-NAKIRI SENZAEMON-

NOVEMBER 15

Before he founded Tōtsuki Tea and Ceremony Culinary Academy, Nakiri Senzaemon can admit:

He was a horrible fucking person in his youth.

An indomitable Yakuza boss and head chef of the most notorious underworld culinary gang, Senzaemon had a devastating reputation. He was merciless, and his insatiable ambition quickly dominated the gourmet scene as he satisfied the refined palates of the worst kinds of men in Japan and across Asia, also known as his clientele. He had high expectations for his sous chefs and did not tolerate failure from his subordinates. He made dishes to die for with flavors that could kill, not to mention he was a sweet lover to whomever he craved.

And he was damned good at pleasing them all.

A savage-savant with the chef's blade, Senzaemon ended countless careers and lives with his intense prowess in the kitchen and intimidating presence in the epicenter of Japan's crime syndicates to reach this status as the "Food's Demon King." With this prestige came more power, influence, wealth, and a revered notoriety that preceded his steps like the Grim Reaper. The fiftieth direct descendant of the most renowned swordsmiths and culinary family in Japan, he was the proud embodiment of the Nakiri dynasty.

The deaths he caused never bothered him. He did not bat an eyelash, let alone lose a wink of sleep when his blade turned from food onto flesh. But he made a point to only kill men worse than him and chefs weaker than him. (But let the record show that Senzaemon was not evil; he only responded to the violence those pieces of shit over what they did to women, children, and food; he never incited it—he still had morals).

But he did the worst with reckless abandon because he never envisioned having a long life. And he for damned sure never fathomed having a family of his own.

Then fate laughed. By chance, one Sunday morning after a fresh kill (of a person or livestock, his old age now fails to recall) he crossed paths with the most beautiful woman he'd ever laid eyes on. Sakura Yoko. He fell in love with his beloved's purple amaranth eyes at first glance and knew there would never be anyone else. She wasn't perfect—a man as vicious and morally depraved as he could never be so greedy as to expect that—but she was his version of perfection. Yoko was kind and gentle, with not a drop of blood staining her virtue, but possessed a fierce tongue and a sharp mind. A beguiling and generous genius in every way, everywhere Yoko went, she was doing good for the sake of others whether they were friends or strangers. In no time at all, Senzaemon fell in love with her humanity and before he could even catch his breath or measure up to her love, every priority in his life had already shifted. She was his peace. He met her at the dawn of a new day—she invited him to Sunday morning meditation at her temple, and he made her lunch at his teahouse—and by nightfall that evening, he had officially quit his life of sin.

Yoko was an angel sent by his spirit guides to save him, he knew, so he adopted her faith and loved her how one loves that which is divine.

So, when he was given the chance to start anew and atone for his transgressions with a new life full of love and happiness, he took it jealously and ran, never looking back. But Senzaemon had never experienced love before Yoko; it was too dangerous an emotion in his former line of work. He'd committed so many crimes and done so many things without any positive regard for others that it took a while for him to settle into it. So, love in its many shameless, humiliating, and humbling forms changed him in ways he'd later understand were ruthlessly unfair and painfully necessary. Through the trajectory his life took by loving Yoko, Nakiri Senzaemon experienced innumerable ego deaths.

Namely, he was ill-prepared for the softening of his hard heart.

Nevertheless, falling in love and becoming a devoted husband and family man were the greatest gifts in his corrupt life. Senzaemon's values shifted to the opposite extreme of "kill or be killed, eat or be devoured" once he was married with children. Yoko's tender heart inspired him to become a better man, an upstanding example for their newborn son. Holding his firstborn son's innocent life in his callous hands opened his narrow eyes to how rewarding it was to live for someone else. No longer did it make sense to kill people who couldn't cook and were too untaught or arrogant to know this. In fact, killing without cause became such a grotesque thing in his new life with his beloved who cried at the mere sight of a swatted fly that he abandoned it altogether in favor of cultivating the next generations of Japanese culinary artists. He didn't even allow his family to consume meat from slaughterhouses. Organic and free-range only.

