ITADAKIMASU!
“Thanks for the food!”
Lowering my hands, I picked up my bowl. It had rice with an egg yolk on top of it. I poked it with my chopsticks, letting it drool over my rice. Akiho, sitting to my left, leaned over to one side and picked up a small bento box, the same one from earlier, and placed it on the table. “Here! I brought dessert!”
“Ah! Thank you very much!” my mother said.
I leaned forward as Akiho opened the box. Inside were round, soft balls of white. “Red bean paste mochi!” she said.
“Wow, did you make these?!”
Akiho chuckled a little, putting a hand behind her head. “No, I bought them. I can’t make these!”
“That’s okay! Thank you very much!”
Sliding the box forward on the table, she briefly shuffled it back and forth between her left and right side. It looked like she wanted to put it between Mother and I, but because we sat across the table from each other, there wasn’t a good spot. Mother said it was fine to leave it in our corner of the table.
I mixed my rice and began the first few minutes of the meal silent, eating the food while it was hot. Mom started talking with us right away, but I did not join in. Akiho did most of the talking.
“And are you in any clubs?”
“Yes! Martial arts.”
“You don’t say! What kind of martial arts?”
“Kendo!”
“Ah, amazing!”
I knew my mother knew these details already. I put a strip of beef in my mouth and sucked on it a little, wondering why she was being so superficial.
“Is that what you want to do when you grow up?” she continued.
“I don’t know. I don’t think I can get a job in kendo.”
“Ah, I see.”
“With my luck, I’ll probably be stuck at a convenient store.” Akiho seemed to lament a little.
“Well, you never know. It’s never been a better time to explore a little. Stretch your wings. When I was in school, I didn’t imagine I would be doing the work I did.”
Akiho sat up. “You work, Mrs. Sasaki?”
I eyed my friend. If she noticed, she didn’t pay any attention.
“I used to be a teacher at your school, up until I had Rose.”
“Oh wow! I didn’t know that!”
“So was Dad,” I threw in.
“Really?!” Akiho turned “Your dad, too?”
“Not anymore.”
“That’s right,” my mother added, raising her bowl to her mouth. “He moved on to a university lab, then a corporate company.”
“Wow!” she looked back and forth, returning to me. “Your family is really into school, huh?”
I pulled my head back, giving her a baffled look. “Heh? Is that a bad thing?”
“Of course not!”
“I met Rose’s Father at your school,” said Mother after swallowing a bite.
“Heh?!”
“Mr. Sasaki is a foreigner, even though he is Japanese. When he first came here, he was teaching English at your school.”
“Yeah, Rose told me Mr. Sasaki is from America,” Akiho readjusted her pillow, bringing her feet forward to sit cross-legged. “But I didn’t know he taught at our school!”
“Not for very long.”
“Really?”
“But, Mr. Sasaki still keeps in touch with some of the teachers at the school. We both do.”
“Ah, that’s great!” Akiho scooped up a bite of rice and nothing else. She didn’t even finish chewing before another thought came up. “Then, do you want to go back?”
“No, I don’t think so,” my mother said with a shake of her head and a smile. “When Rose graduates, I think I want to start a flower shop.”
“Oh, cool!”
The table fell silent for a brief moment. Mother took the moment to look over at my bowl. Seeing I had only rice and broccoli at the moment, she reminded me to eat the beef.
“I have,” I protested.
“Eat some more. There’s plenty.”
“I will, don’t worry.” Hiding my face behind my bowl, I bit into a broccoli head.
“Mrs. Sasaki,” Akiho began. “What’s it like being a mother at home?”
“Ah… It’s hard work.” Mother lowered her bowl. “Especially when your kids are young. They will need more of your attention during that time, and you will lose a lot of sleep.”
“I see.”
I looked up at my friend. The enthusiasm she normally wore was tempered down.
“If you want to work while having kids, then it will be very difficult. It will be nearly impossible to care for them.”
“Yes.”
I wondered what purpose Akiho was trying to get. I didn’t look up again, feeling the awkwardness of the conversation.
“But, you do what you must. I don’t want to discourage what you do. I only had one child, but I know other mothers who had two, or even three.”
“Three?!”
“Unexpected twins.”
“Oh, I see!”
Setting down my empty bowl, I did nothing but stare at the center of the table.
“Here, you two. There is soup as well.” Mother lifted a second set of bowls from the empty side of the table and placed them near Akiho. She pushed one of them further, a bit closer to me.
“Ah! Thank you very much!” Akiho accepted. She stretched her fingers along the rim of my bowl and finished sliding it over to me.
“Thanks,” I said, leaning back as I took off the cover. It still had some steam left, but I could tell it had cooled down a lot.
“There’s still plenty of beef as well,” Mother reminded us as she took some for herself.
“Okay! I’ll have some!” Setting down her cover, Akiho picked back up her chopsticks and took a few more strips.
“Rose. The last two are for you.”
I nodded. “After my soup.”