The tension inside Hotel California, meanwhile, could be cut with a knife.

The record ran out into silence and the bartender didn't bother to turn it over.

Akutaro and Akujiro, while thrilled to see their boss in the flesh, were still quite uncertain what to make of seeing him alive. After all, they had been there at the scene of the crime and seen his dead body with the knife still in it, basting in his own blood like a pierced lava cake.

The phantom Tetsuya must have been equally shocked that he had somehow recalled his deceased father into existence, while Kasanoda was simply trying his best not to move—or do anything that might provoke Mr Sendou into using the pistol that was currently pointed at his head.

The mob boss himself was dressed in the last thing anyone had seen him in, dead or alive: his business slacks from the office that day, the garish tie and the sleeves of his shirt rolled up to his elbows, the apron he used in the kitchen over that. On anyone else, it might have made him appear to have a sensitive side. On Mr Sendou, it not only put a punctuation mark on his seriousness, it also said very clearly that this was a man who did not mind getting a little blood on himself.

"So, Tetsuya," he growled in a voice low with decades of whiskey and cigarettes, "you gonna give me one good reason why I shouldn't take this little prick out right here and now?"

Akutaro and Akujiro's eyes lit up at once with terror and joy. "Are you fucking serious?"

"You would do that, Boss?"

That shook Tetsuya out of his stare. "Right, you wish. This is obviously just a bluff to get me groveling or some stupid shit. It's probably not even real."

In response, Mr Sendou flicked the pistol's aim a couple inches down and to the right, and pulled the trigger. It went off with a loud bang, leaving a smoking hole in the tiled floor. Three of the others jumped instinctively. Tetsuya's jaw fell a little slack.

Kasanoda began to sweat when the piece was pointed back at him. "Um, Tetsuya, I don't think he's bluffing. Now might be a nice time to give him that reason!"

"Don't kill 'im, Dad! He never did anything to you."

"Is that right, now?"

"That's your reason?"

"Bullshit," Akujiro said over him and the boss. "Kasanoda was the one who killed the Boss in cold blood!"

"For the last time, I was never there!" Kasanoda said, gun or not.

"We saw the evidence at the scene," Akutaro backed his brother up.

"What? Waka's umbrella?" Tetsuya shook his head. "I forgot all about that stupid thing. . . . It was only there because I left it when I got the hell out of there."

"You mean, when Kasanoda made you flee the scene, don't you?"

"No, I mean when I fled the scene, all by myself!" Tetsuya snapped at them. "He had nothing to do with it because he was never there with me! What part of that can't you assholes get through your heads? I brought Waka's umbrella with me when I went home, and I left it there when I ran away, because I was the one who killed him!"

That managed to shut the yakuza brothers up, and in the ensuing silence Tetsuya's words rang unusually harsh. For several moments, he continued to stare Mr Sendou down. But as soon as his gaze wavered at all and found the young master's, the defiant resolve in it was quick to fade.

"I'm sorry, Waka," he said in a much smaller voice. "I should never have gotten you mixed up in my business."

Mr Sendou's mouth curved into a cruel smile.

"Wait a second," Akutaro began. "Botchan . . . You killed the Boss?"

"But it wasn't my fault," Tetsuya started to say to them, but something stopped him. He amended: "Well, okay, what I mean is, it was an accident. I never meant to kill him. It was never my intent when I decided to go back home that night to do anything of the sort, but . . . I guess it was my fault, when it comes down to it. It was because of me that he died."

—

"Oh, I can feel his wrath from beyond the grave, like millions of unshed tears weighing on my shoulders!" Ayamakoji moaned and bent exaggeratedly under her jug. "How heavy it is—heavy with the guilt of this young man's crimes! Of his sins! It boils and singes the flesh, oh! He is calling to me, the father, saying this was no mere accident!"

"And you would know all about accidents," Ringo grumbled.

"What did I just get done telling you a minute ago? Ohh! You're treading on thin ice, Ringo, I'm warning you!"

"What are you gonna do, Sempai? Put that bucket down and whoop my little butt? As if! Practice your Hamlet or kabuki or whichever on your own time, why don't you, and let him tell his story already!"

"Um, thanks. I guess," Tetsuya muttered as the two women turned their attention back to him, one of them all but steaming at the ears.