Even more astonishing to the live-fast-die-young gangster, was that he no longer wanted to live fast or die young. He no longer wanted to only leave a legacy of long, bloodstained trails in his wake. He wanted to be a destiny helper, not a demon king. However, he maintained his notoriety for being strict and intimidating. He demanded high expectations from his students and still did not tolerate failure from his budding chefs. But he defined failure differently now. Failure was giving up on oneself and one's dreams, calling it quits before even trying to succeed. And that's why he structured Tōtsuki to be so cutthroat.

"If topping the culinary world is truly worth it to these young chefs, they will have to fight tooth and nail, through their blood, sweat, and tears to make their dreams come true. Success at Tōtsuki Academy is not handed, nor is it simply earned; success is hard-won," he told the local press after the academy's first mass expulsion of ninety out of the one hundred students enrolled caused parents and expelled students to protest the upstart culinary school's savage culling policy and practices. Shortly after, the first Fall Selection was held and the inaugural Elite Council of Ten was formed, and Tōtsuki's prestige began to rise.

Still, this second chance at life was going so well that he felt fortunate to be lavishly blessed and kissed by the gods. He hadn't expected it to take a turn for the worst.

Then Yoko became pregnant with his baby girl and grew gravely ill.

That's when the night terrors of his wicked past came back to haunt him. He did not remember many of their names or faces (after a while, he made the hit orders more than he did the killing himself), but the few that he did recall haunted him relentlessly. The men he murdered who had families of their own visited him every night. They wailed about the wives, mourned their mistresses, and lashed out at him about loved ones they left behind. They cried over the children they never got to see grow up and the legacies they never got to finish building. They hurled curses and terrible wishes at his head and squeezed his heart with the worst fears imaginable. This was all new to him. He'd never known such fear before.

So, he prayed and he prayed and he prayed for forgiveness. He begged and he begged and he begged the gods and his ancestors not to take his dear Yoko's life or the babe in the womb away as recompense. Then, Yoko gave birth after a lengthy and near-death labor, and both mother and baby made it out alive, and Senzaemon felt like they had answered his prayers. But the payment owed was still due, and the family curse that had skipped him and his entire generation had descended upon his baby girl. Soon after, his sweet, precious Yoko met an end that, to this day, still unravels him at the seams, breaks his brain into a billion pieces, and brings him shaking to his knees at the mere shadow of remembrance. He does not share the memories of her departing with anyone. Not even his children know the truth concerning their mother's death.

Now in his old age, Senzaemon reflects on his undeserved long years, and how he failed the woman he loved and the family they created. The nightmares still come during the quiet hours and the hauntings still visit him in his sleep. He laments over the heaping portion of karma placed like hot coals upon his head. How he, his actions, and his bloodline ripped all the goodness out of his life by his own bloody hands. For all the lives, for all careers, for all the futures he destroyed...

Nakiri Senzaemon regrets it all.

-8-

Now in the autumn of the third era of his life, Senzaemon has become more clear-eyed about many things. Namely, the fragile gift of family—now he knows that Yoko and Mana survived childbirth because of Yoko's piety, not his prayers—and the double-edged curse of his ancestral endowment, the God Tongue. The spiritual gift rose the Nakiri clan to dynasty heights previously unknown in Japan and the culinary world, as it rivaled the samurai with its unparalleled dominance. In the Edo period, the Nakiri clan didn't need to compete with the rank and social class of the military, for the divine utility of the God Tongue made it so the samurai fought to protect them. They sat in a social class of their own, feeding only shoguns and their royal families. Of course, as with all influential clans, they were begged and bartered to forge political marriages and strengthen their alliances. But the house of Nakiri stood tall, strong, and independent for ages because, for generations by the God Tongue's holy might alone, emperors, kings, noblemen, and samurai alike were all well fed. And by it, the Nakiri knife became a household blade.

The God Tongue was the Nakiri pride and the reason for their immense fortune.

