Brave Story - Miyuki Miyabe [17]
“Do you answer the phone usually, Wataru?”
“No, yesterday was the first time.”
Akira put his cup down and stared at the phone. “Maybe you should put it on the answering machine?”
Kuniko laughed. “It’s okay, it’s not like it’s a crank call, or some pervert. And if it was your mother calling and we let her talk to the answering machine, there’d be hell to pay.”
Akira smiled, knowing she was right. Wataru got an ice cream from the freezer, and a spoon from the drying rack, and was about to sit down when the phone rang again.
“I’ll get it!” he shouted, flying to answer it. He was going to give the caller a piece of his mind, like he had yesterday. But when he picked up the receiver with a loud “Hello?!” there was an answer.
It was a friendly, hefty voice. “Eh? Wataru? That’s quite a way to answer the phone!”
There was no mistaking the voice of Uncle Satoru. Wataru’s shoulders relaxed. “Oh, it’s you, Uncle Lou.”
“You sound disappointed! How you been, kid?”
“Fine.”
“You’re still going to school, right? You’re not playing hooky like those bad kids?”
“No, Not me.”
“You’re not getting bullied? They taking any money from you?”
“Not even a little,” Wataru said, laughing. “You’ve been watching those dumb news programs again.”
“Well, from what I hear, schools these days are worse than medieval dungeons!”
“I don’t know what that means, but I guarantee you it’s not all that bad,”
Wataru said, smiling despite himself.
“Well, if you say so. I suppose I shouldn’t believe everything I see on television. So, got a girlfriend yet?”
Wataru jerked upright. “Who, me?”
“It’s about time. You’re in fifth grade, right? You’re ripe for finding your first true love! Isn’t there any girl around that makes you go all a-tingle up your spine?”
Uncle Satoru always joked around on the phone like this. Wataru was used to the teasing. He usually laughed it off, but the girlfriend comment threw him for a loop. Wataru felt the heat creeping into his cheeks. When his uncle had said “any girl,” for the briefest of moments, the image of Kaori Daimatsu flashed through his mind. Those white cheeks. Those big, sad eyes.
“O-of course not,” Wataru said quickly, turning his back to his parents at the table. “There isn’t a single cute girl in my class.”
“Hmph, now there’s a tragedy.” Uncle Satoru hadn’t seemed to notice the wavering in Wataru’s voice. “So, is your mother home?”
“She is, and dad’s home early too.”
He heard an exclamation of surprise on the other end of the line. “Well, miracles happen every day. Get him on the phone, will you?”
“It’s Uncle Lou,” Wataru began, but Akira was already there, reaching for the receiver.
“Your uncle’s name is Satoru, not Lou.”
Satoru Mitani was Akira’s elder brother by five years. He had dropped out of high school at the age of sixteen to take over the family business, and continued to work there to this day. In contrast to Akira, who went from college straight to life in Tokyo, Satoru would probably never leave the peninsula where they had grown up. He loved the sea, and boats, and fishing too much.
Though they were brothers, their personalities were one hundred and eighty degrees apart. Uncle Satoru talked up a storm, never lingering on one topic for long. His address was far, far away from where logic lived. At times, he didn’t even appear to be aware of its existence.
Nor did Akira and Satoru look at all alike. His father was of medium height, and slender, while his uncle was short and stocky. His father’s face was long, while his uncle’s was round and hardy. At forty-three, his uncle looked much the same as he had in preschool, which isn’t to say he looked young. Rather, he had looked like a jolly old geezer as a child, and now his age had finally caught up with his face.
Whether that was the problem, or whether he was merely too self-absorbed, Uncle Satoru had never married. Rumor had it that Grandma had fretted about it for years, but Uncle Satoru himself seemed not in the least concerned. Why would anyone want to get married, he wondered. Still, it wasn’t that he disliked children. He always