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A woman was standing in Furin's gates. Her black hair was messy. Ren winced at the look in her eyes, wide but so blank. He glanced back at Enomoto and Kusumi, who gave him shrugs in return.
“Can we help you?”
“Oh! I’m looking for my son!” She grinned eerily.
“Right. And he goes here?”
“Yes!” She placed a hand on her cheek, “you see, it’s his fifteenth birthday today, and I wanted to surprise him.”
She lifted a box from a bakery that Ren recognized. It was a nice place, not too expensive.
Wait, fifteen?
“If he’s turning fifteen this year, then he should still be a middle schooler.”
“No, he definitely goes here!”
He sighed.
“Right. And you can’t message him because…?”
“Oh, I don’t have a phone.”
Ren blinked.
“Okay. And your son’s name?”
“It’s—”
“Everything okay?”
Ren glanced behind the woman to see Sakura walking up with a group of other 1-1’s.
“She’s looking for her—”
The woman turned.
“Oh! There you are, Haru-chan!”
Sakura’s eyes widened, but the red flush Ren would have expected from a high school student whose mother surprised them at school never appeared. Instead, Sakura’s eyes widened, his mouth slacked, and his face paled.
“M—mom?” Sakura looked dazed, blinking as if he were waking from a dream.
The woman approached him.
“My, look at you! So big now.”
She sighed wistfully.
“Wh—what are you doing here?”
“I snuck away to come see you!” Her stomach grumbled. “Oh! How rude of me. Haruka, why don’t we go home to eat?”
“I… y—yeah. We should get out of here…”
“Oh, you should take her to Pothos!” Nirei exclaimed.
“It’s his favorite, ma’am,” Kiryu called, “he especially loves the omurice!”
“And I hope you don’t mind if we tag along?” Suo said. “We haven’t eaten ourselves.”
Ren didn’t think he’d ever seen the boy eat.
“I see where Sakura gets his looks from!” Anzai said, shuffling closer to swing an arm around Sakura’s neck.
The woman’s smile dropped.
“If you’re just going to make fun of my son, then you can go to hell.”
Sakura’s group froze. Some flinching as the lilt in her voice dropped to a monotone. Ren felt his own mouth drop at that.
“M—mom,” Sakura was quick to come closer to her, pulling out of Anzai’s grasp, “they’re not like that, the people here are nice.”
When she turned her gaze to Sakura, he flinched.
Sakura Haruka? Flinching?
“Oh, Haru-chan,” she smiled, “you’re such a good boy. But you know you shouldn’t trust people. Even if it seems like they accept you now, they’ll just turn their backs later.”
A stunned silence.
“E—excuse me but—”
Sakura cut Nirei off, “I… I know. We should go… mom.”
He looked at them with an unreadable expression and shook his head.
“I want to go to that restaurant, Pothos?”
Sakura froze.
“It’s… It’s just okay! Really, I just go there because it’s cheap and convenient. The convenience store food is just as good! Why don’t we—”
“No, I want to try the omurice. If they’re good people, they wouldn’t lie about it. Right?”
Sakura bit his lip, looking nervous in the way he did when he felt pinned down by expectations. Then he sighed, and his shoulders dropped. He looked away from everyone.
“O—okay.”
He turned to start walking away, his apparent mother following.
Nirei and Suo met eyes and nodded, and started tailing them.
Ren herded the others, who looked shell-shocked, back towards the school.
“… I can’t believe he just agreed with her.” Anzai spat out.
Ren sighed.
“Listen, you guys didn’t see his face. There’s more going on.”
“I can’t believe he would dis Kotoha’s cooking like that…” Tsugerua muttered.
“There’s something obviously not right about that woman! Use your heads for a second!”
“He was trying to keep her away from us.” Kiryu’s frown was deep, and his narrowed eyes were watching as Nirei and Suo turned a corner that Sakura and his mother had just rounded.
“But it’s his mom?” Anzai said.
“Yeah? And?” Ren spat. “She didn’t know how old he was.”
“… what?”
Kaji pulled out his phone to send a warning to Hiragi. Just in case.
“She said it was his fifteenth birthday.”
“Oh,” Anzai crossed his arms, “Sakura had mentioned being an Aries before, right? Those are spring birthdays…”
Ren glanced out at the trees, the tops a variety of orange and red, and yellow.
Mom.
Mom.
She followed next to him, bumping their shoulders occasionally. Sakura wanted to hide himself in her side and also scale one of these buildings and hide away.
“Oh! Before I forget! I got you this cake!” She handed it off to him. “Happy Birthday!”
Huh?
“It’s your birthday?!” Sakura sighed, hearing Nirei write that down. Then, his Vice muttered, “I have you written down as an Aries…”
Great.
At least Mom was ignoring them.
“I got your favorite~!”
