RECORDING
Chapter Twenty-Two
Meet the Parents
The weather that day was exceptionally wintry. The sky was overcast, but pale, as it looks before it snows. Several people's lawns already looked bald and colorless. The trees were stark and just ghastly-looking. The home the other four Light Music Club members surveyed from the base of its driveway appeared far from ghastly. It actually seemed to be the sole flame of life in the land of death.
"So this is where Azu-nyan hangs her blazer," Ritsu murmured. She checked the maildrop, satisfied it said 'Nakano' on it. She turned to Yui. "Your directions to her house were actually correct and, uh, direct. I'm impressed."
"Did you expect anything less from me?" Yui pouted.
Ritsu turned an about-face to look at Mio and Mugi. "Have we got everything? The card?"
Mio gestured at the keyboardist. "Mugi brought it."
Smiling, Mugi held up her gloved right hand which clutched a pink envelope. "You know how they say Hallmark makes a card for every occasion?" She patted the envelope with her left hand. "What do you want to bet?"
"I'm done making bets," Mio grumbled.
"That reminds me," Ritsu exclaimed, edging towards her girlfriend with a sinister glint in her darkening eyes. "You owe me two thousand yen!"
"I said I'd get it to you!" Mio ground her teeth furiously. First Chiharu had thrown her by the wayside to avoid Mrs. Abe. Now because of her the bassist owed someone an exorbitant amount of money.
"Mio-chan," Yui spoke up, "did you remember the ice cream?"
The raven-haired girl held up the pint of ice cream, their I'm-sorry-you-got-your-tooth-ripped-open present for Azusa. The kouhai's favorite ice cream place was a private-owned business rather than one of those worldwide chains like Dairy Queen or Baskin Robbins. During the fall and winter, however, business was scarce to non-existent at this place. The manager had worked on her lonesome today; when Mio popped in to purchase dulce de leche ice cream, she looked at the bassist like she had two heads.
"Then we're ready!" Yui cheered, heading up the driveway. "To Azu-nyan's house we go!"
The four of them headed up the driveway. Yui and Ritsu took the porch, whilst Mio and Mugi politely stood behind on the walkway, as the guitarist rang the doorbell. There was no immediate response. Ritsu snickered, "Ne, ne. What do you suppose her parents are like?"
"I imagine they're pretty strict," Yui admitted.
"I imagine they're those parents who take everything away from you if your grade slips a point." Ritsu made her voice whiny — her interpretation of what Azusa's mom would be like: "'We're boarding up the window, Azusa. You can have sunlight again when you bring your English grade up.'"
Her eyebrows knitted with worry, Mugi looked up. She was relieved to find no boarded windows on the second floor.
Ritsu pushed the doorbell. "Are you sure her appointment wasn't in the afternoon?"
Yui nodded. "She told me hers was the first thing scheduled today for her oral surgeon."
The door was thrown open then to reveal a man of maybe Mio's height, maybe taller. His raven hair was in resemblance to a bird's nest, his sweater a little bit rumpled. Mugi looked at him and feared they had caught Azusa's father napping.
"Ah! He looks just like Azu-nyan!" Yui half-gasped, half-squealed.
"Um, excuse us," Ritsu spoke, reverting to more polite, feminine speech. "We're friends of Azu-ny— I mean, Azusa-chan. She asked us to visit her after her root canal."
Mr. Nakano squinted and nodded. "Well, Azusa's asleep now…but come on in, anyways." He stepped aside to admit the four of them. "My wife and I just got some coffee brewing. Would any of you care for a cup?"
All of them save for Ritsu declined.
Yui stared about the house in interest. For some reason she always felt cold whenever entering someone else's house. Azusa's had a distinctly more barren quality to it than hers or Nodoka's (if Yui had to say it was more like one or the other, though, she would say it was more like Nodoka's). She removed her shoes and followed the others through the living room (which smelled odd for some reason) into the kitchen.
From the laundry room adjoining the garage which adjoined the kitchen emerged a medium-heighted, good-looking woman with dark brown hair and hooded brown eyes. She bore a basket laden with, strangely, throw blankets and pillows pertaining to the couch in the living room, which she was planning on setting out to dry. She was about to ask her husband about the weather when she saw the four unfamiliar faces. "Oh my, who're they?" she asked, her voice bouncy.
"They're ours, remember?" Mr. Nakano joked.
Mrs. Nakano placed a hand to her forehead, dumbstruck. "How long have I been asleep?" She quickly assessed that these were classmates of Azusa's, and she went about her business.
