Chapter 3

Spring 6, 2003

After completing his daily work, Yuki walks into his home. As he opens the door, he sees Choco standing inside smiling at him. Yuki just stood there for a good minute staring at her in confusion. The way Choco stared at him gave Yuki a chill down his spine.

“Hi daddy!” yelled Choco.

“Hi there.” said Yuki with a slight nervous tone of voice. “Why are you just standing there like that? Shouldn't you be-”

“Hi daddy!” yelled another voice that does not belong to Choco. Yuki turns around, and faces the direction where the second childish voice came from. Behind him, stands another child about 10 years old. This child was a boy.

“Daddy is so funny!” said yet another voice coming from his left side. He turns his head to find another little girl with short hair.

From his right, he felt another child pull on his shirt. He turns his face to the next child, and sees another boy. “Daddy, I'm hungry! Where's dinner!?” said the boy to his right.

One by one, children were appearing in Yuki's farm. They all had large brown eyes, light brown thin straight hair, and smooth cheekbones, just like Yuki does. Within minutes, the whole farm was littered with hundreds of children all claiming that Yuki is their father. Yuki panics as he is pinned in a corner inside his own house facing an army of little boys and girls all within the age of 5 and 15. They all smile as they say, “Please take care of us daddy!”

Yuki yells to the top of his lungs as he jerks up from his bed. After taking several deep breaths, Yuki realizes that the whole event was just a bad dream. He sits up on his bed, and laughs as he says, “The whole thing was just a dream! Everything that happened yesterday was only a figment of my wild imagination. I don't have any kids, I'm just a single virgin who lives by himself.”

“Daddy?” said Choco who woke up as soon as she heard her father yell. Yuki jumps up, and falls off his bed in shock. Choco looks down at Yuki as she says, “Daddy, are you OK? Did you have a bad dream?”

“Ch. . . Ch. . . Choco! Why on earth were you sleeping on my bed?” asked Yuki.

“There is only one bed in this house. Where else am I supposed to sleep?”

“Oh, yeah. I forgot,” said Yuki as he stands up with a massive pain on his back that he got from falling.

Yuki walks out of his bedroom with a tired look on his face. He checks the clock, and notices that it was 8:00 AM. Two hours later than he normally wakes up. He rubs his head in disbelief as he walks to the bathroom where he could wash his face. Choco follows him into the bathroom where she could also wash up for the day.

After Yuki washed his face, he takes his tooth bush and starts brushing his teeth. Yuki has an odd and unique method when he brushes his teeth. When he stares into the mirror, he makes a very serious face, and sweeps his teeth from side to side. After Choco dried off her face, she grabs Yuki's spare tooth brush and starts brushing her own teeth. Yuki was about to tell her not to use his spare, but he became speechless at what he saw. Choco was also brushing her teeth in the same exact manner as Yuki always does. As she stares into the mirror, she makes a very serious face, and sweeps her teeth from side to side. Even after Yuki pauses, she continues to brush her teeth in that manner. The way she brushes is not an imitation, rather it seems to Yuki that she has been brushing this way for a long time.

“No way! She brushes the same exact way that I do,” thought Yuki. “Could it be possible that she really is. . .” He then slaps himself in the cheek, “What am I thinking? This may be just a coincidence. Keep it together Yuki, you'll find out the truth soon enough!”

After they've freshened themselves up, Yuki heads over to his telephone and starts dialing a number from Mineral Town. A gruff and grouchy man answers the phone, he was not pleased that Yuki called at such an early hour. “Hello, Gotz! It's me, Yuki from the Forget-Me-Not Valley Farm. . . Yes, I know it's early, but I have a job for you. . . I need another bedroom built in my house. . . Three days? Yes, that's fine. . . How much? . . . Okay fine, I got it. . . What do I need an extra bedroom for? Mind your own business, and just do the job!” Yuki hangs up the phone and thinks for a moment. “Damn, this will cost me a fortune! But it has to be done if she's going to be staying here or a while.”

Yuki heads over to his room, and starts packing some things. Choco follows him, and asks curiously, “daddy, what's going on? Where are you going?”

“We are going to stay at the inn for a couple of nights. A man will come today and make a bedroom for you to sleep in. But he needs to do his work in peace, so we're going to leave the house in his care.” Yuki zips up his backpack full of clothing and takes Choco to the inn. Since she never brought any possessions with her, there was nothing to pack for her.

After checking in, Yuki decides to have breakfast at the inn. Ruby, the owner of the inn brings out some pancakes for them to enjoy, along with some maple and chocolate syrup. Yuki always enjoy his pancakes with chocolate syrup rather than maple. But when he reaches out to grab the bottle of chocolate syrup, Choco had already grabbed it and started using it on her own stack. Yuki becomes stunned by this discovery.

“She eats pancakes the same way I do too?” thought Yuki. “I thought that she likes chocolate because she was a kid. But she's a chocolate lover too? This can't be! How can she have the same likes and habits that I do?”

