La Vie En Rose: Chapter 1 - Part 2

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[Six Years Ago] Winter

The day he was released, it was freezing cold from the morning. The security officer who escorted him to the exit gate gave him a sympathetic look and said, "It's cold out there, you know." When Momota was arrested, it was summer, so he was still wearing a short-sleeved aloha shirt, even though it was the middle of winter. When his release was decided, he could have changed into warmer clothes if his family had prepared them, but his letters went unanswered.

As he stepped through the gate, he was greeted by a blizzard. The snow was so thick that he could barely see ahead. In that white expanse, there wasn’t a single person waiting for him.

He hadn’t received any letters for a year and a half. Although he had expected this, he hadn’t completely given up hope for a "maybe."

The last time he was released, his mother had come to pick him up. They took a taxi to the station and ate eel on the second floor of the station building.

"It must have been tough, right? Three years must have been tough. You’ve learned your lesson now, haven’t you? You won’t do anything bad again, right?"

His mother kept repeating the same things over and over. Despite her repeated warnings, her son ended up in prison twice. It was no wonder she had lost hope in him.

He almost cried but held back. Crying would only make him feel even more pathetic.

As he walked along the sidewalk next to the long, long wall, he managed to hail a taxi. He asked the driver to take him to the JR station. The area around the station was desolate, but there was a discount clothing store. He bought a fleece jacket and a knit cap, and still had change from 3,000 yen.

He had just over 90,000 yen in cash, a combination of the money he had when he was arrested and his work bonus. After pondering in the station waiting room for about an hour, he decided to return to his parents' home.

As his release date approached, he had begun to think that maybe he could help with the family business. His family ran an izakaya on the outskirts of Saitama. In his youth, he had scoffed at the idea of working in a shabby countryside bar. But his perspective began to change after he turned 30. He realized his limitations—or rather, that he didn’t have any particularly outstanding talents.

He had never liked studying. Once he entered high school, he couldn’t keep up with the classes and started skipping school. He fell in with a bad crowd, started staying out all night, and eventually joined a biker gang. Finding school too much of a hassle, he dropped out.

Following the lead of his gang buddies, he moved to Tokyo even though he had no money. He kept shoplifting and extorting people, and while working as a low-level thug for the yakuza, he got hooked on meth.

He was first arrested at 21. One of the thugs was caught, and the rest of them were arrested in a domino effect. He was sentenced to a year and a half in prison, with a three-year suspended sentence.

He had planned to be careful during the three-year probation period, but two months after the sentence, he got caught again. He managed to keep it together for the first month, but eventually caved and started using again. From there, it was a downward spiral. He was caught buying drugs from a foreigner in front of Shibuya Station and was arrested on the spot.

While in prison, he had his first experience with another man. There was an older gay inmate in his cell who kept making advances, and one night, he gave in. Technically, Momota was the one who penetrated, so maybe he "ate" him, but in truth, it felt like he was the one who was "eaten."

The relationship continued until the older man was released, and after leaving prison, Momota only sought out men. Although he could still get aroused by women, he preferred men. He found it more satisfying to pin down another man and make him cry out.

After his release, he worked at construction sites for two or three months. But the daytime work was tough, dirty, and the pay was low. Gradually, he grew frustrated with working and switched to easier, more lucrative night jobs.

He bounced around, working as a pimp and a floor staff member at various pink salons for a few months each. He kept moving because he occasionally embezzled money from the shops. When it looked like he might get caught, he’d grab a large sum of money and run. He changed his name, lied about his age, and moved from one red-light district in Kanagawa to another in Saitama, repeating the same pattern.

At 27, he was arrested again for meth. At the time, he was dating a guy who was a bit off his rocker from being a heavy user, and they were caught during a raid while getting high together. The guy was already being watched by the police, and Momota got caught along with him.

The other guy, being a first-time offender, got probation. But despite Momota's comparatively lighter use, his criminal record earned him a three-and-a-half-year prison sentence. It was a harsh outcome.

