No more hopes for the Tobita Club to enjoy a Hawaiian escapade. Too bad Kouya won't reach his dream place anymore, for the time being maybe.
I lay the groceries by the top of the counter table before I wiped the sweat off my right brow. Just to comfort everyone from the sadness of losing --- and also to berate them for doing well --- I decided to cook a nice dinner for us all. Oh, and did I mention that I also want to talk to Kouya about his problems right after that hearty meal? I didn't? Oh well, now you know. I wonder what's been happening on our club lately. They are slowly drifting apart... away from each other. I also sometimes feel like it's my fault for them to be having that kind of camaraderie. I've told this anxiety to Jirou before but all he suggested me was to get out of their way, for he knew very well that they can handle it among themselves, just like the way they used to during gear fights. Talk about such great amount of hope! I really admire them...I'm really proud to be one of them.
Phew. My worries began to melt away just now upon recalling that. Tobita club boys... they're now men.
I headed immediately to Jin's room to check him out upon seeng that the place was already cleaned up. I just want to thank him for at least taking some time to do something helpful out of his depression. Tobita club boys... they indeed have grown up, what can I say?
I guess he's already asleep, probably he got too tired from cleaning. I've knocked on his door for five times already but he doesn't answer. Oh well, I'd better go on my way...
Oh.
He may have cleaned up the living and dining room, but there's one room he didn't dare to clean... or even to enter into.
Kuroudo's room.
I admit it must be really painful from him to accept the fact that he already left us.
I stared at the blank walls and the fully-opened closets now robbed of clothes to store. I set my sights on the neatly-fixed bed; he indeed is a neat man. He had fixed everything back to how it was before we got here. It's been only two days but this room seemed to have collected soot and dust of two years' abandonment. I walked around, trying to visualize what things were there on each drawer and in front of the dresser while he was still here. I sat on his bed gently, careful not to disarrange the sheets he had arranged for everyone's convenience for the last time. Indeed, we miss the guy. I stretched my legs to the bottom right side of the table beside his bed when I heard my feet hit a hollow part. It surely wasn't the wood... it's something else, so I'd better check it out. To my surprise, I discovered one item he accidentally left.
It was a shoe box. No, but it's a black leather box. Lacking in design but still stylish, it has a gold buckle easily getting my attention. It still looked new, so I decided I'd keep it for any future use. I just thought of cleaning it up from any articles inside, but that decision is what I call a big mistake.
With eyes flung open, I took out a pile of scented envelopes torn at one side and papers carelessly strewn inside the container. I caught a glimpse of the date on one of the letters. May 12, 2011. No wonder, the paper's already turning yellow on all four sides. I gulped the lump forming on my throat as I settled down to read out of my curiosity.
May 12, 2011
Papa,
I miss you so. It's been exactly three months after my eleventh birthday, but you didn't even come home. You promised Mama, remember? You promised me that we'll go around Tokyo for one whole day. Papa, I miss you. I hope you and Mama will be together soon. I love you.
Your son,
Jean
Straining to know more, I picked up another randomly and read it:
February 15, 2011
Papa,
I'm still expecting that you would come. Mama misses you so. But you know what? I remember during my birthday party... was it you who called? I remember seeing her cry after she put down the phone. I asked her why but she kept on saying none. Papa, I've decided that from that day on, I won't make Mama cry again because it hurts me, too...
It's because I love her, and I love you too.
Jean
"He's such an adorable boy..." I said to myself as I rummaged more in the box. I saw the bunch of envelopes bundled together by a thick blue string. They were sent with an interval of one month after each and I also noticed the stamp "Return to sender. Invalid address." deeply scarring the thin envelopes... and soon I also felt that it also had scarred his heart deeply.
Here goes another letter dated a year later:
March 19, 2012
Dad,
You didn't come and berate me for graduating. You even can't afford to call. You've been like that many times that I can't remember how many, so many times that I now even can't remember how your face looks like. I'm planning to send this letter to you, but good grief! We don't know where in France you are now. I've come across my letters when I was a year or two younger, and they were always letters of hopes --- hopes for your return --- shattered. Imagine, you've been distant for almost four years now. I read my letters, and they all contain sweetness. I read my letters and they all contain I love you's. Now, I am afraid that there'll come a time when I'll read this letter three more years later and I won't feel sweetness anymore and the word love will be replaced with a four-letter word of its exact contradictory meaning...
