DISCLAIMER: SKIP BEAT! and its associated characters are the creations of Yoshiki Nakamura. This author claims no ownership of Skip Beat or any of its characters. All other rights reserved.
Massive thank you to Claraowl-senpai for the beta read!
Additional Author's Notes at bottom of the page.
Chapter XV: Ripples from the Movement of a Butterfly's Wings
…Nonperiodic solutions are ordinarily unstable with respect to small modifications, so that slightly differing initial states can evolve into considerably different states…
Tina was smiling at the photo on her screen. Despite his promises on the night he'd called her, Kuon's photo responses to her inquiries were less frequent than she'd expected—at least at first. She'd received a few pictures immediately after their first phone call, and she promptly exchanged pictures of herself with Mark and Erika. But the few pictures he'd sent of this Kyoko of his were all from the night at the festival they'd attended, and the girl hadn't quite looked comfortable in any of the pictures he'd sent over. There was a furtive, sneaky quality to the shots, as if he knew Kyoko wouldn't approve of him taking them. Following those, there had been a few days of silence from him, and she'd tentatively sent out a text asking how he was. He'd sent vague replies back, indicating that he was implementing her advice. No real details, though. Tina had decided to step back to let him seek out her advice but not to force it on him. That had been the way it was back when she and Rick were together, and she saw no reason to force another way of communicating on him just when he'd finally reached out to her again.
Something must've happened over the last few days.
Suddenly, Tina was getting pictures—even when she hadn't requested an update. There were any number of cutesy scenes. Typical Kuon—the pictures he'd sent looked like stills from movies. She knew he had an interest in directing and in cinematography, but given his looks and his parentage had chosen acting as a logical first step. But he had an eye for composition and detail, and the care with which he took the photos he sent spoke volumes on how he felt about this girl. The nature and the frequency of them were enough to kindle a small spark of joy in her. Perhaps he'd managed to win her over after all! It was true that he'd been hopeless as a teenager—not that this was unusual for a teenage boy, but Kuon's unique combination of looks, wealth, and charm were particularly detrimental to his developing any kind of emotional maturity—but the difference she'd picked up on the first night they'd spoken was amplified by the nature of the photographs she was receiving. Still, while the pictures indicated the depth of Kuon's regard for the girl, they also showed Tina how shy Kyoko remained. It fit with Kuon's description of her, really. A girl who had been abused, tossed aside, and then adopted into the Fuwa clan as an heir but not as family. Someone who was immensely capable of giving love but just as incapable of receiving it. Someone whose eyes asked, every time she looked into Kuon's phone lens, whether or not she really was the girl Kuon wanted.
Oh, Tina thought, he'd better up his game. The look she was seeing on Kyoko's face told Tina that the girl absolutely reciprocated Kuon's feelings—it's just that she didn't quite believe Kuon was real. It wasn't just shyness. There was doubt, and pain, and deep insecurity, all tempered with a little bit of hope. There was a definite progression as time went on—Kyoko was looking more comfortable in the later pictures than she had at the beginning. But Tina wanted to shake Kuon and tell him that he'd better be affirming the shit out of her, because a girl whose past was like that probably needed as much love as she could get. And Kuon himself was, well…years of trauma just don't disappear in the face of true love. Two broken people, Tina thought, dragging each other out of a deep hole. She'd been meaning to call Kuon for a while now to discuss this with him, but somehow the time never seemed right. The last thing she wanted to do was to interrupt a tryst between the two. She didn't know whether Kuon had told Kyoko about her, but a strange American woman calling your boyfriend's phone was likely to exacerbate Kyoko's insecurities. Tina had no intention, as Rick would say, of cock-blocking her boy.
But the pictures were nonetheless encouraging. The first one she'd received was one of the two of them outside, sitting on a rock by a river and surrounded by verdant hills. "Our rock," he'd captioned the picture. He was sitting with an easy smile on his face, his arm around a Kyoko who was blushing and looking at the camera through upturned golden eyes and trying to hide the smile on her face. And then she'd received a picture where he was sitting behind the girl as she performed a tea ceremony. Kyoko was dressed in a kimono with a pattern of lotuses, he was dressed in an indigo-blue striped kimono. She knew that the stage name he'd chosen meant "Lotus" in Japanese, so Tina partially understood the smirk on his face. Tina didn't know much about the Japanese tea ceremony, but she did understand that Kuon probably shouldn't have been sitting so close to the girl, who was looking just the slightest bit exasperated. And no wonder. Kuon had a lock of her hair entwined around a finger and looked as if he were making a nuisance of himself trying to be sexy. And then there was a succession of what she called his 'artsy portrait shots.' Kyoko looking off into the distance while backlit by a setting sun, for example, or a picture of just her hands, or candids of her laughing at something. Tina had a feeling that Kuon's camera roll was full of Kyoko pictures, one after another after another. It all made her smile.
Today was the first one she'd received where they looked as if they were out in a crowd. "Hiding in plain sight," he'd captioned the photo. The first from this day's set showed the same girl peeking shyly behind a massive sundae that looked almost as big as she was. They appeared to be in a cafe on a busy street. The second showed Kyoko standing in front of a mirror in what looked like a clothing store, dressed somewhat awkwardly in a sleek, pale blue day dress. The dress looked wonderful on her, had been fitted perfectly, but Tina saw how shy the girl was in the questioning look she directed at Kuon. As in almost all of the pictures taken of her, Kyoko was blushing. As for Kuon himself, she could see him reflected in the mirror holding up his phone and taking their picture, staring at her adoringly, and—in a most interesting twist, with a large wall mural of Kuon's Ren Tsuruga alter-ego in the background. Tina guffawed.
Since the night of his call, she'd spent quite a bit of time stalking Ren Tsuruga's work on the Internet. The body of work had comforted her—someone as busy as Tsuruga wouldn't have had the time to indulge in alcohol or drugs as she'd been afraid Kuon would do. But it also made her wonder what his life was like. Ren Tsuruga seemed much, much older than Kuon did, more like a guy in his late twenties than a guy who was a mere twenty-two. Apparently he was now a spokesperson-model for the line—rare, really, for a male model. Most of the large fashion houses preferred to contract with female models whenever they had a line they wanted to promote. But she smiled as she realized he'd taken Kyoko and brazenly decided to shop in an store that had his face all over it. "No one recognizes me when I'm Kuon," he said. She texted back and told him that was ridiculous, hair and eyes could only do so much, he'd better be careful!—but then he'd said "Ren Tsuruga isn't just brown hair dye and contacts—they expect this serious guy." And she could see from the smirk on his face that Kuon was not, in fact, a 'serious guy.' No, there was no mistaking the difference between Kuon and 'Ren,' and when he was 'hiding in plain sight' as Kuon, he clearly played up the playful boyishness in his looks that were absent from his Ren persona.
