DIVE!!

Book 2 Chapter 11 - Day Must Break

There had never been a night that hadn’t ended with daybreak.

It was as Kayoko had said. The night that passed without Shibuki sleeping a wink had ended with daybreak, like always. In the morning, Youichi and Tomoki ended their short vacation and were heading back to Tokyo. Youichi said, “That was a good break. When the Olympics are over, I’ll come back and dive off that cliff.” And Tomoki left with, “That was fun–!”

After Miyuki drove the two to the closest station, Shibuki watched the enclosed video with Kyouko in his room. Although it wasn’t easy to suppress the urge to see it right then after he finished reading Kayoko’s letter late last night, when he recalled Kyouko’s face and how she had been desperately pursuing Shiraha’s footprints, it felt like a betrayal to watch it by himself, so he had hesitated.

The footprints of Shiraha that he had been pursuing since he was little.

The tangible shape of what his grandfather had plainly left behind.

It might have been because it was too heavy to accept it alone, the thing that had leapt into his hands so suddenly.

The video of less than ten minutes was short. As the old film was only dubbed, a rough storm of noise constantly covered the screen, and the images occasionally flew into disorder. Nevertheless, when Shiraha in his younger days appeared on the twenty-four-inch TV screen, Shibuki’s eyes could not help but get heated up.

It wasn’t only because of the nostalgia of meeting his grandfather again after such a long time. As Kayoko had said, Shiraha was smiling widely.

Sixteen years old. Shiraha, who was the same age as the current Shibuki, was indeed running around crampedly in the Tamagawa pool with all the carefreeness of a wild child. The three-meter. The five-meter. The seven-meter. The ten-meter. He ran up and down them as though the platforms that gradually grew taller weren’t unusual to him, as he soared grandly from them many times. Watching Shiraha making his huge splashes was like watching himself, so it was funny. Without waiting for the violently heaving water surface to become still, Shiraha flew out of the water like a flying fish, and then dashed to climb up the diving platform again. Sometimes he would turn around and smile at the cameraman—Mizuki Shinnosuke—who was following his movements. Beneath that bashful smile, who would be thinking about stuff like his back is probably already aching right then? As if he himself had forgotten that, Shiraha was energetic in the distant new world that he left his hometown for, and was enjoying himself wholeheartedly. But his technique and rotations were still clumsy. He was awkward taking off from the platform. But it was certain that Shiraha shone there.

Kyouko, who was hugging her knees next to him, sniffed her runny nose.

Even though Shibuki tried hard pretending to be calm, when the video ended and the screen was painted with blue, he couldn’t bring himself to reach for the remote.

“The reasons why Gramps stopped diving was truly good, no matter what. Either because of the war, or because of back pains, or anything else.”

Eventually, Shibuki’s hand moved, not for the remote control, but for holding Kyouko’s hand.

“What I wanted to know wasn’t why Gramps quit competitive diving, but why he started. If he started to like it, then that’s fine. If he had fun in Tokyo, then that’s even more fine…”

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From then on, Shibuki spent three days at Kyouko’s house. On the evening of August 30, when he told her, “I’m going back to Tokyo tomorrow,” Kyouko nodded without saying anything. She might have been convinced that this day would come someday from the time when Shibuki was being indecisive by himself.

He dragged out his departure until just before the end of summer vacation because he wanted to stay by Kyouko for as long as he could. If he returned to Tokyo, he would devote himself to diving again and forget about Kyouko for a while. He knew about that irresponsibility of his, so he wanted to make up for that in advance, even a little bit.

“Have sex with Kyouko every night, get married after graduating high school, have kids, buy a boat, dig into the tastiest fish that I catch that day with my family…I still think that I’ll never get bored of that kind of life, even now. But…”

On the night before his departure, while Shibuki’s strong arm served as Kyouko’s pillow, he spoke frankly from his heart.

“But, before that, I want to dive with those guys one more time. At the same time and on the same stage as Youichi and Tomo. I don’t have any incredible techniques, but I haven’t done my best yet. That’s why, for a bit longer…I’ll do as much as I can do, lose as much as I can lose, and come back when I feel like it.”

Kyouko also responded in the same open-hearted tone to his voice that held no hesitation.

“Yep. Lose quickly and come home early.”

“Are you really okay with this, Kyouko?”

“When I first started going out with you, I asked you something. Until now I’ve slept with all sorts of men, and I don’t regret that because it was fun, but the men around here won’t have anything to do with me seriously anymore. I asked you if you do. Do you remember what you answered?”

“It’s an honor to choose a woman who knows all kinds of men rather than a woman who knows none at all.”

Kyouko smiled.

“I’m the same. A Shibuki who knows Tokyo, and knows about competing and losing, rather than a Shibuki who knows nothing…that Shibuki is better.”

Shibuki cupped her cheek with his large palm.

“Kyouko.”

“Hmm?”

“It would be nice if you were there.”

Shibuki ended that painful summer with that single sentence, and they moved onto sex without being overwhelmed by their parting sentiments as they were, and snuggled close together and fell asleep healthily to their hearts’ content.

It was all as it was supposed to have been, but it wasn’t enough.

The next morning, just when Shibuki was about to head off, Kyouko suddenly did a one-eighty on her attitude.

“You’re not going to call me when you go to Tokyo anyway.”

“There’s no need to go see off such a cold-blooded man at the airport.”

“To begin with, isn’t there something wrong with leaving contraceptives in the room of a woman before her marriage?”

