Chapter Ten:
It was a calm, glorious Sunday morning and Takashi felt alive and awake. He woke up ready to face the day, and spent his morning with Piyo-chan and the little Tanuki he had rescued. He stood in the expansive backyard of the Morinozuka estate watching the raccoon dog chase around the easily excitable chicken. There was something about this day that made him feel overly optimistic.
"So this is where I can find you on the weekend," a laugh came from behind him.
Takashi turned around quickly and stepped back, faltering slightly as Rae jumped off the wooden porch gracefully. She quickly grabbed his hand with both of hers and pulled him upright once more. She was laughing as she backed up.
"I'm sorry, I didn't mean to startle you," Rae said. She looked around the backyard as she clasped her hands behind her back. After a couple of minutes, she glanced at him from the very edges of her vision and smiled. "Hi."
Takashi looked around and found Satoshi and Yasuchika standing by the door trying to look inconspicuous. The two of them had been very eager to see their brother's developing relationships. Takashi almost wanted to hide Rae away if they continued to observe them. He turned his attention back to Rae. "Hello."
Rae looked around. "I'm sorry. Your brother called me. He said that you wanted me to come over for something, but that you couldn't ask me yourself," she said stepping back a bit. She pointed to the door. "I can go." She turned to walk away.
Takashi reached forward and grabbed her hand and pulled her back gently. "Rae," he spoke quietly.
The truth was this. He really did want to spend some time with Rae. They both had been consumed with busy schedules that even text messages were far and few in between. And while Takashi hadn't been one to dote on the specifics of their relationship, there was still the fact that ever since Rae had fallen into his world (literally), she had made it brighter. Then one night as he was drifting off, his phone chirped with a new text message.
I was thinking we could take a hike when our schedules calm down. Call me. 3
Takashi had ended up falling asleep with a smile on his face. That had been last night, and when he had woken up in the morning, he had forgotten all about it. He wondered if Satoshi had seen the text message. Takashi had a tendency to leave his phone on the small side table just by the doors to the backyard. He wasn't really concerned with his phone's security so Satoshi had no lock to bypass.
Rae smiled up at him for a moment before she jumped slightly as Piyo-chan briefly fluttered by her face. She blushed and looked at the ground in embarrassment. The raccoon dog had abandoned his chase of the chicken and was now sniffing at her tennis shoes. "Hey there, little guy." She crouched down causing the raccoon dog to back up a little bit in anticipation. Rae held out her hand for the tanuki to sniff. "What's your name?"
Takashi waited for the tanuki to sniff and turn his head into Rae's hand. "Pome."
"It's very nice to meet you, Pome," Rae said speaking to the small animal. She looked at Piyo-chan as she stood up. "And this little chick is?" she asked.
"Piyo-chan."
Rae nodded and looked around the backyard. "I didn't get to come out here when I was here last," she said. "Tea with your mother and aunt seemed to take more time than I thought."
"Sorry," Takashi said, though he wasn't entirely sure why he was apologizing. Rae had enjoyed the tea with his mother. The fact that they hadn't been interrupted by the Yakuza was an added bonus. Try as he might he couldn't forget that incident. It was like it had imprinted on him. He no longer wanted to take Rae to anything large and grand. He wanted something small and intimate. He knew that was the reason why his heart felt lighter when Rae suggested a hike. It would be just the two of them.
"Why are you apologizing, your mother and aunt are the most down to earth people I've met. They're energetic, but they have this... realness about them that I always thought the was missing from the privileged world. I've met a lot of rich people and none of them can possibly compare to your family," Rae explained. "I mean, your aunt volunteers her time at a clinic as a nurse. Your mother must have been sent by the high holy heavens because I've never met someone that patient with me."
Takashi smiled. Tea with his aunt and mother had been unexpected, and he had thought for a minute that they were going to run some sort of intimidation tactic on Rae, but instead, they decided to teach her a tea ceremony. It had taken a bit to get accustomed to the way it was done, but Rae could successfully do the first quarter of the ceremony with the ease and grace that was required of her. Takashi still wasn't entirely sure why they had decided to teach it to Rae, but he was happy they did. The look on Rae's face when she found out what they were going to do was filled with happiness. Takashi could remember the way her eyes lit up as she smiled and the area around her eyes creased, demonstrating just how happy she was. Rae was going to be someone who had the wrinkles that had come with years of smiling, and there was something reassuring about the fact that as she got older she was only going to get more beautiful for Takashi.
Rae started walking around the small walkway that would lead her on a circuitous route around the garden and Takashi joined her, guiding her down his favorite path. While the path wasn't as extravagant as the others, towards the end there was a patch of cherry blossoms trees that created a spectacular shaded path. No matter the season, seeing the trees as he walked around to clear his head always managed to bring a smile to his face. It was his hope that it would do the same for Rae.
"I hope I'm not taking you away from your studies," Rae said as she started walking backwards. Takashi grimaced for a moment when he thought she was going to back up into a rock garden. However, she turned at the last second, avoiding the garden as she continued walking.
"Break."
"Are you understanding everything?" Rae asked. She looked back and smiled.
