HA3 6.2 – Night Conversation
The ledger Hide use to record the family expense was pretty simple. It consisted only of date, reference number, entry, debit, credit, and balance. With a gentle tone, he explained to Aizawa how to use it.
“First, you group the receipts based on its date, and then use your pen to give it a number starting from 1 for the biggest receipt.” After giving Aizawa an example Hide continued, “Got it?”
“Mhm,” Aizawa firmly nodded.
“Then you enter it to the ledger, consecutively based on the dates and reference number you make on each receipt. You don’t need to write item you buy one by one as we don’t make formal accounting.
Just write the store name and put the total amount you spend on the credit column, and the formula will do the rest.”
“Does Aizawa really doesn’t need to write the items we buy?”
“Yeah, just use your smartphone to take the receipt’s picture after you put number on it, and then file it following Big Bro’s example. That way, we can easily check the receipt detail whenever we want to,” Hide calmly said, “Also, after you take its picture, you can throw the original receipts to the bin.”
“Okay.”
“Now, give it a try.”
Wasting no time, Aizawa carried out the procedure. She still had to ask here and there when she was not sure, and Hide would gently re-explain to her. In the end, it took an hour for Aizawa to enter twenty odds receipts to the ledger.
“You did a good job,” Hide happily praised Aizawa. “And always make sure the money we have in the bank and in cash are exactly the same with the balance in the ledger.”
“Okay,” Aizawa firmly nodded.
A sense of accomplishment was clearly visible on Aizawa’s eyes, and it made Hide had happy smile all over his face.
“Any question?”
“What about when we receive money?”
“When we receive money, you only have to enter the date, the sender, and the amount in the debit column.”
“Okay.”
“Dad receives his salary via bank transfer on 25th–27th each month. He will keep 85.000 ren for himself and sent the rest to Big Bro’s bank account, and now you will have access on it.” Hide then scrolled down the ledger and showed Aizawa a list of bill. “House installment, school tuition… Water, electricity, gas, & trash bill, and our monthly allowance, these bills are your priority to clear as soon as you receive money from Dad.”
“Okay.”
“And remember,” Hide said as his expression turned serious, “If we forget to pay the house installment, the bank will kick us out of our house and we will become homeless.”
“O-okay.”
The possibility she made everyone homeless made Aizawa super nervous, and Hide could clearly see it, but he had no intention to pull his punch here.
“If you forget to pay our school tuition, we will also become schooless,” Hide added while maintaining his serious expression. “So, you can’t miss the payment for those two by all means.”
“U-mmm…Big Bro,” Aizawa’s tense expression became tenser as she turned her gaze to Hide. “C-can we split the ledger? You handle the most important bill, and Aizawa will handle the smaller one.”
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“We can’t do that,” Hide firmly said. “Family ledger has to cover every single flow of money in the household in one book. When you handle it, you have to take it all or leave it all. You can’t do it half-way.”
“Can we wait until Aizawa a bit older before Aizawa handle it?”
“No, you can’t,” Hide said. “Honestly, right now Big Bro is already in my last leg. I need your help. So, don’t drop your gut halfway after saying you want to help Big Bro. It will crush Big Bro’s spirit into pieces.”
“O-okay,” Aizawa replied with shaking voice while gulping hard. “Aizawa will do the best.”
“Good,” Hide said while trying his best to hold his amusement.
Aizawa made a really cute expression whenever she had internal struggling, but of course, at her age he couldn’t let her to have the struggle for too long.
“Hey, have no worry. Big Bro won’t let you to fully handle it right away.” Hide’s drop dead serious expression suddenly became gentle as he added, “We will walk it down together until you can run it on your own.”
“Okay.” Aizawa immediately took a deep breath full of relief. Then, she asked, “Big Bro, how long until we clear the house installment?”
“It’s about 6-7 years,” Hide casually replied.
“That long?” Aizawa asked while giving Hide a surprise gaze.
“It’s already halfway done you know.”
“Really?”
Hide gave Aizawa a nod before explaining, “When other young workers at his office spent their money for fun, dad use his saving from first two years of his hard work as down payment for this house, and get 25 years of low-rate installment.
Dad was only 23-year-old at that time. He spent all of his money for this house, so he got this nice house with garage, front yard, side yard, and even backyard, but after that he couldn’t buy the furnishing.
Dad once told Big Bro that when he married my mother, the house was practically still empty and they had to buy the furnishing one by one.”
“…”
Hide gave Aizawa a gentle gaze before continuing, “Dad endured a lot of hardships to get this house because he wanted his kids to have solid roof above their head. So, let’s cherish this house and take care of it with everything we have.”
“Mhm,” Aizawa gave Hide a firm nod.
