This is the sixth part of Hideaki's arc in my post-Lilly-neutral-end mosaic, 'After the Dream'.
For some strange reason, Hideaki has elected to describe an unusually sweeping span of his life and times.
Perhaps the best places to seek clarification on the events he describes are the accounts provided by those closest to him.
Hence, your humble writer directs you to the arcs of his sister Shizune and her friend Misha, his cousins Akira and Lilly, and his lady wife.
Hideaki 6: Heroism (T +5)
I am Hideaki Hakamichi. Through pain and fear, forgiveness and joy, I have come to know who I am. I never wanted to be a hero. But now, for the love of a few particular women, I will be whatever I can be; I will be many things, but remain only one Hideaki.
That is the sort of thing I still write in my journal, although then I was in my early thirties, and now I am far older. A third of a century gone, that Hideaki was sure of who he was, but also sure that he would be mistaken at times.
It is not unmanly to be sentimental. Rather, sentiment can be appropriate or inappropriate, depending on circumstance. Men must choose, and even in failure, one learns what can still be done.
Here are seven years of my life. My lady wife once introduced to me Shakespeare, and the seven ages of man. I must disappoint you; here are only seven small pieces of Hideaki, like a tiny handful of woodcuts that depict Mount Fuji.
*****
Let’s begin in May 2022. This is without doubt the strangest meeting I have attended. It is also the first at which I have had the privilege of suffering while my dear sister has the chair, and the first I’ve had in Yamaku’s boardroom. She begins, signing rapidly—I suspect mainly for my benefit, because the others all seem to know what is going on.
[Agenda before you. Read. Main topic is our friend Hisao Nakai. Problem is dying, heart is failing. Method of life extension is proposed. Window is small. Introducing to all someone already known, honorable secretary for meeting Hideaki Hakamichi, who happens to be subject’s lawyer. Also my brother.]
That may seem cold to you, dear reader. But over the years, I must say that Shizune has never translated well into normal conversation as written. In person, she is much better, and her friend Misha is probably best at interpreting her sympathetically—although not always. Today, my sister is miserable, but also businesslike. The latter is holding back the former.
I am late to this meeting, having rushed from Miyagi General where I was handling some legal matters. On the way in, I have seen Rika Katayama’s distinctive black-and-red hybrid in the parking lot, and parked my battered SUV a distance away so as not to contaminate its beauty. Similarly, I have apologetically deposited my sprawling carcass two seats away from her elegant frame. At least, she favoured me with a wan little smile and did not strike me down.
I look around and see that Shizune has done her usual boss-thing of automatically balancing the committee. Three men, three ladies, alternating around the polished blackness of a long marble-topped table. Rika sits on my left, next to Kaneshiro-sama, the school’s doctor and head nurse. Shizune sits between him and Mutou-sensei, who is Yamaku’s senior science teacher. My sister’s best friend Misha is on Mutou’s left, some distance away on my right. She gives me a cheery little wave with her fingers, although her face shows a far less cheerful expression, and then comes over to sit next to me.
The whole meeting looks as if it will be conducted in sign. I already have my tablet out, ready to take notes. It will be quite a challenge. Misha whispers to me, “Hey, how’re you doing? I think it might be better if I help interpret, Hide-chan! Then you can record without having to keep looking at us. Don’t worry, I’m used to it, used to do the whole class for Shicchan!”
This is probably the reverse, sign-to-speech, rather than speech-to-sign, but I appreciate this very much and I smile with some relief.
“Thanks, Misha. That will really help,” I whisper back, just as Shizune taps the table to signify her impatience at our little conversation. She signs at me: [You know everyone? See list. Rika. Doctor. Sensei. Misha.]
There are three scientists and three laymen here. Fortunately, I have hung around Hisao long enough to pick up some of the jargon. I have to interrupt a few times to get them to spell out words like ‘ruthenium’ and ‘tachycardia’—just two examples—but I’m soon able to get the gist of what is said, with Misha’s help. She too has a few problems, but far fewer than I do.
It also helps that we all know each other somewhat. It means that I don’t have to waste time being too formal, and also that the others are willing to cut me some slack despite my ignorance and my stereotypical lawyer obsession with exact definitions.
At the end of the meeting, an audacious scheme has been hatched. Naturally, the scientists have gravitated towards each other and are hunched over a pile of papers, scribbling and furiously discussing their options.
