Neighborhood became problem

. “I’mgoing to school. I told you yesterday that today was the start of the school

year, didn’t I?”

“Ohhh… Then… then…” Sprawled on the futon, she spoke as if on the

verge of tears. “Then, what about my lunch…? What about my bento…? I

can’t smell that bento smell! Ryu-chan, didn’t you make me one?”

“Nope.”

“Wahhh! What’ll I do when I wake up? There’s nothing to eat!”

“I’ll be home before you’re awake. Today’s just the opening

ceremonies.”

“Oh…that’s all, huh?” She laughed, knocking her feet together. Clap clap

clap clap! She used her feet to give him a standing ovation…or maybe a

sprawling ovation.

“The opening ceremony, huh? Congratulations! That means you’re a

second-year student, starting today.”

“Never mind that. Didn’t I tell you to at least wipe off your makeup

before bed? You kept saying it was too much trouble, so I even bought you

those easy-cleaning wipes… Argh, there’s foundation all over the pillowcase

again! This stuff doesn’t come out in the wash, you know! And who knows

what’ll happen to your skin—you’re old enough to know better.”

“Sorrryyyy.”

She got up as-is, fully exposing her leopard print panties, large chest

jiggling. Wavy, mostly-blonde hair fell across the valley of her chest in a

tangled, disheveled mess. She oozed “femininity” as she brushed up that hair

with her long-nailed hands.

But then she said, “I drank so much that I only got home an hour ago…

Sooo sleeeepy… Yaaawn… Oh, right… I brought back pudding!”

While yawning, she rubbed her mascara-laden eyes, then crawled toward

the convenience store bag she’d unceremoniously dumped in a corner of the

room. Those manners, that puckered mouth, the mumbling of pudding,

pudding, her plump cheeks, her round eyes—it was all embarrassingly

childish.

This strange woman, who many might call a beauty…

“Huh? Ryu-chaan, I can’t find the spoon!”

“The clerk probably forgot to put one in.”

“Nu-uh, I’m sure I saw him do it… Huh…”

She was, in fact, Takasu Ryuuji’s biological mother: Takasu Yasuko

(alias Mirano), thirty-three years old (but eternally claiming twenty-three).

She worked as an entertainer at the town’s one and only hostess bar,

Bishamon Heaven.

Yasuko inverted the bag, rummaged around the corner of the futon, and

tilted her small face in disappointment.

“The room’s so dark… No way can I find it like this. Ryu-chaan, can you

open the curtains a little?”

“They are open.”

“Whaa? Ohh, right. I forgot since I’m usually not awake at this time…”

In the dim room, the mismatched parent and child both breathed a small

sigh.

Their apartment had one large, south-facing window. In the six years

since they started renting it, they’d come to completely depend on the bright

sunlight that flooded in from the south. With their entryway on the north side

and neighboring buildings to the east and west spaced just dozens of

centimeters away, they only had southern-facing windows. Since the

apartment got such amazing natural sunlight, they hadn’t needed to turn on

the overheads from sunrise to sunset. The morning rays were particularly

strong; rainy days excepted, they lavished illumination upon Ryuuji when he

made their lunches and also on Yasuko, while she slept out of exhaustion.

“Sure is a huge condo, isn’t it…?” she said.

“I wonder what kind of people live there… Should I turn on the light?”

Ryuuji asked.

Last year, a ten-story, ultra-high-end luxury condo went up just a few

meters from their apartment’s south window. Naturally, the sunlight stopped

coming in, which tormented him with all kinds of maddening frustration.

First, the laundry wouldn’t dry. Then the corners of the tatami mats swelled

and bubbled with moisture. Mold had started growing, and the condensation

was terrible. The wallpaper’s peeling edges were no doubt owed to the

moisture, as well. Ryuuji tried telling himself to calm down, since it was just

a rental, but he was a high-strung guy. He couldn’t help but find such

unsanitary living conditions intolerable.

Now, the two of them could only peer open-mouthed at the white bricks

of that luxury condo, bound together in squalor.

“Wellll, it’s probably fine,” Yasuko said. “I sleep right through the

mornings, anyhow.”

“Complaining about it won’t change anything, either…and hey, the rent

did go down by five thousand yen,” he said, as he brought Yasuko a spoon

from the kitchen. Ryuuji scratched his head. This was no time to have a

family moment. It was nearly time for him to leave.

After throwing his randoseru backpack on, he stooped down from his

newly grown-up height to put on socks. Then, once he made sure he had

everything he needed, he noticed the slight throbbing in his chest.

That’s right, he thought, remembering again. Today is the first day of the

new school year. Opening ceremonies first, and after that—the class

assignments.

He’d failed to change his image, but that didn’t mean he was depressed.

A faint feeling of hope, or anticipation, or something along those lines,

fluttered in Ryuuji’s stomach, even if he wasn’t the type to show it on his

face.

“…I’m off. Remember to lock the doors and change out of your

pajamas.”

“Yuuup. Oh, hey, Ryu-chan, hey.” Still sprawled on her futon, Yasuko bit

down on her spoon with her back teeth and smiled like a kid. “Ryu-chan,

you’re kinda looking fired up! You’d better do your best as a second-year

student! You’re going places I never got to.”

Yasuko had dropped out of school as a first-year in order to have Ryuuji,

and so she didn’t know anything about the world of a second-year high

school student. For a moment, Ryuuji started feeling sentimental. “I guess

so.”

He smiled a little and raised a hand. It was his way of showing gratitude

towards his mother, but it backfired. Yasuko let out a squeal and rolled

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