Red Panda Goddess

A little fun

“You want me to shampoo your fur for you? You’ll smell like my hair when your done but atleast it will feel better.” She nods to me and I grab my shampoo and lather her whole body massaging the shampoo in really good. She purrs and smiles as if she’s really enjoying the massage and the hot water. “Alright I’m done with your back now it’s belly time!” She quickly rolls over and rests her back on my leg and I lather up her belly and rub it gently and you could tell her face was relaxed to the extreme. I never touch her tail, she got mad at me and bit me the last time I touched her tail so I never do that again. I pour some on her tail and she scrubs it with her paws and then she scratches her head and I pour her a drop for her head and she scrubs her head and ears. Then she dips down several times rinsing off and hops out. Shaking several times. Once she’s out I wash my hair and body then get out and find a blow dryer under the sink. I use the blow dryer on Juki first and she stands up to make it easier for me. After I get done her entire body is really puffy and she looks fabulous. I Dey myself off and blow dry my hair as well so I don’t make a mess of the bed. I put on my bottom clothes for the next day but leave my shirt off being that it’s pretty hot like Mr. Cheng said it was going to be. And I walk back to my room and Juki follows me. “Oh so you’re gonna sleep with me this time? Well I guess you have been since you’ve been in my backpack in my lap for the plane rides. And you slept in my lap in the car too. Anyways, I’m thinking of going ahead and laying down for the night and just falling asleep whenever. But you’re welcome to join me and listen to music.” She purrs loudly and jumps up on the bed and pulls my iPod out of my bag. “Wow, I swear, if you weren’t a little raccoon looking red Panda I’d think you were a human.” She looks at me and tilts her head to side. “I’m just saying, all of your mannerisms, you understand English and mandarin very well, and you do things that only really humans do. You’re a really smart little girl!” I pet her and sit down on the bed. She crawls over my legs and makes her way to the pillow and sits waiting on me to lay down. So I pull up the sheets and lay down facing outwards, Juki walks down and lays at my chest curled up. I set the iPod to my sleep playlist and sit it with a speaker on the table next to the bed. I reach up and turn the light off and lay my head down and start petting Juki while listening to the calming music. I drift off into sleep fairly quick with a hand still on Juki.

I feel like I wake up at some point during the night and I have a girl in bed with me with her head at my chest where Juki was. The bright moonlight from the outside allows me to see her in fairly good detail. She has long black hair with red highlights running from her roots all the way down, and part of the side is tied in a blue ribbon. She looks like she’s wearing one of those hair bands with the ears on them on top of her head and the band is probably hidden under her hair because the ears are sticking out. Her slender body curves down the bed against mine like she was cuddling me. It looks like she’s wearing a dress, but I can’t make out much about it other than it’s sleeveless, she’s not wearing a bra under it unless it’s strapless, it has a slit in the chest that opens at her sternum and goes to her waist, it’s tied at the waist with a sash that’s tied like a bow on the left hip, and the bottom is loose around her legs and reaches halfway down her thighs. Her legs are entangled with mine and it looks like she’s wearing one of those straps that has a tail on it that you wear around your waist, but the tail is huge and fluffy. I can’t see her face for her hair but her fingernails and toenails are sort of long and come to a point. Her skin tone seems to be a very pale white but that could be the moonlight. She is gripping my hand against her chest and my arm is fitted firmly between her breasts and under her left arm. I can see and feel her chest moving up and down in a familiar pattern so I could tell she was sleeping, but how did she get here and where was Juki? I drift back to sleep while thinking of getting up to check her out. I wake up in the wee hours of the morning and Juki was still at my chest exactly where I left her and my hand was still on her. So I’m guessing that was just a dream, I look up at the window and it’s still dark out. Juki wakes up and yawns really big, then stands up and stretches her arms and legs. “Hey Juki did you leave last night?” I look at her and she shakes her head no. “Hmm, ok then it must’ve been a dream then...” she tilts her head in confusion at me, “oh,” I laugh it off, “it’s nothing I could just swear I woke up last night to a girl with long black hair wearing a dress and these accessories for girls wanting fluffy ears and a tail in bed with me. It felt so real because I could feel and see her breathing.” Juki just looks at me and then hops off the bed and sits in the floor waiting on me. So I get up and smell some good food cooking. I slide the door open and Juki runs over to the table and sits on one of the cushions. I walk over and see Mr. Cheng sitting at the table too, Mifuon is in the kitchen finishing up on some eggs veggies and bacon, and Juki is bouncing on the cushion excitedly. I sit down across from Mr. Cheng and realized I left my chopsticks in my bag and hop up to go grab them. As I enter the room I notice something poking out from under the bed and bend down to pick it up, it’s a long blue ribbon. “Hmm, I feel like I’ve seen this before.” I whisper to myself as the dream starts fading from my mind. I wrap it around my left wrist and tie it neatly thinking it looked kind of cool, I reach into my bag and grab my chopstick box and walk back into the dining room and sit down on the same cushion as before. I sit the box down on the table and Juki looks over to me and notices the ribbon on my wrist as I open the box and take the chopsticks out positioning them in my left hand. She hops over to my hand and starts sniffing precariously, “What is it Juki? Do you like the ribbon? I can tie it on you if you like...” she puts her paw on my wrist and pushes it towards me shaking her head and hops back over to her cushion. “Well ok then, I just found it on the floor beside my bag so I thought I’d put it on my wrist.” She keeps staring at it with wide eyes but never moves.

