8:15pm
Rei smirked as her father finally entered the small dinning room, “you’re
late,” she said, imitating the tone of voice that he had used earlier.
“That’s enough young lady, I’ve had enough of you as it is.”
“Well, I’m afraid that you will have to put up with me for another few months.”
“Behave yourself like a young lady should Rei.”
“I said I would behave in front of the cameras, that was it.”
He ignored her comment, “Kenta!!” He said loudly, obviously used to dinning in a larger room that required him to say his protégé’s name forcefully in order to be heard, “I hope you realize what I am doing for you, giving you another chance to build yourself.”
“Yes sir.”
“One more mistake…”
“Yes sir.” Kenta said obediently.
“Don’t disturb me when I speak! I said, one more mistake, you’ll be out of here, understand me?” Imaruru said between mouthfuls of food.
“Yes sir.”
“Now, I have a meeting at nine, I expect you in my study at eleven to talk over a few things; Rei, you will be sleeping in your old room with one of my advisors, Yukito will be coming for our meeting, I expect you to be civil with her. Kenta and I will be sharing a room in the master bedroom, and the household staff will be in the other. The security staff will be downstairs and in the hallway, so I expect you to be dressed decently, we will be doing a lot of traveling, on some night, we might be in hotels, so I expect you to be on your best behavior. We have a visit to Osaka tomorrow, we are to arrive at 9am, so we will be leaving at 7:30am, be punctual, wear a nice dress, bring a few changes of clothes for the day, we won’t be coming back until after dinner. Now, Kenta…”
His voice began to drone out, Rei couldn’t believe it, it had been a year since she had last sat down to dinner with her father, and here he was, talking politics. Whilst she hadn’t expected much, but surely she had the right to expect a slightly bit more than be ignored as a human being completely – it seemed not. Her father sat there, shooting out instructions as though she was part of his staff, perhaps so, she was only here to fulfill a transaction, an agreement; she was a prop in his performance. Her ears perked up as she picked up the name Yukito several times, she wondered who this woman was, and what she would be like. As Rei picked at her food, she tried to concentrate and ‘see’ this woman, but her father’s voice kept on intruding; after no more than ten minutes she stood from the table and asked to be excused, without waiting for a response, she left. It didn’t seem to matter anyway; Minister Hino was too busy discussing the country than to notice her existence. Her anger fuelled as she realized that he hadn’t even responded to her leaving the table, stalking back to the table she picked up a plate of tofu and emptied it over her father before retreating back to her room.
He sat there dumbstruck for a moment, wondering what had just happen, until drops of tofu fell onto the table. Jumping to his feet, he yelled his daughter’s name, marching over to her retreating form, but Kenta was quicker, immediately restraining him. He yelled at Kenta to let go, he was only vaguely aware of what Kenta was saying, his rage allowing only his attention to be directed at the spoilt, indignant Rei who had not hesitated in walking away. Finally, shaking off Kenta’s arm, he took large steps towards her, but once again, Kenta pulled him backwards and pushed him into his chair. He watched as Rei disappeared up the stairwell, and later on, the door slamming shut.
“What do you think you are doing?” he yelled at Kenta.
“What do you think YOU are doing?” Kenta responded.
“I am trying to educate my daughter, pouring food over here father is not acceptable, and you have just let her go, YOU ARE ENCOURAGING HER!”
“She is asking for attention, you’ve been ignoring her.”
“I have spoken to her.”
“Giving her instructions, and telling her to behave is not called communication Hino-san, that is what you do with dogs, not people.”
“Are you trying to say that I am not a good father?” Imaruru said menacingly.
“I wouldn’t dare sir.”
“She is a spoilt child, how dare you try and stop me from punishing her. Let’s recount that, was what she did wrong?”
“Yes sir.”
“Should a parent discipline their child when their child knowingly does wrong?”
“Yes sir.”
“Then we are in agreement.”
“No sir.”
“No?”
“Sir, let it go, I think deep inside, we both know why that just happened.”
Imaruru sighed as he pushed his damp sticky hair away from his face, “I’m going to clean up, I don’t want to be disturbed until eleven, make sure that Rei knows that.”
“Yes sir.”
8:20pm
“Rei?” Kenta knocked on the door, sliding it open carefully, he found
Rei sitting close to the window, looking down in the small yard.
She did not respond to his entering, nor to his touch when he began to
massage her shoulders. “Shall we go downstairs?”
