Once she knew what to look out for it was surprisingly easy to tell when she was being followed.
"Mom? Why are we walking this way? We never walk this way. Why are we walking this way?" asked Sho
"This isn't the way to the library." Said Shigeko
"We've been taking the same route for years. Aren't you two bored of seeing the same old scenery?" asked Masami. It was hot. It was dreadfully hot. The kind of hot that made her hair stick to her head and her face red and puffy. Sho's too. Shigeko didn't seem to be feeling the heat. She said that Touichirou was teaching her not to feel the elements…among other things. She was bored. She always looked bored. Even when they were walking through the heat bubble that was this city on the hottest day of high summer she just looked bored.
But she walked along with them.
Which was more than her father had chosen to do.
"I guess….but it's so hot! Why does it have to be so hot?!" said Sho. He tried to pull his hand free from hers. She had to hold his hand because this was a new route. Shigeko could hold onto her other hand if she chose to. She just didn't choose to.
"It's not so hot." Said Shigeko
"It is too so hot! It's so hot that my skin is melting and my shoes are melting and we're all going to melt to death." Said Sho
"People don't melt, Sho, they burn. Like the time with the bacon grease? And mom got that big blister? Or all the sunburns you get? People blister and burn in the heat." Said Shigeko
"So then we'll blister and burn to death, big sis, and there's nothing that we can do about it. I don't know why it has to be so hot out today!" said Sho
"Because it's high summer, Sho. Don't worry, once this passes it'll start turning into fall." Said Masami. She didn't want to be walking down this street on this day any more than he did but she had a reason, a good reason, to drag her children around like this.
Three steps. Stop.
Three steps. Stop.
Five quick steps. Stop.
Five quick steps. Stop.
She was being followed. She could hear the footsteps that dogged hers. Someone needed to give these idiots some stalking lessons. When you were tailing someone you weren't supposed to follow them step for step. Usually when you knew someone was following you they were trying to intimidate you. This was not one of those times. Touichirou didn't want her to know what she was being followed. These guys may have been terrible at tailing her but they were persistent. It had taken her all day, before, to shake these guys and by then it was so late that she had to head home. She had managed to get what she needed done, though.
Cash.
Jewelry.
Burner phone.
She'd have to leave quickly…when she did leave. When the day came. She didn't know when that day would be…before school started up again. It would be easier on the kids. It would be easier if they weren't just ripped out of their classroom and taken...taken to wherever it was that she was going to go. She didn't know yet. She was still financing her escape. Thank God that Touichirou never asked her where the money went. She could have been burning it for warmth and he wouldn't have noticed a thing. He never noticed anything.
"….because the sun is too close right now. That's how summer works." Said Sho. Masami was fading in and out of their conversation. She was still trying to see if she could lose them. She was followed at every turn. The streets here were so winding….even when they rushed across the street or cut through a store they had been followed.
How?
"Sho…that's not how it works. Right now Japan, the part of the Earth that Japan is on, is pointed towards the sun. That's because the Earth isn't straight up and down. Dad told me." Said Shigeko. Masami walked a little faster. The children kept up. It was so hot….but she kept on going. She needed to figure out the best way to lose these guys. She had managed to do it before…but she hadn't had two children in two.
"Mom?" asked Sho. Masami slowed down. She could see it, behind her, the car. There had been a car that…that had been following them. A black car…how clichéd could Touichirou get? That car…and the people on foot…maybe the people on foot were just a distraction. Maybe…maybe everyone was following her…and now she was getting paranoid. Now she was getting paranoid and it was all Touichirou's fault.
"Hey, mom?" asked Sho again. She felt a tug at her skirt. She watched the car park down the road. She made a note of the license plate number. She couldn't see inside, tinted windows, but she assumed that there were some men in black types inside or something. Or some Yakuza. Or something.
She could slip away on her own but…but not with the kids…
"Mom!" shouted Sho. Masami reached down and patted Sho on the head. She pretended that she was looking at something on her phone. She needed….she moved too slowly when she had the kids…but she had to take the kids.
"Sho, mom doesn't want to talk right now. I can tell because dad does the same thing when he doesn't want to talk." Said Shigeko. She had the kids. They could keep apace but they also had trouble disappearing. All it had taken was a hat and a change of clothes to lose those guys before. She couldn't disguise the children. They'd ask questions, first of all, and second of all what was she supposed to do about Sho's very distinctive and noticeable red hair? At least Shigeko, after a haircut and a change of clothes, could look just like every other seven year old girl in Japan.
