2.
Meeting with Yumi presented Sachiko with two unique challenges. The first was that she would need to sneak her past the perimeter without being spotted by anybody—certainly the employees of the Ogasawara estate would have been instructed to inform her mother if they noticed Sachiko with anybody on the grounds. The second was less concrete, but no less troubling—at some level, Sachiko understood that it was entirely possible that she would have to make a decision during the meeting which could change the course of her life, more or less forever. This would also have to be done without being spotted.
It was hard to make life-changing decisions when looking over one’s shoulder.
She could try and sneak Yumi into her room. Her room was more or less soundproof (all of the rooms in the house were—it would not do for a guest to be heard at a party when he had decided to retire with one of the younger ladies, who may or may not have been his wife, for the evening.) but the house was not, and it was bustling with activity. She was getting married soon, after all. There was a wedding. She and Suguru were to be married. Wedded forever in eternal fucking bliss. Boy, that was a hoot. Eternal fucking bliss. Eternal bliss fucking, but certainly not each other. Maybe not even once. Not ever. Maybe if she hadn’t loved him, that wouldn’t be as bad. Maybe then she could just do the responsible thing, marry him, and fuck whomever she pleased, but she couldn’t. Because she loved him. And she could also love other people. But she couldn’t love them both at once, and as long as she was with Suguru, and as long as he didn’t love her, she would not be able to stop loving him. That was the way of it, wasn’t it? You loved somebody until they loved you back, and then you probably had ten more good years. So if Suguru had a change of heart—not to mention of sexual orientation—when they were both around eighty, they could die in love, and how many people could really say that? But he wouldn’t, and she knew it, because that wasn’t how it worked, no matter what the hard-liners said. It wasn’t a choice. It was just how a person was. It was how God made them.
So she had to quit him, and she knew it, because she couldn’t do that sausage-on-the-side bullshit like her father could. Like her mother probably did.
She does, and look what it makes her do.
Look what it makes her do to me.
Focus, Sachiko.
Focus.
It was easy to feel bitter.
It was harder to grow some stones and fight.
So sneaking Yumi in was probably not an option, unless there was a very convenient vine growing outside her window. For the hell of it, she opened the window carefully, stuck her head out, and checked—there wasn’t. It was actually quite a long way down. Longer than her bedsheets.
(come on Sachiko I’ll show you how soft the bedsheets are why d)
No. Focus.
So she would have to go with the blunt approach and walk right out the front door, which meant she would probably be followed, albeit at a great distance. If she could sneak out of the house she might be in the clear—it wasn’t as though the edges of her property were patrolled, though there were some troublingly high walls.
There was another issue. There was a camera at the gate to her property. Could she get Yumi to climb the walls somewhere? Maybe hug the wall to stay out of its line of sight? No, that was overdoing it.
This tactical espionage action crap doesn’t suit me.
It really didn’t.
Why, then, would they deny Yumi entrance to the property? Probably because she was a member of the group that had whisked her off for a free-and-easy weekend in Kyoto.
But that was just fun.
It’s not as though they know anything.
Suguru does. I’d put money on that if anybody sees Yumi on the property, with or without me, she’ll be escorted off the property within ten minutes. After all, there’s a wedding to be planned.
Let him explain it, though. Let him explain to a guard that he doesn’t want me seeing my petite soeur because he thinks we’re lovers. Let him explain it to my mother.
Because that was the thing about polite society. You never said anything like that directly. You implied it, strongly, and usually your message was gotten. But what about a message like this? Something so absurd that it would be positively silly if it weren’t very nearly true.
(We’re not lovers.)
(Not yet.)
The thought gave her a little shiver. She liked it.
So, there was a very simple answer to her issue. If Suguru and her mother wanted to strongarm her, she would strongarm them right back. Suguru could talk circles around most people, but not Sachiko, and if he tried, he’d lose. Her mother didn’t know a damn thing about why Suguru was so dead-set against them meeting, she only knew that Suguru said it would be best.
And isn’t it an Ogasawara family trait for the women to accept unquestioningly what the men tell them?
Isn’t it an Ogasawara family trait for the women to accept unquestioningly what anybody tells them?
Fuck that.
She sent Yumi a text message asking her to call her cellular phone when she was in sight of the gate, and then put on a simple outfit—jeans and a blouse, and a black shirt over it. She wore sneakers, something she rarely wore. She supposed it would be more beneficial to dress up, look the part of an Ogasawara woman, but that was the image she was trying to avoid, so she would have to make do.
