Hifumi Togo glances at the round clock on the wall of her father's bedroom. She suspects it might be broken. Too much time passes between each tick of the second hand. Alternatively, it simply feels that way to her. People have said enlightening things about this kind of liminal space. Not one of those things come to her mind right now.
Her eyes dart to the sliding door whenever she hears a noise on the other side of it. Little else of her moves. She kneels at the low coffee table beside her father's bed. Rests her laced hands in her lap. Just behind Hifumi, her father shifts under his blankets.
"Does your mother know?" His small voice should not startle her. Yet it does. Her fingers slip free from each other. A short but dense breath slips from her mouth. A second later, Hifumi twists in place to give him a slight shake of her head.
He lets out a breath that echoes her own.
The knowledge that her mother had been fixing her competitive matches had taken a toll on them both. Hifumi has noticed that the smile he gives her mother has changed. It falls short of his eyes. It is impressive that he can even offer her mother that. Impressive that he can seem more disappointed than angry. It is still difficult for Hifumi to fight back her own frown.
The floorboard creaks on the other side of the door. Her head and eyes snap to the door as it slides open. Shallowly, Hifumi inhales.
Makoto Niijima steps into the room. There is a redness to her cheeks that makes Hifumi's jaw tremble.
"Thank you," Makoto says over her shoulder to Hifumi's mother. Ducks her head a little as she does. Hifumi wonders if her mother already knows. If she had cornered Makoto on her way to or from the bathroom. Wonders what her mother might have said.
Her eyes lock with her mother's own. A part of her wants to look away. But Mitsuyo Togo is no longer too bright for her to look directly at. She expects her mother's expression to be accusatory. What Hifumi finds instead is curiosity. It makes something tiny in Hifumi's stomach coil around itself.
Her mother draws the door shut as Makoto kneels at the opposing end of the coffee table. Makoto smiles at her. Tucks a stray piece of hair behind her ear.
"It was my turn, if I remember correctly?"
Hifumi hears her father wiggle against the pillows that keep him somewhat upright.
"Yes," Hifumi says. The word is so small in her mouth.
On the coffee table is a shogi board. They had stopped mid-game when Makoto asked for directions to their bathroom. Now Makoto surveys their game. Hifumi watches as her eyes flicker from piece to piece. Makoto is a skilled but unrefined player. When they played against each other for the first time, Hifumi had been surprised by Makoto's willingness to take great risks. She would not say that Makoto is careless with her pieces: there is just a yawning hunger in her. It makes all the organs in Hifumi's chest go hot.
Makoto moves a piece forward. Hifumi's mind moves with it. The board expands and floods her surroundings. Each piece breathes and shifts their weight from one side to another as they await her instructions.
Only occasionally does Hifumi think to glance back at her father. When she does,Hifumi finds him wearing a dazed expression or gazing out the nearest uncovered window. She knows it is hard for him to focus for long periods of time. That is part of why he had to retire from shogi. But sometimes she finds him with his eyes on their board. A smile on his face. This one reaches his eyes.
It makes her own reach her eyes too.
This time, Makoto's big gambit does not pan out. The losses on her side are not numerous. But they are catastrophic all the same. Hifumi distantly hears herself murmur about respecting the bereaved of the soldiers she is about to fell.
Then she ends them. Ending the match.
Leaning backward, Makoto plants her hands against the floor on either side of her.
"Got me again," she says. Only it sounds like she is talking about something else. Hifumi looks up at her. Finds Makoto's lips curled at their edges and her eyes slightly lidded. Something jams inside her mind. Heat build around it.
"It seems so," Hifumi says somehow. That she can speak coherently at all must be due to the vestiges of her queenly persona.
"You said you were an amateur," her father puts in. "Yet your moves suggest otherwise."
Makoto's laugh sounds almost sheepish.
"Oh no, I'm definitely an amateur. I never played much shogi before meeting Hifumi."
"Perhaps you're an amateur player," Hifumi says, "But your spirit is not."
Makoto's cheeks go red again.
They spend the next while talking about Makoto and her studies. Hifumi's father is visibly excited by her ambition to become police commissioner.
"It matches your spirit," he says.
All the while, Hifumi tries not to look at the door. It does not open even slightly. It staying shut makes that little thing in her stomach twist tighter than before.
Much later, Makoto stands up.
"I've really enjoyed this, but unfortunately, I have to get going," she says. "I'm meeting my sister for dinner tonight."
Hifumi's father raises his hand up into the air. Turns his palm up. Hifumi gives Makoto the tiniest of nods when she glances at her.
