Kazuhiko opened the door. The bell attached to it tinkled, and Kazuhiko was greeted with welcomes from the staff and the gentle aroma of coffee.
It was somewhat unusual for an establishment serving coffee to be in the Japanese style and have such an extensive dessert menu. This quirky fusion extended to the staff dressed in kimonos but not acting in the exaggerated, pandering-to-tourists way you’d see at a popular destination for globe-trotting travelers. The inside was modern and the staff friendly…or rather, comfortingly laid-back, making you immediately feel at home.
Reassured that there were no other customers, Kazuhiko went over to sit in his favorite spot, the middle counter chair. He was about to order an American coffee, as always.
“Would you like your usual?” asked the café owner, Mika, from behind the counter.
Kazuhiko found Mika’s deep, unhurried voice calming. He nodded. It was impossible to deny that it felt good to be asked if he wanted “his usual.” The café owner had only started asking him that a week ago.
As Mika began preparing the coffee, Kazuhiko watched him from his counter seat, thinking about how even though Kinshicho had perhaps the highest number of Scandinavian-type bars and restaurants in all of Japan, there was probably no other place, and certainly not a café, where you’d be served by a dark-skinned man in a kimono. At the same time, the barista’s appearance was evocative of what Café LycoReco specialized in—coffee and Japanese desserts.
Mika had an air of mature confidence and a gentle look in his bespectacled eyes. He was tall, yet his finger movements were delicate and graceful, even sensuous.
“You look very relaxed for a weekday afternoon. Remind me what it is that you do, Mr. Tokuda.”
The request came from a waitress sitting at the counter’s corner seat. She was leafing through a book. Her name was Mizuki Nakahara, and although she wasn’t drinking that day, Kazuhiko had seen her before with a bottle of this or that alcohol, getting tipsy during work hours. Condoning such behavior from a waitress went beyond having a relaxed work ethic—she seemed to have a bit too much freedom. Perhaps she had considerable bargaining power, being the one to serve customers seated at the tables in place of Mika, who had a bad leg.
Kazuhiko noticed it wasn’t a book Mizuki was reading but a bridal magazine, Zeksy. It was hugely popular with women planning their weddings, but for the divorced Kazuhiko, it was a cursed publication. Seeing the magazine brought him nothing but bad memories.
It was odd, though, that Mizuki would be reading Zeksy. Kazuhiko recalled an earlier conversation with her in which she revealed she was single. She had complained to him that there were no good men, by which Kazuhiko guessed she might’ve set her expectations too high.
Never mind her dowdy glasses; Mizuki was a natural beauty. She looked fit and was well-endowed, so she could probably pick and choose from a great many suitors. Kazuhiko himself would have made advances on her if it hadn’t been for his unfortunate experience with his marriage.
In this day and age, many women had ambitions other than getting married. Kazuhiko cautiously touched on that subject with Mizuki, who replied with a tired smile, “Nowadays, women get to choose, no? And I’m an old-fashioned lady who dreams of a happy marriage.”
With a pang of shame, Kazuhiko realized then that they’d been conditioned to reject old-fashioned ways of thinking as unequivocally wrong, uncritically believing the often-repeated opinion that the times had changed, and with more doors open to them, women could no longer find contentment solely through marriage. He only had himself to blame for such close-minded thinking, of course, but it was common for teenagers and people in their twenties to be obsessed with keeping up with the latest trends. Mizuki wasn’t like that at all, however. Kazuhiko thought with appreciation that she was a freethinker.
“Well? What’s wrong, Mr. Tokuda? Oh… Is your job the sort you don’t want to talk about?”
He was writing for several popular columns, but the type of generic content he was producing wasn’t anything to boast about. Whenever he explained what he did for a living to curious people, it always resulted in awkwardness, as they’d be unsure about how to react. Having experienced this many times over, Kazuhiko had decided it wasn’t worth discussing his work at all. This time, though, he would have to make an exception…
“Stop prying, Mizuki. You have no tact.”
