"Mama, you always love doing your makeup at home."
"I do — doesn't it look nice?"
"It looks wonderful! But every time I see you doing your makeup, I think you're about to go out somewhere."
"Silly girl. Mama's just covering up the wrinkles on her face. My health hasn't been great lately — probably too much work stress and not enough rest... my skin's gotten worse too."
"Huh?"
"Pfft — you little dummy, Soyo. Look at Mama now that she's all done up. Isn't she young again? I really don't know how Ms. Nagasaki keeps her skin looking so good."
"Mama doesn't look old at all."
The Ichinose apartment. An empty, hollow living room.
Soyo sat alone on the floor, legs folded beneath her, gazing blankly around the room.
Everything she saw, everything she heard, everything she thought — it all circled back to fragments of the past, to the small, ordinary moments she had shared with Chiose-mama.
She still hadn't been able to accept that Mama was gone.
Soyo's eyes drifted to the bottle of liquid foundation Yoshiiro Chiose had left behind at their home, and the memories came flooding back unbidden.
"So Mama's health... was already failing back then?"
Why hadn't she ever noticed?
She turned the crumpled little slip of paper over and over in her hands, and by accident flipped it to the back — where she found a small drawn heart.
"..."
"Ugh..."
Why — why had she spoken to Mama in that awful tone, dripping with sarcasm?
That time she had seen Mama and Sakiko holding each other — it had only been Mama trying to comfort Sakiko. That was all.
So many times, she had been the one misreading everything. It had been her own selfishness twisting things out of shape. So why — why hadn't she been able to see through herself?
She had known about her own selfishness for a long time. And yet — and yet why had she let it run wild, let it keep growing?
Mama had taught her so much. Had shown her so much through word and deed, had poured so much of herself into her. And Soyo had learned nothing. Nothing at all.
Nagasaki Soyo let herself fall backward, with no thought whatsoever for whether her body might hit the floor and get hurt.
The slip of paper caught the small gust of air stirred up as her back met the ground and drifted away from her. Soyo didn't have the will to reach for it.
[Whatever... let it be.]
Yoshiiro Chiose's funeral urn sat on the mantelpiece less than ten metres away, gazing at her. Chiose's portrait had been hung there by her mother.
All she had to do was look up, and she would see Chiose's gentle, warm smile. But Soyo couldn't bring herself to look.
She would cry. She wouldn't be able to breathe.
Soyo opened her eyes. Soyo closed her eyes. The machinery inside her mind was slowly shutting down.
She didn't want anything anymore.
There was no one left to comfort her.
Her mother was grieving too — deeply, painfully — but her mother still had to go to work today. This family needed someone to hold it together, and that person couldn't tend to Soyo's every need.
The mama who had always been there for Soyo — she was gone.
Even in those final days, she had thought of so many things for everyone else. But the one thing she hadn't thought of was just how much she meant to Soyo.
"Mama... how could you be so foolish. Even at the very end... you were thinking about getting my mother to come watch my performance. You were thinking about making us closer to each other..."
Did you not know — did you really not know how much you weighed in my heart? You mattered so much. Without you, there is nothing left inside me. Only emptiness. No warmth at all.
Her head must have knocked against the base of the sofa when she fell, because a cloud of dust stirred up from underneath it.
The choking dust swept over Soyo — and carried along with it was another slip of paper.
It came to rest on Soyo's stomach, like Yoshiiro Chiose's hand reaching out to soothe her.
"Wh — what's this?"
Soyo's eyes were still swollen from crying, but she mustered the strength to focus and look at the paper.
"This handwriting — it's Mama's. It has to be. I could never mistake it..."
A prickling sensation crept across her scalp. A bad feeling slithered up her spine.
In the faint, fading orange light of the evening sun coming through the window, Nagasaki Soyo began to read.
[Dear little Soyo — on what day in the future will you be reading this letter? If you find it too soon, I'll worry. But if it's too late... I'm afraid you might have already forgotten me. That's why I hid it under the sofa. I figured that since I'm usually the one who does the cleaning around here, you probably wouldn't find it for a while.]