Her nod was almost imperceptible, and it was a moment until she finally moved to leave her seat, “you saved me a beating,” she whispered.
“I guess he deserved it…” his voice trailed off as he saw the lines of tears on her face, “do you and your crows have a fetish for food on people?”
Rei laughed, “no, it was a coincidence.”
“Your father has a lot on his mind at the moment,” he began as he took her hand and began to walk down the stairs, “there are a lot of things going on.”
“There always is,” Rei replied emotionlessly.
“I mean…, I made a lot of trouble, there are a lot more things going on than usual,” he paused for a moment as he opened the back door, waving off the body guards to leave them alone, “Seira has just said, in a press conference, that I was the one who cancelled the wedding, that I was unfaithful, disloyal, greedy… she’s just about accused me of being Satan himself, and the people always side with the woman in these matters.”
“What does it mean to the campaign?”
“It means that she has negated every single reason that your father used to take me back, it means that her family, one of the most powerful, and corrupt, political families, has practically stepped out and backed the opposition, which more or less kills our chances”
“I see.”
“And your father has to deal with it, we’re in damage control at the moment.”
“Is that what the meeting at nine is for?”
“No, I don’t know what that meeting is for, an old woman has been coming in to see him every night we’ve spent at this house, she always brings a huge bag of things, and a case, and she leaves with the case but no bag, your father throws away a smaller bag later on in the evening, in fact, he goes out to dump it in the public rubbish dump. He doesn’t let anyone disturb him during that hour, and he insists that the house remain quiet, no one knows what that old woman and he have in common, except Yukito maybe, she brought that old woman here one time, but she’s been here by herself ever since.”
Yukito, her name again, Rei was curious about this woman, “who is Yukito?”
She sensed a slight hesitation in Kenta’s voice before he answered, “she’s his head PR manager and advisor, she’s worked in his office for a long time, about six years now, I think, we all depend on her, we wouldn’t know what to do without her.”
“And?” she questioned, she knew there was more.
“What do you mean and?”
“Is she and oka-san…” she trailed off, unable to trust herself to say those words without displaying too much emotion.
“Yes…”
“Is she young?” Rei swallowed nervously, “is she pretty?”
“Late forties, Rei-chan, it’s not like that, she’s very smart, she’s dedicated her whole life working in politics, bring people like your father to the top, that’s why they’re…”
Rei felt angry, angry that someone else was taking over ota-san’s place in oka-san’s heart, that some woman could just waltz in and replace ota-san’s. So that was why she had been sent away, that was why oka-san was busy, that was why… she dug her nail into her palms, determined not to let this woman get away with it. Taking a deep breath, she held her anger in, seeing the old swings, she tried to smile, “push me?”
He nodded, and walked with her to those swings, he still remembered when he used to push her on the swing, and her demanding him to push harder, wanting to see the entire world as though she were a bird. She was being brave, he knew how difficult it must be to know that her father was seeing someone, that someone she didn’t know of until tonight might become her stepmother, he knew that if he had been in her position, he first reaction would have been to do something irrational. Instead, here she was, trying to hold it in, asking him to do something that was a reminiscent of the past.
He had seen Imaruru with Yukito, and he could see that it was serious, someday, maybe not too far off in the future, he could see them getting married. He knew that Imaruru hadn’t told his daughter about the relationship; he wondered when he had planned to tell Rei. It wasn’t his place to ask Imaruru that, it wasn’t his place to stick his hand in Imaruru’s family matters, no matter how much he felt that he was part of the Hino family, he was still an outsider – he had no rights to get involved.
Absentmindedly, he began to push Rei, pushing her higher and higher, feeling the movement of the air from the swing against his body, they continued in silence, both of the watching the curtained windows of Imaruru’s study. They could see shadows, and unconsciously, they began to concentrate on the details of the shadows, reading their movements. The old woman and Imaruru was sitting across from each other, every now and then, he would lean over, to show her something, or she would lean to observe, but they couldn’t work out what was being observed, or what was the center of their attention.
For an hour, they continued to watch those shadows at work, not a word passed between them. It was only after the old woman had left, had Kenta spoke, “I have to go.”
Rei nodded, she looked at him, her eyes strangely peaceful and accepting, her lashes fluttering shut for a brief moment as his lips came into contact with her cheeks, “good night, I’ll go in later, I’ll be fine by myself.”
He smiled, “don’t stay out too late.”
“Hai.” She replied softly and smiled under his concerned gaze, holding his hand, she squeezed it softly, “I’ll see you tomorrow.”