Tokyo Ever After: A Novel (Tokyo Ever After #1)(20)

“Do you keep your room clean?” He swirls the liquid in his glass.

My room might give you suffocating-in-garbage stress dreams. “I’m pretty tidy, I guess.” All of his questions have driven me to a single conclusion: I am remarkably unremarkable.

His chest puffs with pride. “You’re like me. When I was a boy, I was very organized.” He considers me for a moment. I realize I’m hungry to know about him, too. Questions burn. What else was he like as a boy? Did he get into trouble? Please have gotten into trouble. But before I can ask, he says almost begrudgingly, “And your mother? How is she?”

I roll the champagne glass between my hands. “She’s good. Still single.” My eyes flash to him. No reaction. Guess my plan for a twist on the classic Parent Trap won’t work. I’ll admit it. I had a tiny sliver of a thought to reunite my parents, make them fall madly in love again, and then get them married. A girl can dream.

“Does she still have a mug collection?”

“Yeah,” I say warmly. “Her favorite is one that says ‘Bigfoot doesn’t believe in you either’.”

“How about the one that says ‘I’m quite frond of plants’?”

“No. I broke it when I was seven.” I remember in vivid detail. Mom made me hot chocolate. The outside scalded my hands and I dropped it. She wept and then called herself silly.

“I gave her that one.” His posture relaxes. “She laughed like a hyena.”

I pause, suddenly understanding her reaction. The mug tied her to another life. To my father.

“She’s a teacher?”

“Yep. Mom is super self-deprecating about it. You know the quote, ‘those who can’t do, teach’?”

“I’m not familiar,” he says. “But I understand.”

“Her students love her, and the faculty are gaga about her. She’s accomplished so much great stuff,” I gush.

“And she made you.”

My father waits for me to catch on. Comprehension is slow, but when it dawns, warmth spreads from my toes to my ears. He tips his glass to mine. I’ll cheers to that.

“She always wanted to teach.” His voice has a soft edge to it, a flicker of appreciation and respect. His expression turns wistful. “Are you … did you have a happy childhood?”

I answer automatically. “Yes. The best.” I launch into my favorite childhood stories, like the time I dressed as a pirate for almost a year in elementary school. Mom was totally on board, blackening my teeth every morning, making dishes with limes so I wouldn’t get, you know, scurvy. Those were the days. I tell him about my friends—how Noora has total boss skills, how aggressively sweet Hansani is, how cutthroat Glory can be.

I leave out living in a town with dueling confederate and rainbow flags. And the box of unaddressed Father’s Day cards next to my stash of romance novels.

He inhales audibly. “Your life would have been very different if you’d been raised here.”

“How so?”

“Well, for starters, you would have been given two very specific names. The first would be an official name that ended in -nomiya. It means imperial member.” Right. His name. Makotonomiya. “The second would be a personal name. Scholars would have drafted a list of options. I would have picked one, then sent my choice to the emperor. For approval, of course.”

“Of course.”

“The emperor would have written your anointed names on washi paper and placed them in a lacquered cypress box with the gold chrysanthemum emblem. The box would have been sent to the palace, then to the hospital and placed on your pillow, right next to your head,” he says in a low, warm voice. “After the naming ritual, you would have been bathed in a cedar tub.”

“That sounds nice.”

He swirls the liquid in his glass. “A floral emblem would have been chosen for you.”

My breath makes little clouds. The fireworks are over. Near the pond, fireflies appear, dancing over the water in concentric circles. It’s cold. Even so, I’m not ready to go inside yet. “What would you have chosen?” My eyes are as wide as saucers. My heart is open. I want this to work so badly. I want my life to be different. Better. More whole. Superhero epic.

“I chose the purple iris.”

The vase in my room—a single iris. He thought about me. He cares. My eyes sting. I bat my lashes against the tears. If he asks about them, I’ll say it’s the breeze.

“It stands for purity and wisdom.”

My emotions swell. Since I’m no good at hiding them, I say, “Mom said she didn’t tell you because she knew you wouldn’t want to leave Japan. You would be like a tree without sun.” And she didn’t want the royal life, I think. Their impasse led to separation. It was the only solution. I understand, but it’s still hard to accept.

He nods. “My duties are to Japan.”

I swipe at my nose. “I get it. I’ve seen all the Spider-Man movies.” Thanks to Glory. She’s a Marvel freak. “Power, responsibility, and all that.”

The wind ruffles his hair. He slugs down the rest of his drink. “I had no intention of living in America permanently. That was never an option.”

I nod and gulp. If I don’t dwell on it, his words won’t hurt as much. He plays with the empty glass in his hands, thumbs skirting the rim.