Domani 4

Kanna
“Hurry!” I stopped and frowned. “We don’t want to miss the train.”

“Well, who took forever getting ready just now?”

The last time we were rushing like this was two years ago, on my graduation day.

“Kanna! You are going to be late!” My mother called out. “It isn’t nice to be late on your Graduation Day, is it?”

“I am leaving!”

“Look out for the traffic.”

I was on time. I met up with my friends and we chatted excitedly. Then, we were called into the hall for the graduation ceremony. Throughout the ceremony, I was looking at my watch.

“It is the school’s wish that all of you will always remember the values…” The principal droned on and on, with scant regard to the time.

When the whole thing was finally over, clutching my certificate, I waved goodbye to my friends and ran out to the school gate. Ken was already there, with his bike.

“What took you so long?” he asked.

“They couldn’t bear to let us leave.” I hopped onto the bike. “Let’s go! Ichiro must be waiting.”

Among the three of us, I was the last to graduate from high school. The two of them had their ceremony the day before. I graduated on our birthday.

We were going to Ichiro’s new apartment. Like now.
***
Ichiro
The doorbell rang. I wiped my hands on the towel. “Coming!”

There, standing at the doorway, was Ken. He broke into a huge grin and we hugged.

“I am back.”

“Welcome back.”

Kanna stepped around us. “Is lunch ready? We haven’t had breakfast.”

“More or less.”

Lunch was hot pot.

“Do you remember the last meal we had together?” Kanna asked.

“Yeah. It was exactly like this, having hot pot here. Just that it was two years ago. On our birthday. Right after your graduation ceremony, we rushed here. How could I forget? You were so heavy!”

“Don’t exaggerate!”

I smiled. How fitting, to continue from where we left off two years ago. Two years ago, they were squabbling over the same issue. I decided to put an end to it, “So how was Europe?”

“It was quite an experience. Every day, I was just being bombarded with new things. I think everyone should try it, packing a bag and then going abroad for a while, far from everything familiar. It’s a good opportunity to think through things, to reflect on your life, and to try seeing things from fresh perspectives.”

“So now that you are back, what are you going to do?”

“I want to get a job.”
***
Ken
Ichiro and I sat on his bed, our eyes fixated at the small TV screen. He was holding the remote control and flipping channels repeatedly. His phone sounded. He stopped fiddling with the buttons.

I watched the host of the talk show engage in casual banter with his guests, as Ichiro stared at his phone with a troubled expression. He fiddled with it, before replacing it on the table.

“Who was that?”

“Just…someone from work.”

“Girl?”

“Yeah.”

“Are you seeing her?”

He shot me a dire look.

I laughed. “Not the kind of girl you would fall in love with, I suppose? So when are you going to find such a girl?”

He shrugged. “It’s not up to me.”

“What if she doesn’t exist?”

“Too bad.”

“You know, I get this feeling that maybe we are both going to be bachelors till we die.”

“Why?”

“You will never find a girl, while I will keep switching.”

He laughed. “Nothing wrong with remaining single.”

“Yeah, at least we still have each other.” I looked at him seriously. Then we both burst out laughing. He pushed me away. “Don’t treat me as target practice.”

We returned to staring at the screen, although how much attention we were actually paying to the talk show was in doubt.

“More beer?” he broke the monotony.

I nodded.

He got up to get to the fridge.

“When we first met 6, 7 years ago, did it ever occur to you that we would be like how we are now? It’s kind of magical, isn’t it?”

He looked up from the fridge.

“You know, that day I left, I was thinking about a lot of things on the flight. I was wondering when I would come back. 3 years, 5 years, 10 years, or maybe I wouldn’t even come back. I was also thinking, what would happen during my absence? If I do come back, what would things be like? Would the Concerto still be there? Would they still put up the Illuminario in December? Could you still see Kobe and Osaka from Maya-san? Would you finally have gotten yourself a girlfriend? Would Kanna be with someone? What would happen to us? Could we still be like in the past? Or would we simply drift apart? In a way, I was almost afraid to come back, because I was afraid to see how things would have changed while I was away.”

“I never doubted that you would come back. Because only by coming back can you get the answers that you had been seeking before you left.”
***
Kanna
Hey I am back in Tokyo.

Glad to hear that.

I read the message again and again. Frustrated, I finally flipped my phone shut and threw it onto my bed. I climbed onto my bed, closed my eyes and tried to think.

Why was I feeling this way? What was I expecting? What did I want him to say? What else could he have said?
***
Ichiro
That spring, Kanna was back in Tokyo, playing her violin, while I was busy with work at Domani. Ken found a job as a photographer for Kobe Shimbun.

As the weather began to turn warm, his work caught the attention of several newspapers and magazines, local and international.
***
Ken
I arrived in Tokyo at around noon and met Kanna at a ramen place in Shibuya for a late dinner.

“You just came from an interview?” I nodded.

She asked even more incredulously, “In that?”

I looked at the faded T-shirt and jeans I was wearing. “Yeah, why not?”

“Are you crazy?”

