I got out of bed with my legs still shaking and the bruise from my grandmother throbbing on my face. I changed quickly. Loose jeans and a hoodie. No school uniform. I wasn’t ready for that yet.
I stepped into the hallway.
The mansion’s corridors seemed to have stretched overnight. With every step toward the staircase, the walls pulled like chewing gum, the portraits of unknown ancestors followed me with their painted eyes, and the shadows twisted in the corners.
(It’s my imagination. Just my imagination. Mansions don’t grow.)
But my heart hammered against my ribs like a caged bird.
I reached the staircase. The carved wooden railing gleamed under the dim light filtering through the stained-glass windows. Below, the vestibule stretched out empty. Silent. Too silent.
A strange premonition swept through my body like a current of ice water. The hairs on the back of my neck stood up.
(There’s no one here. Where is everyone?)
I moved forward cautiously, barefoot—I’d forgotten to put on shoes—trying to make as little noise as possible. The marble floor was cold. Every column, every potted fern, every closed door seemed to whisper secrets I didn’t want to hear.
Then, at the end of the hallway, I heard voices.
Distant. Muffled.
They were coming from the kitchen.
I crept closer, pressing my back to the wall, holding my breath. The kitchen door was ajar, a warm sliver of light spilling into the corridor.
I peeked inside.
There they were: my father, Misaki, and Grandmother Hanako.
Misaki had her head down on the table, arms crossed over the wood like she was carrying the weight of the world. My father stood beside her, one hand on her back in a gesture that mixed comfort and resignation. And Hanako… Hanako sat across from them, legs crossed, black kimono fitted perfectly, a steaming teacup in her hands.
The atmosphere was thick. Tense.
“Come now, dear, there’s no need to hide. You know?” Hanako said.
Her voice was sweet but laced with something dangerous—like honey mixed with poison. She didn’t look up from her teacup, but the faint smile on her lips instantly exposed my hiding spot.
Shame burned up my neck like fire.
“Jaja…” I stepped forward, hands in my pockets, trying to look casual. “What? I wasn’t hiding. I was just… admiring the architecture.”
My father looked up. His smile was warm, but his eyes… his eyes looked tired.
“Well, Sienna. After coming back and ending up in a situation like this…”
“What situation exactly?” I asked, laughing nervously. “What do you mean, Dad? Jajaja…”
I glanced at Misaki. Her face was still glued to the table. Her shoulders trembled slightly. Was she crying? Sleeping? I couldn’t tell.
“Don’t worry about trivial things,” Hanako interrupted, setting her teacup down with a sharp click. “We have something to talk about, don’t we? My dear… S-I-E-N-N-A?”
She pronounced my name syllable by syllable, like she was tasting it. Her gaze turned cold. No, not cold—glacial. The kind of cold that freezes you from the inside out.
“Jaja…” I felt a pinch in my leg.
I didn’t know if it was my father or my own guilty conscience. Either way, I reacted.
“Yes, Grandma? What do you need?”
Silence.
Hanako narrowed her eyes.
“Grandma?” Her voice carried a strange tone. Not anger. Surprise… and something else. Melancholy, maybe. “Did I say something weird, Dad?” I turned to my father, looking for backup.
He stroked his chin, rubbing the stubble that was starting to grow.
“Well… I haven’t heard you call her that since you were in fourth grade.”
Hanako nodded slowly. Her expression softened by a millimeter.
“It’s certainly comforting to hear my granddaughter call me that,” she said, fixing me with a piercing stare.
“Hehe…” I was sweating. Cold sweat, hot sweat, sweat from every pore.
(What the hell am I saying? Think, Dani! Think!)
“I… I guess…” I stammered. “I guess I just needed a change of pace. You know. To get back into the usual rhythm.”
(Shit. That sounded fake even to me.)
My father looked at me strangely. Hanako, on the other hand, gave a smile that didn’t reach her eyes.
“Well… I suppose some changes are good.”
She paused. A long pause. Way too long.
“Even so, that doesn’t explain what happened in the bathroom. Can you tell me what exactly occurred?”
(Bam. Straight to the point.)
“Uh…” I looked at Misaki. She still hadn’t lifted her head from the table. “M-Misaki, didn’t you tell Dad anything?”
I glanced sideways at the maid. But she stayed silent. Her fingers on the table were white from how hard she was pressing.
My father sighed.
“Unfortunately, it seems she’s very ashamed of her mistake and didn’t want to talk about it.”
“Mistake?”
“Yes. Imagine letting her young miss fall in the bathroom like that…” He shook his head, looking troubled. “People have died from falls like that, you know? And she broke the door by accident… I thought we had left that in the past.”
(I fell? That’s what she told them?)
“I even had to wake Osvaldo from his sleep to replace it,” he added with another sigh.
Osvaldo. The butler, I assumed. Someone who could replace doors at five in the morning.