Mifuon brings over a big plate of food and sits down on the end of the table. Mr. Cheng hands me a piece of paper and says something to Mifuon in mandarin then gestures for me to read it out loud. It’s in mandarin, and translated it says, “bless this food and may it give us nourishment and energy for the day ahead of us and the trials it brings. The love we share with friends, family, and stranger alike be shared with honor, grace, and life. Good fortune!” I look up and see Mifuon smiling with tears welling up in here eyes.

She reaches her hands over to my right and holds it, shakes it, and bows to me saying, “xie, xie,” over and over. I look at Mr. Cheng and he smiles at me like he knows something.

He says something in mandarin to Mifuon and she leans back on her cushion and wipes her face clean. “If you didn’t recognize what you just read, it’s my wife’s blessing that I only say when we have company to eat with us. Everyone that knows me here in China knew my wife too. And everyone loved her.” He foxes a plate for Juki and sets it down for her. “So every time someone hears her blessing they know that whoever said it must have great respect for her and me.” He fixes Mifuon a plate and sits it in front of her and then makes himself a plate. “Normally whoever says the blessing also deals the food out to everyone because they are the one who blessed the food. But since I wrote it down for you I’m in the same boat. But we always deal ourselves last. Children, women, men, then yourself in that order. Then you must wait for the women to take the first bite before you start eating. This is very important respectful manners here in China so please remember this.” He hands me a plate and I put a serving of food on it and set it down. “That also goes for seconds. You should only go for seconds only if everyone else has or is finished. If there is nothing left then your blessing was fulfilled to everyone’s delight. So you will have good fortune for the rest of the day.” Mifuon takes her first bite and has a sigh of enjoyment, then Juki digs into hers, and then Mr. Cheng and I start eating. The eggs and vegetables are very delicious like they’re cooked differently from what I’m used to tasting. The bacon is just the same as always, delicious. After I’m finished I thank Mifuon for the delicious breakfast and excuse myself from the table. I walk to my room and pack my things up with one earbud in listening to music when I notice Juki walk in and hop up on the bed.

“Hey Juki, you looked like you enjoyed your breakfast pretty well huh?” She nods to me and is staring at my wrist constantly. “I wonder why Mr. Cheng wanted me to wake up at this hour for?” I finish packing my things and I offer my left hand over to Juki for her to climb up on my shoulder, and she sits there staring at the ribbon on my wrist, “umm, are you okay? We are about to leave Juki...” her attention snaps back and she climbs up my arm and sits on my shoulder promptly. I walk out of the room and meet Mr. Cheng and Mifuon at the front door where I put my shoes and hat on. Mr. Cheng and I both hug Mifuon, we all say, “Zaìjìan!” And we go to the car pull back out on to the road. Mr. Cheng silently directs me off the main road and up a steep mountain where it’s very dark and the sun hasn’t even begun to peak over the horizon yet. We reach the end of the road and there’s a small parking area and a trail leading off. We get out of the car and Mr. Cheng gestures for me to follow him so Juki jumps onto my shoulder and we follow behind him. We walk in the dark for about 10 minutes and I can tell the light is starting to shine little by little as we come to some large stones jutting out of the mountain. Mr. Cheng points up and we start climbing up the rocks and get to the top and he points over to a flat area that has a couple of holes in it close to the edge. We walk over to the holes, Mr. Cheng sits in one of them and points at the other, and I sit in it which it’s unusually comfortable.

“This is thunder head rock. It’s been struck by lightning so many times that during ancient times they named it so that people would avoid it and not get struck coming here. Now people come here to take pictures and videos of the lightning that strikes every time there’s a storm. But I come here for this...” he points directly in front of us as the sun starts to peak over the horizon and light starts filling the land as shadows start disappearing everywhere. The pink sky lights up brilliantly and we all sit there in awe. “Lightning made these two holes where people sit to watch the sunrise and give thanks to a new day.” He puts his fist to his open hand and bows to the sun, I repeat his actions as we pay respects to the sun for granting us another day.