Removed – Chapter 19

Coffee. I have to find coffee immediately. I awake to my alarm with a splitting headache and a mouth filled with cotton. I sit up and the room dips a few degrees to the left. I am futsukayoi, drunk for the second day.

A smile breaks out on my face when I remember what happened last night. Damn, I’m happy, despite the headache and all that comes with it. Placing my fingers on my lips, I close my eyes. I grabbed Jiro. He’s mine now, I’m sure of it. When I think of the way he kissed me — I kissed him — a part of me deep down below starts to buzz and a rush of heat travels up my chest to my neck and face. Mmmm.

But there are things I need to deal with.

The secrets. The lies. Sakai owes me the truth. Something big is going on around me. He’s only ever hinted at it but, after last night’s run-in with Matsuda, more lies and secrets exist that I cannot ignore the existence of anymore.

“Don’t forget to ask Sakai about your aunts, Sanaa.”

“Then the kiku line was not destroyed as we thought it was.”

“Perhaps even she doesn’t know.”

Matsuda tried to call me Hanako. Maybe this Hanako and me are being mixed up? Who is she? At least now I’m sure why Matsuda was so surprised to see me in Ku 6. I do look like my mother.

After a long, hot, sobering shower, I get dressed and head to our small kitchen area. Aunt Lomo is eating and reading from her tablet. The coffee maker is already going for me. I grab some hot rice from the cooker, seaweed salad, and soy beans before coming to the table.

“Good morning, Auntie,” I say as I lean over and give Aunt Lomo a kiss on the cheek. She smiles, but then waves in front of her face.

“Oi! Were you out drinking last night?”

“Yes. Sorry. It seems to be coming out of my pores.” The perma-smile I’ve been trying to suppress comes back with a vengeance. Aunt Lomo puts down her tablet and narrows her eyes at me.

“You’re seeing someone, aren’t you? It’s written all over your face. A boy?” I stare at her. Do I tell her? “A girl?”

“No. No, it’s a boy.”

“Hmmm, Kimie and I thought maybe you were gay. Nothing wrong with that, of course.”

“Oh Auntie…” I burst out in a huge laugh. “You’re gay. Of course, it’s okay. It’s been fine as long as I can remember. No, I like a boy.” My cheeks are blushing again. Aunt Kimie has always been the one I talk to about crushes or friends. Aunt Lomo is sweet and kind but not a confidante.

She reaches forward and pats my hand. “Whatever you decide, as long as you’re happy, that’s all I care about. You’ve meant so much to me and Kimie. Never forget how much we love you.”

I try not to cry because for the first time in months, I’m at peace.

“Thanks. I love you, too.” I smile through unshed tears and clear my throat, mixing up my bowl of breakfast. “Where is Aunt Kimie, anyway?”

“Left early to run errands. We’ll see her later. Oh! I have a few apartment addresses for you.”

“Great.” This day is turning around quickly. “Can you message them to me? I don’t know how late I’ll be tonight.”

I eat, take care of my dishes, grab my bag, and leave. Double-timing it to the dōjō, I dodge in and out of people lazily walking to work. I’m already late this morning, but Sakai is still sipping on his tea when I walk in. He’s not by the window as usual, though. Instead, he’s looking at something on his tablet.

“Morning, Sanaa. I hope you had a pleasant day off?” He takes barely a glance at me. “It looks like you did.”

Dammit, he can always tell when I’m not at my best. “Hmmph, sorry. I, uh, had a little too much to drink last night.”

“Really?”

“Yes. Really. Why? What I do on my time off is my business.” What’s with this over-protective attitude?

“Well, from what I see here, you have a way with the men.” He turns his tablet around. There, in high definition, is a photo of Jiro and me kissing in the back alley of Izakaya Tanaka.

I wince at my stupidity. “I forgot to look for surveillance cameras before that happened.”

“I’m glad you’re not going to deny it,” he says, smiling. “It would be a waste of effort.”

“I’m not going to deny anything. It happened. I’m happy. It seems to be mutual. What more is there to say?”

It’s none of Sakai’s business, but I know how invested he is in this family. He doesn’t seem disappointed about Jiro and me so I hope this means he approves.

“We talked about this before and, yes, what you do outside of training is none of my business,” Sakai says. “But you will have to tread lightly. Others would not be happy with you aligning yourself with Sakai clan.”

“I don’t care what anyone thinks, except for you…” And to this, Sakai raises his eyebrows. “And my aunts, but generally, no one tells me what I can or cannot do.”

I have taken this approach to my life ever since I was little. I’m certainly not stopping now.

“Good. You will need that. In the meantime, I hope you can still practice with Jiro?”

I nod. Yes, practice with him. It will be tough, but I will manage. I try not to smile.

“Excellent. You were doing something else before this happened…” He gestures to his tablet again.

“Matsuda has been following me.” His face becomes frosty, like Jiro’s did last night. “For at least a week now. He followed me to the okiya and waited until we all left. None of us saw him. As far as I can tell, he’s never followed me home at night, but he was at Izakaya Tanaka, so he knows I’m there often as well.”

“What happened last night?”

“He cornered me coming back from the bathroom, and we had the most disjointed and strange conversation I’ve ever had. Didn’t Jiro talk to you?”

Sakai is quiet though his eyes search mine for several seconds before responding. “He did. What did Matsuda say?”

“He said, ‘Be sure to ask Sakai about your aunts.’ He also got me mixed up with someone else, someone named Hanako?”

We stand in silence for ages before my nervous energy takes ahold of my body and makes my feet tap.

“Mark Sakai. Say something, please.” Gods, he and Jiro are exactly the same in so many ways. “Don’t shut me out of this.” It’s the first time in a while I haven’t been able to read him.

“It’s no longer safe for you to spend any extended time in Ku 6 alone. I thought our brief moments between the dōjō and the transitway would not draw any attention, but I was wrong. I should have kept you in Ku 9 and made Jiro come to you. It would’ve been safer.”

I think my heart has stopped beating. Safer? Than what?

Sakai grasps my shoulders. “I want to tell you everything because this, Matsuda, changes everything. We wanted to start educating you earlier because the colonization is starting earlier than we ever anticipated. But you weren’t twenty yet, and it had to be legal. There could be no mistakes. I had to keep it all from Kimie, and I couldn’t do that if you were still a minor. I’ve been doing this behind her back, and she is going to kill me when she finds out.”

“This has something to do with my parents, doesn’t it?”

“It has to do with your parents, with your family, with everything. Give me a day. I need to speak to some people, and then we can talk.”

He quickly hugs me and steps back to straighten his shirt. I admit the quick hug is more disconcerting than anything. “In the meantime, you should not go anywhere in Ku 6 but the dōjō. If you want to go anywhere else, ask Jiro to come with you, and he must be armed. Understand?”

I swallow hard in a completely dry throat and nod.

“Now, Matsuda was at the izakaya last night with his wife and Yoshinori Minamoto. Did they say anything else you can tell me?”

“Not that I remember. The saké and…” I wave my hand at the tablet before blushing. “The kissing have blurred most of it.”

He turns to grab his bag but stands at the window for a moment with a puzzled look on his face.

“What’s the matter?” I move to the window to see what he’s seeing, but everything out there is the same as it always is.

“Nothing. Let’s go.”