[kudo norio]
A SEASON OF BLACK CHRYSANTHEMUMS: WINTER
by corbeaun
* * *
Part 5
* * *
Jun's voice whipped across the kitchen.
"Watch it, boy!"
Hikaru caught himself, one hand on the counter, the other balancing the precariously teetering pile of dirty bowls. He made it to the sink this time, not a dish broken. It was a brief respite: the past two weeks had seen more broken crockery than his past two years combined. His paycheck was suffering from his clumsiness.
"Sorry, sorry," he muttered, hurrying past the scowling woman at the entrance of the kitchen.
Jun caught him by the arm as he passed. "What the hell is wrong with you, Shindo?" She looked genuinely concerned. Considering that she was taking time during a busy lunch hour just to ask him, Jun must be very worried.
Hikaru shrugged off her hand. "Nothing." He bent over the boxes of ramen he was supposed to deliver, busily double-checking that they were properly packed before tying them to the delivery bike. When he turned again, Jun was already gone.
That day, the press of customers didn't let up until early evening. By the time Hikaru was ready to hang his apron up on the peg in the kitchen, the sun had already set. As he grabbed his jacket to leave, Jun's voice stopped him.
"Shindo, I need to talk to you."
Hikaru sighed, gave himself a moment, and then turned around to face her. "Look," he said, "I'm really sorry about the last few days. But you're already taking it out of my paycheck."
In fact, there would be no 'loans' to Yuki's roommate this month, nor possibly any gas for his water heater. He saw a winter of cold baths ahead.
Jun shook her head impatiently. "No, that's not what I want to talk about. Sit down, Shindo." She gestured outside to a stool by the counter in the now empty dining room.
With a brief shrug, Hikaru took the stool. Jun sat down on the one next to him.
"I'm not getting younger, Shindo," she began unexpectedly. Hikaru looked at her in puzzlement. This was not what he thought she would say. "Shindo," Jun continued, looking very serious, "I'm thinking of retiring."
Hikaru stared at her, feeling as he'd just seen a roasted Peking duck fly back into the sky.
If there one thing anyone knew about Jun, it was that she was a terminal workaholic. She probably considered the ramen shop more her flesh-and-blood than her own son.
But it seemed that the woman in front of him was still Jun.
"Of course, not immediately," she added. "Sometime. Eventually." A look of pain crossed her face. "Soon." Then she impatiently shook her head, "Ah, excuse this old lady's ramblings. I do have a point. Shindo Hikaru," she grabbed one of his slack hands, "when I go, I want you to have my shop."
He felt his heart stutter and skip a beat. Hikaru swallowed. "But - your son..." he protested.
Jun rolled her eyes and waved an impatient hand in the air. "That young reprobate can handle himself. He'll be a fancy, big-name lawyer so long as he keeps his mouth about me being his mother." Her voice trailed off, and she squeezed his hand. "He'll be fine," she continued gently. "It's you I'm worried about."
Hikaru felt his chest draw up tight with emotion. "Jun," he muttered, and squeezed her hand back. He suddenly thought of his own mom, who he hadn't seen in nearly two years.
"So, what's your answer?"
He considered it seriously for the space of two minutes. The realization that he could have security, that he wouldn't have to worry about money anymore if he continued to live frugally...if he continued to live the way he was right then. Suddenly, he had a vision of himself, twenty years down the line, graying and with a lost look in his, eyes serving the same old, endless line of students and salarymen bowl after bowl of ramen.
He thought back to the past two years. But all he could remember was the last two months and a half, and the cold, brittle feel of stones between his fingers.
Slowly, Hikaru loosed his hand from Jun's clasp. "I'm sorry, Jun," he said quietly. "I can't."
Strangely, Jun looked unsurprised. "Well," she said, blowing a piece of hair out of her eyes, "I saw that coming."
He stared at her, flabbergasted.
