Now that the Kazuma/Tsubasa situation has been resolved in the _Karekano_ 
manga, "Ukyou Kuonji" in particular will be pleased to know I finally have a 
concept for the Tsubasa fic, which is now four months behind schedule.

All others will be pleased to know that this fic is guaranteed 100% _South 
Park_ free, Monty Python free, Nanami Kiryu free, Quebec free, fat free and 
cholesterol free. It does allude to my previous fic "Susuharai," but I 
believe it is self-contained enough that reading "Susuharai" is not 
absolutely necessary to follow the plot.

Some familiarity with Tsubasa Shibahime's situation is desirable as well, in 
particular the latest Tsubasa storyline in the Karekano manga. I have 
recounted the details of the storyline I thought necessary for following the 
story below, but the reader who is still confused can find translations of 
the storyline at karekano.isgreat.net.

Comments welcome.

This story will be archived in short order at Studio Poutine 
(www.msu.edu/user/corrig11/poutine.htm), at which "Susuharai" can be found by 
the interested reader.

Paul Corrigan
corrig11@pilot.msu.edu

---

   The last conversation I had with my first love was a bitter quarrel in our 
apartment, to the tune of our screams of our child. As usual, it was about 
money. The amount he'd brought home from his latest "tour" was pitiful, but I, 
not he, was the one stuck at home getting calls from bill collectors in the few 
hours of free time I had to look after Kazuma, and it had begun to take 
its toll on my nerves. Being married to a member of a rock band had lost its 
glamour long ago; all I cared about these days was whether I'd have a roof 
over my head next month.

   "Maybe you still think the idea of sleeping in a van is glamorous, 
Kenichi, but I don't, all right?"

   "Jesus, Hiromi, do you even know what you're fucking saying? Do you think 
I like running all over the fucking place and not sleeping for three days on 
end and playing 'til my fingers bleed for fucking peanuts? Who do you think 
I'm doing this for?"

   "Well, if you don't like it, why don't you get a real job like everyone 
else we know did long ago so maybe we won't get evicted from our apartment, 
huh?"

   "Oh yeah, easy for you to say...What do you want me to do, huh? Pump gas? 
Flip burgers? Like that pays shit either? Hiromi, music's all I know how to 
do, all right?"

   "Yeah, you sure don't have a clue how to take care of your wife and son, 
that's for sure..."

   He reached out to embrace me. "Oh for Christ's sake, Hiromi, listen..."

   I pushed him away. "No, you listen! I've had it! I'm sick of eating 
instant ramen every night and looking after Kazuma all by myself and crying 
my eyes out every night because you're fuck knows where! You have two 
choices, Kenichi. Either you go call the band and tell them you're quitting 
tonight, or you get the hell out of here and I'll shift for myself because 
goddamnit I already do. So which is it?"

   "Oh God, not this again..."

   "Well?"

   "I've gotta go. We're playing at a bar in Yokohama tonight." He picked up 
his guitar case and headed for the door.

   "Fine!" I said, as he opened the door. "Fuck you too! I hope you rot in 
hell!" But I waited for the door to slam before I threw a plate at it, 
smashing the plate to bits.

   I never saw him alive again.

---
D'yer Maker
---
A _Kareshi Kanojo no Jijo_ ("_Karekano_") fanfic by Paul Corrigan
---
_Karekano_ concept devised by Masami Tsuda
---

   One afternoon in December, my stepdaughter collapsed in the middle of a 
crowded shopping area in downtown Kawasaki. For all I know she would have 
died of hunger and cold right there if some guardian angel, in the form of a 
passerby, hadn't called 911 on his cellphone so she could be taken, as it 
happened, to the ER ward of the hospital where I work. She was kept for 
observation overnight, and hooked to an IV to get her blood sugar and 
electrolyte levels back to something compatible with human life.

   As it happened I was assigned to work in the ward where she had been 
placed the very next morning. I, knowing the case probably better than 
anyone, would have preferred to keep her on the IV, or at most tried to give 
her milk or orange juice. Anything but solid food. I knew for a fact that 
lately she'd eaten nothing at home for days on end, and I had no idea if 
she'd been eating anything anywhere else. She couldn't leave the hospital 
until she ate something solid, but that was all right with me. At least if 
she was at the hospital I knew she'd be okay and I could check on her while I 
was at work. As it was, given this and everything else, I was afraid to leave 
her on her own.

   But it wasn't my decision to make. Eiko Arima had condescended to visit 
the ward that morning, and her word was law. As far as she was concerned, 
contrary to all evidence, my stepdaughter wasn't the least bit ill. 

   At the beginning of that year Takeshi Arima had resigned as president of 
the hospital, returning to private practice for personal reasons. Rumor had 
it the personal reasons was a falling out with the rest of the family, but I 
don't know the details. If they're anything like his sister Eiko, that 
doesn't surprise me. Technically Mrs. Arima's husband Yotaro had assumed her 
brother's position, but no real secret was made of the fact that she was in 
complete control. As senior vice-president, among her first acts was to 
announce not only the closing of our AIDS and substance abuse clinics and the 
firing of their entire staffs, but also the dismissal of all the unmarried 
nurses over twenty-five, that is, all the nurses who might actually need a 
living wage. 