Misha’s been checking my notes and helping me with some corrections. She smells of wild apples and musk, a terribly distracting combination. Thank the gods I am no longer a confused adolescent, I think, as Shizune leaves the other group and walks round the table to join us.
[Thank you for coming. Decided best to have either you or Akira over, but her signing is not as good as yours, she said. Also, she has a godson to look after.]
[Happy to serve. Kaneshiro-sama’s quick briefing last night made it very clear there are few options. At least we now have a chance, although very small.]
Shizune briefly grasps my arm, then lets go. [Yes. I too am uncertain. But a chance is still a chance. You roll dice, or you lose.]
*****
The next year or so is the only time in which everyone still has some happiness. We all know Hisao is now living a borrowed life; the question is how much is left. I begin to spend many hours with him, sorting out his complicated assets and trying to help him find ways to ensure his will is carried out when the inevitable happens.
There’s one night from earlier days which sticks in my mind, dear readers. We’re sitting in a café on the outskirts of Tokyo, a place where two friends can discuss important things without prying eyes and clever ears. I have finally plucked up the courage to ask a question I may never otherwise have a chance to ask.
“Hisao, would you ever have married my sister? I used to dream that you would.”
He laughs, little crowsfeet appearing at the corners of his eyes. He is losing weight from hard work, but still looks relatively healthy. Then he looks at me seriously, as if asking me to understand some unhappy facts.
“There was a time at Todai when Hanako seemed to want me to spend more time with Shizune. It took a lot of courage from her, I think. But it took more courage from your sister, because…”
I smile and complete his sentence, “… Shizune hates losing.”
“Yeah. Always has. But she risked it, when she asked me point-blank, [Do you think we can have a future together?]”
He signs the last part, and his long fingers emulate my sister’s shorter digits so effectively that I can almost see her doing it.
“She was smiling when she said it, that cheeky smile she has? The one that conceals all kinds of things?”
I nod and let him continue.
“That’s when it hit me. I could never do that to someone like Shizune. She had long-term plans, and if I fell in love with her, married her, I’d be abandoning her plans the day I died. A future together? I’d be breaking any such vow. So I promised myself not ever to fall in love with her. Then, stupid Hisao moment, I end up with Emi, whom I really love, and who will hate me for dying even more…”
He smiles sadly back at me.
“Hisao Nakai, that’s me, Master of Doing Idiotic Things. Hideaki, I don’t know how many years or months I have, but you’ve probably got a lot more. I’ve been an idiot, and if people ever find out how stupid I was in matters of love, so be it. You know the score. You’re probably the only one except Mutou, who seems to know everything even if I don’t tell him.”
“Did you actually say ‘no’ to my sister?”
It’s frustrating. Hisao keeps giving me this romantic act. I’m not going to let him evade me by kicking up all that old dirt and sentimentality.
“Huh. You’re very blunt.”
He pauses. I glare at him, knowing that this is important for both of us. Shit, I’m becoming like him in some ways.
“Yes.”
“What did she say?”
“She looked at me with her Madam President laser-beam gaze and said, [Well, that’s that then. I suppose I am fortunate that I did not pledge my love to you back in high school. You win some, you lose some.] And then she didn’t speak to me for three weeks.”
I had guessed something like that might have happened. To remember it now from Hisao, as the game comes to an end, is very painful.
*****
2024 comes. Hisao dies. Everyone has written their own memoirs of it. For once, I have none. You can ask my lady wife, hers more or less covers everything. I am Hisao’s lawyer, but Akira reads the will as a gesture of respect; she was his first lawyer after all. Mutou-sensei is executor, and we all get along fine.
Somewhere in there are my memories of the funeral itself. I remember some moments, in particular, beginning after Lilly runs out sobbing just before my sister begins to electronically deliver the funeral oration. Akira, always very quick in a crisis, nudges me with her left elbow and I slip away after her younger sister.
“Cousin Lilly?”
She is standing next to the gatepost, just outside the cemetery. I am relieved that she hasn’t run into a gravestone or something. Maybe she echolocates when moving at high speed. I mentally smack myself for being so crass, as she turns her face, veiled in midnight blue, towards me.
“It’s been so long, how can it hurt so much?”