"Look, dear boy," she rolled her eyes at him, "you've been restless for weeks - even before you started breaking my dishes. Anyone could have guessed you weren't going to be here for long." She smirked at him, "About time you yourself realized that."
Hikaru sputtered. "But I -"
She held up a hand. "Stop. Lying is a disgusting habit. So is denial. Speaking of which," she raised a sly eyebrow, "exactly where are you planning to go?"
He was becoming increasingly alarmed by Jun's perceptiveness. He'd just then decided he needed to get out of Tokyo. "I...haven't decided yet," he said slowly. "Maybe, maybe Kansai." Kansai, he knew, had its own Go Institute; it was an organization separate from the one he'd been a part of years ago.
Jun raised her other eyebrow. She looked at him in some astonishment. "Not Hokkaido?" she asked.
"Hokkaido?" Hikaru frowned at her, perplexed. Hokkaido was all the way in the north of Japan. "Why would I go there?"
"Surely, Akari-chan..." She let her sentence trail off delicately.
Akari was studying medicine right then at Hokkaido University. Todai had rejected her. Hikaru remembered because she'd come to him and cried into his shirt for nearly an hour. Then Hikaru remembered why she wasn't talking to him recently.
"No," he shook his head firmly, "I wouldn't go to Hokkaido for Akari."
"Oh." Jun stared at him now, honestly perplexed. "Then what the hell's got you so riled up about these few weeks?"
Hikaru stared down at the countertop. "I met someone - someone I thought I knew. But it didn't turn out the way I expected."
He heard a low whistle, and turned to see Jun looking at him consideringly. "You've been a busy boy," she remarked.
He looked away, feeling the darkening frown on his face. "It's not like that," he said harshly. Like he'd want to give Touya one more way to mess him up.
"Well," Jun clapped her hands on her thighs as she stood up, "I can't handle all you youngsters' relations. I'll leave it to the experts. Just be careful, whatever you do."
"Yeah.
"Jun." His call stopped the woman in the doorway of the kitchen. She turned to him curiously. "Was it just a set-up - that whole offer of your shop?"
An uncharacteristically wistful look came over her face then. "I meant what I said," Jun said quietly. "If you'd accepted, the shop would've been yours - and I would have no regrets."
Hikaru stared at her, feeling the heavy lump rise in his throat. He stepped off the stool and, before she could protest, jumped over the counter to grab her in a brief, hard hug. "Jun. Thanks." He squeezed her briefly in his arms, then quickly let go.
Jun frowned at him for his forwardness, patting back the few strands of hair that had escaped her chignon, but the delicate flush to her cheeks bespoke a different emotion. "Go on, now," she said roughly, "if you're leaving, I'm going to be looking for a replacement. And I'm busy enough as it is."
Hikaru laughed, and sketched a bow in her direction. "Aye, aye!"
Then he grabbed his jacket off the counter and strode out the shop without a backward glance.
* * *
"You're leaving?"
Yuki stared at him from the open doorway of the foyer. Hikaru pushed past her, then dumped the box of things he was trashing outside on the sidewalk.
He grunted. "Yeah, I'm getting out of this hell hole." He walked back in to grab another box. He hadn't realized how much junk he'd accumulated over the years.
Huddled against the foyer wall, Yuki looked miserable and uncertain. "Why?" her voice trembled, going even higher than the usual falsetto she used. "Weren't you...happy?"
"Happy?" Hikaru snorted, not really seeing her over the big box in his arms. He dropped the box onto the sidewalk beside all the others. "I just realized I'm worth more than all this."
When he turned back, he caught the tail end of Yuki's heavy, winter boots disappearing around the corner. "...shit." He dropped down on one of the boxes, and ran a heavy hand over his bangs. Yuki always acted so tough, but for some reason, it was unbelievably easy for him to hurt her feelings.
Well, he shrugged to himself, she'll just have to get over it. Soon, he wouldn't be around much to bother her anyway.
With that thought in mind, he turned determinedly back to throwing away all the useless things that were weighing him down.
