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Sometimes he still lied in bed thinking about what had happened five years ago. On nights like this, if he closed his eyes and focused, he could bring the memories back from the storage room of his mind where they were stockpiled and make them almost real enough to hear his friends' voices. It's good to meet you, Shigure, they would tell him as promised. Except he had never met them in this world. He had not lost hope that it may happen one day, but he was also at peace with the possibility of never seeing them again. As the years went by, he had grown to accept many things.
He did not expect to have to accept yet another on his birthday.
By the time June rolled in, Hoshido was already basking in the radiance of an early summer, its plum trees dark green and full, and its temples garnished with hydrangea blooms, simmering in a bath of hazy sunlight. The Atsuta Festival had been held just the day prior, and the air was still sparkling with lingering echoes of flutes and drums and the smell of food. Hot and humid days were on their way. The sweltering evening of June 6, as the sun went down red and round in the horizon, Shigure, drained from the festivities dying down a few rooms away, came back to his room with a sigh. It would be a lie to say he had taken a liking to gatherings, loud chatter and guests overstaying, but, nowadays, he had gotten better at this whole 'socializing' thing. He tired less quickly. His alone time was less for everyone's safety and more for his own comfort.
He went through his bedtime routine like usual – got his clothes ready for the next day, bathed, brushed his teeth, slipped on a yukata and, since it was so hot, slided the shoji door open to allow some fresh air in. The noises on the other side of the wall were slowly dwindling and he could hear people leaving. Just in time.
He sat at his desk, picked up his paintbrush, and waited.
Minutes rolled by in the growing shadows of the room, oozing away like sand in an hourglass. The world around him had become lifeless and would remain as such until early morning. When it became too dark, he lit up a candle. The night was clear and the moon gorgeous. Stars glittered across the canopy of the sky like thousands of twinkling eyes. The wind was blowing through the gardens. Surely, it was just a matter of minutes now...
Right after thinking that, he sensed a shift in the air, a very subtle change of ambience, as if the room had blinked. Keeping his eyes on his painting, he put down the paintbrush. Then looked up.
“It's good to see you, Mother.”
“Hello, Shigure.”
Azura was sitting on the porch, her arms wrapped loosely around her legs, as young as she was the day she died. The expression on her face was pleasant – happy, even. Her hair pooled all around her, and, just like every time, he caught himself being surprised at how long it was, so long he remembered her having to constantly pull it out from under her every time she inevitably sat on it, and how it would get stuck in every branch or door handle she passed. Her body was glowing and white, and he could see the gardens through her.
“Happy birthday,” she wished him. “How was the party?”
“Long and loud, but I have once again lived to tell the tale.”
Shigure regretted his words as soon as they left his mouth – who says that to a ghost? – but Azura laughed, unbothered. Her voice, clear and melodious, rang like the chime of a temple bell.
“I take it you are still not much of a social butterfly then.”
“Was there ever any hope for me to become one? I feel like it was fairly obvious I would be and remain introverted.”
“It was, yes. When you were a child, you would always hide behind my dress. I could barely get you to say hello to people!”
“I remember. Father would even bribe me with sweets so I would greet people.”
“It did not always work,” Azura reminded him with a knowing little smile.
No matter how many years passed, it was still so easy to talk to his mother. There had been a time when he was afraid he would lose this, that having a conversation with her would grow difficult and unnatural, but it never had, thank the gods.
There was a brief silence between them, during which Azura looked at him intently.
“How is your father doing?” she asked.
Although she asked this question every year without fail, he still wasn't sure what exactly she was hoping to hear in response. On his last five birthdays, he had told her his father was doing okay but also still wore his wedding ring (which was true), and every time the look on her face had changed to a kind of distant, thoughtful sadness. Yet he could not imagine she would be happy if he lied. Maybe there was no right way to answer this.
“He still talks about you sometimes,” he said, carefully choosing his words. It was true, even if the intervals between each mention of Azura were slowly but steadily getting longer and longer. “Not as much as he actually wants to, I think. You know how he is.”
“I do. I don't suppose he would ever change, would he?”
She shifted. Her head turned away from Shigure and she looked up into the night sky, her eyes fixated on some star. He tried to imagine what she could be thinking about, but came up blank. Not that surprising, all things considered; when she died, he was a teenager, and what teenagers actually know – really know – their parents? He did not know everything about her, no more than she knew everything about him, for the simple and good reason that there was no knowing everything. But still, he felt that after what they went through together to rid the world of Anankos, he knew all the important things about his mother. He believed he could tell what was on her mind, more or less, in the same way he believed he would never be a people person.