Please, don't let that time come.
Jean
I came to search more, my mind thirsty for what really happened between him, his mother and his father. I soon found out that there's a second latch, a second layer of container in the box... a second secret to be revealed. I lifted the latch and no sooner my eyes grew wider in pure shock.
I picked the black book with trembling hands. I have confirmed my fears of wrecking someone else's privacy: This is Kuroudo's well-kept journal. I was about to leave it alone and unharmed when I just felt my hands snatch it and open it to a random page...
... and the opened page supplied me with the rough background of his family relationship, probably because the page was opened often...
... no. The page was bookmarked with a thin piece of glossy paper. A picture. I carefully lifted it up, and to my horror it was a picture of him, his mother, and his father... only then his father's face was heavily-inked with a permanent marker, so heavy I can't discern his features anymore. Soon, I also found other family pictures with his father's image either cut off, washed away with marker, or burned.
He was like, erasing him from his life... forgetting his name, his face, and even the fact that he is his own father.
That disturbing thought lingering in my mind, I went on and read his entry.
It was a lengthy poem, about ten to eleven stanzas long. I decided I'll save it for later reading, so I browsed on some more pages. I had my eyes focused on the dates on the upper left hand corner. I came to admire his handwriting in this book. His entries were written with fountain pen, and though I know it's messy writing with that kind of pen, he still managed to maintain his writing cursive, finely-inked, correctly slanted... very dainty and understandable. He didn't commit any mistakes on any of his entries, I have observed by now. As I've said before, he's truly an organized guy. It's also pure English, and I admire his writing style. It was like as if he'll publish this as an autobiographical... wait, what's this? He wrote an entry just before he left for Paris. Maybe it contains last words or something, so I made up my mind and took time to read.
3:32 A.M
May 27, 2015
To keep his dream of sharing music to people alive, my dad left us for an adventure on his home land. Because of this dream, he had neglected his own family just so he could focus more on this so-called "valuable vision". For the sake of mom's dream and also his, he decided to let go of her. For the sake of my dreams, he invited me to join him out there, on a land unknown to me... out there on a land they call Paris.
As for me, in keeping my own dream alive, I have learned to let go of many things and people I love. I decided to quit Crush Gear, I decided to leave Tobita Club and all those wonderful memories I have had there... I decided to leave my best friend. I decided to make him angry at me so he won't feel the pain of losing a person he had loved well that much, and it's the exact hard thing I never learned upon letting go of my dad, of my love for my mom, of my love for my friends... of my love for Crush Gear.
For for seven years straight, I've been disappointed by him for leaving us two behind. For almost four years straight I've been furious because I've thought of him as a selfish family man only caring for the things he wanted to get, to achieve, and to pursue. He was irresponsible in my eyes when I was just so-called a kid. For many years I've been in favor of my mom, but I've never known that she also had what I have been calling a "selfish mission" ... a selfish dream.
Yesterday afternoon before going home, I dropped by our house here in Osaka, the house she usually leaves open because she's usually staying here once or twice a week or so. She promised me that she would be there so she could watch me gearfight, but guess what I saw? My mom wasn't there; she left me just like my dad did. She left the whole house closed and the front gate heavily locked, and this only hinted that she won't be back there for quite some time. Indeed, Dad had been very kind.
She had found her "mass media" dream and she's already about to catch it, but what about me? Have I found my dream? I have one, but how will I pursue it?
Upon thinking these thoughts, I suddenly felt shamed of hating my father for more than three years. I understand it... finally, I get it.
This will be my last entry in this black book, the book the had contained all my hatred and loathing to my father. I'd leave it all behind, because I have seen everything in a fresh point of view. And come to think of it, I never felt any more relieved than before. Things seemed to have fallen into their right places already...
And as if it's for the first time, I've finally become proud having Hideaki Jacques Marume, a great violinist and composer, as my dad.
Wiping a falling tear, I heard myself mutter, "Im glad you did, Kuroudo. I am simply glad you finally did." With that stated, I followed the bookmark to read his poem before I cook.