He continued:

"Well, like I said, I don't even really know why I went home that night. It was stupid of me now that I look back on it. But I guess somehow I'd gotten it into my head that it was time to ask Dad to disown me once and for all. It's not like I was worried about my inheritance or anything. What was I going to inherit anyway? The Sendou group?

"Maybe there was a time when I would have been fine with that—when I would have just accepted it as my destiny—but I'd changed since I started living at the Kasanoda compound. I wasn't just some punk son of a mob boss anymore. Being around Waka and serving him had changed all that. It made me a better person. Well, I thought it could make me a better person. I guess in the end we can't escape what's just in our nature, huh?

"So I went home that night, and I told the old man I didn't wanna be a Sendou anymore. I didn't feel like one already, and I didn't want to even think that he could up and die one day and I would suddenly be the new Boss—that I'd have to tear myself away from everything I'd come to appreciate about my life with Waka and the guys, and on top of that become their number one rival. I just wanted to leave all that behind me for good."

It came back to him as if it were yesterday as he said the words—the cold hardness of the kitchen floor under his knees and the heels of this hands, under his forehead as he begged to be released from his family name and all the duties that came with it. The realization that the Sendou Tetsuya of just a little over a year ago would never have allowed himself to suffer this sort of humiliation; and that the Sendou Tetsuya of the present not only did so willfully, but with pride in the person he had become, despite the shame he was causing his own father.

Pride in the person the young master had begun to make of him just by being himself.

"I found Dad in the kitchen, making himself dinner. He used to say cooking was one of the best ways to burn off stress, so I guess I figured it would be as good a time as any to let him know what all was on my mind. Catch him while he's most relaxed, you know? At least, that was what I thought.

"As if just seeing my face weren't enough stress for him as it was. I'd hardly spoken a word to him since I left home the first time, after that huge argument we'd had when he actually had threatened to disown me. But back then I had been too reckless, he'd said, and if I wasn't careful I'd get myself killed or wind up some lifer in prison. Either way, I wasn't the kind of son he wanted carrying on his name and his business. But a few days on the street being cold and wet 'cause I was too proud to go back and apologize—not to mention how utterly hopeless it felt to be hungry and completely ignored by everyone who walked by—being invisible like that, getting a first-hand taste of how worthless you are, well, it has a way of clearing your head. And, to make a long story short, when Waka took me in without even knowing or caring what my family name was, and believed in me without even knowing what I'd done with myself, I knew right then I had to change.

"And I did. I completely turned myself around. And, so, I thought Dad would be proud of me for it. I was no longer the kind of person he would be embarrassed to call his son. I had made an honest person of myself—a person who knew the value of hard work and could appreciate kindness when it was shown to him. I owed Waka more than just a debt of gratitude. I owed him my life, 'cause he'd saved mine in every way possible.

"The only catch was, in becoming the kind of person my father could be proud of, I realized I wanted nothing more to do with the Sendou group and, consequently, nothing to do with him."

He should have known.

He should have known his father wasn't the kind of guy who would be happy for his son's happiness. Not when it meant forsaking his own family, anyway—and for the son of his rival, no less. He should have known that his father would see it as no less than a betrayal when he said those words: "I want to cease being a Sendou so I can spend the rest of my life in service to Kasanoda Ritsu."

His father slammed the sushi knife down so hard the edge embedded itself in the wooden cutting board. The force rattled everything on the counter, and that had a way of rattling Tetsuya as well. An involuntary shiver ran through him, and it took every effort to keep his eyes resolutely down. Part of him said his father just wanted to intimidate him into changing his mind. He couldn't allow that to happen. He'd come too far, and believed in what he had to say too much to back down now.

It seemed like forever before his father sighed and grumbled, "What are you trying to do to me, Tetsuya? Is this about money again? Or is it just your idea of payback for last time? Because you'll ruin your old man with talk like that."

"With all due respect, sir, I'm not doing this because of you. I'm not trying to ruin you, or anything like that. For once, this is something I'm doing for myself."

"For once? For once?" His father laughed. "As if you've ever done anything for me. Or your poor mother. That's a new one. . . . You've been nothing but a leech all your life, and you think now that you've found someone to save you from all your troubles, that automatically makes you different?"

