Programmed Lives – Fifth Stage

Chapter Five

Kyosuke stared at Seisuke for what seemed like an eternity before he saw his younger brother react.

'Where are you going?' he asked seeing Seisuke turning round towards the door.

'I'm going to speak to Mum and Dad,' Seisuke replied and, without waiting for Kyosuke, he walked out of his room leaving the older brother with no other option than to follow him.

'What's wrong?' Kizuna asked, seeing Kyosuke dashing through the corridor.

'I'm not sure,' Kyosuke replied without slowing down forcing Kizuna to walk after him as her boyfriend followed his younger brother.

The three of them found Kyosuke and Seisuke's parents in the living room watching the TV with Keisuke, Kyoko and their daughter Ryoko.

'Mum, I need to ask you something,' Seisuke started and his unusually serious tone of voice made everyone look at him.

'What's wrong sweetheart?' Akiko asked.

'Why are you taking Doxilen?' Seisuke said.

Once more, the Takahashi's living room was filled by a surreal silence making Kyosuke able to hear his own heartbeat.

'Seisuke,' Ryosuke said keeping a tone of voice as neutral as his facial expression, 'what makes you think your mother's taking Doxilen?'

'This,' Seisuke said showing the prescription to his father. The double take Ryosuke did was enough for Kyosuke to realise that something was very wrong.

'Mum,' he started, 'please tell me Seisuke's mistaken and you don't have ca…'

He couldn't even finish the sentence because his mother's horrified expression was a clear enough answer.

'Oh my god,' Kyosuke said and he had to grasp the corner of the sofa for support.

'I think we'll give you some space…' Kyoko said getting up.

'NO!' Seisuke shouted angrily, 'NO ONE MOVES UNTIL WE GET SOME ANSWERS!'

'Baby…' Akiko started as she and her husband got up too. Seisuke took a step backwards looking at his parents with an enraged expression on his otherwise handsome face. Kyosuke walked towards his younger brother and the two young men stood united facing their parents.

'Akiko…' Ryosuke said looking at his wife who, looking sicker than ever, just nodded.

'I've got cancer,' Akiko said with a voice just over a whisper.

'What?' they all heard Ryoko whimper and, looking at her, they saw that the poor eighteen year old looked utterly bewildered.

'Why didn't you tell us?' Kyosuke asked choosing to ignore his cousin.

'I…' Akiko started.

'Did you think we couldn't cope with it?' Seisuke added.

'No…'

'Then why?' Kyosuke he said with a desperate tone of voice.

Akiko looked at her two boys then at her husband and, collapsing again on the sofa, she put her hands on her face and started crying.

'Akiko,' Ryosuke whispered sitting back next to her and passing an arm around her shoulders. Both Kyosuke and Seisuke rushed towards their parents and crouched next to them.

Akiko looked up and, with her face drenched with her tears, she sobbed:

'I couldn't tell you…because I didn't want to have to face this…'

'What?' Seisuke asked his anger quickly turning into confusion.

'Boys,' Ryosuke said, 'your mother and I decided not to tell you because, for as long as you didn't know, we could pretend everything was fine.'

'I couldn't face seeing you getting this much worried,' Akiko added with her voice broken because of her crying.

'Mum, don't you think we'd get even more worried if we found out like this?' Seisuke asked and Akiko bit her lower lip to make it stop quivering.

'Holy crap,' Kyosuke said springing up so suddenly that he almost made Seisuke fall on his butt, 'you were going to let me go to the US without telling me, weren't you?'

Ryosuke and Akiko glanced at him looking horror-struck.

'This is freaking brilliant,' Kyosuke said sarcastically as he passed a hand through his bleached spikes.

'I'm sorry,' Akiko said getting up and lifting a hand to put it on top of Kyosuke's shoulder, 'I didn't want to tell you because I think this trip to the US it's a very good…'

'Mum, you can't possibly think I'll go to the US now, do you?' Kyosuke asked forcing himself to ignore Kizuna's loud gasp.

'But…'

'There's no way I'm going now,' Kyosuke continued, 'I can't go. I just can't.'

