Chapter Text
Family Resemblances
~sciathan file~
***
Chapter 1: Exile with a Side of Old Geezers
His father, his brow furrowing, had given him the map and the instructions—written out in a very messy, unfamiliar handwriting, and told him his great-grandfather would “probably” be home when he arrived. Then, his mother had held out his bags for him with the same vague look of disapproval that had been engraved on her face for a week or so.
“You’ll miss the train,” she said. Also with the same tone she had used for a week or so when talking to him.
Yoshiou had looked up at his mother as if she’d suddenly told him he was going to Mars and opened his mouth to protest and she had given him the same sharp look he had gotten when Sensei had visited their house the previous week and had told his parents—well, that he was pretty crap at school mostly because he didn’t feel so much like ever going and it was likely he was going to have to repeat the year due to insufficient attendance hours.
And that had prompted a Family Meeting held over several phone calls with a lot of advice (from the men) and a lot of yelling and sympathy (mostly from the aunts and great-aunts).
And then somehow Great-Aunt Chiyoko had become involved.
And, since Great-Aunt Chiyoko generally lived with Great-Grandfather, the old man (whom his mother had described to a friend as “eccentric” to a friend when she was relaying news about her son’s incident and he, perhaps, wasn’t supposed to be listening) about whom he had only fuzzy memories of meeting once at a family funeral when he was much younger (He apparently didn’t leave his house in the countryside often and, since both of his parents worked, it was apparently difficult to visit him), had apparently heard about his screw-up and made an unexpected offer. Apparently he was feeling more eccentric than usual, or maybe because Great-Aunt Chiyoko was leaving for a month he needed someone, or maybe because Yoshiou was the only son of his son’s only son or some other such familial obligation garbage… whatever the reason, he was somehow going to be living with his great-grandfather for at least the next school term. Or until, as his father said, weighing in at the end after letting his mother do all the talking like he always did, he “had learned to take responsibility and represent this family the way they expected.”
And, so, apparently, he was supposed to feel grateful to an old geezer for taking on his screw-up great-grandson since all of that familial obligation stuff was why he was now on a rickety, old local train with a suitcase full of his possessions in what was, objectively, the middle of nowhere.
Simply because his great-grandfather had offered to take him and no one refused Great-Grandfather anything.
So, when Great-Grandfather had said, “I’ll take your fuck-up son at my house in the middle of nowhere,” (at least that was how Yoshiou had imagined it happening. He wasn’t sure how he talked, but it likely wasn’t actually like that. And he had apparently had several conversations with both of his parents, so it was likely more complicated than that, too.) the whole family went into a tizzy and put said screw-up on a train to a relative he’d barely met because he was older than dirt and probably just about as lively.
As he watched the countless rice fields and mountains flow past the windows, Yoshiou determined that actually having to go to school might be a far less severe punishment, honestly.
***
He read over the messy handwriting again and focused hard on the barely legible kanji (1). When the conductor’s voice came over the crackling speaker, he confirmed the next stop was his. He hefted his suitcase up and awkwardly put the case with his kendo shinai (2) over his shoulder, since for some reason his father had insisted he bring it. (What the heck does he expect he’ll do with it? Join the school activities he had kept ditching in Tokyo? Beat himself over the head with it in boredom? Beat up his ancient great-grandfather with it, probably also due to boredom?), and got off the train when the tinny bell rang and the speaker buzzed to life with a bored voice relaying the station name.
The station was a wasteland.
The side he was on had one peaked, tin shelter for the approximately zero people other than him that wanted to get on the two trains a day that stopped here, and two banks of bright, turquoise plastic seats occupied by no one. Most likely because no one would come here of their own free will.
He walked through a town that, in something he rather expected would be the case with just about everything that had to do with his great-grandfather, had not made a step of progress beyond the Taisho Period (3). And, because he was hungry and he didn’t know what there would be to eat at his destination, he looked around for a convenience store.
…And, they didn’t appear to exist in this part of godforsaken nowhere (4).
So, he’d be forced to subsist on whatever old people ate.
Mush, probably.
Grumbling under his breath, he followed the directions through the town, checking the kanji characters repeatedly, and, fortunately, found the place contained some signs of life. An old lady bowed to him and another one inquired where “such a handsome young man” was going and, her face breaking into a gap-toothed smile at his answer, she offered him some cucumbers “to bring to them out there.” He didn’t correct her that it was only his great-grandfather, but took the cucumbers as an alternative to the imagined mush. He could at least make sunomono if things got desperate (5).
And—even if it was old life—Yoshiou is glad to see…well, that someone lived in the nearby town.
What his great-grandfather had described as “walkable” from the station turned out to be a forty-five minute walk through back country roads and, twice, Yoshiou got lost and couldn’t find anyone to ask directions from, so he retraced his steps and tried to re-decipher the terribly written kanji that the directions contained before he tried another way.