   It got better, from what I could gather from the rumor mill and news 
reports after her bull-in-a-china-shop antics gained press attention. She 
apparently had decided that not only did such "unseemly" people as AIDS 
patients and drug addicts have no right to medical attention, but the 
employment of single females, some with children they were daring to raise 
without fathers, was a threat to the moral fabric of the nation. 

   I escaped the chop by sheer luck; I had just remarried the previous 
summer, and they needed to keep at least some people who knew what they were 
doing. Even so I was relegated to part-time status, losing most of my 
benefits in the process.

   Of course all the experienced nurses Mrs. Arima had fired had to be 
replaced by girls just out of high school, whose only redeeming quality was 
their willingness to work for practically nothing. They included, for 
example, the nineteen-year-old prescription drug addict I had to work with, 
who was fired when it came out that she was diluting the dosage of painkiller 
shots she was assigned to give patients and using the leftovers on herself--
on the hospital's time no less.

   But enough about that. I could go on and on about the horror stories at 
work since Eiko Arima took over; everyone at the hospital has their favorite. 
I'm only telling you as much as I am to put into perspective just what sort 
of woman this is.

  Among Mrs. Arima's pastimes is showing up at a ward unannounced, to give 
orders and tell the nurses how to do their jobs and generally cause as much 
trouble as possible. That morning she was walking up and down the corridor in 
a clearly overpriced black dress, with a list of the patients and their 
ailments, and and peering into each semi-private room, apparently trying to 
decide whether the patients inside deserved to be treated or not. One time, I 
remember (not that morning, thank God), during a similar walkabout, she 
pounced on a visible minority who was beng treated for a stomach complaint 
(he might have been Iranian--I know he was a Muslim, because he'd asked for a 
Koran earlier in his best Japanese; after asking around I had to apologize 
and tell him we didn't have one handy), ordering him out of bed and out of 
the hospital within the hour. Her reason? "We can't take the risk he won't 
return home without paying his bill," she said. "Such people have no regard 
for Japanese law."

   I was about to go in to check on Tsubasa when I noticed her at Tsubasa's 
door, looking at her from the corridor. "Nurse Shibahime?"

   "Yes?" I squared my shoulders and tried to sound dutiful and not the least 
bit nervous. One must watch oneself around Mrs. Arima. She's had people fired 
for the least perceived dereliction of duty and/or verbal slip, or for that 
matter for no reason at all.

   "What's wrong with this one? I thought someone this young would be in the 
pediatric ward. What's she doing here?"

   "Tsubasa's seventeen, ma'am."

   To be fair to Mrs. Arima, it was an understandable mistake. When Kazuma 
met Tsubasa for the first time, he was convinced that she must have been a 
seventh grader at most, and said so. I won't disturb you with the details of 
the violent tantrum that Tsubasa threw as a result. I will say that the whole 
family's been banned from the five-star restaurant it took place in for life, 
and that Toshiharu was forced to pay the restaurant ungodly sums for repairs 
to the premises. 

   In my admittedly short experience Tsubasa has always been remarkably 
strong (hence the amount of damage she was able to wreak in the restaurant), 
but Toshiharu tells me Tsubasa, when she was little, was quite a sickly girl, 
winding up in and out of hospitals throughout her childhood. She was also 
accident-prone. I met him when Tsubasa had been in the hospital before, after 
a rollerblading accident involving her running into a badly-constructed wall, 
which collapsed on top of her and pinned her down until she was discovered by 
a homeward bound third-shift factory worker the next morning (I couldn't have 
made this up). 

   So there's a rational explanation, but at times I can't help thinking it's 
just because she's so childish. Of course my standard of comparison isn't too 
representative either. Kazuma had to practically raise himself, so he had to 
mature a good bit faster than she did. But the fact is Toshiharu doted on her 
far too much, treating her the way you'd treat a porcelain vase (these are 
his words, not mine). To be fair, I can't say I blame him--for a long time 
she was all he had. Even now, though, from what I've been able to gather from 
observing her around her friends when they've come to visit, she's firmly 
settled in her role as the baby of the group and seems to have no plans to 
give it up. It's as if she's so adamant about not wanting to grow up, that by 
sheer force of will she's stopped herself from growing any taller than your 
average 11-year-old.

   And yes, she is that stubborn. The story of how stubbornly she resisted 
her father marrying me is one that's too long for me to tell here, if I even 
cared to.

   She did accept me in the end, though. Me and Kazuma. She took to Kazuma 
like a duck to water.

   I married Toshiharu in the summer of last year, and Kazuma and I moved in 
with him and Tsubasa. The very day we moved in, while Kazuma's band mates, 
who'd shown up to lend a hand, were accosting Tsubasa and forcing Kazuma to 
defend her honor, Toshiharu wondered aloud about, of all things, whether 
step-siblings could get married. 

   Oh God, we might as well have put two rabbits in a cage.

   Kazuma left the house one evening this April. None of us heard anything 
from him until three days later, when he called me at work to tell me where 
he was and that he didn't plan on coming back for a while. He must have been 
afraid he'd get Tsubasa on the line if he called the house. I'd had a fairly 
good idea he might have taken refuge at the apartment of his bandmates, but I 
found myself completely unable to do what I was sure anybody else would have 
done, namely order him to come home at once. I couldn't because I knew what 
this was about Tsubasa, and I told him so. (It never occurred to him that I'd 
seen what was happening between them. I really shouldn't joke about this, but 
I swear I never fail to dazzle Kazuma with my powers of perception.)