And as Senzaemon took the helm as the Nakiri patriarch, it was nearly the cause of their demise. Without it, his reputation as the "Culinary Don of Japan," and the renown that the Nakiri name carried with it, would have long fizzled into the forgotten past. But Mana's life as its vessel was a living hell. The God Tongue destroyed his strawberry cherub in unforeseen ways that she did not deserve. She did not deserve to pay the brutal price of the sins of her father. He'd been relieved when the boy, Soe, didn't manifest the gifted curse; he thought he'd dodged the bullet and it would pass over another generation. But from the moment Mana spat out Yoko's breastmilk with a sour, displeased newborn face and endlessly cried with colic for forty days, peace forever slipped out of Senzaemon's grasp.

But what being a reformed mob boss-turned-family man couldn't do to thaw his heart, and what mastering the culinary arts and transforming culinary education in perpetuity, producing global master chefs times without number, couldn't do to his pride, fathering his daughter and grandfathering his two precious granddaughters did a billion times over. Parenting, and therein, grandparenting, was the toughest job the former Yakuza ever had.

When his first grandchild, the precocious Nakiri Alice was born, Senzaemon's heart shattered into a million pieces the instant he saw his eldest granddaughter. He saw those piercing red stones once her silver lashes fluttered open for the first time, and he was in shambles. Alice laughed right in his face and he could not contain the joy he felt in his heart. He held the pale babe in his arms, and kissed her wispy hair, its color inherited from her mother, and his old soul was reborn as a divine child, bountiful with the delights of pure, innocent life, and a fiery spirit.

Senzaemon loved his granddaughters equally, just as he did his children, but it's difficult for a parent, or grandparent for that matter, to discuss his equal love and the faults of his children without sounding like he had a favorite. Each child was special in different ways and required different things; and honestly, he'd learned the danger of raising his own two children without any differentiation. His firstborn and only son, Soe was a reserved child who embraced his father's strict parenting style with ease and admiration. He also received the best of the golden years of Senzaemon's new life. But Mana? Senzaemon sighed at the mere thought of his splintery baby girl. Mana rebelled. That beautiful, highly sensitive girl rebelled like hell.

He fumbled miserably at raising Mana. She was a troubled soul right from birth. He hadn't a clue how to father this little girl on his own as her mauve irises melted into melancholy as she wrestled with her eating disorders and mental illnesses. He could never compete with Yoko's motherly guidance and failed, though he tried, to protect her from herself and the wickedness of someone else. She bore his demons, and he could do nothing more than pay for the best treatments in the world and ensure she received the finest residential care affluence could afford.

So, when he found out Mana was with child, Senzaemon wrestled day and night with whatever god would dare listen and have mercy on his wretched soul to make the God Tongue pass over his daughter's child. He could not do that again. He would not. He refused.

In the end, he lost that battle with the heavens. And as his heart bled for his daughter and newest granddaughter both withering away from malnutrition…

Nakiri Senzaemon never prayed again.

-8-

But Nakiri Erina's birth changed everything. She tilted his world on a new axis. The life in that precious child's full-mooned face rewired every neural pathway in his brain, rewove every frayed fiber of his heart, and rewrote the dreadful future he once foresaw.

This peach cherub, with her golden blonde locks and face the mirror image of her mother and her mother's mother, he cried; she had his beloved's purple-pinkish eyes. Her entrance into this world, into his life, was grace abounding over his sinful past. Erina was his final redemption as a clumsy parent and his last virtue as an aging man.

He cradled the famished newborn to his chest and vowed with his life to stop at nothing to save her from the same fate.

-8-

Now, Erina was growing into a strong, beautiful, and lovely young woman.

(Though, as her grandfather, he still punished himself for subjecting her to such a harrowing childhood full of abuse and neglect. He failed to keep his promise to never repeat the past and hated himself for it, though his first act the moment he gained full custody as her legal guardian was to put her into intensive child therapy.)

And like her mother, Erina was at the mercy of the God Tongue. And, unfortunately, just like when Mana started dating, she was going through the maelstrom of young love along with it.

But unlike when he met Nakamura Azami, Nakiri Senzaemon liked Yukihira Soma. He valued the young maverick's tenacious spirit, and courage, and how he displayed such carefree mettle in the face of adversity. He liked that the boy didn't embarrass people just for the hell of it, but taught each opponent to desire more of themselves. He was a good and daring young man with a lot of heart and a deep love for cooking and his friends. Though marriage was too far in the future to consider, if any man was deserving of a daughter of the house of Nakiri, it was surely to be Yukihira.