"It's not as simple as that. I work hard—"

"You're still a selfish, spoiled brat! I should know: I made you that way. The only difference now is, you don't even have the good sense anymore to be so because you're a Sendou. So you think you can leave all this behind for Kasanoda's hellspawn, do you, just forget all your responsibilities here like they never existed? It doesn't matter to me if you've found Jesus or whatever else bullshit that boy has rotted your brain with. The fact that you think you can cease to be a Sendou just because you want to—that you think you can come in here and order me to disown my own son—that's the most selfish thing you've thought up yet."

Tetsuya bit the inside of his cheek so hard in keeping quiet, he thought he tasted blood.

The sound of the rain pouring down on the roof and the gravel outside took over in their silence. His cellphone and the umbrella he had borrowed from the young master lay on the floor by the door where he'd left them, leaving him feeling as naked and defenseless as if he'd laid aside his sword and shield. Tetsuya's hands curled anxiously into fists. After a moment, his father slapped a piece of meat onto the cutting board, pried the knife free, and began slicing it in his usual calm and measured technique. Then Tetsuya judged it safe to look up.

"I won't be coming back home," he said.

"Good, 'cause you're not welcome here."

"I'm not fucking aroun—"

Tetsuya clenched his fists tighter, as if that would keep him from faltering.

"I mean it. I'm not coming back. Ever again. Whether you disown me or not, this is it. That's all I came here to tell you. If you ever need me for anything . . . Well, you won't find me here, you can bet on that. I'm through with you, and I'm through with your business."

There. He'd said it. Even if his heart was beating double-time because of it, and the deep breath he took shook. The words were out, and he would never have to take them back or swallow them ever again. He didn't care if he went through the rest of his life nameless, but he was through being a Sendou.

The knife stilled in his father's hand, and he looked up. Funny how it felt as though he could read Tetsuya's very thoughts with that look and at the same time manage to be so oblivious to them.

"I'm going to spend the rest of my life on this earth serving Kasanoda's son, and there's nothing you can do that's going to stop me or make me change my mind. You'd be doing both of us a favor, Dad, if you just made it official."

The slicing of pork slowly and steadily resumed.

"That would be convenient for you, wouldn't it? Cut the shit, Tetsuya. What's my rival paying you for the loyalty of Sendou's son?"

"He's not paying me anything. Not like you think. This isn't extortion. I'm doing this for Wa—"

Tetsuya stopped himself just in time.

"For Ritsu," he revised. "Plain and simple. He's nothing like any of these thugs you've got working for you. Sure, he might seem a little frightening on the outside, but he's really selfless and kind when you get to know him, and—well, I know it's probably hard to believe coming from me, but he makes me want to be somebody else. Somebody good."

For whatever reason, it felt like a part of him was being sliced up on that board.

"I love him."

He said it so quietly, and Sendou never missed a beat with the knife that for a little while Tetsuya was sure his father hadn't heard the last part. If he had, it might have meant trouble for Tetsuya like he couldn't imagine, so what on earth had possessed him to say it?

The simple fact that it was the truth? That it had been clawing at his insides like something struggling to get out for longer than he could say? Wasn't that reason enough?

"Come here."

Tetsuya's heart skipped a beat, but he kept his gaze down and didn't move.

"I said, come 'ere, boy. You listening to me?"

His father had put the knife down and had come around to the other side of the island counter, his hands on his hips. Maybe he only wanted to make what he had to say clearer, but something about his manner nonetheless gave Tetsuya serious misgivings—something about his father that made him look like a butcher. "I'd rather not, sir."

"It wasn't a suggestion. Get your ass over here!"

He rose to obey, telling himself that whatever his father said to him, he had right on his side. He had made his decision for the right reasons, and he wasn't going to allow himself to be intimidated into backing down, not even by his own father.

He was about to tell the man off when Sendou grabbed his wrist and jerked it forward. "Hey!" Tetsuya cried. It threw him off balance, and it smarted, but it wasn't the first time his father had raised a hand against him. It was just the first time in some ten years, and a part of him had thought he'd grown out of it.

"You know what my old man would have done to me if I told him the kind of shit I've just heard coming out of your mouth?" Sendou growled. "First he'd give me a beating like you've never seen, and then, just to make sure I didn't forget the lesson, he'd give me a little something to remember it by."

Tetsuya's gaze went to the sushi knife on the counter, then to his own hand, splayed in his father's grip. He wished then he could tuck his fingers in like the sea anemones he had teased as a kid.