"Mom always wants to talk. Dad never wants to talk. They even each other out like that." Said Sho. Masami pretended to scroll through her phone. She wished that she had a car….no, that would have made her even more conspicuous. She had no idea how…how she was supposed to run away with two children….
"Dad wants to talk. He just always wants to talk about things that he cares about. Like he was telling me about this show about a train that goes through space, the manga we found in the Treasure Room, and then he told me about another show about a car and-" said Shigeko. Masami worked through the logistics. Shigeko was easier to hide but Sho…Sho needed her more. Shigeko didn't even want to come with, probably, she had chosen her father after all. She had made her choice and that was it…but she couldn't just leave her Daughter alone with her father…could she? Could she just…she loved Shigeko but…Masami's Choice. Like Sophie's Choice but with less World War 2 and in Japanese. Coming to a theatre near you. She didn't….she couldn't chose. If she chose she knew who she would chose and if she made that choice then she knew that she would have been a terrible mother.
"That stuff's boring." Said Sho
"No, it's not. Dad likes some interesting stuff. I mean even kendo can be interesting when you watch enough of it really late at night. You should stay up late with me and dad, Sho, we do want you around. Well I want you around. I love you a lot, little brother." Said Shigeko
"Dad only likes boring stuff…and that's why he likes you…I'm sorry. I'm sorry I said that. I don't know why I said that. Sometimes I just say stuff, I guess, and I don't know why….I just know that I'm sorry." Said Sho. She had given birth to Sho. She had carried Sho inside of her for nine months and then she had been sliced open like a fish and had her organs moved around so that they could rip him out of her. She had the scar to prove it. Ok, it wasn't as bad as it seemed in her mind but she did have the scar to prove it. Shigeko….one day Touichirou had rolled over in the middle of the night and told her that they were adopting an orphan.
And then he came home with Shigeko.
He had asked, of course, if she was ok with that. He had asked in that way of his that wasn't really asking at all. He had asked in that way that told her that his mind had been made up. She hadn't had a problem with Shigeko's adoption, on the contrary, she had been so happy to open her home and life up to Shigeko. Shigeko may not have come from her body but she had raised her….she was Shigeko's mother…and she wished that she was Shigeko's wicked step mother instead. She wished that she had no attachment at all to Shigeko. That she could be one to those terrible women who could raise children for years and then just cast them aside. Who could have looked at Shigeko and thought that just because she had not carried her, had not birthed her, that she was somehow less than her blood child.
She did not want to leave her daughter.
She did not want to leave her son.
But she did want to leave her husband. She had…she had never lost, totally, her feelings for him but she knew that she had to get away. She wasn't…her husband was the sort of man who would send people to tail her….because he didn't trust her. He didn't trust her, he was right not to, so he had her followed. She had cheated on him, had no plans to do it again, but she had cheated on him…and now he had her followed…and this was in addition to all of the other shady stuff that he was involved in. The things that put her in danger.
She had a real reason, now.
She didn't know who she was justifying herself to. She didn't know who it was that she was arguing with. She had cheated, she was in love with another man, and that should have been reason enough. Her husband was incapable of real love, that was another very good reason. She had someone who was capable of real love…but she wasn't running away to be with him. She couldn't. That would be the first place that Touichirou would go looking for her. Not to mention what would happen to Fukuda…not that she knew what it was that her husband did with people who betrayed him, Fukuda refused to give her nay details, but she knew that it was bad.
She had to get away.
"Sho, Shigeko, come on." Said Masami. She couldn't shake these guys, it was hot, and the book bag was heavy. She'd try again later. She'd try…she would try again later. She was…she was going to have to take the both of them…or at least Sho. Shigeko….Shigeko needed her father and Sho…Sho needed her. The whole thing was more even that way. Shigeko herself had been the one to say it. Things were meant to be equal….
"Mom…Sho thinks that we're lost." Said Shigeko. Masami reached down and patted her on the head. She wasn't a bad kid and there might have even been hope for her. Maybe she could come back from this person she had become. She had been the sweetest little girl a mother could ask for. She had been…she had been a good daughter…she was a good daughter. She was…she was her daughter.
Shigeko is, was, and always would be her daughter.
But she had a son to think about. She had herself to think about. She…she had…she had some hard choices to make. Some very hard choices.
"Oh, we're not lost! I was just taking a more…scenic…route, that's all. Now come on, before all the good books are gone!" said Masami. She plastered a smile she did not feel onto her face. She took both of her children's hands. She set off down the road.
With footsteps tailing her the whole way.