I think of Sachiko. Yes, it can. I walk up to her and gently take hold of her arms. Her biceps tense reflexively, but she allows me to pull her into a deeper embrace.
“Cousin, let me bring you back to your rooms.”
She begins to sob into my shoulder. Lilly’s a really tall girl, and unfortunately, I have this ridiculous image of some tabloid reporting an encounter between a high-ranking Family officer (which I am not) and some foreign
floozy lady (which she is not—well, not really).
Okay, wife, I won’t describe your dear Lilly that way, but you don’t get to edit the rest of this part! Ouch, ouch, please stop tweaking my ear! With one arm around her waist, I escort her off the street and into my Hakamichi blue/silver hybrid.
I always keep a supply of little packets of tissue in the glove compartment. With my family, you never know when you’ll need them, for tears or puke or blood spatter. Or to polish one’s glasses. Lilly is on her second packet by the time I’ve escorted her back to her room, made sure she’s settled and shut the door behind her.
Back to the cemetery then. I look at my watch. Shizune’s not one for long speeches; she hates having to speak through a text-to-voice synthesizer, claiming that the vibrations throw her off and make her head hurt.
Indeed, when I get back to the gates, Madam Principal is bowing her farewells to various visitors. Hisao’s parents having passed on four years ago, Emi’s mother is the closest senior family member in attendance. Meiko Ibarazaki, in her dark yukata, contrasts strangely with Sis in her grey suit.
I catch my sister’s eye and do some quick signing: [Drove cousin Lilly back to her room. Apologies. She was unexpectedly quite distraught and is now resting.]
[Noted. No offence taken.]
I nod and make my way back inside. I am about to pay my private, personal last respects to an old friend.
It surprises me to find Hanako still there. She appears to be kneeling beside the grave and reading something from an old book. I move softly and sit some distance away, reluctant to intrude. As she reads, I find myself strangely moved by the words, some sort of poetry.
As the breeze teases a few long strands of her hair out, and the poem comes to an end, I am reminded of what Hisao once told me—that in some ways, Hanako could be the most beautiful woman on earth.
Later, we have dinner together. And not much later than that, I know that I am certainly in love.
*****
“No! Absolutely not! I won’t hear of it!”
Father is being unreasonable again, almost a year after Hisao left us. At that time, he supposedly lost it and said to Shizune something along the lines of, “I’m glad you didn’t marry him, it would have ended in tragedy. Then again, I would have had two grandchildren.” At which point, Shizune very quietly turned off her electronics and continued to enjoy her dinner. My source was Misha, so I’m not entirely sure what happened.
“She has bewitched you with her quiet charms. You’ll see. She… she’s Swordsman’s best friend, of all things!”
As if that has anything to do with it. I’ve come to understand cousin Lilly somewhat; in the last year or so since Hisao went, I’ve spent a lot of time with Akira and Shizune and got to know my family a lot better as a result.
“Scarface is a lot older than you. She’ll soon be past childbearing age.”
Oh gods. A combination of various factors has just eroded a path past my normally thick layer of indifference to his ranting. For a start, ‘Scarface’ is just plain insulting. And there’s the matter of marrying someone just to have children; this is Japan, but it is still a touchy subject.
But my killer stroke today is that he’s lied to me and I’ve ignored it. Time to draw. My friend Rika once demonstrated iaijutsu technique to me when she and Sis conspired to put me on a ‘training regime’ that hurt a lot but was extremely useful. The weapon flows and then it… is where it is.
“Father, mother was older than you too.”
“What?”
I’ve put him off his own stroke. He glares at me, but it’s a guilty glare, the anger of one who has been found out unexpectedly.
“Who told you that?”
“You’ve given her year of birth as 1965. But the Satou records show it as 1959. You dated an older woman, and we were born when she was in her thirties.”
He takes a deep breath.
“You had no right!” he grinds out, his amplitude increasing.
“I had every right,” I reply, sharply, with what Rika calls ‘the voice of command’.
He stops short.
“Father, this humble person is your son, but also the son of your wife Mayoi. You kept her memory from us. It is, in my lowly view, a dishonourable situation.”
My father never refers to Hanako as ‘Scarface’ again. We do have occasional disagreements, but in the end, he gives me my choice.
