Chapter Text
A shooting star soars across the sky, painting your world — the mountain peak in front of the ryokan, the balcony you stood at, your mother's face — a bright blue.
“Make a wish,” your mother whispers behind you, “Go on, Atsumu! Make a wish before it's gone.”
If you were seven, you might not be as sure of what to wish for, but you are still four, so you know exactly what it is: mint ice cream.
✦
When you come back home, there is no mint ice cream in the fridge. This is your first heartbreak.
✦
(Osamu pokes your back with a twig.)
✦
Before you were born, your mother named you Atsumu and your father named your brother Osamu. After you were born, this fact seemed to follow you as you were quick to understand the language of Miya Atsumu's Kaa-san better than anyone else. You know that she likes to talk about yellow, and so you decide that is your favorite color, even though you like green better.
She holds your hand.
“When you take care of a garden,” she says, “you must rip out the weeds that grow in it.”
The brown of the dirt seems closer to red, like when your adventure marks stop bleeding. She likes sunflowers, so you stay quiet while she replaces the weeds — ripped out and bleeding — in the garden of your house with new seeds, even though it makes you feel kind of bad.
You brush your teeth the way she likes to brush hers, practical and quick. When you watch TV with her, you try to sit on your ankles like she does and you try to fold your clothes like she does but you fail because you never know how to quite do that. She laughs. Your brother is too busy paying attention to the cartoon.
—
You try to look like her, once, putting on her lipstick and ending up with it smeared over your face. (Osamu's hands aren't firm at all.) It earns you the sound of her laughter and a picture in the family book. She doesn't says if your performance is satisfactory, if there's something you could improve, if there's something lacking.
It's not difficult to guess that you like her better than your father.
You do like your father, though. Miya Atsumu's Kaa-san comes first, but you like him just as well.
You like it when he comes back from business trips with the world in his case. Toys and souvenirs that traveled the world with him. You like it when he and your family go to the temple, where everyone shushes you (you know how to keep quiet!) You like it when it is a holiday and he's home and he tries to cook with your mother.
You do like your father, but you wish you could see him more than a few times a year.
On your and your brother’s fifth birthday, the two of you get to call him as a gift. Osamu doesn't have a lot to talk to him about, but he does sound excited at some points of the call. You, however, have a lot to talk to him. So much has happened! “Atsumu,” he says, and he sounds like he does whenever he hugs your mother or ruffles your hair or sits with your brother in the garden after coming home from a long trip. “Atsumu,” he says, and he sounds like he does whenever he is in Kansai but comes home late or has to stay up in the room where you're not supposed to play. “ Atsumu ,” he says and he sounds like he did when you pushed a kid from the swing in kindergarten and the headmaster called your parents.
Your mother takes the phone from your hand, and she laughs. “He talks too much, doesn’t he?” she says, then looks at you. “Your father’s tired, Atsumu. Go play with your brother.”
You haven't spoken to your father in so long that you really wanted to update him on what you were doing, just like Osamu had. Osamu said my teacher gave me a gold star. We learned how to write numbers from one to ten. My health is good. When are you coming back? and you said ‘ Samu’s teacher gave him a gold star but she refused to give me one. She never gave me a gold star. Did you ever gain a gold star in school? I got sick a few weeks ago because I ate something bad. I know how to count to twelve! I really want to see you again, dad. Have you met a hero yet? and you have no idea where you went wrong with that, but you know you did, and you didn’t want to bother your father, so now you’re almost crying. You go after Osamu but he just shows his tongue to you.
You try to imitate your mother’s laughter. It sounds broken in your voice.
✦
Your sixth birthday comes and your father is too busy to call, this time. Your mother smiles at you and says, “Papa told me to say he loves both of you very much and hopes to come back soon."
You asked for mint ice cream, but all there is on your plate is a slice of strawberry cake. There's no mint ice cream in the fridge, either (you'd know! You and Osamu climbed up a chair to check.)
You asked for your father to be home, but he is somewhere else in the world, sitting at a long table, wearing a suit and talking to other Papas who are sitting at a long table also wearing a suit.
You asked for a call with him but he’s too busy to talk to you.
Osamu stares at you and you stare back at him.
He turns the TV on, pushing the remote towards your direction.
Your mother ruffles your hair and then she goes to the bedroom. You don't follow her this time, because she told you she’s tired. You want to be a good boy, so you’ll let her rest. You're not sure of what she does when she is watching TV by herself, so you just sit on your knees, but there are no clothes to fold.
Your brother is switching channels. By now, you have tuned most of the sound out. Then, you hear whistling. Thud thud . It catches your attention. You lift your eyes to the screen. It reads Black Jackals vs Schwein Adlers.
Your brother switches channels again, back to the cartoon you two usually watch.
Go back, you ask. Your brother shrugs, and does as asked, and even though you don't really understand what you're seeing, it seems really cool. Like a group of heroes fighting another.
Your mother comes out of her room after the Black Jackals reach something they called a set point. She smiles at the two of you.
“Are you two watching volleyball now?” she asks. Her voice is different from how it usually is, not that you know how to explain it. It’s the voice she had when she showed you pics of your family, the ones of her — as a child, with pigtails, and with her middle school uniform, for the first time. She sits between you two. She smiles at the TV.
