The Daydreamer Detective Returns a Favor Read online

  The Daydreamer Detective Returns A Favor

  Miso Cozy Mysteries, #4

  S. J. Pajonas

  © 2017, S. J. Pajonas (Stephanie J. Pajonas).

  All rights reserved.

  * * *

  Cover design by S. J. Pajonas

  Cover illustration © Mix3r, Depositphotos.com

  Cover illustration © zeber2010, Depositphotos.com

  Cover illustration © emirsimsek, Depositphotos.com

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events, and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblances to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.

  Created with Vellum

  This book is dedicated to saké.

  It was much needed this year.

  Contents

  Author’s Note

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Thank You!

  Thank You!

  From S. J.

  Acknowledgments

  Also in the Miso Cozy Mysteries Series

  Also by S. J. Pajonas

  About the Author

  Author’s Note

  In Japanese, the most common way of showing respect to another person’s social standing is with the use of honorific suffixes that are appended on the end of either first or last names. The most common, -san, means either Mr., Ms., or Mrs.

  When you are addressing someone who is higher in the chain of command than yourself (i.e. your boss or high elected officials deserving of respect) you should use the suffix -sama. When addressing friends or schoolmates, it’s popular to use -chan or -ko for girls (sometimes cutting their first name down to one syllable before appending the suffix) and -chan or -kun for boys. For teachers, -sensei is used.

  It’s important to note that you should never use a suffix on your own name. If you’re introducing yourself, do not call yourself David-san or Smith-san. Just David or David Smith will do.

  The town in this novel, Chikata, is completely fictional, though the area I put it in is not. Saitama prefecture is located to the west of Tokyo, and many of the eastern areas are considered to be suburbs of the city. Chikata is located farther out west, nearer to the prefectures of Nagano and Gunma.

  Chapter One

  “Wrap the yarn around the hook and pull it through.”

  Saya leaned over the table, careful to watch each of the ladies work their crochet hooks through the thick yarn and figure out who needed help. It was her attention to detail that inspired me to hire her for Friday craft nights at Oshabe-cha.

  This was now my favorite day of the week. Each week, I offered a crafting class following afternoon tea, free to my VIP members. Last week, we learned about sock mending. This week, crochet. Each of my usual ladies, and one of the usual men, had turned out to take the class, and they were all enjoying it, laughing and talking throughout the lesson. Their smiles warmed my heart. Next week, Saya would return and show them how to crochet plastic bags together to make mats, something we could either use for picnics or donate to the homeless living in Tokyo parks.

  “You’re doing a wonderful job,” I whispered to Murata, my longest-standing client, neighbor, and friend. She smiled up at me as I reached to collect her teacup.

  “You flatter me too much, Mei-chan.” But she blushed as she continued practicing her stitching.

  I maneuvered my small baby belly past her and the woman sitting next to her. At nineteen weeks pregnant, I still wasn’t used to the belly I had grown. The new distribution of weight knocked me off balance, and my swollen abdomen caught a lot of errant crumbs even though it wasn’t that big yet. I looked strange and lopsided, and my clothes all fit weird. Eventually, I’d have to stop using a hair elastic on my jeans buttons and buy real maternity clothes, but that day hadn’t arrived yet. I was happy to be pregnant, but I was also unhappy with how uncomfortable my body was.

  My changed figure didn’t seem to bother Yasahiro though. He doted on me, waiting on me hand and foot. Some manly instinct must have told him to keep an eye on me whenever he could because he was always around when I was changing my clothes. I smiled and tried not to laugh as I deposited the dirty cups in the back room’s sink and made my way back to the front. Oh, Yasahiro. He was so predictable.

  Letting the cool air of the air conditioner units waft over me, I took my time ambling through the front room of Oshabe-cha. The late August heat was oppressive, heavy and humid, making me sweat almost the instant I stepped outside. Thank goodness Yasahiro had sold more international property to pay for the heating and cooling upgrade. Oshabe-cha needed to be comfortable for my elderly clients. Many of them didn’t have air conditioning, and this was their only respite from the heat.

  I gathered the last of the dirty teacups and brought them to the back room. Piling them into the sink, I sighed at the enormity of dishes in front of me this evening. I loved my job, especially with all the good Oshabe-cha did for the surrounding elderly population, but dirty dishes I could live without. Someday, we would renovate this back room and install a real dishwasher, but that day was not today.

  For a moment, I drifted off on dreams of loading the dishwasher, pressing a button, and walking out for the evening. Wouldn’t that be great?

  Resting my hand on my belly, I wondered if the baby was sleeping. He or she was quiet during the day while I was busy and dancing around at night when I was exhausted. Now, the baby’s movements were more like extended fluttering and less like kicking and punching, but I still noticed every single instance. And I loved it.

