The long-promised story requested by Loveless Raine :) it is a thank you gift for everyone who has kindly followed along and reviewed my works. I hope you enjoy the story!
#0
The Future
Japan, 1974
Once the war had been over, when the old house was up for sale, Mrs Yamaguchi had found a small leather-bound notebook in the drawer of the desk in the General's old office.
She'd kept it.
The rest of the past already felt remote and strange. Like a dream she couldn't quite remember. But the General, yes. When she thought of him she remembered him living, breathing, real and alive. A piece of colour in memories long faded to grey.
She liked to run her fingers over the cracked leather spine, and feel the leaves of paper, softened with use.
It was full of his scrawny writing, a mostly nonsensical account of things he'd seen or curiosities he'd noted in the course of the days. True to the nature of the General's mind, taken in isolation, any one of the pages made little sense at all. Major commented on shoes today.Prefers shiny. Or else, Shortest route to library is via train station. Mrs Yamaguchi found the notebook curiously charming, though she understood little.
At the back of the book was the most coherent section. A diary of sorts, though without dates or context it seemed more a splattering of recollections. Mrs Yamaguchi referred to it in her mind as Conversations with Kaede.
Although Mrs Yamaguchi did not know who Kaede was, she enjoyed reading the General's accounts of him. They reminded her of a time when, despite the war, there had been a prevailing sense of hope, a widely held belief that everything would turn out all right.
She often recalled the last time she had seen the General. Hard to believe it was more than twenty years ago already. He had been standing on the doorstep of his own home, leaving with nothing but a suitcase and the casual clothes he wore. A slight limp in his step. He'd still been a young man, smiling despite everything. Such promise, and such misfortune.
At odd moments she would remember him and his youthful smile, and emotion would rise in her. It was at those times that she would pause in what she was doing, clutch the book to her chest, and close her eyes, wondering where he was now.
-tbc
ANs: Originally written as a one-shot this was far too long to post in one go. I have spilt it into bite-sized chapters and plan to upload one each day. This is the first "multi-chapter" story I've written to completion before posting so the upside is you won't have to wait too long for each new chapter :)
The request received from Loveless Raine was:
*senru
*some mitko
*WW2 era
*love story
*drama/tear-jerker
I have some thoughts/hang-ups about writing in a WW2 setting and I've tried to explain myself somewhat on my livejournal. If you are interested in knowing where this story came from, you are welcome to check it out (you can find the link on my ffnet profile). Thanks!