Back home

Despite Yuzuru's insistence on that next morning, Mia chose to do the trip to Tokyo alone. It simply wasn't justified for Yuzuru to go to Tokyo and come back to Sendai.

Shinkansens were expensive and she had a feeling that goodbyes would be easier if they were done this way.

On that morning, she woke up before him and left his embrace.

Mia's eyes were puffy and red due to all the crying that happened the previous night.

Every time she thought about these being the last hours with him, tears threatened to spill again. The only thing that worked on stopping them was that she didn't want to look weak in front of Alex.

They ate breakfast in silence and peace, surprising her once again. Mia was half expecting him to be all sad and gloomy about leaving Yuzuru and Japan but the boy acted as if it was just another day.

"Everything okay?" Mia asked him as he placed everything in his backpack ready to tackle the long trip that awaited them.

"Yes, why wouldn't it be?" Alex answered right away and Mia couldn't help but look at Yuzuru that had a similar confused expression on his face.

Mia just shrugged her shoulders, it was better this way, even if she expected a different attitude from her son.

Yuzuru did take them to the station where she just tried her best to look as unaffected as Alex. The skater also didn't seem to care if anyone was watching when he hugged her close and kissed her lips.

"I will miss you."

"You have my number" was all she said, not expecting him to keep the contact but somehow hoping to hear from him every now and then.

He said his goodbyes to Alex in a very casual way, the boy just smiling and nodding as Yuzuru whispered things in his ear that Mia couldn't understand.

"I will make sure to talk with Tracy and Brian, yeah?" He finished louder.

"About what?" Mia couldn't help but let her curiosity take over.

"The choreo... Remember?"

"Oh! Yeah, that's cool."

Another short hug and they were boarding the plane. Waving at the man that had welcomed them so well in his home country.

Somehow, from the moment they left for Sendai until they were finally arriving in Toronto again, the trip seemed to go by way faster than she remembered the previous one to be.

Mia was still confused, unsure, and unwilling to admit to herself just how much importance Yuzuru had taken in her heart.

With only a day to rest until she went back to work, she spent the big majority of that day at home, watching Alex that had a lot of homework to catch up with and just trying to get used to the Canadian time zone again.

Her parents showed up for dinner after a short phone conversation, saying they had missed Mia and Alex in the two weeks that they were gone.

"I feel like I haven't seen you in months," her mom said as she entered the house and hugged her.

"It was just two weeks, mom."

"Looked longer to me... But I wasn't distracted by a handsome Japanese man."

Mia just blushed immediately, not even making an effort to lie or hide the effect of Yuzuru on her.

"And I still don't know this young man."

"You probably won't."

"But..."

"Mom... He's a superstar in Japan, a busy one. He can't just come to me whenever he feels like it. I think we both agreed to take some time apart and try to figure things out."

"You think? Did he actually say that?"

"No, but I figured it out on my own."

Mia had to listen to a whole lecture from her mom about assuming things in relationships that she was too tired to pay attention to.

"Are you even listening to me?"

"Just let it be." Mia begged and moved to get things on the table for dinner. She only hoped Alex didn't hear anything of the conversation.

She could feel her parents' eyes on her, concerned about her well-being once again and it was almost like they were going back 8 years when she found out about the pregnancy and Nyck broke up with her.

The situation was far from being the same, it was very different, but still, she was feeling down and lost about it all.

By the end of the night and after tucking Alex into bed, she could tell that her mother still wasn't convinced about their conversation.

"You look like you did 8 years ago." Her mother said as they sat down on the couch.

"It's different."

"I know it is. Because you're self-inflicting the pain this time."

Mia felt all the rage and hidden feelings step out as soon as her mother said that. She couldn't understand and the girl ended up saying everything that was on her mind.

"What am I supposed to do? Move to Japan? Sacrifice myself for a man again? Change my whole life because I fell in love?"

Her mother gave her a sympathetic smile and hugged her.

"You love him?"

"More than anything."

"Then everything will be alright, you will find a way."

"How can you be so sure?"

"Because despite your disbelief that you can be happy in a relationship again, I prefer to think that love always finds a way."

It was exactly like that, Mia didn't believe it, not like her mother did. For her, this was just a big fairytale in her mother's head. To put it simply, Mia just wished she could forget, just wished her heart wasn't so full of memories of him and their time together.

Two weeks couldn't consume her whole life forever.