Extra 6: Give a Sunny Spot

—–Translated by daydrop. Please read on the original site at daydrop.nowaki.net.

It was the epitome of a nice March day today. He hadn’t visited the smoking area very often recently, but he headed over to it now, and he could tell that it was full before taking a step inside. He probably ran into a break in between tapings or something. He didn’t want to be covered in other people’s smoke in cramped quarters, so he turned around and changed his destination for the wooden deck terrace. The weather was fine even without wearing a coat outside. It was past lunchtime, and the place was deserted just as he expected—at least when it came to humans.

As he searched for his lighter to light up a cigarette, a tiny bundle suddenly jumped out at him from the shadows of the plants, and he stopped his hand unconsciously. It was a kitten. A brown tabby with bright green eyes. Just as he thought how suddenly it had shown up, it started scratching at the wooden deck, its front paws about the size of a go piece.

Hey, there aren’t any insects or birds here.

Watching the kitten, he realized that it was attacking the sunny spot at his feet. There were a few spots of light like melted honey in between the shadows cast through the trees, and they swayed back and forth delicately each time a gentle breeze blew past. It appeared to be a suitable prey for an animal that was not much different from a baby.

It had a healthy-looking coat and didn’t appear to be a stray. Maybe it was an animal actor used in a shoot? At any rate, it had nothing to do with him. Sakae left it alone, and as he rested his elbows on his knees, the kitten jumped right next to him. The lighter in his hand had taken the sunlight and refracted the rays like a faint prism on the floor, and the kitten had reacted to it. He moved the lighter, and the kitten raised its tail in the air to pounce the spot like a true predator after its prey. But then the kitten rolled around on the floor in the ray of sunlight, showing its belly as it tossed and turned, and after a while it snorted through its little pink nose and came over to rub its tiny body against his leg.

“…What are you doing?”

Sakae let out a chuckle despite himself.

“You’ll get hair on me.”

He scooped it up with one hand, and the kitten wrinkled its nose and mewed with a rich vibrato. Even though it was young, he could see its sharp teeth and little pink tongue.

“Stop right there.”

Sakae looked over in the direction of the voice, and Shitara approached him.

“What?”

“We just had a missing search request for that cat.”

“Is it a cat for an agency somewhere?”

It would explain why it had no trouble approaching humans.

“No, it belongs to one of the performers. There was no one to take care of the cat, so she brought it with her, which was fine, but then it escaped, and the staff was in a huge panic.”

When Sakae heard the name of a very big name actress, he could easily imagine the panic as they tried to search for it.

“I never imagined that it would be here.”

Shitara took the kitten from Sakae and held it up to his face with both hands. “Now how did you trek all the way out here?” he asked the kitten. Its answer was naturally a meow.

“Like a cat can answer back.”

“Weren’t you talking to it too?”

“How long have you been watching me? You creep me out.”

“You looked like you were enjoying yourself, so I didn’t want to interrupt you.”

“Get your eyes checked.”

“For now, I’ll go deliver this back to its owner. As a reward, 10,000 yen seems a little bland, so let’s go somewhere good for dinner tonight.”

“Before you go, I know you took some secret photos while you were at it, so you better delete them.”

“Huh? How did you know?”

“Whatever, just delete them already.”

“But it’ll help heal me whenever I get exhausted from work~”

In the end, Shitara left without deleting the photos. What remained was the sunny spot with no playmate, the air filled with the signs of spring, and the blue sky up above.

And Sakae who looked up at the sky, no longer in the mood to smoke a cigarette.

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Translator’s Note: This is the last of the extras for now. Tsunaide has a release date of August 10th, but the translations will have some lag time due to shipping and the later release date of the ebook version. I purchase both print and ebook versions, but I expect the translation for Tsunaide to start in the September time frame.

—–Translated by daydrop. Please read on the original site at daydrop.nowaki.net.

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