Mark smiled over at her as Erica threw another Cheerio from her snack bowl out onto the floor. "Is it Kuon?" he asked. "Erica, babe, the Cheerios are for eating, see? Nomnomnomnom…"
Tina grinned.
"Yes. He and Kyoko infiltrated an store and he managed not to get recognized. Apparently he got her to agree to go shopping with him. But look!" She held up her phone to show the picture to her husband. "They haven't recognized him. Even though his damn face is all over the back wall."
Mark laughed as he came over. "So this is the girl, huh? The famous Kyoko."
"Yeah. The girl that brought him back from the dead."
"I guess he and I have a lot to thank her for, huh," Mark responded.
"You do?"
"Yes." Mark nuzzled close to Tina, inhaling her scent. "You've been happier since he called."
"I…have." Tina smiled and leaned into him, enjoying the feel of his solidness at her side.
"Mmmhmm." Mark glanced at the picture again. "He's grown up. I know I didn't really spend as much time with him as you and Rick did, but he looks like he turned out all right."
"Kuon was the missing piece. So long as I didn't know what had happened to him…it was hard to really close the chapter."
Mark smiled and tightened his arms around his wife. "I almost feel like he set a part of you free. It's like you've had a weight taken off your shoulders."
"It's just so strange, you know?" Tina nuzzled her cheek into his chest, feeling grateful yet again that she'd given him a chance. "It's like…there was a Rick-shaped hole, but there was a Kuon-shaped hole, too. And now that he's back, it's a little like…the world is a little bit more whole."
"You have a friend back."
"More like a little brother back," Tina smiled. "I haven't seen him in so long but now that I know what he's been up to, it's like…I feel that connection again. Like these years of absence were just a bad dream."
"It's nice to have a friend that you can pick up with like that. No talking for years, and then suddenly it's like they've never been away."
"I'm so happy, baby," Tina said. Mark tilted up her chin and kissed her, thankful that one more shadow had been banished to the past.
Erica squealed and threw another Cheerio at them.
=.=.=.=.=.=.=.=.=.=.=.=
Some days before Tina received Kuon's picture…
Yayoi had taken Kyoko-chan into the city for the afternoon and now Etsuro found himself awkwardly standing while a blonde-haired young man bowed deeply before him. Etsuro half-expected Kuon to accompany the women, but the young man hadn't. And now he was in his kitchen asking to learn how to cook.
"Fuwa Taisho-san," Kuon had said. It was a respectful, almost shy bow.
Etsuro had raised his eyebrows but acknowledged him. "And how can I help you this afternoon, Hizuri-sama?"
"Oh, please…Taisho-san, simply Kuon will do." The boy threw one of those bright, disarming smiles at Etsuro and he almost flinched. No wonder Yayoi had been so charmed. Not to mention Kyoko-chan. Was this really Tsuruga Ren? This version of him seemed…so much younger.
"Very well, then, Kuon-kun it is," he said. "How can I help you?"
"I understand that the ryokan offers a cooking class for classic Japanese cuisine," the boy said.
"Indeed. And were you interested in the course?"
"Yes, sir. And…" Etsuro watched as the boy blushed. "If...it isn't too much trouble…I…would like to learn." Another one of those winsome smiles lit up his face. "You see, Kyoko-chan and I have a wager…"
"A wager?"
"Yes…one I'd like to win very much." Kuon stood awkwardly, a hand reaching behind his neck. "I wagered Kyoko that I would be able to cook a decent dinner for us tonight and…I would dearly love to be able to make something delicious."
"Tonight? It is rather short notice, Kuon-kun," Etsuro replied. "Generally we ask our guests to book this class well in advance. Our chef won't be able to teach you, he's quite busy prepping for a banquet for one of our other guests."
"Oh." Kuon looked crestfallen.
"But…if you don't mind…" Etsuro offered. Kuon looked up, hopeful again. "I ran the ryokan's restaurant for many years, and am not a bad chef myself."
"Oh yes!" the boy replied. "Kyoko-chan told me that she learned her katsuramuki from you."
"She did indeed." Etsuro stopped and looked at the boy sternly. "But I must ask: what was the wager?"
"I…"
Etsuro heard the younger man stuttering and said, sternly, "I won't tolerate anything indecent or anything that will endanger Kyoko-chan, mind you!"
"No, sir, it isn't that…'' Kuon blushed. "She told me that I could take her on a date…and…maybe take her shopping if I could pull off a decent dinner."
"Take her shopping, you say?"
"Yes, sir." Kuon looked embarrassed. "She mentioned the other day that she didn't want to go out to dinner because she had nothing nice to wear…so I offered to take her shopping. But you know Kyoko-chan. She wouldn't accept it. So I made a bet that I would make dinner for us, and if it was to her satisfaction, then we could go shopping. It's because…she knows I can't cook. At all. I'm really terrible at it, actually. It's just…that I really want to take my girlfriend out. You know."
Girlfriend, Etsuro thought. So they've confessed. Of course they confessed, Yayoi and I saw it with our own eyes! And it's not like they haven't been acting like lovers in plain sight around here! "Is that so terribly important to you? That she have something nice to wear?"
Kuon looked flustered. "No! No, absolutely not. I'd take her on a date even if she decided to wear rags," he said. "I told her it didn't matter to me and that I thought she looked great in whatever she was wearing but she refused." He put his hand up to his nape, a gesture Etsuro quickly realized was a tell for his nervousness. "So I told her, 'Well, if you have nothing to wear, then come with me, we'll find something,' but she says she doesn't want to waste money on something as frivolous as clothing and she won't let me buy her anything…"
He took a look at Etsuro, who had raised an eyebrow at him, and colored even more. "I mean! Well…I mean…Not that I mean anything by it! It's just that I'm a model…and I have contracts with a number of designers, and they provide me with clothes…so I could get Kyoko-chan anything she wanted, really, because a clothes allowance is written into a number of my contracts…"
"Ah yes. Yayoi told me. About your stage name. About your father."
Kuon looked relieved that he wouldn't have to tell yet another person about his secret identity just to get closer to Kyoko. "I truly don't think she needs to change anything about herself, sir," he said apologetically, "But she always looks so embarrassed and shy and I just want to give my girlfriend presents. So she said I could do it, but only if I managed to make a presentable dinner."
Etsuro felt a rising tide of embarrassment. 'We've never even so much as paid her a wage,' he remembered Yayoi saying the night of the chase. He paused."Thank you for being here for her. She had a difficult childhood, and sometimes…" Sometimes Yayoi and I just didn't know what to do, he thought. Thinking back on how Saena had treated Kyoko in those days had never been easy for either himself or Yayoi. He interrupted himself. "Very well. What are we cooking?"
"I was thinking…hamburgers with egg?"
Etsuro found himself smiling. It must be that famous charm of his, he thought. "Kyoko-chan's favorite," he said. "She's loved it since she was a little girl." He gave Kuon an appraising look. "I'm surprised, Kuon-kun. Did she tell you?"
