FrAcTuReD (Part One) (Completed continued in Part Two)

Chapter. 05 (Slight Edit)

The woman then spotted Alex and smiled. "Oh Alex, what are you doing here? Don't you have school today? Or are you just skipping?"

Alex responded with a sarcastic laugh. "Ha-ha funny, but no I'm not. I'm just showing the new girl around. She felt sick and the school nurse decided to send her home and I figured I should walk her back home but also give her the chance to look around since she hasn't had the chance to do that yet."

The woman looked to Charla and offered a hand. "It's nice to meet you. I'm Setsuko Satonaka. And as you can see I run this bookstore."

Charla shook her hand. "Charla Liebert."

Her eyes grew. "Liebert? Oh you must be Nina's cousin then; I've heard that a family member was supposed to come by but I didn't think it would be this soon."

"You know Nina?" Charla asked and Ms. Satonaka nodded.

"She comes here sometimes on her way home after school, and occasionally her father too, when he's not busy with work that is." She then changed the topic. "So how does it feel to come to such a small town from the big city?"

"I like it; it's quite and not noisy or anything. Not to mention the air is good here."

"That's good, though it's surprising; normally I thought a city girl would rather go to that mall then here in the shopping district."

Charla became quite so Alex spoke up "She wanted to come here, she's apparently an avid reader and when I told her about this place it interested her a lot."

"Really?" she looked back to Charla. "What kind of books do you read?"

"Anything really," she said. "I'm also into books from other countries, the kind of things you don't normally find at a commercial book store."

Ms. Satonaka turned and looked to the shelves. "Well we have a number of books in different languages; I myself am a fan of old Japanese books, back where my grandparents came from before they came here. There's something nostalgic about reading them."

"Do you know Japanese?" Charla asked the woman.

She nodded. "I do, can you speak it as well?"

With a warm smile Charla spoke in Japanese. "Hai, watashi wa nihongo o hanasu hōhō o shitte imasu."

Ms. Satonaka looked surprised and smiled happily before switching to Japanese. "Watashi wa miemasu! Anata wa manga o takusan yomanakereba narimasen."

Charla shook her head. "Īe, watashi wa sūnenmae ni oshie raremashita."

The woman smiled. "Sore wa subarashīdesu."

Charla's smile grew warm. "Hai,-sōdesu."

"Uh..." Alex broke in. "You two do know I can't understand a single word that you're saying right now... right?"

"Oh I'm sorry," Ms. Satonaka said switching to English. "We didn't mean to alienate you from the conversation. I just never expected to meet someone else who could speak the language, besides my daughter and husband of course." Then a sudden light came into her eyes. "Oh wait right here, I think I have something you might enjoy."

The woman then vanished into the many mass of shelves, the sound of rummaging about before coming back with two small hard cover books. She held up the first one. "This is called Niji no Monokuro it's a collection of short stories and this," she held up the other book. "It's called Kuro Yagi no Tamago it's a bit dark so it might not be to your liking..." She handed them to Charla. "But I still think you may enjoy them."

"I've read some dark books before so I think I'll be fine." Charla took the books and stared at them before asking. "How much do I owe you?"

Ms. Satonaka shook her head. "You don't owe me anything. Think of this as a gift welcoming you to this town."

Both Charla and Alex looked to each other before Charla spoke. "Are you sure?"

Ms. Satonaka smiled and nodded. "It'd be wrong to charge my daughter's best friend's cousin when she just arrived. Think of it as a housewarming gift."

Charla looked at the two books before looking back to Ms. Satonaka and saw how the woman seemed adamant in not having Charla pay for them. At least this time, she could grasp that this was probably a onetime thing. She put the books in her bag and then to Alex's surprise she bowed to the woman. "Thank you very much."

Ms. Satonaka didn't seem surprised at all and did the same thing in response. "You are very welcome. I hope you enjoy them."

Charla stood up straight and smiled. "I think I will."

They said their goodbyes as Charla and Alex left the store, as they walked however Alex asked a question.

"You know Japanese?"

"I do," Charla said. "I also know French and I know German."

Alex looked stunned. "I have trouble speaking freaking French, so how in the world do you know three other languages?"

"My Dad," she said. "He traveled a lot for business and sometimes he'd take me and my brother with him instead of leaving us alone in the house or with a babysitter. Though in all honesty I didn't really start learning Japanese until I was twelve or so, and even then I know I still have some difficulty. Occasionally I'd often find myself speaking in German rather than English and make people confused because of it. My Dad would often speak in German, since it was also his native tongue, when it was just us so that's probably why I do that. But it hasn't happened in a while."

Alex just looked at her. "Your Dad seems like a cool guy,"

Charla smiled genuinely as she grasped her headphones. "Yeah, he really is."