Seamus Mulligan lay on his Japanese-style wood and vinyl couch, reading Shusaku Endo’s new novel, Samurai, when he heard a knock at the door. He also heard, disconcertingly, what sounded like laughter. He frowned and put the book down on the little black lacquered table. The book had been a sensation when it was published the year before, in 1980. He thought it deserved its reputation, but his Japanese was still too rudimentary to follow Endo’s writing with ease or comfort, and he was finding it hard going.

His apartment, or apato,  was in the Japanese style, a small, white bedroom and living room, and a bathroom and toilet. The walls were wood, not paper, but they offered little more sound insulation than paper. The knock sounded again, this time without giggling. He put his bare feet on tatami matting, crossed the living room floor and opened the door.

Three girls stood grinning up at him. Apparently this was superior mischief. He looked down at them. “Hello?”

Chiaki, Yua and Asuka from his work chorused, “Good evening, Mulligan-Sensei”, in English. Yua wore skirts of multiple layers and multiple colours with a crimson corset, cat’s ears and clumpy boots, while Chiaki wore a simpler version of Yua’s costume.

The look would later be known as Goth Lolita, but in 1981 it was still something startling 

Yua tried to look solemn.  “This is your housewarming, Sensei! It is an old Japanese custom.” She slipped past him into his apato, followed by Chiaki.

Asuka hesitated for a second, then joined her friends. She wore the sailor suit of a schoolgirl, something she must have been just a couple of years ago. By the time he’d shaken his head tolerantly and shut the door the three of them were in his bathroom, opening his cupboards and drawers and laughing delightedly at the strange, English items they found.

Seamus had been in Japan for just three weeks, after getting a job teaching Business English to typists and junior sales staff at  Higashi Corporation in the City of Sapporo, on Hokaido, Japan’s northernmost island.

The nights there were cold even by English standards, but the land was beautiful. He knew that Japan was changing. It was the 1980s, after all. But was this odd invasion really a custom? Or were the girls being inappropriate? He had no idea.

He walked to the bathroom. Asuka was on her knees, after rummaging in his bottom drawer. Her posture raised her little sailor dress at the back so that she presented him a view of her slim and golden-brown bottom and thighs, with her white panties riding up between her buttocks so she was mostly bare. He wondered if that was innocent or deliberate.

Yua, perhaps the oldest of the three, saw him in the bathroom mirror, and turned slowly, eyes downcast. She spread her legs as she slowly raised her face, and put her finger in her mouth, staring into his eyes.

Chiaki, plumply pretty, laughed and breathed him a kiss. Deliberate, then.

Seamus had only recently passed his twentieth birthday, so despite the difference in their status (they took his Business English course and generally addressed him as Sensei) he was only a year or two older than them. He was tempted by them, as they obviously intended. But he said, “Would you like a cup of coffee?”

Asuka turned and scrambled up to her knees, so her eyes were level with his crotch. She didn’t look at his face. Seamus could feel the early signs of excitement. He hoped the swelling of his penis wasn’t visible, but he couldn’t risk looking down to check. Asuka said, “That’s very kind, Sensei, but I will make you coffee. It’s a woman’s task.”

He nodded. In his native Birmingham any girl who said that to him would be being sarcastic, but here such things could be said as if they weren’t embarrassing. He held out his hand. “Then thank you.”

Asuka took his hand, squeezed it and touched it to her bowed forehead, then pulled herself to her feet.

“Women have many tasks, Sensei. I hope you let us show you.” Then she grinned, delighted with her own mischief. 

She went to the kitchenette in one corner of the living-room, no bigger than his mother’s pantry, and turned on his Expresso machine. while he still stood in the door Cjhiaki pressed her bottom against his cock while Yua passed behind him, so there was no longer any doubt about their intensions, or that he was aroused.

He was determined that he would act properly, not that he knew what the rules were. But he followed them to the kitchen. 

[To be continued.]