Over the next few days, Akira fishes for more information, hoping to confirm his gut feeling that his Yoshiko is Seiji’s daughter.
“I know she married,” Seiji shares one day during a lunch break. “I know I have a granddaughter. She wrote to me once, about two years before the outbreak. Maybe as a punishment: ‘I’m doing well. You have a granddaughter that you’ll never see.’”
“Tell me about her,” Akira asks. And when Seiji fills in the details about Yoshiko, her childhood ballet lessons and dreams of becoming a veterinarian, Akira’s suspicions are confirmed. But would knowing that her father cares be enough to save her? Would knowing she’s still alive pull Seiji out of his robes?
The following night, Akira soars over the sulfurous lightning storms of Venus in a hot-air balloon. Yoshiko flies around him.
“Maybe we can meet up for real,” Akira suggests, thinking it might be easier that way to decide if he should tell Yoshiko the truth about her father.
Yoshiko accidentally kicks Akira’s balloon into a cloud.
“I have some pocket money now, so it’s my treat,” he says. “I want to help.”
“What is all of this for you?” she asked. “What do you think this will become?”
Akira considers labels like soul mate, or girlfriend; neither sounds right. “I don’t know,” he says.
“I’m afraid none of our real-life meetings could ever compare to this. Look at where we are. Isn’t it amazing? You don’t owe me anything. What we have is right here.”
“But this isn’t real,” Akira says.
“No, it’s not.”
In the morning, Akira heads to Ameyoko intending to reveal himself, confident Yoshiko will feel different once they meet. He imagines Yoshiko at the market, rearranging her calligraphy prints and T-shirts, how he’ll wave hello to her for the first time. With their meeting, all of Yoshiko’s downplaying of their relationship will vanish. Maybe they’ll hug. Maybe they’ll go for a walk and hold hands. Akira thinks about all the ways they might find to re-create their virtual playground in the real world. How could they fly?
I’m glad you came, Yoshiko would say. I’m so glad that you’re finally here.
But when Akira approaches the entrance to the street market, awash with the holographic illusion of Venice, he can already see Yoshiko isn’t at her usual spot beside the Grand Canal. He buys a small toy from a neighboring vendor for her daughter, a keychain of the popular old robo-dogs, a box of chocolate mochi for Yoshiko.
After a long stroll through Ueno Park, Akira returns to the virtual cafe and finds Ms. Takahashi reading a newspaper at one of the bistro tables, sipping on some tea. She greets Akira and invites him to share a light lunch she has made. Akira wants to return to his pod, but he is hungry, and this meal would mean another few hundred yen saved. He sits as Ms. Takahashi sets the table with bowls of rice, a plastic container filled with salmon and eel slices. Akira studies the purple crystal Ms. Takahashi always wears around her neck, a new age anomaly compared to her steady stream of no-frills kimonos. From certain angles, Akira could swear he sees light emanating from the crystal, almost like tiny stars.
“Are you okay?” Ms. Takahashi asks as she sits.
Akira nods, cracking a half smile. “Almost perfect,” he says.
“You’ve been in better spirits lately. Maybe one day you can leave this place,” Ms. Takahashi observes. “I’ve heard you laughing late at night. Anyone special?”
Akira shrugs and sips a cup of vending machine miso, slowly picks at the eel.
“Complicated,” Akira says.
“Embrace possibility, but don’t let it drag you down.”
“I feel like we’re so perfect,” Akira says. “But . . .”
“That’s all relationships at first.”
“I want to take care of her and her daughter.”
“Sometimes it might be the right thing to give yourself completely to someone. But from where I’m standing, you need to take care of yourself first, think about your future. Me, I lost my mother a long time ago, quite suddenly. She gave me this pendant to remind me of her. I guess I’m still searching. She’s here with me, though—and this job, helping people like you, sitting quietly in the lobby all day and watching the world move on, is what I need. We’re all healing in our own ways.”
“I’m sorry,” Akira says. “I didn’t know about your family.”
“Ancient history,” Ms. Takahashi says, rolling the crystal pendant between her fingers. “Just do me a favor and try not to be here for another year.”