In the taxi to Shinagawa after my recording session, I got a LINE message from my dad. “She made it out of surgery!”
One bullet train ride later, I took another cab to the general hospital where my mother was staying.
When I arrived, the anesthesia had already worn off, and she was back in her hospital room. But while I knew the surgery was over, seeing her lying in a bed in a hospital of all places put me on edge. She was wearing an oxygen mask, and her complexion was deathly pale. Given that she was the kind of woman who could sleep off a cold overnight, this was easily the most ill I’d ever seen her…and I was surprised to learn that deep down, some part of me was still a little kid, afraid my mommy might die.
Now that I was living on my own as a grown adult, I was in full control of my daily life. If anyone would be impacted by her death, it was my poor dad… He probably wouldn’t have a clue how to handle it…
While I was waxing sentimental, however, my mother slid her mask to the side. “Oh, is Kei here? Show him, honey! Show him the thing!” she exclaimed gleefully.
“No, let’s not…” he protested.
“Why not?”
“What thing?” I asked.
“The fibroid they took out—I had your father take a pic. You wanna see it, right?”
It was a good thing she was in a private room.
“Are you brain-dead?!” I snapped. I regretted getting sappy for even a single second. “Don’t you dare show me that shit. C’mon, Dad, why would you even take a picture?!”
“Because your mother insisted…”
“Oh dear, 2 p.m. already? Kei, have you had lunch?” she asked.
“Not yet.” Unsurprisingly, I wasn’t exactly in the mood to kick back with a train bento on the way here.
“Then you must be hungry. Honey, go take him to get something.”
“Say, what about the castella cake my coworker brought in as a get-well gift? You could take it back with you, right?” he suggested.
“No, he can’t. You know our little boy hates the sugar-crusted kind. He says it’s ‘too gravelly’ and refuses to eat it.”
Little boy? Then again, to them, I probably was. Never mind that I was a famous newscaster constantly on national TV—my parents were always going to ask if I was hungry and remember my food preferences. Not all parents were like this, but mine were.
“All right then, let’s go.”
Since I didn’t have time for a leisurely lunch, I asked my father to drive me to the train station.
“I really appreciate you coming out to see her,” he said. “I know you’re busy and all.”
“Sorry I didn’t bring a gift.”
“Seeing our son living well is the best gift of all.”
He beamed brightly at me, and I realized something. He had never yelled at me, not once in all my life. My mother was a nag, but not unreasonably so, and neither of them tried to invalidate my life choices or force me to change. They gave me a place to belong, and they never made me feel alone.
Alone. The memory of Ushio’s voice echoed in my ears, and my eyes suddenly welled up, but I blinked the tears back. Not the time for that. Granted, I didn’t know if the time would ever come, but for right now, I needed to hold it in.
And another thing: I decided I needed to learn more about Ushio—more than he ever told me himself. Even if it wouldn’t lead me back to him, I still wanted to know.
✦ ✦ ✦
“Kunieda-san!” After our broadcast, Tatsuki walked over with an unusually serious expression on his face. “I need to talk to you.”
“Hmm?”
He whispered in my ear, “You’re hiding something about Tsuzuki-san, aren’t you?”
“…Minagawa-kun, are you hungry?” I asked with a smile.
“What?”
“I didn’t get to have lunch today.”
“Aha… Well, wanna go somewhere? If we need a place with a private room…”
“Ramen,” I said.
“Huh?”
“I’m in the mood for ramen. Know anywhere around here that’s still open?”
“I do, but, uh… It’s not a classy place…”
Dude, it’s ramen. Of course it’s not going to be classy. “Could you take me there?”
“Seriously…?”
And so we left the station. On the walk there, Tatsuki started to panic.
“For real, man, are you okay? ’Cause you kinda seem like you got dumped and now you’re losing control of your…”
“Finish that sentence within my earshot and I will burn you at the stake.”
We soon arrived at what looked to be an incredibly standard ramen bar with the employees all wearing black T-shirts and towels on their heads. Without hesitation, I ordered an extra-heavy tonkotsu ramen, jumbo size.
“Um…” The waiter who took my order hesitated. “Our ramen is on the oily side… Is that okay?”
“And extra char siu pork.”
“Oh, uh… Right away!”
My jumbo ramen arrived not ten minutes later, covered by a lid of char siu. The broth was so oily it was practically a roux. I pressed my palms together in thanks and started eating like it was the most ordinary thing in the world. I even ordered an extra helping of noodles and ate that too. Afterward, I paid for both of us and casually sauntered out onto the street.
Tatsuki quickly followed. “Okay, seriously, what’s the matter with you?”
“I was hungry, so I ate. What’s the issue?”
“I mean, I get that, but…”
“The brain needs a little grease to function,” I said.
“Riiight… So you’re saying you have no intention of talking to me, or what?”
“Don’t worry. You’re a great pawn. I’m thinking of a few different ways to use you.”
“What am I, your side piece?! Not cool, man!” After his protests, he eventually concluded, “Well, I guess it’s good that you have energy and an appetite.” Surprisingly, he didn’t try to weasel anything out of me like usual. “But I’ll only offer my services equal to the value of the ramen.”
“For now, just casually set up a get-together with the politics department and invite me. Even better if you can get people from the newspapers or other stations.”
“The politics department? Kinda sus, man… You know people are still gossiping about you running in the election, right? Isn’t this kind of a bad time?”
“That’s why you have to set it up. And don’t worry about the higher-ups hearing.” I knew that after Shitara-san yelled at them, they were guaranteed to leave me alone for a good while.
“Are you going to stop putting on an act, senpai?”
“No.” Besides, it wasn’t an act. From the moment Ushio said he loved both sides of me, they both became equally Kunieda Kei. I simply switched between them as needed.
“So what are you gonna say to these political people?” he asked.
“Nothing much. If anything, it’ll be like an informal interview, I guess.”
I didn’t need to target Wakamiya Homare specifically. I wanted to talk to people who had been in that space—learn the behind-the-scenes speculation and gossip and other random details only they would know. Luckily, journalists were chatty by nature. Whenever something was unverified and therefore unfit to disclose to outsiders, they loved to preface it with “off the record…” and spill the beans anyway.
Fueled by the grease in my gut, my head and stomach were warm and fuzzy. I wasn’t giving up—not yet. I was going to keep charging forward, even if I was just spinning my wheels and wasting my time.
“You know, Kunieda-san,” Tatsuki muttered, “you never complain, do you? Not about work, not about personal stuff, nothing.”
“Complain? To you? I’d sooner complain to that stop sign.”
“Rude!”
Normal people vented their frustrations, asked for advice, or even consulted a horoscope. The fact that I often couldn’t do those “normal” things was one of my greatest weaknesses. There was only one person in this world whose shoulder I was willing to cry on—and now he thought he could leave me? Ridiculous.
For the record, I never knew Ushio was the son of a politician, and he was the one who initiated all this. Why the hell was I getting punished for it? Maybe if his dad wanted to give me two billion yen to formally apologize, that’d be one thing, but instead, he poked around in my business and spread fake rumors. Fuck off! I’ll show you what happens when you mess with us regular folk!
I was delighted to find I was still capable of anger.
“I’m not letting him get away with this…” I said.
“Senpai, you sound like a cartoon villain.”