"Lullaby"
A Maison Ikkoku fanfic written by Emily Siazon.
All characters are owned by Rumiko Takahashi. No infringement is
intended.
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Part 1
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"You're dying." The elderly doctor looked at his patient, only to
find the young man staring blankly at the wall. "I'm sorry."

Soichiro Otonashi never noticed him leave, still overwhelmed by the
news. He'd gone to his physical thinking that it was just going to be
another routine checkup; a visit spent mostly at the waiting room
reading magazines months old until he could be told that he had a
clean bill of health. He was obviously wrong.

Soichiro wordlessly walked out of the antiseptic white office and
into the chilly December rain, oblivious to the water trickling down
his face.

How had this happened? He was still so young.

Maybe the doctor was wrong and he. . . No. It was the most modern
hospital in Tokyo. They didn't make mistakes in those places, did
they?

"What am I going to do?" he muttered while looking at the overcast
sky as if it would give him the answer he sought. "What about my
parents? They're going to be devastated. Who's going to take care of
them after�after I'm gone?"

Soichiro halfheartedly kicked a can across the sidewalk while waiting
for the train. He watched it clatter noisily before ending up near a
giggling high-school girl who never even noticed it.

He looked around to see if anyone else had, but everyone kept right
on walking as if the can didn't exist; as if *he* didn't exist. The
only response he got was the mournful wail of the wind dying briefly,
as if paying its final respects.

The ride home was as uneventful as always, yet he found himself
noticing things that he would never have thought twice of before: the
sounds of raucous laughter from the businessmen heading home after a
couple of drinks, the wide array of uniforms as students from all
over Tokyo went home from cram schools, and the smell of the yakitori
that a housewife was bringing home to her family.

Everyone else seemed oblivious to the beauty of it all; the little
details that made each day different from the last. They were all in
such a hurry to go somewhere they deemed more important. He wondered
if any of them would ever appreciate it before it was too late; or
would they wander around the rest of their lives with blinders
strapped on, concentrating only on the end of the journey and not its
path.

It was a short walk from the station to his house, but he was
drenched by the time he got home. He knew he was late for dinner. He
tried to sneak past the dining room to get a dry change of clothes
before his mother could see and lecture him, but luck just wasn't on
his side today.

"Soichiro, look at you. Dry yourself up before you catch your death."

He wanted to laugh at the irony, but a quick glance at his mother's
concerned face changed his mind. Instead, he went up to her and
hugged her tightly. "I love you, mom."

"What brought this on? The last time you did this, you were trying to
butter me up so I wouldn't get angry when you brought home that dog.
You didn't have another one follow you, did you?"

He laughed and hugged her tighter. "No, not this time."

"Well then go and change. You're getting me wet."

He moved her to arms length and cupped her face. "Let's stay like
this awhile. I want to look at you a little longer."

"Will you please stop being silly and change? You see me all the
time."

"Yes, but I never really *looked.*  I never took the time to tell you
how I appreciate everything you do for me."

"A mother always knows, Soichiro," she answered, stepping back.
"Now, go on."

He reluctantly released her and headed to his room. By the time he
sat down to eat, his parents were absorbed in a game show on TV.

The announcer was telling the winner the free trip she had won when
his father suddenly sat bolt upright and said, "That reminds me, I've
arranged for a vacation to the Izu Peninsula this summer."

"That's wonderful!" his mother exclaimed. "It's been years since we
were there last."

"Remember how afraid you were of the ocean when you first saw it,
Soichiro?" his father inquired.

"How could I forget? I was so convinced that a monster in it was
after me that I slept in your bed for a whole summer."

They sat in silence, smiling fondly at the memory when his mother
said, "By the way, Soichiro, I forgot to ask. How did your
appointment with the doctor this afternoon go?"

Looking at his parents' smiling faces, he couldn't bring himself to
tell them the bad news. "It went fine," he lied.

"We knew it would," his father said while slapping him heartily on
the back. "Instead of wasting your time on something you already
knew, you should have gone out to find yourself a wife. We're not
getting any younger, you know."

He refused to look at them, instead opting to stare at remains of his
dinner. "Would that make you happy?"

"Of course. Why wouldn't it?"

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Author's Notes: I decided to send this out bit by bit instead of
writing it all at once because I know that I'd end up getting
intimidated by its length otherwise and never finish. So, I hope
you enjoyed the first part. Every person that gives me C&C gets
a virtual tub of Ben and Jerry's Chunky Monkey ^_^