Hide then completed the ledger handover by installing mobile banking in Aizawa’s smartphone, and connected it to his student bank account as sub-account. That way, he could set a withdrawal limit and made sure Aizawa couldn’t made payment higher than 20.000 ren without his permission.
Then, he handed over the wallet he used to store some cash for small payment. After that, he asked Aizawa to crosscheck the money in the bank account and the wallet with the balance in the ledger.
“How is it?” Hide casually asked after Aizawa completed the crosscheck.
“The amount is exactly the same,” Aizawa firmly replied.
After a light nod Hide said, “From now on, put more caution to your smartphone as it has access to our bank account.”
“Mhm,” Aizawa firmly replied.
Hide then took Aizawa to watch movie together in the living room.
---
Exactly at 21:50, Aizawa completed an Othello match with Kana and the rest of the group. Their opponent was from overseas and rather strong, but they managed to bag three wins out of five matches. After saying goodbye to each other, they then stopped the connection.
While having big smile in her face Aizawa then went to the bed, but she stopped midway. She remembered she could sleep with his Big Brother even though there was no rainstorm. Without second thought, she decided she would sleep with him tonight.
With happy steps Aizawa left her room. Hide’s room was next to hers, but she wanted to drink first so she went to kitchen. Then, as soon as she entered the kitchen, she found her father was silently sitting in the dining table, enjoying a cup of tea.
Aizawa wanted to turn around and went straight to Hide’s room, but his father stopped her, “Wait.”
“…?”
“Did… I wake you up?”
Hearing his father asked her with awkward tone, Aizawa immediately shook her head.
“No, Aizawa want to drink before going to sleep with Big Bro.”
After a light nod Aizawa’s father asked another question, “Do you sleep with Hide a lot?”
“Usually only when rainstorm pour down,” Aizawa replied with nervous voice. “But recently Big Bro let Aizawa to sleep with him even though there is no rainstorm.”
“So, you are still afraid of rainstorm.”
“Mhm,” Aizawa nodded.
After having a deep sigh Aizawa’s father asked again, “Does Hide treat you well?”
“Mhm.” While having spark in her eyes Aizawa continued, “Big Bro always cooks tasty food for Aizawa. On Saturday he also takes Aizawa to shop in Sakura Shopping District and then we eat in Tohru Ramen. We also watched Yuko’s Mountain match and then ate in Seiya sometimes ago, and it was super fun.
Last night Big Bro also took Aizawa to camp in Uruba Hill, and every Sunday morning Aizawa will help Big Bro clean the house.”
“I see.” Aizawa’s father tried his best to hold his tears while continued, “Glad you have lot of fun.”
“Starting today, Aizawa will also help Big Bro handle the family ledger,” Aizawa proudly added.
A thin happy smile instantly bloomed in Aizawa’s father’s lips. “I teach Hide how to handle family ledger when he was in 3rd grade. Now, he teaches you.”
“Mhm.”
After trying his best to calm the mixed feeling in his heart Aizawa’s father asked again, “What about your school?”
“It’s fun too,” Aizawa happily replied. “Kaede Sensei chose Aizawa to play in Saint Marry every Saturday evening, and she want to talk about it with Daddy, but Big Bro said Daddy has asked him to handle everything related Aizawa’s school, so he will talk about it with Kaede Sensei later.”
“I see.”
Aizawa’s father couldn’t hold his tear any longer, so a few drops streak down in his cheek, but he managed to camouflage it as if a dust entered his eyes. Well, it couldn’t help that he was very emotional right now. Last time he put an attention on Aizawa, she just entered kindergarten and would cry every time she missed her mother.
But now, she was already a first grader. And when he looked at Aizawa’s happy expression, his guilt for neglecting her, along with his relief and happiness that she grow into a cheerful kid even though she didn’t receive proper love and care from her only parent, mixed together and mercilessly torn apart his heart.
After wiping out his tears with a tissue, Aizawa’s father got up and approached Aizawa while carrying his tea cup. Then, he gently tousled up Aizawa’s hair.
“Stick with your Big Brother for a little bit. Okay?”
“Mhm,” Aizawa firmly replied.
Then, as her father returned to his room Aizawa went to drink a few gulps of water. After that, she went to Hide’s room. She found Hide already fast asleep in his bed like a log. After kissing Hide in the cheek, Aizawa then nestled herself next to him.
The conversation with his father was still lingering in her mind, and Aizawa wondered why he looked at her with complicated gaze while asking so many questions. However, Aizawa was too sleepy to think about it. Not to mention, she was very happy because she could sleep with his Big Bro. So, a moment later she already fell asleep with big happy face.
*****