Work Text:
You may forget
but let me tell you this:
someone, in some future time
will think of us.Sappho
The old box let out a veritable cloud of dust when Trucy finally got the lid off it. It had captured her attention immediately amid its neighbors, as it looked a good century older than.
She opened her mouth to call behind her to get her father’s attention, but she paused upon seeing him and Maya in a passionate conversation about which moving company to go with. She decided to begin looking through the box’s contents on her own.
Though it hadn’t felt all that heavy when she had pulled it down, it is actually quite full of a great deal of things. Mostly aged letter paper and envelopes, though a few photo albums, what looked like once colorful strands of ribbon, passports, and playing cards. The latter immediately caught her attention. It wasn't the standard brand of cards she was so familiar with, however. The yellowed and evidently well-loved cards boasted the names ' Birmingham’ and ‘London’; though what British playing cards were doing in the Wright Anything Agency she couldn’t say.
Her eye caught on a faded handkerchief, although this was different from the ones she used for her own stage shows. It was very delicate, made even more so with age. At one point, it had probably been pink. There were gentle designs of cherry blossoms embroidered onto it. Something had fallen out of it when she picked it up. A tiny felt doll of a blue rabbit with enormous ears. The craftsmanship was incredible for something so tiny.
The stacks of sepia-tone photos in the box were kept together with twine. Trucy carefully undid the knot and began to flip through. Many of them were portraits of the same handful of people. In one,a man and woman stood outside of a western-looking building on an otherwise very Japanese street. The sign on the window, Trucy noticed, advertised that this establishment spoke English as well as Japanese. Another common face was a little girl with an eccentric hairstyle and goggles, always either around her head or hanging from her neck. In one of the photo albums, there were a few careful newspaper clippings of her, much older, surrounded in lines of small English text. Frail bits of paper safe behind plastic sleeves. Trucy wondered who had put them there with such care. This girl was often accompanied by a tall light-haired man, or the same Japanese young lady from the picture in front of the building. Trucy ran a thumb lightly over a particular portrait of her covering her mouth in the middle of a laugh. She was very pretty.
“What’s that, Truce?”
Maya had taken a seat next to her, leaning over to see. It seemed like Phoenix had gone out to take some stuff down to the moving van.
“I think… This is a bunch of stuff from daddy’s relatives. From a long time ago.” she said, and handed Maya the photos.
Maya’s eyebrows shot up. “Really? Let me look.” The older girl folded her legs under her and began to flip through, turning them over occasionally. After a few moments, she put her tongue in her cheek and made a small ‘huh’ sound. When Phoenix came back, she motioned him over.
“What are you guys looking at? We don’t have time to waste, you know.”
“Hey, Nick, doesn’t he kind of look like you?”
Phoenix sat down on the carpet next to Trucy. The young girl watched his face as he took the picture from Maya. “Where’d you find this, Trucy?”
“Behind some of the other boxes, over there. Do you know these people, daddy?”
Phoenix frowned in concentration. Maya let out a sudden burst of laughter. “You look so much like that guy in the photo, Nick!”
“Yeah, well, this is technically my great grandpa.” Phoenix said. Maya’s eyebrows shot up. At least now Trucy didn’t feel too bad about not knowing either. But if this had been in here all this time, why hadn’t her father ever told her about it?
“You’re really sharp, huh Trucy?” Maya grinned. “A lot of those say they were taken in Tokyo on the back.”
“Yeah, I think you read this kanji as Naruhodou Ryuunosuke– that’s what Polly told me once, anyway. I think he knows of him. He was a lawyer in his own right, back in Japan.”
“Really?” Trucy suddenly took the picture back from Phoenix. “We’re really related to these people, daddy?”
Phoenix watched her as she flipped through the photos with a newfound excitement. “It seems so, yeah. He helped modernize Japan’s legal system back at the turn of the century, if what Apollo said is true. You’d be better off asking him, he was way more informed than me on my own heritage.” Trucy didn’t miss the way her father’s voice faltered a bit at the end. He picked up some of the folders, labeled in intricate characters. The words were foreign to him.
“I’ve gone through this box once or twice myself,” he continued, as Maya pulled out envelopes and other documents, “But a lot of it is in Japanese, so I sort of gave up trying to understand it. It looks like a lot of letters and old case files, though.”
“But this is so cool! There’s so much in here, I wish we could know what it meant. The clothes they have on in the pictures are awesome too.” Trucy smiled. She had begun placing some of the photographs to the side. “Can I save some of these to look at later?”
“Sure.” Phoenix grinned, noticing Maya was squinting at a particular letter. “Can you read any of that, Maya?”
Her face grew in consternation. She nearly looked how she did when she was beginning a channeling session.“No, a lot of this is classical Japanese, since it’s legal forms.” she chewed the inside of her cheek.
