C1 Part2

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Original: http://seiga.nicovideo.jp/watch/bk116248

Chapter one, part one translation: http://clock08.tumblr.com/post/51042972454/yoshiwara-lament

This is the rest of the free preview chapter.

* * *

At four o'clock A.M., early in the morning before the sun rises, the guests return to the city.

Prostitutes have different ways of parting with customers. Some put their haori back on them in front of the shop, and others wave through the grating. There are also prostitutes who say goodbye from inside the futon.

Yayoi and I escorted the young master of Oojiya all the way to the gates of Yoshiwara with Sasagiku-neesan. It isn’t necessary for a shinzou or kamuro to do as much, but he had given us expensive candy the previous night, so I felt the least we could do was say goodbye.

The rain had completely stopped. A man from the young master’s shop came to meet him at the gates of Yoshiwara carrying a paper lantern.

The young master avoided the puddles in the street by stepping over them. Behind him, Sasagiku-neesan walked with a mincing gait.

Even in the muddy streets after the rain, the young master’s tabi were pure white, and he was dressed with dignity. (Note: Tabi=traditional Japanese socks http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tabi) In contrast, Sasagiku-neesan had a laid-back and untidy appearance. Still, it wasn’t in an indecent way; even her gently fallen hair had a certain seductiveness about it, and somehow hinted at the intensity of the night before.

“I’ll come see you again soon.”

“Okay, I will be awaiting your visit.”

The young master suddenly knit his brow at that exchange. As if displeased by something, he looked at Sasagiku-neesan’s face and whispered, “It’s hopeless after all.”

“When you use oiran speech like that, I can’t tell at all whether you’ll really be waiting for me or not. Could you please at least use regular street talk to say good bye?”

“I can’t do that. This is the established phrase. As long as I’m in Yoshiwara, I can’t use any other phrases to customers.”

The young master suddenly grimaced at Sasagiu-neesan’s resolute answer.

However, though I feel sorry for the young master, I don’t think that it can be helped. Originally, there are of girls of miscellaneous social classes brought together in Yoshiwara. There are the daughters of warriors, merchants, craftsman, farmers, as well as girls bought from surprisingly far away. Naturally, everyone has a different accent, so all of us must use the same phrases in order to hide that.

Despite that, the young master didn’t withdraw. “If that’s the case,” he started, pointing to the other side of the gates of Yoshiwara. “If that’s the case, would you take one step outside this gate and talk with me? Just a single step outside Yoshiwara. If you’re over there, could you use street talk?”

“I can’t do that.”

“Why not? It’s not as if you’re running away from here.”

“No, I can’t. Even if it’s just one step, it’s still leaving. It’s the same as running away. If someone were to see… have you considered what I would suffer?”

The young master suddenly went silent. Looking down, he muttered, “I’m sorry.”

Watching his back as he walked off, I whispered, “How selfish.”

“Kasane, that’s not something you should say.”

“But everything that just came out of his mouth was pure selfishness. It’s a pity for you.”

“Just that was nothing.”

Sasagiku-nesan chuckled. “Besides, he had already noticed how I really felt a long time ago. He just wants to hear me confirm it. Isn’t he cute?”

“Cute? You’re saying he is cute?” My eyes reflexively widened in surprise at her unexpected words.

Sasagiku-neesan continued, “Yeah, he’s really adorable,” her cheeks reddening. “One day, you two will understand, too. Grown men have a cuteness that flowers and dolls don’t.”

Giggling, Sasagiku-nesan gently turned on her heal. The rising sun created flowers of light in the puddles. Watching Sasagiku-nesan, who looked just like a soaring butterfly, Yayoi suddenly sang, “Loooveeer,” out of tune.

* * *

After seeing the customers off and taking a short rest, another day in Yoshiwara began. The establishments open in the afternoon. We begin to accompany clients while the sun is high in the sky, retire in the evening, and take customers again at sunset. In the red light district, each trade has different business hours.

“I’ll come see you again soon.”

After saying that, the young master of Oojiya did not show up at the Oyama brothel even days later.