   Forcing him to come home might have done more harm than good. Mrs. Arima, 
as it happened, was on one of her rampages that morning, and I was afraid of 
the consequences of taking a personal call on hospital time. So I ended up 
telling him (a little crossly too) that I had to go, and would he just do me 
a favor and call now and again.

   He didn't.

   For a little while I kept telling myself that he was in good hands with 
the boys in the band. After all they'd taken good care of him in the past, 
and in any case my Kazuma was a resourceful boy who'd practically raised 
himself anyway. So there was no need to worry about him, because if he 
_wasn't_ calling there probably wasn't a problem. He was never the sort to 
call me at work just to say he loved his mother, and even at home we'd never 
been the most affectionate family. I'm ashamed to say it, but I sometimes 
think I'm nicer to Tsubasa than I ever was to Kazuma. Of course, I never had 
the choice of spoiling Kazuma.

   In June my maternal instincts finally got the better of me and I called 
the band's apartment, only to find the number had been disconnected. Even 
then it wasn't until October, when the school called to ask why he'd been 
absent for the past couple of weeks, and I had to tell them he'd been gone 
for months and I had no idea where he was--that I really began to lose hope 
that he'd ever come back.

   Tsubasa lost hope long before I did. The day she learned Kazuma had moved 
in with the band was the day she began to waste away before my eyes.

   "You know her, then?" asked Mrs. Arima.

   "Yes, ma'am," I replied. "She's my stepdaughter."

   "Oh? Is that right?" she said, raising an eyebrow. "Well then, you must 
have some idea about what might be the problem with her. Hm. Hypoglycemia, it 
says here. Has she a digestive problem?"

   "Not as such, ma'am..." I lowered my voice. "She hasn't been eating at 
home. I had no idea how malnourished she was until she showed up in ER. She's 
been having personal problems. I'd rather not go into the details without her 
permission..."

   "Oh for God's SAKE, nurse!" Mrs. Arima nearly threw her list at me. "Let 
me tell you this--I am sick and tired hearing about silly little girls going 
on blasted hunger strikes because they think it'll get them in the pants of 
some blasted rock star!" She laughed cruelly. "What? Does she think she's 
fat? Has she seen herself? What a joke!" 

   "With all due respect, I don't think it is, Mrs. Arima." Actually as far 
as I was concerned Mrs. Arima wasn't due any respect at all, but I tried my 
best to keep the sarcasm out of my voice, and look her in the eye. It wasn't 
easy; probably without realizing it she'd hit a bit too close to home.

   "Listen, nurse. It's clear to anybody with sense that all your 
stepdaughter needs is food. That, and a good shaking from her stepmother 
might be of enormous help, to my mind. This person happens to be taking up a 
bed that could be used by someone who actually needs medical assistance and 
doesn't just want to play the tragic heroine. That," Mrs. Arima went on, 
glaring at me as he did so, "and I don't approve of you encouraging her 
antics. Keep in mind it's not your money. I was never indulged like this. 
Now. I'm feeling generous today, so what I'd like you to do is to force 
something down her throat, and then get her out of that bed and get her home 
at once, and do what you have to do to make her understand this is not to 
happen again, or, better yet, have her father do it. Understood?"

   "Mrs. Arima, I'm not sure she could keep it down right now. We've been 
feeding her intravenously. Even then there's nobody at home to come collect 
her. My husband's away on business..."

    "Then you'll have to take her home then. In any case, she can't leave 
until she eats." Mrs. Arima clapped her hands. "Move."

   Talking reason gets you nowhere with Mrs. Arima. No solid breakfast had 
been prepared for Tsubasa, so I mumbled an acknowledgement and went down to 
the cafeteria to get her a bowl of rice. When I came back up Mrs. Arima was 
still there, waiting by the door, and as I went in to Tsubasa I could feel 
her eyes on the back of my neck, watching me to make sure I did as I was 
told.

   Mrs. Arima had been quite loud, but Tsubasa had managed to stay asleep 
through it all. I knelt by the side of the bed and shook her gently.

   "Good morning, Tsubasa. It's me, Hiromi." 

   I gave up trying to get Tsubasa to call me "mom" a long time ago. She'd 
made it quite clear she wasn't comfortable doing so. It occurred to me at 
last that if I made he I'd just be indulging myself at her expense. I'd 
always dreamed of having a little girl. But in spite of appearances she's not 
a little girl any more. That was part of the problem.  

   She stirred and looked up at me vacantly, still half asleep.

   "Are you hungry this morning? I got you some rice. Do you feel like 
eating?" I went on, as chirpily as possible for her benefit. I was just 
hoping she hadn't seen Mrs. Arima yet. I dug into the rice with some 
chopsticks and offered it to her.

   Tsubasa didn't answer at once. Even at the best of times she's not a big 
talker. She looked at the rice, looked at me (and my apprehensive expression, 
I'm sure), than back at the rice. Then, after a moment's hesitation, she sat 
up a bit and took the rice. 

   Then, apparently without prompting from the scary lady standing at the 
door, she spoke.

   "I wanna go home."

---

   But she couldn't, at least not then.

   This was not without effort from Mrs. Arima, mind you. The moment she 
heard Tsubasa she pounced, walking in daintily, smiling smarmily at us both 
and beginning, "Hello, Tsubasa! Your new mother's told me all about you..."