Trucy’s gaze fell onto the box again, searching. “I think there are some postcards here,” she noted, “What about these?” Maya took a faded postcard with a photograph of what looked to be a coastline on it, titled with ‘I’m having such a jolly time at Bournemouth!’ The characters on this one looked much less complicated to Trucy’s eyes.
“Oh, hey, this one is easy. It more or less says that the sender’s family misses the recipient. I don’t know how you’d read the kanji for the other names, but one of them is definitely Naruhodou Ryuunosuke. Oh, but one of the names is in katakana…” Maya mumbled, “A.. ri.. Su? Arisu. Alice, maybe? Wait, no it’s Ai… Iris?”
“Maybe it’s this girl?” Trucy held up the picture of the girl with ribbons in her hair.
Maya shook her head. “She’s definitely Japanese, so her name would be in kanji. Iris could be the younger girl, maybe… I guess she learned Japanese? That isn’t your grandma, is it, Nick?” Maya joked.
“She’s not far enough in age to Ryuunosuke for that. Plus, both my grandparents were Japanese.”
Trucy went back to rifling through the box’s contents, newly intrigued by the idea of finding a picture of her father’s grandparents before they had left Japan. At the very bottom, past a folder of red passports, was another smaller rectangular box. It was bound neatly on both sides. She lifted it out gently. Undoing the ribbon revealed dozens of envelopes boasting international postmark stamps, each containing multiple pages of letters inside. On top of them was a picture of a very tall man standing next to Ryuunosuke. The photo showed the two of them in front of a large steamliner; the taller man was dressed in a top hat and holding a suitcase. At his side, Ryuunosuke’s face was split in a wide smile. Trucy couldn’t help but reflect the emotion. The side of the photograph proclaimed it was from 1911.
“I’ve never even seen that before. Are those in English?” Phoenix leaned over to watch as Trucy opened one of the letters carefully.
“Well, they might as well not be…” Trucy’s face fell. All the words were very close together, and the ink had faded in some places. It seemed the letter had seen a lot of handling. “I can’t really read this script– hang on.” She picked up another envelope. This one had a wax seal that was still in one piece, depicting what looked like a family crest. Trucy pushed a finger under the seal, some of its original tack still holding the envelope safely closed. The text was more legible here.
“Okay, this ones much easier,” Trucy said, and began to read aloud.
‘Ryuunosuke,
London’s dreary clime has for once begun to give way to a mild spring, and the flowers you left on the window of our office are beginning to show their colors once again. Each time I stop to water them (once every three days, as you instructed,) I am reminded of your carefree smile. Please, forgive me the sentimentality, but it has been over a year and I miss you terribly, my friend.
It must sound uncharacteristic of me, but you requested to hear about my everyday happenings, and so I chronicle them here. It appears I doze off occasionally when the sunbeams from our window hit the oak barrels in the late afternoon, and Asougi has had to wake me up more than once. My friend, I do confess all my dreams are dreams of only you. It is unkind of you to ask for my thoughts, for you must know how much of them are occupied by you, Ryuunosuke.
Pathos aside, I accompanied Iris to the Jubilee this past weekend, and she looked delightful in her newly bought spring dress. She asks about you every time we meet…’
Trucy’s voice trailed off. Phoenix and Maya exchanged a glance.
“This is… a love letter?” The corners of Trucy’s eyes tweaked up into a gentle smile. “For great great grandpa?”
“According to this, the sender is a ‘Lord Barok van Zieks’, in London.” Maya said, passing the envelope to Phoenix. He ran his finger over the wax seal.
“Are there any others?” Trucy folded up the letter she was reading and began ardently searching for another. Attached to a photograph of the girl probably called Iris holding a small dark dog was a letter bearing Ryuunosuke’s return address in Kanda Ward. It was dated 1904. Both Phoenix and Maya seemed intrigued as she slid the letter out. Trucy could feel her heart in her chest as she read.
‘Barok-san,
If you are receiving this letter, then me and Susato-san have arrived back in Tokyo safe and sound. The trip seems to get longer each time I make it, but anything to see all of you over in England– though I do sometimes wish our countries were closer.. Ah.
You are doing a wonderful job of looking out for Iris. Please, continue to do so even as she starts preparatory school. With you and mister Sholmes at her side, she’ll be just fine (though, please don’t neglect mister Sholmes either. He needs someone to keep him in check sometimes). I can tell Iris truly is glad to have you in her life. I put these words onto paper despite having said them outloud to you many times. In case you ever need reassurance, which I know you do about these things, read what I have written here and know it is true. I wouldn’t lie to you, I don’t think I could.