"She told me. A very long time ago," Kuon said, remembering the Hamburger Kingdom in the forest. "I thought it would be good to learn my girlfriend's favorite dish."
Etsuro raised an eyebrow but Kuon didn't explain further, choosing to look him directly in the eyes, instead. Meeting his gaze, Etsuro merely nodded.
He led Kuon into the kitchen, which was quiet in the mid-day lull. "Alright, Kuon-kun. Let's get started…"
As it turned out, Kuon Hizuri surpassed even his absolute worst expectations. The boy could barely boil water, for heavens' sake. The first time Etsuro handed him a knife, he had to take it away lest the boy chop off a finger. He had to teach the boy how to hold it correctly, first. It would not do for Kyoko-chan's boyfriend to lose a finger—much less when he's a guest at my ryokan! Thank goodness we're starting with pre-ground meat, Etsuro thought. The idea of Kuon mincing meat with a knife was simply too upsetting. And the boy had no sense of how much seasoning to put into anything. Coming from an industrial cooking background, Etsuro was used to dealing with larger quantities of ingredients than the average home cook. But Kuon simply did not understand that a pinch of salt did not mean "stick your entire hand in the salt cellar and put a fist full of salt into the meat." Once Etsuro began demonstrating each step, though, he found that Kuon had an excellent memory and an excellent talent for mimicry. By the end of the lesson, he was making and seasoning the hamburger patties with ease and cracking eggs expertly into the frying pan.
This must be that renowned 'actor's spirit' of his, Etsuro thought, recalling an interview with Ren Tsuruga about how the actor had famously learned the Fantaisie Impromptu just by watching his piano teacher's hands despite never having played the piano before. Etsuro briefly went over steaming the accompanying vegetables and even the proper use of a rice cooker. Kuon followed enthusiastically. By the end of the session, Etsuro pronounced Kuon's dish acceptable and gave him leave to use the kitchen that evening to make Kyoko dinner after she arrived with Yayoi-san.
=.=.=.=.=.=.=.=.=.=.=.=.=.=.=.=.=
Meanwhile…
The girl was certainly being chased quite a bit these days. Yayoi had succeeded in trapping the furiously blushing Kyoko in the back hallway by her office.
"Kyoko-chan," she said.
"Hai! Yayoi-san!" Kyoko was squeaking.
Yayoi fought back a giggle. It was evident that an agreement had been reached the night Kuon had chased after her. The two of them had spent the days together since. Part of it, Yayoi was sure, was more acting—she heard them reciting lines from his room, occasionally. Other times, she'd caught them coming back from hikes around the pretty hillsides and riverbanks around the ryokan, hand-in-hand until they thought other people could see them, and then they'd reluctantly let each other go. Ha! As if that would fool anyone! Nice try, Kyoko-chan, Yayoi thought. But I see you.
"Is there…anything you'd like to tell me about you and Hizuri-san?"
Kyoko's widening eyes just confirmed what she and Etsuro already knew. "Ano…ano…! Yayoi-san—we…we…."
Yayoi smiled indulgently at the girl. "He's confessed, and you've accepted."
"How…? What..?" The girl was tomato-red. "Yes," she finally said, meekly.
"I am happy for you, Kyoko-chan," Yayoi said.
"Yayoi-san…" Kyoko began, "It's not what you think—I…I don't want to abandon my responsibilities. I know how much I owe to you and Etsuro-san, please don't think I would! And…and…if you think it would be best for me to end this, I will." She said the last sentence with a quaver in her voice but had looked up at Yayoi with so much fortitude and bravery it almost broke the older woman's heart.
Yayoi looked down at Kyoko's hands, which were curled into fists at her side. Again she felt how innately unfair she and Etsuro—and Sho—had been to her. They'd adopted her, but failed to treat her as a daughter. They'd rescued her from an abusive mother, but failed to do anything to heal the invisible wounds that had surely been inside her. "Kyoko-chan!" she said sternly. "We will do no such thing."
She took Kyoko gently by the elbow and led her to the office. The place was calm, and familiar, and safe, and she could see the girl let some of the tension she'd been holding go. "Kyoko-chan," she said again. "I must say 'I am sorry' to you again."
"What?" the girl said. "Why?"
"We adopted you, yes…but we've also failed you. We haven't treated you as a daughter at all, have we?" Yayoi smiled ruefully. "You've worked so hard for us this entire time and yet look…we've failed to even pay you."
"Yayoi-san…you and Taisho have been so kind to me. You gave me your legacy. I have everything I need."
"This is one of your virtues, child," Yayoi said. "Always looking to how much you've been given, never to what else you might be missing. What I'm trying to say is that a young girl like you should have someone that looks at you the way Hizuri-san does."
Kyoko was shocked into silence.
Yayoi continued. "And moreover…I know this entire time we've discussed you going to university in Kyoto. But, for example, should you choose to go to Tokyo—I want you to know you are free to do so."
"But…Yayoi-san—how could I…How could I do my daily tasks!?"
"Kyoko, do you think for a moment that if Sho remained the heir he would have been taking out the trash? Or polishing the floors?"
Kyoko had winced upon hearing Sho's name, but the answer to the question was an easy one. "No."
"Precisely. Etsuro-san and I were already discussing this, long before Hizuri-san arrived." She sighed. "What I want to say is…being our heir does not mean you cannot leave and pursue another career. Many modern companies have an executive who may serve on the Board of Directors, or who may manage the business from afar. There is no need for the heir of this ryokan to be scrubbing pots before dawn, Kyoko." Yayoi looked into Kyoko's eyes, which were still wide and questioning. "Do you understand? There is such a thing as a General Manager. It is entirely possible to hire someone for the delegation of your duties. You will remain the heir to this ryokan no matter what. We value your judgment and your strategic acumen, Kyoko, and you can do that as well from Tokyo as you can right here.
"But more importantly," she said, "I don't know if you ever discussed these matters in school, Kyoko, and I doubt Saena ever brought it up, but…"
What followed was possibly the most embarrassing fifteen minutes of Yayoi's—and possibly Kyoko's— life. "But Yayoi-san, we haven't—" she said.
"It doesn't matter," Yayoi responded. "Can you honestly say the two of you have done nothing?" Even Yayoi had to admit that if Kuon Hizuri were her boyfriend, there would definitely be something happening during their time together. Kyoko's responding blush told her that yes, in fact they had done something. For her part, Kyoko was thinking of certain experiences beginning with the night of Romeo and Juliet's balcony scene and continuing with yesterday's tryst by the Corn-rock...with various interludes in Kuon's room in between. Yayoi watched the play of mortification on the young girl's face and said, "Can you honestly say you won't do anything?" Yayoi hadn't thought the girl could blush any redder, but she did. Even her arms managed to flush red.