   Tsubasa sat up very quickly, frowned at Mrs. Arima, and looked her over.

   "Who the heck're you? The Wicked Witch of the West?"

   I nudged her. "Tsubasa, mind your manners. She runs the hospital."

   Tsubasa backed off. "Oh. 'k."

   Mrs. Arima scowled at her. "Well," she said through her teeth, "glad to 
see you're feeling better. I hope you realize you've caused your new mother a 
lot of trouble. I want you to go home with her now and tell her you're 
sorry..."

   I wanted to play peacemaker and assure Tsubasa she hadn't caused any 
trouble at all, but Tsubasa wasn't having Mrs. Arima's nonsense for a second. 
"Okay, okay, I'm going. C'n I get dressed in peace at least? Jeez."

   "Of course, Tsubasa." I stood up and headed for the door so she could 
change into her street clothes. Mrs. Arima, after standing there for a moment 
loking stunned, decided follwing me would be a good idea. Probably not many 
people had talked to her like that before. It was all I could do not to 
laugh.

   By the time Mrs. Arima had gotten back to the corridor, however, she'd 
completely recovered. She gave me a nasty look. "Your stepdaughter has quite 
a tongue on her, hasn't she?"

   "I'm sorry, Mrs. Arima. She's a nice girl really." I laughed, tryiong to 
put a good side on it. "This is good, actually. If she has the energy to 
answer back she really must be feeling better..."

   "Yes. She bounced back a little quickly for someone who's been starving, 
don't you think?"

   I just laughed nervously. Mrs. Arima didn't say any more, but continued to 
stand there in silence, glaring at me and making sure I didn't escape until 
Tsubasa was dressed and emerged from the room dressed for the cold. 

   "C'n we go now?" said Tsubasa.

   "Of course," I said, "once I get my things. Mrs. Arima's letting me take 
off work so we can go home together. Isn't that nice? Say thank you to Mrs. 
Arima..."

   Tsubasa seemed to have remembered her manners. She smiled cutely and bowed 
low to Mrs. Arima. "Thank you ma'am."

   "You, nurse," said Mrs. Arima, not acknowledging Tsubasa, "I want back 
here in two hours. You're to make up for it tonight. Two extra hours at 
regular scale. Now, you had better be off, and I have work to do. Good day."

   And with that Mrs. Arima turned to go.

   The moment she turned her back Tsubasa kicked Mrs. Arima square in the 
behind, knocking her flat on the floor, and to top it off blew a loud 
raspberry.

   I just stood there frozen in shock. All the other staff in the corridor at 
the time looked on, thunderstruck. 

   A patient in a wheelchair, who had been watching the scene with interest, 
broke the silence by enthusiastically applauding.

   The applause unfroze me. I did my duty and ran over to Mrs. Arima to check 
on her. "Are you all right?" I said, surprising myself with the sincerity of 
my concern (force of habit, I guess).

   "Yes." Mrs. Arima picked herself up, apparently not seriously hurt. "Yes, 
I'm just fine, no thanks to her." 

   She stormed over to Tsubasa and grabbed her by the shoulders. Tsubasa just 
looked at her, not even blinking.

   "All right, miss. Just for that, I'm not going to let your new mother take 
off work after all. So you can sit at the front desk all day now and think 
about how much trouble you've caused, and I can let her deal with you when 
she's done here, and you can thank your lucky stars it'll be her, because 
rest assured I would be only too happy to give you the thrashing of your 
life." She shoved Tsubasa in my direction. "Nurse, get this brat out of my 
sight. I have better things to do than put up with this sort of thing."

   When Mrs. Arima turned her backs on us again, Tsubasa restrained herself 
from kicking her again. That said, once Mrs. Arima had stormed down the 
corridor and out of sight and earshot, furtively rubbing her injured behind, 
an encore performance wasn't necessary for the staff to now break out in 
cheers and applause.

   Tsubasa smiled and curtsied. I wanted to tell them not to encourage her, 
but I really hadn't the heart to do so.

---
For a thousand mothers
---

   So there was nothing for it but to take Tsubasa downstairs to the front 
desk. I gave her a can of orange juice from the dispenser there and told her 
to sit and behave, and that I'd be back at lunchtime to check on her, and not 
to bother the staff too much.

   "C'n I go to the cafeteria?" she said, pouting and looking miserable. "I'm 
hungry."

   "No, Tsubasa. You can't eat solid food yet. Your system isn't used to it 
any more. I didn't want to even give you the rice. If I'd given you much more 
than I did you'd have just thrown it up."

   "So why'd you give me the rice at all and be like, 'Good morning, hon! You 
want some nummy rice?' Jeez."

   "Mrs. Arima made me. I might have gotten fired if I didn't."

   "Why?"

   "Because she's crazy, that's why! Don't even try to understand!"

   "Nah. I understand." Tsubasa took her jacket off (she knew she wasn't 
going anywhere for a while) and sat down with her juice. "Miyazawa's 
boyfriend's a psycho too. His dad used to work here. So that was his aunt, 
right?"

   It was silly of me really, but I hadn't realized Soichiro Arima's family 
was the Arima family I worked for, despite the fact I'd met him several 
times. He never spoke of his family, and I'd never gotten around to asking 
him. It seems he had been seeing Yukino Miyazawa, one of Tsubasa's friends, 
for some time now. I raised an eyebrow. "I thought you liked Soichiro 
Arima..."

