Chapter 33 Section 7

Leaving the ramen shop and asking Xiangli's mother to get in the car, Zhe Lang remembered that there was an American restaurant near the national highway and decided to drive there.Xiangli's mother didn't say a word in the car.When waiting for the red light, Zhe Lang peeked at her expression from the rearview mirror, and she didn't show regret following her. The three sat in the innermost seats in the restaurant and all ordered coffee. Zhe Lang first explained the Saeki Kari they were looking for, including her working in a bar in Ginza, and being followed by a man named Tokura, and also explained that the man was killed, and the police may have also launched an investigation on Kari and other inferences.

"That person is not Kari, she is not my child." "It seems to be true. Why did things become like this?" "I don't get it at all..." She shook her head. "Mrs. Saeki," interrupted Risako, "you just said that Miss Kari is no longer a woman, right? What does that mean?" "This..." After she finished speaking, she closed her mouth and held the towel in her right hand. "Although she is a woman on the outside, she is a man on the inside. You mean, does she have a so-called gender identity disorder?" Kaori's mother's cheek twitched.Seeing this, he bowed his head and said, "Please tell us the truth."

Although Xiangli's mother showed hesitation, she still talked about her daughter's difference intermittently.She probably told her acquaintances, the content was complex and contained many delicate issues, but she spoke in an orderly manner. She said that Xiangli was no different from ordinary people before junior high school.At least in her eyes.In her memory, Kari didn't dislike skirts and red schoolbags.She added that this may be affected by the surrounding environment.Because there happened to be no boys of the same age in the neighborhood, her playmates since childhood were all girls.She has a gentle temper, and she doesn't feel disgusted by being dressed as a girl like everyone else, and she will happily play with dolls.

"Oh, but, this is just what we see. I don't know what she thinks in her heart." She held the coffee cup with both hands and said. It happened when Xiangli was in high school.At that time, she had a good friend.The relationship between the two is very good, and they are inseparable no matter where they go, wearing the same clothes and small accessories.That good friend went to Xiangli's house to play several times.If the other party is a man, the parents will definitely be nervous, but if the other party is a girl, there is no need to worry.Xiangli's mother said that they always look at the two people who are in a good relationship with relief.

"My husband often said with a smile that other people's daughters have had several boyfriends, while our daughter is still a child." As the friendship between the two became famous, strange rumors began to spread.Some people rumored that they were gay; some even pointed out the specific fact of "saw two people kissing". Kaori's mother finally became worried, and tried to ask herself as if nothing had happened.But Xiangli immediately denied it: "How could such a thing happen?" Hearing what Xiangli said, her mother was relieved, but not completely relieved.Because of the bewildered look on her daughter's expression, she had an ominous premonition.

Her hunch was right.About two weeks after that, Kari and her best friend were found lying in the courtyard of a nearby chapel.The two took a large amount of sleeping pills, and their lives were at stake.If it was sent to the hospital a little later, there would be no way to recover. After the situation of the two stabilized, the parents of both sides asked the two what happened, and they were surprised by their daughter's confession."Because we really love each other," they said. "But the words of the two are a bit different." Xiangli's mother said. "How do you say that?" Zhe Lang asked.

"How should I put it, it should be said to be the way of love..." She seemed to be at a loss for words. Hearing what she said, Risako said: "Her good friends think they are gay, but Ms. Kari doesn't think so." "That's right, that's right." Xiangli's mother nodded as if she had met a savior. "That's what it is. So it's a second scare? It's just dark before us." When Xiangli said that they really love each other, the parents also suspected that their daughter was gay.But the content of Xiangli crying and continuing to confess is even more surprising.She said she wanted to be a man.She wishes to have a man's body and live as a man.And she wants to marry a woman.

Her parents couldn't understand her confession correctly at first, interpreting it as: because women can't love women, they want to become men.But after listening to their daughter repeatedly, they realized that was not the case. "So we thought, maybe this child is a man at heart. If you don't think that way, there are too many things that are illogical. For example, Kari is not interested in fashion at all. And, at her age at that time, It's a matter of course not to be seen naked by her father, but she doesn't hide it. It's even more strange to me that her hobby is to make models of cars, boats or guns from her father's workbench. My husband and I feel that as a girl She's behaving abnormally."