"It was wonderful to meet you," he says as Makoto steps around the coffee table to take his hand. Hifumi watches as he gives Makoto's hand a little squeeze. The pressure looks like hardly anything. His grip strength has been on the decline. "Thank you for coming here today."
"T-thank you for having me." Makoto sounds almost relieved. Her smile is wide and easy. "Hifumi talks so much about you, so I'm glad that I finally got to meet you."
Hifumi does not think she has ever felt so light. She waits for their hands to part before she stands up. Then she slides open the door. Leads Makoto through the hallway and the kitchen to the foyer.
The family car is not in their driveway. Her mother must be out. The thing in her stomach stings at that.
Makoto pulls her coat from the hanging rack. Slips it on. Then she makes to do up the zipper. Impulsively, Hifumi grabs one of Makoto's hands with both of hers.
"Thank you," she says. Like before, the words are too small in her mouth. There is so much more she wants to say. She is unused to being at a loss for words. The moment stretches. Hifumi can almost hear the second hand tick out of time as before. This is another liminal space. She just does not have the words to bridge this second and the next.
Only then does she remember that she does not need words to do that.
Lifting Makoto's hand, she puts her knuckles to her lips. Kisses each one delicately. Over the ridge of her knuckles, Hifumi sees Makoto smile.
Hifumi moves their hands an inch away as Makoto steps in closer. Lowers their hands even further. Makoto leans over them and presses her lips to the side of Hifumi's mouth. Instinctively, Hifumi shifts her head so that their lips fit more squarely together. Yawning hunger meets her own.
Even still, it is Makoto who breaks their kiss.
"I'd love to visit again," she breathes against her lips.
Every part of her yearns to ask Makoto to stay. Yearns to slip her hands around her and pull Makoto even closer than before. But she has dinner plans to keep.
"Please do," Hifumi says as she releases Makoto's hand.
Makoto returns her a nod and a smile before she goes.
After shutting the foyer door, Hifumi takes a minute or two to compose herself before heading back to her father's room. The air in her lungs has gone bubbly. She wants to hear him talk about Makoto. Wants to hear herself talk about Makoto.
She wants to forgot about the ache in her stomach.
When she arrives at his room, it looks like her father is asleep. Hifumi knows better than to disturb him. Tries to slide the door shut as quietly as she can manage. Her father's eyes open before she can.
"Come on in," he calls out to her. So she does. Careful not to lean against his legs, Hifumi takes a seat on the edge of his bed. Her father looks up at her with his eyebrows pinched together. "Mitsuyo is not here, is she."
She thinks he meant it to sound more like a question than a statement. But she knows that he already knows the answer. Hifumi just rests her clasped hands on her thighs instead. Seconds tick by. Then he says, "She will come around."
Hifumi is not so certain. While her mother had been the one to confess to rigging her shogi matches, Hifumi suspects that it had been the Phantom Thieves who compelled her to tell the awful truth. It is due to their efforts that Hifumi can tolerate being under the same roof as her mother now.
A part of Hifumi has always known that her mother wanted her to hoard attention rather than garner it. That her mother wanted her to marry someone rich and famous. Makoto Niijima is the opposite of that: she would attract the wrong kind of attention in her mother's eyes.
"Why do you think that?" she asks. Hopes that he might know something she does not. After all, he has known her mother for far longer than Hifumi has.
The lines of his eyebrows and mouth curve sadly towards each other.
"Because she will lose you completely if she does not." Lifting a hand, her father puts his palm to her cheek. His touch is so light. His face is worn beyond his years. Yet something about him seems so strong. As strong as before he took ill.
His spirit, she knows. Her eyes nearly close as she soaks in his affection.
"There was a bit of lunch tangled in my hair once. Makoto picked it out for me. The way she smiled..." Hifumi does not know where she is going with this. Even still, she can feel that her words are leading her somewhere. "I've never been so glad to look silly before in my life."
"Of course," her father says. Strokes her cheek with his thumb. He makes what she said sound like it is a simple math equation. Perhaps it is one. Hifumi plus Makoto might be the easiest equation she has ever thought about.
Opening her eyes, Hifumi smiles down at him.
"She'd like to visit again."
"Splendid," he says. Drops his hand from her face. His eyelids drop too. It is clear that he is starting to drift off. The last two days have been so busy for him. Yesterday, old friends of his had huddled around his bed carrying alcohol and laughter.
Hifumi presses a small kiss to his temple before she leaves.
In her bedroom, Hifumi tries hard to study. But in her mind, she is in a place between seconds. A place where the knuckles of Makoto's hand are against her lips.