Chapter 64
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Volume 1: First Performance: A Tragic Love Story Of A Young Lady And Spring Cherry Blossoms
Chapter 64: The Cross-Dressing Boy Feels A Weight Lifted From His Shoulders
[From Kyoichiro Yanagisawa’s Point Of View]
“Here we go.”
After reaching the waiting room, I laid Kisaragi down on the sofa and then grabbed her wrist to check her pulse.
It was a bit fast, but her pulse was normal.
She likely lost consciousness from sheer exhaustion.
She should recover after a few hours of deep sleep, but… she’s sweating profusely.
“For now, I should at least wipe off her sweat.”
I took out a handkerchief from my pocket and gently dabbed away the sweat from her forehead.
Next, I looked at her dress, which appeared unbearably hot, and couldn’t help but grimace.
“There’s no way I can do anything about what’s under the clothes…”
As a male teacher, undressing a female student, even in an emergency, is something I absolutely cannot do.
However, if I leave her like this, the temperature inside the dress might rise, and in the worst case, she could suffer from heatstroke.
If that happens… the situation could become even more serious.
Damn, I should have brought one of the female students with me!
“Damn it! There’s no point in regretting it now! First, I should call an ambulance just in case, and then… I’ll assess the situation and undress Kisaragi if necessary. I can’t just leave a girl who looks so much like my wife in this state!”
I hurriedly took out my smartphone from my breast pocket and started tapping the screen to dial 119.
But then…
Suddenly, someone appeared behind me and snatched my phone away.
“What!? Who are you!? What are you doing!?”
“Hehehe… It’s been a while, hasn’t it, Kyoichiro Yanagisawa?”
I turned to look behind me and saw a beautiful woman with black hair, dressed in a crimson gown.
I hadn’t expected her to show up, and I couldn’t hide my surprise.
“Airi… Hananomiya? Why are you here…?”
“Why am I here, you ask? Are you an idiot? The Hananomiya Girls’ Academy belongs to the Hananomiya family. So is it strange that I, a daughter of the Hananomiya family, would come to watch a play at this academy?”
Airi narrowed her eyes as she spoke, then dropped my phone on the floor and crushed it under the heel of her stiletto.
Tilting her head and raising her eyebrows in a mocking smile, she continued.
“I never imagined that Itsuki would hire you as a teacher, bringing you, who stole my sister Yuki, into this school. Letting a disgrace like Kyoichiro Yanagisawa walk the grounds of Hananomiya… what on earth is that nephew of mine thinking?”
“Stop your damn whining, woman! I’ll listen to your insults later as much as you want! But for now, get out of the way, Airi! I need to get my student to a hospital as soon as possible!”
“Your student… huh? Heh, heheheheh!!”
“Huh? What’s so funny?”
“Oh, nothing. But you need to leave immediately, Kyoichiro. That girl, Kaede Kisaragi, belongs to the Hananomiya family. Therefore, I will personally take care of her with all of my heart. You, who have nothing to do with this, should disappear from here at once. Do you understand?”
“…I had a feeling, but as I thought, Kisaragi is… somehow related to your Hananomiya family… Considering how much she resembles Yuki, I guess she must be your father’s illegitimate child or something—”
“How dare you, you vile usurper!!!! Don’t speak my sister’s name with that filthy mouth of yours!!!! If it weren’t for you, Yuki wouldn’t have died!!! You took her overseas and made her suffer… and that’s why… that’s why she died!!! You’re worse than scum, you maggot!!! Kyoichiro, I will never forgive you!!!!”
After taking a few ragged breaths, Airi regained her composure, tucked her long bangs behind her ear, and flashed a wicked smile.
“If you don’t hand over Kaede Kisaragi to me… I might just kill you right here, Kyoichiro. Surely you haven’t forgotten that the Hananomiya family has connections to the underworld?”
With that, Airi snapped her fingers, and men in black suits began to file in from the door behind her.
Seeing this, I took a deep breath and raised both hands.
“Fine. I’ll leave Kisaragi to you. But make sure you take her to a proper doctor, alright? Got it?”
“Oh, how unexpected. I thought the man who once fought us all on his own and kidnapped my sister Yuki wouldn’t give in so easily. With your skills, you could probably take on all these men without breaking a sweat, couldn’t you?”
“How long ago do you think that was? I’m just an old man in my forties now. Besides… back then, I was fighting for Yuki’s future. If you’re going to take care of Kisaragi, I have no intention of standing in your way.”
“I see. Well then… take Kaede Kisaragi away.”
At Airi’s command, the men in black suits lifted Kisaragi and swiftly carried her away.
I watched them leave, then took out a cigarette, put it in my mouth, and lit it with a lighter.
“After watching today’s performance of ‘Romeo and Juliet’… Kyoichiro, didn’t it make you think of something?”
“Are you trying to say that Yuki and I are like Romeo and Juliet? No, that’s completely different. Yuki was certainly a lady from a noble family, but I’m just an ordinary actor from a common family. It doesn’t fit the story at all.”
“Romeo and Juliet were born into families that were enemies, and their tragic fate led them to a sorrowful end. Isn’t that similar to what happened with you and my sister Yuki? You fled from the Hananomiya family, only to be met with a tragic end. Your children were taken from you… and you were forced to wander from place to place as an actor to pay off your debts.”
“…Hey, Airi, how are Fuuma and Rurika doing? Are they eating properly?”