She plopped her cell phone back in her pocket.
Was that the first time you’ve ever sent a text message?
I think it was.
She went downstairs. The place was more or less empty, but that was not entirely true. There were plenty of people in the Ogasawara residence, if you knew where to look. For example, there was a room that should have been a closet nearby, which was actually where the guard was. That would be her next goal.
Besides, she was getting married. There were bound to be people here. Somebody had to tell her how to do it. She wondered if her mother had hired somebody to teach her how to please Suguru on their first night together. (What a joke.)
She got to the closet where the guard was stationed.
This was going to be the real trick. The timing, for one, but more than that, the execution. It wouldn’t hinge on him, and she knew it—in the end, he was employed by her family, and it would take less planning and more of a firm display of will to convince him of such, but that was where the problem lay—it would be, for all practical purposes, her first true flex of that particular muscle.
I’m not getting any younger sitting here thinking about it, am I?
She stepped away from the door enough to shield her voice, and then flipped her phone open and dialed the house driver, who, of course, answered on the first ring. Unless he was out already, in which case the point was moot. Her family had more cars than it did drivers, and that was what she was counting on.
“What can I do for you, Miss Ogasawara?” the driver asked by way of greeting.
“I’m very sorry,” she said, forcing a bit of sheepish humility into her voice—something she was well-accustomed to, in the event that she somehow offended one of her guests, “but I was in the midst of baking something for my grande soeur, who should be arriving at the house shortly, and we seem to have run short on milk. Could I trouble you to head to the store and pick up a liter of it, please?”
“Of course, Miss Ogasawara. Will you be wanting it delivered to the kitchen?”
“Please.”
“I will take care of it at once, then.”
“Thank you very much,” she said, again sheepishly. “I’m sorry for the trouble.” Never apologize to the help, they had said, but they could royally fuck themselves.
“Not at all, Miss Ogasawara,” the driver said. “I’ll be hanging up now.” And he did.
The next thing Sachiko did was go to the kitchen and write a small note:
Dear Mr. Ougura—I’m so inobservant! Not five minutes after I sent you for milk, I found some in a refrigerator in the basement. I’m afraid I’ve troubled you for nothing. Please leave the milk in the kitchen refrigerator. I’m very sorry for the trouble .
--Sachiko Ogasawara
She left it there and went back to waiting outside the closet. The timing of this would be key, but she knew roughly how long it took Yumi to get here by both car and bus, and they were not too far apart. She had timed it right. She had to have.
A few minutes later, her phone buzzed.
She took a breath, and opened the door to the closet. It was not locked. The guard jumped in shock—he probably had been told he would be well-hidden, because who would use a closet in such a large house, they’d just forget which one they left whatever they were storing in—but said nothing. Maybe he just wasn’t used to being intruded upon.
She answered her phone. “Hello, Onee-sama,” she said. The guard looked at her strangely, and Sachiko looked at him for a moment.
Yumi said, “Wait, what? Onee-sama?”
“Yes, I’ll send a car out for you,” Sachiko said, and then paused a moment, ignoring Yumi’s near-sputtered protests. “I’m sorry the bus didn’t drop you off closer. Just wait at the end of the property, there’s no need for you to overexert yourself. Yes, I’ll send somebody right out. Yes, good bye.” And she closed the small phone.
The guard had regained his composure by this point and said, “Is there anything I can help you with, Miss Ogasawara?”
“Yes, could you please send a car out for my grande soeur?” Sachiko said. “I’ve asked her to come tell me what she thinks of my dress, but unfortunately, she is currently short her car, and had to take the bus. She should be near the end of the road at this point.”
The guard may have protested on many counts, but he did not. Maybe he was honestly not suspicious, or, more likely, he just didn’t care enough to lose his job. That was the thing about hired help—more often than not, they were only that. They had their own lives. If they were told to inform Suguru in the event that Yumi Fukuzawa showed up on the property, then that was what they would do. They would not question her if she told them to send a car out for somebody else. That wasn’t their job, and they weren’t getting paid overtime for this shit.
The guard pushed a small button on a console nearby, waited a moment, and received no response, frowned. “I’m afraid the driver seems to be away from his post.”
“I see,” she frowned. “Could he be out?”
“He may well be. Shall I fetch a car myself?”