Therefore, he did not mind that the lad was in love with his granddaughter, or that she was smitten by him either. That boy was one Senzaemon knew Yoko would approve of. And from the looks of it, he came from a calmer, loving home and more stable parentage than Senzaemon had been able to provide for his own family—especially Erina. He also knew Joichiro well enough to see the same relentless fire that had burned out in the father at such a young age was passed down to his son, still burning bright and alive.

Which brought him to the pressing matter at hand. While Senzaemon was no longer the school's director, he still enjoyed a bit of good school gossip, and what he'd read and the paparazzi photos he'd seen in the last few editions of TohSpo caused him great concern. He'd never seen his preciously pretentious Erina so worn and weathered in the public eye—it was so unlike her. It did not become her to look like such a mess. She was his granddaughter and heir, and though he didn't want to pry—he knows granddaughters aren't particularly fond of talking to their grandfathers about their love lives—he needed to ensure she was okay. So, he agreed to the young Yukihira's request that he attend his birthday dinner.

But that was weeks ago and she was off being professional so they hadn't had one of their cherished daddy-daughter chats, and well…Senzaemon missed his baby girl. He paced his study's floor pondering what an old man ought to do when he heard a knock down the hall.

He opened the door and poked his head out.

"Sakura?"

-NAKIRI ERINA-

NOVEMBER 15

Before falling in love with Soma, if someone had told Erina that she would ever willingly do anything for a man who wasn't her grandfather, she would've slapped them across the face for even imagining such a stupid thing. Growing up, she'd met her fair share of ignorant, well-meaning adults who would try to pair her with their useless sons, grandsons, and nephews in hopes of marrying them off to the great Nakiri clan. They were all so foolish, thinking their weak and sorry excuses for offspring could ever measure and marry up to her. Thankfully, her grandfather never hesitated to reject them all on her behalf.

Once, during a gala dinner as the two Nakiris sat at their top donors' table, one of her clients approached them.

-8-

"N-N-Nakiri-s-s-sama!" He said, bowing and trembling with a bouquet before Erina and Senzaemon. The young man bowed lower before asking for her hand in marriage. The gentle giant she loved with all her heart indignantly slapped the tulips and ring box out of sight right in front of her salad.

"No man that can't even look me in the eye could ever request my granddaughter's hand in marriage," he thundered to the young man running away in tears. It was an embarrassing shame, too, she thought. He might've been handsome enough for her to consider in another life.

"Grandfather," she whispered once he took his seat, "that was the eldest son of the gala's chairman."

"I don't care if it was the Son of God," he said. "You're barely five and ten!" Her grandfather looked at her incredulously. "Don't tell me you wanted me to offer my blessing?"

"Oh, god, no! I would never. I was just saying..."

"Good. Then there's nothing more to say. Besides... tulips?!" He scoffed. "He didn't even think to offer the romantic gesture of a dozen roses!"

Erina giggled. "But, Papa, what if the Chairman tries to retaliate?" She asked under her breath. They looked across the ballroom at the dignified senior scowling their way. Her grandfather stone-glared back, then broke into a wide smile and waved.

"That coward wouldn't dare."

-8-

Since she was a little girl, Erina had little patience for any man apart from Nakiri Senzaemon. So, it's easy to see where she got her superiority from. The rumor mill would have people think her precocious attitude came from her father's callous parenting style, (and sure, maybe he played a small part in shaping her hardened personality). However, she credited her grandfather for molding her deep sense of self-confidence. So, it always left a bad taste in her mouth and activated her gag reflex to even consider pleasing any man other than him. Before Soma opened her heart, no other man was worthy of such care and consideration. Once, she even slapped a pompous male client and shuttered his distribution business for insinuating that he could give her a better life than her grandfather. What an insult! But she'd slapped people for far less. (And this isn't even addressing her older brother's incestuous lore—and that's another story altogether.)

