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● April 25th (Monday) – Asamura Yuuta

The morning sun announced a day that promised to be a scorcher. Sunlight poured into the dining room, so dazzling that it scattered into a seven-colored prism as it passed through the glass vase on the table. The forecast had even suggested that temperatures in the Kanto region might climb past thirty degrees Celsius.

“Gonna be hot today, huh?” I remarked.

Across the table, Ayase-san nodded in agreement.

It was nearly eight o’clock, a time when Ayase-san, despite her short commute, would normally be rushing to make her first period. Today, however, was different. She had no lectures she cared to take on Monday mornings, and my own first class had been canceled, with the lecturer away at an academic conference. It had been a while since we’d been able to relax in the morning light like this.

“Want another cup of coffee?” Ayase-san offered.

“Yeah, I think I will,” I replied.

“Got it. Hand me your cup, I’ll give it a rinse.”

“It’s fine as is, though, isn’t it?”

“We’re opening a new bag of beans. We should savor the flavor properly, right?”

So that was it. The pot from breakfast had emptied the last of the old beans.

“Alright, then I’ll wash them. Saki, could you handle the brewing?”

“Okay.”

Just as we settled into our quiet morning routine, the front door clicked open, followed by a familiar voice calling out, “I’m home.”

It was Akiko-kaasan. “Huh?” Ayase-san murmured, her eyes instinctively flicking to the clock on the wall. Mine followed. It was just past 8:05. A little early for her to be back from a night shift.

When Akiko-kaasan entered the dining room a moment later, Ayase-san and I greeted her in unison. “Welcome home.”

“Yes, I’m home,” she replied, a gentle smile on her face. “You two are taking it easy today, I see.”

“I don’t have classes until the afternoon, and Yuuta-niisan’s morning lecture was canceled,” Ayase-san explained. “Oh, um, Mom, have you eaten?”

“Not yet.”

“Then I’ll get breakfast ready. Just have a seat.”

“I’ll get the bath started,” I added, heading for the bathroom.

I’d heard from Ayase-san that Akiko-kaasan sometimes ate before coming home, but she always took a bath before sleeping. I checked the tub, saw there was still water, and flipped on the reheating switch. The weekday bathing order in our house was Dad, me, Ayase-san, and finally Akiko-kaasan in the morning. With four people using it, the water was usually changed afterward, but it was always best to check first. Akiko-kaasan apparently took a quick shower to wash off the sweat before work, but she never used the tub then.

When I returned to the dining room, Akiko-kaasan was sitting at the table, still in her work clothes—something she rarely did. Ayase-san was handing her a glass of barley tea from the fridge. She took it, tilted her head back, and let out a long, weary sigh after the cool liquid slid down her throat.

“Is it already that hot outside?” Ayase-san asked.

“It really is,” Akiko-kaasan confirmed. “Feels like summer’s come early. Ah, Yuuta-kun, thank you for getting the bath ready. Having such a considerate son is a huge help.”

“It’s nothing, really…” I started to say, but she looked from my face to Ayase-san’s, a cheerful light in her eyes.

“Honestly, it’s a relief that you’ve both become so reliable.” I missed my chance to be modest and could only stand there feeling a bit awkward.

Ayase-san, however, spoke as if it were the most obvious thing in the world. “What are you saying all of a sudden? We’re eighteen now, y’know.”

I silently agreed, nodding along with her words.

“Is that so?” Akiko-kaasan mused, her gaze turning thoughtful. “What do you think, Saki?”

“What?”

Prompted by her mother’s gaze, Ayase-san sat down across from her. Her eyes then met mine, a silent instruction for me to sit as well. I took the seat beside her.

Akiko-kaasan finally spoke, her tone shifting. “Helping out your parents isn’t the only way to be an adult, you know.”

Her words hung in the air, puzzling me. What did she mean by that?

“This is just my opinion, but—” she began, pausing for a moment before continuing. “Don’t you think an adult is someone who can be responsibly irresponsible?”

Responsibly irresponsible? What’s that?

“If you’re truly adults,” she explained, “then no matter what your parents say, you won’t back down from what you truly want to do. Because if you give in just because we told you to, then whether you succeed or fail, our shadow will always be cast over your decision.”

I turned her words over in my mind, chewing on their meaning. “Um… so you mean that giving up on what you want just to please your parents is really just abandoning your own responsibility and forcing it onto them instead?”

Akiko-kaasan nodded slowly. Ayase-san, however, still looked confused by the whole exchange.

“But it’s not like you or Taichi-otousan would ever force us to do anything, right?” she asked.

“That’s right. We wouldn’t want to.”

“Then we’re not going to be in conflict with you, are we?”

She has a point, I thought.

“And I don’t want to do anything that you or Taichi-otousan would dislike, either,” Ayase-san added.

I understand the logic, but why is Akiko-kaasan bringing this up now? And why did she make us sit down for it?

Ayase-san, it seemed, was already a step ahead of my simple reasoning.

“You see…” Akiko-kaasan’s voice grew softer, more serious. “Saki, Yuuta-kun… can you decide your own futures, without holding back for my sake, or for Taichi-san’s?”

