/jp/ - Otaku Culture

>>46545295
The conversation had taken a bad turn already. I knew I shouldn’t have opened my mouth and just talked to him about some book I read recently, but the boat was already approaching the rocks, and all I could do was steer it away. “Hey, I’m sorry for bringing this up. If you don’t want to talk about it, then I could leave. Is that fine?”

As I stand up to walk out the door, face turned away so he couldn’t see my embarrassment, he stops me. “No, just stay. This has been on my mind for a while. I wanted to discuss this with someone, with a fellow parent” I sit back down, still feeling guilty for sparking all of this.

“I thought the best I could do was to grin and bear it. That somehow, she would just target me, or come around to her senses when she realized Hana might find out. So I tried to placate her, keep it behind closed doors. When Hana got curious or asked questions, I lied to her. I said that it was just a normal fight, or I had gotten hurt in an accident when she noticed by bruises. It was all I could do to just cling onto the hope that I could at least give her a normal childhood. Naive, I know. I hated lying to her, but what could I do?” The glamour of this place had vanished fully by now. The front of the suave lover that always wore a smile was gone, now there was just the middle-aged man who had gone through so much in his life.

“You sound like you’re blaming yourself, don’t do that. You did all you could do just by yourself”

“Maybe. Maybe things would have been better if we had more of a family, if there were people for us to depend on, to keep her in check. Reimu doesn’t have one, and rarely even brought them up. It was something personal to her so I never bothered pressing her much. As for me, I can’t exactly bring them around” He looks down into his tea cup. Twenty years since he left the Outside World, from...wherever he was from. I had never even thought of it. “I know Marisa tried to be an aunt to her. She always found a reason to be around to play with her, and stuck around for as long as she could. All the others, Like Kasen and Sanae and Alice, they did all they could for us. I’m grateful for that, always will be, but I just wonder how things could have gone”

The ship had fully crashed into the rocks by now, there was no use trying to steer it away. “Ah, the birthday party we had for Hana was really fun” I blurted out the first thing that came to mind that I thought could fix the situation.

He looks up at me with a hint of a smile on his face. Although it didn’t do much to fix his sad tired eyes. “It was?”

“Yeah, he had cake and a lot of food, there were gifts and Yuuka put on this amazing show with her powers, it was so cool!” That much was true. It was a lot of fun until Yukari showed up but I wasn’t going to tell him that.

“Sounds like a lot of fun. I was wondering how it turned it. We never really could have a party like this we she was younger, so she must have really appreciated it” That same smile remains, but his eyes seem to shine a bit more brightly. “Despite everything, she’s still just a normal teenage girl. So to have a day for her to just spend time with people close to her and have fun is something she really needed. Thank you for that”

I can’t help but feel a bit of pride in his words. It really was a nice party, for the most part. “Oh, don’t mention it. I said, squirming a bit in my seat.

“A day off was what she needed. She’s always working so diligently, with all the jobs she took on back in the village and her training with Marisa on top of that. I think she got one of her mother’s better qualities. Reimu always knew when to stick to a job and finish it when it needed to be done.” Something in his tone changes. Nostalgia? “That’s why I have hope things will turn out right for her no matter what might happen. It’s why I think you shouldn't fret over whatever made your children upset with you. As long as you made the choice you knew was right and there’s a future for them, they’re come around. I know it”

A chime suddenly sounds out. Like a dog, Anon freezes up and looks around. “Ah, looks like our time is up. Thank you for having me, and I’ll make sure to read the books you give me” All hints of sadness and wistfulness had vanished from his face, his normal mask slipping back on. All for the next guest’s enjoyment. Finishing up my last sips of tea, I sit up.

“Thank you for the talk, it really helped” I said as he acknowledged me with a nod of his head. With my time up, I walked down the path again.