CHAPTER 3 #2
“Arisa’s death was a terrible shock for all of us,” his grandfather said. “But it doesn’t excuse our behavior.”
A fresh wave of irritation grew within Shinji.
“Believe me, I know it was a shock. Father grieved her until his death and never cared about me. All three of you have been so focused on the one who had left our world that you forgot about her still living defenseless child.” Tears stung the corners of his eyes, but he held them back.
His grandparents’ eyes widened, then they lowered them in embarrassment.
Shinji hadn’t grieved his mother, at least not as his father did.
It was difficult to mourn a mother he never knew, but he always felt like a piece of himself was missing, like he’d left part of his heart in the land of the dead when they went there together as two souls.
In his darkest moments, he’d wished the doctors hadn’t brought him back.
“During my childhood,” he continued in a low voice, “I never had anyone to tell me about ghosts, to show me what I can do with my powers, to help me stay sane. You won’t understand the haunting loneliness I felt, isolated in that village with a grieving father who longed for the one ghost who wasn’t there.
He wanted my mother by his side instead of me.
” He gave each of them a piercing glare.
“You were disgusted that I joined the Onmyōryō, but they were the only ones who bothered to teach me about the supernatural world and my powers.”
His grandfather parted his lips to speak, but Shinji raised a palm to stop him.
“Don’t. It doesn’t matter anymore.” He heaved a shuddering sigh and turned the subject back to Teruo.
“I know you think I can’t save my superior officer, but I’m not leaving until you tell me more about my mother’s healing skills and whether she had any other partners who are still alive and could give me details. ”
“Her teacher possibly had other students,” his grandfather said. “If he did, we don’t know who they are. Arisa never mentioned them for safety reasons.”
“Since she healed my superior officer’s soul,” Shinji said, “is that what she specialized in?”
His grandmother dabbed her eyes with a tissue, then spoke, “I’m not sure if she necessarily specialized, but she definitely took care of several incomplete souls during her apprenticeship with Senda.
They had some successes—I occasionally heard her talking on the phone about it.
She never mentioned the failed healings, but I could tell they affected her.
One thing she was always loudly proclaiming was that healing should’ve been made available for everyone, supernaturals and non-supernaturals alike. ”
“Do you know any of these people with incomplete souls?” Shinji asked.
“They’re rare and most likely already dead.” His grandmother took a sharp breath. “I meant to say—”
“What else did she take care of?” Shinji cut in, not wanting to hear about failed healings anymore.
“Possessions of non-supernaturals,” his grandfather said.
“She knew how to extract ghosts?”
“Her teacher would do that,” his grandfather replied. “She’d heal the soul afterwards. Possession takes a terrible toll on a person’s soul.”
Don’t I know that? Shinji shuddered as the image of a possessed Haruna came to mind. Yet another regret he carried with him.
“Did my mother ever keep records of these healings?” Shinji asked.
“She had a few journals that she kept hidden,” his grandmother said. “After her death, we took them from your father’s home out of fear that he might sell them to the wrong person for the wrong purpose.”
A painful realization hit Shinji: his grandparents were quick to take a few notebooks away, but they couldn’t be bothered to fight for him. He picked up the cup of tea again and sipped, trying to stop thinking about the past and focus on the current situation.
“Did you read them?” Shinji asked.
His grandfather shook his head. “Never. We wanted to, but we feared what she wrote inside. The less we knew, the better. We even intended to burn them at some point, but they carried her memories and we couldn’t bring ourselves to do that.
” The lines on his forehead creased with sorrow and his hand rubbed on his aching thigh again.
“We have them hidden in a box in the bedroom.”
“May I see them?” Shinji asked.
“Of course,” his grandmother said.
She rose to her feet and extended a hand to his grandfather to help him up. Shinji quickly offered his as well, and his grandfather’s grip on him was firm, like he’d wanted to keep holding on to him, but in the end, he murmured a “thank you” and reluctantly let go.
They led him to their bedroom, and his grandmother kneeled, then slid open the door to the closet where they kept their futon mattress folded.
On the lowest shelf was a rectangular box made of paulownia wood and his grandmother brought it out, then opened its lid.
Inside were school notebooks with plain covers in a faded shade of blue and each had labels yellowed with time.
“Arisa” was written on them and beneath the name was a number for each notebook.
“There’s eleven of them,” his grandmother said, and passed the first notebook to Shinji.
He sat cross-legged on the floor and opened it, skimming to get a feeling for what his mom took notes of.
Journal number one had started when she was still a high school student, judging by the date.
The corners of his mouth curved in a little smile.
She had messy writing, just like he did.
It was, perhaps, a strange thing to be happy about, but he was unbelievably happy as he trailed a finger over the writing.
She spoke about her teacher and his “vision”.
She wasn’t saying what sort of vision that was, but she praised his healing skills, calling him a master of reiryoku.
In the middle, she had started to describe their most peculiar healings, the first one regarding the soul of a formerly possessed person. She delved into its intricacies on a pretty advanced level, analyzing it layer by layer to understand the process of making a soul whole again.
It was an intriguing blend of supernatural and science, and pretty scary too, because such knowledge wasn’t discussed openly by the Onmyōryō, and it remained contained within the walls of the castle’s labs, where supernaturals studied spiritual energy.
“I get why she hid them,” Shinji said, and grabbed another one to check if it had the same types of notes.
It did, and he nodded to himself. Kazuya would likely be able to make sense of them because Shinji’s knowledge of healing powers was flimsy at best, since his reiryoku was its complete opposite. “May I borrow them?”
“You can keep them,” his grandmother said. “They belong to you.”
“Thank you.” Shinji picked up journal number eleven and browsed through it, realizing she had started it around the time she got pregnant with him. He decided to keep this one in his backpack and put the rest in a larger bag.
His grandmother picked up something wrapped in paper from the bottom of a nearby drawer and unfolded it. “They’re old photographs from before she met your father. Keep these too.”
“Thank you very much.” Shinji bowed his head. “I appreciate it.”
“We resented your father for a very long time,” his grandfather said suddenly.
“We thought him too old for her. We could tell she loved him dearly, but we thought her too young to know better and we were scared he was taking advantage of her. It put a ridge between us and Arisa, who ran away to be with him.”
“It’s the parents’ job to worry, isn’t it?
” Shinji said. “I understand why you felt that way, but I don’t think they were ill-matched.
At least, I want to believe he was different with my mom than he was with me.
After all, he grieved her for nineteen years and sent himself to an early grave because of it. ”
When Shinji opened the gate and sent him over, his father’s last words were: Is she waiting for me? But Shinji only shrugged with no care because, back then, there was none left in him.
“Can we keep in touch?” his grandmother said, fear and hope dripping from her voice.
“Yes, I’d like that.” Shinji smiled.
He left their house and headed to the airport, this time feeling a bit more hopeful now that he had his mother’s journals. After he settled in his seat inside the plane, he took the notebook out of his backpack and read, smiling at how excited his mother was to have him.
He turned the pages until he found one full of various names scribbled on the page. Some had been erased and new ones written over them. She must’ve been thinking about what to name him.
In the middle of them, SHINJI was written in large kanji and placed in a circle. This time, he couldn’t keep the tears back anymore.