  I took a moment while thinking about the baby to rest my eyes on my most recent painting. This one had actual potential, and I was excited to get back to it.

  Over the past two months, I had started and given up on several new landscapes. I’d finished the pine forest landscape for Chiyo, and the giant canvas hung in the men’s washroom at Kutsuro Matsu. Then I had been waylaid by wedding plans and our honeymoon in Paris.

  Since we returned in June, I used every last gram of energy I had to run the tea shop. There was no time for painting things I was unhappy with. But this one inspired me. My rough outline carved a wooded cliff into the foreground, a valley stretching to a craggy mountain in the back. Two suns rose over the alien landscape, and a giant planet hung over the plain on the left.

  Growing up, I’d read plenty of science fiction and fantasy manga, but I always left that love in books and movies, never transferring it to my art. Bubbles of excitement stirred in my chest as I closed my eyes and imagined this world, the brisk wind whipping over the trees, the rain falling in the morning, the ghostly light of the planet when the suns were set.

  “And we’re done for the day,” Saya said, ending her lesson in the oth
er room. I snapped out of my daydream and glanced at the clock. 17:50? Where did the day go? I grabbed my rag and returned to the front room.

  “Ah! You beat me again,” Shigimo said, throwing his arms up. He was one of my first elderly clients along with Murata, and he came to the tea shop several times per week. The Go board in front of him was a mess of white and black chips, and the young high school boy who sat across from Shigimo tried not to celebrate. Tsutomo had been coming once a week on Friday afternoons to play Go with the older gentlemen who’d show up here. I loved that my tea shop catered to both young and old, women and men. I just needed a cat or dog, and I’d have all the bases covered.

  “Tomo-chan, I hope you aren’t cheating,” I said, winking at the young man.

  He cracked a smile and feigned surprise. “Mei-san, I would never do such a thing.”

  “Such an upstanding young man, you are.”

  We both laughed as he cleaned up the game and handed the Go set to Shigimo.

  “Do you need dinner tonight?” I asked, waving to the leftover bento boxes in the refrigerated case. There were only three left over from lunchtime, and I always marked them down fifty percent at the end of the day.

  “No, thank you, Mei-san. I’m meeting my parents at Sawayaka for dinner. They both have the evening off.” He smiled as he bowed to me, and my pregnancy hormones spiked, bringing tears to my eyes. Tsutomo was a good kid, but he was lonely. He didn’t have a lot of friends at school, and his parents both worked at strange hours. His mother was a nurse, and his father worked in a factory an hour’s drive away.

  He cringed as his eyes met mine. “I’m sorry?”

  I laughed, wiping the tears from my cheeks and waving him away. “It’s the pregnancy, not you. I cry at the strangest things now. I saw a little girl feeding birds in the park the other day, and the whole scene made me cry.” I laughed again, and Murata joined me, laughing too. “You enjoy your dinner with your parents. I may see you there later.”

  We bowed to each other, and he left the tea shop, shaking his head. I waved goodbye to everyone else as they filed out the door, and Saya said she was looking forward to coming back the next week. Another successful Craftday complete!

  “Would you like me to walk you home, Murata-san?” Heading to the closet to get her shawl, I let my gaze linger over the blank space on the wall, the place I planned to hang my newest painting when it was completed. I was sure the alien landscape would stir conversation, and if I was lucky, maybe it’d even find a buyer.

  “No, thank you, dear,” Murata responded, following me. “I’m feeling revived after that crochet lesson. I’m going to go home and keep practicing. I will take a bento box though.”

  “Of course! I’ll pack one up for you.”

  I handed Murata her shawl, packed a bento box into her bag, and saw her to the door. The heat hit us like a wall of jungle air.

  “Oof, it’s another hot one,” I said, walking her to the corner where I could watch her walk the length of the block around to her apartment building.

  “Did you hear we’re expecting typhoons soon? Maybe within the next two weeks.”

  “I did. I watched the weather this morning before opening.” The weatherman with his long stick and big red dot went on and on about the low-pressure systems to the south of us, but I was sure it would rain like every other storm this summer. Wasn’t Japan wet enough? I had the dehumidifiers running twenty-four hours a day back at Mom’s house otherwise mold would grow in the shoes in the closets.

  “It’ll be exciting!” she chimed, and I tried not to roll my eyes. How many typhoons had I lived through since my youth? Dozens, if not hundreds. It would be a nuisance, and that was about it.

  “Be careful walking home.” I bowed to her and waited the long five minutes for her to walk the length of the block and disappear around the corner.

  Back inside Oshabe-cha, all the chatter of the day was gone. Everyone had left for the night, and the space had become mine once again.

