It touched his chin. Her fingertips warmed his ear. She didn’t even hesitate to flip Ryuuji’s lips up as she continued to check his face. She patted his shoulders from over his uniform and then turned him around to check his back.
“I didn’t know what to do.” Yasuko tried to hug Ryuuji, and her arms went limp. As he watched that, his head went white, and he was only able to say one thing.
“I’m so sorry…”
He wasn’t even able to support his falling mother.
Yasuko sank down onto the living room floor and cried out loudly. Her cry was a dreadful scream, like a baby just born, like a beast about to be killed. She opened her mouth wide and couldn’t even wipe away the tears that overflowed from her eyes. Like she had gone mad, she could only yell over and over again, You’re okay, you’re okay.
Seiji stepped towards her.
“Get yourself together.” As though to bring her to her senses, he slapped her cheek. “You’re a mother, aren’t you?”
I-I-I, Yasuko’s throat fluttered as she looked up at Ryuuji. “I’m…a f-failure as a mother.”
Her wide-open eyes filled with more fresh tears.
“I made Ryuu-chan think that. I’m a failure. I wanted him to be happy, that was all, but I couldn’t make that happen… I don’t think that about you…! Not that—”
Yasuko desperately shook her head side to side, trying to shake off a fretfulness that she couldn’t put into words.
“If you hadn’t been born, then I wouldn’t have anything! Ryuu-chan, you’re everything in my life that makes me happy! So…I was scared!”
Sonoko and Seiji stayed silent. They already understood everything Yasuko wanted to say. They listened to her earnest voice as Yasuko heaved with even more intense sobs.
“I was thinking of what I would do if you left like I did. This whole, whole time since you were a baby, I’ve been scared you would eventually leave someday. I just couldn’t help but be scared! I abandoned my mom and dad, and I thought the punishment for that would eventually come for me! When…when you were born, I finally understood what a horrible thing I’d done…so I thought you would leave, and that I couldn’t stop you. I thought that time had finally come, and I didn’t want to see it. I couldn’t, I couldn’t bear it…so I ran away…! All I know…is how to run…”
The echoing words Yasuko breathed out filled the room with sadness, seeping out from corner to corner. No, no. Ryuuji bit his lip and glared down the sadness.
We’re done with the sadness. We don’t need any more.
“I thought that I needed to ask the landlady to watch until you left. Then the landlady said that you were crying yesterday…and I thought, I did it again…! I did another terrible thing, and I finally understood that…so when that message came, I thought this really was the end! I’m an idiot, so I thought that everything would be taken from me…and I thought this would be the end!”
“I’m alive!” Ryuuji declared firmly in order to keep Yasuko from making him cry. He got on his knees and held Yasuko’s shoulders. As though rebuking the sorrow that oozed around them, he breathed out sharply. No one had to run away from home again. Not anyone.
“I was born! And I am alive! What do you want after that?! What else do you want?!”
Like seeing a person for the first time, Yasuko’s eyes opened wide. Her lips trembled, wet with tears.
“After that…? What else…?” she repeated back at him, like the words puzzled her. “I’m happy that you were born and that you lived…and…after that…if that happiness were to last…forever…and ever…”
“Then it’ll last. Let’s make sure it lasts.” Nodding, he pulled on Taiga’s hand next. “She’s going to be here, too. Always. For a lifetime.”
“Taiga-ch—”
Yasuko swallowed her breath and trembled slightly, then eventually grabbed and roughly pulled Taiga’s head closer after Taiga crouched down. The rest wouldn’t form into words. She grabbed Ryuuji’s arm firmly and cried again. No matter how much she cried, her tears wouldn’t run dry, but if sadness tried to break into that place, Ryuuji decided he would strike it down as soon as it emerged.
“I was thinking about you, Taiga-chan.” Yasuko buried her crying face into Taiga’s small head and patted her hair several times. “I was thinking that you would end up going somewhere where I couldn’t reach you. I was thinking about how much pain and suffering you might have felt. I thought…if only I hadn’t cared about you so much. Because I can’t tell you not to go myself! No matter how much I wanted to! Even when I thought Ryuu-chan would leave me as long as you two were together… As long as there was something left for you two, I thought it was okay.”
“It’s okay. There’s something for Ryuuji. There’s something for me, also. Your share is here, too. Ryuuji already said so, and I agree.”
They exchanged words that were cryptic to everyone but the two of them. Thank you, thank you, Yasuko said over and over again. She was saying it to Taiga.
“Why? Why are you thanking me?”
“For everything. For being here. For coming to our house. For coming to love Ryuu-chan. For meeting me. For your mom and dad, too… I’m thankful for all of it. I’m thankful for everyone.”
“Are you gonna brush off your own mom and dad?”
At her son’s joke, Yasuko seemed to look around her surroundings like she was noticing them for the first time. She sniffled and rubbed at her tear-puffed eyes as she finally looked at Sonoko and Seiji.
“Huh?”
Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh! Sonoko and Ryuuji sighed like tornadoes at the same time. That’s all you’ve got to say? they were probably both thinking.
But…
“It’s…okay now. It’s okay, it’s okay, it’s fine now,” Sonoko’s tensed back suddenly curved gently. “Were you living together with Ryuuji-kun? Just the two of you? This whole time?”
Yasuko hesitated slightly and then finally nodded just once in response. Neither Sonoko, Seiji, nor Ryuuji asked anything more of her.
This was as far as they needed to go.
“You did a great job coming home. You finally made it home… You must have traveled so far. Isn’t that great? Everyone came home safe. I’m so happy.”
For the time being, give them something to eat—even though they had just eaten fried rice, Seiji’s words made Taiga’s eyes glitter.