The interruption came just as Kazuhiko was bracing himself to speak. It wasn’t Mika who’d told off Mizuki, but a short girl who’d just emerged from the far end of the café munching on some snacks. She looked to be in her early teens…or maybe she was still a preteen? Her name was Kurumi. It seemed that Mika was looking after the girl, but Kazuhiko didn’t know the particulars of the situation, having judged it insensitive to probe into it.
While Kurumi’s fair skin, long, wavy blond hair, and blue eyes hinted at Caucasian ethnicity, something about her face made her look Asian, too. She spoke perfect Japanese, but Kazuhiko had heard her talking in English like a native to a lost tourist who’d come into the café another day, so it was safe to say she was at least bilingual. Kazuhiko couldn’t guess her nationality, but then again, Kinshicho was home to many people of mixed nationality.
Whether the girl was going to any school was unclear, but she was brilliant and would sometimes join in adults’ conversations about the economy or other grown-up topics. Her interactions with Mizuki also made Kurumi seem like the more mature of the two. She was a mystery.
Kurumi walked over to the low tables on the raised tatami floor and started setting up board game pieces. A group of regulars was meeting up for a game party later, so she was getting everything ready for them in advance. When Mika approached her, she bowed her head slightly.
“We used to host game parties only after opening hours, but since younger players have joined the group, we have daytime sessions, too,” Mika explained.
“Huh,” Kazuhiko grunted in surprise. “Don’t kids prefer digital games? I sure did.”
Thoughtful, Mika turned his profile toward Kazuhiko.
“I think that with digital entertainment being so common, it no longer has the same appeal to kids. It’s analog games that you play in person with other people that feel exciting and different now… Especially for Kurumi.”
Kazuhiko thought that it made sense that old trends were making a comeback. As the novelty of the digital world wore off, people were seeing value in real-world experiences again.
“Do you want to play too, Mr. Tokuda? There’s space for one more,” Kurumi offered.
On another day, Kazuhiko might have been up for it, but on this particular visit to the café, he had important business to focus on. He wasn’t there just for leisure.
“Mika, um, I have something important to ask you today…”
“Omigosh, is it a love confession?!” Mizuki cut in, to Kazuhiko’s consternation.
If he had fallen for the barista, he surely wouldn’t have come to tell him that at his workplace at lunchtime with other people around.
Mika told off Mizuki with a sigh and passed the freshly brewed coffee to Kazuhiko, who took a sip to calm himself before resuming the interrupted conversation.
“You see, Mika, I’d like to discuss—”
Ding-a-ling! The bell rang as the door opened, but it wasn’t a customer who came in—it was two high school girls in cute uniforms. They worked at the café too. They were its poster girls.
“We’ve bought everything, Boss,” announced the pretty girl with long black hair as she carried the shopping to the back.
Her name was Takina Inoue. She was quiet and graceful, and while her presence was unobtrusive, she had a strange, subtle charm that made your gaze linger on her.
“Oh, hey! It’s Mr. Kazuhiko! So what were you two talking about? Oh, sorry if we’re interrupting!” said the girl who came in after Takina, Chisato Nishikigi.
Her hair was a very light shade of blonde, dazzlingly radiant in the sun. She accessorized it with a red ribbon on her left side. She came to the counter and darted her gaze between Mika and Kazuhiko. Mizuki butted in again.
“Mr. Tokuda was just about to confess his love for the boss!”
“Are you serious? I did notice Mr. Kazuhiko pays special attention to the boss, but I didn’t think it was that kind of special… Teach, stop stealing hearts, or they’ll put you in jail!”
Chisato banged her hand on the counter, teasing Mika like an auntie might a nephew.
The way she approached anyone without reservation, could never sit still, and always spoke fast and excitedly made her resemble a puppy happily chasing down an interesting scent. She was the opposite of Takina, naturally becoming the center of attention wherever she went.
Kazuhiko thought that if he’d had a friend like Chisato when he was a boy, his childhood would have been much more fun.
“Chisato, please… I don’t think that is what Mr. Tokuda wanted to discuss with me at all.”
Chisato looked back at Mika blankly.
It occurred to Kazuhiko that while the other staff called Mika “Boss,” Chisato was the only one to refer to him as “Teach.” He wondered why.