DISCLAIMER: I do not own Mai Hime.
UNEDITED. The names of the artists used below are well-known Filipino artists. They are no works of fiction.
AIJIN
She was a shock materializing in front of Natsuki after more than five years that she had not seen Shizuru, although every so often, she came to mind as some sweet memory. There on the sidewalk, walking towards nowhere.
"I have something to buy on this shop for a while just wait here outside." –she turned to the bakeshop 5 blocks away from Natsuki's apartment. Shizuru bought some Danish pastries for her tea break later in the office.
"I know you are up there in your penthouse but I never see you."
Contemplating on what to add in order to break the uncomfortable silence,
"You have moved to the house you purchased near the shore then?" Natsuki asked pretending that the brick wall in the side street was interesting to avoid eye contact from the brunette.
"For the last 6 months." Five years ago she saw an Italian style house near the shore and instantly took a liking on it.
And in these Five years, not once did the blunette call her, write to her, anything that proved she remembered.
"Let us have coffee," Natsuki offered as she led Shizuru inside Mc Donald's. They went upstairs and took a seat close to the window where they could the pedestrians and the traffic.
She first met Shizuru in one of her lectures in the university on Philippine Arts. It was her eyes that attracted her –soulful, deep and they are bloody like crimson. Her friends told her that she has eye fetish but personally for her, eyes are the person's most distinguishing feature, the window to the soul, so the cliché goes. She had done several sketches of Shizuru's eyes and learned to yearn for them –not just the eyes but the rest of the body of the brunette.
"What do you want Shizuru so I can go down and order?"
"Ara, Anything is fine." Shizuru answered.
"Anything?" Natsuki asked quickly. With undeniable surprise adorned her face.
"Yes, anything."
After 5 minutes, she came up with a tray of pair cups of coffee and meal of fries and burger.
She sat down on the seat facing her companion and Shizuru took their tray of meals from Natsuki's hands to put on the table when suddenly the brunette noticed the two German sketching pens in the azure- haired jeans pocket while arranging it.
"I don't see the sketchbook you always carry." She asked.
"It is much smaller now, in my hip pocket. It is less in plain sight and I don't have people looking over my shoulder 'cause it would seem that I am just taking down notes when I am sketching."
Natsuki took a sip from the cup then continued,
"As you can see, in spite of all what happened, I am still working. So many of us –and I don't mean just the painters but also the other artists, they don't work as much as I do. It is not because they are tired or some have grown weak, or have reached the summit, it is because inside they died."
"But aren't you dead too?" with mockery hinted on the voice of the red- eyed woman, she wants to piss her off.
She let the flash of anger fade. She must never be riled by anything Shizuru said. She had helped her a lot, assisted her in her work, she was her number one critic, follower and fan of her works. And in those times the she did not make enough, She had loaned..err, no, she had given her money. She had every right to consider her a curt, an ingrate. Even now, it was Shizuru who bought her coffee.
"Maybe you are right but in those times that I knew you, I wasn't dead," Natsuki said softly.
"Times, huh? It has really been that long?" Shizuru replied and was reciprocated with a nod from the blunette then she continued,
"I have seen you change, not physically but more on your personality. You became more selfish and more manipulative."
Now, all the bitterness like the taste of her favorite tea was coming out.
"Selfish or self-centred whatever the vocabulary you can use to describe it, yes. I have never really thought much of other people's feelings. I did everything for me but not me as me… I hope you can follow the distinction. I was me as an artist and I have never been manipulative. That is how it seems to others but I have never consciously manipulated people and least of all… you." with anger showing as she have spoken.
Both of them took a sip on their respective cups then Shizuru started another conversation,
"What are you doing now? Got another showcase?"
The emerald- eyed girl answered quickly, "I have one next year. Not here in the Philippines but on a small gallery in Paris. It is not that I am selling very well but the case is, I am producing less and less and that is because lately I have made this habit of doing many studies before I work on the final frame. And remember the sketches of you that I did? They are all in there but it will just to show and not for sale. I cannot stand those artists letting go of everything they just worked hard for. "
With a slight blush covered her face, "Ara, You kept them all?"
In her mind, Natsuki knew she have won for telling her that then she smiled at her then looked at the window with a face of someone reminiscing,
"I went last few years back to Japan to visit the rural areas there just to relive my life, to remember those times, those scenes. Not to romanticize them as Amorsolo had done. Yes, I've kept them."
"You will get the national Artist Award," she smiled back.
She waved her hands in objection, "It would be nice but it doesn't mean anything. They have given the awards to poseurs, to phonies. I valued more the reviews that I get in Paris and New York. The critics there don't know me personally and have commented favorably on my work. Here in the Philippines, everything was done through pakikisama, utang na loob, kumpadre system, coteries. Awards were tarnished."
She understood every single detail of the blunette's words,
"Ara, you have become articulate and your speech was becoming magnetic."
"Yeah, and starting to get a little open and how did Mai put it… yes, honest. But with this newly acquired honesty, I have hurt a lot of people."
"Like you have hurt me." Shizuru retorted.
