Kawakami handles a bizarre load of laundry

Sadayo Kawakami-- teacher by day, maid by night-- had unwittingly become an ally of the Phantom Thieves before she even realized it, simply by helping one of her students with basic chores. She hadn't put together everything just yet, but she was sharp enough to realize that something about the transfer student, Ren Amamiya, was clearly unusual. After arriving under poor circumstances, the boy had improved his impression from that of a dangerous delinquent to that of a local legend; he was basically some kind of cross between a super-hero and a life guru, to hear the locals talk about him. Even with how busy her life was, Kawakami couldn't help but marvel at how much the guy seemed to get done in the course of one day.

Although the two had started as teacher and student, they'd soon gone on to develop a much stranger relationship. When Ren made the bold move to call a local maid service, he coincidentally pulled his teacher's number, summoning her to his door-step in unfitting double ponytails and a scandalous maid fetish uniform. With her slender body and pretty smile, she was the type that clients wanted all kinds of service from... naturally, she'd expected Ren to have the same ideas. Kawakami had thought her life was over... but, oddly enough, she'd simply been rolled up into Ren's routine now. He kept her secret and called in her service like an ordinary customer; in return, she handled basic chores, like tidying up and laundry. It was really the easiest job on her route, almost like a break in her routine. The two of them had gone from teacher and student to maid and master...

As Kawakami exited Ren's home, carrying a large, blue bin full of laundry in both arms, she knit her brow and blushed in spite of herself, wondering how many of the neighbors had seen them come in and out. With her black-and-white maid gear, her bouncy ponytails, and her remaining prettiness as a lady not quite past her prime yet (she told herself), she'd draw plenty of attention. It was a far cry from her usual appearance: a frizzy-haired, sweater-wearing slouch.

"Washing and folding his clothes like this... We look less like a maid and a client, and more like we're a couple, don't we?" she mumbled to herself irritably. Ren seemed to hang out with a lot of girls, but none of them had a sordid relationship like the two of them, right? Well... She thought of it as sordid, but Ren had been a gentleman from the very beginning. He acted like he didn't even know how the call-in maid service was typically used. "I can't tell if he's an innocent idiot who just has luck with girls, or a two-faced casanova who knows exactly what he's doing..."

Thankfully, it was already dark out; the Leblanc cafe caretaker, Sojiro, was nowhere to be seen as she exited and the neighbors had all shuttered up their windows for the night. In her apron and short skirt, the maid headed to the laundromat across the street and pushed open the door with her hip, grunting as the door flapped back to slap her in the side while she wiggled through. "Uff!" Growling, she kicked the squeaky door once more for good measure. This wasn't the kind of place that could get a lot of unanticipated business, and thus, not the kind of place to bother spending money fixing a door. For that matter, the open hours were pretty hard to memorize... Whatever the case, people didn't seem to come here too often. That included tonight; Kawakami found herself alone in the cramped, coin-operated laundry room.

Sadayo Kawakami was a professional. Therefore, she wasn't going to dwell on things like the illicit nature of a teacher in her marrying years folding her handsome younger student's boxer shorts. "Geez... This guy gets away with a lot, if you really think about it," Kawakami said to herself, looking momentarily cross. "He can leave these out of the load and handle them himself, can't he? Sometimes that air of mystery around him just seems like a lack of common sense-"

While the teacher was busy ranting to herself, she suddenly noticed an odd assortment of items, piled at the bottom of the hamper. Every now and then, Ren gave her something truly bizarre to wash, like a festival happi or weird, military grade combat gear. Today, however, the load was especially strange. Buried under all of his usual garments were sets of women's clothing. Not only were these women's clothing... they spoke to some pretty bizarre fetishes, much stranger than a simple kink for maids!

With wide eyes, she began to pull the items out, one after another. First, a frilly apron, much like her own, but with no dress accompanying it, as though it was meant to be worn with nothing underneath! Then, a black, leather bra and panty set with spiked tips in a particularly naughty place, poking out from the points of the nipples! She dug a bit deeper, then fished out one more item: a cat's collar! Of course, that one was really just Morgana's "armor," but in her panicked state, she couldn't help but picturing it belonged to one of the girls Ren was often seen with. "What... What on earth?!" she asked herself, holding the items sheepishly in one hand as though they were vital evidence from some sort of crime scene. She had no way of knowing Ren was simply intending to clean gear his party had collected on their latest trip to the Metaverse and had forgot to set it aside so he could do it himself later.

Gulping, the lady placed each of the items on a bench in front of herself and then crossed her arms across the breast of her maid uniform. Her expression was tense as she organized her thoughts by conversing with herself. "Well... No wonder he hasn't actually made a move on me yet! I thought that was weird, but really, the guy seems to have a lot on his plate already! Those nice girls he's hanging out with all the time are actually wearing cosplay fetish junk for him; a maid outfit's no match for something like this! Oh God... Those kids are so much weirder than I pictured them being..."

...

Kawakami looked left and right, bobbing her ponytails as she put on a suspicious look. "... Young people are really into these sorts of things nowadays, huh? I can't imagine wearing this stuff, even in the bedroom..." The teacher was **** to recognize a lack of courage in herself. She didn't care about the things her guardians had always said, about how she was moving too slow and needed to use her womanly charms to net a man, but still... she had her pride as a lady! It hurt, imagining being defeated in that realm by a bunch of her own students. With renewed vigor, she clenched her fists at her side and wore the sort of weary scowl that sometimes caused boys to give her a wide berth. "Those kids deserve a talking to, but... I don't want to let them beat me either. I'll bet... I'll bet I could still fit into any of these! That's right! Maid work is a lot of exercise, really. I'm probably in better shape than most of them!" Kawakami ignored that one of them was literally a fashion model; besides that, she couldn't have known the kind of workout they were also getting during the nights.

After giving herself that little pep-talk, she let her eyes dart back and forth between the items while clutching her own apron nervously in both hands. Was she really going to try one of these on, just to prove to herself that she could? A naked apron? A dominatrix bikini? A cat's collar?! Was her ego really that incessant?

... Or maybe she was just really bored, doing laundry by herself to start her weekend?