Of Course It's A Lie

Mothers (Take Two)

Fumina hummed to herself as she boarded the train. She was making good time, she thought, as she checked her watch. No need to panic just yet. There would be enough of that at the meeting. She grinned at the thought.

As she took her seat in the back, as she preferred--away from the quiet hubbub of people clutching briefcases and newspapers--her thoughts strayed back to her daughters.

She was proud of Fuyu, first and foremost. Very proud. After the poor girl had been held back a grade on account of failing so many classes at once, she'd really stepped up magnificently this year. You'd never guess she was once a misfit, Fumina proudly thought. And then, her daughters were never misfits. They were perfectly sweet and well-mannered and Fumina thought that was the most important thing.

Fuyu had been marked for trouble from the start. She was born prematurely, and the doctors had said that it'd be either Fumina or Fuyu who would die that day. It was because they both pulled through after tremendous effort did Fumina call her youngest a 'miracle baby'. And here that baby was, now fourteen, proving time and time again that maybe she didn't always pull off the best of astonishing spectacles, but one couldn't deny that she never failed to pull off an astonishing spectacle--whether it be tremendous failure or tremendous success. And with Fuyu, the story never ended on a bitter note.

The opposite was true with Nunoe. She was a very gentle girl who was extremely hard on herself. That had been apparent from an early age. Fumina could never forget the day her daughter came home from school, no more than seven at the time, and told her mother a seemingly endless story of tirades and trials facing her friend Sumire at school. Then to cap it all off, Nunoe blamed herself for it. That girl could make out a way to blame herself for anything. And as she got older, she talked less about it, but Fumina could tell that Nunoe was uncomfortable with socializing for that reason. She wasn't crippled by shyness--she could talk a storm when needed--she wasn't afraid to speak up--she just wasn't used to not taking responsibility for a person. And when she did that, she expected some affection in return.

Fumina wasn't sure how to handle Nunoe at all. She'd never been sure, and it was because of this that she tended to come off as harsh on her elder daughter. With Fuyu, it was easier to plot a course of action, even if Fuyu's achievements and failures were on a much grander scale. With Fuyu, everything had a distinct cause, and the causes were all directly caused by Fuyu herself. Failing? No motivation. Motivation? Success. With Nunoe, causes were linked to all sorts of other minute factors. Did she have friends? Did she have a bad day? Did her music taste change? Did someone say something? Did she do well on her exam? It was normal to suffer because of hits from the outside world. Fuyu could shake off those hits because she knew they didn't matter. Nunoe also knew those hits didn't matter, but she couldn't make herself believe they didn't matter for her.

Through the years, the Yamane family had been able to shabbily pull through Nunoe's various outward struggles, even if they only barely managed to do so. Despite their best efforts, Fumina and Fuyu both knew that you can't change someone's internal state. They'd have to fight those inner battles on their own, and it was hard for them to leave Nunoe to it. But in recent years, it had seemed almost as though Nunoe was finally getting somewhere in terms of the development of her self-preservation. Until last spring.

Fumina knew she had to be the tough one when she saw Nunoe come home with bitter misery in her eyes that fateful day. So she gave up her own vulnerability for the sake of her daughter being able to get fully acquainted with her own vulnerability. Fumina had grit her teeth and mentally scrolled through every interaction she'd ever had with the Maeda family, every story Nunoe would tell her after coming home from a day out with Sumire, every photo album of the two as toddlers, as teenagers. She came up void. Her daugher had simply never actively been out to hurt Sumire's feelings or self-worth. And if she had, then Fumina would be the one to blame, because it was under her that her daughter's manners and character and morality were shaped.

So Fumina did what she thought would best so that Nunoe's heart would be at ease: she blacklisted the Maeda family.

That was no easy undertaking. She'd been close friends with Maeda Akiko since grade school. Now they were both in their late forties. But she'd given Akiko her chances. The other mother could've apologized on behalf of her daughter. She didn't. She could've talked to Fumina personally. She didn't. But she did refrain from calling Fumina. When they saw each other in the market, at school events, Akiko bustled away. Fumina didn't like that. She wouldn't have liked it if Akiko had acted coolly and normally, either. The only way to sort out these things was by communicating, which Akiko hadn't been willing to do. So she ended it. Akiko was an adult. Fumina had expected nothing more from her than adult behavior.

But that didn't ease the pain of the end of their own friendship. It didn't soothe the ache of nostalgia for decades' worth of memories. And it sure as hell didn't loosen the awkwardness. Because Fumina and Akiko were coworkers. And today, at the meeting, they were giving a joint presentation.

Thankfully, their higher-ups had made the presentation beforehand. It was just their job to present it once, at this meeting. Fumina couldn't imagine the horror of having to collaborate with Akiko to make the presentation. The last time they'd worked together for work was in high school for a project.

Although she sometimes wanted to, Fumina didn't allow herself to feel sorry for herself, nor for Akiko. She didn't allow herself to hate Sumire, either. After all, she hadn't allowed herself any of those detrimental emotions when she was at the hospital giving birth to a baby who would supposedly either die or kill her. Ever since then, she'd resolved to make herself so strong, her courage would be worth a whole hoard of doctors. A tirade of threats and bad omens. A tsunami of worries and failures. And, most importantly, a single, long-haired, bad-mouthing, seventeen-year-old misfit.