The Before Short Story Series. Part 1 - стр. 2
‘Daddy! Daddy! Daddy!’ Ayaka leapt up and began to run wild around the room.
‘Ayaka, please, calm down! Grandma Yano will think a volcano is erupting if you stomp your feet so much!’
But Ayaka heard nothing of what her mother was saying. Running up to the front door and having made her way through the lock, she ran downstairs to meet her father, all the while yelling loudly.
‘So many tourists in the park today. There were like two buses of Americans brought here. I don’t even know where they got so many people to begin with! Can you imagine, Hiromi,’ Keirou was telling her wife, ‘two buses! I do think though it was on purpose—it surely is a lot cooler on Deck 1 than in the city, oh yes it is. They must have wanted to save on air conditioning, right Ayaka?’
‘Keirou, don’t distract her please! it wouldn’t hurt you to eat as well, too.’
‘I think, Daddy, that air conditioning needs to be turned off. They are very inefficient energetically. It’s so hot today! Mummy turned the air conditioning on at home. And she also put some tights on me: here, have a look,’ Ayaka lifted her dress in the same way again—to show her father her white tights covering half of her belly, which had already got bigger since she started eating.
Keirou burst into laughter.
‘Ayaka!’ Hiromi called her daughter as though threatening further action. ‘Pull the dress back at once and eat on! Why are you encouraging her, Keirou?’
’I am sorry, Hiro-chan. Sorry,’ he smiled while struggling to hold his smile and throwing a glance or two at his wife. ‘Aya-chan, Mummy was right to turn the air conditioning on. Otherwise it would be too hot inside—you see, it is about two o’clock, and it’s like 30° out there right now. And it probably will get hotter yet! Meanwhile, it is cool and nice in here, isn’t it? And the tights—you were sitting on the floor, so that’s why Mummy did that.’
‘Yes, Daddy, I do agree. It is right. It is warm in the tighties.’
‘The lunch is great today, Hiromi. Thank you!’
‘I am glad you like it.’
‘I like it too, Mummy!’ Ayaka supported her father.
‘Keirou, do you remember that we need to go to Tōkyō next week with Ayaka?’
‘Tōkyō? Why would it be?’ Keirou asked, surprised.
Hiromi looked at her husband with some disapproval, ‘Next week, Keirou, our daughter is turning six. That means we need to go to the Destiny House.’
‘I sure do remember that Ayaka’s birthday is next week, right. But I did forget everything about destiny.’
‘Well now you do remember—so please, we need to think everything out.’
‘Daddy, dad-dy! Look, I’m already done with it!’ Ayaka ran up to her father showing him a finished module of a Martian atomic power plant. A lamp on the module was blinking green, indicating that the module was ready to be connected to the main energy network of the base.