| I'm not my Mother

“Good morning.” her voice was surprisingly faint. Aiko didn’t know much but she knew her voice was definitely sore from all the screaming hours prior. While the two apparitions slept in peace, the ones monitoring them could not.

“It's not morning.”

“It's 3am. From the looks of it, he really did fulfill his goal. If you don’t mind me asking, what specifically was it??”

“Sex..”

“Oh..”

“Just kidding. Beats me. I didn’t get the chance to ask. He vanished while I was asleep.”

“In that case, I misjudged him.”

“Don’t get me wrong, he was still extremely perverted. Say, did you hear anything?”

“Impossible not to, but let’s not dwell on that.”

“I swear, for an asshole, he did have a really good--”

“Go take a shower, Miss Ari.”

“That’s my pen name. You can call me Kuzuya.”

“Perfect timing.”

“Wait, where's your partner?”

He also left.

“Oh.”

“There happened to be an emergency and we were closest to its coordinates.”

“Must be rough. Dealing with a job while on a job.”

“On the contrary. He was so bored he decided to indulge in over time.”

“Fair enough. I'll be in the shower. You might have to speak louder. Hmm? Why the look? We're both women here.”

“Just do your thing.” she averted her gaze as the lady made her way to the shower room in her birthday suit.

“Oh, if that's your preference, enjoy the view. So, have you found her?”

“I've called in. They're on it. What would you do if we can't find her...or she's dead?”

“If she's dead then I'm dead. I'll gladly vanish into the wind with a smile on my face. But I know she's not.”

“How?”

“Did you know? The disaster happened a year after he left me. Left Japan. I was in Hakone at the time, getting ready to return to Tokyo but I'm lucky I didn't. Over here, we were largely unaffected by it. I saw explosions in the distance, hurricanes, buildings collapsed like jenga pieces. The sun was nearly devoured that day. In that very moment, new found hope was born in my heart. I believe it must have tied my life to hers.”

“Do you understand what you’re saying? You’re already dead but she must be alive?”

“I’m not dead. This is simply my second life.”

“Your second life. Borrowed from who?”

“god? Who knows?”

“What I’m concerned about is your certainty. There’s no logic behind your words.”

“There doesn’t need to be. This is purely instinctual. I can feel it, so I’m absolutely certain. If I was alive, she had to be. Because no one could take her from me.

“...”

“Seems like I said too much. Anyway, I indulged your whims in the past. I ask you to return the favour. If I’m wrong, dismiss whatever I say as ramblings from your very own undead.”

“No need for all that. Luckily for you, she's alive.”

“Well isn’t that a relief. Tracking her shouldn’t be a problem, at least I hope not.”

“With your track record, a few things that are legal to you are….Nevermind, I’ve requested the co-ordinates though. We’ll give her the heads-up before going there.”

“That ruins the surprise but sure…I've gotta say, I'm loving the VIP treatment but it's getting awkward.”

“Don't push your luck. You're not special. But despite that, you're human so we need to see this through. I'm sure that's what he would have wanted.”

“You're right.”

“Speaking of, I will be required to make my report but your friend never openly displayed his abilities. The records will reveal something soon enough but any info will be helpful.”

“His abilities were simply super regenerative capabilities.”

“Right. Is that what he told you or you saw it for yourself.”

“Oh, I saw it in action, alright.”

“????”

An hour later, the two were standing in the middle of the manor patiently waiting for their host. At this time, they surely would have been caught by the patrol team but the fact it was empty was rather suspicious. Megumi took it as a good sign and had a smoke in the meantime.

“Thanks for getting me this coat on the way.”

“You’re welcome. It’s chilly at this time of the year, right?”

“It would be snowing anytime from now. Hope I’m not alive to see it…”

“Apologies for the wait, we should have had the guards escort you inside.”

There she was. The one she claimed her life was attached to. The one who remained in heart all these years.