It goes without saying that I miss you something awful already. Susato must be the most long-suffering of judicial assistants, because I was just about inconsolable for the first few nights after we set out from Dover. We both were. Though we go on so the next time we meet can be even sweeter. I say these things, but my vision is blurring even just thinking about it now. Please come back home to us soon, all of you.’
The girl holding the letter made a small sound like a sigh. “I had no idea, daddy,” she said softly.
Maya broke the silence between the two of them after a beat.“Nick!” she accused, “You really didn’t know about any of this?”
Phoenix made a face back at her.“Maya, seriously, how was I supposed to? My grandparents went back to Japan when I was born. I barely ever saw them.”
Trucy looked through the letters again, searching for one with the same wax seal as the first. Barok’s words were so charming, she needed to read more. The romance was almost like a plot in a show! She could hardly believe this had really happened to her great grandpa, it made her feel special in some roundabout way. She eventually found one, sporting dark green wax instead of blue this time. The date was August, 1909. Maya and Phoenix quieted as she held the letter up to read it.
‘Ryuunosuke,
Your previous letter has arrived promptly. If only there was a way to speak more frequently, my heart. Though I fear I would think of little else other than when next I could speak to you if that were the case– and I venture to say, if you will excuse the frankness, that still I do little else now. I would be waiting at the mailbox night and day for your words to reach my hands.
Perhaps asking you to excuse me this early into my correspondence was hasty of me. After all, you were quite frank in your previous letter, were you not? If you only knew how many times I have read and read again those words of yours by candlelight in my quarters. Please know that I miss you desperately and think of you nightly, Ryuunosuke. And when my thoughts of you grow too loud for my skull, I surmise there is no other possible panacea than to imagine exactly what you describe; you underneath me as we–’
The letter was deftly snatched away from Trucy’s hands by her father.
“Nope, no, that is far enough into that one, I think.” Though he was obviously flustered from hearing his daughter nearly recite the fantasies of her relatives one hundred years prior, Maya and Trucy both couldn’t help but burst into giggles. The two girls laughed as Maya reached across Trucy to try and pry the letter in question back from Phoenix. The older man was taller however, more concerned with protecting Trucy’s innocence than anything, and put up a strong fight.
“Daddy!” Trucy cocked her head, still giggling. “I think I should be able to read about our ancestor’s sexcapades if I want to! It’s important family history!”
Phoenix shoved a loudly agreeing Maya back to sitting across from him. “No, you really, really shouldn’t.”
“A tamer one then, Nick, please? I want to hear you read one from Ryuunosuke’s perspective.”
Phoenix sighed, still awkward and out of sorts, but began looking through the letters Trucy passed to him regardless. A few of the ones that bore the postmarks of Mt. Fuji and Torii gates are written in quite a sloppy hand, but further investigation turns up that after a while they switch to type written text. Ryuunosuke must have purchased one then, or this Barok van Zieks character had one sent as a gift. It was either that or invest in reading glasses, it seemed. Why did he feel slightly scandalized for his ancestor at the thought of this other man’s name? Ryuunosuke was the one older than him. Still, it seemed crude, to be suddenly made to think of his great grandpa that way.
Trucy and Maya stared at Phoenix expectantly, forcing the man to push past his inhibitions and read. He paused at the first word however, which was different from the rest in that it was handwritten.
“Maya, what’s this say? It’s probably just a header but…”
“Let me see. Banjiikusu ken…Oh! I’m pretty sure this is the kanji for prosecutor! It’s read as kenji. I guess this Barok guy was a prosecutor back then?”
Phoenix looked especially taken aback. “Really?” To which Maya nodded and held up the page she had pulled up on her phone for the kanji translation. Phoenix slowly took the letter back and read on. Alright then.
バンジークス検事,
‘What do you do when you have a client who just won’t cooperate? Susato-san’s calming tea can only do so much for the headache I get when I’ve been at the office all day and everything on the page starts to blur together. I’m eating three square meals like you advised, please don’t worry. But even the yakiniku stand two streets down tastes like nothing when I have got this pressure looming over me.
Barok, you’ve been at this longer than I have. In your next letter, please be so kind as to include some methods of clearing my head. Or, just distract me with your flowery words of love and praise, that would suffice as well. You are especially good at being the only thing on my mind.
I miss you beyond words, but you know that already. Please pack light when you come in September, Tokyo will still be rather humid, unfortunately. Still, a nice change from London’s grey sky, isn’t it? But even that has its charm when one is around family. Enclosed with this letter you should find a neckerchief Susato-san and I picked out from the recent spring festival. Please pass that on to Inspector Lestrade for me, it was bought with the express purpose of being a good luck charm to help her during the long voyage over to us. I know she gets nervous, even when she won’t say it outloud.
Susato-san and I have a calendar on the wall of our office, the one Kazuma gifted us last year. I am counting the days until you are in my arms again.’