"Kyoko-chan, it's alright, it really is. You're a growing young woman and it's only natural to start…exploring…" Yayoi expounded at length on the importance of condoms, and birth control, and consent. Kyoko's face blushed red throughout, but it culminated in Yayoi telling her to get dressed for a quick trip to the city, where an appointment had been made to meet with a doctor.
A few hours later, Yayoi watched as Kyoko proffered her arm to a doctor and a nurse, who subsequently numbed it and inserted an implant designed to prevent her pregnancy. Triumphantly, she and Kyoko made their way back from the clinic, and Kyoko went to hide in her room.
Yayoi walked past the kitchen, observing the boy cooking with Etsuro. "Hmm," she thought, and moved past.
=.=.=.=.=.=.=.=.=.=.=.=.=.=.=.=.=
Later that same evening…
Etsuro was standing outside the suite he shared with Yayoi. Since the night of 'the chase,' as he called it in his mind, he'd had…odd feelings. Not so much about Kyoko and the Hizuri boy, no. He and Yayoi had watched as Kyoko slammed the door in Kuon's face. The camera in the back hallway broadcast the boy's heartbroken look to him and Yayoi quite clearly. By the time he saw Kuon sink down to the floor, he was convinced that he meant no harm to Kyoko. It was clear they were talking to each other through the closed door, but the boy had looked so sad that Etsuro had almost wanted to offer him a glass of sake to commiserate. By the time Kyoko opened the door to let him in, he was downright sympathetic. The security cameras had no sound, and of course they did not have cameras in Kyoko's room. But even so, the look on their faces had given him a distinct sense of unease. And he began to feel like perhaps Yayoi had known something when she'd asked him if he loved her that one night some weeks ago.
After Kyoko had allowed the Hizuri boy into her room, Yayoi had insisted on turning off the monitor and giving the couple some privacy. Etsuro had wanted to monitor the situation, make sure that the Hizuri boy didn't molest Kyoko further, but Yayoi had given him a warning look. "Kyoko is a responsible young woman, Etsuro," she'd said. "She is well and truly able to make decisions regarding the level of intimacy she wishes to extend to the Hizuri boy." He'd almost choked at his wife's words.
"Are you serious?" he'd asked her.
"Etsuro…she lived in Tokyo with our son for two years. If you can't trust her to act responsibly when she's under our roof, how can you trust her at all?"
"We don't run a whorehouse!" he responded.
The word stopped Yayoi in her tracks. "A whorehouse? Are you hearing yourself, Etsuro?"
"She's a teenage girl and he's a fully-grown man!"
"And what is she doing, Etsuro? Has she done anything even remotely like a whore? And he's barely four years older than she is, so shush." Yayoi didn't need to remind him that he was six years older than she was.
Still, watching the two children—because that's what they were to him, children—over these last few days gave him a wistful, lonely feeling that he could not define. If it hadn't been for Yayoi pointing it out during the night of 'the chase,' he may never have been observant enough to catch it. But it was evident that something had changed over the course of that evening—at least if Kyoko's blushes were any indication. He'd see them come in after long walks in the early morning, hand-in-hand until they realized they were in plain view of the ryokan and moved furtively to separate. He was seeing Kyoko-chan smile in a way that he hadn't seen since she was a tiny girl, and if he had to be honest, it warmed his heart.
And as for Kuon—well. The boy couldn't cook to save his life but the effort he put into learning Kyoko's favorite dish truly won Etsuro over. That, and the way he listened raptly to stories about Kyoko learning how to cook herself—the way she'd kept on trying to do her katsuramuki despite the cuts on her fingers, for example, or the first dish she ever made. Turns out the boy had actually eaten some of Kyoko's first dishes. Who knew? Etsuro had taught her how to make onigiri one morning, and she'd brought some for Kuon the very next day. But he'd started feeling…somewhat exposed when Kuon had started asking for advice. About…marriage, for one thing. About the longevity of love, for another. If Etsuro had had any lingering thoughts about Kuon's intentions towards Kyoko, they were well and truly put to bed. And Etsuro found that he couldn't answer Kuon—nothing beyond a few pithy remarks. "Always say yes," he'd said. "Because your wife is always right." But the fact that he couldn't give this earnest boy some true nugget of wisdom about long standing love bothered him.
Etsuro had grown up in an old-fashioned family, with an old-fashioned estate. He'd been an indifferent student and had gone to an all-boys' school, so dating was non-existent until his omiai with Yayoi. Romance had not ever truly crossed his mind. He and Yayoi had certainly done their duty with Sho, of course, but their union was not particularly passionate and he was certain that Yayoi thought of her wifely duties as precisely that—duties. He didn't know exactly what he was doing, but somehow he regretted not having an answer for her when she'd asked if he loved her. His first knee-jerk response was to call her question stupid. But why was he so defensive? It was a fair question. Weren't married couples supposed to love each other? And he didn't even really know what she meant by that. They'd been together for over twenty years, after all. He respected her. He got along with her. He considered her a partner. But did he love her?
It was too bad he couldn't talk to his own parents about it anymore, either. That was the thing—he had no one to talk to. He didn't have any friends that he stayed in contact with from high school or from university, and the day-to-day operations of the ryokan, plus its relative isolation, meant that he truly had no confidants beyond his wife and his staff. What did it mean to love someone? The children were in love, fine. He could concede that to Yayoi. A man who marshalled every bit of concentration in learning how to cut onions or fry an egg for the sake of love must be applauded. But for Kyoko-chan, Kuon would never even entered a kitchen. When Etsuro had given him his approval on the dish, the boy had looked as if he'd won an enormous prize. And Etsuro could find no fault in him, besides the fact that he would certainly take Kyoko away if things worked out between them. They acted like people in a saccharine drama—but somehow more real. The way the Hizuri boy looked at Kyoko-chan made him think that if anything—anything at all—were to happen to the girl, the boy would lose his mind. Seeing the Hizuri boy like that made him sincerely grateful that Sho had apparently never touched Kyoko. Those two simply looked…right together.
But surely he wasn't expected to look at his wife of twenty years like that, was he?
Was he?
That was the problem. He…kinda wanted to.
And why not? Yayoi was still an attractive and lovely woman, she was responsible, she was practical…she was…she was…
He didn't even know what she liked to do outside of running their ryokan. He knew she liked salty tamagoyaki, much like Sho did, but he didn't know much else. He didn't know what her favorite song was, for one, or her favorite food. Kuon had gone so far as to learn how to make Kyoko-chan's favorite dish and yet he, Etsuro, Taisho of a renowned ryokan, former head chef of a now Michelin-starred kitchen, did not know his wife's favorite food.
He felt a little ridiculous.
This was ridiculous, right?