“Go through the bamboo groves to the gate and come in” was likely the final instruction.
Yoshiou had never been so happy to see bamboo in his existence as he was today. He’d also never been so glad to see his own last name on a gate. He was so happy, he didn’t even think about what came next.
Because, although he had some notion of it, his great-grandfather’s house was huge and so, rather than figuring out how the heck to find the door—let alone another human— he was happy to see someone of a vaguely old-person-ey description sitting on the engawa (6), maybe kindly waiting for him so he doesn’t have to figure out how everything works in the way old people do.
As Yoshiou had suspected, he is as much of a relic as the house and the town and the station and everything else he’s probably expected to deal with during his exile. He’s wearing a green nagagi (7) and there’s a pair of round glasses perched on top of his head. And, for someone who his father had told him, with a weird hesitation, had had a career as a photographer, his face and arms are scarred.
Maybe a dark room accident? Got in a fight with a Polaroid?
Vaguely, his mind taking a more serious turn, he wondered if he was in the war, but even he knew you didn’t just ask stuff like that.
“Um,” he began, as he doesn’t acknowledge him. The man doesn’t so much as turn his head. So, he raises his voice a little bit and says, “I’ve arrived! Thank you for having me!”
And then the man’s head turns and he scowls and then patting his own head, grips the rim of the glasses sitting up there and slides them down onto his nose, before scowling deeper and then, putting a hand on a knee to stand up, he practically growls out, “Who the fuck are you, kid?”
Yoshiou stares and, for a moment, wonders if his great-grandfather has dementia or something.
“Yoshiou,” he grinds out and then, not knowing how bad it is for old people and if his great-grandfather really does some sort of profound and unfortunate memory loss, he adds, “Tomioka Yoshiou,” even though his great-grandfather’s surname is the same as his.
The man, who is presumably his great-grandfather, presses his glasses up with…well, with what remains of what should have been two of his fingers and his lips curl into a hard line.
“Yoshikazu’s kid, right?” he says, giving the name of Yoshiou’s father.
And, by now Yoshiou is quite sure that there could be no worse punishment than being in the godforsaken countryside taking care of his apparently senile great-grandfather, so, vowing to do whatever he had to in order to get the hell out of—whatever this is—he swallows his pride, decides to have manners, and merely nods.
Great-Grandpa makes a tch sound in what might be annoyance and then says, “Are you going to come in or are you just letting the fucking bugs in?”
Swallowing any complaint, he mumbles an apology and, shucking off his sneakers, follows the old man in. He makes his way down the hall and Yoshiou notes he’s surprisingly fast for an eighty-something-year-old.
“Hungry?” he asks.
“Yes,” he admits quietly. “Please,” he mumbles as an afterthought.
“Look kid,” he says, not facing forward, “I’m old as shit and half-deaf, so you’ll have to speak louder to me—Giyuu hears better, but he hates noise, so don’t do that shit to him… he’s off, somewhere, though. Either work or some damn doctor’s appointment. Seems to be all there is when you’re old as shit. Bastard still hasn’t learned to explain shit. It’s been almost seventy years, though, so he’ll probably forget to tell me when he dies.”
“Giyuu?” he repeats dumbly. That’s his great-grandfather’s name, after all. And, for a moment, Yoshiou has to decide whether he’s so senile he doesn’t know who he is or if this old person is not, indeed, his great-grandfather at all.
“Uh,” he says eloquently, since the man in front of him doesn’t seem to even acknowledge that he has spoken.
But then the old man stops and peers at him over the thick gold rims of his glasses, and says bluntly, “Your great-grandfather told me you were some kind of punk—my words, not his—” he slid a door open and flicked the light on in what is apparently a darkened kitchen, “—He didn’t mention you were stupid.”
Feeling something white hot boil under his skin, Yoshiou scowls and unthinkingly growls out, “I guess you’re so fucking old you can just say whatever shit you want.”
Then, he snaps his mouth shut, because he hasn’t even been here for twenty minutes and already he’s screwed up.
The geezer puts his elbows on the counter and a grin spreads over his features. His eyes glitter and he says, “I am fucking old, punk, and you better fucking believe I’ve earned the damn right to say exactly what I want… but let me make this clear—even at eighty-three I can still kick your damn ass. And, since you don’t know where the fuck you’ve been sent, let me just say, the only bastard your great-grandfather tolerates talking like that around here is me. And, for the record, he can kick your ass, too.” He opens the fridge and pokes around. “He just isn’t as likely to do it because you’re related and he’s nicer than I am. But if you piss him off, you get to deal with both of us old bastards.”
Then, he none too delicately plonks down a dish of onigiri (8) and grimly pronounces, “Enjoy it. That’s some of the last of the good stuff. Chiyoko’s gone to her husband’s relatives for a month, so you just get whatever Giyuu and I can make.”
Yoshiou makes no move to eat the proffered food.