“Yes!” I exclaimed, maybe too quickly, too brightly. “You’re right, Dad! But it was my fault. I shouldn’t have exaggerated.”
Hanako nodded gravely.
“Indeed, you shouldn’t have.”
“Quiet…” I muttered, then realized what I’d said. (Shit, I forgot she was here!)
But Hanako didn’t seem offended. On the contrary. Her smile widened.
“Still, the matter can’t be left like this… Isn’t that right, my granddaughter?” She tilted her head like a predator studying its prey. “Don’t you think we should cut the problem off at the root?”
(Shit. She knows. SHE KNOWS!)
Sweat soaked my back. My armpits. My palms.
“N-no, that’s not necessary,” I said, using the firmest voice I could manage. “It’s fine like this.”
“Fine like this?” Hanako turned to my father, and suddenly… her eyes filled with tears.
They didn’t look fake. At least, not completely. They sparkled under the kitchen light like little pearls.
“Look, my dear Hiroshi,” she said, her voice breaking. “My granddaughter doesn’t understand how worried her grandmother is.” She placed a hand over her heart. “I only want to spend more time with her after so long…”
(What is this weight in my chest?)
“G-Grandma…”
I couldn’t finish.
My father stepped forward and hugged Hanako tightly. His face sank into her shoulder, and for a moment he looked like a little boy again.
“Don’t worry, Mom. I understand.” His voice was soft and warm. “If that’s what you want, then please feel free to spend the whole weekend with Sienna.”
Hanako cried. Real tears rolled down her perfectly made-up cheeks.
“Thank you, son. You’re my treasure. Always so generous.”
My father smiled… and then, behind Hanako’s back, he made a quick mouth gesture.
I didn’t understand it at first. But something in his expression chilled me.
(Damn it. IT WAS ALL AN ACT.)
I raised my hand. Out of habit. Pure instinct from my old life as Dani, when my friends betrayed me in poker games or lied about who broke the PlayStation.
I flipped her the middle finger.
Hanako turned slowly. She saw me with my middle finger raised.
Her smile grew darker.
(I think I fucked up.)
“Miss! It’s 6:05!” Misaki shot up like a spring.
Her face was marked by the edge of the table, but her green eyes burned with renewed energy. She looked at me. Just for a second. But in that second I knew we were on the same side.
My father reacted quickly, checking his pocket watch.
“Well then, Sienna. Go change. You have 55 minutes before school.”
“Yes!” I slammed my fist on the table, making the teacups rattle. “I’m going!”
I bolted out of the kitchen like a rocket. My bare feet slapped against the marble vestibule. I took the stairs two at a time, grabbing the railing so I wouldn’t fall.
I reached my room panting. I slammed the door—the new door, freshly installed by Osvaldo—shut behind me.
I leaned against the wood, breathing hard. My heart pounded in my temples.
“Okay…” I whispered. “Okay. Just change. Go to school. Everything will be fine.”
I pulled off the hoodie. Put on the white school shirt. Yanked the pleated skirt up to my waist. My fingers were shaking so badly I couldn’t button it.
Knock, knock.
“Yes?” I asked without turning around, still focused on the damn buttons. “Misaki? Maybe she’s confused about everything… I owe her an apology…”
Still half-dressed—the skirt on, the shirt open showing my white bra, the lower buttons still undone—I opened the door.
“Well, my little granddaughter. Didn’t you know I was waiting for you?”
I stepped back.
I couldn’t hide my shock. My mouth fell open. My eyes widened. I took two steps backward, tripping over my own feet.
Hanako stepped into the room. She closed the door behind her. The lock clicked like a death sentence.
“Now…” she said, her voice sweet enough to freeze blood. “Let’s say that, after some time away, my granddaughter has finally come home.”
She walked slowly toward me. Her wooden sandals made no sound on the carpet. Her black kimono seemed to drink in the light.
“You look exactly as I remembered,” she stopped right in front of me.
The scent of jasmine and sandalwood wrapped around me. Her dark eyes scanned me from head to toe.
“But you speak differently. And you have…”
Her hand moved downward.
Fast. Precise.
She grabbed Excalibur.
Not through the clothes. Directly. Her fingers closed around the bulge under my skirt, under my panties. I felt the heat of her palm through the fabric.
“…this.”
(Shit. Shit, shit, shit. I haven’t even been here two full days.)
“G-Grandma,” I stammered, trying to gently push her hand away. “I don’t know what you’re talking about… Could you please give me some privacy?”
I pushed her hand. Or tried to.
It didn’t move.
It was like trying to move a brick wall. Like pushing a mountain. Hanako stayed right there, motionless, with that murky smile and her iron grip.
“I see you have no intention of talking, hmm?” she said.
She shoved me.