Until today.
“Why don't you tell me what happened in your life this year?” Azura asked.
Shigure obliged. He told her about the paintings he had worked on since the last time they saw each other, the ones he had finished, those he had yet to finish and those he had scrapped after barely sketching them. He told her about the festivals he had gone to, how freezing cold last winter had been and how he had spent four days bedridden with a raging fever that had all but ruined his enjoyment of the Winter Festival. Small, inconsequential little stories she eagerly listened to. One had to wonder how much of her attention was genuine and how much was just a kind attempt from a spirit to relate to wordly experiences it could barely comprehend anymore. Someone else might have found it unsettling, but he appreciated the effort.
“I see,” she said after he had ran out of things to tell. “You seem happy. Are you?”
“I am. Why wouldn't I be? Besides, it's always a comfort to know I get to see you. I wait for this day every year.”
“Yes, I... I am glad to hear that.”
Then there was a long silence. It felt long, at least, even if in reality it probably only lasted a few seconds. Shigure could hear the wind blowing, and a dog howling at the moon, far away. Even the beating of his own heart. Something felt off, but it did not alarm him yet.
“You seem preoccupied, Mother,” he remarked, hoping to sound casual. “Is something on your mind?”
Of course there is, he thought. He needed only to look at her. If he did not know everything about her, he knew at least that.
Azura looked back at him. For a split second, her gaze seemed unsteady, and although the impression was gone in the blink of an eye, it was too late. You could not fool the people who had known you for a long time. They had this annoying tendency to notice the hesitation in your voice and the dark thoughts in your eyes. And right now, Azura's eyes were somber.
“I will not be visiting anymore,” she said. “Today is the last time.”
Her words hung in the air, lingering. Shigure realized that he had stopped breathing. He had frozen mid inhalation, and the air had gotten stuck in his throat. His stomach felt like it had been replaced with a ball of steel, unpleasantly pulling his insides down. With hands completely devoid of feeling, he reached up and nervously tugged at his yukata sleeves.
“Oh,” was all he managed to utter.
His voice cracked. He sucked in air between his teeth, counted to five in his head, then tried again:
“Why?”
Azura looked down.
“Spirits must move on eventually, Shigure. So must the living.”
“I don't... I don't understand.” Gods, his voice sounded nothing like his. “Don't you want to see me anymore?”
“I will see you again. In time.”
She means when I die, he thought. A bitter, nasty thought.
“It's not the same. I have to live before that can happen. I won't see you again for years. Decades!”
“I am sorry,” she said, and Shigure knew she truly was. She had said the same thing, in that same tone of voice, right before dying. “But that is how it must be. Some things are meant to happen, no matter what. I have disobeyed the laws of nature for much too long already.”
Shigure was more than a little peeved with the unspoken assumption that being abandoned by his mother (not for the first but the second time) fell under the natural order of things, but saying so seemed like something he would later regret.
Azura's hand fell on his shoulder and rested there like mist. Somehow, she had moved from the porch to his desk without him even noticing. He felt his throat tightening. When he spoke, his voice sounded as weak as his legs felt.
“You have been with me for so long...”
“And I always will be,” she said. “Wasn't I with you unto the end of the world once?”
She gave him a smile. It was a sad, knowing one, and why not? The dead know everything, don't they? That initial burst of anger was leaving him now, like stale water flowing out of a barrel. In its place, dejection settled in. His mother had been beside him when Anankos' puppets had slaughtered their friends, and even after she gave up her life to bring him down, she had been at his side – even if he could not tell, most of the time. At the end of all times, she had been there. On that day the Silent Dragon had been slayed, she had completed the mission she was entrusted with by her own mother, and there should have no longer been a reason for her to linger in the mortal plane... and yet she had been doing that for the past five years. Life was all about moving on, wasn't it? A great and ever-growing pile of both happiness and grief, and of things everyone is forced to accept, sooner or later. Maybe she was right. Maybe it was finally time to begin the difficult journey from denial to acceptance. Only he was as afraid to move on as he was not to.
“I have thanked you for everything you have accomplished before, right?”
“You have. Many times, in fact.”
“Let me thank you one last time then. You have accomplished so much. I don't think you realize it. You succeeded where I had failed, where my mother before me had failed. We can never thank you enough for this, Shigure.”
“I don't need thanks. If it weren't for them, I would have failed as well.”