   "Oh, Arima's nice to me 'n stuff. That don't mean he ain't a psycho." 
Tsubasa sipped her juice. "I pity Miyazawa sometimes."

   I decided to let it go at that. In spite of everything I still had a job 
to do. I explained the situation to the young woman at the desk--a very young 
girl, not much older than Tsubasa--and asked her would she keep an eye on 
Tsubasa for me.

   She said yes, of course, but the truth was neither of us had a choice. As 
I went back to work I'm sure I heard her say, "What is this, a day care 
center? Shit."

   For all that when I got back at lunch time to check on Tsubasa she and the 
secretary were thick as thieves. Tsubasa, when she behaves herself, has an 
uncanny ability to make people adopt her as their little sister, regardless 
of their age, gender, or other background. Years of practice, I suspect. She 
was arguing with the secretary about what to watch on the television set up 
in the lobby for people to watch while they were waiting.

   "I wanna watch the Kaho Mitsuki trial," said Tsubasa. Kaho Mitsuki, in 
case you've been on the moon, is the former schoolteacher who was indicted, 
and eventually convicted, on several counts of child molestation in that 
month's trial of the century. She was extradited to Japan from Britain, where 
she'd apparently been living in sin with a twelve-year-old Japanese boy, who 
the press had nicknamed "Ariel" in lieu of his concealed real name.

   "No way, girl. That ain't kid's stuff," said the secretary, who apparently 
had the remote.

   "I'm not a kid." I had to titter when Tsubasa said that. If she had to at 
all, she couldn't have expected it to help her case.

   "Don't matter. This is a family hospital. Damn, girl, you want some five-
year-old sitting there and hearing about that sort of shit? 'Sides, I don't 
need some kid's mom kicking my ass."

   "So, you think Kaho's going down? She should, she sounds like a real sicko 
to me."

   "I dunno. She's got a damn smooth defense. 'Sides, I don't believe half 
the stuff they're saying. Sounds made-up to me, all that occult shit with 
Crowley and tarot"

   "They accused Terada of the same sorta stuff. Well, the perverted stuff 
anyway. It could happen."

   "Terada? Shit, he was guilty as sin, girl! No way should he have walked!"

   I walked over to Tsubasa at the desk and cleared my throat. "Tsubasa, I 
got you some lunch..."

   She turned to face me, looked at the bottle of milk I was holding up, and 
pulled a face. "Milk. Yay."

   "I'm sorry, Tsubasa, I already..."

   Tsubasa waved her hand and took the milk. "Yeah, yeah, I know. Give me 
that." She sat down with the milk, opened it and took a swig.

   "Has she been any trouble?" I asked the secretary.

   "No ma'am, she's been good. Pretty smart kid. How old is she anyhow?"

   "Seventeen."

   The secretary looked a bit confused. "Oh. You don't say."

   "Don't sweat it, I get it a lot." Tsubasa didn't look at us as she said 
it. She took another drink. I sat down beside her. I was silent for a moment, 
not at all sure where to begin.

   In the end I settled on: "Tsubasa, do you want to go to school tomorrow?"

   "Sure. Why wouldn't I?"

   "I mean...if you're not feeling up to it, just say so...I mean, given 
everything that's been happening..."

   "I'll be fine." Tsubasa took a swig as if for emphasis. "No point me 
sitting around here anyway."

   "Don't let Mrs. Arima get to you. She had no right to make you leave 
before you were ready..."

   "Nah. 'Sokay. I hate this place anyway. Sitting by yourself in a hospital 
bed sucks ass. If I wanted to sit in bed I could do it at home." She took 
another swig, and looked at me, frowning. "What was with you anyway, kissing 
her butt like that? What's the matter with you?"

   "Count your blessings, Tsubasa," I shot back. "You're still a kid. You can 
still tell people what you think of them and get away with it."

   "I'm not a kid."

   "Look, I don't like her either. Nobody does."

   "No kidding. Look, if you're expecting me to apologize, you're out of 
luck. Her ass needed kicking. It was a matter of principle."

   "I'd rather not die for your principles, miss. I'm lucky I still have a 
job."

   She suddenly smiled at me. "Come on. You'd been dying to do that for ages. 
Admit it."

   It was true, but it was beside the point. "Look, if you want people to not 
treat you like a kid, you should learn not to pull stunts like that any more, 
okay? God, I thought I'd die of embarrassment..."

   Tsubasa didn't reply immediately. When she did, after taking another swig, 
she sounded awfully thoughtful.

   "Are you mad at me?"

   "About Mrs. Arima?"

   "No. About everything else. About acting up and not eating and winding up 
in the hospital and stuff." If she wasn't sorry about Mrs. Arima (and, to be 
honest, neither was I), she did seem genuinely sorry about that, judging by 
her expression. Not to mention hungry. "That was dumb. I'm okay now. I won't 
do this again. God, I'm _starving_..."

   "I know, Tsubasa, I know. I'm not mad, really." I tried reaching out to 
touch her shoulder. "It's okay, I understand..."

   "Look, don't, okay?" she suddenly snapped waving me away. "Don't act all 
sweet and stuff and saying you're sorry like it'll actually make me feel 
better, 'cause it isn't, all right!" She stopped herself. She paused, and 
took a breath. "I'm sorry. Look...I just don't want to discuss it, a'right? 
I'm over it, really." She finished her milk. "Jesus, if I'm not over being 
left in the dust when something better comes along, I never will."