I fell backward onto the bed. The mattress cushioned the impact, but my pride shattered. Hanako stood over me, one hand on her hip, the other… still exactly where it was.
“Then…” She bit her lower lip. “It seems I’ll have to examine everything myself.”
(Fuck… Ancestors… Friends… I’m sorry. But what you couldn’t do, I’m going to be forced to achieve.)
Hanako reached into the sleeve of her kimono and pulled out a small pencil.
The size of a pinky finger. Yellow. Sharpened to a point.
“Huh…?”
The pencil changed size.
Not like magic, but like when you move an object back and forth to create an optical illusion. Except this wasn’t an illusion. The pencil grew longer. Thicker. Sharper.
In three seconds it was 25 centimeters long and 10 centimeters thick.
A yellow wooden stake.
“Cold sweat,” I whispered, scrambling back toward the headboard. “What… what are you doing?”
Hanako’s expression changed.
She was no longer the sweet grandmother. No longer the actress who had cried in the kitchen. She was something else.
Anger. But a contained, cold, surgical anger.
She raised her arm. The giant pencil gleamed under the lamp light.
“It’s nothing, Sienna… I just need a little of your blood to check something.”
“CHECK WHAT!?”
“JUMP!”
She leaped toward the bed.
I reacted on instinct. I grabbed the pillows on either side and hurled them at her face.
The pencil shredded them.
Feathers. Fabric. Threads. Everything exploded into the air like a bomb had gone off. White feathers floated around me like snow in August.
Hanako caught me.
One hand around my throat. The other on my arm. Her grip was iron. Her fingers pressed my throat just enough to scare, not to kill.
“You crazy old hag!” I screamed. “What are you doing?! Dad won’t allow this!”
“Jajajaja…” Her laugh was low, guttural, almost masculine. “Do you really think your father will know?”
“Mis—”
“If you scream, I’ll break your arm,” she interrupted, squeezing my wrist.
I felt the bone give slightly. The pain was a white flash.
(Shit… God… Misaki… Dad…)
I closed my eyes.
(This is it.)
Knock, knock.
We both turned toward the door.
“Well… that was it,” I said with a hysterical laugh that sounded more like crying. “Jajaja…”
“Yes,” Hanako nodded calmly. “That was it, unfortunately.”
Her hand moved. Fast. The edge of the pencil—or maybe the edge of her hand—traced a straight line across my arm.
The skin split open.
Blood welled up.
“AHHHHH!”
It hurt. God, it hurt so much. It wasn’t a clean knife cut. It was something else. Something that burned, that throbbed, that sent waves of agony from my forearm straight to my brain.
The door exploded.
Splinters. Wood. Hinges. Everything flew inward.
And there, in the doorway, fist still extended and green eyes blazing like beacons in a storm, stood Misaki.
“WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU DOING TO THE YOUNG MISS?!”
Her voice wasn’t a shout. It was a roar. A roar that shook the walls, made the paintings tilt on their nails, and—for the first time—made Hanako blink.
Her beautiful pink hair waved as if stirred by an invisible wind. Her green eyes sparked. Her uniform was impeccable, but her stance was that of a warrior.
(Misaki…)
Tears welled up in my eyes.
(She’s a hero.)
“Misaki…” I sobbed.
Hanako released me. She stepped away from the bed as if nothing had happened. She straightened her kimono and slipped the pencil back into her sleeve.
“How boring…” she said with a disappointed sigh. “I’ll bring you the news on Saturday, Sienna. Jajaja.”
She walked past Misaki, brushing her shoulder.
“I warn you,” Misaki said, never taking her eyes off her. “Whoever you are… I won’t allow anything to harm my young miss. Understood, Hanako?”
Hanako stopped in the hallway. She turned slowly.
Her smile was murky. Her confidence disgusting.
“Well…” she said. “It’s surprising that you still call that your ‘young miss.’”
She left. Her footsteps faded down the corridor. The sound of her wooden sandals disappeared into the distance.
Misaki stepped into the room.
“Are you alright, Miss Sienna?”
She offered me her hand.
I took it. Her fingers were warm. Steady. They didn’t tremble.
“Thank you…” Tears rolled uncontrollably down my cheeks. “Thank you, Misaki…”
I hugged her with all my strength.
And she hugged me back. Her arms wrapped around my back. Her cheek rested on my shoulder. Her fresh floral scent enveloped me like a blanket.
“Don’t be afraid,” she whispered. “As long as I’m here, no one will hurt you.”
I closed my eyes.
(Maybe… maybe this isn’t so bad after all.)
Outside, the sun had fully risen. The mansion gardens sparkled under the golden light.
And somewhere in the house, a crazy grandmother with a giant pencil was already planning her next attack.
“Six days left,” I murmured against Misaki’s shoulder.
“What?”
“Nothing. Just… thank you for being here.”
She squeezed the hug tighter.
And for a moment, the world stopped hurting.