Part-Time

Late in the afternoon one Saturday in early May, Chihiro Hashima paid a visit to a certain mixed-use building. It was six floors tall, built ten years ago, and looked very tidy, inside and out. Getting off at the fifth floor, he headed for the black door in front of him, one that featured a sign in red lettering: ONO TAX ACCOUNTING. This was the office of Ashley Ono, the accountant who had helped Itsuki Hashima and a number of other novelists with filing their tax returns.

“H-hello…,” he said as he nervously entered the office.

The office was a symphony of red and black. The carpet featured embroidered black roses on a red background. Black shades covered the windows, despite it being the middle of the day. There was a black table, a red sofa, and a bookshelf painted entirely black. Deeper in, a black desk and an ornate chair with flashy red decorations on it—and the blond-haired Ashley Ono was seated on that noble throne, wearing a dress.

…This is an accounting office, right…?

Chihiro had never been in any other accounting office, but nothing about this decor suggested an “office” at all. It thoroughly confused Chihiro, even as the woman with the young-looking face and the bewitching eyes opened her mouth.

“Hee-hee-hee… Glad to see you here, Chihiro.”

“Um, hello…Ashley. I’m, uh, I’m glad to be here.”

“Ho-ho… As am I.”

Chihiro was paying a visit to Ashley for one purpose only—to take on a part-time job. At the cherry blossom–viewing picnic the gang had a few days back, Ashley had enjoyed Chihiro’s homemade food and snacks so much that she suggested Chihiro could help out at her office. She’d teach him the basics of bookkeeping when they weren’t busy, and after some hemming and hawing, Chihiro decided to take up her offer on Saturdays only. Both his parents had qualms at first, but they relented—the term “tax accountant office” had a certain weight to it that helped out.

His responsibilities were mainly tidying up, making food, organizing documents, and other miscellaneous tasks, nothing too different from what he usually did at Itsuki’s place. He’d get to study accounting a little, and the pay was pretty good, too.

“Right. How about I set you to work?”

“S-sure… Is there anybody else, by the way?”

Ashley was the only one in the office. It made Chihiro worry.

“I hire on some extra help during the busy period between December and March, but mostly it’s just me.”

“Oh, I see…”

“Hee-hee-hee! Does being alone with me unnerve you? Well, don’t worry… I won’t eat you up,” she said with a devilish smile.

“Ha-ha… Um, so what would you like me to do first?”

“I’d like you to do some cleaning in the kitchen.”

“The kitchen?”

Looking where Ashley pointed, he spotted an inconspicuous door there, the same color as the rest of the wall.

“This is my office, but it’s also my residence. My kitchen and bedroom are in there.”

“Oh, really?”

He opened the door—

“Eep…?!”

—and promptly let out an unconscious shriek.

The first thing he saw was a combination dining room–kitchen, a hundred or so square feet in size. The low table in the middle held a few empty instant-ramen containers and half-drunk sake bottles and cups, and the floor had ten or so empties rolling around, along with empty packets of string cheese, dried-squid snacks, convenience-store packaging, panties that had been tossed aside with abandon, and so forth.

Fearing the worst, he turned toward the sink. It was littered with unwashed dishes and utensils stewing in a dark, slimy swamp. Looking closer, he could see stains on the floor—maybe soy sauce, maybe sake; he didn’t know—that hadn’t been wiped off and were now making the whole place sticky.

“I manage to keep my office room clean for the sake of my customers,” Ashley explained, a tad embarrassed, “but I just can’t seem to find the time for the rest of this place.”

To Chihiro, this went beyond a mere lack of time. Does this girl know how to take care of herself at all…?

“Ha-ha…” He recalled Itsuki’s place when he first started living alone. It had been fairly similar. He couldn’t help but laugh awkwardly.

“… Ashley?”

“What is it?”

“…Is it all right if I go all out on this?”

“Um, sure… Knock yourself out.”

The sheer ghastliness of Chihiro’s expression made even Ashley lean back a bit before nodding her approval.

About five hours later.

“…I barely even recognize it.”

Scoping out her sparkling new apartment, Ashley couldn’t help but gush a bit. The littered garbage was all tossed out, the floor and washbasin polished to a shine, the nasty sludge scrubbed from the sink. Even the dirt and dust had been wiped away from the window glass and frames. And Chihiro didn’t stop at the kitchen. He had the bedroom, hallway, bathroom, and toilet thoroughly clean as well.

The floors were waxed, using a few items Chihiro got permission from Ashley to purchase at the home-improvement store. He spotted three or so cockroaches as he did his work, but he quickly took care of them with a rolled-up newspaper, showing no hesitation whatsoever. Ono Tax Accounting’s live-in quarters—a place that the term “squalor” could have easily been applied to just yesterday—now boasted the sheen it had back when Ashley first started living here.

“…I didn’t think you’d go this far.”

Chihiro flashed a brisk smile as he wiped the sweat from his brow. “Oh, no. It was fun, getting to really go for it on a cleaning job for a change.”

“You’re all sweaty. You can use my bath if you like.”

“The bath…”

After five hours of full-on cleaning, Chihiro was fairly covered in sweat. The office had a pretty large bathroom. He envied it a little.

“Thank you very much! I’d love to.”

So he headed for the bathroom and quickly disrobed—just as the door opened again.

“Oh, Chihiro, you can find the towels in the—”

“…?!”

“…Oh…?”

Ashley gave an odd look to Chihiro, standing there naked and unable to speak. Her eyes turned from his chest to what lay below that.

“…Hmm. So you were a girl, huh?”

Five minutes later, Ashley and Chihiro were lounging in the bath together.

“You know, I run into a lot of strange people in my line of work, but I think you rank pretty high up there. Tee-hee-hee…”

Despite her lack of tact, Ashley didn’t seem uncomfortable with this revelation, smiling warmly at her companion. Chihiro had told her the truth about hiding her gender from Itsuki—not that she had much choice.

“…My brother’s the only person in my family who thinks I’m a boy. I go to school and stuff as a girl—everything else, too, I mean. Except for his editor, Toki, and his other friends. I’m still passing as a guy with them.”

“And I guess the cat’s out of the bag with me, hmm? Hee-hee…”

“Um, I’m hoping you can keep this a secret from him…?”

“Ooh, well, who can say?”

“Please, Ms. Ono!”

Chihiro looked about to cry as Ashley gave her a sadistic grin.

“Tee-hee… It’s all right. I’m not in the habit of picking on girls just because their breasts aren’t too developed.”

The sadistic grin turned into a somewhat sincerer smile.

“Th-thank you very much,” Chihiro replied, not entirely satisfied but relieved enough for now.

“…But you know this isn’t the kind of secret you can hide from him forever?”

“…I know. I want to explain everything to him, sometime.”

“…And how do you think Itsuki will respond, hmm? He looooves his little sisters. Just imagine if he knew he had one cleaning his apartment all along…”

Chihiro bit her lip in silence.

“After all,” Ashley continued, “Itsuki’s one of my favorite toy—er, most valued clients…hee-hee… Oh, how I do wonder… Tee-hee-hee- hee-hee-hee…”