It was dark outside by the time he finished cleaning out his apartment. Standing at the doorway, Hikaru looked at the nearly empty room where he'd spent the past two years, and felt both tired and accomplished. Only an old backpack and a duffle bag lay on the floor, with some leftover clothes strewn around them. The day of packing had taken more out of him than all but the busiest day at the ramen shop, but Hikaru was already planning for what he should do next.
He had called the Kansai Go Institute from a payphone. They had never heard a case like his before, but he'd gotten an invitation to go over there and make a full argument in person. With the partial refund he had managed to talk out of his landlord, he had then bought an expensive, one-way ticket on an overnight train. The train was scheduled for Osaka, Kansai that very night, and Hikaru wasn't at all worried. If the Kansai Go Institute would not have him, then there were institutes in Seoul and Beijing - he would find some way around the problem of him being a Japanese national. Meanwhile, there were even professional tournaments, like the Samsung Cup, that amateurs could enter.
And when his money ran out, he would work whatever menial jobs there were. He had his strength; he wouldn't give up, not this time.
Sai, he smiled, sorry I made you worry all these years. I think - I think I'm finally ready to walk back on that path you left me.
His head felt clear, clearer than it had been since he was a boy...Clearest for the first time since his life had fallen disastrously apart. He had been unhappy for years, and he hadn't known it. Now, without regret, he swung the backpack and duffle bag onto his shoulders, prepared for a new start.
Only...
As he passed the bathroom counter, he hesitated. The cell phone was lying there on the tiles. It was as silent and turned off as it'd been since that evening at the Ritz, nearly a week ago now. He hadn't touched it.
For a moment Hikaru fought with himself, not wanting to take it but at the same time...unwilling to let it go. Then, abruptly, one part won and, with a noisy sigh, he snatched it from the countertop and stuffed it into the deepest, hidden recess of his backpack.
Hikaru suspected Touya Akira would always have this effect on him.
With no other thought, then, he put on his shoes and locked the door securely behind him.
* * *
end of "Winter"
to be followed in "Spring"
previous part
by corbeaun
* * *
Part 5
* * *
Jun's voice whipped across the kitchen.
"Watch it, boy!"
Hikaru caught himself, one hand on the counter, the other balancing the precariously teetering pile of dirty bowls. He made it to the sink this time, not a dish broken. It was a brief respite: the past two weeks had seen more broken crockery than his past two years combined. His paycheck was suffering from his clumsiness.
"Sorry, sorry," he muttered, hurrying past the scowling woman at the entrance of the kitchen.
Jun caught him by the arm as he passed. "What the hell is wrong with you, Shindo?" She looked genuinely concerned. Considering that she was taking time during a busy lunch hour just to ask him, Jun must be very worried.
Hikaru shrugged off her hand. "Nothing." He bent over the boxes of ramen he was supposed to deliver, busily double-checking that they were properly packed before tying them to the delivery bike. When he turned again, Jun was already gone.
That day, the press of customers didn't let up until early evening. By the time Hikaru was ready to hang his apron up on the peg in the kitchen, the sun had already set. As he grabbed his jacket to leave, Jun's voice stopped him.
"Shindo, I need to talk to you."
Hikaru sighed, gave himself a moment, and then turned around to face her. "Look," he said, "I'm really sorry about the last few days. But you're already taking it out of my paycheck."
In fact, there would be no 'loans' to Yuki's roommate this month, nor possibly any gas for his water heater. He saw a winter of cold baths ahead.
Jun shook her head impatiently. "No, that's not what I want to talk about. Sit down, Shindo." She gestured outside to a stool by the counter in the now empty dining room.
With a brief shrug, Hikaru took the stool. Jun sat down on the one next to him.
"I'm not getting younger, Shindo," she began unexpectedly. Hikaru looked at her in puzzlement. This was not what he thought she would say. "Shindo," Jun continued, looking very serious, "I'm thinking of retiring."
Hikaru stared at her, feeling as he'd just seen a roasted Peking duck fly back into the sky.
