“Mom, I’m sorry…”
“What?”
“I’m really sorry. I genuinely planned on listening quietly until the end, but…”
“…?”
“…Hearing about my parents’ mushy love story is seriously hard to stomach.”
“…”
✦ ✦ ✦
It was the winter of my first year of high school when Kyoutarou confessed to me, and we started dating. By then, he already knew everything about my family situation, and he said that he wanted to formally introduce himself to my father.
“It is a pleasure to finally meet you. I’m Kyoutarou Kuze. Yumi and I have been dating for the past month.”
Kyoutarou was honest with my father about everything—even that he came from a middle-class family.
“Yumi, I want to speak with him alone. Please give us a moment,” my father said to me after Kyoutarou finished talking.
I was sent out of the room, and even now, the details of their conversation remain a mystery to me. However, I suspected my father had demanded that Kyoutarou pursue a career as a diplomat. Having written off his mediocre daughter, he had found a new prospect in her talented boyfriend. The evidence was clear, because from that day forward, Kyoutarou abandoned his dream of becoming a police officer and devoted himself to his diplomatic studies. Yet, despite feeling that my father had given up on me, I still had no intention to cede taking over for the Suou family in place of my brother.
“I think that’s a great idea. Let’s study and become diplomats together!”
Kyoutarou never dismissed this dream of mine, and we made a promise to become diplomats together…but studying side by side only highlighted a brutal truth I could not ignore: We were completely different in terms of intellectual ability. Even when we studied together, he had to teach me essentially everything, and I constantly felt like I was holding him back. Still, I couldn’t give up, so I continued to desperately study as hard as I could. However, Kyoutarou was the only one who passed the national civil service exam in the end.
“Congratulations. You really are amazing, Kyoutarou.”
On the surface, I congratulated him from the bottom of my heart, but looking back, I felt that this was when I began harboring a dark sense of inferiority. I wouldn’t allow myself to let it show, though. He remained as kind to me as ever, and more importantly, he had abandoned his own dreams to instead become a diplomat for the sake of our future. And that was why…
“You studied so hard, Yumi, and it wasn’t all for nothing. Maybe you didn’t become a diplomat, but I want you to continue to be there for me…as a diplomat’s wife.”
I buried those dark feelings deep in my heart and accepted his proposal. Our married life was happy, yet as Kyoutarou had warned, being a diplomat’s wife proved challenging. Overseas, every interaction with other diplomats awakened that familiar sting of inadequacy—the reminder of what I could never become. Therefore, when I became pregnant, I seized the chance to retreat to Japan’s familiar comfort. Kyoutarou even indulged this selfishness of mine, telling me that it was okay. But for some reason, that kindness of his only deepened my misery.
It was very peaceful for a while after our children were born. They were precious, and raising them was exhausting yet fulfilling, even with Natsu’s help. Being a competent mother finally quieted my inferiority complex toward Kyoutarou…until the children began revealing their own brilliance.
“Masachika? You can read that? That’s a really difficult book.”
“Hmm? Yeah.”
Our two children, with eyes exactly like my brother’s, possessed the same genius that had defined him, and once my father recognized this, he became obsessive. He lavished them with the same elite education he had given my brother, only more intensely. My daughter, perhaps due to her fickle personality, often fled mid-lesson, but my son absorbed my father’s instruction at a tremendous pace, and people started calling him a child prodigy.
“…”
I had an accomplished husband and children with prodigious talent. In this house, I alone remained invisible to my father’s gaze—the only one destined for nothing. My husband and children had luminous futures stretching before them, lives filled with grand stages where crowds would shower them with respect and praise. I, however, would spend my days watching from the shadows, forever relegated to the wings. That future crystallized before me with absolute clarity.
Why can’t I be on stage?
I could feel the inferiority complex I had suppressed swelling deep within my chest, becoming harder to contain with each passing day. I wondered why I was the only one cursed with mediocrity. No matter how hard I tried, I could never reach my brother’s heights. Despite studying so hard since my second year of middle school, I couldn’t become a diplomat, yet my husband started studying in the winter of his first year of high school and passed the exam on his first try. And my children—they were born with gifts that might even eclipse my husband’s brilliance or my brother’s genius.
Why? It’s not fair.
That voice echoed in my mind, but I frantically shook the thought out of my head. Resenting my own children’s gifts and feeling jealous of them made me a failure as a mother. I couldn’t allow it. Those weren’t my true feelings. It was merely a momentary invasion of wicked thoughts. I told myself that and pushed those thoughts back deep into my heart again. But…
“Mom! I get to start studying middle school–level material today!”
“Mom! I got a black belt in karate!”
Every time my son innocently shared his accomplishments, that familiar misery of inadequacy surged through my chest like poison, making me want to scream. So I turned away to make sure he would never see those ugly feelings reflected in my eyes. Instead, gradually and without realizing it, I began channeling all that venom I couldn’t unleash on my child toward my husband.
“Work?! Again?! You’re never home!”
“I’m sorry. I really wish I could spend more time with the family…”
“You’re always like this! An apology isn’t good enough anymore!”
I didn’t know why he apologized. I was the one in the wrong. This was all senseless, cruel lashing out. The reason my husband wasn’t by my side was because he was busy with his diplomatic work—work that he had taken on for my sake, and staying in Japan was my decision as well. My husband had done nothing wrong, so I didn’t understand why he wasn’t angry with me. That kindness only made me feel more miserable. The pain became unbearable, so I fled to the piano yet again.
“Mom, that was amazing! Play another piece!”
“Play again! Again!”
Only while playing piano and receiving the innocent praise of my children did my inferiority complex fade slightly. I still felt like this remained my one redeeming quality.
If my brother had never died that day…
What would have happened if I had continued pursuing becoming a pianist? I might never have reached the world-class heights I had once dreamed of, but perhaps I could have become a first-rate pianist who truly moved people’s hearts.
Yeah, right…
All of it was meaningless speculation—fantasies without foundation—but for me, it was my one precious escape. Perhaps I, too, could have become someone remarkable—someone others respected. Perhaps I, too, could have claimed a place on stage. Such sweet, gentle fantasies consoled me…but even those crumbled into dust the moment I heard my son play piano that day, forcing me to confront the truth I had been hiding from.
“If you need anything, you tell me. If you want to study abroad to learn piano, then I’ll arrange for it.”
“Oh…!”
“Give it everything you’ve got.”
It finally made sense. My father’s words weren’t expectations at all, but pity for a daughter clinging to impossible dreams. My father never truly believed in or expected anything from me.
I was ordinary to my core, destined from birth to amount to nothing, but I didn’t want to know this crushing truth. So, I couldn’t stand him shattering my last illusion. I lamented that he made me so miserable. With that innocent smile of his—with the same eyes as my brother when he praised me…!
“Stop! Just stop!”
It would be a few moments before I even realized that scream had come from my own mouth, but when I saw the emotional strain on my son’s face, I realized what I had done…and by that time, it was already too late.