Page 49 of A Serving of Hope

“I thought of that too. The problem is, it isn’t that simple.”

“How come? If it was the restaurant’s specialty, lots of people must have eaten it.”

“Like I said, it was more of a sort of myth. It wasn’t even on the menu. There were just rumors. I never actually met anyone else who’d eaten it.”

“I’m not sure I follow. Can you tell me a bit more about the restaurant?”

“It was a casual sort of place, not far from the Yubatake. During the day they served all sorts—udon, soba, ramen, rice bowls, curry—and at night they switched to yakitori. It was always packed with tourists and employees from all the ryokan, but I never saw kara-age on the menu.”

“Why, I wonder? You’d think it would have been their main offering!”

“I’ve no idea. Mr. Kawakami was a quiet man. I hardly ever talked to him.”

“I can just picture it. The gruff old master grilling yakitori in silence.”

“Sounds about right. Though I didn’t go there in the evening, so I never tried the yakitori.”

“I have another question for you. If Mr. Kawakami served ramen and rice bowls and all sorts of other things, why stick to onigiri?”

“It was the only thing he’d serve me.”

“How come?”

“He wanted me to eat dinner properly when I got home. Told me to think of my poor mother, working hard all day at the inn and then coming home to cook. He said eating any other dish that late in the day would be disrespectful to her.”

“Wise words. I remember doing just that—eating a bowl of instant ramen because I couldn’t wait for Mom to get home, then not being able to finish the dinner she made me. She looked heartbroken.” Koishi’s gaze softened. “This Mr. Kawakami sounds like a good man.”

“Back then I thought it was a little unfair, but looking back he was right,” said Masaru reflectively. “If he’d served me ramen or curry, I doubt dinner would have tasted half as good as it did.”

“So, if the onigiri was just to tide you over, then this kara-age must have been for some special occasion. Your birthday, maybe?”

“The baseball team at Kusatsu Chuo High was, well, not the greatest. We’d won a grand total of two interschool games in our entire history, and those were over twenty years ago. In the three years I’d been on the team, we hadn’t managed to change that record.” Masaru’s voice quivered with regret. “Mr. Kawakami told us he’d make us kara-age if we won. It became our motivation. But we just couldn’t break the spell.”

“Sounds tough.”

“Whenever we dropped by Tori-dake after losing another game, we’d sit there chewing on our onigiri in silence. Berating ourselves for being such disappointments.”

“Sounds about as cheerful as a funeral.”

“Yeah,” replied Masaru softly. “Something like that.”

“Ah, now I get it. You finally got your first win in twenty years, and Mr. Kawakami made you the kara-age to celebrate?”

“Unfortunately not.” Masaru stared down at the table. “We ended up losing the final match of our senior year too.”

Koishi let out a quiet sigh. “Right.”

“The atmosphere was even gloomier than usual that day, so the captain suggested we skip our usual trip to Tori-dake. But in the end it felt like we should still drop by and let Mr. Kawakami know. When we walked in and told him, he marched off into the kitchen without a word. We were expecting the usual rice bombs, but instead he turned up with this mountain of freshly fried chicken. Even though we’d lost!”

“He wanted to cheer you up,” said Koishi, tears welling in her eyes. “He sounds like a real angel.”

“Normally he barely said a word, but that day he looked us in the eyes and said, ‘You can lose as many matches as you want, boys. Just don’t lose at life. Live it with your heads held high.’ ”

“Good advice if ever I heard it.”

“Yes, but what really stuck with me was what he said next.” Masaru gazed into space as he went on. “He gave us this pained look, then told us that he was speaking from experience. That he knew what it meant to lose at life.”

“Losing at life, eh…” said Koishi, following his gaze. “I feel like I can relate to that too.”