As she walked down the stairs in her soft fluffy slippers, an unknown figure behind her wrapped her in a coat properly. Normally, at her age, you would see the tolls of life on her face due to repeated facial movements but this woman had none. Her brows were as light as ever, her lips always seemed as though she was holding in a secret that could very much destroy you. Her hair had no indications of aging, no traces of silver whatsoever. Just who on earth was this woman?

"The guards don’t even know they’re here. How the hell did you get in?" the lady behind her, moved forward, her guard was up the roof. Rightfully so.

"We used the front door."

"Bullshit."

“Are you the person we spoke to on the phone?”

“Indeed. Apparently, you’re Miss Kuzuya.”

“She sounds like a pain.Didn’t we call in advance?”

“And I remember declining.”

“Did she, though?”

“Welcome.It’s an odd hour, I must say.”

“Indeed. Long time, Yano."

“Oh, you’ve got company too?”

"Nice to meet you. The name is Takano. She's my guardian.”

"Nice place you got."

"This is really fishy. I’m calling the cops.”

“Jun, don’t you dare.”

“How can we even tell that it’s her?”

“It’s very simple. I’ll get my proof over a cup of hot chocolate. Be a darling and prepare some for us, okay?”

“I already have a bad feeling about this.” she whispered.

"If I act out, please stop me.”

“Got it.”

“What a surprise. I still can’t help but get excited."

“Yes, yes. You know why I’m here. Savour this moment while it lasts.”

“How dare you? Walking in here like you own the place.”

“I don’t care about any of this. I would have preferred it to be a one bedroom sandwiched between a drunk and a hooker.”

“Please stop. Jun, I’ll appreciate it if you keep an open mind and avoid butting in.”

“I can’t accept that. I know nothing about these two. She especially seems dangerous.”

“Oh? Assuming we were dangerous, what would you have done? Yell at us??”

“Why don’t we find out??”

“Jun!!!”

“Hmph.”

"Security is light for a reason and it seems, she is on her guard which is understandable but please come in. Let’s talk, dear."

They sat in the dining room. It was dark so they turned on the neon colored lanterns in the room. On one end was Ichika Yano and her carer. On the other were the two, one slightly nervous while the other calm but enraged.

"What suits your fancy? Hot chocolate, warm milk or just water?"

"I'm fine."

"I'll like some hot choc please."

"Absolutely."

“To be honest, I didn’t expect things to go this well. The woman I knew was as sceptical as she was quick tempered. The you I’m looking at… ”

“Feel free to speak your mind, dear.”

“I'm just disappointed, that's all.”

The old lady shook her head.

“I believe you said you had something to discuss with me?”

"I’m going on a long trip after this. I wouldn't be satisfied without seeing whether my predictions were correct. In short, I came here to mock you."

“That audacity. You sound just like I used to.” her lips finally curved. This infuriated the one in front of her.

“You think that is a compliment? Have you lost it?”

“It’s not like that. You see…” all this time, she had them closed but now, she opened her eyes and just like she guessed, they were not fully functional.

“Even though it’s a bad habit you picked up from me, it’s still a form of assurance. It’s really you.”

“Your eyes..”

“Just a case of Mild optic atrophy.Nothing to worry about.”

“Who would have thought?”

“Not me. That’s for sure. With my obsession with mirrors, perhaps it was for the best. Have you heard of the lady overseas that proposed to her reflection in the mirror?”

“.….”

“Something wrong?”

“What happened to you?”

“You mean my eyes? Well, it’s a long story but about ten years ago..”

“Who cares about that? I’m asking about what happened to you. Are you really my Mother?”

“Is it that surprising? I've had nearly half a century to ponder on life so of course I'm different."

"Are you that spineless?"

"Huh?"

"Aren't you trying too hard to be some wise, easy going adult. You still aren't a good person. You've never been. So why are you wasting your time? What are you doing?"

"I don't think I follow."

"You do."

