Even after spring turned to summer, Momoko seemed as healthy as ever. I worried her condition might deteriorate in the intense summer heat, but her appetite was unchanged; even her complexion was good. She was in and out of the hospital for a while, but she even dropped by the Morisaki Bookshop, though she had to pause now and then to rest. One night when Tomo came to visit, the three of us went out to eat at Mr. Nakasono’s place.
Yet, at the beginning of fall, when we would finally get a cool breeze in the afternoons, her condition took a turn for the worse. Momoko collapsed while she was recuperating at home. Her week of convalescence at home was canceled, and they quickly decided she needed to return to the hospital that day.
“It’s time to prepare for the end. That’s what the doctors told us yesterday,” my uncle told me in a stiff voice over the phone. “Takako, when you have time, could you go see her again?”
This brief phone call from my uncle was all it took to obliterate the fleeting hope I’d held on to for half a year. And it was also in that instant when things finally became clear, the parts I’d been trying not to shine a light on, the reality I’d been trying desperately to turn away from.
The next day, I used one of my vacation days at work and rushed over to Momoko’s room at the hospital. The anxiety and worry were tearing me apart as I opened the door to her room.
“Oh, Takako.” I was struck by the sound of her voice. “You’re back again?” It was the same speech she always gave. But there was no comparison between her voice then and how feeble she sounded now. There was no strength in her voice. Until then, I had rarely seen her lying down in bed, but today, perhaps because she was in pain, she didn’t get up even when I came into the room. And only a week ago she’d seemed so healthy.
When her eyes met mine, she let out a laugh, almost like a shy little girl.
“Momoko . . .” Without meaning to, I said her name like I was about to cry. But I immediately regained my composure and did my best to smile. “My uncle called. It gave me a scare.”
“I look pretty awful, don’t I?”
Her new room was a single. Momoko was alone, lying in the middle of a white bed. The room was relatively large, but its size made it feel strangely oppressive. A great number of people had spent time in this room, in this very bed, and now they were gone. Somehow you could feel that keenly just by being in the room.
“Uncle Satoru?”
“He went back to the house a bit ago to change. It was so sudden we didn’t have anything prepared.”
“Oh . . .”
I waited there until my uncle returned. Unlike before, Momoko didn’t try to hurry me and tell me to go home early. She lay there quietly.
When I was leaving, she muttered, “Takako, thank you for always coming to see me. Will you come back?”
“That doesn’t sound like you, Momoko.”
“I mean, it’s embarrassing, don’t you think? I only talk this way when I’m feeling weak.”
“Sincerity is more becoming.”
“Hey, you’re talking to an old lady, you know.”
“I’ll come back soon. So, get some rest. Okay?”
Momoko turned just her head toward me, smiled, and said “Yes” meekly. I felt a warm lump inside. It was somewhere in my chest, throbbing. I could feel it rising inside me, like it was trying to find a way out. I left the room and leaned against the wall in the hallway. I looked up and stared into the fluorescent lights on the ceiling until the feeling passed.
From that point on, because my uncle often went to be with my aunt at the hospital, the Morisaki Bookshop was closed more frequently. Momoko objected, but no matter what she said to him, my uncle stubbornly refused to stop coming to the hospital.
I could see my uncle was getting skinnier. He was skinny to begin with, but he was far beyond that now; his body was shrinking so much that it was painful to look at him. Dark circles formed under his eyes, and his cheeks sank in; he seemed to age five years over the course of a few months.
He was always absent-minded—even to the point that at times a customer would be holding out a book in front of him, and he wouldn’t notice.
“Uncle, you’ve got a customer,” I’d say, gently nudging his shoulder.
“Oh, forgive me. I’m sorry,” he’d say as he hastily accepted the book and rang it up. Once he was finished, however, he’d go back to staring off into space again.
There was no change in the shop’s appearance. The books were put on the shelves where they belonged following my uncle’s system of classification, and the place was scrupulously clean. Yet I couldn’t help feeling that the shop now felt suffocating to be in.
I tried to tell my uncle gently that he might try to take a little break. But he wouldn’t listen. “If I’m working,” he told me, “I don’t have to think about everything.”
“But if you keep this up, you’ll collapse.”