No one could protect her like her 'Papa', and even he nearly failed to save her from her father's wickedness. But she forgave him because he played the long game to redeem her humanity. She'd seen enough of the depravity and inferiority complexes in the hearts and egos of men to know that no man alive deserved her, try as he might to earn her love. Erina doubted she'd truly love another man if Soma never took her life by storm that fateful spring day. Then again, Yukihira Soma was in a category on his own. She wanted to give him the world and then some.

But that's enough talking about the men.

Now, when it came to her girls and the women in her life—even her selfishly neglectful mother—Nakiri Erina would do anything for them. She preferred to keep her circle as small as a period, so she didn't have many trusted friends—just Alice and Hisako—but they were enough. They were very different people, a temptress versus a soothsayer, each girl balanced her like opposite ends of Libra scales. And she needed them both to keep a level head in the cutthroat and elite world she'd grown up in. So, please understand how stressed she was to find out these two separate but equal circles in her life were incompatible when brought together. She was the middle part of their Venn diagram, so she needed them to reconcile fast.

Therefore, the final matter on Erina's task list to clean up her messy life was to mediate the drama between her two best friends. Thankfully, the trip to Tōhoku gave her the perfect idea of how to do so—because she couldn't lose either girl. She called Hisako to meet her in her director's office in an hour. She knocked on Alice's bedroom door. Her cousin did not answer. She walked down the mansion's long hallway, texting feverishly.

"Sakura?" Only one person ever called her by her middle name—her maternal grandmother's surname. Erina turned around to find her grandfather poking his head out of his third-floor study, looking more adorable than intimidating. "Can you come to this old man's aid momentarily?" His long gray hair swept past the scar on his right eye, making her think of her scarred-eyebrow love.

"Of course, Ojiisan!" She said with the childlike smile she only reserved for him, made her way toward him, and shut the room door behind her. "What is it, Grandfather? Do you need me to check your blood pressure?"

His groggy old man's laugh warmed her heart. "No, please, don't treat me like I'm that old…and don't make that face! I'm still as strong as a bull and healthy as an ox!"

"Oh. So, what is it?"

"Come. Sit." They sat across from each other at the large oak-carved desk she'd seen him sit behind her entire life, the sister desk of the one in the Academy Director's Office. "Let's first talk shop. I read through the final paperwork from the Board. What has been ratified seems ambitious. Have you read through the new terms and conditions yet? They leave very little margin for error." His face hardened. Erina leaned back—this, she was not prepared for.

"Yes, I read through the terms and conditions like a fine-tooth comb and fought for every single itemized agreement. It is a gamble... but I think it's worth my vision for Totsuki's future."

"I don't doubt your ambition, Sakura! But what is there to gain besides money and even more prestige in this deal?" Her grandfather was Board Emeritus, and Erina made sure his duties post-retirement remained few, but his presence and influence were still strongly felt. She knew he wouldn't step on her toes as director—he hadn't in the past two years, only offering her guidance and intermittently taking tasks off her plate when she was quietly overwhelmed—as he was her only lifeboat from all the sharks in the business world's waters who cared about her over stocks and dividends.

"Better chefs, for one. Totsuki can't keep throwing away promising talent. Where do they go when they fail?"

"To college to get more knowledge?" Her grandfather simpered, tickled with his nursery rhyming. "I just worry that it'll add too much work on your plate. I think it's too soon." His gaze softened on her, and Erina couldn't help but feel like his little princess again—not the director of the premier culinary academy in the world. She rolled her eyes.

"I've already closed out the agreements with the Department of Education, and the grounds contractor will send me the final blueprints once the building permits are cleared. This is happening."

Senzaemon swiveled in his chair, the pensive look he'd been sporting melting away. "So when do we break ground?"

"In the new year."

"Erina, my darling, you never cease to amaze me." He leaned over to hold her hand. "Will you join me for my afternoon tea in the garden? The Yoko tree's cherry blossoms are in pre-bloom."

"I'd love that, Papa," Erina said like a child.

-8-

They made their way to the central courtyard, hand in hand. Business talk was one of her favorite pastimes with him. Learning from the best always felt like the most sensible option to her.

"Anyway, I must send Uncle Soe an apology basket because I was ruthless on those calls."

Senzaemon let out a booming laugh. "He's used to it by now. I am his father, after all, and you took that trait from me. That's why he's COO."