You look at the screen again, paying close attention to what’s happening. The man throws the ball up, then runs and jumps. He hits it. It gets to the other side, and you can hear people cheering.
“That, Atsumu, is called a jump serve,” your mother says. I want to do that too, you say. I want to do that too, mom. Can you teach me? Can you teach me?
You take a peek at your mother’s face and she's staring at you like your brother stared at omurice when he ate it for the first time, both surprised and happy.
Then, she ruffles your hair, a wide smile on her face, “Of course, sweetheart.”
After that, you try to imitate what you saw on TV. Your mother shakes her head.
“You need to stretch first, or else you’ll be all sore tomorrow,” she tells you. She yells for your brother to accompany both of you. “Osamu, come outside! You can’t stay cooped up all day!”
She teaches you how to stretch.
“Your legs and your arms are both important,” she says. “So are your feet and your hands. So are your fingers and your forearms. Your entire body matters when it comes to volleyball,” she says, “so you need to take good care of it.”
‘Samu seems to be tired already, but you want to do more, and your mother holds your hands together.
“Put them like this,” she says. “Then, when I send a ball to you, you try to throw it up with this,” she touches your forearm, “area.”
You do that with the ball, a small plastic thing she bought just for this. It goes upwards. That’s a receive , she tells you. You try to do it again but then you fail. ‘Samu laughs and she smiles and you try not to yell and you try not to cry.
You hate it when you can’t do something right, especially if ‘Samu is watching you, especially if he can. You hate it when people laugh at something you did, especially if ‘Samu is one of them.
They both laugh at your pout. It's not a pout!
Even after your first day at an actual elementary schoo,l you want to practice, receive, and everything else.
Even after your father comes back from his business trip you want to practice, receive, and everything else.
Whatcha doing, ‘Tsumu? your brother asks you, but he continues to stare at you throwing the ball at the wall then getting it in your hands and throwing it again instead of coming out to play with you.
Watcha doing, ‘Tsumu? your brother asks youm but he continues to stare at you and your mother throwing the ball back-and-forth instead of coming out to play with both of you.
I am having fun, you say. When your mother’s nor nearby, you add, Like you wouldn't know how to!
✦
When you are seven years old, your mother ruffles your hair.
She does it delicately.
“Atsumu,” she sing-songs your name, “ah, my ‘Tsumu. Don’t cry.” She hates it when you cry until you snot, especially if you get her clothes dirty, but she hasn’t complained once about that this time. “I’ll be fine ‘Tsumu, I promise. Pinky promise,” she tells you.
You believe her because she is your mother and she will keep you and your brother safe forever.
You believe her because she is your mother and your mother never lies (no one’s mother lies but yours is even more honest).
You believe her because she made a pinky-promise and no one who does these is lying because it’s a promise and you can’t break them.
You once tripped in your garden and scraped your knee and now you have a very, very tiny scar there. She tripped and the same will happen to her. Just a scar. You once vomited because you ate a bad thing. She vomited because of the same thing. You’re here and she’s here.
Your grandmother, the one who is your father’s mother, the one who doesn’t look down on your mother for having married him and who doesn’t think she should be teaching you about something that matters, presses her hand against her temple.
“Sick,” she says while you draw together with your brother. He’s drawing a prince who’s supposed to be him and who’s saving your mother, which is a little weird, because princes are not heroes. You’re drawing grass and sunflowers for your mother. “for how long?”
“It was just a headache,” your mother replies. “At least that’s what I thought. A few months.”
Your stare at the sunflower you drew. There is green for the leaves and brown for the middle. You see your brother’s hand. There is a yellow crayon in it.
You look up at his face.
Sunflowers are yellow, dummy , he whispers. Not green.
“And it never crossed your mind that you could ask for a professional’s opinion before it got to this point?”
Your grandmother always talks like she’s spitting something out.
Like she’s telling you to paint inside of the line, to not open your mouth while you eat, to be quieter.
She never sounds like she wants to be there but she doesn’t sound like the teacher who dislikes you at school either. She doesn’t sound like your mother but she doesn’t sound like someone who hates you either.
“I was too busy taking care of my responsibilities, Miya-san,” your mother answers. “You know, my responsibilities? The children I had with your son? It’s not like I can just trust a random babysitter, so I need to take care of them alone. Pretty time consuming.”
The yellow crosses the path of the petal and ends up in the leaves.
When you give your drawing to your mother, however, she smiles at you, sweetly. She ignores the yellow leaf. Her eyes look like your brother’s did when the wind got especially strong in the last thunderstorm. Like she wants to cry, but she's trying to be strong.
When you come back home with your mother and brother, a few days later, your grandmother is there.
She is with you and with your brother and with your mother. She will stay for a while, your mother said to you, just for a while. When your father calls, he doesn’t want to talk to you and your mother doesn’t want to talk to him. He promises to come back as soon as he can. (You don’t understand and neither do you pay attention.)
After a week of that, and of being taken to school by your grandmother, who is quiet, instead of your mother, who would sing with you and force your brother to sing along or laugh or embarrass both you, you ask your mother to help you practice receives.
“When I feel better, alright?” she asks, with closed eyes and a soft voice. You nod. “I promise I’ll play with you, Osamu.”
Even though she had never gotten it wrong before, you just lower your volleyball, and don’t correct her.