"I want a family."
Those words remind her of the time when her adopted parents divorced and left her behind. Back then, she also had that simple wish. She wanted to live with her family the most. She wanted her father and her mother back.
She has seen the same yearning in Yuta"s eyes that she once had in her heart.
"Say, Mother." Yuta grabs her hands and shakes it. "Why can"t we live together?"
Kiyohira"s heart is also aching to see his son like this. Whatever happens between him and Rie, he can"t let his son suffer between them. Yuta wants both his mother and father together. He can tell that his son brought him here to make up with Rie.
He looks at Rie who isn"t saying anything. He sighs and says to his son, "I can fulfill your first and third wishes, Yuta. But your second wish is impossible."
"Why is it impossible?" Yuta has noticed that his mother hasn"t said anything since she found out the truth. Is she in shock? He grins at his mother. "Mother, if you give me a sister, I will do everything that you ask me to do."
"Yuta..." For the umpteenth time, Kiyohira is wondering what Rie fed Yuta. The boy"s words make him speechless.
Rie stares at Yuta and questions him with a dark voice. "How do you know about child making process?"
He went too far... Yuta purses his lips and thinks hard before he answers, "Mother, my IQ is over 200. Don"t change the topic. You haven"t answered my question, Mother."
"You didn"t know it before you left." Rie glares at Kiyohira accusingly.
"I didn"t teach him anything." Kiyohira glares back at her. "You tell me why does a 4 years old boy know so much."
"I always knew it. I wanted a sister. That"s why I asked you about my father." Yuta interrupts before they continue arguing. Thank G.o.d, he has never been an average child and his parents are lacking in the department of common sense. Otherwise, he would have gotten caught long ago.
"Go to your room." Rie tells him sternly, "I will talk to you later. If you hear a single word, no pancakes for a month."
He pouts and looks at his father who gives him the same look. Upset, he walks back to his room. Regardless of the warning, he presses his ear against the door, trying to listen.
Does Rie not know her son enough yet? She can already guess what"s he up to. She pulls Kiyohira to the backyard.
Not knowing her intentions, Kiyohira glowers at her. "I am not leaving without Yuta."
"Let"s talk here." She ignores him and sits down, "I don"t want Yuta to hear us."
But Yuta can already hear them. Earlier, he could tell that his mother was going to send him away with his father because of DH. He has managed to change her mind. He needs to make sure that everything goes well.
"What do you want to say?" Kiyohira prepares his mind. He"s sure that she will accept the divorce and send him away with Yuta. Maybe she will come up with something worse. When it comes to her, he always meets the dead end.
"You said everything that you wanted to say. It"s my turn to speak. So, don"t open your mouth until I finish," She says calmly, looking at the snow on the ground. She will be honest and say everything that she"s been keeping in her mind. It"s because of her son.
"I am sorry for what I did. But loving you has never been easy for me, Kiyohira. You came to my life like a tsunami. Everything changed after I met you. Everything I knew turned out to be a lie. You also broke my walls forcefully. My parents were not my parents. Takes.h.i.+ wasn"t my brother either. Everyone believed that I was the wrong one. Then, Chisa reappeared in my life. My life was chaotic. There were times when I hated the fact that I met you."
Kiyohira opens his mouth to say something. He closes it when she meets his eyes. He looks away from her and continues listening.
"But if I didn"t meet you, I wouldn"t have gotten better. I met my nightmares, but I was able to cross it and become the person who I am today. I met my father. I met Ren again. I found out that Chisa was a human, after all. Till the very end, she only wanted to destroy me. I thought about doing the same to her that she wanted to do to me. But I couldn"t do it with my hands. I am not cruel enough to watch her suffer the same pain that I suffered. I also didn"t want to let her go and live. That kind of person would have come back to hurt me again."
She pauses momentarily. She still remembers Chisa"s screams. 5 years ago, she didn"t feel happy when she heard those screams. She is still not feeling the joy in someone else"s pain. Maybe it is because she knows how much it hurts. She couldn"t bear to watch Chisa"s suffering in the end. Hating Chisa drained her. After Yuta was born, she learned how to love.
"I already knew about the playgrounds. If I had told you, you wouldn"t pretend to in love with Chisa. If you hadn"t drowned my laptop, I could find out the location of the playground and give it to you. When I asked you how you were dealing with Chisa or who you were meeting before you came back home and you had answered me honestly, I wouldn"t have felt the way I did. If I had confronted you once with the photos and the recording that she sent me, you would have told me the future. If we were truthful with each other, some things could have been avoided."