“I’m fine. I’m not that fragile.”
Even though he was normally so fragile that he was always whining, right now he was pretending to be tough.
“You know Momoko was trying to apologize for everything she put me through. Hearing her actually say it aloud threw me off. I didn’t know how to respond. That’s why I have to prove to her that I’m doing just fine.”
“Uncle . . .” I couldn’t find the words to say.
“I’m useless,” my uncle mumbled to himself. He was sitting astride Roy, still staring off into space, lost in grief. “The past six months, I wanted to resign myself to letting her go, but it’s no use. As the moment gets closer, I just want to be with her for as long as I can. I keep selfishly wishing for her not to die yet. She’s already resigned herself to it. In the end, I’m the one who can’t accept it. I’m just being greedy.”
“You’re not greedy,” I said firmly.
My uncle shook his head.
“No, I am. Lately I find myself thinking that I’d sacrifice anything if it meant she would live even a little bit longer.” My uncle smiled grimly. “I’m hopelessly selfish,” he added in conclusion, and then he suddenly seemed to come back to himself, and he looked at me.
“I’m sorry. I’m just complaining.”
“It’s okay. The only thing I can do to help is to listen.”
It really was about the only thing I could do. It broke my heart to be so powerless.
My uncle, ignoring how despondent I was, suddenly shouted “Oh” and stood up. “It smells like sweet olive blossoms,” he said, and inhaled deeply and closed his eyes.
I took a breath too, caught up in the excitement.
“I guess it’s already that time of year,” I said.
My uncle gave his first proper smile of the day.
“Momoko’s always liked this scent. I hope she can smell it at the hospital too.” My uncle closed his eyes for a long time, like he was making a wish.
The days went by, and time kept on passing. No one can stop that.
The last time I saw Momoko was a quiet afternoon in the beginning of October. The autumn air blowing in through the open window felt pleasant, and the scent of sweet olive blossoms was carried into the room. The curtains swayed slightly in the breeze. Surrounded by this quiet, you could hear the soft sound of rustling fabric. That’s the kind of afternoon it was.
When he saw me come in, my uncle mumbled something about having an errand to run and quickly left the room. Looking back, I think it was probably his thoughtful way of giving us some time alone, since he knew it might be the last time Momoko and I saw each other.
“Hey, can I talk to you about something?” Momoko said, once she opened her eyes after nodding off for a while. “I feel much better today. And I’m in the mood for a story.”
“What kind of story?”
“Any kind. How about a memory from when you were a kid?”
Caught short by the sudden request, I thought through what kind of memory might fit the situation. A funny story would be good. Something to make her laugh. Something to let her forget about the pain she was in, even if only for a moment.
“Now that you mention it, there was this one time that my uncle took me to a summer festival. It was before you two got married.”
“Really? Satoru did this?”
“It was the last night of our usual summer trip to my grandfather’s house. In the distance, we could hear the music from the festival in their neighborhood. I was whining because I wanted to go so badly. My mother said we had a flight the next morning so we should go to bed early, but I loved being with my uncle, and the thought that we wouldn’t be there the next day made me miss him so much. And so he brought me to the festival. My uncle was in high spirits too, of course. Ultimately, the festival ended right after we arrived, but I was content that I got to go. It was this incredible feeling, like I’d won something. We couldn’t buy anything at the stalls, so my uncle bought us ice cream at a convenience store nearby, and the two of us walked back together, eating our ice cream and feeling sad.”
As I talked, I could vaguely recall the light of the paper lanterns, the sound of the crowds of people talking, and even the way the afternoon heat lingered in the evening air. I’d forgotten about that, but now it felt like a really precious memory.
“That’s all. I’m sorry. I wish I’d thought of a more interesting story.”
Momoko was gazing up at the ceiling as I apologized. She slowly shook her head. “I can imagine it somehow. That scene . . . It’s wonderful. I wish I’d been there. I wish I’d gone to a festival with Satoru and you when you were a child.”
“No way, Momoko. I told you we barely even made it there.”
“But isn’t that just so like the two of you?” Momoko said and giggled, and I ended up laughing too. At least I meant to laugh, but then I felt something cold drip on the back of my hand. Before I had time to react, it was like raindrops were falling from my face onto my hands. No, I can’t, I thought, but it was already too late.