*****
Despite Father’s ill-natured attempts at derailment, we are still family. In the years before he himself goes back to the earth, he proves to be a fairly kind-hearted host to Shizune’s friends and mine. Indeed, he seems to have forged a strong friendship with Misha over the years, and he has come to accept my Hana almost as another daughter.
Father is sixty-five years old in November 2026, and we have all gathered for his birthday. Hana and I have been a couple for longer than a year now, and perhaps she has been with me all my adult life, were I to examine it closely. I am going to ask his permission, formally. It is not needed, of course, but it would be nice. We Hakamichis are like that.
In April last year, I’d already brought Hana to visit Sachiko. I’d never done that for anyone before, not even Sis. It was strange, but I felt that Sachiko would’ve approved. I could imagine her saying, “Hurry up you idiot, you shouldn’t waste time!”
We had tea, and on that occasion, Hana was there in person for the third cup. As we held hands, her uneven right hand in mine, I kissed her slowly and deliberately on her right cheek. I felt her hand tightening as I whispered, “Hana-chan, most beautiful to me, my love is yours. ‘
Though lovers be lost, love shall not, and death shall have no dominion.’”
There were no cheers from a hidden audience, only the sounds of birds, and the sweet scent of springtime. And Hana’s soft reply, “M-mine too, Hide-kun.”
I am remembering this, and many other things, as we sit on my bed at the Saitama residence and I help her unpack before lunch.
No! Really, wife, I was not intending to describe everything in your suitcase! Although the readers might enjoy it… Ouch! Sorry!
Lunch is, as usual, somewhat peculiar. We’ve bought Father an improved fishing-rod, lighter and stronger. Shizune has bought him a silk-bound version of some arcane treatise on swordsmanship. Misha’s gift is an outrageous array of seven brightly coloured floral shirts with butterflies, apparently designed by Rin Tezuka—it goes some way towards making up for the fact that Misha herself can’t be with us until tonight. There are lots of other gifts, but Father saves them for after lunch, which he himself has cooked.
Roast lobster with grilled beef and root vegetables sliced thinly. I am quite sure this is not something I’ve tasted before. The octopus is fine, but its combination with some kind of fig paste and grape leaves? Where does Father get all this stuff anyway? Nevertheless it is all quite enjoyable.
Then the fight begins. All happy and cheerful, we sit back. Shizune, sharp as ever, signs to me, [If you’re going to ask Father, do it quick.]
I grin foolishly for a moment.
“Ah. Father, again, we wish you many more good years. On this special occasion, Hana and I were going to ask you to give us your blessing on a special matter.”
He looks at me, his thoughts clearly elsewhere.
“Yes? Go ahead, man, say it.”
Everything blows up shortly thereafter. Father and I are stalking around the house snarling at each other and Shizune has taken Hana outside for a quiet conversation.
Then he tells me.
“I’m dying. You can do what you want when I’m gone. Maybe I’m wrong. You get what you can when you can. It’s over for me, and you know what? I don’t give a damn. You can have my blessing. Ha, you can have this house. You don’t have to listen to this foolish old man.”
What does he mean, he’s dying? He looks down where he’s stopped short. He sheathes his katana. He picks up the fishing rod, and for a moment, I think he’s going to snap it. But he sights along it absent-mindedly and gently flexes the shaft.
“That’s a good rod. The last time anyone bought one for me was when your mother last gave me a birthday present. I miss her very much. Always have.”
He puts the rod down and walks off to his room. I don’t know what to say. Why is my family so screwed up? I swear to myself that I will never do that kind of thing to my Hana. We will fight, but only for fun.
Yes, wife, I know you remember this day too. See? I’ve mostly kept my promise!
*****
I spend most of the next year watching my father cough blood and get thinner. If not for my dear Hana, who is patient with me when I am moody, I would be a wreck. She has also begun to get along fairly well with Father, although she feels uncomfortable when he starts asking for ‘Mayoi’.
As she finds out more about our family from him, I realize that I too have much to learn. I never knew Mother had three sisters as well as a brother—I’ve only ever known that Akira’s father was Mother’s brother. I guess that Father has almost given up on keeping secrets, although he occasionally gives me a sly smile and whispers, “Wait for my biography, there are more chapters in it now.”
Father survives beyond his 66th birthday, which is a much more peaceful affair than his previous one. It is marred by the tabphone message that Shizune receives late that night, after the birthday dinner.