Kyouko, who couldn’t help but act hateful and ranted on and on, was like a completely different person from the understanding girlfriend she was yesterday. This was common, but each time Shibuki seriously wondered if Kyouko had a twin sister. Come to think of it, four months ago, when Shibuki was going to Tokyo for the first time, they had also gone through this exact same process.

“There’s no more time, so I have to go now.” Shibuki said, regretting his own lack of learning ability.

“Are you sure you’re not coming to see me off?”

“I’m not going.”

“You can just come to the front door.”

“I’m not going.”

“At least turn around and look at me here.”

“Not doing it.”

“What the hell’s the matter with you?”

The same question from four months ago.

While still keeping her back facing Shibuki, Kyouko answered with the same reply from four months ago.

“Just leave it. Go quickly, so it feels like you’re coming back soon again.”

“All right.” Shibuki nodded, walking out of Kyouko’s room like he was coming back as soon as possible.

When he went down the stairs, he came across Aya-san sweeping at the front door.

When she noticed him carrying his backpack, she put one hand into the pocket of her apron, and said, “You going?”

“Yeah. I already ate.”

“Take this with you.”

From the other side of the dust glittering in the morning sun from the window, Aya-san curtly presented to him a charm passed down in this region. It was a bivalve (1) shell that had a hole pierced through the top of it, with a red string passed through it.

“It’ll help you stand on your own feet. Don’t let anything get in your way.”

“Thank you.” Shibuki murmured, warming the shell with his palm. Then after that, once again, he went through the rotting sliding door, acting like he was returning soon again.

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Miyuki drove him all the way to the airport. Until the day before, Shibuki had been planning to return to Tokyo by train as he had before, but when he called his house to tell them that he was going back tomorrow, Miyuki had already prepared airplane tickets. Moreover, a flight on the morning of the 31sthad been planned for Shibuki.

His mother didn’t seem to understand much about himself, but was he just judging from appearances? When Shibuki got into the car with those unclear feelings, Miyuki’s voice came from the drivers’s seat. “Is Kyouko alright?”

“Who knows. Geez, do all women have split personalities?”

“It’s good to express your feelings. When the things you pent up inside explode, you’d break.”

“You don’t express your feelings.”

“That’s because your dad died before the explosion could happen.”

The car drove smoothly, but there was still time before it reached the airport. In that case, Shibuki decided to try asking about the things that he had been curious about up until now.

“So, my old man, who grew up listening to all the bad things that the other relatives said about Gramps, and so denied his way of living and felt like going into the honest work of fishing. So if that’s the case, did he not want me, his son, to dive? Why didn’t he stop Gramps from teaching me how to dive?”

“He did.” Miyuki replied easily. “But, even if he did that, you wouldn’t listen.”

“I did?”

“Did you forget? Even if your dad got angry, you talked back to him, pulled on your grandpa’s arm and went out to the sea. Even if you got hurt, even if you got bruises, you didn’t stop diving. Your stubborn father had to give way.”

“…”

“That’s what I remembered again when you returned this time. According to my mother’s intuition, you will be going back to Tokyo again.”

“On August 31st?”

“That’s woman’s intuition.”

Upon their arrival at the Aomori Airport parking lot, Miyuki took out a large paper bag from the trunk. “Since there are four boxes of kujira mochi (2), give them to everyone who helped you,” she said, grabbing onto Shibuki’s right hand. It was a whale-colored uirou (3) made of rice and red beans. He clearly remembered that four months ago, she had also pushed those presents at him for “everyone in Tokyo.” Anyone would like this, she had said back then, and he should have pushed it back at her like back then, but this time he silently hid it in his bag.

“I can’t come home in glory, but I’ll do as much as I want to in Tokyo, and then I’ll become a fisherman here. One day I’ll buy a boat, so that I can let you live as much as you want without having to take care of anybody.”

When Shibuki left with that last line as he headed towards the airport, the corners of Miyuki’s eyes were glittering. “I just want your health to be…” She said, before her voice got stuffed up. Until the end, she never asked Shibuki why he came home and about his diving situation.

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The departure time for the plane to Tokyo was 10:16 a.m.

Shibuki checked in at the airport at 9:33.

Because he had plenty of time before departure, Shibuki scraped out some coins from his jeans pocket, and called Ooshima’s cell phone from the payphone in the airport’s lobby.

“Hello, this is Ooshima…”

“It’s Okitsu, but I’m flying back now.”

When he said that first part, Ooshima was silent for a moment like he was confused, and then casually said, “I see,” not as though he was putting on a show of courage, but like he was pretending to be calm.

“Be careful when you come home. Don’t go missing.”

“Please tell that to the pilot.”

“Look forward to the airline meals.”

“It’s only seventy minutes.”

“That’s too bad. Right, well, we’ll be having sukiyaki tonight, okay?”

“…is that the only thing you know how to make?”

While he was amazed at Ooshima, who was the same as ever, when they conversed like this like nothing at all had changed from a month ago, the odor and feeling of that apartment, and the small, casual things in all the nooks and crannies of life were revived at once, filling up Shibuki’s heart.

I really feel like that I’m over there, that I returned to Tokyo.

Of my own will.

Maybe, in order to lose.

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Notes:

1. A sort of mollusc that people use a lot as charms.

2. A kind of rice cake eaten on Hinamatsuri

3. Steamed cake made of rice flour and sugar