But maybe he lacked that same sense of self-preservation, because it didn't stop him from opening his big mouth.

"What is this, the Edo period? This isn't a fucking movie, Dad. Quit joking around!"

"This isn't a joke!"

And Tetsuya knew he was telling the truth. He had seen enough fingers missing tips over the years as the Sendou boss's son. He tried to imagine how it would feel to lose one himself, and he couldn't do it. He couldn't picture his father doing that to his own flesh and blood, no matter how they'd gotten along—or hadn't—in the past.

Sendou grabbed the sushi knife in his other hand, and Tetsuya flinched, before he noticed it was being pointed at his face.

"You think you're such a badass," his father said, "so proud of yourself with that Band-Aid you wear around, but you don't have the first idea what real pain is. How'd you like a real scar, boy, one you can't just cover up or show off like a friggin' trophy? Huh? Something to remind you what a disgrace you've made of yourself and your family every time you look in the mirror—let everyone who sets eyes on you know what an ungrateful little bastard you really are—"

"You wouldn't— Not to your own son—"

"My son? You have the balls to talk to me about being my son after what you've put me through? Weren't you the one who came crawling back here begging to be disowned? When I was your age, and a young man did what you did, he'd at least have the sense to do the honorable thing and cut his stomach! But not today. No, nowadays it's all cowards and nancy boys who talk back to their fathers, running off after their family's enemies like some stupid schoolgirl—"

"Maybe it's you who oughtta cut his stomach then, if I turned out to be such a failure to you! 'Cause it must have been something you did wrong, right, something bad in the genes I got from you to make me turn out this way! I certainly didn't get that from Mom—"

Tetsuya hardly had a chance to finish. The breath was forced out of him as his father grabbed the collar of his jacket hard.

"How dare you talk to me that way. Get your head out of the fucking clouds, Tetsuya! You have no idea—"

"No, you have no idea! This is my life, and you can't stop me from doing what I know is right—"

"The hell I can't! You're still a Sendou as long as I have anything to do with it, and I am through sitting on my hands while our reputation is marred by some asinine infatuation of yours—"

"What're you gonna do about it, huh? Let go of me! I'm sick and tired of trying to make you understand. I'm out of here—"

"Over my dead body, you are!"

While they yelled over one another like so, Tetsuya struggled to free himself of his father's grip, just as Sendou was struggling to get his point across, whether doing so took the form of a fresh scar on his son's face or not. All Tetsuya knew for certain was that the sushi knife clutched tight in his old man's grip was too close for comfort while their emotions were that charged, and he had to get it out of the way before either of them could begin to reason with each other like adults.

After a few tense moments, he managed to twist it free, and was just about to throw it down on the counter where it couldn't do any harm when . . . something happened. He wasn't even sure how it happened, only that all of a sudden his father's angry words cut off and Tetsuya looked down to see the knife's blade embedded in him.

With himself left holding the handle.

Both were too stunned to do anything at first, as if someone had hit the pause button on reality. When it finally did sink in for Tetsuya, he let go of the handle like it had burned him. It was self-defense, was the thought that sprang to mind. An accident. He wasn't responsible. He couldn't be responsible for this.

But as he stared first at the blood on his hands, and then into his father's bulging eyes, Tetsuya knew what a lie that was.

"Tet . . . tsu—" his father managed to gasp before collapsing.

His weakened grip found no purchase on the kitchen counter and he crumpled to the floor, where he lay choking for breath.

Tetsuya found it difficult to breathe himself. This wasn't happening, he told himself with every hammer of his heart. But the longer he stared at his father's prone form, the more aware he became of the quiet house around him, the pouring rain outside, the blood on his hands and cold inevitability of the situation closing down around him. . . .

He bolted for the door.

—

Tetsuya trailed off in the telling of his story, and the lounge fell silent. All eyes remained fixed on him.

He sheepishly found his father's among them. "And then I ran off. There wasn't anything I could do except stand there and watch him die—"

"All you could think about was your own ass at a time like that—"

"No, Dad, I wasn't thinking about what was going to happen to me. All that was going through my mind was, Oh my god, what have I done? I've killed my own father with my selfishness."

"And yet you did nothing to help me."