Mio rolled her eyes at the cutesy voice Ritsu used in thanking Mr. Nakano for the cup of coffee. If only he knew she only uses that voice when things are going her way. Nonplussed about the opaque heat steaming out of the mug, the drummer took an eager sip.
"Gyuhh!" she gagged, coughing a little. Hikaru froze in the middle of seating himself at the practically doll-sized round table and fixed his garnet eyes on her retching silhouette. "Arigatougozaimashita," she said again, sounding a lot less cute. The coffee the Nakano bunch drank was Sanka-brand, and decaf to boot!
His eyes fell upon the ice cream pint in Mio's hand, and he smiled in recognition of his daughter's favorite flavor. "Golly, you brought ice cream for her? Such friends Azusa has. You can put that in the freezer there, if you please."
Ritsu raised a suspicious eyebrow. "She's…never mentioned us, has she?"
Mr. Nakano tilted his head, his own short eyebrows arced in a comical expression. His purring tenor voice had that I'm-sorry tone to it as he replied, "I've only heard her mention a Jun-san and an Ui-san."
"Ah! Ui is my sister," Yui supplied eagerly.
"That little wench!" Ritsu raged. She couldn't fathom why Azusa would never give any mention to their friendship. And after all her ramblings about gee-isn't-it-nice-to-be-in-the-Light-Music-Club. Is she ashamed of us? "What a brat! That lout-headed, knuckle-dragging, ungrateful — uh! I mean," she stammered, remembering she was in the company of Mr. Nakano. She changed her voice back to feminine speech with a sorrowful note. "I just thought she might be a little more grateful…for helping her try to get into Tokyo U."
"Ritsu!" Mio growled.
"Tokyo U?" Mr. Nakano gasped, his copper eyes wide and shiny. Tokyo University elicited the same reaction from him as a worldwide tour with the Pixies would elicit from Azusa. "My daughter in Tokyo U? MY DAUGHTER in Tokyo University!"
"That's right," Ritsu smiled. "She could skip her third year at Sakuragaoka and move on to the greatest school in Japan. Me," she sighed, "I got accepted into Tokyo U, but the prices for housing and books are too steep. I'm just hoping to experience it vicariously through Azusa-chan."
"Ritsu!" Mio hissed, her left hand clenched threateningly.
"Oh my God…" Now Hikaru's eyes were glazed as he pictured his little Azusa at Tokyo U. He didn't let his imagination stop there. He imagined her filing down with the other graduates, a blue silken Tokyo U tie draped over her shoulders, with the bagpipes playing. What if she graduated with high distinction? And imagine the job opportunities she would have! Hikaru shook his head in amazement. "I have no idea why she wouldn't tell us about this. But thank you! Thank you so very much!"
"Maybe Azusa-chan's just modest. People have told me before that I'm —YEEEEOWCH!" she cried as Mio stomped her heel into Ritsu's foot. All Tokyo U talk was extinguished from then on.
In a momentary blast of icy wind, the back door slid open, admitting Mrs. Nakano. Mitsuki's delicate frame heaved with dry gasps, her little hands crushed under her armpits, all color in her face rerouted exclusively to her nose, chin, and ears. She gave a falsetto whoof! and exclaimed, "Is it ever cold out there! Why, Hikaru, if you and me hadn't—" She stopped herself when she saw the four friends of Azusa still in the kitchen. "Never mind," she sang as blithely as she could.
Silence had its hold on them as Mrs. Nakano poured herself a cup of coffee. The silence stretched out save for the scrape of a chair as she seated herself next to her husband. Mitsuki worried she had just intruded on a private conversation — though for the life of her she couldn't imagine what private matters Hikaru had to discuss with these four perfect strangers. After sipping a bit of coffee, she said uncertainly, "You don't have to stop talking on my account."
Mio replied, "Oh, don't worry. You're not interrupting anything." Bigger points, if it matters, she thought.
"Oh," Mitsuki muttered into her mug.
Somehow the clock ticking over the entrance to the kitchen made the ever-lengthening hush among them all the more awkward. Mio felt like it was they, the Light Music Club members, who were intruding on them, Azusa's parents. Neither side attempted conversation. Mr. and Mrs. Nakano sipped their coffee sullenly, their postures stiff and uncomfortable. Ritsu had noticed the couch lining in the woman's laundry basket; maybe someone spilled a drink, or…
Or… She tried to conceal her horrified stare as she took in Hikaru's messy hair with new meaning.