During his time in prison, with endless hours to reflect, Momota realized something: in the eyes of society, he was probably a "loser." But even among the losers in prison, he was treated like dirt. He was weak, cried easily, and was mocked for being all talk. The strong inmates often took his food or made him run errands. His treatment inside the prison walls was no different from how he was treated outside.

In his second year in prison, after writing home to say that he’d lost his chance for early release because he was caught gambling with other inmates, his parents, who had visited him monthly, stopped coming. He sent letters, but there was no reply, and it really got to him. It felt like even his own parents had given up on him, let alone society.

But this time, it was different. He had truly reflected. He swore to himself that he would work honestly and become a person who didn’t have to live in shame. He was convinced he could turn his life around. This was the first time he had ever felt this determined.

By the time he got on the train, the blizzard had subsided, and the snowfall was easing up. As he crossed the prefectural border, the snow turned into rain. He thought he might have to buy an umbrella, but by the time he got off the express train and transferred to the local line, the rain had stopped.

He arrived at the station closest to his home. It felt awkward to return from prison with no gift, so he bought a large box of local specialty manju as a token.

It was still cold outside, but compared to the blizzard in just an aloha shirt, it was nothing.

Holding the souvenir in one hand and pulling his knit cap down low, he walked the road back home. He hadn’t returned home even once since he left like a runaway.

The surroundings had changed, yet they hadn’t. Memories mixed with new elements, making it feel like he had slipped through time. Despite how much he had once dreaded returning to this countryside, seeing the old house again made him happy, while the memories of buildings that were no longer there filled him with a sense of loss.

When someone approached from the opposite direction, he looked down to avoid being recognized. Before he left home, he had done all sorts of things—fighting, breaking other people’s stuff, stealing. He didn’t want to run into anyone who might remember him from back then.

It was a ten-minute walk from the station. When he reached the edge of the shopping district, he couldn’t believe his eyes. The shabby izakaya his parents had run had transformed into a trendy café. He wondered if he had taken the wrong road, but the shops on either side were familiar. There was no way he could mistake the place where he had spent the first seventeen years of his life.

He walked back and forth in front of the café three times, but all the waitresses were young girls. The izakaya hadn’t been very popular even back when Momota was still around. Perhaps his father had finally decided to modernize the place.

When he entered the café, a young girl quickly approached him, saying, "Welcome!"

"A table for one? Do you smoke?"

After three years, he was experiencing the ordinary life of being treated like a normal person. Savoring the feeling of being back in the free world and with his stomach growling, he ordered spaghetti. When the waitress came to take his order, he asked, "Wasn’t there an izakaya here before? Do you know anything about it?"

She tilted her head and replied, "I’m not sure..." He also asked for the owner’s name, but it wasn’t his father or mother.

As he ate, he thought about it. Both of his parents were quite old. It wouldn’t be surprising if they had closed the izakaya because the work had become too much for them. But if they had closed the shop, why hadn’t they told him? The shop had a residence on the second floor. If they had moved, why hadn’t they informed him of their new address?

His chest filled with unease, and even though he was hungry, he couldn’t finish his meal. Maybe they had used closing the shop as an excuse to erase their troublesome son from their lives.

No, that couldn’t be, he told himself. His mother, at least, had always been lenient with her wayward son. Even when he was in Tokyo, if he called crying because he was out of money, she would send him some. When he was in prison, she regularly visited and brought him money. She might have been disappointed by the gambling incident in prison, but that was something everyone did. He had just been unlucky enough to get caught.

Maybe he should ask someone in the neighborhood where his parents had gone. The people in this shopping district had always been close-knit. Someone might know where his parents had moved.

Even though the spaghetti wasn’t bad, he left half of it on the plate and walked out of the café. Many of the shops in the shopping district were familiar, but he found it hard to approach them. All he could think about was the time he shoplifted from that store or broke the sign at another.

As he walked through the middle of the shopping district, he spotted a bakery run by a childhood friend’s family. He had been close to Renji, the son of the bakery owners. Renji didn’t like studying either, and though they went to different high schools, they often hung out together.

