Crimson Footprints Part 39

"I want to share my love and my life with you, and if you'll have me, I want you to be my wife."

With effort, he opened a hand to reveal the Tanaka family ring. His father purchased the band of white gold when he sought his mother's hand in marriage. Perched upon it was a polished natural pearl more than seven generations old. The lone valuable of a once wealthy family, that pearl had seen the docks of America at the turn of the 20th century, been buried in haste with the forced internment of j.a.panese Americans, and would adorn the finger of one more Tanaka woman, so long as he got the answer he desired.

She answered in a whisper, soft yet clear nonetheless. It was the word which had been in her heart all along.

Yes.

CHAPTER SIXTY-ONE.

When John slipped into Tak's room, a day or so after his transfer from intensive care to the general ward, he found Deena snoozing in an armchair and Kenji by his brother's side, flipping through an old and battered copy of Sports Ill.u.s.trated.

"I hear congrats are in order," John said, closing the door behind him.

Tak smiled. "Word travels fast."

"Man, you should hear Allison. You've got her ready to elope right now. She's all 'they didn't even know each other when we started dating!'" John shook his head. "You try to make me look bad."

"Don't have to try hard."

John leaned against the door and gave Tak a once over. He had more beeping machines around him than the Stars.h.i.+p Enterprise and looked like someone had hurled a can of whoop a.s.s at him, but h.e.l.l, he was alive, and for that, n.o.body was more thankful than John.

"Enjoying your vacation?" John asked.

"It's great,"

Tak attempted to s.h.i.+ft and winced. "Just the break I needed from the monotony of life."

"You got a break all right. One for the leg, another for the ribcage." He shook his head. "How many bones you plan on breaking this year?"

Tak's laugh was like wisps of smoke, thin and barely there. "The plan was all, but I think I'll tap out now."

John looked up and spotted Kenji's scowl. He knew the kid didn't have the self-deprecating sense of humor that he and Tak shared, so he took Kenji's red-eyed glare as a sign to back off the jokes. He'd never known Kenji to hit anyone, but he wanted no parts of that just the same. Something about being the test subject for a kid The Herald claimed didn't hit b.a.l.l.s so much as snipe them, didn't exactly whet John's appet.i.te.

He glanced at Deena. "She's been here as long as I think?"

"Longer probably."

"Well, they're all excited out there. You should hear them cackling about spring colors and summer weddings and caterers from L.A. or some s.h.i.+t."

Deena stirred in her chair. "Are they really?" she said.

John laughed. "Go out there and talk to them. See for yourself. They're ready to make you a Tanaka tonight if you'll let them."

She sat up. "Are you...sure?" She lowered her gaze. "Maybe they're just being polite. I'll bet they're being polite."

John raised a brow. "Maybe you weren't paying attention in California, but the Tanakas tend to be a blunt bunch."

He tilted a head towards the door. "Check it out. And take your new brother with you. I'd like to shoot the s.h.i.+t with Tak."

Deena rose, her smile shy. When Kenji stood, he balled up the old issue of Sports Ill.u.s.trated and tossed it in the garbage. John raised a brow.

"Babe Ruth, all time greatest player." Kenji rolled his eyes. "Gimme a break."

John grinned as they disappeared into the hall, and as Kenji continued to mouth off about Ruth's impressive stats in a league that was all white.

With the door closed behind them, John turned back to Tak. He eyed his cousin with interest.

"Now how are you?"

Tak sighed. "Tired. Sore as h.e.l.l."

"The other guy, the one that hit you, he showed up with flowers back when you were still in ICU. It took security and every orderly in the building to get our dads off him."

Tak rolled his eyes. "Your dad, maybe. My dad was probably just trying to find an exit. I'm sure he had a flight somewhere."

Silence filled the room. In it, John ventured over to the floral arrangements stacked on the nightstand with overflow on the floor. He lifted one and admired it. They were lilies or lilacs or something like that.

"He offered me a job," John said.

"When?"

"When we were in California. In-house tax attorney for the firm."

"You gonna take it?"

John shrugged. "I'm thinking about it. It's more money than I've ever seen. Good even for an Ivy League grad at the top of his cla.s.s. And I wasn't at the top of my cla.s.s."

Tak sighed. "He talks with money."

"You know, you're right. Problem is, he can't get you to listen."

John gave his cousin a wink, s.n.a.t.c.hed the remote from his hand and tossed it to far side of the room. With a grin, he closed the door to the sound of Tak's pained laughter.

CHAPTER SIXTY-TWO.

Daichi sat in his home office pouring over drafts and notes for a single project he'd become obsessed with over the last few weeks. It should've been a simple enough task-a public library, but something about the designs bothered him. There was simply-something left to be desired.

