Konoha. March 2018.

1.

Searching for her outside her elementary school, I finally spot her soft golden hair and big blue eyes.

“Daddy!” she cries out, filling me with joy. My angel flies up and lands in my arms. I hold her tight, breathing her vanilla scent. I haven’t seen her for four days, and I’m already pining for her.

“Daddy, look at what my teacher has given me!” She shows me a seashell bracelet. My princess is excited, like a butterfly in a spring sky, eager to tell me all about her misadventures.

“Daddy missed you so much, little Pikachu!” I tease her, pinching her plump cheeks.

“Let’s go eat some ramen then!”

I burst out laughing. This girl has inherited my bad temper and that makes me proud. Her Majesty’s whims are orders I can’t disobey, even if it means upsetting her mother, who resents me for being a doting father.

I fasten her seatbelt and drive to my favorite noodle restaurant in Konoha: Ichiraku Ramen.

“Mama says you’re always busy, but I know that’s not true. Mama’s always busy too … why don’t you come home anymore, Daddy?”

“Darling, your mom and I…” How do you explain to an eight-year-old child that her parents can’t stay together anymore without blaming one or the other? I don’t want to keep the truth from her, yet I don’t want her to hate us.

“You split up. I know…”

I glance in the rearview mirror. Arms crossed, she swings her legs: her way of expressing displeasure. “Yeah. Your mom and I … we love you so much, ttebayo.”

“But you don’t love Mommy,” she mumbles.

“Ayako … sometimes adults have misunderstandings and disagreements. And to stop arguing, they get apart. That doesn’t mean they don’t love each other, it’s just that… Your mother and I don’t wanna bother you anymore with our arguments, so we try to solve our problems separately. Alright?”

“I don’t want us to get apart, ever. I want you to stay around, always, even when we fight. I want you to keep on being with me, to eat ramen with me and buy me dolls…” Judging by her trembling voice, her tears will soon flow. “And to take me to the amusement park … and to the beach … and to the stadium.”

My heart clenches tighter. I can’t stand it anymore! “I’ll always be there for you, baby. And we’ll do all those things you love, and your mommy will be there for you too. Okay?”

I imagined the worst scenarios before making the decision to divorce. “Ayako will grow up and understand, nothing’s gonna change, I’ll always be there for her…”, I told myself. “It’s not like we’re a real couple, you’ll keep on seeing her…”, Sakura said, encouraging the idea. Nothing changed.

A thin smile graces Ayako’s face. It’s reassuring, but it doesn’t stop me from feeling guilty for thinking of rebuilding my life away from Sakura. It’s crazy how every time I make a selfish decision concerning those I love, I end up paying the highest price.

Sakura and I have never been an ordinary couple. She was there to underline that. She agreed to marry me for “our” child, not for myself.

I wasn’t there at my daughter’s birth. I learned of her existence when she was three years old. As a medical student back then, Sakura worked part-time in a pharmacy. Too proud to ask anyone for help, not even her family, she managed … until the day she broke down, and came to see me. “I’m sorry I didn’t tell you sooner, Naruto. We have a kid. A little girl,” she said, her head bowed.

Those words rang in my skull like the death knell of the end of the world. I prayed there had been a mistake somewhere, that I’d misheard, that she’d gotten the wrong address … or that I wasn’t the father. None of this changed the fact that I had slept with that woman, four years before that day.

But why?

Memories of that night floated to the surface. My stomach had twisted, and I’d run to the bathroom to vomit up the noodles I’d nonchalantly eaten before this news.

Just why…

Why when my financial situation had stabilized, when I was about to face the father of the woman I loved… Boom! A kid?

That day, I saw the castles I’d built in the air crumble, my dreams scattered…

I was just as responsible for Ayako’s birth as Sakura. She didn’t have to remind me. She didn’t really need me, she called on me when she was going through a financial crisis, complicated by the difficulty of her studies. She hoped I could help her look after our daughter.

Marriage was my ‘brilliant’ suggestion. I wanted Ayako to grow up with both her parents, to have a better childhood than mine, being an orphan myself. But … with Sakura, I didn’t feel like I existed. Eternally invisible before her eyes. Every time I considered divorce, the idea of losing Ayako frightened me. I refrained from thinking about it to stay close to my daughter, so that she knows that her father loves her more than anyone else in the world.

2.

Ayako greedily eats her noodles. Her childish voice tickles my heart. I can’t stop smiling to see her like this, to listen to her stories, waving her little hands in all directions. No, Ayako ain’t a mistake. She’s the most beautiful thing that happened to me during my thirty-two years of existence.

“He speaks but has no mouth, he hears but has no ears, guess who it is!”

I put my index finger to my mouth. She looks at me with a little pout, pretty sure that I know the answer. “I don’t know.”

“C’mon, Dad! It’s easy-peasy.”

“Um … the phone?”

“Yes!” she yells. “You and Mama are always like that, saying ‘I don’t know,’ when you already know the answer.”

I kiss her forehead. “Cause we’re lazy. We don’t like racking our brains, ttebayo.” We don’t search for many solutions to our problems. We don’t think about all the possibilities. I have no idea what I could have done back then. I didn’t realize I wouldn’t forget her. She soon forgot me, though.

“Dad, can I take some ramen for Riku?”

“Who’s that, Riku? Your friend from school?”

She nods as she drinks her broth. “It’s a cat.”

I laugh. “Maybe he prefers something else, eh?”

“I promised him ramen!” she retorts. “Riku eats everything. Carrots, radishes, eggs … we always share breakfast.”

Once in my apartment, Ayako rushes to turn on the XBOX in the living room. Good luck with your night shift Sakura, my daughter and I will have so much fun!

“Whoever loses washes the dishes!”

“But that’s not fair, Daddy, I can’t reach the sink!”

“Let’s order some pizza then.”

“Yippee!”

You can’t have everything in life. It’s thanks to sadness that we can appreciate happiness. That’s what my girl taught me.