He entered the bakery and headed straight to the register. He was relieved to see a young girl working there. If it had been Renji’s parents, they might have given him a dirty look, but this girl probably didn’t know who he was. As expected, she smiled brightly and said, "You’re here to see Renji, right? He’s in the kitchen; I’ll go get him."

When Renji emerged from the back, he was wearing a white work uniform like a chef’s. As soon as he saw Momota, he made a face as if he had just bitten into something bitter.

"It’s been a while," Momota greeted him.

"Yeah, it has," Renji replied, almost mechanically.

Momota remembered that the last time they had met was when he had shaken Renji down for money. He had been in a tight spot and needed cash desperately, so he had no choice but to target his old friend. But even then, it was just a few thousand yen, the typical amount a high schooler might have on him.

"Hey, I came back after a long time, but my house is gone. Do you know where my parents went?"

Renji stared at him for a moment without saying anything. The awkward silence was interrupted when a customer entered the store.

"Let’s talk outside," Renji said, pointing to the door.

Momota silently followed the white-clad figure as they walked out of the shop. Renji didn’t stop at the front of the store but continued through the shopping district, crossed the street, and walked down to the riverside promenade. Leaning against the railing, Renji pulled a cigarette from his breast pocket and lit it.

"You became a baker?" Momota asked.

Renji gave a shallow nod. "Yeah."

"Wow, you used to say you hated the idea of being a baker. Whatever happened to wanting to be a foreign car dealer?"

"...What era are you living in?" Renji spat out, taking a drag of his cigarette. Momota noticed that Renji's pinky was sticking out, making him look a bit like a caricature of an effeminate person, but with Renji clearly in a foul mood, Momota didn’t dare mention it.

"And what about you? What have you been up to all this time?"

The question was turned back on him.

"Me? Well... sales. I've been doing sales. You know, door-to-door stuff like health products and supplements."

He couldn't admit that he had been in prison, so he lied.

"Sales? In prison?"

Startled, Momota turned around. Renji was staring at him with eyes as cold as ice.

"You weren’t even at your parents' funerals. Well, I guess if you were in prison, you couldn’t have come."

Momota's mind went blank. His fingertips went cold, and his whole body trembled.

"Wha—what do you mean, funerals? You mean they died? No way, it can’t be true, right? Answer me, Renji!"

He grabbed his childhood friend by the collar, demanding answers. Renji's icy gaze softened slightly with a hint of sympathy.

"I think it was a little over a year ago. I heard they had an accident on their way to a trip."

"...That’s not true."

"It is."

"No, it’s not! No!"

Even as he kept denying it, a part of him knew the truth. This wasn't a lie; it was reality.

Renji twisted his body, causing Momota's grip on his collar to loosen. His hands dropped to his sides, and the box of manju he had bought fell to the ground with a thud.

"This... can't be happening. Why didn’t anyone tell me? Not even my brother..."

Then it hit him—this was his brother's doing. His older brother, five years his senior, had graduated from a prestigious national university and worked for a well-known company in Tokyo. Momota had always been compared to his brother, who was diligent and meticulous, growing up. But rather than just disliking Momota, his brother had despised him.

When Momota dropped out of high school and wasted his days as a low-level thug in a biker gang, his brother had once looked him in the eye and said, "You should just die." That was the day Momota left home and never returned.

"It was shortly after your parents died that the izakaya was torn down. Your brother was living in Tokyo and had no intention of taking over the business. The building was too old to rent out, so they just demolished it."

Memories of his parents flooded Momota's mind, like a montage playing out before him. He remembered holding his father's hand as they went to a festival, clinging to the bridge railing in tears as his mother struggled to drag him to the hospital... Memories he thought were long forgotten surged forth, and his chest ached as tears welled up.

"I hate to interrupt your nostalgia, but do you remember what happened when we were in our second year of high school?"

Renji's words barely registered.

"I'm talking about when you had those gang members shake me down for money. You disappeared right after calling me out, so you probably don’t know what kind of beating I took afterward."

Momota lifted his tear-streaked face.

