular, with very narrow eyes that reminded me of a samurai painting.  He was a good bit taller than most of the people around the scene.

            Eiji and I bowed then Eiji handed me the policeman’s card: ‘Detective Hiroshi Kuroda’ was printed in bold black characters with the emblem of the MPD underneath, followed by direct line and mobile numbers.  I pocketed the card and gave him a smile despite the situation.  I shocked myself by looking to see if he wore a wedding ring, which he didn’t.

            “You found the body?”  he asked us.  Eiji and I nodded.  I glanced back to where paramedics were carrying the now-covered body into the back of a waiting ambulance ready for transporting to the police mortuary.

“If you don’t mind me asking, why were you out dressed like that?”

I looked down at my frilly maid uniform.

“I work at La Rose maid café in Akihabara.  I finished at nine.  We were on our way home when we found… him.”

Detective Kuroda nodded and wrote some things down in a leather notebook. 

“Whose home are you going to?”

Since Eiji had forgotten how to talk I told him that we stayed in the same block of flats, pointing in the direction of the building, a couple of minute’s slow walk away from this murder scene.

“Right.”  He looked over my head and towards the shopping centre.

“Toyama! Toyama-san!”

I turned to see the policewoman approaching us, her annoyingly long legs flashing under the skirt as she walked with the confidence of a woman totally at ease.

“Oh, it’s you again,” she muttered, recognising Eiji, then turned back to Kuroda.  He gave her a quizzical look, to which she replied that Eiji had been one of the shop assistants in the scene of the robbery she reported earlier.  In her hand was the gun.

“A toy,” she intoned.

“That’s a Mamoshi plastic scale model of a 9mm Colt pistol.  You can see the copyright stamp on the grip.”

We all looked at him.

“Is this the same as one of the items stolen from your shop, Watanabe-san?” she asked.  Despite being infatuated with this example of female power Eiji was scared stiff.  I patted his arm.

“Tell her, Eiji… you haven’t done anything.”

Eiji nodded and bowed deeply.

Kuroda took the bag and held it in his hand.

“Very light.  I can see how it would fool someone from a distance, but it looks like a toy from here.”

He handed it back to Toyama, who looked closely at it through the bag.  She gave me a side glance that sent chills down my spine and then walked back to the black Nissan.  I turned to Eiji who, despite his fear was watching her walk away… I could see that his eyes were staring at her backside.  I hated her for having a figure like that.  She looked like a Western model with that figure, tall and leggy.  I was secretly praying that she would trip up and fall flat on her perfectly made-up face.

I turned back to Kuroda, intently talking into a mobile phone, his back to us.  I nudged Eiji, who had resumed his terrified expression.

“I’ve never seen a dead body before,” he whispered.

“Neither have I.” 

I had been to a funeral for an aunty but they had kept the coffin closed.  I never expected that my first corpse would be like this: the violence and all of that blood.  I began to feel sick and a little dizzy.

“Are you feeling ill, Suzuki-san?”  It was the rich mellow voice of Kuroda.  I looked up at him and nodded like a child, too emphatically.

“The two of you will have to come to the station to fill out witness statements, and then you we’ll get a car to bring you back.  It shouldn’t take less than an hour.”

I saw him wave to another plain-clothes policeman, his plastic armband held in place by an all-too-obvious safety pin.  He jogged up to us and stopped short.  I almost expected him to snap to attention and salute.

“Can you take these young people back to the station, Beniya?  Take their statements and then I want them taken home in a car.  Understood?”

Beniya nodded sharply and directed us to a waiting police patrol car.  A uniformed officer opened the rear passenger door for us and bowed as we clambered into the black interior.  The officer slammed the door shut and then he and Beniya took the front seats.

I had never been in a police car before, and the sounds and smells were playing hellish games with my nerves.  I could see that Eiji had calmed down and was smiling despite the gravity of the situation.

