Prologue

Yo, it’s been a while, ladies and gentlemen! Guess, it’s quite long time since we see each other like this. Well, from my side is just two months passed.

Yeah, it had been close to two months since I, Ogawa Kyousuke and Evelyn had returned and rekindled our relationship. It took time but I believed we have managed fix our relationship. Though, I still could not believe that she’s really here with me once again in my world. This time without baggage or secret on her back.

I guess I am being rewarded after I’m going through back on her world.

The hardships I have been enduring in her world. The emotion turmoil I have been endured. The fight and the circumstances leading to our return now seemed like a distant past, but it had just been about seven weeks only.

Evelyn was still adjusting to after return with me knowing that she had left her world permanently. By staying with me, she had left her family and friends. Sometimes, I felt so cruel to do this to her. But with sad smile, Evelyn assured me that she’ll be fine. She just need a bit more time to adjust after leaving everyone she knew.

Of course, I always stay by her side to comfort her. But it’s must be really sad for her knowing I don’t love her. After her little sister, Emilia reveals my true feeling toward Evelyn that I never in love with her, I tried my best to fell in love with her. It’s not easy fell in love with someone, eh?

And turn out, Evelyn know about this from beginning and accept that. So she’s been abusing the power of bond since I confessed to her.

Well, I believe I need to take it easy and Evelyn agreed. She knew that I need spend time with her to fell in love. With determination face, she’s said going to make me madly love with her. Well, I truly am looking forward to it.

Sure, while I’m not in love with her. We are still lover and as a lover, we had needed to work on ourselves if we had any hope of our relationship working.

Evelyn and I had been more than willing to work on what we needed to make sure that happened.  We had continued seeing the counselor even after vacation, and it had helped us immensely. She had given us great advice and asked us to consider going away for a little bit. As our counselor has suggested, we had taken a vacation a month before to spend some quality time together and fix our relationship. After everything that we had been through, it was great for us to just take some time away from everything and just focus on us.

It was no secret that our relationship had not been easy, and we had really gone through a lot. Sometimes I even wondered how we had even gotten through it all, and how we had come to this wonderful place where we could just be together. But the important thing was that whatever we had gone through was mostly behind us now and we were in a good place with our relationship with each other. A vacation was just what we needed to cement that.

We had first travelled to a hot spring inn in Kyoto, which had been a wonderful experience. Their tourism boasted of beautiful hot springs and I had been keen on the idea of it and experiencing the rich culture of the city. Evelyn had particularly enjoyed that trip and we’d had the time of our lives. Evelyn in Yukata is… very deadly.

Then we had gone to Bali. It’s not on my plan going there but… RK gave me free tickets and even let us staying on his high class hotel for a week. It’s truly a beautiful island with extraordinary sites to see. We had made the most of our visit there of course, and it had been a fascinating and enjoyable vacation destination. We had gone on a meditation retreat once, and it had been one of the most calming experiences of my entire life!

I had taken Evelyn to every site we could manage to visit, and it was lovely just seeing her be so carefree in my world. Nothing made me happier than knowing that she had fully embraced me and this world and was truly happy here. That I had made her be that way. It made it all worth it; every single thing that we had gone through. Wait…. It’s seems I’m the one who made Evelyn love me even more.

And no, I don’t bring her to the beach. Her swimsuit appearance is mine only.

Then we had gone to Rawanda. It was a still magnificent and advanced country as I remembered. I visit the country when I’m still enlisted. It doesn’t change much. By the way, you know Wakanda from marvel comic? If you don’t know Google it, please.  Well, this is my world’s Wakanda. Not only because it was the last stop in our grand travel plan, but because it was such a beautiful country and with friendly citizen. We wished that we could have stayed a bit longer.

Lastly, we also went to visit my mother and my grandmother that in the countryside at the end of our vacation. Ever since my divorce, I had not seen them, and the trip was a much needed one. I realised that not only had the divorce left me with a multitude of anger and trust issues, it had also robbed me of simple joys in my life. I had lost a relationship with my daughter, lost time and freedom when I had gone to prison for eight months and also missed out on a close relationship with my parent. It was really hard to move on completely and go down a road of hate. Hate for my ex-wife and the man she had cheated on me with. The time with my mother had healed something else within me and I was grateful for that.

Of course, my mother had instantly liked Evelyn and the two of them had formed a quick relationship. I guess it was difficult not to love Evelyn for normal people. Am I not normal? Perhaps I was a bit biased…or a lot biased.

However, it’s really touching when my mother had embraced me into her arms and hugged me. Well, it’s embarrassing especially when Evelyn gave me “What a cute boy” smirk looks.  But it’s really feels like coming home and feels just right. Yes, I am a grown man and yes, I was also a father to a grown child. But I could not care less in that moment, I love being hugged by my mother and I would never get enough of her warmth and gentleness for me. I would always be her child after all, no matter how grown I became.

It saddened me a greatly that I had not seen her in so long. Not only had I just realised how much I missed her, but I realised just how much she must have missed me too. So, I promised to see her again more often from now on that I will stay on with her every month for a week or two with Evelyn.