"What could I have done? Really. I don't know the first thing about first aid, and anyway, anyone could see it would all be over in a matter of minutes."

But how long those few minutes must have been. And it was a lie when Tetsuya said he hadn't spared any thought for himself. Maybe there wasn't anything he could have done to change the outcome, but that did not excuse the fact that he hadn't tried. As soon as he'd realized what he'd done—as soon as he'd seen the handle of that knife protruding from his father's torso and seen the blood smeared on his own hands—he had backed away in horror of what he'd become.

A murderer, worse even than the father he had wanted so badly to renounce, and all because he had the audacity to think he could just run away and leave who he had been behind. Wasn't that what they called irony?

"Alright, so I was wrong and a coward for doing nothing, but what does any of that matter now? It's not like we can go back in time. I already tried that, and all I did was get myself stuck and killed in the Edo period."

Tetsuya shook his head.

"The fact is, I'm more sorry than I could ever say. Of course, if I could, I'd undo everything in a heartbeat. You know I would. I should have known better than to think I could change what I am and always have been. You live by the sword, you die by the sword, right? And it was stupid of me to think something like love could overcome who you were born to be, no matter how pure or strong a force you think it is. The fact of the matter is, love can't change shit."

"Wait," Kasanoda said, forgetting the gun for a second. "When you said you loved me, you meant, like, platonic, right?"

Tetsuya blushed. "Well, not entirely."

"What, you mean, um, physically?"

"Well, not to put too fine a point on it or anything, but, yeah. As it turns out, I appear to be queer for you— But do we really need to get into details in front of all these guys? My dad's listening, for god's sake. I mean, so what if I am just a fake Tetsuya, it's still embarrassing."

Kasanoda could only stare at him as he found himself—for once in his life—the object of someone else's confession. Well, if this strange, round-about sort of admission counted as a confession. His best friend, the young man who had been sweeping his walk and clearing his dishes every morning and evening, turned out to be in love with him; and while something told him his first reaction should have been to be a little creeped out, all he could manage to feel was an overwhelming sense of loss.

He took a step forward. "Tetsuya—"

Sendou's grip on the pistol tightened, stopping him in his tracks.

"So the truth comes out. Thank you, Tetsuya. That's all the reason I need to put this punk out of both of our misery."

Tetsuya blinked. "But, Dad, it wasn't his fault. He never asked me to feel this way."

Kasanoda wanted to nod vigorously, but having a gun trained on oneself tends to quell such urges.

"Of course, it's his fault. He must have done something to you to make you feel so unnaturally you'd want to betray your own family for him in the first place. He's responsible because he exists. But fortunately that's a problem I can rectify right now—"

"No, don't!"

Forget kid gloves, Tetsuya left the bar stool and stepped forward to confront his father face to face. "We're both figments of his imagination," he said. "You kill him now and you and me both disappear, just like that. Forever this time. And I really doubt either of those jerkoffs are gonna spare a single brain cell to bring you back."

He didn't need to point or even tilt his head in their direction. Akutaro and Akujiro exchanged glances and tried to look invisible.

Sendou narrowed his eyes at his son. "And in order to protect this scumbag's life, you would deny your father's spirit the justice you know he deserves."

"I was pushed to my own death by the very person I left you for." Tetsuya shrugged. "I'd say you got your revenge."

His eyes met Kasanoda's. But whatever blame or resentment the young master might have thought he'd find in them was absent. Just the same devotion and admiration he had seen that day Tetsuya came to school to bring him his umbrella, and wound up telling him he wanted to devote the rest of his life to serving Kasanoda.

"What is this sweet aroma? I can only think of one thing so heavenly, so perfect, so . . . Yes. But could it really be? Could I have finally found what I've been searching for?"

Over at the other end of the bar, the old man whom the two travelers had encountered so frequently on their journey was speaking as one who has stumbled into a fabulous dream—or spotted a glimmering oasis after forty years of wandering in his own personal desert and found it not to be a mirage. An empty Memboroshi glass sat by his elbow, and his cheeks had the rosy glow of a teenager, nor was it difficult to see why.

An elegant woman in kimono with long, shimmering hair pulled into a bun had joined the bartender behind the counter. She placed a few plates of old-fashioned home cooking before the old man, but it was the steaming bowl of soup that drew all of his attention.

That was, until he gazed up into her face.