"Because I didn’t have much money on me, they got pissed and beat me to a pulp. They broke four of my front teeth, shattered my nose, and my face was a bloody mess. Three of my ribs were broken, my left leg was fractured, and I had a complicated fracture in my right pinky. The nerves were damaged, so I still can’t bend it."

Momota remembered calling Renji out, but he hadn’t cared what happened after. He never even asked.

"Every time I see my pinky, I’m reminded of that day. I thought I was going to die, got so scared I wet myself while they beat me. After I was hospitalized, my old man stormed over to your house... and he said your parents were on their knees, crying, begging for forgiveness."

Renji flicked the ash from his cigarette. His right pinky, slightly crooked, stuck out like an effeminate gesture.

"I always thought of you as a friend, even though we were up to no good. But I guess that was just me, huh?"

Renji looked up and saw Momota, now crying with snot running down his face.

"Don’t ever come back to my place again."

...There was nothing Momota could say.

◇:-:◆:-:◇

On the outskirts of town, after nearly twenty minutes of walking up a gentle slope, he finally reached the temple. He had reluctantly visited a few times as a child, dragged along by his parents.

He passed through the rustic gate and walked among the clusters of gravestones. His memories were hazy, and he had to peer closely at several gravestones before he finally found his family’s.

On the side of the gravestone, freshly engraved in black paint, were his parents’ names. They had both been the same age and passed away at sixty-two.

“I bought these big ones, but...”

Momota placed the slightly squashed box of manju in front of the grave.

“You used to say you liked these... But now that you can’t eat them, it’s pointless, huh?”

The sun had already begun to dip in the west, and a light breeze had picked up. The leaves rustled with a lonely sound. No matter what he said, it was just talking to himself. The bones wouldn’t respond.

“I was planning to help out with the shop...”

But it was all too late. Much too late. Momota’s knees buckled, and he collapsed in a squat. Tears flowed uncontrollably. In the deserted temple grounds at dusk, Momota cried loudly, like a child.

He left the temple before the sun fully set. To hide his swollen, stinging eyes, he pulled his hat low over his face and headed straight for the station. He bought a ticket to Tokyo.

He didn’t know his brother’s address—he had never asked. But he knew his brother lived in Tokyo and remembered the name of the company he worked for.

The scenery outside the train window was completely dark. Whether it was streetlights or the lights from houses, the glimmers of light flew past, fading into the distance.

No matter how much he hated him, they were still the only two brothers. His brother should have at least informed him about their parents’ deaths. And to top it all off, he had sold the family home without a second thought. Didn’t that stiff-necked jerk realize that when his brother got out of prison, he would have nowhere to return to?

Momota clenched his teeth. There was no way his smart brother hadn’t noticed. He must have done it all knowing that his younger brother would be left out in the cold. A deep anger welled up from within. He wouldn’t be able to calm down unless he landed at least one punch when they met.

He arrived at Shinjuku Station just after 7 PM. He found a nearby manga café with internet access and searched for the company name. Thanks to an ex who was a junkie and also a programmer, Momota had picked up enough skills to use a computer for basic tasks like searching the web, even though he didn’t own one himself. The company, Mouri Corporation, had several branches in and out of Tokyo, but its headquarters were in Nishi-Shinjuku.

By the time he reached the headquarters building, it was past 8:30 PM. He chose the headquarters because it was within walking distance and because he figured they could help him locate his brother, even if he worked at another branch.

The Mouri Corporation building was so large that it made Momota feel small and out of place. The enormous white building, so tall he couldn’t count the floors, pierced the night sky like a towering pillar, never darkening.

About 20% of the windows were still lit. There were still people inside. As he approached the entrance, Momota hesitated, intimidated by the grandness of the place. The vast glass façade, marble-like floors, and incomprehensible art installations all seemed to tell him, "This is no place for someone like you."

He shook off his hesitation and rushed inside. The entrance hall was dimly lit in spots, with the reception desk at the center darkened and a sign displayed that read, "Business hours have ended for today." It would have been smarter to return tomorrow, but the urge to find his brother was overwhelming.

