Every evening, the wind comes in from the edge of town. Strangely, it always comes from the same direction, because the town faces the sky and never turns to the side. So the side that catches the wind has always been fixed. Even the houses only ever repaint the wall that faces the sky, come spring. The other wall stays as clean as the day it was built.
On that bench at the edge of town, Matsu and Yuki sit together every night. It’s been sixty years now. The two of them were born the same day, in houses two doors apart on the same street — though which of them came first is still, apparently, an occasional point of dispute.
The bench has an outer side and an inner side. The outer side faces the sky, faces the wind. That spot has always belonged to Matsu. Whenever Yuki tries to sit there, Matsu scowls and pushes her back with one hand — “You’re inside.” At some point Yuki stopped questioning it and simply settled into the inner seat, as though that were just how things were.
The townsfolk assume they’re sisters — sisters with a considerable gap in age, at that. Yuki’s cheeks are smooth and glowing. Matsu’s face is cracked and weathered dark. So the fishmonger and the baker say it every time they pass: “Still looking young, Yuki!” “Matsu, you ought to take better care of your little sister.”
Yuki, to be honest, didn’t mind hearing it. Whenever someone called her young, her hand would drift up to her cheek. Beside her, Matsu always just watched the sky and said nothing. No one had ever actually asked what Matsu thought about any of it. And if they had, she probably would have just said, “Who knows.”
One evening, Matsu dropped her hand towel. It rolled downwind, right to Yuki’s feet. Reaching for it, Yuki circled around to the far side of Matsu for the first time.
And then she froze.
The left cheek, the one that had always faced the sky, was scoured dark by the wind. Deep cracks ran through it like bark on a tree. But the right cheek was different. That was the side that had faced Yuki for sixty straight years. Not once had the wind touched it. It was still smooth and pale, just as it had been the day she was born.
Yuki raised a hand to her own pale cheek. Only now did she understand. She hadn’t just looked young. She had stayed young — because someone had been sitting in the windward seat, all along, so she wouldn’t have to.
“Matsu.” Yuki started to rise. “From today, I’ll take the outside, I’ll—”
“No.” Matsu grabbed her sleeve and pulled her back to the inner seat. Then she turned her weathered left cheek back toward the wind and said, “If your side wears down too, there’ll be nothing left worth looking at from over here.”
The fishmonger walked by just then, calling out as always: “Matsu, sitting on the edge again? Let your little sister go first.” Matsu waved him off with one hand and settled herself heavily back into the outer seat — weathered cheek to the wind, smooth cheek toward Yuki. And so, once again tonight, still mistaken for the elder, she sat exactly where the wind came from.