“That won’t be necessary,” Sachiko said, keeping her voice level in spite of the fact that her chest was trembling with nerves. What if he insisted? What if there was a reserve driver? Hell, what if Yumi didn’t get the message—that she should just stand and wait at the end of the property—and while she was on her way to get a car, she showed up at the gate? “I’ll go out myself—she is my grande soeur, after all. Could you please just open the gate for us?”
“Of course, Miss Ogasawara.”
She bowed slightly, thanked him, and started for the garage as quickly as she could, focusing her best at not tripping over her feet. Her hands were trembling, hard. When she made it to the garage, she selected the nearest car to the exit, and prayed the keys would be in the ignition already—if they were not, she didn’t know if she could get them in with her hands shaking as hard as they were. As it turned out, she needn’t have worried—when she got in, there was a key sitting happily in the ignition. She started the car and tried her best not to tear out of the garage and off the property. It was hard for her not to simply floor the gas, but she didn’t.
Yumi, as it turned out, had gotten the message, and had even hidden herself a bit by leaning against the outer wall. It was most unladylike, and in another time and place, Sachiko might have chastised her for it. As it was, it just seemed to fit. When she saw her petite soeur, she could not help it—she burst into a grin. She rolled down the window, and said, “Please get in the back, Yumi.”
Yumi didn’t question her. In truth, and Sachiko would never know this, nobody seeing the woman’s face at that time would have questioned her, so determined it was.
Sachiko turned around and drove right through the front gate, which was sitting open for her, taking a moment to roll her window down and bow thankfully at the camera. The gate closed behind her.
The best way to avoid being seen is still to walk right in through the front door.
They pulled into the driveway, and sat there for a second, and then Sachiko shook her head. Gotta keep moving. “Come on, Yumi. Let’s see if we can make it to my room.”
Yumi frowned. “Make it…?”
Sachiko grinned a bit more widely than she ought to have, and turned around to face her petite soeur. “Make it,” she said. “You, uh.” Do not use stupid words like uh. (get fucked, should I use that instead?) “Are not technically supposed to be here. No, not technically, that’s the wrong word. Unofficially, you are considered politely-escort-out-on-sight.”
“I see,” Yumi frowned. “Onee-sama, I don’t want to be a bo—”
Never interrupt somebody. There is nothing that smacks of impatience, and of ill breeding, quite like speaking when somebody else is speaking. Give them a two second (dose of shut the fuck up, I have no time for you, you haggard bitch) “I think it’s too late for silly things like that, Yumi. Don’t you?” After all…
(admit it)
Isn’t what I’m doing much akin to being a permanent bother to her? And her to me?
(that’s very cynical)
It’s very me.
“Besides, I’m enjoying myself more than I have” excluding that night “in years. You should have seen the fast one I pulled on the man who was supposed to be driving this car.”
“Fast one?”
Sachiko outright grinned at Yumi. “I’ll tell you later. Come on.” She got out of the car, and Yumi followed her, around the car and towards the door. Just as Sachiko touched the door, the garage door started opening. Yumi gave a small shriek, and Sachiko grabbed her hand and they fled. Hopefully before they were seen, but if not, who cared? At this point, Sachiko was prepared to barricade herself in her room. She would not need long to say what she needed to say, in absolute terms, anyway—there were very few words to it. As to whether or not she would be able to say it in any reasonable length of time, that was another story.
They sped through the kitchen—after all, that was where the driver would be going. Sachiko checked her note to make sure it was still in place on their way by, and then they were into a hallway.
No, that closet is in here. What if he has to use the bathroom? They kept going, curved around at the stairway, headed up to the second floor. To Sachiko’s left, towards her room, she heard the chatter of maids, probably making up a guest room. Unfortunately, the house did not curve around into a full circle, and so barring putting Yumi in a suitcase she wasn’t going to get by them.
We have to get out of the hallway.
She pulled Yumi to her right, and Yumi protested very briefly with a “Isn’t your room that wa—”
Sachiko started to put a finger to her own lip, thought better of it, put it to Yumi’s instead. The move was so overused in popular culture that alone, it had lost its effect, but the touch startled the girl into silence.
I can do this in a guest room, too. I can.
Unfortunately, there was only one guest room off to this side, and the door was flung wide open. There was very little noise coming from inside, but Sachiko peaked her head around the corner, saw a maid working quietly in on what amounted to little more than a glorified turndown. There was, after all, going to be a wedding. She let go of Yumi’s hand briefly, dashed across the opening while the woman had her back turned.
Yumi blinked at her, mouthed something like what now?