I had decided I wasn’t going to cry in front of Momoko. I thought it would be shameful, since she was the one suffering the most. Although I’d decided I wouldn’t cry, on that afternoon alone it was no use. Once I let go, there was no stopping it. That lump that had been growing inside my chest had found a way out.
“I’m sorry,” I apologized as I tried to find a way to stop my tears. But once those emotions had found an outlet, there was no reasoning with it, the tears kept coming and coming.
“I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.” I hung my head, repeating the same words over and over, and Momoko reached out her hand and touched my hair, and stroked my head like she was taking it in her arms.
“It’s okay,” she said, almost whispering in my ear. “Don’t apologize.”
Hearing Momoko whisper gently to me like that made me cry even more.
“But . . . I am sorry.”
“Takako, don’t apologize, okay?”
I managed to nod through my tears. Momoko weakly pinched my cheek. Her fingertips were very cold. On impulse, I took her pale, cold hand in mine and held it tight. Such a small hand. Momoko had always had small hands, like a little girl. But now they felt so much smaller. As soon as I held her hand, it seemed to shrink, and it seemed like it might go on shrinking until it vanished like a dusting of snow.
“Thank you for crying over me,” Momoko said. “When you’re sad, don’t try to hold it in. It’s okay to cry a lot. The tears are there because you’ve got to go on living. You’re going on living, which means there’ll be more things to cry about. They’ll come at you from all sides. So don’t ever try to hide from the sadness. When it comes, cry it out. It’s better to keep moving forward with that sadness; that’s what it means to live.”
Yes, I nodded, holding her hand tightly in mine. The scent of the sweet olive blossoms lingered faintly in the room. Even as I went on sobbing, I could smell it.
“Hey, Takako, I don’t regret anything. I think I was really lucky that I got to see Satoru again, and I got to spend the time I had left with him at my side, and I was given the time to say goodbye. What’s more, I even got to become close with you. I couldn’t wish for any more than that.”
So that was it. Momoko had come back to my uncle because she wanted to say goodbye. Maybe the reason why she didn’t seem any different after she found out about her relapse was that her wish had already come true. And even after she was hospitalized, and she lived under the watchful eye of the people around her, she always seemed dignified. Because she truly had no regrets.
After she told me this, she went on talking. “But, um . . . there’s just one thing I still worry about after I die,” she said abruptly. “I feel bad asking you this because I’ve already imposed on you so much, but I do have one final request. Can I ask you one more thing?”
“A request?” I looked at her, with my nose running and my face wet with tears. She stared back at me intently, her eyes full of determination.
“You know Satoru hasn’t once let me see him grieving since he learned my cancer had relapsed. He smiles, and I can see in his face that he’s always carrying the whole burden himself. But I’m painfully aware how sad it makes him to see me like this. He denies it, of course. But my worry is that after I’m gone, he won’t let himself cry, and he won’t let himself be dependent on anyone, and that he’ll live trying to bear the burden of this grief himself. Because he’s a very kind and a very foolish man.”
“I see.”
In the back of my mind, I pictured my uncle’s pained smile, and it made my heart break.
“That’s why if it seems like Satoru isn’t able to cry after I die, I want you to be with him. We never had any children, so you’re the only person I can think of to ask. If Satoru closes himself off from the world, yell at him and make him cry. What I hope more than anything is that if he cries, he’ll be able to move forward.”
Momoko squeezed my hand hard. Her face contorted like she was in pain.
“I’m sorry. It’s selfish of me to ask this of you.”
I looked Momoko in the eye and said, “I’ll do it. I promise.” I wanted her to know that I’d understood.
“Thank you. That’s a huge relief,” she said, and the look on her face finally softened into a smile. It was a tender smile that showed how deeply relieved she felt now. Then she gently wiped the tears from my face with her handkerchief. Like a child with its mother, I closed my eyes and didn’t move a muscle as she wiped all my tears away. We stayed that way for a long time.
It was a truly peaceful afternoon. The cream-colored curtains swayed quietly in the breeze.
Momoko died in the early morning, three days later.