Takashi nodded as he took to matching her stride with one longer step. One thing he had noticed is that when Rae wasn't in the middle of a large crowd she came off as energetic and powerful. She was confident, she smiled more, and she was able to communicate. But in crowds like at the airport, or the charity dinner, there always seemed to be an urgency to get away as soon as possible. He saw a bit of it when she found out that his family was going to watch them spar, but then she relaxed somewhat, almost as if she realized that it wasn't really that many people in the grand scheme of things. He thought back to a small conversation she had with him about why she chose mediation.
I can't be in a courtroom. There are too many people. Too many moving parts. Juries, judges, media. It's all a bit much.
Rae obviously loved working in the legal world. As she talked about it, he felt his own passion for the justice system and the world of laws growing. She spoke about it with the same passion that Akira used when she was telling Mitsukuni about a new recipe. When he looked at Rae, he saw the essence of hard work and passion combined. She believed in win-win situations and she wanted the law to work in such a way that the little guy wasn't killed in the system because he couldn't fight. That was the kind of thing Takashi wanted in the legal system. He would end up helping his own family's enterprises, but he wondered if he would consider working for free for the little guy. He actually thought he might.
"If you don't understand something, you can ask," Rae supplied. "I'm not an expert, despite what your mother thinks, but I've gotten really good at taking all that legal speak and putting it into simple terms. When I was studying, I would start to talk to my parents about everything. They started begging me not to unless I could translate legal into something that actually made sense. Not to say I doubt your abilities, it's just that I want to help if I can."
Takashi only smiled back and guided her to the left of a forked path. "Thank you," he said.
Rae and Takashi walked quietly for a few minutes and Takashi prepared himself to properly enjoy Rae's reaction to the trees. He kept his eyes on her as she walked on, face forward. As they came around a bend in the road Rae paused and let out a small gasp.
The cherry blossom tree leaves had changed color and had started to fall, their oranges, reds, and yellows sprinkling the walkway. Rae jogged under the trees and looked up as she spun around, her arms out to keep her balance. "I just love fall, don't you, Takashi?" She stopped spinning and laughed at her own embarrassing behavior. "I'm sorry, I just. . . I guess I don't get out that much."
Takashi just stood there memorializing the moment in his mind. He told himself to remember the wrinkles around her eyes, the way the edges of her mouth pulled at her face as if her mouth was too big to be held back. He savored her laugh as she started to blush profusely. He took note of the way she scratched the back of her head causing her blue hair to lift up around her cheeks. The moment was too perfect. He couldn't afford to lose such a memory. He had no clue if he would see that same sense of wonder in her eyes again. Every single moment was different and worth remembering.
Takashi walked over as Rae started investigating the bark on the tree. As he stared at her, he wondered about her name. He found the name itself unusual in it's spelling. He even acknowledges that Rae used Katakana to spell it out. "What's your name mean?" he asked carefully.
Rae turned and smiled. "Usually that's the first thing people ask me," Rae smiled. "There is the name Rei, but my name, while it sounds the same isn't spelled the same way. A lot of people wonder about it."
Rae leaned against the thick trunk of one of the trees and smiled sadly. "You know that my dad was American Military, right?"
Takashi nodded. He wouldn't soon forget it either. While her father was an ex-patriot, he was still quite proud of his Japanese-American roots. His parents were in the Japanese internment camps as children, and they raised their children in the wake of the Korean and Vietnam wars.
"My dad grew up in California in Berkeley during the Free Speech Movement," Rae explained. "Right there in the middle of it all, my dad was just as outspoken as the others. He was in San Francisco when they wanted to gentrify JapanTown. One day he got into trouble with the law. It was a simple protest, but things got out of hand pretty quickly and even my dad wondered what he was fighting for.
"Anyway, a police officer pulled him to the side and sat him down and asked him what he wanted to do with his life. I guess he didn't want to see another young, intelligent, man be entered into the criminal system as a deviant. My dad said that he was fighting for the people. I'm not entirely sure what was said to him next, but when my dad graduated from college, he applied to officers school for the Navy. He was in Officer Training School with a guy that would become his best friend. They both believed in the Free Speech Movement but felt that there was more they could do not just for the United States, but for the world. They both rose in rank around the same time and by the time my father was in Okinawa, he was a Lieutenant Junior Grade. He left the Navy after time served because he fell in love with my mom, but his friend stayed with the military."
Rae looked at the ground and kicked at the dirt as she took a moment to collect her thoughts. "I was born in 1992, a year after the Gulf War. My dad's best friend was killed in Afghanistan. His name was Ray Tanaka, and he was Ren's godfather. My name was a special request from my father to my mother. He wanted to honor Ray by giving me the feminine spelling. So everyday I try to make my namesake proud. I promise Ray Tanaka that I will do my best to make the world a better place."
Takashi smiled at her. It was obvious to him that the name meant a lot to her. Even if most people in Japan didn't understand its significance, he felt that he had been granted special access to just another facet of who she was. He reached out and tucked some of her hair behind her ear as she grinned at him. There were still so many things he didn't know about her, but he knew that he had all the time in the world to figure it out. He had known Rae for three months, and he was quite certain that this was what love felt like.