"I never claimed to be a good person. I'm just a person going through life."

"That's it?"

“Growth is the only thing I think we are entitled to as humans. For better or worse. Simply because we are imperfect."

“Glad the light bulb is finally coming on after all these years.”

"If it makes you feel any better, everything you said about me was true. Up to a certain point. You said at the end of the day I was going to be alone and miserable. That turned out to be true.

I could feel myself being tossed around by some force of nature I couldn’t comprehend, nor argue with, nor disobey. Each and every single day, I looked in the mirror and saw a monster. That’s why I had to change. By the way, when was the last time we spoke?”

“Thirty five years ago, give or take.”

“That’s over three decades. Just thinking about how long that is makes my hands tremble. Time is the greatest liar.”

“I wonder how you can be this cheery and excited?” with a blank stare, she clicked her tongue.

“I’m talking to you after so long.”

“What is there to be excited about that??”

“It seems I’m being cornered.”

“I hoped to see a wretched woman who would curse the world for as long as she lived but refused to do anything about leaving. Someone with nothing but hollow words left to spout. I was hoping to see you at your worst. ” she lowered her head in utter defeat, refusing to look her in the eyes then sighed

“That would have been quite the plot for you, Ari. I’m sure your writer’s instincts were itching for such a fate. I’m sorry to disappoint but my life feels magical, every moment of it.”

“I don’t know how to feel about the fact that you know that name. So, I take it you’ve read my novel??”

“Every single one. But let’s start with the first. It was made for me, yeah?”

“It wasn't for you. It was simply about you.”

“They aren't mutually exclusive. I'll like to believe it was.”

"Well you're dead wrong. My question to you. What was your obsession with me taking first place? How much of an impact did you think it was bound to have on my future?"

“I can’t describe how ashamed I feel.”

“That doesn’t answer the fucking question, does it?” she slammed the table.

“Forgive me for that. What I meant to say was..it changed nothing. Student council president? First place? What did that ever do for you? You had a knack for caligraphy and generally, things of the arts but you seemed to deviate from that path, undoubtedly because of me. I did the same thing your grandparents did to your Father.”

“’Mother knows best.’”

“My parents did the opposite.They had no expectations for me. I was branded a failure that was only good to look at. Beauty and no brains, they said.”

"Maybe they were right."

“It was a big bundle of trauma that I passed on from my own parents. I'm so sorry."

“Unlike you, I’m not an idiot who relied on men her whole life so my life was never on the same trajectory. What was your impression of my novel??”

“I initially thought it was going to be filled with venom, a cluster of it. Much to my surprise, it wasn’t. Your criticisms were clear and precise, although there was no praise in there, I found your objective stance on the woman named Yano impressive.”

“Never named her.”

“I do have one question though. Why exactly did you name it ‘The reflection of Mona Lisa’?” “Intuition. I couldn't physically confirm it on the past but I can now. You've always been beautiful and you always will. That's the truth but it takes nothing away from the terrible person that you are. Blood is red. My ear rings are silver. Ichika Yano is beautiful. Nothing more. Nothing less." "Objectivity at its finest."

“I could not let my feelings get the best of me when diving deeper into you. That would make me a fraud.”

“You didn’t have to hold back. After all, that venom is also art. Jun, how does she look?”

“Decent."

“That’s right!!! She’s my daughter. Jun, my daughter is pretty, yes?”

“...Yes.”

“I wish I could see that for myself.”

“I thought…”

“I can’t see in clear detail. What a shame.”

“You can feel her, you know?” aiko cut in.

“I can?!?!?” she stretched her hands but Megumi ignored it, not until Aiko slammed her hand on the table with a scary smile.

“Whose side are you on?”

"I'm neutral here. Sorry for startling you, ma'am, please go on.”

”Don’t be insecure about your chin. Mine is similar but I feel like I paid too much attention to it in my youth.” Indeed, they both had well defined chins.

