Jewel, who was reclining on the ivory sofa, nodded and looked around the room.
“It really is incredible. The people from before—they said they were Mitsu’s fan club?”
“Right, right, the fan club. They can be a little intense.”
Mitsuri thought she’d surely be surprised, but Jewel just said, “It’s always the same. It was like that when he was in high school, but I just realized it still happens now.”
Mitsuri gasped in disbelief.
“His high school fan club had very strict rules. For example, each member could only write Mitsu two letters per month. And you had to write your member number on the letter. That sort of thing. We still get lots of New Year’s cards with numbers.”
Jewel giggled, but Mitsuri was astonished. A high school student with a fan club…? So had the whole charm thing started in his teens? She wished she could have been there to see it.
“Oh, that’s right,” Mitsuri said with a start, “I almost forgot your drink. Take this for now, but drink it slowly.”
She handed the bottle to Jewel, who had settled herself snugly back into the sofa again. She was as lovely as Snow White or Sleeping Beauty. When she lifted the bottle to drink, her slender throat was exposed, and that, too, was beautiful. If her brother had a high school fan club, it wouldn’t be much of a stretch to imagine that this girl had one of her own, Mitsuri thought.
“Oh, speaking of home,” Mitsuri remembered to ask, “they said you came all the way here without telling your parents or brothers?” Jewel suddenly became very still.
“The manager said he and Tsugi went home to bring you their Christmas presents. If you had only told them, you wouldn’t have missed each other.”
“What, really?” Jewel lowered the plastic bottle. “They came home for me?”
“Why didn’t you tell anyone? It must have been a hard trip, all the way from Miyazaki to here.”
“My friend was going to a concert in Hakata, so she said her parents could drive me that far.”
“Hmm. Still, why not tell someone? You know I’m not angry or anything, right? I just have a kid who’s about the same age as you, so I’m curious. He’s in eleventh grade.”
Mitsuri smiled as she said this, and Jewel murmured, “One below me.” She thought for a few moments and then asked, “Um, your child. Does he have a plan for his future?”
“Who, Kōsei? Not at all!”
Mitsuri chuckled, picturing her son lost in the video game with his friend when she was leaving earlier, but then she saw the earnest look on Jewel’s face and added more seriously, “Our son still doesn’t know what he wants to do.”
“He doesn’t? But he’ll have to think about it at some point soon, won’t he? Like a year from now, for instance.”
“Well, perhaps. But I don’t think you can really set a deadline for that kind of thing, can you? I mean, he might discover it when he’s in college, or else after he graduates when he starts working. Look at me. I’m doing exactly what I want to do, but I’ve only really felt that way for a few years now. If that’s how it is for me, it wouldn’t be very fair to tell my own child that he has to make up his mind immediately, right at this moment, now, would it?”
Mitsuri laughed, then added to Jewel, who was giving her a doubtful look, “Of course, it would worry me to see him stumbling blindly through life, searching for fulfillment. At some point he’ll have to set aside his dreams and learn to live life as a mature, independent human being. But I believe there will come a time when he has a clear sense of what he wants to do. Or that’s my hope, anyway.”
Jewel looked down at the bottle she had clasped between her hands. “Mothers all say the same things,” she murmured in a small voice. “My parents said that, too. But I don’t have the slightest idea. My brothers all found what they wanted to do and left. But I can’t. I’m worried I’ll spend the rest of my life this way, living with my parents, chopping firewood…”
Mitsuri knew all about the vague anxieties of youth. She had been listening with sympathy to Jewel—but had she heard the last part correctly? Now, in this day and age, had she really said she was chopping firewood?
“It’s not that I don’t like life in the mountains. My parents love it, too. But I also really want to see what it’s like to live in the city, with electricity and everything, so I don’t know what to do.”
What was this! Mitsuri had heard that their house was set far back into the mountains of Miyazaki, but was it really that primitive there? She had a feeling this would be the wrong time to verify that with Jewel.
“Anyway, I wanted to talk to my brothers about it. The oldest one and the youngest one are overseas, so I thought I’d visit the two here in Mojikō.”
“Yes, yes, I see.”
Mitsuri had said she was going to make the Shiba brothers her life’s work, but now their story was moving at such a breakneck speed that she couldn’t keep up! What to do? Now was the time to act like an adult and offer Jewel some sage advice, but it was too much. Mitsuri had to restrain herself from asking the girl to break it into installments.
“Well, I think I understand, more or less. Your brothers will be back soon, so you can take your time and ask them for advice. That will be good. And of course, I’ll talk to them, too.”
Jewel gave a smile of relief, and Mitsuri smiled back at her.