Book One – Chapter 19

When Yu got back, he finally found what he should have seen from the beginning: proper, non-fina bowls. Broad and shallow. Not mugs. Not the stupid things he had carried out there, but plates with raised rims, made for spooning stuff with hands. They sat in one of the cupboards that doubled as the legs of the central workbench. Actually, there were plates, bowls, and cutlery in all three of them. Yu must have seen all of it earlier, during his compulsive rounds of inspection. He had opened each cupboard, but somehow remembered none of it. He had looked straight at all that kitchenware and yet, he had not registered any of it. Perhaps because he had not been looking for bowls then. He had been looking for something else. Or rather, for someone.

After setting up three of the new bowls on the workbench, Yu poured the stew from the mugs. It went badly. He slopped and spilled so much that three mugs became but two muddied bowls, with not enough left to fill the third. In hindsight, it might have worked out if he had not filled the first two all the way to the rim, but by the time that thought arrived, it was already too late. All he could do now was wipe the mess away. Well, he managed the tray, the bowls, and then the major spills on the workbench, but was forced to stop when wiping shit up became spreading shit around. Good intentions only spread the filth thinner. The rag was soaked through, slick and heavy with chunks. When it left more behind than it took away, Yu dropped it where it fell, amid some salt-rimed prints and a last smear of stew.

There were probably more rags somewhere, but Yu really did not want to search for them. He could clean properly later, when the feeling of being watched through the walls had quieted. To make it stop, he had to get them what they wanted. Yu stared at the two bowls on the tray. One at a time. That was the plan. Take one, walk it out, come back for the next. In and out. Hello, there you go, more is coming.

Yes. He could do this.
The mask could do this.