Maria-sama ga Miteru:Volume23 Chapter4 1

Full to Bursting at the New Year's Party. Part 1

Yoshino-san had brought a combination of fried chicken and french fries and Rei-sama had brought a large take-away pizza and two 2 litre drink bottles (oolong tea and orange juice). Ah, plus a coralberry branch. It was currently adorning the alcove, in an arrangement with apricot and gold stained willow.

"Yumi-chan, you remembered. I'm touched!"

Sayako-oba-sama danced with joy when she spotted the festival food and, overcome with emotion, embraced Yumi. An innocent maiden, no matter her age (and her actual age was unknown to Yumi). She always came across as cute, although it was a bit impolite to think that.

"Let's heat them up right away. Ah, I wonder if Rei-san's pizza should go first?"

"Ah, I'll do it."

They followed Sayako-oba-sama into the kitchen, Rei-sama carrying her pizza and Yumi with her festival food.

"Oba-sama, you've got two ovens, right? If it's alright to use them both at once, we could split it into two lots."

Rei-sama inquired.

"If it's alright to use them both at once?"

Sayako-oba-sama looked confused.

"I mean, if it's not going to trip a breaker, or something like that."

"A breaker … I've never thought about that. I use them whenever I like, though."

But that didn't rule out the possibility that other people had noticed and refrained from using them both at once. Sayako-oba-sama pondered this, saying, "What should we do?" and was answered by Sachiko-sama who appeared in the kitchen behind her.

"It'll be fine. When you made those massive quantities of mille-feuille, it took over all of the big oven, but we still had a proper dinner that night, right? That would have been made with the small oven."

Indeed, that was quite the compelling piece of evidence.

"I suppose so."

Sayako-oba-sama seemed to temporarily accept this, but another question soon popped out of her mouth.

"Oh, but then why did we only use one oven last year?"

"Well, that's because,"

This time it was Yumi's turn to answer.

"Last year, no-one knew how to work the big oven."

"Ah, that's right."

But since then, she'd used it to bake mille-feuille, which meant –

"You've mastered how to use this oven then, oba-sama? That's good, I think it'd be great for the large pizza."

Rei-sama quickly opened the oven door and placed the pizza inside. Yumi placed the octopus dumplings inside the small oven too. They called it the small oven but that name was just for convenience, as it was a standard family-size oven. Probably about the same size as the one the Fukuzawa's had at home. But the other one was large enough for commercial use. It was big enough that they could probably roast two whole turkeys in there at once.

"You should cover them with foil, it'd be bad if the dumplings burst open."

"Okay."

She followed Rei-sama's instructions then switched the oven on. As she was moving the calamari and corn into the heatproof dish that Sachiko-sama held out to her, Yumi accidentally glanced to her side and saw Sayako-oba-sama frozen in front of the large oven she'd been entrusted to operate.

"Oba-sama … umm, is something the matter?"

"What should I do, Rei-san? I've only ever used it as an oven."

"–"

Although reheating a pizza wasn't totally unrelated to using the oven functionality. But Rei-sama didn't know how powerful the oven was, so she let Sayako-oba-sama take care of that. She watched it through the glass door and when the time was right she opened the door and placed a single piece of aluminum foil over the top of the pizza. Thanks to that, they avoided burning it and ended up with piping hot pizza.

Yumi got caught up watching this and some of the dumplings exploded, but thanks to the foil she managed to avoid a huge disaster. Cleaning exploded foods from a microwave oven was enough to make her want to cry, so this was quite a relief.

"Alright, let's eat these while they're hot. Ah, before that."

First, she filled their glasses with non-alcoholic champagne.

"Does everyone have a glass? Well then, a toast!"

"Let's make this another good year."

They clinked glasses with the person next to them and took a sip. Uwah … the champagne fizz jumped across to the tip of her nose. Mmm, it was good.

From the second glass onwards it was self-serve and they were free to choose their favorite drink. As well as the juice and oolong tea that Rei-sama had brought, there was also herbal tea and roasted green tea.

So with that, the food that they'd brought was laid out along the tables and the New Year's party began.

There was Sayako-oba-sama's homemade potato salad. Bite-sized portions were placed on top of slightly bitter leaves (chicory apparently), which served as plates and made it easy to pick up. Yumi had often had potato salad at home, but this was somehow different and felt more fancy, like adult's food. As an example, she'd describe it as a "delicacy," instead of "tasty."

Sachiko-sama had made ham and cheese sandwiches, and they were exquisite. They were cut into single mouthfuls, so obviously not meant to be eaten with a knife and fork, but skewered with toothpicks instead.

"It's really good, but don't you think it'd make the flavor pop just a bit more if it had pickles or olives?"

Rei-sama's advice was probably correct but since Sachiko-sama didn't like either of those things it seemed unlikely that she would follow it. It looked like Rei-sama knew this and had intentionally said it anyway.

The take-away pizza and fried chicken were the standard fare, but still (no, because of this) quite tasty.

The various sweets were set aside for after-meal enjoyment. At any rate, they were all staying overnight, so there was plenty of time left for chatting and eating.

The intercom sounded and Sayako-oba-sama hurriedly left the room.

"It's so busy without the house staff around."

"Could it be, perhaps, another guest?"

Yoshino-san asked Sachiko-sama. Asking if she'd invited anyone else.

"Yes, well … perhaps."

Sachiko-sama responded vaguely and stood up. Yumi's mind buzzed with thoughts of "what if?"

She thought there was a chance it was Touko-chan. Since she knew that Sachiko-sama had invited her to the New Year's party.

But would she really come? Yumi didn't know.

She didn't even know if she should follow after Sachiko-sama or wait there motionless, despite her impatience.

They'd used the intercom so they were now at the front gate. How long would it take for the gate to open and for them to walk to the front of the house? Five minutes? A bit longer?

Even if she stayed still, there should be some way to determine whether or not it was Touko-chan during that short time. The bell would ring first, which would demand Yumi's attention.

But it ended a lot quicker than she expected. The bell wasn't rung.

Sayako-oba-sama and Sachiko-sama arrived back in the room carrying three and four lacquer coated wooden boxes, respectively.

"It was the sushi store."

To reveal the trick: since the sushi was delivered by car, it was many times quicker for them to drive from the gate to the house than it was to walk, and since they'd announced their arrival over the intercom, Sayako-oba-sama was waiting outside for them to arrive.

Yumi felt conflicted, she was both relieved and disappointed.

Looking at her watch, it was 1:30.

Touko-chan probably should have arrived by now, if she was feeling inclined to do so.