Seibundo Stationery

Seibundo Stationery is the long-established family shop managed by Rié in Town S. More than a local business, it is the point where her life after loss settles into routine and where Daisuké Taniguchi first approaches her; its familiar counter becomes the beginning of a relationship that the town will come to regard as a source of reassurance.

Place in Town S

The shop had belonged to Rié’s family since her grandfather’s generation and was known throughout Town S. Rié, the proprietors’ only daughter, eventually took over its management from her mother. The business’s continuity made it a visible fixture in a town whose main shopping stretch was losing businesses: after the center had flourished during the Showa-era economic bubble, a low birth rate and aging population left many premises along Mera Road permanently closed. The remaining shops were few, and Seibundo Stationery was one of them. Locals ruefully called the declining street “Showa Burial Mound,” a name that set the shop’s persistence against the surrounding signs of depopulation.

The stationery store also carried the practical weight of a small-town enterprise. Rié delivered office supplies to her former middle school, the town office, local corporations, and other customers, while tending the checkout counter and handling the work that kept the business running. Since her father’s time, the shop had also distributed goods for a mail-order company, bringing it a steady supply of unfamiliar clients. That mixture of local familiarity and commercial routine shaped the working world Rié inhabited each day.

Rié’s Work and Return

When Rié met Daisuké, she had taken over the shop from her mother. Her workdays passed in a blur of deliveries, customers, and varied tasks. Familiar faces offered some consolation, but dealing with new clients could feel less stressful. The shop therefore gave her both a rooted place in the town and a stream of encounters beyond its close-knit circle.

That daily routine followed a difficult return. Rié had lost a young child, divorced, and come back to Town S with Yuto. In private, she continued to grieve Ryo, remembering him in the hospital and sometimes losing the strength to stand when the memory returned. She tried to keep going cheerfully for Yuto, whose energetic growth was a solace. The stationery shop did not erase that grief; it gave her a set of ordinary duties to resume while the past remained close.

Daisuké’s First Visits

Daisuké first entered Seibundo Stationery alone one February evening, after Rié had recovered from another cold. Town S was supposed to be warmer than Yokohama, but Rié had found her family home drafty, especially its bathing room, and she and Yuto had both been ill twice that winter. On the evening Daisuké arrived, darkness had already fallen and children were stopping in on their way home from school to buy pens and notebooks. Rié was considering asking her mother to take over so she could go home and make dinner.

The shop became the place where Daisuké could visit without needing to turn the encounter into a purchase. Rié told him she was there almost every day and had plenty of free time, inviting him to bring his pictures and assuring him that he need not buy anything. From then on, he came about once every ten days. Their conversations grew longer, and the visits gradually led to tea and other outings while Rié’s mother watched the store. Daisuké worked in forestry nearby; logging sites generally closed before four, and he came over as soon as his workday ended.

A Local Institution and a Private Threshold

Seibundo Stationery’s familiarity helped make Daisuké’s arrival part of the town’s life. He had moved to Town S seeking forestry work at thirty-five, with no experience in the industry, and was reserved with his coworkers. Within a year of arriving, however, he married Rié, a well-known local whose judgment people trusted. The town’s surprise at the marriage gave way to confidence that Rié must have had good reason to accept him. In that sense, the shop’s place in the community and Rié’s standing helped shelter Daisuké from prying questions about his past.

For Rié, the store was both workplace and threshold: a familiar public setting where a new relationship could begin without fanfare. She initially avoided asking Daisuké about his past, sensing that the subject made him uncomfortable, but later began to notice what she took as hints that he wanted her to ask. The shop’s repeated, ordinary encounters made room for that gradual change—from a customer’s visit to a conversation, and from conversation to a bond that would alter the future of the family business’s proprietor.