“What are you smiling at, you idiot?”

“This is the latest model of the Crown… nice.”

Here we were, being taken to the police station to give our witness statements about us finding a dead body and here was Eiji, enjoying the chance to ride in a nice new police car.  I wondered if all otaku were so single minded.

My nerves jangled even more as the car started up and we headed down towards Kusagi-dori Avenue and headed off for Ueno.  I wanted to thump Eiji more than ever!

MAID IN TOKYO: Chapter 1

Chapter 1

Mamiko and Yuri were performing a parapara dance with three of the customers while I busied myself slowly cutting slices of lemon cheesecake, hoping not to be noticed.  As much as I hate to admit it the otaku were pretty good, so good in fact that I had visions of them in their smelly flats practicing to DVDs in their underwear.

I shuddered at the thought.

The track mercifully came to an end and the three men flopped down into their seats to a round of applause.  Mamiko and Yuri bowed and offered ‘V’ signs and cats paw impressions.  I cringed.

Mamiko was a year my senior, twenty-five, but looked like a high school girl, especially with her clear complexion and long hair.  Yuri was just out of high school and still had that annoyingly cute roundness to her that I lacked.  All three of us were dressed in heavy French maid costumes with frilly head-bands, and I mean heavy.  This was August, hottest month of the year and we were wearing three layers of heavy material with long socks and clumpy shoes.  The air conditioning system wasn’t perfect and, while it kept the customers relatively cool, we had to retreat to the back room every so often to blast ourselves with the big fan in there.

We worked in one of the many maid cafes which had become increasingly popular at the turn of the century and were now part of the Akihabara scene.  There were five of us in La Rose: Mamiko, Yuri, Akiko and Rei… plus myself of course.

The café was up a side street not far from the biggest of the Liberty stores, meaning that we got a lot of custom, especially at the weekend.  However we did have our regulars who turned up every day.  Didn’t these people work?  How could they afford some of that junk they brought in to show off to us?

Yuri poured herself a glass of still lemonade and drank it in one gulp, giving a self-satisfied sigh as she placed the glass down on the counter top.

“That was so tiring,” she breathed.  “I haven’t done parapara since I left school.”

I glared at her.

“That was six months ago, Yuri.”

Then she did it…the face!  She stuck out her bottom lip and ballooned her cheeks.

“You’re so mean, Momo-chan.”

I bristled and looked over my glasses at her.  She was wearing those flashy contacts that made you look like you had blue eyes.  I tried them once, and ended up being shouted at by my late father for turning my back on our heritage.  So my slightly amber coloured eyes bore into hers.

“Don’t ever call me Momo-chan, you little twit.  It’s Momoko”

Yuri’s act vanished and she placed her hands on her annoyingly shapely hips and thrust her chest out.  God I hated her.

“Listen, granny, those losers out there want us to be cute and sweet.  You already have a cute name, so why not make the most of it?  And what’s with those glasses – you’re a bit old for the moe look.”

Moe was the look that seemed to drive the fan-boys wild… then again, anything seemed to drive them wild.  I wore glasses because I needed them and contacts really irritated my eyes.  I don’t think it would do for me to turn up for work looking like a vampire.  Then again I suspect there would be otaku who go for that look.  Moe was cute and virginal, and was typified by either a schoolgirl or maid in glasses, preferably with long hair.

“I need them, Yuri, not like those plain glass ones you have in your pocket.”

Miss Namikawa, our manager suddenly appeared from the inner office.  Unlike the rest of us she was dressed in normal office clothes, her hair in a loose ponytail and a stern look on her face.

“Will you two please cut it out?  We are trying to run a business here.  Momoko.”

She turned her gaze on me.  I flinched.  Despite being only thirty years old she had this aura about her that commanded respect, and yes, even fear.

“Stop being so sensitive about your name.  Now get back to work… all of you!”

Like scolded schoolgirls we went back to the floor and served our customers with smiles and cute poses.  I had to get a better job!

