Chapter Twenty Four – The End of Summer
Shizuku sat quietly in her room, at her desk. She stared at the damp grey autumn day, the damp grey autumn sky. Most of the leaves had been blown from the trees now and today still the wind blew. She glanced to her right where the Baron and Luisa dolls stood in the corner. She reached out and straightened the hem of Luisa's skirt where a book had creased it. She thought about what had happened since the funeral.
"School started. September came and went, the leaves began to fall early. We had such rain. Luisa and Anna-Marie stayed with Seiji's parents. It was funny, Luisa insisted they pay Dr. Amasawa for their board and lodging while they were there. Of course Seiji's father was quite put out by this but Luisa got her way. There is amazing strength in the old lady, I don't know where it comes from. With school keeping us busy things almost became normal again. Almost. The pain became easier to bear for me but Seiji never did get over the death of his grandpa, something in him changed for good. A light went out. Of course grandpa was such a huge part of his life, the violin making and an escape from the hell of his fathers presence. All that was now lost and Seiji still struggles to deal with that. I missed the old man's company, I missed going to his shop at weekends and cooking meals for him. But most of all I missed just sitting by his fire and listening to him talk. He could talk for hours, long into the night of anything and everything."
"Except for the afternoon of the funeral I never went to Seiji's house – he would meet me in town or he'd come to my parents apartment. At weekends I would meet Anna-Marie and Luisa at the station. Anna would go shopping and I would show Luisa the town I know, not the shops but the hilly streets up toward the library, the school, the playing fields, up on top of Iroha-Zaka where the views are. I'd push that wheelchair for hours and we'd sit and just look at the view, not talking much. Seiji told me he had a long talk with his father. He never goes into details about such things but I think his father is now making plans to appoint a director of the electronics company. Does Seiji still hate him? He won't talk about it. Luisa did say something strange to me before she left. She mentioned something about Seiji's father in such an odd way, as if she herself had talked with him about Seiji. But what does she know of the situation? Only what we talked about at her brothers house. I don't know what she could have said that might have affected his dad's decision."
"Luisa and Anna-Marie returned to Cremona, we're going to visit them next summer. Something wonderful happened with the Earth Shop though. As grandpa's last surviving child the shop became Mrs. Amasawa's property. The antiques were sold off, sadly they had to be, and the place cleared out. But she decided not to sell it. It was redecorated and refurbished and now she is renting it out. Seiji told me that she has promised it to him, when he's older, she will transfer it to his name. But will he be here? Will either of us be here?"
"Then in October the letter arrived. Seiji cycled round at once and showed it to me. Signore Guarnieri had written. He told him that of all the students on the summer course, Seiji was by far the most outstanding. He had been especially impressed by the work Seiji had done in the last week, the week following the evening he hired the suit to go to the music recital at the Museo Stradivariano. Signore Guarnieri wrote that something must have really inspired him that night. Therefore he would accept him as his full time pupil, an apprenticeship that would last ten years. He understood that Seiji needed to complete his high school education, and that he might want to attend university, but when he was ready, however long that was, the apprenticeship post would be waiting. After the ten years if all goes well, Seiji would be entitled to establish his own workshop in the city and officially state that he is a maker of violins in the most renowned musical city in the world. At the end of the letter there was something odd, in fact reading it was the strangest moment for me of that whole strange summer. The signore mentioned that he had not seen hands working like Seiji's did for many years, not since he had sat as a boy and watched his own father make violins. And that settled it, Seiji told his father that once he had finished high school he would emigrate to Italy."
"A year ago Seiji asked me to marry him. It was a silly childish thing, and I gave a silly childish answer. Yesterday however he asked me again. This time he wasn't being silly. And when I answered him, neither was I. The Baron and Luisa stand on my desk and even though the love between grandpa and his sweetheart is over I sometimes sit in my room, the hairs on the back of my neck stand up and I can feel their love pouring out of those dolls and washing over me. Sometimes it's so strong I can't breathe. I've decided that I can never bear being parted from the one I love. I will never leave Seiji, no journey halfway round the world is going to separate us. Before the war a flowing tide forced grandpa Nishi to leave Europe and come to Japan. Luisa was left behind and they never met again. Now the tide is ebbing and with it, Seiji is leaving Japan to go to Europe. I won't be left behind, I couldn't bear it. I'm going to marry him and emigrate with him. And I will take the Baron and Luisa with me. I'm going to go to Germany and find the place they were born. Then the circle will be complete."
Shizuku sat for a moment, not thinking, not worrying about anything. What would happen would happen and she would face it. And with her would be a person she could face anything with. Each of them need never be alone, they would always have each other. As she calmly sat, he got up from her bed where he'd been reading and stood behind her. He placed his hands on her shoulders. She lifted one hand and placed it over one of his. She gave him one of her special squeezes. He tilted his head forward and placed his lips on the top of her head and kissed her hair.
The End.
MS-C
4th – 25th October 2006 (original screenplay/script)
24th November – 7th December 2006 (this narrative version)