Epilogue #1
Fujiwara Sai, who'd been, once in a now forgotten past, a Go tutor to the Emperor of Japan, then a ghost doomed to forever wander and whose only chance at realizing his dreams of playing Go, and reaching the Hand of God, lay in relying on friendly hosts, and who now was a convalescing blind man, whose hoped to be playing Go and playing the flute for and with his friends soon, was busy doing as much as he could, which was lying stretched out on the couch and trying to get enough air in his lungs to stop that horrible compressed feeling.
It was at least another 30 minutes before he would be allowed to take the next medicine inhalation, but he wasn't too sure he make it that long. But he did want to try, because the doctor had told him that taking more than one dose of the medicine within an hour would be harmful. The man had also said that if Sai had too difficult a time breathing, even with the hourly doses, he was to go see a doctor. As Sai lay there wheezing, he realized that it might just come to that, because he wasn't going to last another half hour he felt sure.
As he retrieved his phone from the coffee table and pressed the 1 and then the call button, he was, apart from the uncomfortable breathing, quite calm; he knew Ogata would come running - the man had gone down to his own apartment to retrieve something and had probably stopped to check his e-mail or something - and he would help the blind man as a true friend would and Sai would not ever have to feel guilty about it. It was a great feeling.
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The next day - the doctor had, the day before, changed Sai's meds and now the blind man could breathe a lot better - was the first day Sai would be home alone for a good chuck of the day. Touya-kun and Hikaru both had official games to go to, the Touyas had a wedding to attend but Ogata would in his own apartment working on his computer, so he would just be a call away, and Sai now knew that that arrangement would work.
Sai spent the morning reading a few hours, then he got out his /fue/ and experimentally tried playing it. He very quickly put the flute back in the box and the box he put back on the shelve after he'd stopped being dizzy, from messing with his breathing. He was rather miffed with himself that he had forgotten to ask the doctor when he should try playing the flute again; not knowing made him that much more impatient!
Tired from all that effort, and from experiencing such a strong surge of emotion, Sai took himself back to the couch and sat back for long while, just playing back some music in his head; one of the modern compositions from one of the newer CDs in his music collection.
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It was the door bell that woke the blind man, and Sai groggily got to his feet. As he made his way to the door, he tried to figure out who it could be. Not any of his Go friends; they all had keys and wouldn't bother to ring before coming in. He was expecting no parcels but of course it could still be the doorman with a delivery of some sort.
He reached the door just as the bell chimed a second time. Carefully he sought out the door latch, grasping it and pulling the lock open, while he gasped the knob with his other hand and pulling the door open.
'Good morning Fujiwara-san,' the unmistakably cheery voice of Mr. Yashida chimed, followed by a soberer 'I hope you are recovering well,' spoken in the cultured tones of Mr. Fukurou's voice. All of a sudden Sai felt happiness spread though him and a smile forming on his face; he hadn't realized how he's missed his music friends these last weeks.
'I hope we are not intruding,' Mr. Fukurou added. 'Not at all!' Sai hastened to say, stepping aside and inviting the gentlemen in.
'We've brought Joshu-kun, I hope you don't mind,' Mr Yashida said as Sai made his way back into the flat so the guests could have room to shed their coats and shoes. 'Not at all,' Sai repeated before moving to stand next to the couch, leaning his leg against it because the shock of the arrival of the sudden visitors, however positive, had zapped the energy he had gained from his short nap. He needed to wait until the guest had been greeted properly and had been given refreshment before it would be polite to sit down himself.
'Oh, Fujiwara-san, please sit down, you look pale,' Mr. Yashida said, his voice coming from the entry point of the living room. 'Since we've come unannounced, Joshu-kun can take of us and play host, if that's okay?' he added.
'But,' Sai started. Having a guest serve themselves and others, it just didn't seem right.
'No buts,' Mr. Joshu said. 'I'll be delighted to be of assistance, my friend.' Sai felt another wave of warmth; Sai had only ever had interaction with the soft spoken Joshu, with the young man in the role of, well 'butler' Sai supposed, to the older gentlemen. The fact that Joshu was calling him a friends gave Sai an even better feeling about the man; after all Joshu knew of Sai's origins - or at least the ones in this life - and still the man accepted the blind man as a friend. Sai promised himself that Joshu's kindness and friendship would be returned in as much measure as Sai could muster. It would certainly not be a fair exchange, but Sai swore it wouldn't be through lack of trying!
