Dear Mother and Father,
I attended the party last night, but was late. I suspect they may have started early, but that's probably just a poor rationalization for my misbehavior. I know that it is never a good thing to be late when meeting with Important People. I tried to get questions answered, even though it's impolite to hijack conversations by one's superiors. I hope it will be alright. I don't think it helped, particularly. My mention of the cluster of nuns by the docks was met with Ms. Aaoee-sama's assurance that is was "nothing", or more specifically that it was "the tong", which she says are nothing. I can't imagine she meant salad tongs; a large group would have very few reasons to get worked up over cutlery. I really must learn some Japanese just so I can understand her when she talks. That is, I believe, a worthy objective. I gathered last night that she is a more important person around here than I have been giving her credit for. Not counting a lighthearted remark about gradually "owning" more and more of Steelhead Shanghai, there was an instance in which she appeared to exert influence over the others present. She greeted me as "Ashbourne-san", upon which the others greeted me simply as "Ashbourne" or without mentioning my name, rather than the usual mix of "Miss Ashbourne" and sincere efforts to work out a pronunciation of "Shaqad". They really seemed to look up to her.
Eventually the two official owners of Steelhead, Mr. Lunar and Ms. Tensai, arrived. Ms. Tensai was still in the form of a kitten, but for the second time in a row I was able to restrain myself from squealing like an undisciplined little child. There was, however, a moment of quiet and secret horror for me: Ms. Tensai had a cat-sized hat on which was decorated by even tinier skulls; I asked what they were. Both "awkwardly human-looking mice" and "mimmoths" were proposed, and I'm really not sure which one they decided it was. But I remembered mimmoth skulls as looking a lot different than that. I kill wild mimmoths on sight to avenge Valdy's home, so I'd seen mimmoth skulls very recently and still didn't recognize them on Ms. Tensai's hat! I fear for my sanity. I really hope they were mice after all! Do you remember that time you had to tell me a second time that babies are made through kissing because I had misremembered the first time as involving a story about storks? Then there was also that time when I told the whole church that I was sad because I had gotten my first spanking that morning, thus embarrassing you in front of absolutely everyone, before you explained that I had only pretended such a thing had happened and forgotten that I was pretending. I am so sorry about that and hope someday you will forgive me. But what seemed to be mere stupidity and arrogance in the past may indicate severe ongoing mental problems. Even after the belt incident was resolved, it took my bottom several days to acknowledge the truth my brain already understood. Do you think I belong in a sanatorium? I'm sure the unease I dealt with when receiving surgery at Crimson Falls was more of a temporary shock reaction than what someone staying there would actually experience. But if I could be cured of everything about me that hurts you, it would be worth most any cost, I should think.
When I mentioned my difficulties with the barrier around Shanghai, Ms. Aaoee-sama made a cryptic remark about "age verification". Mother, this barrier is something I mentioned in my last letter to Father: It is an invisible wall of pushiness that seems to completely surround a large section of the city. It is very selective in what it allows and what it pushes away. It pushes me away, but it lets in: Sticks, stones, dirt, pine needles, pine cones, grass, a torn-off bit of paper, Miss Gearbox, and Ms. Aaoee-sama. I don't know what Ms. Aaoee-sama meant about age, but either Miss Gearbox is younger than me or she never, ever eats her vegetables. Perhaps I misunderstood what she was trying to tell me.
Either way, I don't think the city likes me very much. It may not be in the minds of the citizens themselves, but something here seems not to be fond of me. I wonder what forces are at work beneath the surface of a high-tech, magically inclined pocket of The Grid like this. Do you suppose they can be placated? I don't want to get into witchcraft or anything, of course. It may just be one of those things one must accept and live with.
I haven't seen Valdy recently. I suppose I can't look for her around Shanghai now, either. But maybe my fixation with her has been misguided. The more I consider my reasoning, the more it seems like yet another case of my dubious grip on reality. For one thing, the more I think about her having said, "You're a good kid, Shaqad," the clearer it becomes that even a parallel universe would not cause it to have occurred outside my imagination. The pleasant dreams have all but tapered off now (though I have gotten better at handling the nightmares, as I was before the sea monster hijacked them), but it still most likely came from a dream misremembered as reality. However, if there were something I could do that would make such a fanciful thing real, I know that I would do it. I cannot, off the top of my hand, think of any value of "something" for which that is not the case.
No, never mind what I just said. I would most likely forfeit such a reality in exchange for one in which you yourselves said something like that. But now I'm getting severely off-track from the real world.
She probably didn't hug me, either. That whole thing was so surreal. Why was she a dragon at the time, anyhow? I almost certainly got the whole scene out of some nearly-forgotten picture book. My skin still remembers it in clear, gratuitous detail, but I never gave my body a license to tell me what is real and what isn't. I wish you were here to tell me what reality is. I miss you so badly. I wasn't ready to be on my own. The way I am, I may never be ready.
The underground locomotive I took out of Steelhead last time brought me to the middle of nowhere and left me. If I am to return to you, I will have to find another way. May God have mercy on me, lost as I am.
Miss Blackheart of the Music says that Saturday is Christmas, and that there won't be a party. I don't want to spend Christmas away from you, and especially not alone. I could go back along the mountains and spy on Miss Gearbox's family again, but that might get depressing and potentially cause trouble for both me and them. I don't want any of that. I am not sure what I shall do.
Love,
Shaqad
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