"Then how do you face it?" Zhe Lang asked tentatively. "Honestly speaking, our brains were really troubled, and we were in a state of panic. If people on the street looked at her strangely, or even dressed up like a man, I don't know what would be said about her." Zhelang realizes that this place is different from Tokyo where no one cares no matter how he dresses up and walks on the road. "Then, the kid said she wanted to go to Tokyo." "To Tokyo?" "She said before that she wanted to study design, that she wanted to be a car body designer."

So that's the case, Zhe Lang understood.It is indeed the dream of a man with a man's heart. "Do you agree?" "It's not that I agree, but we don't think it's good for her to stay here. After graduating from high school, Kari went to Tokyo immediately. She seems to have entered a technical school." "How does she live in Tokyo? In other words, uh, does she live as a woman?" "I'm not sure, I almost never went to see her. Even if she came back, she wouldn't mention that aspect at all." "How will she be dressed when she comes back?"

"How should I put it, a woman looks like a woman, but a man also looks a bit like him. She dresses very neutrally. Her father once told her not to dress up weirdly when she came home, So she put a little thought into it." "What about makeup?" Risako asked. "I don't think she has any make-up on. Although there is no make-up, the eyebrows are trimmed." She seemed unaware that young men trimmed their eyebrows these days. "How about the facial features and body shape? Has it changed?" Zhe Lang continued to ask. "When I came back often, there was no big change. Because her father was very strict." "It's very strict? What does it mean?" "Her father said that it is your freedom to live what kind of life you want in Tokyo, but you are not allowed to cause trouble for others, and you are not allowed to undergo surgery when you are not sick." "Surgery." Zhe Lang thought to himself, this is indeed the tone of a craftsman who has sold knives for a living all his life. "Then, Miss Xiangli hasn't undergone surgery yet?" When Risako asked, her mother frowned in pain. "About this..." She took a sip of her coffee before speaking again. After Kaori went to Tokyo, she would return home once or twice a year.But after the third year, unless there is something important, she will come back.When she came back occasionally, she also fled back to Tokyo in the same day.Her mother was skeptical, and after pressing questions on the phone, she heard an unexpected answer.Kari said she dropped out of design school and is currently working in a hotel. "She said that no matter how hard she studies and gets good grades, it is impossible for a person like herself to enter an ordinary company. So she has given up." Zhe Lang thought, this situation is not difficult to imagine.No matter how popular the term gender identity disorder becomes, secular prejudices will not go away.No, it is fundamentally paradoxical (kratti: weird, weird, uncanny) to use the word "obstacle" itself. "I told her father, and her father just said: 'Let her go. If you get frustrated over something like that, you can't do anything.' But I think he must have been very worried." After that, Kari never seemed to come home.The stubborn father was determined not to bring up his daughter again, and told her mother not to call Xiangli home again, so the only way for the couple to know their daughter's current situation was the New Year's card.Her mother didn't know she had moved to Waseda Tsurumaki until she saw the New Year's card. But about a year and a half ago, Xiangli made a phone call to her mother.She didn't have anything important, just said that she hadn't talked to her for a long time and wanted to hear her voice.However, it was the mother who felt heartbroken when she heard the other party's voice.It's not because I miss my daughter, but because my daughter's voice has completely changed into a male voice.At first she didn't recognize who was calling. Mother asked Xiangli, but she hung up the phone without further explanation.Her mother wanted to call her again, but there was no phone number written on the New Year's card from Xiangli. After all sorts of hesitation, her mother approached her father to discuss it, but he still said the old saying: "Let her go with that kind of guy." But after seeing his subsequent actions, he knew that he didn't care about his daughter from the bottom of his heart.One day, without telling his wife, he went to Tokyo alone. What he saw in Waseda Tsurumaki's apartment was a daughter who had completely turned into a man.Her voice was low, and she even grew a little