“Your skin is healthy enough but slightly rough, don’t be down about it. Why do you have bags? Have you been sleeping properly? Your cheeks are not soft anymore. I guess you’re also quite old yourself. What was I thinking?”

“You don’t.”

“Haha, I got carried away.”

*ahem*

“You know, your first book was a smashing hit but the second one was even more well acclaimed.” “Right. Medusa was indeed the work based off of Megumi. If I were to criticize the biggest demon in my life, I ought to face myself with the same honesty.”

“I appreciate that. It opened my eyes quite a bit. It reminded me that there’s always two sides to a story. And even those two sides combined might not be able to produce the whole truth, just an imitation of it.”

“Could I get a glass of water please?" she glanced at the young lady seated beside Yano.

"That window has passed, dear guest."

"Please?" Yano softly uttered.

"Fine."

"I felt your passion through every page. Like I was jumping from a tranquil lake to a volcano. I could feel not only venom, but evil in that work. It was safe to say the only thing on your mind was self destruction.”

“Self destruction? That's a fancy way of putting it. So you want to talk about me? Fine, what about my life do you want to dig deeper in?”

“You named it the scales of Medusa’. I found it a bit odd, there was a clue in the name but it didn't make sense in the way you intended..”

“The story of Medusa often goes like this. She was a beautiful maiden who was violated by the god Poseidon. The goddess Athena cursed her with snakes for hair and turned her into a gorgon. She became ugly after the curse but from my interpretation, they were simply her scales. It stands to reason that perhaps those scales are what made her ‘ugly’.”

“I think I understand.”

“The scales represent a barrier. That barrier in essence is the state of her soul. Add that to the fact that her blood had healing qualities. Perhaps the real reason Medusa couldn’t be cured was because deep down, she’s always been ugly. So the paradox goes like this: Medusa will continue cursing Athena for the rest of her days, unbeknownst to her, that burning, nauseating hatred she holds deep within her is the very clay that hardens the scales. Don’t you think I’m Medusa?”

“Megumi..”

“You violated my innocence at an age I shouldn’t have known better. Thanks to you, I was already an adult at the age of twelve. After taking that away from me, you replaced it with a void. That void has stuck with me everyday of my life and I'm forced to deal with it all by myself. But who was the one sustaining it all this time? Was it you? A woman I hadn’t seen in decades? No. I am responsible for the person you see today.”

“No..”

“Silly you, you can’t just say no to an argument without providing a counter. Or are you saying that Medusa secretly enjoyed doing it? That could create an entirely different dynamic, you know?”

“No. You're saying she was a victim but no longer is. There is no expiry date when it comes to that. You know this yourself. ”

“Quit dancing around the truth. I’m less of a victim than you think.”

“No you aren’t. Even if you decide to end me right now, who am I to blame you?” as soft-spoken as she was, her bravery was unmatched. She truly welcomed this moment as her last if things went in that direction.

“Bullshit!!!”

"I know you're not looking for sympathy but as your Mother,how could I feel any other way?”

“Perhaps we should talk about something else. I actually had a third novel in the works.”

“That’s a relief. I actually wondered why you had not published anything in about a decade but I figured perhaps it was an issue with inspiration.”

“You’re right. The truth is that after my second novel, I was ecstatic. I wrote two out of the three most important perspectives that shaped my life. I had just one fucking job.”

“You mean??”

“After that, I could watch the money dry up and starve to death, that wasn’t a problem. I wasn’t going to pick up a pen after that. That was the one vow I made. Unfortunately, I just couldn’t write it.”

“...”

“It was so anti climatic. Not a single page. It was not a question of ability, circumstance or inadequate perspective. I had a worthy story to tell but I just didn’t know what to say. I’ve known him all my life and there was nothing. I couldn’t make a decent story based on him. It hurt to say the least. The person I cherished the most in this world, I couldn't show the world that love in a fitting manner. If I couldn’t give his life any poetic justice, my career deserved to end in shambles.”