Natsuki took her hand and look at her eyes intensely,
"Shizuru…"
But was interrupted by the crimson-eyed beauty,
"You used me then dumped me." She said it as if it is just a statement of fact.
"I did not dump you," she said with irritation. "You helped me and I will always be grateful. But people are free to reject me—they are under no compulsion. I never dump people—you are saying this now after all these years? I always keep them in mind but I am unable to give them my fullest attention and they are hurt by this negligence. This is what I am, and particularly now, everything—almost everything… anyway is going. Except this—" She gestured to her head, "and this—" she hold her chest.
"Ara Natsuki have hurt me so much… you are too cruel on how you have said things." She said it simply due to her mask but Natsuki knew the turmoil behind it.
She looked at her crimson eyes, "I have hurt all I love."
Her voice was tinted with humility and with head slightly low, "Takeda, my child, my mother and my friends. All my women. It is not selfishness or cussedness; I want you to understand that."
"What it is then?' This time the emotion is too much for her mask to take.
"Listen to me Shizuru, It is not an excuse. Some years back, I met a monk. He was a very good writer, a novelist. He said he found it more and more difficult to be a writer so I asked if his servitude had something to do with his writer's block. He gave it a thought and said yes. There was also once in my visit to the Jesuit run Sophia University in Japan that I met a Jesuit Seminarian who wanted very much to be a poet and quoting from the bible he was learning to deal with as I have read some of its famous texts, I told him that he cannot serve two masters. Both priesthood and arts are a vocation and he must make a choice. I made a choice long time ago and sometimes, like now when you say I dumped you, I regret it with all my heart. Believe I do. "
"Ara, my Natsuki was really becoming skillful with words not just with color and form. I wish to believe you—your regrets. I really do not want much."
And for Natsuki, Shizuru was right—she had never demanded anything from her and was for a while deeply ashamed by what she said. A lump was formed on her throat because of their exchange of words.
"Sometimes I muse, I wonder how it would have turned if we went to that village…"
"What village?" Natsuki enquired.
"The small village we saw near Okinawa? Went we went there after all your rants about the situation of artists here in the Philippines? You said you want to start a new life there… "
Then she remembered her fantasies of escape. Escape from Takeda whom he did not really loved. Escape with the only woman she loves among her string of lovers. Escape from the harsh reality of Arts and idealism..but…
"There are no ifs in the past."
"Still it is nice to wonder." Shizuru answered quickly.
"I would have been a mechanic owning a small shop. But I would have continued painting, drawing, and sketching."
"And we will have our own kids." The brunette said. "I always wanted them but you didn't want me to."
"Look, even without me, you have done very well and I know you will always be. Your mansion, your Porsche…"
"It is five years old." The red-eyed goddess interrupted.
"Mine is almost ten," Natsuki interjected. "Your law practice."
"It is empty here," shizuru brought a fist to her breast.
The blunette nodded. "I know that feeling."
Silence.
"Now it is your turn, you have done very well yourself right?" she smirked at her.
"Not enough. Artists crave recognition, flattery. And I am no exception. Look, in this country, there are only three of us whom I consider as real artists. Manasala, Ang Kiukok –but what fortune have I made? What awards?"
"They will come." This time she sympathized her… consoled her.
"Look at Amorsolo and Batang Francisco. Sure they are important—they are splendid craftsmen. Amorsolo and his color, Botong—when his subjects are in pain, they still manage to be beautiful in their eyes. And there's Anita Magsaysay Ho—she found a formula forty years ago, a pretty mabini formula and she never deviated from it, in fact, she never grew."
"Sour grapes." With a raised mocking eye brow for her.
"But it is true." The blunette's face said with a puppy pout adorning her face.
How cute. I miss that.
Shizuru had not eaten her burger, "I am bringing it home for dinner. Will you come and visit me?" She gave Natsuki her address.
"I will try." She dryly said. Natsuki knew that it was more likely that she could not do so.
"Natsuki knows that I am in need of no things… just you."
"I know." She leaned forward with affection visible to her face. "There is one woman to whom I have given all my attention, my absolute loyalty. Believe me, all in my waking hours and even in my dreams she was there. I love her and the only one, more than the person I regretfully married."
She was incredulously shock on what she's hearing.
"She has given me the purest joy and endless torment as well but I have never pleased her or satisfied her. I am so stupid for letting her go. "
Tears are starting to well up in the crimson eyes.
"But what can I do? When I decided long ago to serve her, to love her, I did not realize then that love could be so tenacious, so enduring. And also so vicious because she is so demanding despite the fact that she knows I am tied by a marriage contract with somebody else and has a child, and a dream to pursue. She wants all my time, efforts, my sweat, even my blood—she wants them and I am willing to give them all to her."
Their meet ends. Outside Mc Donald's after waiving their goodbyes and one last kiss; Shizuru turned away, a wistful look on her face.
"This is why you must forgive me. I do care for you, for all you who have touched my life. And all I can say is I am very, very sorry. You gave me so much, now I am asking one thing more—your compassion."
After an hour, Natsuki died of poisoning. She wilfully drink a poison to commit suicide to end her misery. She has planned to have one last look at her before she died. One last look at the only person who holds the key to her heart, and that is her Shizuru.