Ritsu tried to abort her sickened Ohh, God! but instead it came out as a pathetic whimper. She threw her hand over her mouth. Neither Hikaru nor Mitsuki seemed to notice.
"Say," Mrs. Nakano spoke up just as the drummer was about to suggest leaving. Azusa's mother looked at the four girls with a glow of interest kindled in her brown eyes. "You're close friends of Azusa's, right?"
"Hai," Mugi smiled. She and Yui grinned amicably while Mio and Ritsu still appeared to be on their guard.
"Well…" Mitsuki's cheeks pinkened as she giggled sheepishly. "This might be weird of me to ask about, but…You wouldn't know if she's dating anybody, would you?"
Hikaru set down his coffee mug, prepared to yell at her about her nosiness. He couldn't help but notice, however, the look of recognition on the girls' faces — nay, the fear of recognition. So maybe Azusa was dating somebody and she wanted her friends to keep mum on this.
Mr. Nakano could feel the rusty spikes of a headache bursting in his temples. It was times like these where he didn't enjoy being a father. From the day his daughter was born, he risked being seen not as Mr. Rogers or even Steve. There was a plentitude of occasions for him to be seen as Father Flanagan. Then there was the confusing conundrum of fearing he might be a Father Flanagan and telling himself he wasn't. Those were two good enough reasons to butt out of Azusa's love life. But still he worried about her dating the right guy.
Mrs. Nakano also sensed the girls' change in mood and added, "Or, y'know, someone she's interested in…?"
Mugi's smile tightened. Even her eyes seemed pale with restrained fright. Mio stared at the ceramic tile floor, her bangs hiding her eyes. Ritsu stood rigidly, a knot of tension tightening between her shoulder blades.
"Yeah," Yui replied happily. "She and I are—"
Ritsu and Mio clapped their hands over her mouth, stifling the rest of what could have been a joyful announcement. The bassist, being a bit slower, missed and ended up whacking her hand against Yui's nose. A muffled "Itai!" hummed from under the drummer's hand.
"Pay her no mind." Ritsu's faulty excuse was a rushed blabber: "She's not in her right mind. Heheheh. Mio here probably switched her Ritalin with Zanax. Again. Just glad she didn't have an episodic reaction like last time. Don't you hate it when that happens?"
Hikaru and Mitsuki stared at her in horror.
Ritsu grabbed the back of Yui's denim jacket and pulled her toward the door. She nodded at Mugi, motioning for her to follow. "Perhaps we should get her to the doctor. Nice meeting you. Give Azu-nyan my regards."
"Well, we can no longer show our faces here," Mio said, sighing, once they were outside. She shook out her left hand, knuckles red and smarting from the punch she dealt Ritsu. It was safe to say the top of her girlfriend's head wasn't freezing in the late-autumn chill.
"Yui." The drummer grabbed Yui's shoulders and leveled her stern gaze into the guitarist's eyes. "You should not tell Azu-nyan's parents that you're dating. Leave that to her."
For a moment Yui looked confused and still a bit shaken from having her snoot smacked by Mio. Then she gave an understanding nod. It was Azusa's good news to tell, not Yui's. It would be like if she got into Tokyo U and I announced it: inappropriate. "But they asked," she pointed out.
Ritsu frowned. "Well, they shouldn't have." Turning, she strode down the sidewalk with the others following. On a cold day like today a pumpkin-spice latte from Starbucks would really hit the spot. "I guess some parents are overly concerned about their kids' dating lives." She flashed back to her mother's shocked face upon finding her only daughter kissing Mio on the front porch. For now there was peace, but ever since then Ritsu noticed her mom avoided speaking to her; when she did, she did not make eye contact. "Azu-nyan's parents might not like you two together," she added.
This Yui could not fathom no matter how hard she tried. She might have been a bit more careless than Azusa, yes, but she didn't consider herself a bad girlfriend. "Why?" she asked with a shameless curiosity common in small children.
Ritsu winced and beside her Mio's face was similarly pained. "I kinda feel like I'm about to tell a kid how babies are made," the drummer muttered.
Mio jumped in with: "Think of Romeo and Juliet. Some parents just have a…strict agenda," she chose her words carefully, "which they…enforce upon their children."