Sachiko peeked in on the maid again, then looked down the hall past Yumi, saw that the maids were piling used bedsheets in the hall. They weren’t taking their time at it, but even so. Sachiko peeked inside again, her heart beginning to pound. What if they decided to come out for a smoke break? What if one of them tries to get chatty with me? Did anybody tell them about Yumi? Does--
Yumi smiled at Sachiko and dashed across the opening, grabbed her hand, and took off, stopping and knocking on the nearest door. Nobody responded, so she opened the door and pulled them both inside.
And that was how through no fault of her own, Sachiko’s plan was diverted from her own room to a guest bedroom to a guest bathroom.
At least there was a good lock on it.
--
There’s not much more that I can fake.
--
They sat in silence for a moment, letting the rush of the moment sink in, maybe, or maybe just not sure what to say now that they had actually found a place to be alone, albeit a very bad one.
Eventually, Yumi said, “So.”
It was a start. Not much of one, though. Sachiko said, “That was quite something, wasn’t it?”
Yumi frowned at her, and Sachiko felt something low kick at her stomach. She was either very nervous, or quite pregnant.
“I can’t believe we ended up in a bathroom, though. It doesn’t seem right for…”
Yumi didn’t say anything.
What the hell are you doing?
“Oh, I wonder if we’ll ever see that Ryuusuke or Kyoko again. They were such lovely…”
You had something to say to her. You called her over here. You made a hell of a deal of getting her in a place where you could be alone together. Is it that this isn’t where you envisioned doing it? Or are you just turning chicken-shit on me?
“Onee-sama,” Yumi started, but for the second time in less than ten minutes, Sachiko cut her off.
“Let me get to it, Yumi,” she said gently. “Please.”
How are you planning on getting to it? By talking about the weather?
What was the best way to get through something like this? She knew what she wanted to say, but she didn’t know what she wanted to say.
You could go with a fancy metaphor. Have you ever seen an old couple walking down the street holding hands? Well, me neither because it would be inappropriate of them, but it’s sure cute on the dramas, isn’t it?
Maybe just grab her and throw her to the ground and take her as you want her?
Should I lead into it? What if she doesn’t even swing that way? Oh God. It seemed almost a little late for that. She’s locked in here in a bathroom with me. I don’t want her getting nervous. I don’t want her feeling trapped or pressured. Go on a date with me or you’re never getting out of this bathroom, Goldilocks. God, this is all wrong, there was never any right but there’s damn sure a wrong and this is it I can’t
Sachiko had a very distinct memory of her mother, one of her favorites, from when she was very young. Her mother, still young and pretty and happy, read to her from a book, and to a seven year-old girl, her voice was like the singers she heard on the radio. It was charming and distinct, light and airy, but with a strength underneath it that she would not have believed could succumb to something as insignificant as time. It sounded like nothing less and nothing more than lying outside on the warm grass with the sun on her face.
It was in that voice, not in the half-frenzied voice concerned with nothing more than the outcome of her dinner parties and to hell with the psychological impact on her children, that Sachiko’s mother said to her, in her mind or maybe divinely whispered in her ear, Sachiko, dear, you think too much.
Sachiko took a very deep breath. Maybe she wanted to get it all out in one go. There weren’t that many words to it, though, not really. No crazy metaphors, no casual lead-ins. No I have something I’ve wanted to say to you for years, no relentless stammering like a silly little schoolgirl making her first confession. (Something Sachiko had no experience with anyway.) Just four words. Easy ones, but hard ones, too.
She said, “Yumi, I love you,” and exhaled.
Yumi inhaled, but said nothing, her face a fascinating mixture of surprise and … something else that Sachiko couldn’t place. If she had really wanted to know what it was, she could have looked at Yumi’s eyes, because those couldn’t lie like the rest of the face, but she didn’t.
What is she thinking? Is she shocked? Is she even surprised? Is she about to tell me she’s got a boyfriend?
Of course not, you silly girl, her mother told her. She is giving you a moment to wonder all these things.
But why?
The smile in her mother’s voice was almost palpable, and seemed to simply melt into Sachiko’s face, causing her to smile herself. It was a voice Sachiko had never known, and yet had known all along; the voice of a mother giving her daughter her first advice on love, born from years of experience. Regretful, yes, because it meant her daughter was turning into a woman and she would miss her daughter, the little girl, but happy, too, because her daughter was turning into a woman, and she would be proud of her daughter, the woman. Because it’s the ladylike thing to do. A lady must be coy, too.