'Yes you can,' Akiko said.

'NO!' Kyosuke shouted, 'I can't leave you like this!'

'Kyosuke, this is precisely the reason why your mother and I didn't want you to know.'

'I can't believe this,' Kyosuke said shaking his head as he started pacing up and down the room.

'Kyosuke…' Kizuna said walking towards her boyfriend.

'I'm sorry but you'll have to go back home by yourself,' Kyosuke said.

'No,' Kizuna said shaking her head, 'if you stay here, I'll stay too.'

'No,' Kyosuke said, 'you've go to go, you can't miss out this chance.'

'Neither can you,' Akiko said trying to make her voice sound as firm as possible.

'Mum!' Kyosuke exclaimed, 'you don't get it, do you? If anything happened to you while I'm gone I would never be able to forgive myself.'

'Kyosuke…' Akiko started.

'Mum, I'm staying,' Kyosuke interrupted her.

'Kyosuke…' Kizuna said.

'And you're going,' Kyosuke added looking at his girlfriend, 'end of the story.'

'But Kyosuke, I…' Kizuna said beginning to sound every bit as upset as Kyosuke was.

'Shit…' Seisuke whispered as he realised that Ryoko was silently weeping looking extremely distraught.

'Honey,' Akiko said walking towards her niece and, passing an arm around her shoulders, Ryoko crushed herself onto her aunt's chest and started sobbing loudly making both Akiko and Kyoko start crying again.

The next day, just after lunch, Kyosuke drove a very reluctant Kizuna to Narita spending the whole time in complete silence.

'I'm sorry about this,' Kyosuke said as they climbed out of his RZ-1 after parking it in the airport's short stay car park.

'Are you sure you don't want me to stay?' Kizuna asked as Kyosuke took her suitcase out of the car's trunk.

'Kizuna, I've told you before, there's nothing you can do right now,' Kyosuke replied.

'But…'

'Look, as you could see last night, my family's a mess and I can't leave them like this…'

'Kyosuke, I don't think you wanted to go in the first place,' Kizuna commented.

'What? Of course I did.'

'No, you didn't. Your brother and Akito had to persuade you into accepting the offer and you know it,' Kizuna said.

'Look, talking about this is useless, my mother's got cancer and I need to stay with her now. I'm really sorry I can't come with you.'

'Alright,' Kizuna said nodding.

'Kizuna, I do love you,' Kyosuke said taking the girl's hand.

'I know, I love you too,' she replied looking very much as though as she was about to burst into tears.

'I'll be counting the days till you come back,' Kyosuke said, 'but I want you to learn as much as you can, okay?'

Kizuna nodded and then, Kyosuke hugged her briefly before pulling her apart from him just enough so he could kiss her.

Half an hour later, and after having seen his girlfriend go through the airport's security, Kyosuke walked back to his car, climbing into it and, putting his hands on the steering wheel, he leant his forehead against them.

His life had suddenly turned into a royal mess and he had just sent off the only person who could make him feel better about it all.

'I'm going to miss you so much,' Kyosuke said aloud as though as Kizuna could still hear him.

When he got back home, Kyosuke saw Akito climbing out of his V-86.

'Hey, what are you doing here?' he asked getting out of his Mazda.

'I think I should be asking that to you,' Akito replied, 'weren't you supposed to be on your way to South Carolina?'

'Yeah,' Kyosuke said, 'change of plans,' he added.

'Does this have anything to do with the fact that your cousin has called me this morning begging me to come and see her?'

'Yeah, it does,' Kyosuke replied and, as shortly as possible, he explained the whole thing to his best friend.

'Wow,' Akito gasped as they made their way into the Takahashi's home, 'I'm sorry to hear that.'

'Yeah, well, she told us she's already getting treatment,' Kyosuke explained while opening the house's front door.

'That's good,' Akito said, 'hey, I think I'm going to cancel this Saturday's race.'

'What? No, don't do that, with all of this happening and Kizuna gone, I'm going to need every distraction I can get.'