Yui took a pregnant pause. She thought of Romeo and Juliet. She thought of lovesick Juliet not being able to see impulsive Romeo because he was a Montague, and Capulets do not marry Montagues. She thought of how convincing Ritsu's acting was when she woke from her three-day death to find Mio with the poison vial and sobbed uncontrollably. All those thoughts settled heavily upon her features, and Ritsu and Mio breathed a sigh of relief, elated they would not have to explain this.
"So why does Azu-nyan's family hate mine?"
Mio and Ritsu almost fell through the ground. The former turned desperately to Mugi and stuttered, "W-would you like to spell this out, Mugi?"
The keyboardist beamed. She assented by raising a hand. "No problem, aside from my not understanding this either."
The look of agony was so intense on Ritsu's face, it appeared like it would crack. She is European. Buncha liberals, I'll bet. Same-sex love is probably par for the course over there, I'll bet. She scowled at Mugi and Yui, envious they had such easy lives while she and Mio had to skulk around out of fear of discovery.
"They might not like Azu-nyan dating a girl," Ritsu burst. She sighed as the pain subsided.
Now Yui's shock and interest was massive enough for two hundred curious children. Again her mouth fell open and she was only able to utter, "Whyyy?"
The drummer shook her head. "They just won't. They'll think it's wrong."
"Or dirty," Mio added soberly. "Or evil." Sort of how Abe-sensei felt about me writing left-handed. She shoved her left hand deep in her coat pocket and thought of her own parents. Of course they were interested in Mio's love life, or else her mother wouldn't have given her the boy talk in junior high. It wasn't her father she was worried about. He was easygoing. Her mother — the almost-barren therapist with great expectations for her only child — was the heavy. But, maybe that Mio was dating her childhood friend and an almost surrogate daughter to Mrs. Akiyama would make the whole lesbian thing less dirty and evil. That was a hope the bassist was banking heavily upon.
"What's wrong or dirty or evil about it?" Yui asked. "I thought being in love was a good thing." Mugi fervently nodded her agreement.
You're dating our homeroom teacher, Mio thought, squinting at the keyboardist, so wouldn't it make sense to you that some love is not okay? "It is a good thing, but…" Now Mio felt like she was about to tell a kid how babies are made. What Yui said — how do you reply to that? "Watch Brokeback Mountain. Then you'll understand."
"Or South of Nowhere," Ritsu added. "Some people are just not okay with homosexuality."
Ui poked a fork into the simmering pot of pasta, checking to see how done it was. Nothing was worse than gum-soft penne rigate noodles (though Yui complained once that underdone pasta made her face hurt). The Hirasawas weren't into Western food, but with winter speeding in like greased lightning Ui decided tonight called for a pasta recipe she had — lemony with asparagus and a little too much cheese. There was no better time for comfort food than winter.
"How do you think Mom and Dad feel about homosexuality?"
Ui blinked and looked up in surprise. Yui sat cross-legged on the floor, Gitah's headstock nestled between her thigh and chest. Her bare, unamplified strumming slowed as she awaited a response.
"Are you asking me this?" Ui inquired perplexedly.
The strumming stopped long enough for her older sister to nod.
Of course she is. Who else would she ask? Gitah? It was moments like these where Ui was grateful for Yui's disinclination toward sarcasm.
"I don't think they care," the ponytailed girl stated simply, poking the pasta again.
Yui looked up from Gitah, studying her little sister's face, which bore a hard expression. Ever since she was nine, Ui displayed a bit of resentment towards their parents for staying away in Europe. It was the one conflict in the guitarist's life that she could look at with an uncharacteristic amount of perspective.
"I'm sure they have some opinion of it."
"Maybe," Ui grunted, stabbing the penne. She felt sorry that these noodles had to bear her spleen, but she kept jabbing. "Are you thinking of telling them about Azusa-chan?"
Yui smiled at Gitah, whose fiery hue reflected the passions ignited in her from just hearing the kouhai's name. Society really demanded that such happiness not be allowed to certain people?
Her coyness was enough of an answer for Ui, who was wondering what all this conscientiousness was about. Did Azusa really have her hooks in so deep that she was sucking out Yui's exuberance? "Well, they're never here, so they shouldn't have any objection to who you date," the younger sister concluded, switching off the burner. "That reminds me: they're running awfully late on this month's allowance."
Every month Mr. and Mrs. Hirasawa sent a check to their daughters to cover food, bills, and other necessities.
Yui set aside Gitah, and dinner commenced in earnest. The conversation shifted over multiple topics like grains of sand on a blond coast: the fast progression from fall to winter, that time when they were little and Ui and Nodoka had to grease Yui's head to unlodge it from between the stair bars, the performance at Hair.