He thought about asking someone for help, but there wasn’t a single person around. He walked over to the elevator on his right and pressed the button. The light on the 42nd floor slowly descended. Frustrated by the wait, he looked around for the stairs but couldn’t find them.

“Hey, you there.”

He turned around at the sound of a voice. A middle-aged man, probably in his fifties, dressed in a blue uniform and holding a flashlight, stood nearby. Momota immediately recognized it as a security guard’s uniform, but the color and style reminded him of the police, making his heart skip a beat.

“Do you work here?”

“Yeah, sort of...”

Even in the dim light, he could tell the man’s expression was suspicious.

“May I ask which department you’re with?”

“Sales.”

He lied again, figuring that sales was a plausible department in a company like Mouri Corporation, which dealt in everything from food to clothing.

“Can I see your ID card?”

For a moment, Momota didn’t understand what he was being asked.

“Your ID card. Everyone in the company carries one, right?”

“I... uh, I left it at home...”

The security guard’s eyebrows knitted together in open distrust.

“I’m going to have to ask you to come with me.”

...The lie was exposed. Momota bolted for the entrance, but the middle-aged guard moved faster. The man spread his arms wide, blocking the way.

“What are you sneaking into this building for? Are you a thief? A spy?”

Momota tried to push past the guard on his left side, but the man grabbed his arm.

“Let go of me!”

Momota struggled to break free, but the guard’s grip was surprisingly strong, his fingers digging in like chains. As Momota flailed his arms, the guard yanked him close. In that moment, Momota’s body was lifted off the ground.

He landed hard on his back with a thud. The impact and pain knocked the wind out of him. Before he could resist, he was pinned face-down, with the guard’s weight pressing down on his back.

“Get off me, damn it!”

He thrashed his arms and legs wildly.

“Stop resisting! Stay still!”

As he squirmed like a shrimp under the guard’s weight, he heard the elevator arrive with a ‘ding.’

“What’s going on here?”

Footsteps approached, and a pair of black shoes entered his field of vision. Twisting his neck to look up, he saw two men, roughly his age, standing over him.

“This man trespassed. Call the police.”

The word "police" triggered a reaction before he could think.

“No, please don’t call the police! I’m just here to meet someone. There’s a man named Shigeru Momota who works at this company. He’s my brother!”

He shouted loudly. One of the men in suits leaned toward the other and whispered, “Shigeru Momota? Isn’t he the head of the general affairs department?”

"I don't care about the position or whatever. I just need to meet Shigeru Momota. Just tell him Yasuo Momota is here, and he'll understand," he shouted, his voice echoing through the entrance. After that, silence fell over the lobby. The man in the suit pulled out his cellphone, and the faint beeping of his fingers tapping the screen could be heard.

"Is this Ms. Azuchi? This is Souya from HR. Sorry to bother you, but do you know if Manager Momota is still at the office? Oh, he is? Right... So, there’s someone here in the lobby claiming to be a relative of his. A man named Yasuo Momota. I was wondering if the manager might know him... Uh-huh... I see, understood."

The man hung up the phone. 

"The manager said he'll come down to the lobby shortly. Could you please wait a moment?" 

The man who had pinned him down finally got up. As Momota stood, he clicked his tongue loudly and shot an irritated glare at the middle-aged security guard, who looked somewhat embarrassed. 

Before long, his brother Shigeru Momota appeared from the elevator. The security guard had vanished at some point, and Shigeru exchanged a few words with the man in the suit. The man gave a small, apologetic bow before disappearing across the lobby.

Shigeru turned around to face him. His dark blue suit was crisp, a green tie neatly knotted, his hair cut short and tidy. Just standing there, he exuded an odd, intimidating aura. In contrast, the younger Momota felt out of place in the atmosphere of the lobby, where his brother seemed to fit in effortlessly.

He had thought of all the things he wanted to say when he finally met his brother, but now that he was standing right in front of him, the words stuck in his throat.

It had been thirteen long years since they last saw each other—since he had left home at seventeen. Neither time he went to prison had his brother visited him even once.

