She was a terrible person for even considering it.
"Mom, big sis is taking up the whole tub!"
"I'm sorry. I guess that we just got too big to share. I'll be done soon and then you can have the whole bathtub to yourself."
She was a terrible wife, terrible mother, and terrible woman for even considering it.
"I don't want to be all by myself I just want you to take up less room in the tub."
"I'm trying my best, Sho, I really am. I can't help it if I got bigger."
What kind of a mother would ever even begin to consider it?
"Your toys keep floating over to my side."
"Sorry, they just go where the water goes"
She couldn't go through with it…but she had to. She had no choice.
"We should cut the tub in half. That way you can have half a bath and I have half a bath."
"But if we cut the tub in half then water will just end up going everywhere."
There was no other way. She couldn't…this was not the place for her…for the children. This was not the place.
"That's true…."
"Here, maybe this will help."
Sho. She had to think about Sho. He was becoming…she did not like the person he was becoming. Fighting with his sister….fighting her…even fighting at school now. She did not want that for her son. To be that sort of person. He used to be such a gently boy….and now he was fighting with anyone and everyone…and it was all her fault. It was her fault for…for raising him the way she had. For having him with who she had…
"But now I'm cold."
"Sorry. Here's I'll stop."
She loved her son. She loved her son more than anything else in the whole world. She would kill or die for him…and if she would be willing to kill or die for him then she also should have been willing to leave for him. There was no other way. This house…this was not the place for her son. For her children. She had two children.
"Shigeko, stop that." Said Masami finally. The water had been parted like the red sea. They really were getting to be too big to bathe together. It had been easier when they had been toddlers…everything had been easier when they had been toddlers. They were elementary schoolers now. Sho would be going into the first grade next year and Shigeko the second grade. Grade schoolers. She had grade schoolers and soon she would have middles schoolers and then high schoolers and then she would blink and they'd be graduated from university with their own homes and lives and they'd be full adults…their own people. They would be their own people…and the people who they became would be as direct result of what she did, here, and now to raise them. They would be what she made them into.
She could see the adults that they were becoming.
And she didn't like it.
"Sorry mom." Said Shigeko. She said it in the same way that her husband apologized…in that way that said that she was in no way sorry. She knew how Masami felt about her powers. She knew…and she did it anyway. She thought she could do whatever she wanted to…and of course she did. Touichirou would have let her get away with murder if she could. Sho, in tears, had told her the truth of what happened in the junk room.
The things Shigeko had said.
Sho had said some mean things, too, but he acted as a child did. He did not deliver a cold and logical speech about how it was in his best interests to surrender who he was to his father's will for basic self-preservation. No child should ever have had to do that…or to think like that. No child should have had to live like that…afraid of their own father…and Sho was afraid. Shigeko wasn't but she had always been daddy's little girl.
"Don't do it again, Shigeko" said Masami. She loved her daughter. She loved Shigeko…but she did not like the person that Shigeko had become. She used to be so sweet back when she had been small…but she had gotten older. She got more and more like Touichirou with every passing day and Masami, at this point, would not have been surprised if Shigeko had been his secret daughter by some mistress in some far off land…
But she wasn't.
Her name had been Kageyama Shigeko. She had been born on May 25th at some hospital in Seasoning City to a woman named Hana and a man named Ichimaro. She was not Touichirou's child even if she did look and act exactly like him. She was herself…she had become this person all on her own…she had become this person because Masami had allowed her to become this person. This smaller version of the man she had married…this person…this cold, pragmatic, person….
"I won't mom. I know that you don't like it when I use my powers." Said Shigeko. Masami said nothing, just poured some shampoo over her daughter's head and began to lather it up. Shigeko was her daughter. She had raised her as her daughter…but in some ways she was more Touichirou's daughter than hers. Even though Touichirou knew nothing at all of raising children. Even though he had spent less than a year, cumulatively, with his own children she was more his daughter than hers.
They would have been happy together.
She could not control Shigeko. Even now she couldn't control Shigeko. She sang 'I'm sorry', she always sang 'I'm sorry', and then she went right back to doing whatever it was that she had been doing. She was like her father in that way….they deserved each other. They would do well together...and Masami was no kind of mother for even beginning to think the thoughts that had been running through her mind. No kind of mother at all…
Shigeko was better off with her father.