"Nodoka-chan said she got offered a job there," said Yui.
Ui nodded assent, giggling at the memory. "Sawako-sensei's cousin is something else. She offered Nodoka-chan one thousand two hundred yen an hour to serve food as a cat-eared meganekko in a maid outfit."
"One thousand two hundred?" the older sister gasped. The penne scraped her throat, and she began to cough violently. With a panicked cry of "Oneechan!" Ui scrabbled around the table to Heimlich Yui. Once the confounded noodle was dislodged Yui cried, "Why didn't she take the job?"
"Please try to eat more carefully," Ui whimpered, still holding her sister by the waist. Yui was so soft and warm. Reluctantly releasing her, the ponytailed girl added, "Yokohama's awfully far to go to work." She neglected to add that Nodoka had been the focus of unwanted female flirtation, that one woman had seized her by the waist of her jeans and greeted her with, "How would you like to lose your virginity tonight?"
"You weren't there afterward," Yui remarked.
Ui hesitated over her plate. "Yes…Well…" She shoved a forkload of pasta in her mouth, buying time by chewing it slowly. She felt like the guy in the Twix commercials. She had promised Jun she would remain tight-lipped on her feelings for Azusa. But she hated lying, especially to Yui. With their parent gallivanting and spending euros, Yui was all the family Ui had.
Fortunately Yui's attention span didn't hold out long enough for Ui to explain. The pasta just smelled too damn good, and in cold weather like tonight the hotter the food the better. So the older girl dug into her dinner, dropping the matter.
After she finished eating, Ui leaned back a little, letting the meal settle in. It was either the lull of a full stomach or the lull of the furnace, but something relaxing prompted her to say, "I'm going to tell you why I was out, oneechan, but you can't tell a soul."
Yui paused over her plate, the heavy silence broken by the pasta falling from her fork. Her eyes were wide and shiny. "Not even Mom and Dad?" she queried in an undertone, as if the walls had ears.
After a moment's consideration, Ui decided, "Not even Mom and Dad." In truth the whole Jun and Azusa thing didn't apply to them, but she wanted to emphasize how super-secret this was to her sister.
Yui made a hammy gesture of locking up her mouth and throwing away the key, which Ui found both hilarious and adorable. Then she leaned in, eager to be in on this dishy secret.
A little haltingly, Ui relayed the events following last night's performance. She had Yui sworn to secrecy, so that wasn't her chief concern (though perhaps Yui would inadvertently blab). No, the ponytailed girl was worried about her reaction to someone else taking a fancy toward her girlfriend. In the worst-case scenario, this information would put a serious strain on Yui's and Azusa's relationship. They could even break up.
Oneechan would be crushed if that happened. Ui faltered mid-sentence and blinked back the wave of emotion that reached up her throat. Suddenly she wished she wasn't telling Yui about this. But now she had to. If that happens, she thought, glaring at her hands tensed to the point of resembling claws on her lap, then I have to do everything in my power to see that they get back together.
"Oneechan." Ui forced herself to look her older sister right in the eye. "Jun-chan told me she loves Azusa-chan."
It took but a single moment for this to sink in for Yui. Then she gasped. Her jaw dropped and her eyes shone. "Really?" she said. Then she brought her hands to her cheeks. "How cute! I mean, Azu-nyan's extremely adorable, so no wonder Jun-chan fell for her." Yui grinned and rubbed her chin. "Yep, I was right all along. I know a cute girl when I see her."
Ui stared blankly at Yui, her hands relaxing. And she treats it like it's her moment of pride? Somehow she found words and constructed them into coherent sentences. "You're not…upset?"
"Why should I be?" the older girl asked openly.
Ui glanced aside and shrugged. "If it were me, I'd get pretty, well…jealous." She would have laughed if only it were appropriate to the situation. A week ago she had insisted that she never got jealous. I sounded so high and mighty back then, didn't I? Shame stung her cheeks.
Smiling widely, Yui shook her head. "I've no need to be jealous. I know Azu-nyan loves me." Her smile dropped and she stared sorrowfully at her empty plate. "I feel pretty bad for Jun-chan, though…"
Ui blinked. Well, if that wasn't security, then what was? She could see now how profoundly her sister trusted Azusa. But no matter how she looked at it, no matter how blissfully in love Yui was, Ui could not reconcile herself to this; not with her jealousy-rotted heart insisting: Nobody loves oneechan more than me.