Taiga crawled out, still in her uniform, and came to the kitchen. “I kind of do… Something with rice…”
Ryuuji pulled on Taiga’s sleeve. “You…! Do you have any shame…!”
“But I’m hungry. We haven’t eaten any lunch. Actually, last night and this morning, my stomach hurt so much I couldn’t really eat. But it’s the same for you, isn’t it? I was thinking in the hotel yesterday, I’m sure Ryuuji is so sad right now that he probably hasn’t been able to eat anything… His stomach probably hurts just as much as mine… Isn’t that right? Since we’re of one mind and one body?”
“I ate! After Yasuko abandoned me yesterday and I was left alone at the apartment, I actually took out leftovers and made sure to have a decent meal! I even ate your chocolates!”
“No way?! Are you heartless or something?!”
“I ate breakfast, too! You have to feed yourself to make sure you have enough in you to get around everywhere today, right?! You didn’t even eat a meal to prep for a big day like this or make sure you were taking in enough nutrients?! That’s way more heartless!”
“My…!”
Taiga whispered purposefully into Sonoko’s ear, See what he says, that’s your grandson’s true face. Seiji chimed in, Let her eat, and ended up standing from his seat.
Sonoko laughed as she peeked into their fridge. “Oh, I have frozen rice and eggs, ham, onions, and a little…”
“You have mustard greens, too! Ryuuji can make mustard greens fried rice, then!” Taiga was all smiles as she checked out the leftovers in a stranger’s fridge. Ryuuji ended up blushing and turning his face down.
“You…! How can you be so chummy right off the bat… Don’t you have manners?!”
“But they’re Ya-chan’s mom and dad. And they’re your grandma and grandpa. Next year if I marry you, then they’ll be my grandma and grandpa!” Taiga’s mouth opened up into a triangular smile, and she raised both arms in the Glico man pose. Seeing that, Sonoko smiled slightly.
“You want fried rice? Want me to make you some?”
“Yay!”
Ryuuji blinked, and with speed on par with that of a launching battleship, Taiga was perched right at the dining table in the next moment. Seriously? He covered his face.
“I’ll help… Please let me help. I’ve really lost face…”
He came to stand next to Sonoko in the ordinary little kitchen. When Sonoko pulled on a string, the once-dark sink top was lit up by a harsh fluorescent light.
“Ryuuji is suuuuuuuuuuper good at cooking!”
“Is he now?” Urged by Taiga’s proud voice, Sonoko watched Ryuuji chop up an onion, and her eyes went wide. “Wow! I wouldn’t have thought you were Yasuko’s. She’s terrible at that, and she could never remember the steps, so nothing came out of it. If she just put the time into it, she would have been able to make some tasty meals…”
“I know,” Ryuuji continued to chop in an unfaltering rhythm as he answered, “because I was raised on Yasuko’s cooking. Ever since I learned how to cook, I’ve been doing the cooking, but we always did it together before.”
“I see. That’s how it was.”
I hope she’s not going to cry, he worried as he looked at Sonoko, but Sonoko’s gaze had only gone distant momentarily. She was silent for a while, mulling over something.
“She was stupid, that kid.”
She stared out the window as sunset approached. He didn’t know whether she meant, The two of you going through all that without a father was stupid, or No matter how you tried to live, running away like that was stupid, or whether it was both, and Ryuuji had no way of checking.
He was sitting at the table eating fried rice with Taiga when—
“You can take a look through these.”
Thump thump thump! Seiji, who must have gone up to the second floor, piled albums of Yasuko onto the table. He brought the baby-faced spectacle of seeing her grow up through kindergarten, elementary, and junior high school. Ryuuji and Taiga became unintentionally absorbed in staring at the pictures, and at some point, night fell outside.
“Whoa… She’s got a kid’s backpack…! Whoa…a recorder…!”
“Hey, Ryuuji.”
“And her face looks exactly the same as it does now…!”
Taiga’s pointer finger prodded at the back of Ryuuji’s hand, which held the page, trying to gain his attention. Next, she pointed at the Takasu couple. They wouldn’t even sit at the heated table. They had just been staring out the living room’s front window the whole time, even though it was too dark to see anything. They were waiting for the time when Yasuko would come home.
“If Ya-chan doesn’t come back, then what do we do…?” Taiga asked him, bringing her face close and lowering her voice.
“We’ll wait until she comes home, and if we can’t wait for her, we’ll look for her until we find her.” Ryuuji rasped next to Taiga’s ear so only she would be able to hear. It seemed Taiga accepted that. She rubbed her apparently ticklish ears as her eyes once again dropped to the album. Even though there were plenty of photos of Yasuko in her junior high school blazer and in her own clothes, Ryuuji was disappointed there were only a few pictures of her after she reached high school.
The answer he’d just given Taiga was flawed. He knew that his wish would never come true, even if he and Taiga went searching for Yasuko after waiting for her to show up. That wouldn’t be enough to fulfill it. The message they sent was toeing the line of legality…and they had done something terribly dark by sending it.
The watch that had been left on the table pointed out that it was long past dinnertime. The world he wished for was still far off, and his heart was growing impatient.
“Are you nervous?”
“Why? Of course not.” Ryuuji used both hands to prop up his face to hide his mouth. At some point, Taiga started to stare intently into his face. I said I’m fine, he mumbled back to her.
“Hmm…” She closed her eyes and lightly shook her head. After she took a long breath, she said… “Smooch.”
She threw him a kiss.
Ryuuji immediately threw his head to the side to avoid it. She continued to smooch smooch smooch in quick succession, and he dodged to the right and left to escape from them.