“You have no right to know what those filthy rats are doing now. Your children have already been destined to marry into other families as tools for the Hananomiya family’s diplomacy. Fuuma Yanagisawa will marry the daughter of the noble Chatelard family in France, and Rurika Yanagisawa will marry the president of the Sakuraoka conglomerate. They will live their lives in the upper class, where you will never have any involvement. Aren’t you jealous? Hehehe, hehehehehehe.”
“I’ll pay off the debt before they come of age. I won’t let that happen.”
“Ahaha! Ahahahahahahahahahaha!! At best, don’t pour every last penny you have into the Hananomiya family, like the slave you are!! Kyoichiro Yanagisawa, the genius actor!!”
Laughing triumphantly, Airi Hananomiya, my late wife’s sister, elegantly left the room.
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[From Fuuma Yanagisawa’s Point Of View]
“…An unfamiliar ceiling.”
“Honestly… That’s the first thing you say when you wake up? Are you secretly an anime otaku?”
I turned toward the direction of the voice and saw Karen sitting there.
She was seated in a folding chair next to the bed, crossing her arms and glaring at me.
I smiled at her, then sat up and scratched the back of my head.
“If you recognize the reference, that makes you an anime otaku too, Karen.”
“Ugh… You passed out from exhaustion on stage, and yet you seem pretty lively? I had a lot to deal with on my end, too…”
“You had a lot to deal with?”
“Think about it… What do you think would happen if a cross-dressing guy got rushed to the hospital? Especially if he’s registered as a student at the Hananomiya Girls’ Academy. By now, you’d be all over the news as some perverted freak, wouldn’t you?”
“Ah…”
“Next time, think things through. If it hadn’t been for me and Aunt Airi, who knows what would have happened… You should be grateful that you were brought to a hospital affiliated with the Hananomiya family.”
“Huh? Aunt Airi… What? What’s Auntie got to do with this?”
“Aunt Airi came just in time to stop Kyoichiro Yanagisawa from discovering your true identity.”
Her words left me utterly bewildered, and I couldn’t help but blink in confusion.
“…I see. So, after that, Dad carried me to the waiting room. He was about to call an ambulance, but Aunt Airi stopped him… But why was Auntie there? What was she doing at the Civic Center? Did she come to watch the play?”
“It seems that way. Well… Aunt Airi is one of the people who sent you to this school, after all. She was probably worried about how you were doing, so she came to check on you.”
“She’s worried about me…? N-no, no, no! That can’t be right! This is the same aunt who calls me a sewer rat every time we meet! There’s no way she’d care about me!”
Airi Hananomiya has always had a deep-seated dislike for me, the son of Kyoichiro Yanagisawa.
Whenever she was in a bad mood, she’d force me to bow down to her and would often do things that bordered on abuse. She’s never been someone I’ve had a good impression of.
There’s absolutely no way that aunt came to see my play out of concern for me. There had to be another reason.
“You look like you absolutely can’t believe it. Is it really so strange that Aunt Airi would come to see your play?”
“Of course it’s strange. Don’t you know how nasty that woman can be? She calls me a sewer rat and Rurika a water flea. She’s a hysterical old hag!”
“She’s not that harsh with me, though. When it came to the contest for the heir to the family, she supported me without hesitation. In the Hananomiya family, full of wicked people, she’s actually one of the more decent ones.”
“…Mmm… Maybe…”
Well, the other uncles and aunts were the absolute worst scumbags, so… If you compare them, yeah, she might be better since she hasn’t hit me directly… But no, I take that back. Any aunt who demands her nephew grovel isn’t decent.
“Still, your performance was amazing, Yanagisawa-kun. That final scene you did… It was on par with the old Fuuma Yanagisawa… No, it was even better. It had a different tone than your past performances. I’ve never seen a Juliet like that before. Truly, it was spectacular.”
Saying this, Karen smiled gently and stood up from her chair.
She walked over to the window and began to quietly gaze out at the clear, early summer sky.
“From today onward, the name Kaede Kisaragi will be on everyone’s lips. Heh, it’s strange, isn’t it? The boy who was once hailed as a child prodigy will now leave his mark on this world as an actress. It almost feels like I’m watching a comedy.”
“Shut up. You’re the one who orchestrated all this, Karen Hananomiya. You’re the one who created this actress named Kaede Kisaragi.”
“That’s true. But I knew from the start that if you ever stepped onto the stage again, something interesting would happen. You’re an actor who brings color to the world, like the sun. Once you take the stage, people’s hearts are stirred, and the stories around you begin to move. That’s the kind of actor you are, Fuuma Yanagisawa.”
“I’m not that extraordinary. You’re overestimating me.”
“Not at all. You’re like the sun, a presence that brightens everything around you. And the people who are drawn to you are like satellites orbiting that sun.”
Karen turned back towards me, her usual cool beauty replaced by a mischievous smile.
“Hey, Yanagisawa-kun, do you have someone you like right now?”
“Huh? What’s with that out of nowhere…? No, I don’t.”
“Heh. I don’t know what kind of person could capture the heart of someone like you… But if you ever do fall in love with someone, please share your love story with me. I’m interested in the life of someone like you.”
Saying this, Karen narrowed her eyes and smiled gently, warmly, almost like a mother.
A breeze blew in through the open window, fluttering Karen’s long black hair.
May was ending, and with the rainy season approaching, summer would soon begin.
The idea of me falling in love with someone is honestly impossible, especially while I’m living this double life.
But what if, while living this double life, I were to fall in love with someone?
When that time comes, would I tell that person that I’m actually a boy?
Would I confess my feelings, even if it meant putting myself in danger?
Right now… I don’t know.
But unlike before, now that I’ve moved past my mother’s death, I feel like maybe… just maybe… I might fall in love with someone someday.