He searched deep in his memories and remembered the parts of the life they shared—parts he cherished but never acknowledged. He remembered the hundred small kindnesses she did for him daily—the way she would bring him tea when he was looking over the ryokan accounts, the way she occasionally let him sleep in while she took care of the things he was planning on doing. A 'Ganbatte ne!' whenever he embarked on a larger project, an 'okaeri' whenever he left and came back home. The look on her face sometime during her seventh or eighth month of pregnancy, her belly as big as a house, backlit by the late winter's sun over the river. The radiant smile on her face right as Sho filled his lungs with air for the first time and screamed, and the way his heart pounded when he sat by her and they held their baby for the first time. The dignified and quiet way she stood by him as they watched the ruin of a man that he became. There were many things that were lovely about his wife, so why had he never treasured her?
Standing outside the bedroom that he shared with his wife of twenty years, the middle-aged father of a grown man, everything drooping down somewhat unattractively, grey hairs streaking through hair that was unfashionably cut…and hoping she would accept his affection.
But he had a red rose in his hand anyway.
Was it too late?
When he opened the door, Yayoi was in the pajamas she'd worn for years, brushing the black hair that was now streaked with grey.
"Etsuro?" she asked, surprised.
For a while he was tongue-tied. He was going to turn around and put the rose into a vase somewhere by the dining room so that the staff could put it onto a tray tomorrow for a guest. But he shook his head and walking up directly to his shell-shocked wife, handed her the rose.
"Yayoi." He stated her name awkwardly. He was her husband, dammit, her husband of twenty years. Not some middle-school boy confessing his love on the playground.
She looked at him expectantly, a single eyebrow raised.
"What I wanted to say was…I wanted to say…" He groaned, turned around, put his hands up to his face. Why was this so hard?
He was an ADULT, for goodness' sakes!
He turned around again, and with a determined air, declared, "Yayoi. I love you. Ahem."
Yayoi stared at her husband in surprise. Part of her wanted to ask if this was some joke, but the bashful sincerity on his face told her it wasn't. What he was trying to convey came through to her, loud and clear. And in a blink of an eye, she saw that even though she'd chosen this life of security, even though she'd chosen the safe road, the partner that had been chosen for her had somehow become the partner of her choice. Etsuro Fuwa—on the wrong side of 'middle-aged,' graying, occasionally querulous, and utterly unromantic—was standing in front of her as awkwardly as a boy at a middle-school kokuhaku. Her heart rose to respond to him.
This was the man who had carried her over the threshold of this ryokan as a pragmatic young bride, who had painstakingly made her the food she craved over a long and difficult pregnancy—the man who had held her when that son had repudiated them. This was a man who had not married her for love, but who had acted with all fidelity and honor and loyalty towards her. What they had wasn't the work of a thunderbolt. It was nothing so dramatic. No, what they had was the work of the passage of many years. And while it was nothing as dramatic as Kyoko and Kuon's, it was, to her, as beautiful.
He couldn't look at her, expected her to laugh at him and this stupid display. But he didn't hear anything.
When he finally looked up at her, he saw tears falling down her face.
"I love you too, Etsuro," she said. A smile had softened the severe expression she always wore. It made her look years younger.
All of a sudden, Etsuro felt a burst of warmth where nothing but anxious butterflies had been before. The affection he hadn't known was in him had burst forth from him and he found that he simply wanted to touch his wife, to hold and be held by her.
When they kissed moments later, it felt almost as if they were entirely new people, and Etsuro thought to himself "I'll have to thank Kyoko-chan for this someday, too."
=.=.=.=.=.=.=.=.=.=.=.=.=.=.=.=.=
Lory looked through the folder of pictures Ruto had managed to take. Damn Kuon. The boy had a sixth sense for evading photographs, likely the effect of having been in the paparazzi's eye for the entirety of his life. His parents had sold his baby pictures for a cool $4 million, for god's sake. Every time Ruto managed to get into position, Kuon found a convenient lamp post, or tree, or pillar. He was particularly good at hiding Kyoko from sight, moving in front of her or beside her. There was only one clear shot that he'd received, when Kuon had been too exposed and too fixed in one place to really be able to duck behind something. And even then he'd managed to keep his girl's face from being photographed. They were seated in a corner at a Kyoto dessert cafe, Kyoko facing away from the windows. Ruto managed to catch a shot of him grinning at the girl who sat with him and a massive sundae. He could only imagine what was going through the boy's head. Kuon hated eating, and hated sweets even more. From what Ruto had told him, it sounded as if the girl knew that and was protesting the ice cream that Kuon had ordered for them both.
Knowing Kuon, it was probably his damn chivalry. Lory could imagine the scene: Kyoko's face lighting up once she saw the desserts, and Kuon dragging her in and buying her the absolute most expensive thing in the place just to make her happy. He'd been like that when he was a teenager too, using his access to his parents' funds to please and impress the girls he dated. But this time, the look on his face was different. There was a softness there, a playfulness, a certain understated glow. Oh yes, Lory thought. He found what it was that made him happy in Kyoto. Lory thanked his feeling. This was what his intuition had been telling him! Now if only he could get a good shot of the girl's face! It was downright infuriating. What did she look like? From the shots he had from Ruto, it looked like she was the kind of girl who dressed simply, one that didn't particularly care for designer items. Her handbag looked well-worn, as did her shoes. Her hair was long and black, but not particularly different from any number of other Japanese girls that wore their hair long and black. She was of average height, had a lithe build, and otherwise looked…totally normal. At least from the back. But there was no question she'd captivated Kuon.
Ruto had eventually caught them wandering into the store, and Lory had to laugh at Kuon's chutzpah. His FACE was emblazoned all over the store—it was on posters, blown up all over the back wall, and the commercial he'd shot was playing throughout the establishment on sleek TVs. And yet…no one had recognized him. Lory was fairly certain the matsuri would be safe—dark and full of people, and with so many distractions and other foreigners in the mix. But to fool a store where his own face was on display on nearly every surface, well. That was talent. They were clearly there to buy outfits for the girl, and Ruto had reported on them wandering around the store. Kuon had piled a ton of clothes for her to try on, and the girl had…protested. In the end, they'd walked out of the store with a single outfit.
Most girls wouldn't have held back like that. But by now, Lory figured that Kyoko was not 'most girls.'
He was still proud of the boy for managing to hold her hand as they walked around the rest of the mall.
Lory sighed and sat back. From his reports from Yayoi-san, it was evident that some kind of understanding or confession had taken place. The boy was evading his phone calls. The last time Lory had called, all he'd gotten were monosyllabic responses from Kuon. No matter what bait Lory threw, the boy withstood the lure. It was this evasiveness more than anything that convinced Lory that something was happening. While he didn't necessarily regret sending Kuon out on this forced vacation, it gave him some pause. Once he'd settled into his Ren personality, Kuon had been a known quantity because Ren Tsuruga was a known quantity. A man without any vices except overwork, no inclination to womanizing or to drugs or alcoholism. If Ren was boring, it was because Lory had impressed upon Kuon the importance of transcending the mess he'd left behind in LA.