If there one thing anyone knew about Jun, it was that she was a terminal workaholic. She probably considered the ramen shop more her flesh-and-blood than her own son.
But it seemed that the woman in front of him was still Jun.
"Of course, not immediately," she added. "Sometime. Eventually." A look of pain crossed her face. "Soon." Then she impatiently shook her head, "Ah, excuse this old lady's ramblings. I do have a point. Shindo Hikaru," she grabbed one of his slack hands, "when I go, I want you to have my shop."
He felt his heart stutter and skip a beat. Hikaru swallowed. "But - your son..." he protested.
Jun rolled her eyes and waved an impatient hand in the air. "That young reprobate can handle himself. He'll be a fancy, big-name lawyer so long as he keeps his mouth about me being his mother." Her voice trailed off, and she squeezed his hand. "He'll be fine," she continued gently. "It's you I'm worried about."
Hikaru felt his chest draw up tight with emotion. "Jun," he muttered, and squeezed her hand back. He suddenly thought of his own mom, who he hadn't seen in nearly two years.
"So, what's your answer?"
He considered it seriously for the space of two minutes. The realization that he could have security, that he wouldn't have to worry about money anymore if he continued to live frugally...if he continued to live the way he was right then. Suddenly, he had a vision of himself, twenty years down the line, graying and with a lost look in his, eyes serving the same old, endless line of students and salarymen bowl after bowl of ramen.
He thought back to the past two years. But all he could remember was the last two months and a half, and the cold, brittle feel of stones between his fingers.
Slowly, Hikaru loosed his hand from Jun's clasp. "I'm sorry, Jun," he said quietly. "I can't."
Strangely, Jun looked unsurprised. "Well," she said, blowing a piece of hair out of her eyes, "I saw that coming."
He stared at her, flabbergasted.
"Look, dear boy," she rolled her eyes at him, "you've been restless for weeks - even before you started breaking my dishes. Anyone could have guessed you weren't going to be here for long." She smirked at him, "About time you yourself realized that."
Hikaru sputtered. "But I -"
She held up a hand. "Stop. Lying is a disgusting habit. So is denial. Speaking of which," she raised a sly eyebrow, "exactly where are you planning to go?"
He was becoming increasingly alarmed by Jun's perceptiveness. He'd just then decided he needed to get out of Tokyo. "I...haven't decided yet," he said slowly. "Maybe, maybe Kansai." Kansai, he knew, had its own Go Institute; it was an organization separate from the one he'd been a part of years ago.
Jun raised her other eyebrow. She looked at him in some astonishment. "Not Hokkaido?" she asked.
"Hokkaido?" Hikaru frowned at her, perplexed. Hokkaido was all the way in the north of Japan. "Why would I go there?"
"Surely, Akari-chan..." She let her sentence trail off delicately.
Akari was studying medicine right then at Hokkaido University. Todai had rejected her. Hikaru remembered because she'd come to him and cried into his shirt for nearly an hour. Then Hikaru remembered why she wasn't talking to him recently.
"No," he shook his head firmly, "I wouldn't go to Hokkaido for Akari."
"Oh." Jun stared at him now, honestly perplexed. "Then what the hell's got you so riled up about these few weeks?"
Hikaru stared down at the countertop. "I met someone - someone I thought I knew. But it didn't turn out the way I expected."
He heard a low whistle, and turned to see Jun looking at him consideringly. "You've been a busy boy," she remarked.
He looked away, feeling the darkening frown on his face. "It's not like that," he said harshly. Like he'd want to give Touya one more way to mess him up.
"Well," Jun clapped her hands on her thighs as she stood up, "I can't handle all you youngsters' relations. I'll leave it to the experts. Just be careful, whatever you do."
"Yeah.
"Jun." His call stopped the woman in the doorway of the kitchen. She turned to him curiously. "Was it just a set-up - that whole offer of your shop?"
