I try to get out of bed but my body's numb all over. I take a deep breath and look up at the ceiling. I hear the sound of plates, of someone scurrying busily across the floor, preparing a meal for me, I imagine. I'm finally able to stand up. Though it takes a while, I struggle into my pants, my socks and shoes. Quietly I grab the knob and open the door. A young girl's in the kitchen cooking. Her back to me, she's leaning over a pot, tasting the food with a spoon, but when she hears the door open she looks up and turns around. It's her. The same girl who visited my room in the library and gazed at the painting on the wall. The fifteen-year-old Miss Saeki. She's wearing the same clothes, a long-sleeved, light blue dress. The only thing different is now her hair's pinned back. She gives me a small, warm smile, and a powerful emotion overwhelms me, like the whole world's been turned upside down, like everything tangible had fallen apart but has now been put back together. But this girl is no illusion, certainly no ghost. She's a living, breathing young girl, someone you can touch, standing in a real kitchen at twilight, cooking me a real meal. Her small breasts jut beneath her dress, her neck as white as porcelain fresh from the kiln. It's all real. "Oh, you're awake?" she asks. No voice comes out of me. I'm still trying to pull myself together. "You seem to have slept very well," she says. She turns back to tasting the dish. "If you didn't wake up I was going to put the meal on the table and leave." "I wasn't planning to sleep so much," I finally manage to say. "You came all the way through the forest," she says, "so you must be hungry." "I'm not sure. But I think I am." I want to reach out and see if I can actually touch her. But I can't. I just stand there, drinking her in. I listen to the sounds she makes as she bustles around the kitchen. She ladles hot stew onto a plain white plate and carries it over to the table. There's a bowl of salad, too, tomatoes and greens, and a large loaf of bread.