After breakfast, Yuki and Choco heads over to their room. Choco bounces on her bed playfully, while Yuki prepares all his tools. He checked his watch, it was already 10:00 AM. He usually starts working on the farm at 7:00 AM. After he is fully prepared to work, he puts on his rucksack and starts to leave. Choco runs up to him, and grabs his shirt.

“Daddy, where are you going?” asked Choco.

“Where do you think? I need to go back to the farm and take care of my work. I'm not on vacation you know.”

“But Daddy. . . If you go, I'll be so bored. . ,” complained Choco

Yuki pats Choco on her head and says, “Just be a good girl, and wait here. I'll be back later.”

Yuki then leaves Choco by herself in the room. She takes a deep sigh, and looks around. There isn't anything in the room other than a few beds and some furniture, nothing to keep a ten year old child entertained for the day. She sits on the bed playing with her fingers and toes waiting patiently for her father to return. But no matter how hard she tries, she ends up getting bored to tears anyway. After waiting for four hours, Choco fell asleep on the bed until Yuki comes back to the room. It is 6:00 PM by the time Yuki arrives at the inn. As soon as Yuki walks through the door of their room, Choco wakes up and jumps out of bed to give Yuki a big hug.

“Daddy, you're finally back! I'm glad, I was so bored! Now you can play with me!”

“Sorry, I can't.” said Yuki dropping his bag of dirty tools. “I'm too tired and dirty to play right now.”

Choco tilts her head down, and makes little whining sounds. Yuki goes over to his backpack and starts pulling out two bowls and some toiletries. In each bowl, he adds one bar of soap, toothpaste, toothbrush, towel, shampoo, and conditioner. He then hands one of he bowl to Choco.

“Come on, let's go take a bath.” said Yuki.

“Yay!” cheers Choco. She hums a happy tune as they walk over to the bathing rooms. The inn has their own bath tubs for the guests to use freely. They are much similar to Japanese public baths, but much smaller. Yuki walks into the men's bathing room, and sighs in relief.

“Umm. . .Yuki. . .” said Rock, the son of the owners of the inn.

“Yes Rock. What's up?”

Rock points at Choco who followed Yuki into the men's bath. She already started taking off her clothes to bathe. Yuki freaks out, and screams. He dresses Choco again, and pulls her out of the men's bathing room as quickly as he could.

“Choco! What do you think you were doing!?” yells Yuki.

“But I thought you said we're going to take a bath?” asked Choco.

“I didn't mean together! You're a girl! Go to the women's bath!”

“Aww, but I wanna take a bath with daddy!”

“I said no! And I mean no! You're old enough to bathe on your own!”

Yuki's constant yelling was making Choco upset. Soon enough, tears were developing in her eyes, and she starts crying. All the other guests were coming out of their rooms to see what was going on. Yuki starts to feel embarrassed. So he tries to calm Choco down, but she couldn't hear him over her own crying. Yuki quickly runs back into his room, and grabs a chocolate bar. He goes back to Choco, and places the chocolate in her hands which quickly stops her crying.

“Sorry about yelling, I was just a little upset. Now be a good girl, and go to the women's bath okay?” said Yuki as he rubs Choco on the head. Choco nods and walks over to the women's bath right next to the men's bath.

Yuki goes into the men's bath. After cleaning himself up, he sits in the warm bath to try and relax his nerves. It has only been less than 48 hours since Choco came to live with him, but he’s already feels stressed about having a child living with him. It wasn't long until Choco starts to beat against the wall that divides the men's bath from the women's bath.

“Daddy! I'm bored! Will you please tell me a story?” asked Choco from the women's bath.

“I'm trying to relax here! Why don't you talk to someone else who is in there?” complained Yuki.

“But nobody else is in here but this one guy.” said Choco.

“Who are you calling a guy!?” yelled Nami. “I'm a woman!”

Yuki turns red in embarrassment. All he could hear from the women's bath was Nami yelling about how chest size does not make her any less of a woman than any other girl. Even though he tries his best to relax, Choco and Nami discussing the difference between a man and a woman was making him feel very uneasy.

Spring 8, 2003

It is now the third day that Gotz is working on Yuki's house. Yuki is glad that he can return to his home later that evening. So in the morning, Yuki packs his tools to work on the farm and tries to leave. Choco is not going to let him leave that easily. As he opens the door, Choco grabs his shirt and tries to pull him back in.

“Choco! What are you doing?! Let me go!”

“NO!” yelled Choco. “You always leave me here all alone! I get so bored when you're not here, so stay with me! You're gone all day, and I have nothing to do!”

Yuki yanks his shirt away from her. Then he picks her up, and places her on the bed where he can have a serious talk with her. “Now you listen to me. I need to work every day to make money. Without money, I can't afford to live here in Forget-Me-Not Valley. If you want, I'll show you around the valley when I get back, and then you can find stuff to do on your own. Is that a deal?”

Choco nods sadly. Yuki then grabs his tools again, and leaves. As he closes the door behind him, he sighs letting out a mountain of stress. He knows that he needs to work, but he feels bad about leaving her in the room all alone.

