Shigeki

Shigeki is the nineteen-year-old son of Hideo Harada and Ayako, and his changing relationship with Hideo gives a concrete measure of the distance created by their divorce. For much of their separation, Shigeki turns toward his mother and away from his father; later, practical help and a tentative answer to an invitation suggest that the estrangement may have softened, without resolving it. His importance lies less in a dramatic declaration than in the small signs of contact that Hideo learns to hope for and cannot control.

Identity and Family Context

Shigeki is nineteen during the events described, old enough for Hideo to regard him as capable of deciding for himself whether to visit. When Mamiya raises the idea of setting a regular schedule, such as seeing his son once a month, Hideo resists imposing one. He reasons that a nineteen-year-old could come by whenever he wished and that, at that age, a compulsory monthly dinner with his father would have felt burdensome. The exchange establishes a tension that shapes their relationship: Hideo wants contact, but recognizes that turning it into an obligation could make the distance worse.

Shigeki is also a college student. When Hideo tries to arrange a meeting, Ayako tells him their son is in America, spending three weeks of his summer vacation with the host family of a friend studying at a college in Arizona on a one-year exchange program. Hideo remarks on the heat there; Ayako answers that Shigeki is young. The short exchange places him beyond his parents’ immediate reach, living out an independent summer while his father is only beginning to consider how to approach him again.

Estrangement During the Divorce

As Hideo and Ayako begin discussing divorce, Shigeki turns almost completely away from his father. He ignores Hideo when Hideo speaks to him, while continuing to talk with Ayako with familiar ease. Hideo understands this as Shigeki siding with his mother, with whom he expects to live after the divorce. Although the silence wounds him, Hideo does not claim that his son is wrong: he reasons that Shigeki’s choice may help him remain close to Ayako, and decides to stop trying to win his affection. He goes so far as to tell himself he will try to forget his son.

That decision is not the same as indifference. After leaving his parents’ apartment, Hideo recalls Shigeki and reflects on the separation between what he has just experienced with his parents and ordinary life. The thought of his son reopens a different obligation. Hideo suspects that Shigeki may have learned of Ayako’s relationship with Mamiya, and wonders whether the news might make him feel a need for a father’s love. This remains Hideo’s speculation, not a confirmed account of what Shigeki knows or feels. But it changes Hideo’s stance: having received affection from his own parents, he imagines that he might offer something similar to his son.

Hideo’s Attempt to Reconnect

Hideo responds to that possibility with a practical plan. To avoid lying to Kei about where he will be that night, he asks the cab driver to take him to a hotel in Akasaka. From there, he intends to call Shigeki and invite him to lunch the next day, perhaps giving him some extra spending money. The plan combines an attempt at ordinary fatherly generosity with Hideo’s awareness that his son may not welcome a sudden approach. It comes to nothing when he learns that Shigeki is away in Arizona.

In a later conversation with Ayako, Hideo asks whether she intends to marry Mamiya. She says the matter is none of his business; Hideo replies that Shigeki is his son too and that he has a right to worry about how the relationship might affect him. Ayako challenges the sudden concern, pointing out that Hideo had paid little attention to Shigeki before. Hideo says that he called because he wanted to see his son. The exchange leaves his effort complicated: he asserts a continuing parental bond, but Ayako’s rebuke recalls the earlier neglect that helped produce their estrangement.

Practical Help and a Tentative Opening

After Hideo leaves the hospital in mid-September, he moves into an apartment near Kyodo station on the Odakyu line. Mamiya, Ayako, and Shigeki have moved his belongings for him. That evening Hideo calls Ayako to thank her and asks to speak with Shigeki as well. Ayako says that Shigeki worked especially hard on the move, turning the son who had once ignored his father into a participant in the practical work of helping him establish a separate home.

Shigeki asks how Hideo is feeling. Hideo says he is doing all right, and Shigeki answers that this is good. Hideo then thanks him for helping move his things; Shigeki minimizes the difficulty. Their exchange is brief, but Hideo notices that his son’s manner is familiar without seeming eager to end the conversation as quickly as possible. He cautiously considers whether the distance between them has eased now that they no longer live under the same roof. The possibility is Hideo’s reading of the call, not a direct statement from Shigeki.

Encouraged, Hideo asks whether the two of them might go out to dinner sometime, just the two of them. Shigeki pauses before answering that they could do so one of these days. Hideo treats this as about as good a response as he could have hoped for. The invitation and the pause preserve the uncertainty: Shigeki does not promise a date, but neither does he refuse. His relationship with Hideo ends this portion of the story not in reconciliation, but in a modest opening made possible by his help and his willingness to keep talking.

Narrative Significance

Shigeki’s presence makes Hideo confront the difference between longing for family and sustaining a relationship with the living family he has neglected. Hideo’s renewed desire to see his son follows the affection he experiences with his own parents, but it cannot simply be transferred into an instant repair. Shigeki has his own loyalties, plans, and distance from his father; his trip to Arizona and his measured response to dinner remain his, rather than becoming instruments of Hideo’s wish.

The contrast between Hideo’s proposed monthly rule and the later, unforced invitation is especially telling. At first, Hideo rejects a schedule that could make visits an obligation; by the end, he offers one meal and accepts an indefinite answer. Shigeki’s small gestures—helping with the move, asking after Hideo’s health, and leaving dinner as a possibility—do not erase the years of estrangement. They do, however, shift the relationship from near-total silence toward a fragile, practical form of contact.