Did she… remember?
“Haru-chan. Isn’t this world cruel? No one else will ever love us. Ne ne, why don’t we leave it together?”
The taste of his favorite cake had distracted him so that he hadn’t fully understood what she had said. Even then, he knew the correct answer.
“Okay, mommy.”
She smiled at him, dark circles under her eyes. She reached out, and Sakura tensed, then leaned into the touch when she gently ran her fingers through his hair.
“We’ll never be apart,” she said.
The sound of cars passing by and the lights of the night. The bridge they were on was tall, and the air blasting them was cold. The river below was dark and—
“Haru-chan?”
Sakura flinched.
“Th—thanks, Mom.”
“Huhuhu,” she sounded so proud of herself.
When was the last time someone had called him by his first name? He almost forgot about it sometimes that he wasn’t Sakura but was a Sakura. After all this time, did a Haruka even exist?
“Y—yeah?”
“I was asking more about your life! You’re not still getting into fights, are you?”
“Uh, no ma’am! Sakura definitely hasn’t been—”
Sakura interrupted Nirei. He’d have to apologize for that. Later. He was sure he’d be forgiven with the new information Nirei would get for his book.
“Yeah.”
Nirei made a strangled noise, and Sakura could already hear the incredulous response that Nirei would let out any second.
His mother clapped her hands.
“Good! Good! Remember, my little fighter, if they hurt you, hurt them back! And always hit hard enough that they don’t get back up.”
Nirei’s jaw dropped. Suo’s brow rose, his eye wide.
Sakura nodded.
Pothos came into view. The sidewalk seemed to stretch on forever, Sakura’s dread slowing his pace. Then, too soon, his mom was pushing the door open.
Kotoha glanced up, called out a greeting as she started to look back down at the cup she was drying off. Then she snapped her head up, eyes wide.
“Oh, uh…” her eyes flitted to Sakura, to his mom, and then back to him.
Sakura wondered what she was thinking of, as he felt her gaze pointedly on his golden eye. He guided his mom towards an empty booth. His friends went to sit at the counter, notedly, the seats closest to where Sakura and his mother were sitting.
Kotoha watched them for a moment before coming over, water cups in hand.
“Thanks…” Sakura mumbled.
“Thank you,” his mother said, no inflection.
She picked up her water and drank it, like she’d been in a desert. Sakura wondered when the last time she drank was. Her clothes didn’t seem to fit quite right, and were nothing like what Sakura could remember her wearing.
“Sakura. And…?”
“This is my mom,” he said.
“Oh, wow!” There was a disingenuous air to her tone and suspicion in her eyes, “it’s nice to meet you, I—”
Sakura gave a sharp shake of his head. Kotoha stopped, mouth parted. Her teeth clicked as she closed her mouth. She cleared her throat.
“Right! What can I get for you two…?”
“I want—"
“I want the omurice.”
“Ah, M—Mom! You know their egg salad sandwich is really good! And—”
“Haruka,” she said sharply.
Sakura swallowed and then looked down.
“… Okay, two omurices coming right up.”
Once Kotoha had left, Sakura looked back up to see his mom smiling.
“I want to hear more about your life,” she said, “it must have been so hard…”
“Ah, yeah…” Sakura swallowed. “It… was. But you know… I really like it here.”
Her expression went blank, which chilled him. However, this wasn’t something he could go back on.
“I came here because I heard Furin was a dog-eat-dog kind of place a—and I thought that if I could become the top, then…” Sakura shook his head. “But it’s changed over the last two years. You know Furin helps people? We fight off troublemakers a—and we don’t just fight. Painting over graffiti, helping out the elderly, even just… catching someone’s cat… and the townspeople are so nice. Taiyaki, apples, buns, and other kinds of foods. They smile at us and wave and—and I made friends who came to check on me when I was sick and made me food, and help me when I can’t use my phone… and… and…”
His mom smiled at him.
“I still want to be the top… because I want to be able to be someone like…”
His heart felt squeezed in his chest. He could feel the burning stares of his friends. He understood. After all, this wasn’t something he would have ever been able to admit.
But he wanted his mom to know… that he was okay…
“Wouldn’t that be wonderful?” She said. “It would be so nice if that could be true for people like us… but it’s okay, I’ll always love you even when no one else does.”
Guys like us… don’t need the baggage.
“Even when no one else does.”
Sakura was brought out of his thoughts by the clicking of a plate being set down. He looked at the omurice steaming in front of him and the one in front of his mom. He felt seven again, excited about eating his favorite meal. The best part was the soft laugh his mother would give him when he would take the first bite and mumble out a “yummy” through a mouth full of food.
He looked up at his mom. Right now, her face was blank, even with the smile on her face.
“Well?” She said. “Take a bite.”
Sakura swallowed.