But now…well, Kuon was alive again. Who knew what would happen when Ren came back? For Kuon's sake, he hoped that this Kyoko-girl would understand. Lory assumed that Kuon had told her the entire sordid detail of Kuon's past. She was part of it, wasn't she? Yayoi had confirmed it to him. His feelings had told him she existed long before she appeared in Ruto's photographs. If Lory had ever had a doubt as to whether or not a crimson thread connected those two, they were silenced after Yayoi managed to pry the story out of Kyoko.
He was worried for Kuon's sake. Worried that the girl wouldn't be able to withstand the pressure of being a celebrity's girlfriend. Worried about the inevitable separations that would occur as work took Ren further and further away—first to Tokyo, and then to America for the Route project. But…well…sometimes even a tragic love story was better than no love story at all. Better to have loved and lost than to have never loved at all, and all that. Somehow, though, Lory had a feeling that this wasn't going to have a tragic end.
He grinned with satisfaction. His feelings were never wrong.
=.=.=.=.=.=.=.=.=.=.=.=.=.=.=.=.=
Maria watched her grandfather's face as he perused the manila folder of Ruto's pictures. Something was up. Something had been up for a while, she knew. Maria was always more observant than adults gave her credit for. First, Grandfather was more pensive than usual. And then Ren-sama went missing, and no one could tell her where he went. She was sure Grandfather and Ruto knew, because they knew everything. But even Yashiro didn't know, and this worried Maria. She knew he wasn't lying about not knowing, either. For Yashiro not to know was cause for major panic. Was it something extremely dangerous? Something Ren-sama couldn't do publicly? Even his fan sites hadn't reported any sightings for weeks and now, all of a sudden, there was lots of speculation over where Ren could be.
"Grandfather!" she said, running into the office. Lory looked up from the manila folder, surprised. It had been a while since Maria had come running in like this, and he hastily closed the folder and shoved it away.
Too late.
Maria grabbed it, and opened it up to see an oddly familiar figure sitting next to a girl with a huge sundae. A tall young man, with broad shoulders and a gentle smile. Who was it? Maria felt as if she should know him, but she didn't know any blondes with green eyes.
"Grandfather, are you spying on someone again?" she asked.
"Hardly, Maria," Lory replied. "Your grandfather doesn't spy on people!"
"Oh realllllllyyyyyyyyyyyyy…."
"It's true!"
"Then why is this guy always trying to hide? Who is he? And who's the girl?"
"Why, that's…" Lory paused. "That's someone who might do some work for LME," he eventually said.
Maria's eyes narrowed. As a precocious child, she knew when her grandfather was lying. "OK, grandfather," she said. "Now who is he, really?"
"You really don't know who that is?"
"No—he looks like a foreign—"
And then it struck her. Ren-sama had been missing, and no one knew where he was. And now here was this oddly familiar foreigner and Grandfather had pictures of him.
"Did…is that…Ren-sama….?" she asked.
Her grandfather's silence was all the response that she needed. "But why, grandfather? Why is he blonde? Is it for a role?"
Her face darkened as she saw this strange blonde Ren holding hands with the mysterious girl. "And who is that? Is she trying to steal my Ren-sama?" Maria's hands clenched into fists and her childish voice quavered. "Why…why is he looking at her like that?"
"Maria…shhhh." He was preparing himself for yet another tantrum. He suspected it had nothing to do with Ren at all, but with her ongoing resentment with her father. Maria had only been using Ren-sama as a screen. Maria's tantrums had been uncontrollable of late. It started last year, when she was hiding from her handlers and wreaking havoc in the LME acting school. Even he couldn't find her. He'd even written an entire play for her, all about a girl who had lost her mother and who was convinced her father hated her. She'd figured it out and accused him of pandering—but only after she'd called the acting school students in that cast 'talentless swine' and made them all cry. It didn't help that all of her barbs were brutally accurate. Her interest in the occult had burgeoned, and now she managed to terrify every single nanny he'd hired. She was so observant that she knew exactly what most people were thinking most of the time, and the way she wielded that knowledge was more than a little frightening. In a way, he was immensely proud of her. She had all the makings of a true Takarada. But in the meantime…things simply couldn't go on like this. He had tried everything.
"You always tell me to be quiet! But you're lying to me, and Ren-sama shouldn't be looking at anyone like that except ME!"
Here it comes, Lory thought. Typhoon Maria making landfall. She started with throwing papers off his desk, beginning with the offending paperwork. And then she moved to the bronze statue of a cowboy—Lory was doing an American West theme right now. But when she moved to his laptop, Lory put a hand out to stop her. This simply wouldn't do anymore. He wouldn't have anyone say that he wasn't doing right by his granddaughter, and doing right sometimes meant telling her that her behavior was not acceptable.
"Maria, stop."
Maria stopped, looking up at her grandfather with wide eyes. He'd never spoken to her that way before. Tears were beginning to fall down her face. "It's just…it's just that Ren-sama doesn't look at me like that, Ojii-san." Her upper lip quivered. "No one does."
'No one does,' Lory heard her say. No one looks at her like that? He took a look at the tears that were falling down his granddaughter's face. Maria knew how to summon tears at will. She was surrounded by actresses every single day—she knew how to act. But unless she'd figured out how to fake hitherto unknown depths of grief, these tears were the real thing. Lory sighed heavily. "Maria…you say you always know when adults are lying. So let's have a very honest conversation, you and me."
Maria nodded, wiping her tears away defiantly. "You are my beloved granddaughter. Do you believe that is the truth?"
She nodded again. "Tell me who you are, Maria."
"I am Maria Takarada, Jii-san. Your granddaughter."
"Tell me honestly. Do you truly believe what you're doing right now is acceptable behavior for a Takarada?"
Lory looked into Maria's eyes and didn't flinch at the anger he saw in them. He stared at her. He didn't want to yell, didn't want to pontificate. Maria was a smart girl, and had inherited his considerable abilities at reading and manipulating people. She was still a child, but there was no reason to treat her as if she didn't understand what was going on.
Eventually she lowered her eyes. "No, Ojii-san." Her voice was quiet and a little ashamed. She knew grandfather was worried about her. She had heard him on the phone to someone by her bedside when he thought she was asleep, going over what she'd been doing that day, how she was doing in school. She knew her temper tantrums upset her grandfather, but then—he never paid attention to her unless she was screaming!
"Can you explain to me why this picture upset you so much?"
"Ren-sama is…well, he's mine, grandfather!"
"Why do you think that?"
"Um. Well…he's nice. And he's handsome."
"That's true. But besides that, what do you like about him, Maria-chan? Kijima-kun is also nice and handsome. Ruto-san, too. And Murasame-kun, and Yashiro-kun."
Maria couldn't answer her grandfather. The truth wasn't so much that she wanted Ren-sama…it was just that she wanted his attention. "I…don't know."