I left the café around 8 and still dressed in my maid uniform walked back to my little flat in Kojima, around fifteen minutes away.  It was getting dark and I walked a bit faster than I normally would do in this oppressive humidity.  I passed couples going out for an evening meal or a drink, or some other more romantic liaison. 

I envied them.  The only men who were interested in me were either gaijin tourists, dirty old men, or sweaty otaku.  I shuddered despite the heat, remembering the foreigner who had asked me to pose for a photo while I was in Akihabara handing out packs of tissues.  I don’t speak English so I crossed my arms in an ‘X’ to tell him  that photos weren’t allowed, but he took one anyway.  A few weeks later one of my regulars showed me his new pocketbook computer and cued up a maid website in English.  There was my photo, arms held in front of me like some weirdly dressed “Ultraman” cosplayer.  Apparently this American was a maid fan and had created a site to show off his photos.

These men were just not normal.

“Momoko-saaaan!”

I stopped in my tracks as the slightly nasal voice came from behind me, accompanied by the sound of running feet.  I turned and in the light from the street lamps I could see Eiji Watanabe bounding towards me.  Eiji was my neighbour and worked in one of the many collector shops in Akihabara.  His speciality was model kits, but I knew that he had a thing for the Tokyo police.

Don’t get me wrong, it wasn’t some unhealthy obsession with girls in police uniforms (though I expect there was an element of that), he had a genuine interest in our city’s police department.  One time when we shared a meal in his flat I was amazed that he had so many models of black and white police cars on a display shelf.  He even had a real police uniform in his closet – but it was a female officer’s.  When he showed that to me I had a nasty feeling he wanted me to dress up for him, but luckily he didn’t.

As far as otaku go Eiji was pretty level-headed.  Well, he managed to hold down a job, so he had to be pretty stable.

“Hello, Eiji, “I called back, waving politely.  He stopped in front of me and bent over double, catching his breath.

“You really need to exercise more.”

He looked up at me and smiled.  He wasn’t bad looking, but he had that gormless, almost sad look that a lot of young men who worked in shops had these days.  Maybe it was having to climb two flights of stairs seven days a week that made him look like a skeleton – if he ate more he would fill out a bit.  Then again, he was only about five centimetres taller than me, and I’m only 155cm.

“You heading home?” he asked.  I nodded and pointed to a Seven-Eleven convenience store just over the road and up a little. 

“I want to get something for dinner and a drink.”

He smiled and suggested that we get the same thing and have it in his flat.  I liked the idea of company tonight and suggested we go to my flat instead.  Apart from being a bit tidier, I actually had a working TV.  Eiji tended to watch his mystery DVDs on his PC.

So, we headed back to our block of flats.  Kojima is a quiet part of Tokyo, with a fairly large population of Koreans, Chinese and Indians.  Our block was about a minute from the Hotel Villa Fontaine Ueno, and up a little side street. 

We passed through the block’s automatic doors and I inserted my key into the security box.  Visitors had to dial the room number on a keypad but those of who lived here just inserted a key.

We checked our mail boxes and headed for the lift.  I waited for Eiji to squeeze in with his bags and pressed the button for the tenth floor.  The polite voice of the lift announced that we had arrived at our floor moments later and we tumbled out.  I can only imagine what a stranger would make of a young woman in a maid costume and a young man falling out of a lift and laughing like kids.  I fumbled in my bag for the key and unlocked the metal door. 

We left our shoes and entered my sanctuary in all of its pink fluffiness.

“This is nice,” Eiji cooed, noticing a pink fluffy Pepo-kun, the mascot of the Tokyo Metropolitan Police Department… although they were normally yellow.

“UFO catcher?”

I nodded and placed the shopping on the single table in my humble little home.

I had a bed down one side, a small table and two chairs opposite with a laptop computer.  A space heater was currently acting as a shelf for some of my books.  There was a closet at the foot of my bed and a small chest of drawers.