   My heart froze in my chest. 

   "You have no idea how much that hurt, Tsubasa."

   She looked at me, a bit apprehensive, obviously realizing what she'd said. 
"I wasn't talking about Papa, Hiromi, I swear..."

   "Then who did you mean, my dear?"

   "Someone else. Take too long to explain." She hung her head. "I'm sorry. I 
didn't mean that the way it sounded. I'm just not in a great mood right now, 
'k? My stomach's rumbling something awful, I bet you can hear it..."

   I believed her. Tsubasa wasn't the sort to make verbal slips like that. If 
she held something against you, she said so and didn't apologize for it. I'd 
learned that the hard way. 

   "Do you want some more milk?" I asked, trying to sound concilatory.

   Tsubasa looked me over suddenly. "Where's your lunch anyway?"

   "I ate it in the cafeteria. I figured you didn't need me eating in front 
of you."

   "Oh. Thanks, I guess."

   "So do you want more milk?"

   "Yah I want more milk!"

   I wasn't sure whether to laugh or cry. She certainly was trying to act 
like her old self, but I wasn't sure how much of it to believe. I went back 
to the cafeteria, got her the milk and sat back down beside her in silence, 
watching her drink for a few minutes.

   "What?" she said at last, making me realize I'd been staring. 

   "Tsubasa...it's not like I don't know what all this is about..."

   "Look, it's not your fault, okay? Not like you made him run away with his 
dumb band."

   "I want him to come home too..."

   "That makes one of you. What's he want to come home for anyway? For all 
you know he's got a pack of groupies by now. What's he need his mommy and his 
dumb sister holding him back for? I figure he's happy being a big rock star, 
and that's fine by me. He can go to hell for all I care, and take his dumb 
band with him." She opened the milk and took a big swig. "Men are bastards."

   "Tsubasa, don't say things like that!"

   "Oh, God, not the old 'be careful what you wish for' crap? Whatever." She 
took another swig, and stared into the bottle. "I'm sure he'll be just fine."

   "Did I ever tell you about Kazuma's father?"

   She looked up at me. She looked surprised, and not uninterested, but was 
trying not to show it. "No."

   "Would you like me to?"

   She considered it for a moment. "You sure you wanna? You never did 
before."

   "You didn't ask. Neither did your father, even when you weren't there. Of 
course, there was a reason for that."

   Tsubasa took another drink. "What was he like?"

   "My Kenichi," I said, settling back in my seat and putting on the best 
storytelling voice I could muster, "was in a rock and roll band."

   "Whoa." Tsubasa looked impressed. "I actually just wanted to know what he 
looked like."

   "Well..." And I started giggling for some reason. "The fact was he was 
gorgeous...!"

   "Tall, short, fat, thin, what?"

   "Oh. Oh THAT!" I said, remembering myself. "Um. Actually Kazuma looks just 
like him. Take Kazuma, give him long black hair instead of his short blonde 
hair and you've got Kenichi."

   "You got a picture of him?"

   I thought for a moment. "I don't know if I do."

   "Why not?"

   "I got rid of just about all of them when I started getting serious with 
your father. At the time I thought, I can't have him in my house, I have to 
move on. But then, if you're worrying about that, maybe you're not ready to 
move on. I do know Kazuma didn't appreciate it at all. We had an enormous 
fight about it."

   "Well, the guy was still his dad, right?"

   "There was that, but...well, Kazuma idolized his father. From the time he 
could talk he'd tell me, 'I wanna be a rock star like dad!' And I'd just 
smile and tell him, 'You can be anything you want, Kazuma.' When he got big 
he got a bit shyer about saying things like that, of course, but...I'm 
convinced Kazuma ended up being a musician because of his father. didn't he 
ever mention him to you?"

   "No. Was he famous?"

   "No, no. When I met him was in one of those little local bands that wasn't 
ever going to go anywhere. Of course I was a girl and that never occurred to 
me for a second." I chuckled. "Want to know how we met?"

   "How?"

   I bent over and whspered in her ear. "I threw my panties on the stage."

   Her jaw just about dropped. "WHAT?"

   "I wanted to be able to say I'd done it. It worked."

   "You've got to be kidding me."

   "Yes, Tsubasa, once upon a time I was a groupie. Scary thought, huh?"

   "No...no..." I'm sure Tsubasa as backing away. "Just can't see you 
throwing your panties at anyone..."

   "Have no fear, my groupie days are over." I sat back in my seat and 
continues, more seriously. "Actually they were over by the time Kazuma came 
along."

   "What'd he play anyway?"

   "Hair music."

   "Whazzat?"

   "Music played by people with big hair like Kenichi." I laughed. "Lots of 
Heavy metal. Some Zeppelin, Black Heaven...Oh God, I loved Black Heaven. So 
did Kazuma. When he was little he'd play my old _Space Invader_ LP at volume 10 
and he'd air guitar to it until I'd yell, 'TURN THE NOISE DOWN!'" I laughed. 
"God, that's when I knew 
I was getting old..."

   "Who're Black Heaven?"

   "You wouldn't remember them. They were a one-hit wonder band when I was 
about your age. _Space Invader_ was their only album. What happened to them 
only God knows. People called them a Japanese Zeppelin ripoff, but I thought 
they were fabulous. Gabriel was Kenichi's idol."

