Chapter 8 The Man Magnet’s Osechi #5
“So then I came up with the idea of making him osechi, in order to make up with him. Fujimoto-kun had told me that he’d never properly tried osechi before, because when he was growing up, there was usually no one home on New Year’s. I wanted to make him his first homemade osechi.”
“You’re really something, Shiori-chan,” I said. “Osechi takes a lot of time and effort.”
“I had no choice. I mean, they say the way to a man’s heart is through his stomach, right?
But nothing that I cooked for him had worked, not even nikujaga, karaage, or beef stew.
I thought that if I made him something as impressive as osechi, then he would be able to see a future with me.
I desperately wanted to make him go, ‘If it was with her, maybe I could give this being-a-family thing a try.’ ”
Shiori-chan tapped at the jubako with the tips of her nails. The osechi, once neatly packed inside the boxes, had now been reduced to a scatter of leftovers.
“From then onward, osechi became something of a magic cure for our relationship. Every November, on my birthday, I would get impatient and ask him if he was ever going to marry me. He would avoid answering properly, start saying that he was scared or whatever. I would get pissed off and leave. But then I’d start to miss him, and I’d show up at his place just before New Year’s, my homemade osechi in hand.
We’d enjoy the osechi together and make up.
This whole routine has been our norm for the past three years. ”
Shiori-chan nonchalantly poured tequila for herself and drank it in one gulp. Her eyes had started to turn droopy.
“Yesterday, I was hoping to reset things by following that same routine: make osechi, go to Fujimoto-kun’s house, have osechi together, and poof!—another year begins.”
“I think you’ve had enough to drink.” Iori seized the bottle of tequila from Shiori-chan. Protesting playfully, Shiori-chan laughed. Her blinking had slowed down.
“But as I was packing the datemaki into the jubako, a thought struck me. Didn’t I do this last year?
And the year before, and the year before that?
It was like I was in one of those time-loop movies.
He would allude to a future together by saying things like, ‘Remind me next year that I’ve put away my winter clothes here.
I’ll forget.’ He would talk to me as though we were going to be together in a year’s time.
It gave me hope that one day he would change. Do you see what I mean?”
Iori was about to pour his beer when, like a cat pouncing on its prey, Shiori-chan snatched the beer out of his hands and downed it. She let out another satisfied sigh and slumped over the table.
“She caught me off guard,” Iori said, as an explanation for his weak reflexes.
We cleared the plates and glasses away from her hair.
“I wonder what Fujimoto-kun is doing right now…” Still slumped over on the table, Shiori-chan slurred her words. “He cried, you know. When I told him yesterday that I wanted to break up.”
“He did?” I said. “He didn’t want to break up with you?”
“Oh, I don’t know…I don’t get him. He said he was sorry.
He told me that he would be ruined if he stayed with me.
‘I’m scared. When I’m with you, it feels like a version of me that I never knew gets dragged out of me.
It feels like I’m being stripped naked.’ Imagine a brawny, bearded man crying his eyes out. ”
Her head still resting on the table, Shiori-chan shifted her glance to me.
“Hey, Momoko.” She stared at me with sleepy eyes.
Even her neck was red from drunkenness. “What was I supposed to do? I just couldn’t do it anymore.
I had done everything I could to convey my love to him.
For five years, I was me. No games, no techniques.
I confronted him as me and I got hurt a lot.
Even still, I really, really loved him. And now I’ve used up all of my love. ”
Tears pooled under her reddened eyes and dropped down the side of her face.
“I’m drained of love. I loved him to the last drop. I tried my best, but I’m at the end of my rope. How could he say that he didn’t want to love me any more than he already did, when I’ve fallen this deeply in love with him? I couldn’t fall deeper if I tried.”
I could hear her sobs slowly building in her chest. Using the sleeve of her cardigan, Shiori-chan wiped at her face.
“Maybe I could have done more. If I had taken better care of him, or if I had been kinder to him, perhaps he would have wanted to be my family. But it’s…
it’s too exhausting. It hurts that he didn’t accept me, even though I showed him my naked self—literally.
Had I been tactful, had I been showing him a different version of myself, then I could have lived with that.
But I wasn’t. I was just being me. I can’t stand this, not anymore. How could he treat me this way?”
Overcome by emotion, I pulled her into a hug and held her tightly. A faint smell of alcohol mixed with the soft scent of roses.
“You did more than enough,” I said. “You really gave it your all.”