"...I got out today."

His brother responded with a simple "Oh," as if he couldn't care less. The uninterested look on his face and the dismissive tone reignited the anger that Momota had momentarily forgotten.

"You’re something else, you know that? How could you not tell me when Mom and Dad died?" he shouted.

His brother shrugged casually. 

"Even if you had known, you wouldn't have been able to attend the funeral."

Momota stomped the floor in frustration. 

"It’s not about attending or not! Our parents died; I had the right to know. And what the hell—selling the house? You did whatever you damn well pleased!"

His angry voice echoed through the dimly lit lobby, but no matter how much fury he unleashed, his brother's calm demeanor remained unchanged.

"Oh, I see. You came here for the inheritance, didn't you?" 

"That’s not it!" 

"Father had debts," his brother replied.

Momota's eyes widened. 

"What?"

"The shop had been struggling for a long time. The death insurance and the money from selling the shop went to paying off the debt, but there was still a hundred thousand short. I paid the difference. How about you cover half of Dad's remaining debt? We’re brothers, so it’s only fair to split the debt evenly, right?"

Momota’s head sank low. Being suddenly told to pay fifty thousand was impossible; all he had was eighty-two thousand yen in his pocket, nowhere near enough. As he stayed silent, unable to speak, he heard a soft chuckle. 

"Don’t take my joke seriously. No one expects anything from you."

The words pierced his chest like a dagger.

"I never thought I'd see you again, but since we’re here, I’ll tell you. Let’s cut ties as brothers from today onward." 

Momota gritted his teeth.

"I don’t want you involved in my life, and I don’t want to be involved in yours. It’d be easier to just think I never had a brother like you."

This is wrong… it’s not supposed to be like this. Momota clenched his fists tightly. He was the one who was angry. His brother was the one at fault—he hadn’t even told him about their parents’ deaths. And yet, why did he feel so defeated? Why did he have to feel more pain when he was already hurting this much? This wasn’t fair.

"Good! I’m relieved to be free of a bastard like you!" he yelled, almost like a scream.

For just a second, his brother's indifferent face twitched, but then it quickly returned to normal.

"Then this is it," Shigeru said, turning on his heel and heading toward the elevator. 

They hadn’t seen each other for so long. He hadn’t even wanted to see him. He still hated him, and yet, despite himself, he wished his brother would turn around.

As if hearing his silent plea, his brother stopped and turned. Momota's heart trembled.

"Do you know how Mom and Dad died?" his brother asked quietly.

"They got into an accident while traveling... Renji told me."

A brief silence followed. His brother's lips moved slowly.

"...They were on their way to Nagano Prison by car."

Momota held his breath.

"Why didn't you just die?" his brother said flatly.

Even after the sound of his footsteps disappeared, Momota couldn't move. His feet carried him out of the chilly lobby and into the street. He wandered left, then right, stumbling as if he were drunk. A passerby shot him a glance filled with annoyance. He didn’t know where he was walking, or where he wanted to go. His feet just moved on their own.

His head was pounding, about to burst, and he didn’t want to think about anything. Thinking would be dangerous. He felt sick, a nauseous wave building up inside. Unable to bear it, he dashed into a narrow alley between two buildings and threw up.

After he had finished, he began to walk again. The light around him slowly faded, and he stumbled through the darkened streets. His legs gave out, and he collapsed. The ground beneath him wasn't concrete but dirt, a gritty sensation filling his mouth.

He lay face down like a dead man. Shadows of low things filled his vision: a sandbox, a slide, a bench… A cat crossed in front of him. Suddenly, his nose tickled, and he let out a big sneeze, startling the cat into sprinting away. He laughed; then his laughter turned into sobs, and he cried loudly.

"Is this all my fault? Are you saying it's all my fault…?"

Just like his bastard brother said, maybe he should’ve died. Should’ve died a junkie. It’s not like he had any dreams or ambitions left. Nothing mattered anymore, not really.

The future he had never imagined when he walked out of Nagano Prison that morning—the reality he had unknowingly brought upon himself—quietly crushed him.

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