"Now I see," he said. "All this time, I was so busy looking under every stone and eave for that magical combination of ingredients that would produce the perfect bowl of soup, I must have forgotten the only one that truly mattered. It's not the stock or the spices or how long you boil it, but the love that goes into it. That is what makes it perfect."

"Whatever happened to your pride, Tetsuya?" Sendou asked his son. "Your self-respect? You don't mean to tell me you don't want this son of a bitch to suffer for ending your life."

"How could I? Like I said, I owed him my life. I know he never meant to hurt me. If anything, I'm angry at myself for not being more grateful for what I did have, because now I'll never again have even the simple satisfaction of welcoming him home from school."

Ever so reluctantly, Sendou lowered his pistol, a momentary surrender.

The phantom Tetsuya turned back to Kasanoda.

"I'm sorry, Waka. I know you never planned to go to Ise alone, and that you only agreed to go with me because I promised you nothing bad would happen, but as you can probably tell by now I'm not real good at keeping promises. Not when they really matter, anyway."

"You knew all along you were dead?"

For a second, Tetsuya could only blink. Then he chuckled. "That's what you're worried about? Yeah. I mean, I didn't know at first, but I figured it out. I guess it came back to me."

"That was probably my fault," Kasanoda thought out loud. If this Tetsuya were just a figment of his imagination, then he probably couldn't hide his thoughts from him as well as he'd thought.

He grabbed his friend by the sleeve, just to feel his arm beneath it and know he was still there, even if he was just a phantom and a facsimile. He already seemed a little too soft-focus. "Tetsuya. I don't know what to do. If I stop drinking those drinks, you'll disappear."

"Then don't drink any more."

"What?" Kasanoda and Sendou said at the same time.

Tetsuya ignored the latter. "Don't drink any more, I said. Just let me go. Won't do you any good to have my ghost hanging over your shoulder everywhere you go anyway."

"But I don't want to keep going without you."

That struck Tetsuya dumb for a moment, and even Kasanoda was surprised by the words that had come out of his mouth. Which didn't make them any less true. After all they'd been through on the road to Ise, just the thought of reaching the Shrine without Tetsuya, let alone returning to his own time without Tetsuya, was . . . unimaginable to say the least. Maybe it was selfish of him, but that was the real injustice in his mind.

But what else could he do? Stay here asleep for the rest of his life? What was done was done, and he was the one who had gone and done it.

"Waka," the phantom Tetsuya muttered, "you know I'm not real."

"I know."

"Then let me go. If you have to keep me, then keep me where I belong—as a memory in your heart—and keep on living the way you've been living. Be that kind-hearted young man I fell for all those months ago. Okay? You owe me that much. Don't let it all've been in vain just because of one stupid little accident. Trust me on that."

Kasanoda blushed. "You sound like such a sap."

"Spoiled brat," Tetsuya teased back, punching his arm.

"I'm going to miss you. I mean that."

Tetsuya wanted to say the same, but could only trust himself to nod in response. He cleared his throat, and turned back to his father. "Satisfied?"

"No, but I guess it'll have to do." Sendou tucked his piece back inside the waistband of his trousers at the small of his back. "I suppose I can console myself that the prick will have to carry the guilt of my son's death around for the rest of his life."

"Dad—"

"What? I think that's about right, don't you?"

It was, but neither Kasanoda nor Tetsuya thought he had to put it so bluntly.

Something in his expression softened a bit, though, when he said: "I really was proud of you, though, Tetsuya. For making something better of yourself and sticking to your guns. And I would never have hurt you. I just want you to know that. Even if I don't agree with you, and still can't forgive you for everything else. You understand."

He shot Kasanoda such a look that the young man had no doubt Sendou still blamed him every bit as much as before.

"I guess that's fair," Tetsuya said.

"But as much as I wish I could hate you for killing me—much as I tell myself you deserve nothing less—somehow I find it impossible. Must be because you're my son, no matter how much you wish you weren't."

Tetsuya managed a weak, lopsided smile at that. The man's expression was as hard and unforgiving as ever, but that small admission was as close to warmth as Tetsuya might ever have hoped to receive from his father. As minuscule a victory as it was, it was a victory nonetheless.

Sendou's outline began to flicker first. Then a strange burst of clarity occurred to Kasanoda, and the two phantoms vanished in a literal blink of the eye.