Shigeko was uncontrollable. She was a prodigy. Touichirou had been singing her praises since before he had even brought her home. She was more powerful than most adults and would only get stronger the older she got. She lost control, or so she said, all the time…and the only person who could stop her was Touichirou. Shigeko…she would never have left her father. She was such a daddy's girl…she was just about the only person in this family that Touichirou actually enjoyed spending time with. They were up late almost every night even though Shigeko knew that she had school in the morning. She sang 'I'm sorry' every morning when she practically fell asleep in her cereal but she wasn't, not really, because she just went and did it all again the very next night…and Touichirou encouraged her. He saw no value in her education. All he cared about were her powers.
Shigeko was better off with her father.
It was the only way.
Masami…it was like Sophie's Choice, almost, but this was Japan and nobody would have to die. She was just…she had to choose which one of her children to save and which one to…there was no choice. She would save the one who could be saved. Sho….he had been acting so aggressively lately…and that had been her fault. There was hope for him yet, though, and that was why he would be the one she…she took with her. It would be both easy and hard.
Leaving.
Taking Sho with her.
Leaving Shigeko.
In a perfect world she would have been able to take both of the children with her. In a perfect world she would have been able to just divorce her husband in the usual way and not have to spirit her son off in the middle of the night…or day…whichever was easier. In a perfect world she would not have had to divorce her husband at all. In a perfect world he would have been a warm and loving man who treated her and the children well and…and…didn't put her in danger….and hadn't ruined their daughter and…
And this was not a perfect world.
This was the world that they lived in. This was the real world and it was not perfect, far from it, and hard choices had to be made. Fukuda said…he said a lot of things. Some things he could not take back…some things she did not want him to take back…and some things that could never be taken back….and that was…it was what it was. It was what it was and she was who she was and this was…this was her life. This was her life and it didn't have to be her life. Not forever. She had gotten herself into this…
And she could get herself out.
It would be hard. Apparently her husband frequently had her followed….and she…she was not ok with that. She wished that she could have said that it had been the last straw, the sending people to stalk her…but every single time she thought that they had reached the last straw he went ahead and got another box out of the pantry. She had no idea what he even thought that she could be doing that she needed to be followed. What? Did he think that she was cheating on him?
Fukuda said that he was just paranoid about her safety.
Fukuda said that if Touichirou suspected a thing then he would have been dead. He would have been killed…by her husband….and Masami got the feeling that Fukuda had not been exaggerating….which was even more of a reason to leave….even though it might have even been dangerous to do so. She had to leave. She could not spend another day in this…this…this prison…and she could not let her children…her child…her son….grow up in this place.
She was a terrible mother.
She was…she had no idea how she had become…this. Her life had moved by so quickly. Who would have thought that seven years of her life could have just blow by like…like they were nothing. Forty. She was almost forty now. She was forty and she had let this happen to her. Let her life become this. When she had first gotten married…when she had been pregnant with Sho…there had been a world of promise laid out in front of her. Now there was only…only this. This person she had become. The people she had let her children become. The person…the person that she had let her daughter become. The person that she was letting her son become…
She would never let Sho become…become…his father.
She already had two Touichirou's to deal with.
"Mom? Mom? Hey, mom?" asked Sho
"Yes?" asked Masami. She took her hands off of Shigeko's head. She was more lather than girl at that point. It would have been a good photo-op if she had just smiled or frowned or…or something. But no, even when she had been small she had been pretty non-emotive….just like her father.
"Can we get a bigger bathtub so me and big sis can still have baths together but still have room?" asked Sho. Masami smiled and dipped her hands in the water before patting Sho on the head. Shigeko's shampoo smelled like citrus, lemons to be specific, and Sho hated citrus. He might have even been allergic to it. When they were gone she'd take him to a doctor and see if he was allergic or just picky. When they were out of this...this place….
"Yes, if you want. We can get a bathtub as big as a swimming pool." Said Masami. They wouldn't be able to live anywhere nearly as palatial as this. They would…she had no idea where they would live. She had money…well she could syphon some off…and then they'd have to find a place to live…and she hadn't worked in so long…and going to her parents' house was out of the question…
She had to get out.
She had no idea what she would do, then, when she left…but she knew that she would figure it out. Leave the city, leave the prefecture, leave the country….she didn't know where she would go or what she would do but she knew that this was something that she had to do and should have done years ago. She had…it would be hard…but it was something that had to be done.
For the children.
Both of them.
They were debating, now, at which point an artificial indoor body of water stopped being a bathtub and started being a pool. Sho said that a bathtub could never be a pool because there could be hot water in it. Shigeko said that once an artificial indoor body of water became big enough to do dive in it become a pool. They were still so cute….Sho and Shigeko. She may not have been very animated, she looked bored as always, but she was still cute…and seven. She was only seven and she was so much like her father….but there was still time for her. There was time for her but….but Masami…she couldn't give her what she needed. Shigeko was…she wasn't like Sho. Sho had inherited very little from his father besides looks. He would…he could do some of the things that his father could do but as Touichirou had said many times Sho was nowhere near his sister's level…
She was a terrible mother for even considering it.