Akito just nodded and, as he and Kyosuke entered the living room, a very miserable looking Seisuke waved at him and said:

'Ryoko's in her room.'

Akito nodded again and, turning round, he made his way to his girlfriend's room, leaving the two Takahashi brothers alone in the living room.

'Hey babe,' Akito said stepping into Ryoko's room, finding her lying on top of her bed.

'Hi,' she said propping herself up on her pillows. Akito sat down next to her and took her hand.

'I'm sorry about your aunt,' he commented and Ryoko just nodded, 'come here,' he said while pulling her towards him, hugging her tightly against him.

'I don't want her to die,' Ryoko said with her voice muffled by Akito's chest.

'Shush, don't say that, she's not going to die.'

'But…'

'Hey, I know, why don't we go ice skating?' Akito proposed.

'What? You hate it!' Ryoko said looking up at her boyfriend.

'Yeah, but you laugh at me loads when I fall onto my ass,' Akito commented smiling at her.

Ryoko smiled back at him and, nodding once, she pulled herself away from him, climbed out of her bed and went to get her skates' bag.

Preparing himself for the ordeal, he followed her out of her room and, after grabbing their coats and putting their shoes on, they walked towards Akito's V-86.

Shortly after, they parked the Toyota near the ice rink and, as they entered the building, they saw a guy in his early thirties walking towards them.

'Ryo-chan, I didn't know you had practice today,' the guy said looking at Ryoko in a way that Akito didn't quite like.

'I don't,' Ryoko said offering a smile to him, 'I'm just here to skate with my boyfriend…'

The guy looked at Akito and, for the tiniest moment, there was an unidentified emotion flashing through the guy's eyes.

'Hi,' he said with an obviously fake friendly tone, 'I'm Higuchi Saburo.'

Akito took the hand the guy was offering him and shook it as briefly as he could.

'Fujiwara Akito,' he said.

'He's the team's new choreographer,' Ryoko explained.

'Right…'

'If you're here to skate, do you mind if I join you?' Higuchi asked.

Yes! Akito thought but, before he could find a way to politely refuse, Ryoko said:

'Sure, you can help me teach him to stay upright for more than a few minutes.'

Higuchi laughed at that while Akito was forced to fake a smile.

'Hey,' Ryoko said as she helped Akito putting on his borrowed skates, 'you didn't take offence from what I said, did you?'

'Of course not,' Akito lied.

'Good,' she said getting up and helping Akito doing the same.

'Hey!' Higuchi shouted from the middle of the ice rink, 'are you guys ready?'

'Yes,' Ryoko replied as she stepped onto the ice while Akito was trying his best to follow her.

God, how much he hated ice skating!

Soon Ryoko started doing some simple but beautifully executed moves.

'She's great, isn't she?' Higuchi asked appearing out of nowhere, startling Akito so much that he stumbled dangerously.

'Yeah, she is,' he replied as soon as he was sure he could remain standing up.

'You really are crap at this, aren't you?' Higuchi asked dropping any diplomacy.

'Hey, you two!' Ryoko shouted from the other side of the rink, 'Come here!'

'Let's see who gets to her first,' Higuchi exclaimed and, as he started skating, he patted Akito's shoulder a bit too hard, making him lose his balance and fall onto his knees, 'Sorry!' Higuchi said glancing over his shoulder with a very nasty looking smile on his face.

'Freaking bastard,' Akito muttered as he pushed himself up and, going as fast as he could, he made his way towards Ryoko.

'Hey baby, are you alright?' Ryoko asked as soon as he finally got to where his girlfriend was.

'Yeah,' Akito replied then, taking Ryoko's hand in his, he said, 'but just in case, don't let go of me.'

'Don't worry baby, I've got you,' Ryoko reassured him with her sweetest tone of voice.

For some reason, Akito enjoyed himself enormously seeing Higuchi's furious expression.

At long last, the torture, sorry, the ice skating session finished and, by the end of it, Akito had made himself a mental note to keep an eye on that bastard.

For now, he had a very important race to think about.

To be continued…