'Please sit down, Fujiwara-san' Mr. Yashida repeated and Sai did so just as Joshu announced, 'Ah, I've found the kitchen and the tea pot. Green tea all around?' Everybody murmured accent and Sai could hear tea making sounds from the kitchen.
Consistent with the gentlemen's behavior in the past, there followed a period of exchanging pleasantries. All very nice, but Sai did feel he should let the gathering know he wasn't up to any music playing. He said so, worried that his visitor's would be disappointed.
'I am sorry you've come all this way, well, for nothing,' he ended his explanation. 'Oh, not at all,' Mr. Fukurou said. 'We came to see our friend and maybe talk about music if we feel like it. None of us expect you to be up to playing, we do know you've been released from hospital just over a week ago. So do not worry, my friend, we've come to see how you are doing and we are not at all disappointed,' he added.
With this Sai was reassured enough to start enjoying the tea Joshu had made and the vanilla cake the gentlemen had brought. As he listened to his three visitors talk about music and tea and cake, the blind man found himself in happy and relaxing company; just the thing to make a long convalescence bearable.
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When Sai next awoke, he almost shot up from his seat on the couch. Didn't he have visitors? Had he fallen asleep on them? Sai was mortified at the idea; the height of rudeness.
'I'm sorry, I fell asleep,' he excused himself to the room. A room that was oddly quiet. The blind man heard no movement. Not even breathing could be heard. So, empty than; the visitors had left. Sai suddenly felt sad, and a bit frightened; what if he'd scared them of?
Then there was a noise from the direction of the kitchen. 'Who's there?!' Sai yelped, not being used to not knowing who was in his house.
Footsteps, socks of wood, and then, 'Oh, Fujiwara-san, you're awake. Good. I made soup, do you want a bowl?' Joshu said.
'Uh, yes,' Sai found himself stuttering after his nose had caught a whiff of delicious smelling /miso/ soup; obviously not from one of Sai's instant soup packages. As serving noises emanated from the kitchen Sai sat down properly and tried rubbing the sleep out of his eyes; boy, he was beat. The thought of food sounded so good right then.
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The late lunch - it was already three o'clock - turned out to also be freshly made rice with vegetables and sliced raw fish that Sai was pretty sure - Touya had done the groceries, but Sai hadn't smelled any fish among the haul, and besides that had been two days ago - hadn't come from his shared fridge. Joshu informed the blind man that he'd brought 'some' stuff for lunch. And he reassured Sai that the gentlemen hadn't left because they had felt insulted but rather, that the three of them had decided, after Sai had fallen asleep on them, that it really was too early for a lengthy visit and that Joshu should stay behind in case Sai might need something when he'd woken up. Joshu had used the 'down time' to make soup and rice and also to turn the planned lunch supplies into a few /obento/ boxes after he'd found some empties on the dirty dishes pile.
A dirty dishes pile, oh dear! Sai shuddered to think what the kitchen looked like with Hikaru in charge of it for the last few weeks. He knew Touya would have done a better job, but the poor boy was already doing so many other chores, including basically managing Sai's transport schedule to and throw from work before he had lost his job. (Touya-kun had offered and it had made Ogata very happy to; knowing when Sai needed a ride in advance. It had improved their game scheduling too; up until before Sai's hospital stay they had been able to combine Sai's getting picked up from work, dinner and full evenings of Go quite successfully.)
But Joshu verbally waved Sai's apologies away and confided in him that he was the eldest of a family of nine kids - all boys except the youngest - and that he had been in charge of kitchens his whole life. And besides he liked making /obento/s.
They talked a little while longer and then Joshu insisted on clearing up and after a hearty farewell the nice man left Sai alone with his thoughts. Yes, it had been a good day. And it wasn't quite over yet, because the boys would be back by 7 o'clock, they'd said. So Sai decided this time to lie down on the couch for another nap.
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The weeks flew by with Sai busy getting his strength back and receiving visits from friends of all kinds. Even Kawai stopped by for coffee one afternoon when a fare had brought him into Sai's neighborhood around break time. Like most guests the cabby made his own drink, Touya-kun having set up the kitchen so things were very easy to find for visitors; apparently he'd had done very thorough job - too thorough in Hikaru's loud opinion - with the /hiragana**/ label gun. Hikaru complained bitterly that the kitchen now looked like a kindergarten!