"Sho? Shigeko?" asked Masami softly. They were still debating. Sho was winning by virtue of shouting the loudest. Shigeko was letting him win by virtue of being incapable of raising her voice just like her father. Touichirou had never once shouted in the entire seven years she had known him. Not even at the television. She was so much like him…and so much like…like herself. Touichirou was incapable of debating anything with anyone. He either conceded that they could agree to disagree or just shut down. She had asked him about that ages ago and all he could say for himself was that he knew that he was right. If he knew that he was right then he didn't need other people to tell him that he was right. He always thought that he was right.
"Mom, can you settle this?" asked Sho
"You can win if you want, Sho, I don't like it when we fight." Said Shigeko. Masami fought herself not to hear Touichirou saying that. She was…she was and she was not Touichirou. She was her daughter and…and…and Masami just did not know.
"It stops being a bathtub when you stop bathing in it." Said Masami finding some words. She grabbed the measuring cup she kept in the tub and poured bathwater over Shigeko's head. She had so much hair…and she focused on Shigeko's hair. She focused on how black it was, how long it was, and how it did not spike up ever. Not even when it was wet. How it was black, the blackest shade of black there was. How it was long. How it could grow long without breaking off.
How Shigeko was not her father.
She was her own person.
She was…she was….she was a lot of things.
"So I won. It'll never be a pool because you're supposed to take baths in it. You can't take a bath in a pool because of the chemicals that make it smell weird." Said Sho
"You win." Said Shigeko
"I know that I won." Said Sho
"I'm agreeing with you." Said Shigeko. Masami couldn't listen to this anymore. She dumped a handful of conditioner into Shigeko's hair….and it wasn't Shigeko's conditioner. It was hers. She had accidentally dumped a handful of nineteen hundred yen conditioner on her seven year old daughter's head. Now her hair would be way too greasy. Masami's hair was dry. Shigeko made a lot of oil for a seven year old. She…would she be able to wash her own hair? When Masami was gone…if she couldn't take her with…would Shigeko be able to wash, shampoo, and condition her own hair? Would she….would she be ok? Not that Shigeko would be on her own…Masami…was there even a way to take Shigeko with? Touichirou cared about Shigeko. She was his pride and joy. She was the only person he even tolerated. She was…she was his daughter…
Masami didn't know how to feel about her own child.
About the child she had raised.
"Sho? Shigeko…? Listen. This is just a question but if you…you had to choose between your father and I…who would you chose?" asked Masami. She was interrupting another one of their debates. Now they were debating whether or not hot tubs could count as bathtubs. Shigeko said no because you couldn't wash your hair in them but Sho said yes because you could wash your hair in them if they were in your house and there were no other people around.
She would miss this.
"You." Said Sho immediately. There was no thought there, none at all…and it was so…Masami did not have words for this feeling. This good feeling. This good feeling that she had when her son chose her without question…and of course he would. His own father wouldn't even call him by name.
"Do you mean forever?" asked Shigeko. What was there for her daughter to think about? Her father never even called her by her name! He only spent time with her on his terms! He was the most selfish man to ever exist and-
"Forever. I think she means forever. Like if the house exploded or something or there was another dimension or something where we only had either mom or dad." Said Sho
"Oh. Dad then." Said Shigeko. There was no thought there, none. She had just gone straight to her father…who father who never called her by name. Maybe she didn't like her name. She was always calling herself 'Mob' after all. Maybe she liked being called 'daughter' all the time. Maybe she liked being ignored until her father felt like interacting with her. Maybe she liked being up all night with her father even though she knew she had to get up early for school. Maybe she liked…
She liked Touichirou better.
They were two of a kind after all.
"Because then you get mom and I get dad. Then it'll be even and things should always be even." Said Shigeko. Masami nodded. She nodded again and again until she felt like that bird the kids had that looked like it was drinking water. She wiped her eyes with the back of her hand and nodded.
"Mom…are you ok?" asked Shigeko. Like she cared. Like she actually cared about…about anything….like she was anything other than her father's daughter….
"Fine. I'm fine. Just a little tired….Shigeko, rinse your hair. Both of…play until you get bored and then dry off and get into your pajamas. I need…Mommy needs…..Mommy needs to rest now." Said Masami. She couldn't stay in that room any longer. She needed space.
Space from her own daughter.