This reunion made me feel regret. Because I started wondering… What if… What if I just went my mother’s side after divorce instead of let myself being consumed by anger, hatred and bitterness. Maybe I won’t become like this. All messed up.

My grandma? She’s just like my mom. I’m glad you and mom still very healthy!

When grandma saw Evelyn, she just laugh and hit my back few times as she told me that I have finally pick a great piece of ass unlike the previous one. I guess beside Grace, my grandma also can see through Yuriko’s true colour. I guess I am really dense for that one.

I had been going through my anger and trust issues because of everything I had gone through since my cheating ex had revealed her true colours to me on that fateful day. And by seeing the counselor, it helped me a lot. According to her, that event actually messed me more than I thought. Yup, exactly like what Emilia said. That brat is character reader indeed.

I knew I still had some deep issues that I really needed to work on, and I felt so messed up in the head at times. Was it because mind breaking potions I drank? I mean drink it twice. It must be affect me greatly beside enhanced my power.

Would I ever get over those feelings, I wondered? Through the counselling, a part of me believed that I could get back to how I was before my ex-wife cheated on me. If I continued with the sessions, I could definitely get to a place where I made peace with everything that had happened, and it did not affect me so much anymore.

Yeah, compared to before I believe I’m so much calmer. I guess it’s time for healing. But only time would tell and if I could just return to normal, that would be very wonderful.

Because that was how it supposed to be.

That’s what I supposed to be when I gave my resign letter to Grace.

The moment I quit military, the moment I hang my uniform, and from the moment I turn my back on Grace that day…

I am nothing but normal citizen.

I am just Ogawa Kyousuke . Nothing more than that…

Yes, I was supposed to a normal man with normal day to day problems and things to take care of.   I’m pretty sure I’m doing very well as normal citizen would do… until that day… Since that day, I carried too much baggage and it’s very hard to remove it. What Yuriko did to me messed me so bad. But like I said, thanks to counselling… I’m so much better than before. Well, I still unable to let my anger and hatred toward them go though.

Right now, I just wanted to reach that point where all I could do was just take care of Evelyn and be happy with her. My divorce might have wrecked me at one point in time but I was slowly piecing myself back together now and I wanted to get to that ideal point. Evelyn deserved that much and more, and I wanted to give it to her.

*Knock. Knock. Knock.

A knock startled me out of my long thoughts.

I looked around. Ah, right, I remember that I was sitting on sofa in living room. I guess I was dozed off as I didn’t even notice it was raining outside. I can see Evelyn on the kitchen cooking our dinner while humming.  Ugh, it’s cold… I felt like cursing up the rain…

*Knock. Knock. Knock. *Knock. Knock. Knock.

The knock continues, it seems hurry and urgent this time. I guess I can’t ignore this.

*Knock. Knock. Knock. *Knock. Knock. Knock.

Yeah, yeah, I heard that, dammit. Geez, whoever it was, can’t they just ring the bell? Were they just too lazy pushed a damn button!? I thought as I walked to the door and opened it. I was shocked to see none other than my daughter, Kirino, at the door entrance.

The daughter I had loved with my entire being once upon a time. When she had come into our lives after five years of happy marriage, Yuriko and I had been ecstatic. We had really been a happy family until the truth had been exposed. And not only had I lost everything that I had ever thought was true, I had lost my only child. My beautiful daughter had abandoned me and had refused to have anything to do with me. It had been one of the most difficult things that I had ever gone through and it still hurt even now.

Before meeting Evelyn, I would have given anything and everything to repair our relationship again, but she had ignored my efforts at every turn until I saw her months ago in the mall. Now the greatest shock was seeing her right there in front of me, honestly the last person I would have expected to show up at my doorstep.

It was like a dream and I was not even sure she was really there. But she was here, I would never forget the face of my own daughter and her eyes looked up at me like she was my little girl all over again. My little girl who always crying for me…

Kirino was wearing a school uniform while standing in the rain. The soft, cool fabric was shrivelling from being wet, sticking to her skin. But something was definitely very wrong. She got few bruises on her face and her clothes were tattered like being ripped forcedly…

I did not know what had happened to her or why she was here, but her appearance was not giving me much hope that this would be a happy reunion feeling. I wanted to say something; to ask her what she was doing here and why she was in such a dishevelled state. I wanted to ask her why now after all this time. And what she really expected form me. But my emotions were all over the place as I just stared at her.

Kirino looked at me. Her face looked pained. Her damp auburn hair was hanging all over her face, disheveled and messy. I couldn’t tell if the water on her face was from the rain or her tears. But I can tell she was crying…

“Dad… please help me,” With tears on her face, she said in a hoarse and tear-filled voice.

As soon as she said that, I almost toppled over. What was that? Was my estranged daughter actually asking for help after all these years?

But when I heard that, I felt something shatter inside of me. It was a mysterious feeling. I don’t know what it was. I blinked as I tried to figure out what it was. I felt like that something was about to explode. I took a very deep breath. I tried to dampen what I was feeling by remembering of what had happened a week prior.


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