“Hi there!” yelled Van popping in at the scene; surprising Yuki who was lost in thought. Van is a heavily obese salesman who travels between many villages buying and selling goods between them. Although fairly friendly, he does take advantage of any situation in order to make a living. Some people says he's a godsend. Others think he's a scam artist.

“Van!” said Yuki catching his breath. “I forgot that you come to the valley today.”

Van smiles as he continues, “A little birdie told me that you have a kid! Is this true?”

“Not sure.” answers Yuki trying to figure out who's been gossiping over the phone. “I am not 100% sure if the kid is mine or not.”

“You look like you've been through a lot! Are you okay? You can tell me, maybe I can help,” continues Van showing a false sense of sympathy.

“She's always bored. She came here with no possessions other than the clothing on her back. She wants me to play with her 24 hours a day, seven days a week. It's too much for me to handle.”

Van smiles gleefully, “I have just the thing for you!” He opens up his huge bag of random goods and starts to pile stuff on Yuki's arms. “Lets see what we got here. . . We have a drawing pad for the little artists, crayons, a ball, a toy car, building blocks. . . And last but not least, since it's obviously a girl, I have a little stuffed horse to stimulate the imagination!”

Yuki can barely balance all the toys in his arms. He’d never really planned to buy anything for Choco, but considering that she needs to be constantly entertained, “Fine I'll take them. How much do you want.”

Van pulls out a calculator, and starts punching in a bunch of numbers. “The bill will come out to this.” said Van while showing him the total on the calculator.

Yuki was shocked at the number. “What! You want that much!? That's a whole two weeks' worth of work!”

“Hey, I never said that raising kids was going to be cheap!” answered Van. Yuki sighs realizing that Van has a point. He didn’t have much of a choice. He reaches for his wallet and throws it to Van. even though Van loves money, he is an honest businessman. “Thanks for the business!” he said as he counts his money.

Yuki goes back into the room and dumps the toys on the floor. “What is all this stuff?” asked Choco.

“What do they look like?” answered Yuki. “They are toys to keep you busy while I am out.”

Choco grabs one of the building blocks and makes a pretty sour face. “Daddy, these toys are for little kids!”

“Umm. . . Last time I checked, you are a little kid.” said Yuki.

“But-”

“No buts! I paid good money for these, so I expect you to make good use for them!”

Choco looks up at Yuki and nods. After Yuki leaves, she starts to rummage through the pile of toys to see if anything she can play with. The first thing she grabs is the drawing pad and crayons. She tries her best to come up with something, but she ends up drawing nothing. Then she starts to bounce the inflated rubber ball around; but without someone else to play with, she got bored within minutes.

Her boredom quickly fades as soon as she sees the stuffed horse within the rest of the toys. She holds it up in front of her in awe as she stares into its glass bead eyes. She finds its blank expression, brown fur, and black mane to be rather cute. She couldn’t help but smile at it.

“Hello there! So, what's your name?” asked Choco. Even though the stuffed horse says nothing, Choco pretends that it's talking to her. “You don't have a name? Well, then let's give you one! I'll name you. . . Uma-Kun! Uma as in horse, and Kun because you're a boy! So Uma-Kun, do you want to play with me?” Choco looks at the ball that she was playing with earlier. “You wanna play 'horse ball'? How do you play that game?” Choco looks at the crayons next to the drawing pad. “Oh I get it! I'll get started right away!”

At 2:00 PM, Yuki finally returns to the inn. Gotz told Yuki that the renovations were complete, and that he was allowed to return to the house. Yuki is glad that he can finally have a room all to himself once again. However, he still knows that life will never be the same as long as Choco is living with him.

As soon as he got close to his room, he hears a large crashing sound coming from inside. He quickly opens the door to find Choco jumping on the bed hitting the ball using Uma-Kun as a bat against the wall. The wall had a bunch of crayon drawn circles that resembles a giant sized dart board. Choco was trying to hit the ball in the center circle, but the ball was knocking over everything else in the room. The crashing sound Yuki heard earlier was from a lamp that Choco hit just before Yuki entered the room. There were also other items that had broken within the seven hours Yuki was working.

“OH MY GOD!!! CHOCO STOP!!!” yelled Yuki. He tries to stop her, but as soon as he rushes in, he steps on the toy car and falls on his back. Choco then notices him, so she jumps off the bed and lands on his chest knocking the wind out of him.

“Daddy, I take it all back. These toys are great! Thank you so much!” yells Choco excitedly.

Yuki becomes furious, his face is steaming with anger; but he takes a few deep breaths, and calms down. He takes Choco down to Ruby and makes her apologize for the broken items in the room. Yuki offers to pay for the damages, but Ruby had everything insured.

Yuki then grabs all of this things, and returns to the farm with Choco. They are both impressed at the work Gotz did with Choco's new room. It was as big as Yuki's room, had plenty of room to run around and play, and plenty of storage for toys and clothes. The bed was a bit too big for Choco, but nobody complained.