Chapter Fifty-Two A Re
Chapter Fifty-two
A Reunion
The Horishi’s cuts outlined the scar like the frayed edges of an old map. It covered Toshio’s entire back. Hana stared at the scar, unable to speak. Haruto and her father each had one year to live because her mother had not cared about anyone but herself.
Toshio refastened his robe around his waist. “Haruto owes me no debt. It is I who owe him. He has but a fraction of the lifehe was meant to live. My failure stole the years he was supposed to have with you.”
“It was not your fault, Otou-san,” Hana said, her voice hard. “It was my mother’s. She was the one who was selfish. She did not just steal Haruto’s life. She stole yours.”
“That was never her intention.”
“I do not care what her intentions were. Why did you even want to find her, Otou-san? A monster belongs with monsters.”
“Toshio?” a woman’s voice called from behind Hana.
Hana turned. The woman she had known only from one faded photograph stood in front of her. Hana staggered into Keishin. He clasped her by the shoulders, keeping her steady. “Okaa-san…”
“Toshio?” Chiyo’s eyes flew from Hana to Keishin. “What’s going on? Who are these people?”
Toshio led Chiyo to a seat. “You must be tired. You should sit down.”
Chiyo lowered herself onto a floor cushion and smiled up at Toshio. “Are they clients? The pawnshop has not had any clients in so long. But you are here now. That is why business is better.”
“They are not clients, Chiyo,” Toshio said. “This is Keishin.”
Keishin bowed.
“And this is Hana,” Toshio said gently.
Chiyo tilted her chin. “Hana?”
Hana pulled her shoulders back, refusing to bow. “Yes.”
Chiyo smiled. “You have the same name as our daughter. May I offer you some tea?”
“Chiyo…” Toshio took a seat next to her and clasped her hand. “She is our daughter.”
Chiyo laughed. “Forgive my husband. He is confused. Our daughter is still a baby.”
Toshio took her hand. “No, Chiyo. Hana is not a child anymore. She has grown up.”
“That is not possible. I remember Hana. I know who my daughter is. I have told all her brothers and sisters about her. I was holding her in my arms when—” Chiyo yanked her hand away from Toshio. She wrapped her arms around herself, rocking in her seat. “Hana is a baby. You are wrong. Hana is a baby.” She pointed at Hana. “And you are a liar. Liar! Get out of my house! Get out!”
Toshio hurried over to Hana. “She is just in shock. I will explain everything to her.”
Hana shook her head. “I should just leave. You were right. Coming here was a mistake.”
“No. Don’t go. She doesn’t recognize you, but she will. I promise. Wait in your room. I will talk to her. I will make her understand. Please, Hana. She is still your mother.”
—
It was strange being in her old room again, surrounded by things that were supposed to be familiar but were not. It was like looking at her mother’s face. The mother she found was both the woman in the picture in her head and a stranger. In this version of the pawnshop, her room was still the space where everything that did not have a place to live anywhere else in the pawnshop found a home. She ran her fingers over stacks of books and overflowing boxes of odds and ends, feeling an affinity with things that didn’t belong anywhere.
“Are you all right?” Keishin asked. “I’m sorry that she didn’t recognize you.”
“I did not recognize her either. She is like those creatures outside. She looks like my mother, but she isn’t. I will never forgive her for what she did to Haruto and my father. I wish I never came here. I was a fool.”
“Loving your parents and wanting them to be safe doesn’t make you a fool.”
“It does when all this time, I should have been caring for only one of them. My father never hid my mother’s crime from me. I knew that she was a thief, and yet I didn’t care. I justified her actions. I told myself that she did not deserve to be punished for what she did and that the Shiikuin were cruel. They were not. They were too kind. My mother has a life here. A family. A home. Haruto will have none of that. And my father, he is too blind to see that she is stealing the little time that he has left.”
Toshio burst into the room, his face pale. “Hana…”
“What’s wrong?” Hana stood up.
“The girl who found you…”
Hana frowned. “What about her?”
“She is back.”
“Are we in danger?” Keishin said. “I thought that you could control them.”
“She is not here to harm you. She came to warn us. The Shiikuin are in the tunnels.”
—
Keishin and Hana flew down the steps of the pawnshop. The young girl who had led Toshio to them in the garden sobbed against Chiyo’s breast. But something about her was different. She had aged.
“Is that the same girl?” Hana stared at her face. “She looks like she’s ten years old now.”
“Time goes by differently for the children here,” Toshio said.
“Hush.” Chiyo stroked the girl’s cheek and gently re-tucked a loose pink flower into her hair bun. “Hush. Don’t cry. Your brothers did not mean to scare you. Thank you for coming here to tell me that they have arrived. They hardly ever visit. I will make some tea for all of us.”
“Brothers? Tea?” Hana said. “What is she talking about?”
“There is no time for this now,” Toshio said. “You need to leave before they get here.”
“Enough. I’m done with lies and secrets. I am not going anywhere until you tell me what’s going on.”
“It is difficult to explain,” Toshio said.
“The Shiikuin are my children.” Chiyo held the girl’s hand.
Hana froze. “What did you say?”
“The children have no souls, Hana,” Toshio said. “They grow up but can never die. In time, parts of their bodies will wear out and they will have to…replace them.”
“With metal parts…” Keishin said.
“Chiyo revealed the truth she had learned about the Shiikuin when I found her,” Toshio said. “But the Shiikuin are different from the children. They have forgotten everything about being human. They must not find you here. You must go.”
“What about you?” Hana said.
Toshio put his arm around his wife. “I will stay here.”
“Otou-san, please listen to me. This woman…she is not my mother. She is not your wife. She’s a monster. Leave her.”
“You do not understand, Hana.”
“I understand that the Shiikuin will kill you if you stay.”
“I am dead either way. Let me at least die saving you. There is no life for me to return to. I stole a choice just as your mother did. The Shiikuin will hunt me down until the end of my days.”
“They won’t. Not if…” Hana swallowed hard. “You give them back what they are really after.”
“What are you talking about?” Toshio said.
“They would forgive you if you returned the choice you stole.”
“I cannot return it. I set it free.”
“That is why…” Tears quivered in the rims of Hana’s eyes. “I brought it with me.”
“What do you mean, ‘you brought it with you’?” Keishin’s throat constricted.
“I told you, Kei…” Hana pulled out her mother’s glasses and a small mirror from her bag and offered them to Keishin with her head bowed.
This was not how she had planned to tell Keishin the truth. She had thought about what this day would be like since he showed up at the pawnshop, and nothing she had imagined came close to the reality unraveling in front of her. She had hoped that she would be more composed, that she would have the right words to explain exactly why she had done what she did. The only image she had gotten right was what Keishin’s face would look like when she told him. All warmth had fled his eyes, replaced by sadness and rage. “Nothing here is as it seems.”