Romance Vaccine Extra Story to rewrite the past (XNUMX)

On the weekend, Ina drove a car and headed to the tip of the peninsula where the lighthouse can be seen again.

Maki is in the passenger seat, and Hikari is in the back seat.

It is dotted with pine forests.

In the Edo and Meiji periods, this area was a fishing village, and the old roads, which may be the remains of the highways of those days, twist and cross here and there.

An island can be seen beyond the green sea.

It's a small island with a population of only a few hundred.

Ina used to go there once by ferry.

The sea breeze was strong, and it was a rustic island with nothing to see except the souvenir shops on the wharf.

There is a parking lot and several restaurants near the wharf where the ferry to the island leaves.

Looking up, the white hotel I went to with Maki the other day was on top of the cape hill.

That area was developed as a resort during the bubble period, but the area I'm visiting today is an old townscape.

Ina parked the car and the three of them headed to a restaurant.

I had contacted him, so an old man was waiting in front of the entrance.

The old man's name was Otabuchi.

He used to farm fish and run a fishery processing factory, but he retired and lives a leisurely life helping out at this small restaurant run by his wife, who is a little older than him.

Ina and Odabuchi met for the first time in a developing country in Asia.

Ina was dispatched as a doctor, and Otabuchi was dispatched by different support organizations to teach aquaculture techniques.

At that time, Ina was still young and burning with enthusiasm as a doctor, but she was troubled by private issues.

Wanting to make a breakthrough in his own way, he volunteered to apply for short-term medical support activities in this country where civil war continued.

Otabuchi, on the other hand, has been familiar with the area by teaching local young people about aquaculture techniques for nearly two years.

Otabuchi welcomed Ina and the others and held a barbecue at the beach.

After drinking, Ina suddenly burst into tears while looking at the distant horizon in a foreign land.

At that time, Ina was living separately from his wife and children, and divorce was only a matter of time.

Ina has devoted herself to emergency medicine with passion, and has given top priority to everything, but what remains as a result?

Patients may have thanked me, but I couldn't make my family happy.

Despite this, he didn't learn anything, or rather, he left Japan as if he was running away, and is working hard for a stranger in a far foreign land.
complacency, deceit, and hypocrisy are also extreme.

It's not the time to do this, spending more time with young children and making your own family happy first should be your top priority as a person.

As a doctor, you are the worst human being.

I kept blaming myself.

Once the dam is broken, the tears won't stop.

I cried.

I don't remember much about what happened after that, as I wondered if I got really drunk from the unfamiliar foreign liquor.

Odabuchi hugged Ina, who had just met him for the first time, and said that he understands, that he too had a divorced child that he had not seen for a long time, that all the people here were the same, that they were suffering at the expense of something rather than being beautiful.

The next morning, I had a strong hangover and a severe headache.

However, in this case, Ina and Odabuchi probably got along well, and though they were two completely different occupations and lived in different worlds, even after returning to Japan, their exchanges continued on occasion.

Even after returning to Japan, Odabuchi continued volunteering by accepting poor young people from foreign countries for training at his factory.

Odabuchi himself had heard that he was raised in poverty and could not go to high school, but Ina respected him as a great person.

It's a perfect way to introduce the light that you've never met a decent adult.

Ina wanted to bring these two people face to face and see how Odabuchi opened his heart to the light up close.

On the beach of the cape nearing the end of summer, hiragana blooms here and there.

The flower language of the afternoon glory is "bond".

It seems that it is because the underground stem spreads and connects.

similar to human relationships.Flowers and flowers are connected underground.

The same is true of the human mind.

I told Otabuchi the general story over the phone and the purpose of taking the two young men.

I honestly confessed that I used a dating club and that it was a connection with a woman I met there.

Odabuchi swallowed up the situation like that.

Odabuchi guides the four to a private room with a view of the sea, and is greatly delighted to see Ina's face, whom he has not seen in several years.

When Ina saw Odabuchi, she felt old.

I heard that he had surgery last year to cut his stomach, and that he will have cataract surgery next month.

Ina and Odabuchi enjoyed the old tales as they drank sake while looking at the green sea beyond the window.

The two young men act as listeners.

It's interesting because the story of the world different from ours continues.

- So, um, let's talk about my parents.I think my father and my mother were wonderful people when I think about it now.ー

After an hour of pleasant chatting and calming down, Otabuchi began.

- My family was poor.But I respect my father and I really appreciate him.ー

-Wait a minute.ー

Ina pinches her mouth.

- I know that Mr. Odabuchi was poor and had a hard time, but he worked hard and succeeded in his business, and on top of that, he supported poor young people overseas.
I brought in a young man who was wondering where that richness of mind, or rather, something like leeway, came from.
If the flow of the story goes like, "I'm poor, but I was blessed with my parents," Hikaru, who was poor and had bad luck with his parents, would have no salvation.ー

Grandpa, you look drunk.

I wonder if I've grown down.

Was it just my imagination that Ina felt that her heart had been saved in the past?

Ina became worried.

Whether he was listening to Ina or not, Odabuchi lit a cigarette and smoked with a smile on his face.

Then, looking at Maki's young and abundant breasts, he said.

- Miss, you have nice breasts.ー

Ina takes the place of Maki, who is at a loss for what to say with an embarrassed smile.