   "Gabriel?"

   "The lead singer of Black Heaven."

   "Oh. Shows what I know." Tsubasa paused, hesitating. "Hiromi..."

   "Yes?"

   "What happened to him?"

   "Kenichi?"

   "Mm-hmm."

   "Oh."

   "You don't hafta say if you don't wanna. It's okay."

   "No. No, it's all right. It was a long time ago." I said that, but I had 
to take a deep breath before going on, and prmoise myself not to cry. 
"Kenichi dropped out of high school to play in the band because he thought he 
had a good chance of being discovered. He wasn't, but he kept at it anyway, 
even after everyone else we knew had grown up and gotten married, after I'd 
married him, joined the hospital...had Kazuma...thing was after a while the 
sorts of music he knew how to play went out of fashion and he couldn't get as 
much work as he used to, and pretty soon we were this close to starving, 
because I wasn't making nearly enough on my wages either. At one point he 
didn't play for two months, and we were down to a meal a day. How we survived 
I don't know.

   "Anyway, it was more than I bargained for, to put it mildly, and I took it 
out on him. When he was home, towards the end, we did nothing but fight. And 
I'd tell him I thought he didn't care about me and Kazuma as long as he could 
keep playing music and not grow up like everyone else. When I did he'd shoot 
back, more or less, that he kept playing in the band necause he couldn't do 
anything else, and in retrospect he might have been telling the truth.

   "Anyway, one night I told him I couldn't take it any more and told him to 
get out. And he didn't come back."

   "How'd you know he died?" asked Tsubasa, looking concerned.

   "It wasn't the first time I'd told him to leave, mind you. I'd get really 
angry and tell him to get out, and he'd say, 'Fine, I'm going.' And for a few 
days he'd stay away, I guess until he'd managed to get some work so he could 
hold up his head when he came back and say, 'I'm home, can I come in?' and by 
then we'd have both cooled down and of course I'd let him in, and he'd give 
me every penny. He was good about that. And in my heart of hearts I guess I 
knew he was trying to take care of me as best he knew how. I know I didn't 
really want him to leave me, but...one night we fought again, and he left the 
apartment in a huff, and the next thing I knew I was being called to the 
morgue to identify him."

   "What happened?"

   "The band's van got hit by a truck. By the time the ambulance got him to 
the hospital he was dead." I could hear my voice getting ragged, and I tried, 
and failed, to control it. "He'd come back before, but the fact was it was all
unraveling before my eyes. I don't know how much longer we'd have stayed 
even if he'd lived. As it is..." I sobbed. "As it is I'll never if he planned 
to come back that time or not. I mean, as far as I could tell I'd basically
told 
him to choose between his music and me, and in the end he ran off and got
himself 
killed because I made him run away. I blamed myself for years." I began to
choke up. 
"I don't know, maybe I still do. I'm sorry, Tsubasa..."

   "'Sokay." Now Tsubasa had to reach out and try to console me. "Don't cry. 
He'd have come back."

   I wiped my eyes. "That's really sweet of you to say, Tsubasa, but..."

   "Kazuma did."

   My heart just about stopped. I looked her in the eye. "What?"

   "Kazuma came back. It was last night. He said he loved me and he really 
didn't want to run away. He wanted to kiss me, but I got scared and I 
couldn't, and he got sad. He said he wanted to know if I loved him too."

   "You must have been dreaming. How could he have known you were here?"

   She looked at me quizzically. 

   "Didn't that ever happen to you? I thought people saw their dead 
boyfriends in their dreams and stuff."

   "Tsubasa," I said, "Kazuma isn't dead." That was the only thing I was sure 
of. If he had died, at least then I'd have heard some news of him.

   Tsubasa didn't reply. She turned away and settled down in her seat, 
looking straight ahead.

   "Being a rock and roll widow isn't half as glamorous as people think," I 
added.

   Tsubasa continued to stare straight ahead, not looking at me. "That was 
the impression I was getting, yeah."

   Then, sadly, she added: "I figured he'd be back in a few days too."

   Her words hit a bit too close to home. In the months and years after 
Kenichi died all I thought about was him. It even hurt when Kazuma had told 
me in his innocence that he wanted to be a musician like his father. I would 
smile, but I'd think all the while, yes, and you'll run away from me and die 
just like your father.

   But somehow I hadn't dreamt of Kenichi. Not once. Or perhaps, if the dead 
haunt people's dreams, he'd thought it best to stay away.
 
   "Do you still got the Black Heaven LP?" When Tsubasa spoke again I got a 
bit of a shock, perhaps having lapsed into a reverie like hers without 
knowing it.

   "Why, Tsubasa?" I asked.

   "Did you throw that out too?"

   I thought a moment. "No. No, that was mine before I met Kenichi. I think 
it might be in Kazuma's room." I laughed a bit. "He's the only one who's 
listened to it lately."

   "C'n I listen to it when we get home?"

   "Of course." I tried to smile, and rose from my seat. "I'd better get back 
to work."

---

   Tsubasa and I didn't get home until eight o'clock that evening. I put her 
straight to bed, and she didn't protest. I hadn't thought she'd be up to 
dancing to Black Heaven in her condition anyway.

