Programmed Lives - First Stage
Chapter Five
Ryosuke drove the short distance between his hometown Takasaki and Gunma's capital Maebashi feeling very worried about his younger brother. It was the first time since the time when Keisuke had left his biker days behind that he had spent the night out of the house without Ryosuke knowing where he was.
He hoped that Keisuke had stayed out of trouble. He was well aware that in the sort of state his younger brother was, anything could have made him pick up a fight. He also knew that if Keisuke started fighting again, he could easily revolve to his old ways. It hadn't been easy to get him back onto the right track the first time around, and Ryosuke had had Keisuke's full trust back then. This time, Ryosuke knew that it would be much harder. Pushing this thought to the back of his mind, he focused on the conversation he had ahead of him.
Akiko had been surprisingly bold, not only she had come forward by calling him, but she had also taken the initiative of looking for his number and calling him without her father knowing anything about it.
Considering his father's latest lecture, Ryosuke had had to re-examine the entire plan. So, he no longer could be the one breaking off the engagement, for his father would be absolutely furious with him. This didn't mean that Akiko couldn't do the same.
Albeit his behaviour with his daughter had been pretty strange, Ryosuke knew how powerful a daughter's pull with her father could be. He had witnessed many times the not-so-subtle ways in which Tsugumi always managed to get her father to do exactly what she wanted.
He was certain that Akiko could easily do the same thing with hers.
Sure, if she did so, not marrying her meant that his father's hospital wouldn't get the license it so desperately needed. But there were two facts that consoled Ryosuke: one, it wouldn't be his fault, for it would be Akiko who would have broken off the engagement. Two, Ryosuke would figure out a way to get the license by other, much less complicated means.
Yes. This was a much better plan. He just needed to convince her to talk herself out of this engagement with her father and, the way things looked like the previous night, Ryosuke knew that it wouldn't take much convincing for her to do so.
With this new-found confidence, Ryosuke parked his car at the Café Uno's customers' car park and, getting out of it, went inside the coffee shop.
Akiko wasn't there yet but, again, Ryosuke had arrived there with over ten minutes to spare then, and since the coffee shop was a smoke-free area, Ryosuke went back outside to have a cigarette.
A few minutes later, and when Ryosuke was about to re-enter the coffee shop, he saw a truly beautiful blue-coloured sports car entering the customers' car park.
To his immense surprise, the owner of the car was none other than Akiko herself. She appeared to have spotted him for, as she shut the car's door, she rose her hand to greet him then, and without being fully conscious of actually doing it, he found himself walking towards her.
'Is this your car?' Ryosuke said, completely skipping any formal pleasantries.
'No, I've actually stolen it,' she replied laughing softly, however and seeing Ryosuke look rather perplexed, she quickly added, 'yes, it's mine, sorry, sometimes I forget that you probably don't understand English humour.'
Ryosuke looked down at her and then did something that startled her: he chuckled too.
'No, it was funny. I just found it surprising you'd have a car like this. The 10AE is a pretty rare sight, you know it's a limited edition, don't you?'
'Yes, I do. Mazda has only made five hundred of them for the Japanese market,' she replied, then she asked, 'do you like Mazda cars?'
Ryosuke laughed softly once more, before pointing at the white FC parked nearby.
'Do you see that car over there?'
'Sure, that's an FC3S, if I'm not mistaken,' she replied.
'Correct and that is my car,' Ryosuke said smiling.
'Well, that's a rare sight too. Especially one in such good condition,' she commented looking at the car with her eyes full of genuine admiration. This made Ryosuke feel strangely proud about his car. He didn't really know why, but he was pleased she liked his car.
'So you weren't lying then,' he said.
'Pardon me?' she asked, her smile quickly fading away.
'When you said you liked cars,' he explained, 'you weren't lying when you said you liked cars and, by the looks of it, you seem to have an excellent taste too…'
Her smile returning to her face almost as quickly as it had disappeared, she said:
'Yes. My passion for rallying and cars in general is just one more of my silly forms of retaliation against my father. Pathetic, isn't it?'
Ryosuke didn't know what to say to this, so he simply said:
'Let's go inside so we can talk, okay?'
'Okay,' she replied.
Looking at her from behind, Ryosuke said he liked her much better out of that dark grey formal dress she had been wearing the previous night. With a pretty light blue skirt and a white short sleeved blouse, she looked much more relaxed, more herself, Ryosuke decided. Also she wasn't wearing the severe looking black high heeled shoes but she had favoured a pair of white ballerinas that made her look much younger than her actual age.
They were shown into a table for two by a waitress who, for some reason, had mistaken them for a pair of lovers and couldn't stop smiling at them, making both feel rather uncomfortable.
'The first thing I have to ask you is that you don't tell my father about this meeting,' she started once they were settled at the table with two coffees in front of them.
'Sure but, why is that?' Ryosuke asked.
'Let's just say that he would go ballistic if he found out about what I'm going to ask you,' she explained.
'And what is that?'
'I clearly see that you want to marry me even less than I want to marry you. What I'd need you to do is to talk to your father so we can both break this engagement off and carry on living our lives as they've been up to now.'
Ryosuke stared at her finding himself unable to speak for a few long, painful instants.
'Why don't you talk to your father?' Ryosuke finally was able to ask.