“Wouldn’t it have been better to temporarily push that to the side?”

“You weren’t the first person to say that. Basically the entire world was telling me forget the most important thing to me. 'Stop thinking about it. Don’t let it take up too much of your time. Your time is precious’. I wish I could produce a proper rebuttal but they were probably right. It was a lost cause. After much deliberation, I decided to write something else. Unfortunately, they were all duds. Even my editor nearly gave up on me, advising me to never release it. For my last work, even my fans gave up.”

"Did you release it?"

"Just a chapter for the beta readers."

“Could you tell me more about it?”

“It was about the mirror in Alice in Wonderland. In actuality, it was a special mirror based on the one from my childhood. The one where we used to live."

"So you're also a fan of mirrors."

"Shut up. This mirror had the ability to display your darkest thoughts, no matter how well you hid it. The main character in question was a pretty frail woman who happened to be emotionally unstable due to work harassment. Hah, I say that like I wasn’t the one that made her that way. Anyway, the mirror was more than just a push, it was a shove.

She broke the mirror after a week. In turn, it took just a week to break her. Now, she went along her life like usual, she actually thought that was the end. She later discovered that any reflective surface she stared at took the place of that single mirror. What do you think happened after?”

“She killed herself?”

“Well she did after a while, but she initially tried avoiding those surfaces. Of course it wasn’t possible so she killed herself after a month. It was supposed to be an isolated incident but that wasn’t the end. She worked as a sales representative at some regular company. Now, everyone in the office also got affected, but in their case, the darkness intertwined. Long story short, every manner of death occurred at the office and it was eventually shut down.”

"I didn't know you dabbled into horror.”

“Well, my editor absolutely hated it. Called it well moulded shit. Something pretending to be provocative when it was infact empty. I could have sworn my pen would have passed through her neck at that exact moment. I was seriously thinking about killing her then rewriting it using her blood as ink. What do you mean, pretentious? It was supposed to be empty from the start."

"That is a compliment in a way."

"I know but it's bloody horror, not a damn philosophical lecture. I ultimately chose not to. This pen is too precious.”

“Umm… You’ve got to show it to me sometime.”

“There won’t be a next time. Don’t get ahead of yourself.”

“Haha..My bad.”

“That stupid smile of yours absolutely irritates me. If not for the fact that you’re old, I would have paid you back tenfold for everytime you hit me."

"If you did that, I'll die."

"Making jokes now, are we?"

"That probably will be better than an apology. Go ahead if you wish."

"No."

"Thank you."

tsk

“I want to help you write the novel about your father. I’ll help in anyway I can.”

“Pfft please.”

“And for us to have a slight chance of making that happen, we need to talk about that man. So let’s rewind a little. Perhaps that would give you a better perspective.”

“A trip down old memory lane. Who would have thought you would show so much interest in a man you left in such a vulgar manner.”

“I’m doing this for you.”

“What a thing for a whore to say.”

“How dare you!!”

“Jun!! Calm down. Megumi, I’ve got to thank you for one thing. You gave me thicker skin. I was called much more on a regular basis by my relatives and colleagues. The only time it shook me to my core was the time you said those words to me.”

“You’re welcome.”

“As cheeky as ever. Anyway, let’s relax a bit…We strayed quite a bit, didn’t we?”

“Perhaps.”

“I’ll tell you the truth from my perspective. There are three puzzle pieces we need to connect. The first one being your father’s dismissal and infamous blacklist from reputable businesses. Why did all that happen?”

“It was a set up.”

“Did you think that was the whole story?”

“Frankly, no. My assumption was that he ruffled some feathers at work and paid the price. Daddy wasn’t the type to witness an evil deed and remain quiet.”

She crossed her fingers and smirked.

“Zero points. Your father was set up. Quite true, however, that wasn’t the reason. The root cause was that…….. he was messing around with his boss’ wife.”