There was no doubt in Shigure's mind that this was true. How he thought he could take on Anankos alone back then, he had no idea. Without everyone's help, he would have met the same fate as Azura and Arete; today, he had gotten things into perspective enough to accept that.
He gestured to the room and, in doing so, to the world outside the room, hoping Azura would understand what he meant.
“This is thank you enough.”
She looked at him, and a smile lit her face. He was so relieved to see the understanding in her eyes he almost didn't notice how the smile never quite reached them. You never realize when someone you love smiles at you for the last time, he thought, but this felt exactly like it.
“You will be alright, sweetie,” she affirmed. Her golden eyes were on his, sad but tender. “I know you will.”
“I don't know,” he said.
He knew it was true though. It would not be at first – it never is – but it would become true eventually. Part of him felt even worse for it.
“I have never been good at letting go,” he added in a strangled voice.
“No one is. But everyone has to learn regardless.”
“I love you, Mother.”
“Thank you. I love you as well. Be it now or in a hundred years. Never forget it.”
He never did.
⁂
His next birthday was unbearable. The next, difficult. By the third one, the pain and loneliness had subsided into an acute but silent bitterness in his chest that lasted until dawn. Day after day, the sun kept rising, and time resumed its old course. I will see you again. In time. If he could believe, without a doubt, that he would find her waiting for him when he died, it would be one thing. But he had no way to know for certain, did he? Even so, he chose to believe it. Not so much out of faith, but almost out of necessity. Everyone needs to hold onto something to make it through life, he figured, and he was going to hold onto that belief with all his might.
Each summer, Hoshido brightened with colors, donning its vibrant red, blue and pink blooms in anticipation of the upcoming festivals. The heat was back as well, both bittersweet and comfortingly familiar. A good summer was coming, with plenty of sun and rain, but hopefully none of those crop-crippling winds farmers feared. It wouldn't be long until his birthday, but he would be lying if he said he was excited; the older he got, the more unremarkable this kind of stuff became.
The day before the Summer Festival, Shigure dragged his easel and paintbrushes up the hill that overlooked the whole area, under a large maple tree. From up there, you could even see the rice fields stretching out into the golden line of the horizon. Painting during the rainy season was always tricky, but every year he was determined to do it, and so far had consistently succeeded – except that one summer four years ago, when painting was about the last thing on his mind. One of his patrons wanted a picturesque scene of summertime country life to hang on his walls, and it was best to keep this kind of people content.
He had been hard at work for a little over an hour when a voice came from behind him:
“Excuse me.”
Shigure looked over his shoulder, a paintbrush in hand and another one between his teeth, eyebrows raised. His eyes widened.
“I am looking for Toshogu Temple. It should be nearby, but I can't seem to find it. Would you show me the way?”
For what felt like forever, Shigure was unable to move or utter a single word. His heart hammered in his chest so hard he could feel it in his ears. The warm breeze rattled the branches above his head.
He forgot about the paintbrush, and when he opened his mouth – to say what? – it fell. He threw his hands up in a dazed attempt to catch it, but was not quick enough.
“Ah, I apologize, I didn't mean to startle you. Here.”
“Thank you,” he said, struggling to keep his voice from wavering.
He took the paintbrush back. His eyes were starting to burn and his fingers were shaking a little.
“Toshogu Temple, you said? You're very close. It's...”
He trailed off. In the silence that followed, the only sounds were coming from the wind and, somewhere nearby, a cheerful bird singing the same few notes over and over. Looking up, he was met with eyes so painfully familiar he couldn't help but laugh. It was all so silly, so unexpected. But it made sense, didn't it?
“I'm sorry, I just... Let me start over.” He paused, standing there next to his unfinished painting that didn't look anything like what he wanted it to yet, and smiled. “It's so good to meet you, Hisame.”
Remember me, he thought feverishly. Please remember me.
His heart was beating faster than ever. All around them, the world was on hold. Of course, he knew it would make no sense for Hisame to remember, but since when did anything that happened to them down there in Valla ever made sense?
Shigure stared as the look in his friend's eyes went from mild surprise to complete confusion. Another silence fell over them. He's going to ask me how I know his name, and if I explain even a fraction of how I do, he's going to think I'm crazy, and he'll be gone forever. And if the arranged greeting doesn't work on him, what are the chances it would work on the others?
But nothing of the sort happened. Instead, Hisame smiled.
“It's good to meet you as well, Shigure.”