During that time, Sasagiku-neesan lived out her busy everyday life as usual. Attracting cheers in the oiran parade from the establishment to the assignation teahouses. She skillfully handled each customer one after another, working to please even the men who I would want to strike upside the face saying, “You are really an idiot!”

Everything was exactly the same as always. The only thing that had changed was the brand new tortoiseshell clip decorating Sasagiku-neesan’s hair. The clip of chrysanthemums and bamboo leaves, associated with her name, remarkably beautified her face.

Even so, I wondered when the young master of Oojiya meant by “soon.” As the days passed me by, one day, when I realized it was all I could think about–.

“Oh my God!”

Sadaji suddenly flew into the second floor room. (Note: The room is a “mawashibeya,” which is a large room which could be divided with screens where the girls of lower status stayed and worked.)

It was in late the morning, after the morning baths were over and the crows had long forgotten their cries of dawn. At the time, Yayoi, the other shinzou, and I were scattering matching clothing throughout the room. Since Sasagiku-neesan told us that we should “wear a color that would look pretty on the shinzou before the rainy season,” we were discussing wearing a pale green kimono the color of celadon porcelain with a swallowtail butterfly pattern.

“Sadaji, you idiot! Don’t just come in the room as you please!” one shinzou cried in anger at Sadaji’s rudeness.

However, Sadaji disregarded her, exclaiming, “No time for that!” and settled down in the middle of the room.

“What do you mean? What happened?”

“Listen, don’t be too shocked at what I’m about to tell you.” Sadaji chuckled proudly and turned his nose up toward the ceiling. “Sasagiku is going to leave Yoshiwara.”

“Huh?”

The room fell silent in an instant.

Unable to understand the meaning of Sadaji’s words, everyone in the room exchanged glances. Suddenly, Yayoi burst out, “Liar!” and hit Sadaji in the face.

“There’s no way Sasagiku would go away! Stupid, stupid, stupid! A liar like Sadaji should be denied food and water, hanged, and left to dry in the sun!”

“What?!” Sadaji yelled, seeming ready to fight back, so I hurried to stop him and asked him to explain.

“What happened?”

“She was paid out,” Sadaji replied with a grin. “It was the young master of Oojiya. He says he wants to have Sasagiku near him.”

The room echoed with shouts which were something between screams and cries of joy. There were people who clapped their hands in excitement, those who burst into tears out of the surprise, and those who flew out of the room to spread the news to the older prostitutes in another room.

I repeated the question to Sadaji.

“Wait, wait a second. You’re kidding, right?”

“Is this something to joke about? This is breaking news, just in!”

Thoughts of “I knew it” and “no way” mixed inside my head.

To tell the truth,there are plenty of prostitutes besides Sasagiku-neesan who have lovers, but that doesn’t mean any of them were tied to those lovers. After all, it took quite a sum of money to pay someone out of bondage– the amount of money to be exchanged was something the warriors and merchants about there would never see their whole lives. Among them, there were many cases where one couldn’t tell if the man was a lover or a pimp. Even if the lover were rich, it was rare for them to try to try to remain so devoted to them that they would raise so much money. Most people see love with a prostitute as just a dream only possible in Yoshiwara.

And in spite of that.

I never would have thought that Sasagiku-neesan would have been paid out.

“I think that Obaba will discuss it with us later, but in three days, there will be a banquet to celebrate the ‘selling out’ of the establishment. For that reason, starting today, Sasagiku-neesan is reserved by the young master of Oojiya.”

“I’m not sure about being reserved, but being bought out in three days? That’s too soon.”

“Even if you say that, I wouldn’t know. The owner and the young master were negotiating saying that just a while ago. Well, but the young master seemed to want to buy us out as early as today.”

“What are you talking about?! He wouldn’t do something so childish–,” I began to say, when suddenly, I remembered what Sasagiku-neesan had said.

–Grown men have a cuteness that flowers and dolls don’t.

This is definitely what she meant. The moment I understood, I felt a light pain in my heart similar to yearning. In the room breaking out into shouts of joy, I tightly gripped my collar over my chest.

* * *

There is a phrase that goes describes waiting eagerly as “a thousand autumns in one day,” but to me, being able to experience autumn a thousand times in one day was so happy that those three days seemed to pass more quickly than three blinks of the eyes.

