‘I know you’re busy here too, so thank you so much for taking the art classes again this week.’
‘Of course, not a problem,’ Kazu replied.
‘Thank you for the orange juice,’ Yohsuke said nodding towards Kazu and Nagare, who were both standing behind the counter. Yohsuke left the cafe first.
‘OK, I’ll be off.’
Kyoko waved goodbye and followed Yohsuke out of the door.
When the two left the cafe, so did the lively atmosphere, leaving the room silent. The cafe did not play background music, which meant when no one was talking, you could hear the woman in the white dress turning the pages of her novel.
‘How did they say Kinuyo was getting along?’ Nagare asked Kazu as he stood polishing a glass – his tone no different than if he had been talking to himself. Kazu slowly nodded her head once but she didn’t answer his question.
‘I see,’ Nagare said softly and then disappeared off into the back room.
Left in the cafe were Gohtaro, Kazu and the woman in the white dress.
Kazu was behind the counter tidying up in her usual way.
‘I’d like to hear more now, if it’s all right with you?’
Kazu was ready to listen to Gohtaro’s reason for returning to the past.
He looked up at her for an instant then immediately averted his eyes. He took a slow deep breath.
‘…Actually,’ he began, suggesting that perhaps earlier he had been purposely holding back about his reasons. Maybe because Kyoko was just a bystander, and it was none of her business.
But now, apart from the woman in the white dress, it was just Gohtaro and Kazu. He began explaining hesitantly.
‘My daughter is getting married.’
‘Married?’
‘Yeah, I mean… really, she’s Shuichi’s daughter,’ he mumbled. ‘I want to show my daughter who her real father was.’ He brought out a very slim digital camera from his suit pocket. ‘I thought if I could record a message from Shuichi…’ He sounded lonely and small.
Kazu stared at him in this state. ‘What happens afterwards?’ she asked quietly. She wanted to know what would happen after he revealed that he was not her true father.
Gohtaro felt a jolt in his heart.
This waitress won’t be fooled by lies.
He spoke while staring into space, as if he had prepared his answer. ‘I can only see it being the end of my role,’ he said with quiet resignation.
Gohtaro and Shuichi were in the same rugby team at university, but they had known each other since they began rugby training back in elementary school. They played in different teams, but occasionally they would meet at a match. That isn’t to say they noticed one another right from the start. Through junior high and high school, they were playing for their respective schools, competing in opposing teams in official matches, and so gradually became aware of each other’s existence as a result.
By chance, they entered the same university and became teammates. Gohtaro was a fullback while Shuichi was a fly-half.
The fly-half, identified by the number 10 on his back, is the star player in rugby. He is like the fourth player in the batting order or a pitcher in baseball, or the striker in football. Shuichi was amazing as a fly-half, and he earned the nickname Shuichi the Seer because his plays during matches were like miracles – players even remarked that it was as if he could see into the future.
A rugby team has fifteen players, and there are ten positions. Shuichi took note of the other players’ strengths and shortcomings, and he had a talent for knowing how to utilize or exploit any player in any position. This earned him the absolute trust of the senior players of the university rugby club, and they began to see him as a candidate for team captain early on.
Gohtaro, on the other hand, had tried various positions since he first began playing rugby in elementary school. He was not the type of person who could easily say no to people’s requests, and would often fill in when the team was short of a player. The person who finally decided that fullback was the best position for the versatile Gohtaro was Shuichi. The fullback was the last bastion of defence, and thus very important. If any of the opposition breached his team’s line of defence, his job was stop them with an effective tackle and prevent them scoring a try. Shuichi wanted Gohtaro for fullback because of his superior tackling ability. When he played against Gohtaro in official matches in junior high and high school, he was never once able to slip past him. If the team had Gohtaro’s formidable tackling, there would be absolutely nothing to worry about. It was his steel-wall defence that enabled Shuichi’s daring offensive plays.
When I leave the back to you, I know I’ve got someone I can count on, Shuichi often said before a match.
Then, seven years after they graduated from university, the two met again by chance.
After leaving the cafe, they headed off to Shuichi’s apartment. There to greet them were Yoko and their newborn daughter, Haruka. Shuichi must have contacted Yoko on the way, as she had run a bath for Gohtaro.
Yoko greeted him – still unwashed and reeking – with a warm smile. ‘So you are Gohtaro the Fullback? Shuichi has spoken of you countless times.’
Osaka-born Yoko was even more accommodating than Shuichi. It was quite normal for her to spend every waking hour chatting, and she enjoyed making people laugh with her jokes. She was also quick-thinking and proactive. In less than a day she had found Gohtaro a place to live and clothes to wear.
After losing his company, Gohtaro had lost his ability to trust people, but just two months after starting at Shuichi’s restaurant, he was back to his bright and cheerful self.
When the restaurant was filled with regular customers, Yoko would talk Gohtaro up: ‘Back at university, he was my husband’s most trusted player.’
While he found that embarrassing, it also brought a smile to his face. ‘My next task is to earn the same reputation working here,’ he once added, his newly brightened outlook on the future on display.
Everything seemed to be going well.
One afternoon, Yoko complained of a screaming headache, so it was decided that Shuichi would drive her to the hospital. They didn’t want to close the restaurant, so Gohtaro stayed while minding Haruka. That day, petals from the cherry blossoms were scattering across the cloudless blue sky, silently, like a flurry of snow.
‘Look after Haruka for me,’ Shuichi said, waving thanks while hurrying out.
That was the last time Gohtaro saw him.
Shuichi’s and Yoko’s parents and grandparents were all dead, so at the age of one, Haruka was left all alone in this world.
When he looked at Haruka’s smiling face at Shuichi’s funeral – too young to comprehend that both her parents had died – he decided there and then to raise her himself.
Dong, dong, dong…
A wall clock chimed eight times.
Startled by the sound, Gohtaro looked up. His eyelids were heavy, and his vision was blurry.
‘Where…?’
Looking around, he could see the cafe interior infused with a sepia hue by the shaded lamps. A fan hanging from the ceiling rotated slowly. The pillars and beams were coloured a deep brown. There were three large, and clearly very old, wall clocks.
It took him a while to come to the conclusion that he had been asleep. He was alone in the cafe, apart from the woman in the dress.