After having been discharged from the hospital Sai had been surprised at how relaxed he felt about his dependent situation. Somehow the world was different, kinder, after his - as he later found out - near death experience. He remembered nothing from winking out at the flat where the paramedics had helped him to waking up to Mrs. Touya, but somehow something had clicked in his life and he felt the happier for it.
Maybe life was just looking better after having nearly died, or something. Sai decided not to investigate the effect more closely than that. And anyway, something of unexpected importance happened just a month after he'd come home.
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It started with a phone call from Mr. Yashida; could the gentlemen - and Mr. Joshu - come over the next day? That would be a Wednesday in March, and since everybody was off doing Go stuff, Sai was free to receive the welcome visitors. And so the 'date' was set and that Tuesday afternoon Sai put in an extra hour of flute practice - first scales on the silver flute and then a mini (unasked for) concert for the boys on his favorite flue, the /fue/ - so he could feel ready to impress his music friends. Life was really fine sometimes!
Wednesday mid-morning saw the company of three arrive on 10:30 on the dot. Pleasantries were exchanged, tea was made and served with delicious gift cookies - by Joshu as usual - and then Mr. Fukurou spoke at length. And Sai had trouble following what he said, because the man using a lot of terms Sai didn't know like 'recording contract', 'music industry', 'royalties' and 'world wide distribution'. It really didn't help that most of these words originated from a language called 'English' which the blind man was totally unfamiliar with.
Then Mr. Yashida interrupted his friend - a thing that never had occurred before in all the time Sai had know the two - by saying, 'Fukurou-san, I don't think Fujiwara-kun is grasping any of what you just said.' Sai was glad of the interruption, because he was getting more confused by the second, and confusion always made him feel small and helpless, and surely he had had enough of that!
But Mr. Fukurou and Mr. Yashida had always been kind to him and they were so again that day as they explained in detail what Sai apparently had missed realizing had been going on all those visits he had made to the 'music room'.
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'It's a recording contract for four CDs of traditional Japanese music,' Ogata said after a long silence after Sai had handed the man the papers the gentlemen had left with him that afternoon. Ogata had been the first person that popped into Sai's head to consult on, what had understood to be, a matter of money and law.
'This is, uh, this is amazing,' Ogata said after another silence. 'They are offering you real money here,' Ogata's voice sounded awed.
/Why wouldn't their money be real?/ Sai thought, and then he said it too.
What followed was a rather incomprehensible explanation that Sai, after some questions, distilled down to meaning that it was unusual to pay an untried new-comer like Sai such an amount of money. At first Sai felt flattered by the gentlemen's offer. And then it sunk in; he could make money, 'real money' as Ogata put it, with his music. And then Sai sat still while the world spun around him 180 degrees yet again. And then he had Ogata explain exactly how these kind of earnings worked, which the man did for a full hour until Sai felt he had understood how it worked.
Simply put, if he went to 'music room' and played his flue - any one of them he could play well - his paying would be recorded and a collection of these recordings would go on a CD. The CD would be multiplied and these copies would be sold in stores in Japan and the rest of the world - oh my! - from which money would come in and end up at Yamatogoto Inc., Mr. Yashida and Mr. Fukurou's company. From there Sai would be paid a (large) single sum after he's made the original recording and a smaller sum that would come from the total sales of each and every CD. So it would be good for Sai to record a lot and great if he could make it sound so good, a lot of people would buy his CD. And if after he had made those 4 CD, a lot of CDs had been sold, there could be another contact, which would mean more money.
It sounded like a dream, and for a moment Sai wanted to pinch himself just to check that it wasn't. But Ogata had said that while a lot depended on Sai's hard work when making the recordings, outside factors could influence the process; traditional music could suddenly go out of fashion. Sai listened very closely to each word his friends said and took to heart that nothing was certain. He promised himself that the money earned - that wasn't spent on rent and food and on donations to the homeless shelter and the Library - would be saved for a rainy day.
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Of course life goes on and so it did for Sai. And sometimes things went well and sometimes they didn't. But through it all Sai had great friends to rely on, who would support him when things went badly and who would cheer him on when things went well. And Sai realized that, despite a few minor flaws, he was having a wonderful life.
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Do stick around for Epilogue #2!
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Notes:
* obento = Japanese prepared lunch.
** hiragana = Japan's simplest script; even a 4 year old can read it.
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