“Anyway, listen…I was gonna call Ushio-chan about this originally, but then I realized she’d probably be at work at this hour, right? So I figured I’d just call you instead, and you can fill her in later.”
“Yeah, no worries. What’s up?”
“There’s been some talk about doing a little class reunion over the long holiday for Obon this year. Nothing formal or anything, but we were probably gonna invite Ms. Iyo, maybe try to book a venue, and stuff like that. But yeah, all that to say: We’re just trying to put out some early feelers to see who all might be interested.”
“Hey, that’s a great idea. You can count me in, at least. Pretty sure I’ll be back in town that week.”
“Nice! Okay, then I’ll put you down as a tentative yes. Could you make sure to ask Ushio-chan when you have a chance, then get back to me?”
“Yep, will do. Cool—guess I’ll look forward to that. Sounds like a lot of fun.”
“Oh, it will be, don’t you worry! Marine and Shiina already said they’d be down too.”
Mashima was also going to college in Tokyo on an athletic scholarship, though I hadn’t seen her once since graduation day. But I didn’t have her current contact info, and there was no real reason for us to meet up, so that wasn’t too surprising.
As for Shiina, I’d heard she’d stayed back home in Tsubakioka to help out with the family business. It sounded like she and Hoshihara still met up fairly often.
“Oh yeah, and you know who else is—actually, you know what? I’ll save that thought. I’d feel bad talking your ear off about all this stuff when Ushio-chan’s not around. Though I guess you could ask why I didn’t just wait to call another time, then, ha ha!”
“N-nah, you’re all good.”
“Anyway, I’ll talk to you later!”
She hung up the phone.
Well, that was quite the frantic farewell… She sounded kinda all over the place. But I guess she probably has a lot on her plate.
After graduation, Hoshihara had enrolled at a local culinary school within commuting distance of her family home, and she was currently pursuing a career as a pâtissier. When she first told us this was her plan, I actually felt a little nervous for her; it was almost too in line with her self-established “foodie” persona, to the point that I couldn’t help but wonder if she was doing it for the right reasons. But according to her, this had been something of a dream job for her ever since she was a little girl, so I kept that thought to myself. Both Ushio and I were fully supportive of her.
We still stayed in frequent contact, with Hoshihara always giving us the scoop on local goings-on back home and sending us photos of the latest sweets and treats she’d cooked up in her classes. Her sunny presence brightened our days even from afar.
“All right,” I said, rising to my feet. “I’m officially starving.”
I headed back to the kitchen. It was time to cook.
After watching a bit of TV while eating my dinner, I took a quick bath, lay back down on the couch, and cracked open a novel I’d brought home from work to kill time. By the time I was about halfway through, I looked up at the clock; it was after midnight. Any minute now, I thought to myself—and then, sure enough, I heard the door click open.
Aha. There she is.
“I’m hooome…”
I set the paperback I’d been reading on the coffee table, then hurried over to the entryway. Ushio was already taking her heels off. It seemed like she must have been feeling kind of hot, judging from the way she’d rolled up the sleeves of her white uniform button-up and loosened her necktie.
“Welcome home,” I said.
“Ugh, I’m so tired…” she groaned.
She tottered over to me on unsteady feet, and I wrapped my arms around her to give her a big hug—our first order of business whenever she got home from work. I could smell the alcohol on her, as well as the slight scent of cigarette smoke. After indulging in my embrace for about five seconds, she gently pulled away.
“Hi,” she said with an affectionate smile, seeming a bit more refreshed as she continued into the living room. “What’d you have for dinner?”
“Mapo eggplant. Just the kind you make from the box. You?”
“Ooh, that sounds good… I just had the boss’s curry again. Hate to complain about a free meal, but boy, am I starting to get sick of it.”
She let out an exhausted sigh as she removed her necktie and laid it over the back of one of the chairs, then started unbuckling her belt.
“You wanna go get washed up?” I asked.
“Yeah, I think I probably should,” she said.
She took off her slacks and folded them over the chair back as well, then walked off toward the bathroom while unbuttoning her shirt.
Ushio was working part-time at a well-known local bar. It was a pretty solid gig, with decent pay and good flexibility, so she’d taken it without any hesitation after being recommended for the job by one of her upperclassmen at her university. At first, they’d just had her working the floor—but when customers started showing up in droves specifically to see Ushio, they’d brought her behind the counter and taught her how to bartend. Like always, she was extremely popular with men and women alike, and she was almost working more than she was going to school nowadays.
Ushio claimed she wanted to make enough money to support her ideal lifestyle, and while I was definitely supportive of her, I did worry sometimes that she might be overworking herself a little bit. But she seemed to find her job extremely rewarding, so I didn’t feel like it was my place to say anything.
She tended to take very long baths, so I picked up the book I’d been reading and cracked it open again. As the night wore on, I could feel my eyelids growing heavier, to the point that I couldn’t properly parse the words I was reading on the page. Thinking I might try playing a mindless video game or something instead, I set the book down—but then my phone vibrated. Who the heck is messaging me at this hour?
I grabbed it off the table and had a look.
“No way,” I mumbled in disbelief.
I did a double take—then a triple take—at the photo I’d just been sent.
And then let out a burst of laughter.
“Holy crap… He actually did it…”
As I sat there marveling at my phone screen, Ushio finally emerged from the bathroom in a baggy sweater and a pair of sweatpants, her hair wrapped up in a towel.
“Oh, wow,” she said. “You’re still awake?”
“Yeah, hey—come look at this.” I turned my phone screen to show her.
“What is that, a crocodile?” she asked. “Wait a minute… Is that Sera?! Wh-why is he sticking his head in its mouth?!”
“Who knows,” I said. “Maybe he lost a bet or something. Stupid idiot.”
I genuinely could not believe that he still remembered our ridiculous agreement after all this time—let alone that he’d actually kept up his end of the bargain. As much as I still wanted nothing to do with the guy, I couldn’t help but feel just a teensy bit nostalgic, seeing him still up to his same old reckless antics.
“What a weirdo,” Ushio said, then returned to the bathroom to dry her hair and do her skincare routine. Once she was done with that, she came back and joined me on the couch as though she could finally take it easy for the rest of the night.