Hana and I are woken by a gentle tapping on my bedroom door. I kiss her under the right ear, throw on a robe and make my way there in the familiar darkness. Of course, I have to open the door, or Sis will be quite inconvenienced.
As the door opens, she thrusts her tabphone at me. Her swift jab at the glowing screen shows me all I need to know.
[Rika’s heart just failed, 0216h. Prepare for worst. Say prayers for the operating team. They’ll need it. KG.]
Kaneshiro-san. Shit. I nod at Shizune, sign [5 minutes] and duck back into the room. Hana is sitting up, her arms around her knees on the bed. She sounds very concerned.
“What’s up, love? Is it your father?”
Normally, that leads to bad jokes from me, but this is not the time. I tell her what’s happened, and she says, “You must go. I’ll l-look after your father and you can drive Shi-chan to the hospital. I’ll say the prayers.”
I give her a grateful hug and quickly get my stuff together. It will be a long day.
*****
The prayers might have worked, but what is beyond doubt is that what sits in Rika’s chest is something very much like Hisao’s final heart, but with more than five years of intensive technology review and evolution thrown in. Hana and I are sitting in a fairly modest staff apartment in Sendai, where Rika is convalescing after surgery.
If she had been thin before, she is pure beanpole now. One pale foot sticks out from under the thick blanket that Mutou-san keeps throwing over her reluctant body. It is so white that her veins appear like cloud-dragons playing peek-a-boo in their natural element.
“I shall be fine, young Hideaki,” she says, pretending to be grim. But I can see past her intimidating façade now, and she cannot sustain it beyond Hana’s gentle giggling. Even Mutou snorts, which triggers a slender chain of thought in my mind.
When Mutou-san and Rika Katayama suddenly got married in April three years ago, it had come as a shock to me. Clearly, we’d all missed something. All, except perhaps Shizune. She had that knowing smile on her face which meant she was keeping extremely juicy secrets.
So I had taken it upon myself to ask Sis what she knew, and she had done something that was mysterious even for her—she’d signed to me: [Family secrets. Some day you may be told.]
My immediate response was: [Our family or one of the Families?]
All I got in return was another mystifying smile, tinged with something else I could not identify. It was pretty frustrating for someone like myself, who loved information and always wanted to find things out. When I told Hana, she merely gave a little laugh and said, “You should’ve been a journalist.”
I look at the long, slim woman in the bed, and at the old but respected teacher next to her, and I think of what friends they have been to me. I still do not know how their secret is connected to what Shizune knows, but I can wait until she tells.
*****
And then Father dies.
I realize, in July that year, that all my life I’ve been shadow of sorts to Father—larger than life, and now smaller than death. With him gone from home to hospital, the house is an empty shell, and even my memories of Mother are fading from my mind. Am I ‘just a living legacy’, a ‘poor attempt to imitate the man’, as the old song says?
In that moment of self-doubt, two things change my mind forever. The first is that I am suddenly seeing more Hakamichis than ever before. My father has cousins all over the place, despite being an only surviving son. When they ‘bring me in’ and begin to ask questions about where Father’s data is kept, I realize I need consultants of my own.
The second outrages me no end, and I am so furious that I drag Sis into it. The Hakamichis bar my cousin Akira from Father’s wake. I tell them curtly that he is my father and I choose whom I will invite. Their reply is that he belongs to them, not me. Shizune smuggles Akira in anyway, while I run interference with the help of an old friend whose heart is forged from ruthenium.
I will be better than my father, because he has always asked me to be. I will be better than Hideaki, because my friends have encouraged me to be. There are escalating complications. Months before I am to be married to the love of my life, we fly to Edinburgh to escape the madness.
The year that Shizune and I wrest our legacy free is a year of dire portent and sometimes-violent negotiation. Someday, the truth will be known in full. But it is during the spring of 2029, at the Church of the Sacred Heart in Edinburgh, that Hana-chan at last walks up the aisle towards me. Her god-daughter Akiko bears flowers of joy and remembrance. My cousins Akira and Lilly are her honoured supporters. The saltire of Saint Andrew alternates with the Hakamichi colours—banners of white on blue, flags of blue on white—and our hands are joined forever under the bright vault, amidst the applause of those we love.
=====
prev |
next
