OMG guys this is IT!
Once they were gone, I began pacing back and forth.
"Stop that, Rika," Mom said, seated in front of her laptop once again.
"I-I can't!" I said. "You're the one - Why did you have to ask him to go?"
"He'll be fine," she replied. "Sit down, and I'll tell you about Kimiko."
"What about Kimiko?" I asked, pausing. Did it have to do with the whole Kimiko-isn't-the-heir thing?
"Sit down and I'll tell you."
Masahiko seemed frozen when I sat down. I glanced at him. "Uh, Masa-san, would you like some tea? Something to drink?"
He turned to me and forced a smile. "No. It's okay. I'm fine."
Mom looked at him and must have understood my concern. "Don't worry, Kitano-kun, what I'm about to say shouldn't change your opinion of Kimiko. It's more about her family history."
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shouldn't change your opinion of Kimiko. It's more about her family history."
Family history? Then it does have something to do with how she isn't Mom's real daughter! "Tell me!" I said, leaning forward impatiently.
Mom nodded and set her laptop aside. "Let me begin with your aunt."
Aunt?
"Setsuko, my younger sister, liked the arts. She enjoyed painting the most, although she wasn't exceptionally good at it. She was talented with musical instruments though. Well, since I was already going to inherit the entire family business, she was free to study and do whatever she wanted to. So Setsuko chose to go into the arts.
"She went to an art school that was a part of a larger school. There, in her first year of college, she met a charming, young man. He was handsome, and tall, and kind. And he wooed her quite quickly. They started going out, and we - your grandparents and I - learned that he was studying business. That his family used to have a small bookstore, but that store went bankrupt a few years ago.
"He was studying business in the hopes of starting his own business. If I recall correctly, he wanted to open a coffee shop. When he came over the first time and told us of this idea, I told him it was stupid. His coffee shop would need something extremely unique and special to survive against those chain stores these days.
"Well that's not important. What is important is that the two of them dated steadily, and my sister was happy. In their third year of college, he proposed; she accepted. They got married with a small ceremony. My parents didn't care that she was marrying a less-than middle class man as long as she was happy.