She snorted rather loudly, startling Ryosuke in the process.
'Sorry but, I don't know if you've realised this tiny detail about my relationship with my father, but he tries his utmost to speak to me as little as possible and he never listens to me. Ever.'
'W-Why?' Ryosuke asked worriedly. His whole plan was dissolving as quickly as the sugar inside his coffee.
'Oh, that's pretty simple. I was born the wrong gender, you see,' she explained keeping her tone of voice light even though Ryosuke could detect the bitterness she was trying to hide with her feigned nonchalance.
Seeing he didn't speak, she carried on:
'This whole marriage thing is just his latest punishment because, silly me, I thought that I could try to live my life freely.'
'What do you mean?' Ryosuke asked.
'Well, every time I try to do something of my own accord, my father does something to punish me. You really don't want to get in my father's bad side. Trust me.'
'Care to give me an example?' Ryosuke asked, more out of worry than curiosity. After all, the man was to become his boss and he needed as much information about him as possible.
'There have been three times in my life when I tried to do something my father didn't quite approve. Once, when I was a kid, I tried to get him to send me to a public elementary school here in Japan so I could be with what was my best friend back then. Instead he sent me to a private boarding school in England. Then there's my current best friend. My father doesn't approve of this friendship so, in order to stop us from seeing each other, he managed to get my best friend transferred from the English office to the Australian one. We still keep in touch and that is what has brought me to this situation.'
Ryosuke was shocked, of all things he really didn't expect this. He had not been so taken by surprise since the day when Takumi had beaten Keisuke in that first, historical race in Mt Akina.
'How is that?' he managed to ask.
'Well, my best friend works for Oxfam, you know, a charity organisation based in Oxford, England. You already know I studied my first three years of medicine there. Well, the thing is, Oxfam has an ongoing programme in several African countries and, well, I thought that, since my father clearly wouldn't be leaving the clinics to me, being a girl and all, I would have the freedom to choose where I would work, once I become doctor, that is. Well, the idea was to volunteer in one of these countries. Organisations like Oxfam and Medicines sans Frontieres are truly desperate for doctors to go and work with them. I know it sounds silly, but it's been my dream ever since I decided I would become a doctor.'
'It doesn't sound silly. It's rather admirable that you'd think of giving up the money for such a cause,' Ryosuke said feeling so sorry for Akiko that he almost forgot about what this meant for him.
'After what had happened with my best friend, I tried to run this idea through my father, stupidly thinking that he wouldn't really mind as long as I stayed out of his way. I couldn't be any more wrong though, I then found out that, apparently, he had an entirely different plan for me.'
Ryosuke noticed that, at this point, Akiko seemed to be on the verge of crying. Something within him, probably the protective instinct he felt towards his younger brother, his own cousin and, even towards Takumi and the rest of the Project D members kicked in and it made him take Akiko's hand in his own.
She looked at him stunned. Then, the pain in her eyes cleared away, to give way to the strength and determination he had seen in her before. She also removed her hand from his grasp and said:
'I don't want you to pity me. Don't get it wrong, I'm not the classic poor-rich-girl story, believe me.'
He believed her.
'Okay, so, talking to your father is out of the question but, what about your mother?' Ryosuke asked.
The pain, with even more intensity than before, came back to her eyes.
'My mother died when I was five. Just before I got sent to England,' she answered.
'Ah. I'm sorry to hear that,' he said wanting to kick himself for saying something so meaningless.
'It was a long time ago. I barely remember her,' she explained, almost looking as though as she was trying to make him feel less stupid.
'What happened?' he couldn't help himself but ask.
'Car crash. Something related to the brakes of the car: they stopped working while going downhill and she went down a cliff. The rescue team spent several hours just get to where the car was but, unfortunately, there wasn't anything that could be done for her nor the baby.'
'Baby?' Ryosuke asked startled.
'She was six months pregnant when it happened,' she replied, this time not being able to keep the pain out of her voice.
'Wow. I'm so sorry,' he said, realising that he had once again said something completely pointless.
'The worst part is that she was carrying a baby boy, talk of irony, huh?' she said her eyes shinning and looking dangerously close to burst into tears.
This time Ryosuke decided to remain silent for he thought that anything he said would be definitely out of place then, he saw her shake her head almost as though as she was trying to get rid of those troubling memories.
'So, do you think you can speak to your father?' she said.
Ryosuke considered his answer briefly. It was rather clear to him that she couldn't do anything to prevent this whole thing so, it was all down to him.
'I'm not sure I can do anything either but I'll try my best,' he finally said, something within him realising that he had just made a promise that, unless a miracle happened, there was no hope in hell he could keep.
'Thank you Ryosuke-san. I'll appreciate anything you can do,' she said and, finishing her coffee, she got up and said, 'I must leave now, my father thinks I'm at the library so, I better go.'
'Sure, we'll keep in touch, alright?'
'Okay. Again, thank you for meeting me, let me at least offer you this,' Akiko said and, not waiting for his reply, she grabbed her purse, left a few coins on the table and walked away from him and out of the shop.
Ryosuke observed her going back to her car, climbing into it and, with a swift manoeuvre, leaving the car park. Things had just got a lot more complicated once again, making Ryosuke think that when it came to things getting bad, there was no limit for how bad they could actually get.
And he still had to speak to his brother.
To be continued…
