Chương 26: BIRRRRRRTHHHHDAY GIFT!

As I enter, a red void assault me. I grab the towel, red towel, that he threw at me and use it to wipe my hair and my face. The door behind me swings three times before it finally close and leave us in the empty shop with almost no sounds. The only sounds around me is the small tampering of the rain against the wall and the door, there's also the sound of my wiping and of course hatomo footsteps. Talking about hatomo, what is he doing right now?

Looking up from my towel I see him walking straight in the cramped shop. It's... well, cramped. Like most houses and shops around, there's some exceptions, but most of the time it's cramped. Hatomo shop reflects his profession pretty well. He's a leather worker. So he works... leather. Well, I think he works leather. He definetly have a preference for leather, but I already saw him work with other material before. Like wool, or sometimes normal fabric. But most of the time? He's with leather.

There's leather everywhere in his shop, most are in form of clothes or accessory, there's some basic leather jackets, or coats around, most people that comes inside his shop though, don't come for leather clothes. No, usually they come here for personal and private projects. A handbag for their wives, a wallet or a purse for the obvious, there's some around me right now. Beneath a display window that's on my left, inside, there's a lot of really well done piece of work.

There's belts of different colors, some with fine embroidery in different colors, or even in gold, considering how poor this village is. It's probably not real gold. On my right, there's a lot of different products, they are less worked on, but there's more products. For example there's some leashes and collars for pets, or saddles for horses, there's also hats, most of those hats have wide brims for the rain. They're pretty bland.

But of course, if you need better looking rain hats, you just need to look left and down at the display case. And you'll find the weirdest and most cool looking hats you'll ever need. Well, I need to just look left. Don't need to look down, I'm too small for that. The narrative has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the infringement. Even if this shop is cramped, it's pretty comfortable for me.

As a child at least, when I grow up, it will be a different problem, but for now, I'm two, so let's not worry too much about it. I keep following him while passing more and more accessories, from boots to harnesses, soon enough though. The big bellied man, hatomo, turn to the side, left, on a little corner that leads to the to back of his shop, there's a small little hanging door that separates the customers side, and the owner side.

"Come in brat my arm is killing me" I pass behind him, and he keeps the little side door open for me. Looking to my left, I can see the opposite side of the display case, no glass protection on this side. Of course I won't steal anything. But it's funny to see.

"Almost forgot your damn birthday I swear, my wife reminded me of it at the last minute" he grumbles under his breath while leading me to a door, behind it? His workshop, who's connected to his shop, and deeper inside, his house. At his grumbling, I laugh. He's a big softy even if he doesn't show it, proof is, he's the only one that remembered my birthday. Well, I guess if you count my mom giving me a two thousands ryo and a key as a birthday gift, he's the second person.

"Well, at least you remembered my birthday" He frowns for a second as we enter his workshop, smells like leather. Don't know how to describe it, it just smells like leather. He keeps walking forward, going straight up to a big wooden table where he works on most of his project.

"The drunk brat forgot your birthday?" That's how he calls my father.

"Didn't saw him today" He nods for a while, the mood slowly growing somber. Soon enough, he slaps a hand on his belly "Ah! What a dumb brat, I remember, when he was your age he was happy when people rememebered his birthday" He's the same age as my father but I don't point it out, instead I look at what he's holding and brushing off on the table, what... is this?

"Eh, let's not talk about drunkyards during a joyous day! Here!" Before I can even say anything, he turns around and shoves something in my hands. My first reflex is to hold it, and I do. This shit is... so fucking soft. Holy fucking hell what is this? He answers, crossing his arms under his chest and looking away as if what he gave me wasn't a big deal.

"That's just something I worked on really quickly after seeing you walk in the rain like an abandoned dog everyday, it's nothing much, did this really fast when my wife reminded me of your birthday" I look up at him. His hands free of the cigarette he held before. He threw it away somewhere, I don't even know when, but he did, because kids shouldn't be around stuff like this. Looking down at what's in my hands, a single thought invade my mind. The quality is better than what I had in my past life.

I'm not even joking, I hold the coat up, it's... it's odd. It's a long coat with a hood, fully black with white accents on the hood, the white color drops down around the collar, sliding and shaping together before writing a small little name over my heart. That's my name! In Japanese right here! I learned how to read well enough to know! It's my name! Some parts of the coat feels leathery, but most parts feel... like wool?

And my curiosity is satisfied real fast as he keeps droning about how it wasn't that hard to make this for me.

"Nothing much. Shaping leather is as easy as breathing for me, well, I guess the wool was harder to deal with because dealing with wool isn't my speciality, but treated wool is the best for rain. This I tell you, it's the best!" For twenty good seconds. I just stare at my birthday gift, feeling the soft treated wool beneath my finger, and seeing the name embroided in it. I keep staring at it while he tells me about the fabrication process, it looks like it took more efforts than he's trying to make me believe.

He keeps talking about how annoying it was to get seal fat from his contacts, with the whole economic crash around here, but he needed it because.... it's really useful to grease leather and make it water repellent and... Fuck I wanna cry. After two minutes. He finishes.

"So... do you like it?"