Shiori-chan was even smaller than I expected. I patted her slight and delicate back. Her chest heaved with sobs, her cries growing more and more audible.
“Fujimoto-kun. Please…please find happiness.” Shiori-chan’s voice trembled. “I need you to be happy, happier than anyone else…. Actually, no. Why—why couldn’t it be me? I wanted to be the one who makes you happy, Fujimoto-kun. Why not me?”
Shiori-chan pressed her face against my left shoulder.
Truly, she’s such a wonderful person.
This is what it means to love somebody.
Hiccuping, Shiori-chan gently pulled away. Her face was a mess from all the crying and the mucus dripping from her nose. Her bangs were stuck to her forehead.
“Momoko, I’ve done the right thing, haven’t I? I know I’m embarrassing myself…” Shiori-chan said, still hiccupping.
“You’ve done everything right. I’m sure of it.”
I’ve always wanted someone to love me for who I am. I wanted to meet that someone who loved the real me.
Perhaps I was the one who failed to face them as myself.
I was the one who was scared.
Pretending to be a woman with infinite patience.
Pretending to be a low-maintenance woman.
Pretending to be understanding.
Pretending to be the same as everyone else.
I was the one who couldn’t live without pretending. I’ve been protecting myself so that I can make excuses. That way, I would never get hurt. I found a way to beat the system.
But Shiori faced him as herself, with all her heart.
Her heart is shattered to pieces. Still, she puts a brave face on and says she’s okay.
But the next moment she’s pining for him, bawling her eyes out.
To the onlooker, she may come across as embarrassing.
Maybe they’ll think that she’s stupid to have wasted five precious years of her twenties on a flaky jerk.
That she should’ve locked down a desirable guy while she was still young and attractive.
I say they can go fuck themselves.
“It was a good love, Shiori-chan. You did something extraordinary. Maybe embarrassing yourself as much as you are right now is what it takes to truly love someone.”
Shiori-chan’s eyes widened.
“Fujimoto-kun will be okay. I mean, he’s received so much love from you that you’re drained of it.”
“I—I guess you’re right. I really gave him my all. He will find happiness, won’t he?”
“He will. And so will you, Shiori-chan.”
Sniffling, Shiori-chan nodded several times and laughed.
I had wanted to be absolutely sure that my ex-boyfriend regretted losing me.
But perhaps sometimes, wishing someone happiness is the best revenge.
I was so disappointed and so hurt, I made it all about myself.
I wasn’t thinking about Kyohei at all.
I was protecting my own heart by making Kyohei the bad guy.
From now on, I will—
I will…
“God, my whole body aches!” was the first thing Shiori-chan said when she awoke on the café’s sofa that morning. Despite her excessive drinking the night before, she acted as though nothing had happened.
Her face was unbelievably puffy, though, and the moment she emerged from the bathroom, she pointed to herself and said, “Oh my God, Momoko. Look at my face!” and burst out laughing.
“Oh, no, where are your eyes? Can you even see like that?”
“Actually, no. I can only see a tenth of what I normally see. By the way, your face is really bad, too, Momoko.”
After that, we couldn’t look at each other without laughing our heads off and we spent a good while snapping photos of our puffy faces as if they were the funniest things we’d ever seen in our lives.
Agreeing that we couldn’t let the boys see our faces, we decided that I would walk Shiori-chan home without waking Iori and Hozumi, who were still sleeping with their heads down on the table.
“I lied to you about something,” Shiori-chan suddenly said as we made our way to her house.
“Huh?”
Shiori-chan grinned. Taking care not to slip, she moved her Doc Martens one step at a time. The snow reflected the morning sun, relentlessly attacking my swollen eyes.
“I’ve been to Amayadori once before.”
“You have?”
“Yeah. The place was packed that day, so I guess you don’t remember.”
“I can’t say that I do, sorry.”
She’d probably come on that day we had long lines outside the café after we were featured on TV.
“I saw the Ex-Boyfriend’s Favorite Curry on the menu, and I thought, who does that? So of course I had to try it. And when I saw you at the till as I was leaving, I told you that I enjoyed the curry. And guess what you said to me in reply?”
I couldn’t remember it at all. I’d received compliments from other customers before, but what did I normally say to them? I’d never really thought about it. I had no idea what I’d said to her.
Watching me rack my brain at her question, Shiori-chan chortled.
“You said, ‘I know! It’s so delicious, isn’t it? I love that curry!’ ”
I started coughing. I could feel my cheeks getting hot.