[I didn't ask anyone to tell you about my condition — so please don't blame Ms. Nagasaki for keeping it from you either. My health started declining around the time I was in middle school. I had a feeling early on that things might end up this way, but even when I finally knew for certain, I was still frightened.]
[Little Soyo... I was so scared. I never once imagined I would die — truly, I didn't. But I couldn't let it show. All these days I've been turning it over and over in my mind — is there another world out there somewhere? Will I be able to see my parents again, and my little sister? Will they be waiting for me there? I've read so many stories about what comes after death, and they all say there's still a long road to walk... Mama has always been afraid of the dark.]
[Every time I pick up the pen I start coughing. I've written this letter several times over, and this is the first version where the handwriting turned out even close to satisfactory. Today I can clearly feel myself running out of breath. No appetite. Can't eat. My limbs feel like lead and I have no strength. Am I not going to make it.]
[In these last days I've wanted so badly to just be by your side... but you've been busy with your own things, and I didn't want to be a bother. Your bass playing is wonderful, you know. There were a few times I wanted to come find you, but I could hear you practicing through the door and thought — I'll leave her to it.]
[Little Soyo... will you read this letter? You won't forget me, will you? I miss those nights from a few years ago, falling asleep with you in my arms. The very first time I met you, I loved you instantly. I wanted to protect you for the rest of your life, but it seems I'm going to fail at that. The night I heard you'd been bullied, I couldn't sleep. I was so upset that I hadn't been able to protect you — comforting my daughter on one side while carrying the weight of it all on the other. I must have looked a complete mess.]
[Mama's condition has been getting worse and worse. Breathing is so hard now. The feeling of suffocation keeps getting heavier. Speaking clearly is difficult more often than not. Every time I come to see you, I'm running on nothing but sheer willpower — I'm terrified you'll notice something is wrong and start to worry. I think about you every single day. Weekends are what Mama lives for. Just knowing I get to sit with you and chat and watch dramas together — that thought alone makes me happy for the whole day.]
[Little Soyo... have I written a bit too much? Will you have the patience to read all the way through? But I have so much I want to say to you. The truth is, every time I come to see you, there's so much I want to say — but I'm always afraid you'll find me annoying. When my own mother was still alive, I used to get impatient with her for rambling on sometimes... and then one day her voice was just gone. I never got to hear it again. Mama is so full of regret. But Mama is also afraid of being that same burden. I don't want to become someone who makes you want to roll your eyes.]
[In the corner of my room, underneath the teddy bear, there is a bank card. It holds the savings I have set aside over all these years. When I was young I loved buying this and that, so there isn't as much as there could have been — but ever since I had you, I made saving a habit. The PIN is your birthday. Spend it freely — it would make Mama happy, up in heaven.]
[Going forward, keep your guard up. Don't trust everyone and don't give yourself away to just anyone — have your own convictions. When something happens, face it calmly first, give yourself space to breathe, and don't let it eat you from the inside. Little Soyo loves eating vegetarian food, but mind your nutrition and make sure you're getting a balance. Mama knows you love samgyetang, so I've been teaching myself to make it on and off... I'd often make a batch and leave it in the fridge — if you didn't come, I'd drink it myself; if you did, I'd get to feed it to you. Pretty clever of Mama, isn't it.]
[Don't stay up late from now on. When Mama was young she loved burning the midnight oil, and in the end my eyesight suffered for it. If you do stay up, remember to keep the lights on — don't look at your phone in the dark, it's bad for your eyes. With the band, talk to your bandmates often. When problems come up, you can work through them together. I believe my most beloved girl can solve anything she sets her mind to.]
[Little Soyo... I'm tired now. I'll stop here. You have always been Mama's greatest pride. You are Mama's only child. When I'm gone, take good care of yourself.]
[Remember to dress warmly in winter.]
[From your ever-loving —]
[Yoshiiro Chiose.]
"Ah... Mama!"
The time is 4:44 in the afternoon. Good evening, Soyo.
____
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