"Here's what I think, Maria-chan, and you can tell me if I'm wrong." Lory was dead serious. "I don't think it's Ren-sama you want at all. I know he's extremely handsome, dear, and many other people besides yourself think they're in love with him. And I know he's very much a gentleman—"
"Ren-sama is going to marry me!" Maria interjected. "He has to! You can make him marry me, Grandfather! Ne, jii-san?" She stomped her foot on the ground.
But Lory continued impassively. "—but I don't think you know him very well. Can you tell me what makes him happy? Have you ever really seen him happy?"
That quieted her down. Didn't Maria make Ren-sama happy? Maria thought about that for a long time. "Maria-chan, how are you?" he'd always ask, and his eyes would crinkle up into little slits as his mouth smiled a practiced smile. Ren-sama could always be counted on to pick her up and spoil her and treat her like a gentleman, but when she really thought about it…his smiles always seemed a little fake. And when he was working, or walking with Yashiro-kun, he was always so serious.
She looked up at her grandfather, who was looking at her thoughtfully. "No," she said. "I don't think so." All of a sudden she wanted to cry. If she really loved Ren-sama, shouldn't she have seen before now that he wasn't happy at all?
Lory picked up the picture of Kuon that she'd thrown off his desk and placed it in front of her. "Now tell me. Does he look happy here?"
Maria's eyes were blurry but she couldn't deny it. "Yes." She was jealous. Jealous, jealous, jealous. And it wasn't about Ren-sama, really, but seeing him look like that…it made her feel so lonely. Everyone around her never truly looked at her. They looked through her, or over her, but they never really looked at her.
"I want him to look at me like that."
"Can I tell you another theory, Maria-chan?" Lory asked. "I don't think it's about Ren-sama at all. I think you don't know that other people have looked at you the way he's looking at this girl."
"Other people?"
"Other people have looked at you like Ren is looking at that girl. Other people love you, Maria."
Lory reached into a desk drawer, pulling out a well-worn album. "Come here," he said, motioning to his lap. It had been a long time since he'd held his granddaughter, and in just a few short years she would be altogether too old for sitting on grandfather's lap.
He opened a page and then there were pictures. Maria had never seen them—she'd been so young when she'd estranged herself from her father. Lory was certain that before now, she wouldn't have even been remotely receptive to seeing them. But he flipped to the first page of his son holding his granddaughter on the day she was born. "This was when you were born, Maria. Do you recognize him?"
Maria turned her face away. She didn't want to see her father. Her father had told her she had killed her mother—and the problem was Maria knew he was right. "I don't want to see him, Grandfather," she said. "He hates me."
Lory stroked the golden-haired head and said, "No, dearest. I think you should look. We said we wouldn't lie to each other today."
Maria looked. Kouki Takarada's face was streaked with tears but he was holding his infant daughter and gazing at her with all the love Kuon had had on his face and possibly more. "It's father. He's…looking at me."
"Like he loves you. Because he does love you, Maria. He loves you very much."
He showed her picture after picture of his son holding his granddaughter—pictures of Kouki and Lina, back when Maria was still a baby, and then as she grew older, into a laughing toddler with curly golden hair and twinkling amber eyes. Picture after picture of her parents looking at her as if she was the most precious thing they had ever seen.
"So you see, love. You have been looked at like that before."
"Maybe he used to, but he doesn't love me anymore, jii-san. He said so. At mother's funeral."
Lory knew that this was a landmine. "Doesn't he email you every morning and every night?"
"Adults can do that. It doesn't mean that he means anything by it."
"Adults spend hours lying to other adults to make themselves feel better, Maria. But your father doesn't just email you…he calls me, and he asks me about you, and he wants to talk to you—he just doesn't know how."
Maria met this last statement with stony silence.
"Then let me show you something, then." Lory opened up a browser window on his laptop, to the Financial Times homepage. Kouki had just been given a feature as an up-and-coming investment banker with ties to several prominent Hollywood production companies. The article featured a large portrait of him, seated in his office. "Maria, look."
"It's…it's just a picture of him, grandfather."
"No. Look closer."
Maria peered closer in. "Look behind him."
And then Maria gasped. Behind him, she could see picture frames. Pictures and pictures of her…taken recently. "Your father asks for pictures of you constantly, did you know that? He says it keeps him going. He says that even if you won't see him, he feels better if he can see you."
Maria sobbed deep into Lory's shoulder and he hugged his granddaughter for what felt like the first time in a very, very long time. "So you see, Maria, yes. You do have someone that looks at you like that."
He felt Maria nod her head into his shoulder and sob and sob and sob and was grateful he was wearing a worn flannel and some durable denim today, instead of the ancient Chinese-style hanfu he'd had on yesterday with the notoriously expensive silk. Still, he felt that some wall between them had been broken. It had taken her reaction to Kuon's ridiculous face to show him how terribly she'd been craving love, and he decided to make it a point to spend more time with her. And then at some point soon, he would have to get Kouki back to Japan. I'm going to have to apologize to Kuon and then thank him for looking like this in public, he thought.
His thoughts were interrupted by a calmer, clear-eyed Maria. "I still want to know about what's happening with Ren-sama."
Lory grinned. That was his girl. She was going to be a lovemon just like her grandfather. "Perhaps you would feel better if I told you a story."
"Is it going to be a good story, Grandfather? Sometimes you make the girls date too many guys."
"Of course it'll be a good story, Maria," Lory said. "And once you hear it you'll understand why Ren-kun is doing what he's doing."
At eight years old, Maria considered herself a little too old for her grandfather's fairy stories. But this one…this one smelled a little different. So she settled into her chair and listened.
"Once upon a time, a very lonely little girl was crying by a stream. She had a very wicked mother who was cruel to her, and very wicked children who taunted her and bullied her. One day, instead of finding herself alone, a beautiful boy with golden hair was by the stream. 'Are you a fairy?' asked the little girl…"
=.=.=.=.=.=.=.=.=.=.=.=.=.=.=.=.=
The quiet 'ding' on the phone woke Kuu up. 3am in Los Angeles, Julienna breathing quietly and evenly by his side. Not terribly many people knew this cell phone number, and even fewer would have the temerity to text him so late at night. For a second he was afraid it was an emergency, but then…if it was an emergency, wouldn't they simply call?
He fumbled on the nightstand until he felt the cool block of his mobile, and then swiped. A text from Lory.
