Dangerous Lines | Yuzuru Hanyu

7. Trip

There are certain times and events in your life that end up having more impact than you could have ever predicted.

Maybe for Yaeko, one of these moments was coming across that man.

Either through the show or the mere effect he had on her during that morning when they met for the first time, it was undeniable that the feelings he instilled were too drastic to simply ignore.

The thing was, just like every single time, Yae had to focus on the other priorities in life, especially when her husband returned and everything was back to the same cycle.

It was uncertain just how many weeks ended up going by before she finally realized the implications of meeting the other man.

For years on end, her desire to get out of the Yazuka life had slowly dimed as she got more and more used to living like that.

The reality was that for some kind of reason, this man whom she barely knew was making her wish for more. He had so easily brought her desire back to be independent and make more of her life that she wondered what was going on with herself.

10 whole years that she barely thought of the topic. Suddenly it was back with an unexplainable strength.

Still, and as much as she would love to allow all of this will to develop into something more and encourage her dreams, the reality was that there was no true alternative to what she was currently going through.

If the whole thing even managed to increase her mood for a while, it was only temporary until she finally convinced herself that there was nothing more to do.

Maybe it was better this way, if most of her hopes were killed in an instant, without a single opportunity to have desire for something more.

The one thing about circumstances and life is that our destiny has this way of getting in front of us and showing the path, even if it's not really the one you planned for or even wish to attempt.

In her case, it came in the form of a trip.

Her husband was in trouble and the whole family knew it. Being in the Yakuza meant knowing what was going on with the police's active cases and when the rumour started about investigations on him, no one really worried at first.

Paying for silence wasn't uncommon. In fact, it was so common that most people in the group had constantly gotten rid of some random problems through that method.
It wasn't necessarily surprising that they tried that first, bribing the detectives in charge of the investigation in an attempt to keep it all quiet.

The problem, you might ask?

This investigation had already reached such a level that it was physically impossible to stop the investigation from moving on.

In an attempt to get some distance from Tokyo, the Oyabun had come up with a plan that he made her husband dutifully follow. Travel to Miyagi and try to lay low as much as possible, no crimes, no deals and certainly no use of their usual influence as he did his very best to keep things under wraps in their city

Yaeko tried to see it as some kind of vacation that she had taken for the first time ever. She rarely traveled so it was a good opportunity to be exposed to new things and places.

Well, no one really blamed her for not being too concerned with her husband's dealings and consequences as long as she stayed out of trouble. And if there was anything she was good at, it was hiding her tracks, unlike most of the people around her.

They settled in an expensive hotel and the whole plan was to act like any normal married couple, with the very obvious fact that nothing about their relationship had ever been normal and it was way too obvious to ignore.

From the way their age difference was incredibly noticeable to the way she couldn't possibly even attempt to be fond of him, it was something that no one could ask her to make believable.

Not that they needed it.

The city they ended up in was Sendai, a place that she had never visited before but looked beautiful from the very first moment they landed at the small airport. She tried from the very first moment of arrival to see this trip as something positive.

As much as she just wanted to go free and just explore the city on her own, that seemed completely impossible when her husband was right by her side.

So when she was dragged to the hotel and forced to play the part of a loving wife, Yaeko was bored from the very first moment.

It wasn't that hard to tell that she wasn't the only one bored with the whole thing. Besides constantly being on the phone, her husband wasn't in a much better situation. She could tell from miles away just how crazy he was going from not being able to do what he liked the most.

He spent his days organizing everything through the distance, coordinating operations, going through all of things that he shouldn't even be placing himself on. That man didn't know how to lay low, that was something that Yaeko figured out way too soon.

So what if he went to prision? In a way, it would only be a good thing for her and it wasn't as if she was hyper loyal to the family when the choice was given.

The important part of his boredom and struggle to keep low was that he eventually just started doing business as usual, which meant that Yaeko, as the recognized wife of the second in line currently living in a hotel, had now the freedom to go outside and explore this city they chose to hide in.

Just the right time to explore.