"I'll have to appreciate him, anyhow. His patience while negotiating is to be envied." Sensaemon's long, olive-colored yukata rustled as he dragged his feet. Erina looked down, then at him with worried eyes. "Grandfather, are you resting?"

"Why, yes! What makes you ask."

"Your feet are dragging."

Senzaemon stopped and looked down. "Oh!" He chuckled, his large voice echoing in the foyer. "I'm just sluggish, is all. I require my afternoon tea with my favorite granddaughter."

"Better not let Alice hear you say that," Erina giggled. "You know she's greedy."

Oh, speaking of my son and starlet," he abruptly switched gears. "What in the world is going on with your cousin?" Erina knew her grandfather better than she knew herself. He wasn't worried about Alice. He wanted to gossip. And if she knew the full answer to his question, she would've sat in his study for hours clucking like two hens about it, as they did about all family and culinary dramas. But she also needed to figure it out for herself.

"I don't know, Ojiisan. I've been too busy with work and my own relationship drama. And you already know just how much of a loose cannon Alice is. So, for that tea, you'll have to ask Alice."

"Aw, poo!" He frowned. "My darling free spirit has been holed up in her room all week. So now I have to wait? I thought at least you'd know." Erina giggled and patted his arm.

"Don't worry, Grandfather. When we both know we can have another tea party to gossip like hens."

"Great. Let's have tea at your grandmother's pond. I'm sure she'd love a cup, as well."

-8-

They sat under the shrine, bundled in thick winter coats as Senzaemon poured a cup of green tea in a saucer before his wife's altar. They held hands, bowed their heads, then lifted their eyes to the sky. The cherry blossom trees' buds lining Yoko Pond's shoreline winked at them from their branches. Snow flurries floated around them as snowflakes powdered the grass around them and the serene pond collected the ice on its belly, freezing the scene in time like a slightly disturbed snow globe. Their offering was accepted.

"She loved cherry blossoms in the wintertime. We met under one in full bloom, you know?" Her grandfather's voice was wistful. He was drifting back to old memories again. Erina fondly looked at him. Whenever he spoke of his wife, a twinkle of devotion and sadness peeked through his gaze.

"Yes, you've told me before," she said. Erina smiled at her grandmother's altar. "It's why you named me after them."

"Mm, no, I named you after her. But, I think she loved the tree and its pink petals even more because her clan was named after it." A snowflake blew into the covered shrine and fell on her head. Her grandfather rubbed it into her head. A prayer of his own making since she was a little girl.

Erina nodded in awe; she knew she was named after her grandmother, but she had no idea her maternal clan chose to be named after the tree. She reached for one of the Buddhist prayer flags.

"You miss her, don't you, Papa?"

"As if none of the oxygen around us is enough to keep me alive." (Later that night Erina would reflect on his answer, and wonder, could Yukihira ever love me that much and miss me for that long?)

They sipped from their porcelain teacups in silence, family heirlooms from Grandma Yoko's side. Since she was little, Erina enjoyed their tea times and the security her grandfather's presence brought her. She sighed as the warm tea slipped down her throat. She'd missed this.

"Sakura?"

"Mm-hm?" She was lost in her thoughts—a vicarious sadness of a love gone too soon hung in the air.

"How's things between you and young Yukihira now?"

Erina slowly turned toward the man she regarded as her father. His soft expression made her feel safe. It reminded her of simpler times—when it was just the two of them raising each other in that mansion just beyond the pond.

"We're much better, Papa." She smiled. She only called him that when they were alone and she felt like his baby girl again.

"That's good to hear. A relief, actually."

"Why do you say that? What do you know? Grandfather! Have you been reading the gossip blogs, again? I told you—" She stopped fussing when he started laughing.

Senzaemon shot his hands up in surrender. "Hey, an old man's gotta do what an old man's gotta do!"

"Well," she huffed, embarrassed that her grandfather knew about such fabricated stories…though she hated to admit, the rough-looking pictures were not doctored. "You will be glad to know our break never interfered with my priorities as director." She crossed her arms.