  I locked the door, grabbed a bento from the case, and sat at the table nearest the register. Sitting at these low tables was becoming difficult, even with my tiny belly. Something about the way the bump sat on my long torso did not help. I either had to lean away from the table or maneuver my belly underneath it, both of which were not exactly comfortable. So instead, I sat turned from the table and rested with my back against the wall eating a leftover rice ball.

  I was gathering strength for the thirty minutes of dishwashing in front of me. But at least when I was done, I could catch the bus and have dinner with Yasahiro at Sawayaka. Then I could go to bed early. Ah, I couldn’t wait.

  Just as I was about to stand up and attend to my dishwashing, movement at the front door caught my eye, and someone rapped on the glass with their knuckles. I couldn’t see who it was except to spot the bottom of a wide black skirt and black plastic clogs.

  I hefted myself out of my seat and made my way to the door, knowing that whoever was there saw me sitting inside. There was no way I could pretend to be in the back and not hear them, though I wanted to get back to work. But as I came to the door, a smile blossomed on my face.

  “Akai-san! Long time, no see. How are you?” I unlocked the door and pushed it open to my hacker friend, Akai. It was always interesting seeing her in street clothes instead of her usual housecoat. In a skirt and plain red top, she appeared to be a normal human being, capable of interacting with the world outside her computers.

  I hadn’t seen her in a few weeks, not since bumping into her at a summer festival where we chatted about her neighbors and laughed while Yasahiro and Goro, my police friend, and his wife, Kumi, wandered among the stalls. Kumi had been almost at full-term then. She gave birth only three weeks later to their first son, Taiga.

  “Hi, Mei-san. I hadn’t been here to see your place yet, so I thought it was time for me to finally stop in.” She entered Oshabe-cha, looking left and right, checking the floors, the tables, even peering up at the ceiling. I tried not to laugh at her need for order. I lived an organic lifestyle of haphazard disorder. Akai bordered on obsessive-compulsive. “It’s really cute. I like what you’ve done with the place. This used to be a…” She snapped her fingers.

  “A brush maker’s store.”

  “Riiiiight. I forgot about that man. Bet he’s living a cushy life now.”

  I smiled as she set her bag down next to a table. Hmmm, I guessed she planned on staying?

  “So, uh, look, I know you’re closed.”

  “You can stop by anytime, Akai-san. I don’t mind.” I tried to sound as welcoming as possible even as I pictured the dishes in the back sink teetering over.

  “Well, I purposely came when no one else was here. You know I don’t like… people.” Her lip curled, and she growled. “I’m willing to do all the town festivals because of the food, but that’s about it.”

  I laughed. “The food is the best part.”

  “It is.”

  She sighed as she sat down, and I took that as a sign. I would be late to finish up here tonight.

  “I guess something is on your mind,” I said, picking up the discarded cushions and stacking them against the wall.

  “The tables are turned, Mei-san. I need your help.”

  Her face fell into a deep frown, and worry pains shot through my chest. The baby stirred, sensing something was up. If Akai was coming to me for help, it must be serious.

  “Okay. Let’s talk while I wash dishes.”

  Chapter Two

  “I’ll help.” Akai threw a dishtowel onto her shoulder. She removed the clean cups and plates from the dish drying rack and placed them on their shelf.

  I smiled as I watched her line up the cups into neat rows. I suspected, though I didn’t want to pry, that Akai had some sort of obsessive-compulsive disorder. She was constantly washing her hands, using new towels for every little spill, and performing rituals like folding her gum wrappers into six equal parts before throwing them away. I felt honored she was e
ven at Oshabe-cha, that she was willing to step out of her comfort zone to help me wash dishes.

  “You don’t have to do that,” I said, shifting the teacups to the side and turning on the hot water. This was one of my primary jobs and a responsibility I knew I’d have to take on when I dreamed of this shop.

  “I can dry dishes, Mei-san. It’s no big deal.”

  “Okay, fine. But just this once.”

  She waited with her hands out while I pulled on my dishwashing gloves and got to work.

  “So what’s on your mind? What do you need my help with?” I expected her answer to have to do with an elderly parent or aunt or something of that nature. If there was anything I was known for now, it was taking care of the older set, and I was proud of my achievements. I loved my mom, despite our fight earlier in the year, and I loved the family farm, too. I would do anything for her. But I didn’t want to be known as a farmer. That wasn’t my destiny. This was.

  “It’s complicated. Did you know I’m only about five years older than you, and that my family goes back in this town for several generations?” She dried a teacup, being careful to wipe the porcelain down thoroughly before setting it on the shelf next to the others.

  “No. I didn’t know that. Did we go to the same high school?” It was the same high school I had visited last year during the investigation of Akiko’s father’s death.