At the entrance to the flat was my little kitchen: a two-ring cooker, rice steamer, fridge, oven, microwave and a sink.  Small cupboards held my crockery, such as it was.  Opposite the kitchen were the western-style toilet and a small bathroom with shower.

As flats go it was quite well appointed… if miniscule.  Just as well I wasn’t any taller – it seemed crowded with just me and Eiji. 

Fifteen minutes later and we were tucking into instant ramen with some miso soup from my cupboard and a couple of cans of something cold.  Eiji was slurping while staring intently at the TV.  His favourite drama was on: “Random Crime Squad”.  A police drama, naturally.  I turned in time to see the lead actress, Yukie Nakama slam her fist down on the table in an interrogation room, causing the housewife being questioned to jump.  Somehow an actress as pretty as Nakama-san didn’t seem right for a tough no-nonsense detective.

“Go get her, Ayumi!” Eiji cooed, using the character’s name rather than the actress’ own. 

“You really like this?” I asked, coughing as some noodles went down the wrong way.

“Of course.  You know they’re talking about a spin-off movie?”

I hadn’t seen him this animated since they cancelled “Sexy Policewoman Reiko”, and he protested outside the TV studios along with three dozen other otaku. When the real police came to move them on he got to ride in a real patrol car since he identified himself as the ring-leader.  They questioned him for about two hours then let him go without so much as a caution.  He must have thought he died and went to heaven.  It was all he talked about for a week

Nutter.

“You just want to see Nakama-san on the big screen again, don’t you?”

Eiji blushed and slurped noisily at his ramen.  I giggled and downed what was left of my soup, then stood up and walked into the kitchenette, dropping the bowls into the sink.  I caught my reflection in the mirror.

I would say that I’m pretty attractive, at least compared to some of the girls I see everyday.  I have a smallish nose and a very small mouth.  My eyes are quite narrow and are a sort of golden brown rather than almost black.  My hair is collar length and not quite black.

I looked down, sighing at the way my t-shirt didn’t stick out as far as I’d like.  My breasts were pretty small: my ex-boyfriend called them pimples.  I won’t tell you what I used to call his excuse for a manhood!  I was also pretty slim, verging on the skinny.

“Ooh!”

The pained cry came from Eiji.

“What?”  I rushed into the other half of the flat.

“They had the wrong woman all along!”  He looked genuinely disappointed.  I felt like telling him to get a life, but this was his life.  Just like being a waitress in a maid costume was my life.  My only hobby was making costume jewellery in my spare time, and I didn’t do much of that these days.

Eiji went back to his flat on the ninth floor and I locked the door behind him.  He left behind a man’s smell that my little hovel wasn’t accustomed to.  I grabbed the air-freshener and sprayed it around a bit.  I would have used perfume but I only have a bottle of an expensive French one that I can’t pronounce.  Too expensive to waste like that.

I washed the last of the dishes and flopped down onto my bed.  I picked up the TV remote and flicked through the channels: period drama, sumo, baseball highlights, a foreign movie about someone called Austen Powers, and a news show… I went back to the film.  The Powers character was being confronted by Asian twins dressed like naughty schoolgirls.  I groaned.  Yet another western image of Japanese girls.

I turned it off and picked up a magazine, leafing through the pages of scandals and fashion, my eyes growing heavier as the minutes past.  I was asleep by eleven.

New Blog

For a while I have been blogging about model kits of cars and Gerry Anderson subjects, and even some of my CGI comics from years past... but I have decided to also upload my text fiction to the internerd.
While I sometimes like to write the odd piece of SF TV fan fiction (Doctor Who) I won't be uploading them to this blog... everything here is mine, characters and situations are all from my fevered, raving mind.

I don't know if anyone will like it, or even read it, but it makes me happy to know that there is the potential for people to read my stories.