   She insisted on going to school the next morning. I wasn't keen on it 
myself, if only because I was afraid she'd be tempted to stuff herself, but I 
decided to risk it. Fortunately, she didn't succumb to temptation, but she 
told me later she'd ended up making many more visits to the bathroom than 
normal.

   "To pee," she added, to reassure me. "It was a lot of juice."

   A few days later I was working during the evening. Mrs. Uchida was there 
that night, as she had been the evening Tsubasa was brought in, and she took 
me aside to ask me how she was doing. I was able to say with pride that she'd 
kept down some rice porridge that morning, and was looking appreciably 
better. "No thanks to Mrs. Arima," I added.

   "Mrs. Ikeda," Mrs. Uchida said to me in her Yamaguchi accent--I'd know it a 
mile off--"Mrs. Ikeda, pardon me for saying so, but what I saw couldn't have 
happened overnight. Is there anything the matter with her at home?" (She still
calls me Mrs. Ikeda from force of habit. I never bother to correct her.)

   "Well..."

   "She's not going around saying she's fat, is she?"

   "Not that she ever told me..." 

   "Well, she mightn't, you know. Sure if I were you I'd be taking her to see 
someone about this. It isn't normal, Mrs. Ikeda. You shouldn't take chances
with 
something like this..."

   "It's not anorexia. She wants to eat now. I feel horrible about only being
able to give her rice porridge. I think she's starting to get over what was 
bothering her. I think."

   "And what was that?"

   I lowered my voice. "It's Kazuma. She was pining away because she missed 
him so much. You know what she told me?" I smiled. "She dreamt she saw him 
the night she was here..."

   "But he was here."

   I just looked at her as if she'd been speaking Greek to me. "What?"

   "He was here. He came to see her."

   "On your shift? In the middle of the night? Why didn't you tell me?"

   "Did he not tell you he'd been here?"

   "No he didn't!" I grabbed her by the shoulders and shook her desperately. 
"I haven't heard from him in months and he just shows up here in the middle 
of the night? Is he all right?"

   "Sure he looked all right to me, Mrs. Ikeda. He's grown a bit so I didn't
know 
who it was at first, but it was him all right. I'm actually about to check on 
her, and there's your man in the corridor, asking is Tsubasa Shibahime there, 
and your one Miss Yoshida says, 'Visiting hours are over, sir. Please leave the 
building.' And I said, leave him alone, sure this is Hiromi Ikeda's son, how 
are you, pet? Because I hadn't seen him in the longest time. And he says, 
'Fine, ma'am.' And I tell her, sure all he wants to see is his sister, it 
won't do any harm. Because Miss Yoshida's one of the new ones and she didn't
know 
him from Adam, and she must have looked at him with his bleached hair and 
thought he was some sort of hooligan trying to rip something off under our 
noses, but I put in a good word for him. Because I'd never heard a bad thing 
about him. And Miss Yoshida says at last, 'Be quick as you can, sir.' And he
says, 
'Yes, ma'am.' And we let him go in for a few minutes, and he comes out and 
says thank you very much, and off he goes on his way, and that was that."

   I let Mrs. Uchida go and let my arms hang by my sides.

   "I see. He came to see her and not me."

   "He might have been in a hurry, Mrs. Ikeda. Sure they tell me he's turning 
into quite the celebrity. The nurses in the pediatric ward hear nothing 
from the girls but about Yinyang, even I know who they are. He must be a busy 
fella these days. You know, his father'd be proud of him. God knows he's doing
everything his father wanted to do and more."

   "Maybe, Mrs. Uchida. I don't know. Right now I don't care."

   "You're sure it wasn't you told him she was here?"

   "Yes!"

   "Then who was it?"

   "How should I know?" I was really getting into a state. "Didn't you tell 
him to get a hold of me? Find out here he was living? Anything at all"

   "Well, this is it. If he's not already, I couldn't very well make him, 
Mrs. Ikeda, now could I? If he was going to he could have done it, and him in 
town. I was sure he'd've gone to see his own mother, and that's what I
thought he
did, so I didn't bother telling you, because I didn't see the point."

   I thought about that. "No. I guess you're right. It makes sense really."

   "Mrs. Ikeda?" Mrs. Uchida hesitated before continuing. "Mrs. Ikeda, I
know this 
isn't any of my business, but...have you any idea why he mightn't have 
called? Is he afraid to come home? Did you have a fight?"

   "It makes sense he'd visit her and not me. I was the one who told him he
should 
stay away."

   "What?"

   "Excuse me, I need the bathroom."

   Mrs. Uchida looked completely thunderstruck. She didn't try to stop me. 

   I can't say how long I spent in the bathroom, sobbing and cursing and 
banging the mirror. Mrs. Uchida says she came after me after about twenty 
minutes, but it felt like hours. Thank God Mrs. Arima never visits at night. 
I do know that by the time Mrs. Uchida came in to check on me I'd stopped 
crying, and I was just staring at the mirror, muttering to myself. Just what, 
I don't remember exactly, I was so out of it. 

   Mrs. Uchida and I grew up listening to the same tunes. She tells me I 
was singing Led Zeppelin, of all things, apparently trying to soothe myself.
She'd know. Back in Ube as a teenager she consumed everything Zeppelin she
could find.

   It makes complete sense to me.

   "Oh, oh oh oh oh oh
    You don't have to go, oh oh oh
    You don't have to go, oh oh oh
    Darling please, don't go..."

TSUZUKU

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