Chapter Text
It takes Junko all morning to find a suitable black dress for Julie’s funeral service. She arrives too early and she awkwardly tells Julie’s relatives that ‘no she isn’t that niece from that side of the family’.
She had just one meeting with Julie but she feels indebted to attend her service. The old woman left an impression on her. The way she looks at you, touches you and talks to you is easy, familiar and comforting. She’s unnervingly polite in the first fifteen minutes of their meeting but she probably decided that she’s too old for that and dropped her pretense and went unabashedly blunt to Junko. And Junko saw how the glint in the older woman’s eyes brightened as she humored Junko with her abreast frankness. Julie reminds Junko of her own grandmother in the flimsiest sense but the truth is no poor child deserves such a conniving woman to be their dear old grandmother.
She had heard about Julie’s passing from her mother who is in Okinawa at the moment, knee-deep busy with that dance school she founded a while back. Upon hearing the news over a short phone call with someone from Avex, Takako stares at the kettle on the stove for a long time until the water boils and the loud wailing sound from the kettle snaps her out of her trance. She says she wishes to be there, asking to extend her condolences to the family but she doesn’t explain what is that pressing and urgent issue a neighborhood dance school in the middle of a class break has that needs her undivided attention. And Junko didn’t insist on details anymore. Her mother has her reasons.
Junko assumes that it would be a quiet affair, and that being a private person Julie would have previously requested and arranged to only have the closest family and friends to be present. But the Jimusho knows or rather, won’t allow such thing. They only know how to organize the biggest, grandest events and Julie, being their matriarch for several years, only deserves the best. A meticulously-arranged blanket of lotus flower and lily cover the base of Julie’s coffin. The large ceremony hall is decked in giant walls of white and yellow chrysanthemum and at the middle of the wall, there’s a picture of Julie, gray haired and wrinkly skin, but she looks a bit healthier, a couple years younger but still with that distinctive, ever-present sly smile of hers.
Despite the ostentatious setting somehow they manage to still pull it off as a solemn service. The respect and, arguably, the love of the industry people for Julie is felt through all the snippets of conversations and stories Junko hears that afternoon. All the major media outlets have representatives present but they do not have any recording devices. They linger among themselves and speak anecdotes of their brief encounters with Julie. The stories vary from heartwarming to embarrassing. Junko has caught herself grinning as she eavesdrops some broadsheet writers relive that one incident where Julie hurled a fire extinguisher at their EIC when he threatened to run some story on a newly debuted group.
With a loud buzz and murmuring from the crowd, Junko notices the party from Avex has arrived – the head of Avex himself, Mr. Hiro Yoda and a couple other high ranking officers walk in with their head bowed down. From where he was kneeling, Chairman Hirai hurries off to the entourage and helps Mr. Yoda settle. The older man seems visibly upset the whole wake but he tries vainly to show little emotion and doesn’t speak to anyone.
The priest reads the sutra and the whole hall goes silent. As Chairman Hirai lights an incense, Junko sees Akanishi’s quiet retrieving form. He’s wearing a black suit and an ill-fitting coat, an equally black umbrella hanging from the crook of his elbows. He looks small with his back hunched and for a split second Junko wishes to run after him and apologize for the misunderstanding. He seems to be a good man and Junko would love to talk to him again in the future, but today she’ll let him be on his own.
Junko and her mother had a long and tearful conversation. They’ve been dealing with Enou’s passing on their own in the past and haven’t allowed themselves to grieve completely and openly. Junko apologized for doubting her mother, feeling completely silly and broken but Takako assured her again and again that it didn’t matter and instead apologized for not noticing how Junko was suffering and doubting all this time.
Junko had also dropped by her brother’s music lounge and saw that it’s been relatively successful. He seemed to be coping well until he saw Junko on his doorstep and they both broke down and cried themselves silly, clinging to one another like they’re kids again and someone tried to one-up them in a game of tag.
It will be a long time until they accept that their father is gone and everyday will be a painful reminder. And even if they ultimately chose to deal with their loss separately, they know – and Junko knows especially – that her mother will always be there for her, with her warm, reassuring words and calming and familiar laughter; and her brother, who reminds her so much of their father from his gentle mannerisms of scratching the back of his ears when he’s thinking, to his tendency of leaving the windows open and to the way he blindingly adores their mother.
“He’s on his way back to the States today.”
Junko whips her head to see who just spoke and is faced with the young man she met in Julie’s office before.
As she stares at him, the young man coughs self-consciously, “Sorry – I just saw you looking at Mr. Akanishi.” He says quickly and Junko feels a little warm swirling deep in her chest.
“It’s Hiromichi, by the way. Hiromichi Ken. I don’t know if you remember but I was there when – ”
“I remember.” Junko cuts him off. “Hamada, Junko.”
Later, as the Avex entourage is about to leave the funeral service, Junko will see Mr. Yoda place a reassuring hand on Chairman Hirai’s shoulder. The older man will not whisper or talk to the Jimusho Chairman, but he will just nod at him, briefly and it will take an inhumanely strength from Chairman Hirai to not breakdown and cry right there and then.
About seven weeks after Julie’s body is cremated and the dust has settled, the news of Avex and Johnny & Associate merger will headline all the major broadsheets and the internet will collapse in hysteria. It isn’t the buyout Julie had dreaded and is a rather unexpected move from Avex, showing that there’s compassion left among the industry players.
Julie’s work to tie all loose ends in the company before she died will bear fruit as the agency will slowly regain its footing, reinventing itself to become a competent entertainment giant once again.
And all of this will happen in the near future but presently, something has clicked in Junko’s mind and she suddenly remembers . Junko is then thanking Julie’s blessed prankster soul for this opportunity the older woman could only divinely orchestrated. In the most unlikely place and time, Junko sees her Ken of the seaside village of Hyogo again. The very Ken who is currently asking her quite nervously:
“Hey.” He pauses, eyes wild and unsure, “I just realized that – well, you look familiar? Have you ever been in Hyogo before? It’s a town near Kobe...” Ken trails off unsurely, blinking and he is looking like he’s going to be sick.
Junko will say yes and in few years, she’ll hear from the grapevine that Akanishi and his wife have relocated back in Japan with their adopted son. Takako will invite Akanishi’s small family to a badly-cooked dinner and Junko’s daughter with Ken will have regular play dates with Akanishi’s son every Friday afternoon well until they reach grade school.
Akanishi will eventually reprimand her and ask her to call him Jin. And she will.
And one day, she’ll visit Enou’s grave in the hills of Hyogo, still missing him but she’ll realize as she methodically cleans his grave that she has finally accepted that he’s gone and that she has moved on.
And that day will not be a grim day, but it will be a beginning.
End