After those ten beats had passed—Sachiko had counted without even realizing it, Yumi said, “Onee…Sachiko. How long have you been waiting to tell me this?”
“Not long,” Sachiko admitted, and it was true. She basically got it out as soon as it came to her head. Oh God just answer me. “And…I could be mistaken, but I think I just did it in a bathroom.”
“Planning is key, Onee-sama,” Yumi said, echoing something she had once been told to her by none other than Sachiko herself. They stared at each other for a moment, Sachiko with some horror, Yumi with a bit too (it was doubtful she could believe that had actually come out of her mouth) and then burst into giggles. Somewhere along the way, Yumi’s hand found that of her grande soeur, and some time after that, they were chest to chest, still giggling, but now experiencing the unique, wonderful tickling sensation of holding someone else who is giggling.
After a while, their laughter subsided. A while later, Yumi murmured, “Sachiko, I love you.” Not Onee-sama. Sachiko.
Yumi sounded … grown up.
Probably she was. Probably she had been for longer than Sachiko herself.
Probably if she had planned this they wouldn’t have ended up in a bathroom.
Probably it was okay that they had.
They held each other some more.
“So then…what?” Yumi said after a while. “You’re still engaged to Suguru.”
Sachiko said, “Suguru is engaged to my company. You … know about him, don’t you?”
“No.”
“Really?”
“What is there to know?”
“He’s …not particularly interested in women.”
Yumi blinked. “I don’t think I have any ground to be shocked on at this point.”
“No you do not,” Sachiko said, and they giggled again.
“So then, what?” Yumi repeated.
“So then, nothing,” Sachiko said. “I’m not marrying him. I can’t, and I never could, I think. I just liked fooling myself into thinking I could. I can’t do what mother does, and mother gets attention from father once and a while.”
“So then, what?”
“I’ll call the wedding off, simple as that.”
“I can’t imagine he’ll be happy about it.”
“I think he’ll be overjoyed.”
“You do?”
“Think about it. Suguru is smart and cunning. Don’t you think he’d get bored if somebody simply dropped one of the largest conglomerates in Japan into his lap? This way, there will turn out to be a power struggle, and he’ll turn out on top.”
“Suguru seems like the type to be grateful for what he has.”
“Oh, he is.” She knew that all too well. “But that doesn’t mean he wouldn’t prefer it this way.”
And in her heart, Sachiko knew he would. Why?
“Because I would too.” And it was the truth.
Being handed things was dull. It was terrible. You got all the responsibility that having that thing entailed without any of the fun or the sense of respect that the process of getting brought. She had been handed things all her life, and she fucking hated them. Hated them. Yumi, she’d had to fight for.
And she loved Yumi.
And she thought for a moment, that maybe, just maybe, she always would.
For another day, Sachiko.
For another day.
She stood up after that, and Yumi got up with her, and they walked out into the halls holding hands. They walked downstairs and the driver stared openly at Sachiko, and then remembered he was supposed to be terminating Yumi on sight. He informed her that the Ogasawara property was very busy getting ready for the coming wedding, and though it was rude, asked her if she might come back another day. Sachiko looked at him for a moment, and he saw their hands intertwined, not palm to palm like friends, but fingers interlaced. Like lovers.
He smiled for a moment. Perhaps appreciating the irony. Perhaps simply relieved not to have to face Sachiko’s wrath.
Sachiko told him she would take Yumi home when Yumi was ready to go home, and the driver said, of course.
After that, they walked out onto that new veranda. The one that had just been repaired, that Suguru had suggested they spend the day on.
It started to rain shortly afterwards.
It really was nice in the rain.
I could live forever here, Sachiko thought at one point. She remembered very little else. Few thoughts, fewer words. Another man might have said that this was one of the greatest cruelties of life—that our happiest, most carefree moments didn’t engage the brain enough to really form vivid memories. Sachiko would have told him otherwise.
They formed impressions more vivid than any moment, like laugh lines on an old woman’s face. She certainly would never be able to tell you where she got them—who could remember all the times she has laughed, after all—but she could tell you how she got them, and that was the important part. She got them by being happy. By laughing a lot. By experiencing the only things that make life worthwhile.
As they sat outside, far past dark, after the rain had stopped, simply resting on one another, sometimes talking, occasionally kissing, most often dozing while staring into the clear, dark sky, and enjoying the air after an evening rain (truly one of the greatest things a man or woman on God’s green earth could experience) Sachiko formed an impression that would last her until the day that she died.
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