We did not say a thing until we left the place. She started walking at a fast pace.

“Are you in a hurry?”

“We still have time before the shops close.”

We ended up in a men’s boutique.

“How about this? Or this? What about stripes?” she sounded more as though she was talking to herself as she held out different shirts in front of me.

In the end, she pushed me into the fitting room with a shirt and trousers. When I emerged from the fitting room, she took one look at me, snapped her fingers and said. “Oh, a tie.”

She held out different ties as the process repeated itself.

We finally bought four ties, three shirts and two trousers.

“Give me a treat when you get the job with Asahi, Yomiuri, Time, whatever.”
***
Ichiro
It rained a lot in the summer of 2004. I spent a lot of time staring at the rain. When I was young, my mother used to tell me that rain is Heaven’s tears. “Heaven is crying for somebody on Earth,” she would say whenever it rained.

That summer, Heaven must either be crying for many people, or someone must have been so important to Heaven that Heaven was crying so much for him or her.

But as Heaven’s tears dried up, my master approached me after work. “Kenichi, you have spent around two years with me, isn’t it?

“Two and a half.”

“Two and a half… Well, I think you have improved a lot. Surely, you would have come up with your own creations, just that you haven’t let me try. Autumn’s coming, and I think we should launch new creations for autumn and winter. Why don’t you help me with that?”

I gave him a look of disbelief.

“To me, making pastries is a form of expression. You have been making nice pastries, but those are more for the customers, for other people. Why don’t you try doing more for yourself? Make something that means a lot to you, and other people can share your emotions with you.”

That night, I opened my mailbox to find an envelope with a pass to a concert by students from Kanna’s conservatory in Tokyo.
***
Ichiro
I sat with Ken in the upper terraces of the concert hall, a bouquet in my lap.

The only time I ever heard Kanna play the violin she loves so much was in April 2000, when the first sakura of the millennium were beginning to fall. The three of us had arranged to meet, to watch the sakura. I was the first to arrive. Kanna came a bit later, lugging her violin.

“Just had lesson,” she said when she noticed my eyes on her violin case.

“Since Ken isn’t here yet, why don’t you play something for me?”

She thought for a while. “Ok, what would you like to hear?”

“What can you play?”

“What do you want?”

“Why don’t you play something that you think I will like?”

She thought for a while and nodded. Then she took out her violin and played Pachelbel’s Canon. She gave a little curtsy after her short performance and stuck out her hand. “Flowers.”

I gave her a blank look.

“It’s courtesy to give something to the performer after her performance. Me, I like flowers.”

I applauded.

It was Kanna’s turn to perform.

Listening to her play the violin in this autumn evening, I suddenly realized how much the violin, autumn and her had in common. Elegant, yet melancholic. On her beautiful, smiling face, I saw hurt, pain and dried tears. In her music, I could feel the sorrow of her heart, her helplessness. Melancholy hung in the crisp autumn air.

It was to be the last time I ever hear her play the violin.
***
Kanna
“Kanna!”

I turned and caught sight of Ken. Waving back, I walked towards him.

“Ichiro didn’t come?”

He looked away and nodded.

“Oh.” I said quietly.

“What’s that in your hand? Is it for me?” I asked in a cheerful voice.

“Oh.” He looked at the bouquet in his hand and held it towards me. “For you. Your performance was great.”
***
Ichiro
Are you asleep?

Yes.

I am sorry that I couldn’t be there.

There is no need for ‘sorry’.

Are you angry?

No. I am sleeping.

Sweet dreams.

I placed my phone beside my pillow and tried to sleep. The previous night’s conversation kept coming back to me.

“I’ll go first. See you.” Rie gave a short bow before taking her leave.

“Kenichi.”

“Yes?”

“Do you have time? I would like to discuss something with you.”

I nodded.

“Let’s go. I know a good pub near here.” He smiled. “You need a change of environment sometimes.”

We went to a pub called ‘Dead Drunk’.

After our beers came, he asked, “What do you think of Milan?”

“I have never been there before. But I heard it’s very nice.”

“It is.” He looked at me and continued softly, as though he was telling me a secret, “I learnt there.”

It wasn’t something that I didn’t know. Italy had been a big influence in his life. Domani means ‘tomorrow’ in Italian.

“Anyway, if you are serious about pastries, which I think you are, I think you should go out and learn. Italy would be a good place. My friend has a school there. In Milan. Why don’t you go? Then when you come back, I can retire and hand over Domani to you. I can go to Italy and spend the rest of my life in a quiet village near the mountains. How does that sound to you?”

I somehow smiled. “You have to give me time to think it through. It’s quite sudden.”

“Of course of course. I am not telling you to pack your stuff now.” He looked thoughtful for a while. “You don’t really look happy these days. Of course you always look impassive, but these few months…more than usual. Sometimes, it is good to put down everything and leave for a while. See new things, meet new people. Then come back when you are ready. It’s not really running away. It’s going away to change the stale mixture a little, and also to make necessary changes to your life.”

He smiled. “I am offering you a chance to do that.”