From street level, the floor lamp in the Wright Anything Agency was just a pinprick of light. Phoenix sat by it, yellow light making the letters in his hands appear even moreso. Trucy was asleep on the couch. Maya had tossed one of many throw blankets over her before she had left to put some miscellaneous boxes into the hallway for tomorrow. They had made a good headway today.
Phoenix rubbed at his face as he put the paper back into its respective envelope. He’d been going through the small rectangular box Trucy had found and was nearly done sorting them into chronological order. There was no real purpose to the process, really, but it was soothing after a day of so much stress.
The letters stopped after about 1910. But there were photographs dating much further past that of Ryuunosuke and who Phoenix had gathered to be this Barok in Japan. Many of them were simply scenery— it seemed his ancestor had taken up photography in his later life— but there were many pictures of the two of them together as well. They really were such an odd pair. The Englishman was about a full foot taller than his friend, to begin with. Sometimes, he is even in traditional yukata or hakama, which falls strangely over his larger frame. There are two pictures of a small dark haired girl standing between the two of them, when they are much older. Phoenix doesn’t know what to make of that.
A lot of pictures showed Ryuunosuke with a myriad of different people. It appeared he was well-loved in his time, and this made Phoenix’s chest feel strange when he thought of it too long. There was the girl with pinned back hair who Trucy wouldn’t stop fawning over all day, most likely Susato-san. (When he had first looked at the pictures years ago, Phoenix could have easily said that she was his ancestor as well, but something didn’t fit quite right about that now. He’d have to ask Apollo.) The Japanese boy with the straight cut hair who often appeared in Western clothing with his arm around Ryuunosuke or his face in a huge smile, the little girl all of them were always speaking of in their letters (she seemed to have turned out just fine, if her many newspaper accolades were anything to go off of), the tall funny-looking detective type who Phoenix swore he recalled from somewhere, the mustached Japanese with a streak in his hair sometimes in professional portraits with Susato or the other boy– or the detective, the short freckled girl in boys clothes often holding a small dog...
“Hey, Nick. You good?”
Maya’s voice came softly as she shut the door behind her. He looked up at her, eyes bleary from reading in the dim light. “Yeah, sorry. This stuff is so interesting. I kinda got sucked into it.”
“I can see that. Any more of great grandpa’s ye olde sexts in there?” Maya laughed as she perched herself on the arm of Phoenix’s chair. The man gave her an unimpressed look in response.
“No, but honestly– a lot of these are just… really genuine. Ryuunosuke cared so much about these people. And, they really were in love with each other,” he paused, staring at a picture of Barok and Ryuunosuke in front of the ruins of a castle somewhere in the countryside. “It must have been hard for them, huh?” he spoke after a beat in a tone Maya had rarely heard him take.
Her bracelets rustled as she took the picture Phoenix was looking at and stared at it herself. “They seem like they made it work. They spent their whole lives together after all, right? Otherwise, how would their letters to one another be all in the same place like this?” Maya replied frankly after a few moments. Phoenix nodded.
“Trucy was so excited by these. I think I’ll vet them a bit so they’re, uh, age appropriate and let her read the rest. Thank you for translating, by the way.”
Maya blushed. “Nah, I’m not all that good. I only picked up what I could at home. But I’m glad I could help.”
“It is crazy, though. All these people really had whole lives back then, huh?”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean… they counted the days until they could see each other again. They sent each other gifts when they couldn’t be there in person. They must have treasured every single moment they spent all in the same place. They traveled so much because not seeing one another wasn’t an option, they crossed oceans for one another, didn’t they? But they’re not around anymore. And we’re all that's left of what they must have had,” he paused. He thought of the photograph of the tiny dark-haired girl standing between Ryuunosuke and Barok. Trucy had fallen asleep with it in hand.“I don’t even know if we’re really related anymore. I just took it for granted when Polly told me, but maybe we’re not.”
“You mean, you’re not related by blood.” Maya corrected.
Phoenix ran a hand through his hair. “Hm? Well…”
“C’mon, Nick, when has that ever mattered to the Naruhodou-Wright-Fey-Justice mishmash of a family we have?”
Phoenix smiled, his eyes downcast slightly. “I wonder what they’d think of me now. All the way in a different country. I can’t even speak the language they grew up speaking.”
“Well, I think Ryuunosuke would think you’re pretty rad.” Maya jumped to her feet decidedly as she spoke. “You share his taste in men, don’t you?” She snickered, and Phoenix couldn’t help but smile back.
“C’mon, it’s late. I’ll wake up Trucy. It’s not good for her to inherit your unhealthy habits of staying overnight at work.”
“Yeah. That’s something I probably shouldn’t pass down.”