Year of the Boar, Eleventh Month, Day 3. Postscript.

  Atsuko found me eventually and when I told her why I would not return to my chambers she sighed and asked me why I had not simply asked her to remove the offending missive... She did not describe it in such polite terms but I do not like to defile the pages with profanity... She was right, of course. The answer was so obvious that I could not see it straight in front of me. She snapped the wax seal sending tiny fragments of it into my tatami and once she had read it, screwed up her face contemptuously and told that I need not worry myself about it. More of his nonsense, she said...

But I do worry... I cannot help myself... how can I not when anxiety grips me every stick of every day, paralysing me in this way. How can I not worry when I am afraid all of the time...? Afraid to be... afraid not to be... 

Izumi continues to flit about my periphery like a moth drawn to a flame; only its downfall awaits and yet still it flitters and tests the heat time and time again until like legend, it draws too close and plummets to its death. Except that I will not be Izumi's downfall; far more likely that she will be mine. Most of the women of House now copy my lack of cosmetics and wear only kohl and red lips; they are also starting to cut their hair in the old fashioned style and forego the elaborate styles which have been so popular for so long. Except it is not my style they copy... it is hers...