The sudden question caught me completely off guard. The expression on her face was more earnest than any I had ever seen, and a premonition washed over me—she was about to say something of immense importance.

“Umm…” I faltered, my hands growing clammy. A nervous tension filled the air. Looking at the sweating glass of barley tea on the table, I suddenly felt parched.

Can I decide my future without holding back for her or Dad?

Was this a roundabout way of acknowledging my relationship with Ayase-san? I risked a glance at her. She looked just as bewildered and tense as I felt.

What if Dad or Akiko-kaasan, or both of them, were against us becoming a couple? What if they begged us to stop?

“I wouldn’t want to make our parents sad…” Ayase-san began, her voice firm despite the tension. “But that doesn’t mean I’d do everything they say. Entrusting things we should decide for ourselves to them is just pushing our responsibilities away.”

“Yeah,” I agreed quietly. “Same for me.”

Akiko-kaasan let out a soft sigh, carrying a mixture of emotions. “I want you to cherish your own lives more than anything. There’s no guarantee that our judgment is always correct…”

Logically, that was obvious, but for a parent to admit that to their child felt like a profound declaration. I’d always imagined parents wanted their children to see them as infallible.

“You see—” Akiko-kaasan started, clearly changing the subject.

Next to me, Ayase-san gasped. What could have surprised her so much—?

“Whether it is a little brother, or a little sister… Our family might be growing.”

Huh? A little brother… or sister? So… a child? Between Dad and Akiko-kaasan?

The announcement was so sudden my mind went completely blank.

But then, in the silence that followed, it clicked. Ah, I see.

She said the family might be growing, but she didn’t ask if it was okay to grow it. She wasn’t asking for our permission. Of course she wasn’t. If we objected and they gave up, then by that same logic, if they pleaded with us about something, we would also have to give up. Many parents probably sacrificed their own desires for the sake of their children’s immediate lives. But they couldn’t do that. Because if we knew, we might end up abandoning our own wills in return.

—I want you to cherish your own lives the most.

To convince us of that, she couldn’t ask for our permission here. Not even if the positions of parents and children are not truly symmetrical.

I looked at Akiko-kaasan again. Her hands were clasped so tightly on the table that her knuckles were white, as if she were trying to physically crush the anxiety of whether her message had gotten through.

Akiko-kaasan… our parent. When I was little, I thought of parents as infallible beings. But as I’ve grown, I’ve come to understand they’re ordinary people, just like us.

They worry and get confused and suffer, all while trying to make the best judgment they can.

So I discarded all the complicated answers I had considered and said the simple truth.

“I’d be happy, too, if our family grows. I think Saki would be, as well.”

Was it Akiko-kaasan who let out a faint gasp, or Ayase-san beside me?

Unclasping her hands, Akiko-kaasan looked at us, her eyes glistening. “Can you promise me that you won’t hold back on what you want to do for that reason?”

In other words, a new baby would make life more difficult, but she and Dad would bear that burden. She was asking us not to be overly considerate, not to change our own lives to match theirs. It was tantamount to saying that if it would impose on us, they wouldn’t go through with it. The positions of parents and children are not symmetrical. Or perhaps it’s impossible to ever see them that way. While telling your children to live as they please, you yourself are thinking you don’t want to force your will on them. Ah, so this is what it means to be a parent, I thought, as if understanding for the first time.

“It’s okay,” I said firmly. “I promise.”

“Yeah. I promise, too,” Ayase-san added, her voice clear. “But… I want you to tell us anytime you’re in trouble. We’re family, after all.”

I nodded beside her.

A wave of visible relief washed over Akiko-kaasan’s face. Phew, she breathed out.

“Thank you.” Then, a little bashfully, she added, “To be honest, I was thinking we’d wait until you two graduated from university and were living on your own, before nonchalantly have one.” A small smile touched her lips. “But considering my age and physical strength, I think this year or next is probably the limit.”

I, who had never faced the risks of pregnancy and childbirth, could say nothing. I could only listen.

Akiko-kaasan told us she loved us as a parent and was happy we were growing into fine young adults. But alongside those motherly feelings, she also honestly admitted her desire to have and raise a child with Taichi-san.

When she finished, she muttered, “Well, this isn’t something you can be sure of just by deciding, though…”

And with those words, I finally understood. Ah, so that’s what she meant before.

Ayase-san had told me: —She might be about to attempt something that’s up to fate, where it takes several months to know the result, and nearly a year to see the final outcome.

Now that I had the answer, I wondered how it hadn’t clicked for me back then.

“A little brother or sister,” I said, putting as much cheer into my voice as I could. “I’m really looking forward to it.”

If she was feeling anxious, then this was the least I, as her son, could do. And I meant it. I genuinely was looking forward to it.

When the conversation drew to a close, Ayase-san and I stood up to get ready for school. “Ah, Saki. A moment,” Akiko-kaasan called out, stopping only her. I was a little curious, but figuring there were things only women could discuss, I headed back to my room.

As I packed my textbooks into my bag, my thoughts drifted to the changes that would likely come over the next year.

Our family is growing.

I looked around my room. Just two years ago, this house had felt far too big for just me and Dad. But now—

—We’ll need a room for the baby, huh.

That was the only thing on my mind.