beard. "'Why are you doing this? Do you think you can do such an irreparable thing on your own? You bastard!' My husband seemed to be yelling at her. Kari seemed to retort that she was just returning to her real appearance, and there was something wrong. The result , the two had a big fight, broke up unhappy, and my husband came back." The young man who lives next door to Xiangli seems to have heard the conversation at that time. "Did you hear this from Mr. Saeki himself?" Zhe Lang asked. "He told me later. Before that, Xiangli called me." "Phone? What kind of phone?" "She called and told me that his father went to visit her today, and the operation was discovered, and the two had a fierce fight. She wanted me to apologize for her. I said, you can just apologize, but Thinking that the two might quarrel again, I said forget it, don't apologize. Finally..." She lowered her head and pressed her lips tightly. "What happened in the end?" Zhe Lang urged her to continue. "The child said that he didn't know when we could meet next time, and asked us to get along well and take care of our health, and then hung up the phone. That was the last time for me," she lowered her head again, and continued, "I heard that child sound." Zhelang and Risako looked at each other. "You haven't talked on the phone or met since then, have you?" She nodded. "She didn't send a letter either?" Hearing Zhe Lang's question, she raised her head.Zhe Lang knew she was hesitating. "Did she send a letter?" Zhe Lang asked again. "I told the police people that she hadn't sent the letter because I didn't like it when they were questioning Kaori." "But she actually sent a letter, didn't she?" "Only one, sent this summer." "Can we see it?" She tilted her head with a sour plum in her mouth.Zhe Lang thought to himself, the feeling of hesitation probably went back and forth in her heart.Even if this request is rejected, there is nothing she can do, after all, she knows almost nothing about Zhe Lang and the others. "But," she said, "the person you are looking for is probably not Xiangli from our family?" "That's what surprised us, so we wanted to investigate further why things turned out that way." "Then can I ask you one thing?" "What's up?" "You...uh, the person you are looking for should have nothing to do with me, but if you know the news from our family incense, please tell me." "Okay. If we find her place, we'll arrange for you to meet." "No no no." She smiled and waved. "The child probably doesn't want to see me. I just need to know what she is doing now and whether she is healthy or not." Zhe Lang thought to himself, this is what a mother would say.So resolutely said: "I promise you." The three left the restaurant and returned to the Saeki knife shop.Zhe Lang parked the car about 20 meters away from the shop.Kaori's mother got out of the car alone and entered the store. "An unexpected development." Risako said. "yes." "What do you think about the appearance of someone who has the same troubles as Mizuki?" "This should not be a coincidence. There is another big mystery. If the real Xiangli is no longer a woman, then who is the 'cat's eye' female publicist I have seen?" "Which one lives in the apartment in Koto Ward? The real Miss Saeki Kari, or..." "The one who lives there must be a fake. Have you read Akio Tokura's notebook? That guy's obsessed with is the girl Saeki Kaori." "So, the real Miss Saeki Kari went into hiding after leaving Waseda Tsurumaki's apartment?" When Risako finished speaking, Kari's mother came out from the Saiki knife shop.She jogged back to where Zhe Lang and the others were, looked around carefully, and then quickly sat in the back seat. "Is Mr. Saeki back?" Zhe Lang tried to ask. "Come back, he's watching TV in the inner room." "Wouldn't it be bad if he found out that you took out the letter?" "Don't worry, I took it out behind his back." She handed out an envelope.Zhe Lang looked at the back first, and only wrote "Kari Saeki" without address. Inside the envelope was a note that read the following: "howare you guys? I have found a new job and am working with energy every day. Sorry to make you worry. You have managed to bring me up with great difficulty, but I have failed your expectations. I am really sorry.However, I want to live like myself no matter what. Although I know I am selfish, please forgive my willfulness.I am very happy now, I live a fulfilling life every day, and I have made many friends. I just have one request. Whatever happens, don't come after me, and please don't tell the police about me.However, one day, I will definitely meet you.Until then, please take care of yourself. Unfilial son on"