Instantly he was awake. While it was almost certainly daytime in Japan, Lory was fairly good at staying within normal hours when it came to communication. Kuu's heart twinged a little. Was this about his son? He'd gone to Japan last year, while Dark Moon was still filming. He and Lory had discussed visiting the set, perhaps having Kuon come over to have dinner as a Katsuki-to-Katsuki heart-to-heart. But Ren Tsuruga had refused. Oh, Lory had tried to placate him. "You look too much alike," he'd said. "It isn't so obvious right now when audiences can't make side-by-side comparisons, but if you pose together it'll be obvious that Ren looks too much like you." Kuu had argued against this line of argument. Of course we'll look a little alike, he'd told Lory. If you were a casting director, wouldn't you find someone that kinda looked like the original actor? Many actors resembled each other in coloring and in facial structure and were in no way, shape, or form related. It became evident, though, that it wasn't Lory who wanted to keep them apart but Kuon himself.
"I'm sorry, Kuu," Lory had said. "Ren's refusing to come meet you."
"Ren?"
"Ren. Kuon is gone, you know. He's sworn he won't speak to you or see you until he is ready to come back."
This hurt Kuu considerably. He understood where Ren came from, of course, understood how and why his son had to leave the United States. But surely the Takarada mansion was secure—secure enough for him to see his son. But every report he'd ever received about Ren Tsuruga indicated that Ren Tsuruga was a stranger. A sober, serious, professional stranger who had a reputation for precision in his work and a low tolerance for bad behavior in his co-stars. Not Kuon. By the time he'd left L.A., Kuon was an angry, hostile shell of a boy. Kuu knew he called himself a murderer, but nothing Kuu said or did could dissuade him from thinking of himself like that. And not for the first time, he wondered what he'd done wrong as a father.
Was he so bad that his son wouldn't even shed his cover persona for a second to meet with him? Even if he met Kuon as Ren, he would've been grateful. And as for Julienna…well. She'd sent him to Japan to tell Kuon that she was dying in three months, but the message had not been delivered. How could he deliver it when Kuon wouldn't even meet with them? Notwithstanding the fact that the illness was a fabrication, he sympathized with his wife. Kuu, at least, had been informed by Lory when Kuon had walked away to go to Japan. But Julienna? Julienna had been in Paris, walking a runway. She hadn't been told until hours later, and had refused to believe it until after a week had passed where Kuon was noticeably not in his room, or at school, or on their property.
His hands shook as he opened Lory's message, and then there it was. A single picture. A single picture of his son as he remembered him, in a blaze of golden-haired glory. In front of him was an enormous sundae, and in front of that, a girl whose back was turned to the camera. The look on Kuon's face reminded Kuu of a time when his son was still young, and innocent, and lovely—before he had been corrupted by the darkness of an untempered Hollywood. The smile on that face was, in every sense of the word, heart-stoppingly wonderful. Ren Tsuruga was an exceedingly handsome man—no hair dye or contact lenses could change that about Kuon. But here, in this picture, Kuu could see how their son had taken the very best of both himself and his wife. The combination was far greater than the sum of its parts. An undisguised Kuon Hizuri could probably turn entire battalions of women into stone, and Kuu almost felt sorry for the girl with the sundae.
He stopped.
Who was the girl with the sundae?
For a second, Kuu was wildly jealous. He had crossed an entire ocean to see Kuon, and Kuon had refused to see him. And yet here, in this picture, was evidence that Kuon was alive and well and, apparently, gallivanting around Kyoto.
He couldn't tell very much about her from the photo. A Japanese girl, apparently. That was it.
Beside him, Juliena murmured in her sleep, and Kuu couldn't resist.
"Julie!" he said.
"Mmmmmmmm" came the response.
"Julie! It's Kuon! Wake up!"
"Kuu…" she murmured. "Miss him. Miss Kuon…"
"Julie, wake up."
His wife rubbed her eyes sleepily. "What?"
"Look."
"What is this?"
"Just look at it!"
He handed her the phone and watched as her face cycled through a whole spectrum of emotions. Surprise, confusion, disbelief, love, jealousy, joy. "Kuon…!" she breathed.
"In the flesh."
"He's…not in disguise."
"No. And he's not in character, either."
"That's our baby!"
Kuu put his arm around his wife as tears began falling silently down her face.
"I thought I'd never see him again. I thought…he'd be Ren Tsuruga forever…"
"Me too," Kuu said, rubbing comforting circles on her back. There was an overwhelming sense of warmth that rose from the core of his body. The son he remembered as an adolescent boy had undoubtedly grown in the intervening time, but seeing him as himself was a revelation. Who knew his eyes could look at someone with such affection? Julie's tears fell onto the sheet and he reached to engulf her in his arms.
"He's…he's coming back," she said.
"Yes."
"He's alive!"
"Yes."
"Who…who is she?"
There was an unmistakable note of jealousy in her voice. Kuon had refused to listen to the message that she only had three months to live, after all, and yet here he was in broad daylight with a girl and some ice cream.
"I don't know," Kuu said. "I was wondering if you'd like to call Lory."
Her smile was answer enough.
Author's Notes:
First of all, I want to thank everyone who's been following this story with me. This chapter brings DoK to over 100k words and I am flabbergasted. When I started, I'd never really written a long fic before and I thought I'd be done in about 30,000 words. WRONG. So wrong. So very, very wrong. That said, I also never expected you guys to send me so many kind words and kind reviews. I didn't expect finding such a nice community to be a part of! I am really thankful that I began writing and really thankful that you guys are here.
I wanted to have a calm, fluffy chapter before the next few upcoming. Please let me know what you think! Reviews are like food!
1. Lorenz, E. (1963) Deterministic Nonperiodic Flow. Journal of the Atmospheric Sciences, 20(2), 130-141. Or, in the words of Neil Gaiman and Terry Pratchett: It used to be thought that the events that changed the world were things like big bombs, maniac politicians, huge earthquakes, or vast population movements, but it has now been realized that this is a very old-fashioned view held by people totally out of touch with modern thought. The things that really change the world, according to Chaos theory, are the tiny things. A butterfly flaps its wings in the Amazonian jungle, and subsequently a storm ravages half of Europe.
2. The sundae in the picture is the same sundae found on Ren and Kyoko's spread in the 2022 Hana to Yume calendar. Just picture blonde Kuon and pre-haircut and bleach Kyoko in place of our normal RenKyo XD
3. Subdermal contraceptive implants such as Nexplanon are NOT available in Japan. In fact, the only available means of birth control are the pill, spermicides, condoms and the IUD. You CANNOT get the minipill (though I hear this might be changing soon), diaphragms, vaginal hormone rings, hormone patches (the sticker), or contraceptive sponges. This scene is entirely fictional. For the exigencies of this story, though, I'm going to wave my magic wand and say Kyoko was able to get the implant. Because. Because next chapter, that's what. [maniacal laughter]
4. The scene where Kyoko gives Kuon some onigiri is now a one-shot which is part of the 2021 Kyoko Birthday Minibang entitled "Christmas in July" - there are some really cute stories by a number of SB authors in that collection!
5. The tea ceremony picture exists! It was inspired by an ink drawing by artist Chitesnoo_art on Insta titled "Tea for Two" and published on that platform on December 12, 2021. BTW check out her art because she's awesome!