“O—okay,” he picked up his spoon and began to slice into the egg, stirring up the rice, “let me just… let me let it cool off a bit.”
His mother tapped the nail of her left forefinger against the table, not touching her own utensils. He could feel her impatience and deemed the meal cool enough not to hurt.
He took a bite.
“How is it?”
“I—it’s okay…”
“Hey, you usually gobble it down,” Nirei said.
Sakura winced. He knew Nirei just had a habit of verbalizing his thoughts, but…
“Yeah? Do you like hers better than the one Mom makes?”
“What? No! Of course not—!”
She grabbed him by his hair and slammed his face down onto the plate. Pothos was silent.
Sakura was frozen, then he slowly righted himself. His face was messy, but he just grabbed a napkin and started to wipe at the rice and egg, and ketchup on his face.
“… I’m sorry,” she grabbed the napkin and began to wipe his face gently, “I didn’t mean to, I’m sorry… when we go home, I’ll make whatever you want for dinner.”
“… Thanks, Mom,” he sighed, “it’s okay.”
She smiled sadly at him and pulled away when she deemed him clean enough. It was quiet between them, his mother staring at him with sad eyes.
Sakura sighed and went back to eating.
“Don’t eat that,” Kotoha snapped, before he could spoon up a mouthful.
“Huh?”
“I said don’t eat it. I’ll make a new one,” she took the plate away, glaring at his mom as she did so.
His mom ignored her.
Sakura had thought that she had been good at that, ignoring the stares and whispers, and condemnations of the people around them. The father who blamed her for his appearance and left, the adults who disparaged her parenting and morality for being a single mother, and the teachers who demanded he dye his hair.
“You don’t have to change, Haruka,” she said, tone certain, “you’re so beautiful. Mommy’s sorry other people are cruel… The world really is unfair.”
The signs of her temper that had gotten shorter and shorter, and the lines of stress that had been aging her, had gone over his head. Now, he knew how much she had been unraveling. That with every time he had caught her crying to herself, there were probably at least three more times that she had hidden it.
He knew what it was like to have your world be small. To be scared and lash out when you don’t mean to, to feel alone. His mother hadn’t been alone… she had had to take care of him as well.
Protecting people was hard. He now understood that he had been a burden. He had seen the photo of her posing with his father, her belly swollen, smiling widely. If that child had been born normal, they would still be happy. Yet, the reason he had never tried to dye his hair or hide his eyes was that she had never made him feel like a burden.
That came from the words of others, after everything.
His mom pushed the cake box towards him.
“Happy Birthday, Sakura,” she closed her eyes, “happy tenth, eleventh, twelfth, thirteenth, fourteenth, and fifteenth birthday!”
Six years…
He looked down at the box in front of him. Then he glanced at the windows. He had sat them so that her back would be to them. A couple of men in light blue, short-sleeve shirts that were properly buttoned and tucked in to dark slacks that were cinched with a belt to complete the uniform came into view.
“Hey, Mom,” he rushed out, “on the bridge that night, why did you hesitate?”
“Hm?”
“That guy who pulled us off the bridge railing. He wasn’t close enough to grab us. You could have jumped, but you hesitated. Why?”
“I…” She trailed off and looked away, biting her lip.
“Mom, why?”
“… you looked so scared,” she whispered, “and I realized that if heaven or hell or reincarnation… if none of that was real… I couldn’t stand for the last time I saw you for you to look like that.”
Ah… everything… had been because she couldn’t abandon him.
Sakura could feel himself shaking.
“… Mom, I love you.”
“I love you too, Haruka.”
“I promise… they won’t let me right now, but… when I’m eighteen, I’ll come visit you.”
“Huh? Haruka, what do you mean?”
“I promise. We can celebrate my sixteenth, seventeenth, and eighteenth birthdays together.”
“Haruka, what do you mean by that?!”
“You don’t have to worry about me… I’m happy, so just do your best to get better, okay? Then we can live together here a—and I can introduce you to all the friends I made.”
The door opened to show the orderlies from her hospital.
“Sakura-san,” one said, “it’s time to go back.”
“Huh? N—no. No! He’s my son! You can’t take him from me!”
“Sakura-san,” he sighed, and they approached.
“No! He doesn’t have anyone else! He needs me!” She screamed. “You can’t! You can’t! You can’t!”
Her nails dug into the orderlies’ arms, but she was quickly restrained and dragged out, kicking and screaming. On the way out, one of the orderlies bowed as best he could and apologized for the disruption.
And then Sakura was alone again.
He looked down at the box, and woodenly, he opened it. He took the spoon from his mother’s plate and took a bite of the cake.
Ah, chocolate. He was barely able to taste the sweetness over the emotions clogging his throat.
He swallowed.
“So good…” He said. “You remembered my favorite… Mom…”