An uncharacteristically wistful look came over her face then. "I meant what I said," Jun said quietly. "If you'd accepted, the shop would've been yours - and I would have no regrets."
Hikaru stared at her, feeling the heavy lump rise in his throat. He stepped off the stool and, before she could protest, jumped over the counter to grab her in a brief, hard hug. "Jun. Thanks." He squeezed her briefly in his arms, then quickly let go.
Jun frowned at him for his forwardness, patting back the few strands of hair that had escaped her chignon, but the delicate flush to her cheeks bespoke a different emotion. "Go on, now," she said roughly, "if you're leaving, I'm going to be looking for a replacement. And I'm busy enough as it is."
Hikaru laughed, and sketched a bow in her direction. "Aye, aye!"
Then he grabbed his jacket off the counter and strode out the shop without a backward glance.
* * *
"You're leaving?"
Yuki stared at him from the open doorway of the foyer. Hikaru pushed past her, then dumped the box of things he was trashing outside on the sidewalk.
He grunted. "Yeah, I'm getting out of this hell hole." He walked back in to grab another box. He hadn't realized how much junk he'd accumulated over the years.
Huddled against the foyer wall, Yuki looked miserable and uncertain. "Why?" her voice trembled, going even higher than the usual falsetto she used. "Weren't you...happy?"
"Happy?" Hikaru snorted, not really seeing her over the big box in his arms. He dropped the box onto the sidewalk beside all the others. "I just realized I'm worth more than all this."
When he turned back, he caught the tail end of Yuki's heavy, winter boots disappearing around the corner. "...shit." He dropped down on one of the boxes, and ran a heavy hand over his bangs. Yuki always acted so tough, but for some reason, it was unbelievably easy for him to hurt her feelings.
Well, he shrugged to himself, she'll just have to get over it. Soon, he wouldn't be around much to bother her anyway.
With that thought in mind, he turned determinedly back to throwing away all the useless things that were weighing him down.
It was dark outside by the time he finished cleaning out his apartment. Standing at the doorway, Hikaru looked at the nearly empty room where he'd spent the past two years, and felt both tired and accomplished. Only an old backpack and a duffle bag lay on the floor, with some leftover clothes strewn around them. The day of packing had taken more out of him than all but the busiest day at the ramen shop, but Hikaru was already planning for what he should do next.
He had called the Kansai Go Institute from a payphone. They had never heard a case like his before, but he'd gotten an invitation to go over there and make a full argument in person. With the partial refund he had managed to talk out of his landlord, he had then bought an expensive, one-way ticket on an overnight train. The train was scheduled for Osaka, Kansai that very night, and Hikaru wasn't at all worried. If the Kansai Go Institute would not have him, then there were institutes in Seoul and Beijing - he would find some way around the problem of him being a Japanese national. Meanwhile, there were even professional tournaments, like the Samsung Cup, that amateurs could enter.
And when his money ran out, he would work whatever menial jobs there were. He had his strength; he wouldn't give up, not this time.
Sai, he smiled, sorry I made you worry all these years. I think - I think I'm finally ready to walk back on that path you left me.
His head felt clear, clearer than it had been since he was a boy...Clearest for the first time since his life had fallen disastrously apart. He had been unhappy for years, and he hadn't known it. Now, without regret, he swung the backpack and duffle bag onto his shoulders, prepared for a new start.
Only...
As he passed the bathroom counter, he hesitated. The cell phone was lying there on the tiles. It was as silent and turned off as it'd been since that evening at the Ritz, nearly a week ago now. He hadn't touched it.
For a moment Hikaru fought with himself, not wanting to take it but at the same time...unwilling to let it go. Then, abruptly, one part won and, with a noisy sigh, he snatched it from the countertop and stuffed it into the deepest, hidden recess of his backpack.
Hikaru suspected Touya Akira would always have this effect on him.
With no other thought, then, he put on his shoes and locked the door securely behind him.
* * *
end of "Winter"
to be followed in "Spring"
previous part