Lately, concentration was something else left to be desired. Daichi's mind insisted on wandering to the moments after his son's accident. The feelings of helplessness, of inadequacy, of despair. Never had he felt so impotent, so desperate. But when his son regained consciousness, Daichi failed to do as most fathers would. He didn't rush to his son's side, embrace him, and whisper words of fondness. Instead, their encounter was brief and awkward, and when they parted, he was left feeling empty and feeble. To that day, the feeling remained.

After a series of strengthening exercises in the full service weight room in his parent's home, Tak thanked his therapist for the visit, showered and dressed, and went in search of his mother. In the hospital, he'd spoken candidly with her about her drinking and the need to quit. With the doctor's promise that Tak would live came his mother's commitment to detoxification. A somber bit of reality coupled with Alcoholics Anonymous meetings had given her two months of sobriety.

The family maid told Tak that his mother was out walking in the garden. Their 'garden' was closer to arboretum than the patch of field most people toddled around in planting herbs and lilacs. His body revolted against the idea of search of her. He headed for the door.

Tak didn't know what made him stop to speak with his father. Maybe it was the way his office door was cracked instead of welded shut. Maybe it was the glimpse of him doing nothing, save staring at the wall that caused Tak to pause and tap on the door.

He told him to come in.

His father's home office was pretty big. The desk he sat at was broad and made of cherry wood, the chair behind it leather and ergonomically correct. He'd pushed back his pc's flat screen monitor as if it annoyed him and piles of paper were stacked neatly in its stead. On the far end, against the wall, were a series of double wide cherry wood bookshelves, polished to gleam. In one corner was a drafting table and the various supplies his father used when he went old school-pencils, a T-square and a compa.s.s. At the back of the office was a leather couch, black and soft.

"Got a sec?" Tak said.

Daichi nodded. He pushed away from his desk and turned to face his son. Tak hesitated. His father didn't usually stop working just because someone wanted to have a word with him.

"Mind if I sit?"

Daichi shook his head.

"Are you all right? You don't look well," Tak said after a brief but awkward silence.

"I'm fine. How is your rehabilitation going?"

"Good."

More silence. The two glanced at each other, then looked away.

"She liked the ring," Tak said suddenly.

Daichi nodded. "She should. It's three hundred years old.

Tak conceded the point.

"And the therapy? You said that it's going well?" his father asked again.

"What? Oh, yeah, yeah. Pain management. Breathing techniques, strength and endurance. That's the gist of it."

"And is there much...pain?"

Tak shrugged. "Sometimes. The incision site bugs me. You know, where they had to stick the chest tube. And it hurts to cough. That kind of thing."

"I see. Well...let me know if there is anything I can do help."

"Yeah. Okay."

Tak cleared his throat.

"You know mom-mom's stopped drinking."

Daichi turned back to his desk. "Is that right? Is that what she's taken to saying these days?"

Tak's gaze narrowed. "She hasn't had a drink since the day of the accident."

His father unraveled a draft. "Perhaps."

Tak stood, scowling. "There is no 'perhaps.' She's not drinking. She says she's not drinking, and I believe her."

"The woman is a drunkard, Tak.u.mi. She revels in the feel of intoxication."

"She's trying. Why can't you even give her that? Why can't you give anyone anything?"

Daichi sighed. "I don't know what that means, Tak.u.mi."

"It means that I'm sick of you. I'm sick of you being so d.a.m.ned cra.s.s and indifferent. I'm sick of you not giving a d.a.m.n."

"And what would you like me to give a d.a.m.ned about?" he said quietly.

"Your wife! Your kids! Me! I mean, come on, dad. I nearly die, and for you it's just an inconvenience in your schedule!"

Daichi swiveled to face him. "Is that what you believe? That I care for no one? For nothing?"

"I know you don't!"

Daichi leapt to his feet. "How dare you. How dare you come into my home and speak with authority about what matters to me."

He began to pace with the heat of his fury.

"When you lie dying in that hospital it was me who was so overcome with grief that I could neither eat, nor sleep, nor function. It was me who tortured himself with every decision, every unspoken word, every measure of affection I ever withheld from you. Me, who spent the night weeping, even after hearing you were alive, as I lie there convicted by every cross word I ever spoke to you. It was me, Tak.u.mi. Your father, and no one else. And you have the audacity to tell me that I don't care for you? That I don't love you?"

"And mom? Does she have to die for you to love her, too? Is that what it takes?"

Daichi turned on Tak, enraged. "Who the h.e.l.l do you think you are? You've crossed the G.o.dd.a.m.ned line."

"Well I'm so sorry! I didn't know we recognized lines! Not since you habitually encroach on mine!"

"You think I didn't love your mother? You think I didn't ever love your mother? You wouldn't even be here if I didn't love your mother. Why don't you sit down and shut up about things that you know nothing about?"

Tak crossed his arms defiantly.

"G.o.dd.a.m.n it, Tak.u.mi, I said sit down!"

Reluctantly, Tak lowered himself onto the couch, partially surprised his burst of emotion.