Covered Court

Chapter 3: "Black Hole"

The man stood before him was his younger brother, Kurogane Wataru. Despite being older than him, Rei calls him the older brother.

"Good thing you remember, Rei-kun. I hate it when I remind you of what our Father told you." said Wataru. Daigo saw everything and reported it to Isabelle.

"His young brother is here, Sabu-chan. What should I do?" he asked. Isabelle told him, "It's fine, Daigo. I trust Wataru-kun. He won't do anything bad to his older brother."

Wataru then sat in front of Rei and invited him to go back home, "Father might not welcome you, but Mother really misses you. As soon as she heard that you were coming back, she asked me to bring you home."

Rei was hesitant to go with his brother, but their mother wanting him back seemed to have wavered his decision. Before he could make a decision, however, Wataru added, "If you don't want to get humiliated by Father, I suggest you don't go back."

"How about Mother?"

Wataru grinned cunningly and answered, "If she managed to live without you for five years, then she can live for more years without you."

He then stood up, placed a one-thousand yen bill on the table, and left the place. Rei was speechless and seemed to have lost his strength. A few moments later, the wind suddenly blew the bill towards his face. Upon taking out the bill, he saw a phone number written on it and was labeled "Mother".

"That bastard..."he smiled and became teary. He was excited to give his mother a call, but he thought about what his brother told him about their father.

"Father, I can't blame you for hating me. What I did was a disgrace to our family..." he thought.

He replaced the bill with another one and left the coffee shop. On the sidewalk, he looked at the number written on the bill.

"Mother..."

Just as he was about to go back to his condo unit, he stopped at a corner, leaned on a lamp post, and drowned himself in reminiscence of the memories he had with his mother. Such memories consisted of times where she would help him stand up after he stumbled upon a crooked path, times where she would dress up like a clown to make him laugh, and times where she would scold the vase instead of scolding him for breaking it.

Recalling these memories brought him into tears. He then smiled as he wiped it off with a handkerchief.

"Maybe I should pay her a visit..."

Driven by the longing to see his mother, Rei decided to go back home in Sengoku, despite the threat of getting humiliated by his father. While he walked straight to Sengoku with guts and conviction, he didn't notice his brother's convertible car parked a few meters away from his location.

"Welcome home, huh?" said Wataru as he started the engine and drove off somewhere.

Seeing Rei walk away from a distance, Daigo knew where he was going and told Isabelle about it.

"That guy's going back home, Sabu-chan..."

Isabelle's voice sounded exhausted over the phone, but she tried sounding strict and told him,"Today's not the time to meet his parents. Not yet..."

She ended the conversation and immediately called Rei. Upon picking up the phone, Rei wondered, "Oh, blondie. You called?"

She then raised her tone and scolded him, "Why are you slacking around there? Didn't I ask you to meet Professor Kitamura as soon as possible?"