"Oh, I never doubted that." He took a beat. "But, I'm sorry to hear you two broke up," he said in his soft and caring grandfather tone. A tear dropped and rippled in her tea, her grandmother's eyes reflected at her. Remembering the past hurt.

"We didn't break up, Papa. We took a break."

Senzaemon's eye twitched. "What's the difference?"

"We were still boyfriend-girlfriend. We just weren't speaking to each other for a while."

"Youth these days," he said, dumbfounded. "So, that's what your apology at his birthday dinner was about, huh?"

She shyly nodded and simpered, "I love him, Papa."

"I see..." Erina didn't know how to interpret her grandfather's contemplative tone. "Like, love love?"

"Like, in love," She replied. "I know we're both young, especially compared to you." They shared a sidelong glance and smirked at each other. "But, I seriously hurt him without thinking, Papa, and it almost cost me everything we fought so hard for. And that's not okay. Yamomo helped me see how I needed to take accountability for the mess I made, but it's so hard not to be like them. Sometimes I fear that I truly am my parents' daughter. A broken child born of broken parents."

"You are," he agreed and Erina cringed. Then he wrapped her in his coat and then in his arms. "But, my precious flower blossom, you took responsibility for the harm you caused, and that level of maturity, my dear, makes you equally our daughter, too." He tipped his head toward his wife's tombstone, a tear rolling down his cheek. "Love, no matter the age, is a difficult lord but it's always worth the humble submission to its will. So, Sakura, you are whole and complete. And we are both proud of you for following your heart and doing the right thing. So, princess, it's okay to not be okay." He tipped her chin up, a warm smile meeting her red eyes, and wiped away her tears. "Hm?"

Erina leaned into his broad chest and her grandfather kissed the crown of her head. Tears immediately sprang to her waterline.

"I'm okay."

-NAKIRI ALICE-

NOVEMBER 15

She heard Erina's knocks, saw her missed calls, and got her many texts. She heard her grandfather whisper at her door just to check in and knew he was the one who fetched the servants to bring her meals to her bedroom door. It's just that kind of loving attention that made her hide, buried in her bedsheets, even more. After the conversation with her parents and Ryō, Nakiri Alice did not want to speak to a soul. So, she wouldn't. Instead, she'd lock herself up in her room until someone sent for her corpse. She felt ashamed and didn't know how to reconcile those feelings with her free spirit and its carefree...okay, careless...actions.

Gosh! Who knew loving two boys would be this draining?!

Ryō and Akira's longstanding rivalry as best friends was only supposed to add a spicy challenge to the game of chase, not end it. This was supposed to be a thrilling plot! Not a horror story for her heart. Alice was supposed to be young, fine, and having fun, dammit! Not holed up under her feather-soft duvet, wrapped in her thousand-count Japanese silk sheets crying, frustrated, and alone.

When did everything stop being fun?

Why did love always have to get in the way?

A/n: i know, i know i kept you waiting for so long but if you're reading this just know it was a great feat for me to get here. but omg did i really get into senzaemon's lore like that...?! centering him was important to me because none of these characters would exist without him. so i knew when i was writing him in chapter 21 that i wanted/needed to bring him back because this old man is teeming with narrative possibilities! his late wife, Sakura Yoko is an OC that i've sprinkled in this story and Twin Flame because a patriarch as formidable as senzaemon is not great and did not get there on his own. can you tell i love this dysfunctional family system and its complex/complicated dynamics? this was my way of teasing some things coming down the SYUniverse pipeline, so i hope you enjoyed this chapter and felt it was worth the nearly three-month wait. i'll try my best not to leave you waiting for so long for the final chapters. (yes, you read that correctly.)

also, leave a comment. they make my days, nights, and weeks! and i read them like it's the air that i breathe. y'know, writing costs me time, energy, and imagination, but reading is free, so i hope you'll be gracious and extend your words and thoughts to me, too! i appreciate all of your readership and will be back sooner than later with ch. 32.

ps: this chapter is dedicated to piyaa—i read your comment about senzaemon often since last fall and it kept me motivated to do his story justice. i hope you're well pleased.

-You're Welcome!-

disclaimer: yeah yeah, do i still have to say i do not own SnS? but i do own this story, so, blah!

\_(ツ)/