Rather, bluntly, Yoshiou asks at a fairly loud volume so he is sure he hears, “Who the heck are you?”
He ignores the question and gestures to the onigiri again.
“They’re not poisoned.”
It is immediately clear Yoshiou is not going to get anywhere with him.
Stupidly, Yoshiou remembers the cucumbers and, trying to recover some kind of politeness, he manages to mumble that a lady in town had sent them. And, because whoever this guy is really actually does appear to be half-deaf, he says it three times, finally losing his temper and shouting “THERE ARE CUCUMBERS!” during the last iteration.
He finally takes them saying snidely, “I can fucking see that. I’m slightly deaf, not blind.”
Then, because he really is hungry, Yoshiou defeatedly takes one of the onigiri and eats, while the strange old man who definitely isn’t his great-grandfather—unless he has really, really lost it—bustles around and does something or other. Finally, he sets a cup of tea near him and then consults an oversized gold watch on his wrist.
The crotchety geezer sighs, flicking a look of vague disapproval at him (Yoshiou’s used to that one by now), and sips his own tea. After a moment, his eyes lift and, Yoshiou nearly jumps out of his skin when a voice says behind him, “Ah, you’re here.”
He wheels around and then there is another old man who he hadn’t heard come in at all and Yoshiou himself is definitely not half-deaf.
And, looking at him, Yoshiou thinks he may actually be stupid, because he doesn’t know how he could have confused the other man for his great-grandfather at all. This man has the same eyes as his father and him and, although his hair is steely dark grey and closer cropped than his own (which probably isn’t saying much), it’s very clear who in his family tree Yoshiou resembles. He’s got a camera slung over one shoulder and, from the pinned up sleeve of his blue track suit, it’s immediately clear why his handwriting is so terrible—apparently no one in his family thought it was noteworthy to tell him that Great-Grandpa is missing an arm. But he doesn’t have time for that because the man whose the head of the entire Tomioka Family is looking at Tomioka Yoshiou, the fuck-up, with an inscrutable expression that he hopes is not disgust. Mostly—weirdly—it just appears to be something like blankness.
And then, as he should, because he’s the Family Head and an elder and all that, and, really, Yoshiou supposes he is doing him a favor because he is a screw-up, after all, Yoshiou bows and formally thanks his great-grandfather for caring for him.
When he rises, his great-grandfather puts his hand on his head and smiles—and whoever the other guy is was absolutely right, his great-grandfather is much nicer than he is—and says, “Welcome, Yoshiou” like he’s not so much of a fuck-up at all.
Then he moves past him and asks, “Did Shinazugawa feed you?”
He flicks his eyes over to the other man, and, now having a name for the ornery geezer, hazards, “Shinazugawa-san did offer me food.”
The other man, who thankfully is apparently supposed to be here, grumbles, “Oi, I have some manners” before shoving one of the onigiri into his mouth.
His great-grandfather seems to ignore him and looking down at his luggage, sets his camera upon the counter and picks up Yoshiou’s suitcase, and gives the other man a look and says, “Not enough manners to take him to his room.”
Shinazugawa rolls his eyes at him and grumbles, “I’m not your wife, Giyuu. Do it yourself.”
He gives a brief snort and, with a brief raise of one eyebrow, collects the bag with his shinai, as well, and quips drily, “My wife was a lot prettier.”
And then, since he leaves, Yoshiou supposes he should follow, although the old man doesn’t say so. And Shinazugawa—whoever he is—just keeps eating another onigiri in the surliest way possible.
They are winding their ways through the hallways of the rambling old house before his great-grandfather says quietly, “You practice kendo?”
“Sometimes.” Yoshiou flounders a bit. “I mean, I was supposed to,” he says. Then he admits, because it’s not like the other man doesn’t already know, “I was supposed to do a lot of things.”
And, novelly, without any snide tone or judgement, he simply responds, “I’m aware.”
He thinks back to his father’s insistence that he bring his shinai, and his implication that it has something to do with his great-grandfather. Meanwhile, they must be at what is meant to be his room, as great-grandfather slides open the door to a spare room, with a small, traditional writing desk, a bureau, and a door leading to the house’s engawa.
“You must have done kendo, though, Hi-ojii-san (9),” he says, as he steps inside after him.
The old man frowns and tilts his head to the side in something like confusion, and says, “Never.” Then he sets Yoshiou’s luggage near the bureau, and then he looks up at him, and says without a hint of irony, “I’ve always used a real katana and very different technique.”
Then he continues in the same mild tone that after he’s unpacked and made himself comfortable, he is welcome to come join him and Shinazugawa, whom he apologizes for ahead of time.
Then, Great-Grandfather slides the shoji screen (10) closed behind him and Yoshiou stares after him for a moment thinking—now for a very different reason—he has no idea what kind of place he’s come to.
And, very belatedly, blinking at the space the patriarch of his whole family had just occupied, he wonders, just who the heck his great-grandfather is.
***