The bird grew quiet on her desk. Chiyo gently lifted the silk tea box wrapping she had thrown over its cage. The bird calmly preened its glowing blue feathers. When Chiyo took off her glasses and set them on top of the month’s record book, a bottle of sake took the bird’s place.
Chiyo reached inside the cage and carefully pulled it out. This bottle contained all the sake its former owner never drank, on all the nights that she had refused invitations to have a life outside her gray work cubicle. She had a plan and schedule for herself and refused to be distracted. In time, her gray workspace grew larger. Eventually, it turned into a corner office on the building’s top floor. The invitations grew fewer and farther between the closer she got to the top. One day, they stopped coming. The woman sat in her office every night after everyone had gone home, wondering what kind of life she might have had if she had believed that she was worthy of rest. She imagined the conversations she would have shared, the people she might have met, the man she could have fallen in love with, and the family they might have had. She liked to think about the names she would have given her children. She was especially fond of the name she had picked for her daughter.
Chiyo stared at the bottle of sake, envying her client. Regret was a luxury no one in her world had. Chiyo wondered what it tasted like. She raised the bottle to her lips, telling herself that no one would ever know if she took just one sip.
—
“Chiyo?” Toshio walked over to her desk. “What are you doing down here?”
Chiyo yawned and stretched her arms over her head. Glass glinted in the corner of her vision. Chiyo rubbed her eyes and blinked. An empty bottle of sake lay on its side. “No…” Chiyogasped, remembering, in a flurry of images, how a sip of sake had turned into many, the last sip the longest of all.
“What is this?” Toshio picked up the bottle and set his glasses on his nose. Toshio’s hand shook and dropped the bottle as though it were on fire. It shattered on the floor.
“Forgive me…” Chiyo said.
“Chiyo, what have you done?”
“I…I took something that wasn’t mine.” She pressed her hand over her belly and felt, in a way beyond what any words could ever explain, the path she had been denied growing inside her. “And her name is Hana.”
Chapter Fifty-eight
A Choice Named Hana
The waves of the tiny ocean inside the pearl grew still. The orb dimmed but continued to hold the three people seated around it in its grasp. Keishin was the first to break away. “Hana…” he stammered, trying to remember how to speak.
Hana’s eyes flooded with tears. “This can’t be true.”
Keishin clasped her hand. Hana clung to him just as tightly.
“I understand now,” Haruto said quietly.
“Understand what?” Hana lifted her head.
“Why you chosehim.”
Hana let go of Keishin’s hand. “Haruto…”
“I think that this is a conversation that the two of you should have on your own.” Keishin stood up. “I’ll be outside if you need me,” he said, gently touching Hana’s shoulder before he left the room.
“You and he are the same, Hana.” Haruto’s fingers flitted over the spot where the Horishi had tattooed Hana’s name on his arm. “Your name is on my skin, but greater gods have carved your fates into your bones. You and I were never meant to be. In truth, I did not require your mother’s memory to know this. I needed it only to help me find the will to admit it to myself. I did not make a mistake when I agreed to pay the price for healing my hands.”
“What did you pay them, Haruto?”
“Nothing. Yet. I negotiated for the payment to be collected after the cranes brought you back. I needed to see you one last time.”
“Last time?” Hana gripped Haruto’s sleeve. “What are you talking about? What have you done?”
“I did what I needed to do. My hands were shattered. Without them, I was less than nothing. I had no purpose or duty. I had no life. The vendor at the healing stall told me that he could fix my hands, but at great expense. I possessed only one thing that precious. My memories of you. After you leave, I will return to the Night Market and surrender all of them.”
The color drained from Hana’s face. “I cannot let you do this.”
“Why not? The ink the Horishi took from your father was not enough to write a full life for me. Your father told you that I only have one year left. Let me live what remains of it without longing for something I cannot have. If you cannot give me your love, then at least allow me to find peace.”
Piercing shrieks cut through the paper walls of Haruto’s home.
Haruto jumped to his feet. “Shiikuin.”
Keishin ran through the door. “They’re here.”