ーWhat is it, Mr. Odabuchi, did you like big breasts?ー

-I'm...

Odabuchi puffs on his cigarette again.And he continued.

-I grew up in Shigeyu.Do you know what heavy water is?The one that melted potato starch.
That's why I like boobs.
I think all the kids who grew up on baby bottles like boobs.ー

-Odabuchi-san's mother, did you mean that your milk didn't come out?ー

ーYou were the sixth of eight siblings.My mother was old and malnourished.
There's an island you can see from the pier over there, I grew up there.My father was a fisherman.ー

- That's right.So you live here now?ー

Odabuchi agreed and nodded.

ーI was almost killed by my father once.
I have a bad drinking habit.When I get into a fight with my mom, I throw everything at her.
He threw a liquor bottle and it just hit the pillar next to my head.
The broken glass cut the skin of my head roughly and blood flowed.
I was five years old.Do you have a bald scar here?ー

Saying that, Odabuchi held out his head.

There is certainly a scar about XNUMX cm wide and XNUMX cm long.

-My younger brother and sister didn't see me just because they were there.I think he died early.ー

Odabuchi smokes again.

ーPerhaps they were thinned out.I was poor anyway.ー

Neither Maki nor Kou said anything.

Ina doesn't know what to do with her hand.

- Well, but.ー

Odabuchi continued.

- Overall, I think your father was a good man.
You're a good fisherman.When he caught a fish, he tied it around his waist and came up, but the shark was looking for his prey and gouged him around his right thigh.
Even so, he went out fishing every day to support our six children.ー

Light interjected for the first time.

- That's right.When I talk about my father, everyone says they feel sorry for me, but I don't hate him.ー

Without even nodding, Odabuchi continued as if he was talking to himself.

It seems that the alcohol has been around for quite a while.

-I used to play all the time in elementary school, but in middle school I was the best.
Since it's an island junior high school, there weren't even XNUMX students, but I was still the best for three years.
When I told my parents that I wanted to go to high school, they said they would let me go if I took the best high school in the prefecture and passed.
So I studied hard, took the exam, and passed.
And what do you think I said, Dad?

"You idiot, there's no way you have that kind of money at home. You didn't seem to know the language of the frog ocean in the well, so I let you take the exam to teach you."

I mean, you never thought I'd pass.

"But did I get it?"

If you say that, things will fly again.ー

Ina had heard that Odabuchi couldn't go to high school due to family circumstances, but he took the high school exam and passed.

Was that the case?

- But I think your father had a hard time too.
He's a cute kid, so I would have liked to have let him go to high school if I could.
When I think about it, I now realize that I was really immature and did something bad to my parents when I forced myself to go to high school.ー

the light is nodding

- When my father died of pancreatic cancer.
Even though my father was bitten by a shark, he didn't even change his complexion.
I went to the hospital every day after work.
I thought there was no god.
Why should such a poor man, who earnestly went out fishing every day and worked honestly for the rest of his life, be treated like this?
My mother's life was much more difficult.
It's all about luck in the world.
After graduating from junior high school, I was sent to work as an apprentice, but at first I was reluctant to do the work, but I found it interesting.
Sometimes I feel like my dad and mom left me without using their luck.ー

You can see the sea outside the window, and a cargo ship is slowly advancing in the distance.

The sea is very calm in the afternoon, and the waves glisten in the reflection of the sun.

By the time the sun sets, the distant horizon will be dyed madder red.

Ina was shaken by an indescribable feeling.

Odabuchi said, "I was blessed with good parents."

In particular, his father, who had a bad drinking habit, threw things at Odabuchi and seriously injured him.

It is true that it was because I was poor, but it is hard to say that I was blessed.

However, in Otabuchi's mind, something has been rewritten to say that they were good parents.

There must have been some kindness in his life with his family, because he was a parent and child, and it might have been a little episode or conversation that Odabuchi himself had forgotten, but it seemed like he was amplifying and embellishing the impression of such good memories to the limit.

Is it possible to change the interpretation of the past to your own convenience without changing the facts themselves?

In an attempt to overcome the trauma of being raped by Maki, with the help of Ina and Hikaru, Otabuchi seems to have slowly and unconsciously accomplished what he was trying to do, so to speak, overwriting the past.

The past can be changed.

The human mind has that power.

to survive.

What Hikaru needs is not to sympathize and criticize his father for being a terrible person, but to help him keep telling his unconscious mind that there were good things about Hikaru's father, that Hikaru was happy.

As a result, the interpretation of the past, and in turn the past itself, is rewritten, leading to natural healing.

A stable balance comes into play, if not a cure.

It is the most necessary thing to live in the future.

The future cannot be changed.

The only thing that can be rewritten is the past.

Only by doing so will the future of light open up.

I don't know if Odabuchi is conscious of this or not, but in any case, they share the unspoken rule of affirming each other's fathers, who, from the perspective of others, can never be said to have been blessed.

Odabuchi must have told the light that there is only one way.

The cargo ship outside the window suddenly disappeared from sight.

It was such a slow movement, but before I knew it, it had passed like life.

You can hear the faint cries of seabirds and the sound of waves in the distance, but it might just be your imagination.

It was a quiet summer afternoon.