The banquet held the day of selling out was extravagant and elegant. All were treated to alcohol and food. Rice cakes and red rice were distributed to the manservants and geisha of the establishment, and even to the neighboring shops as well.

Just as the name “selling out” would imply, all of the prostitutes of the Oyama brothel were bought up by the young master of Oojiya. The older girls were dressed in the best uchikake, and the kamuro shinzou such as myself colored the scene in matching furisode. The sounds of the shamisen played by the geisha living here and the roaring laughter of the jesters filled the room. A storm of enthusiastic shouts arose from all around.

In the midst of the noise of the singing and music, I cut through the crowd of people to the formal tatami room and headed toward the young master of Oojiya who was enjoying the party in the seat of honor. When he noticed me, the corners of his mouth lifted into a grin.

“What’s wrong, Kasane? You seem in a bad mood.”

“Yes, I am, because you’ve taken our Sasagiku-neesan away from us.”

He loudly laughed “ha ha ha,” and I laughed along with him.

“Young master, congratulations. Please make Sasagiku-neesan happy.”

“Ah, yes, I know.”

“Here, have a drink,” I said as I poured alcohol into his cup.

All of a sudden, a paper flower that a geisha had folded as a show fluttered as a cherry blossom before my eyes. It was a gorgeous sight, just as if a slightly late spring had arrived. The young master drank down the alcohol seeming deeply moved, then muttered, “It’s thanks to you.”

”It’s thanks to you that I made up my mind. Now I can finally move from being a 'fake lover’ to a 'real lover.'”

The banquet soon came to an end, and Sasagiku-neesan quietly took off her uchikake. She fixed her hair again in the inner room, and got dressed into the flower-patterned kosode that the young master had prepared. (Note: Kosode=A basic robe http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kosode)

Completely transformed into the dress of a street girl, Sasagiku-neesan was more beautiful than ever before. She wore neither lipstick nor face powder nor the smell of perfume, but her beauty would beat any gorgeous clothing.

A palanquin carrying Sasagiku-neesan was brought to the gates of Yoshiwara. Sasagiku-neesan greeted each person with “Good bye, take care,” and we replied the same.

The palanquin was lifted from the ground. The time to part was growing near. The voices saying “good bye, take care” were gradually rising with emotion. There were people who suppressed the tears. There also people who burst out crying, unable to hold back. Yayoi was clinging desperately to Sasagiku-neesan, because in her young mind, she understood that they would never meet again. Sasagiku-neesan simply smiled at us, showing no tears, so I smiled in the same way. Until the moment the palanquin began to move, I tightly squeezed her hand.

“Thank you for everything. Please, please, always take care and be well.”

“You’re not going to cry?” When I suddenly realized it, Sadaji standing next to me was curiously staring into my face. “Even though she loved you so much.”

“I couldn’t do that. After all, I’m the one who pressured him.”

“Hmm,” Sadaji answered apathetically.

The palanquin carrying Sasagiku-neesan had already gone far away. The other older girls had returned to the shop, and Yayoi, worn out from crying, was sleeping in Sadaji’s arms. As I stood before the deserted gates, a damp breeze gently brushed my cheek. Sadaji began to talk to me in a low voice.

“It seems the young master was quite rich, right?”

“Huh? What do you mean?

“I mean, no matter how big of a shop the Oojiya family runs, there’s a limit to how much money he can use. He can’t just go and use the shop’s money, of course. So he must have bowed his head and humbled himself so much that his father finally gave him the money as a loan.”

“Then he wouldn’t have had to do something so over the top as buy us out.”

“Don’t be ridiculous. It’s a rule in Yoshiwara that in order to pay an oiran out of bondage, you have to buy out the whole establishment. And furthermore, Sasagiku was ranked the most beautiful oiran in Yoshiwara. It would be a dishonor to him if he didn’t do it overdo it.”

“That’s strange,” I muttered.

Overdoing it, buying up, honor–those things don’t even really matter. The most important thing is that they wanting to be with each other. –Although it’s not as if I don’t know that there are cases when just wanting won’t achieve anything.

A meaningless sigh escaped, and Sadaji scoffed through his nose.

“It seems like you still don’t know, so I’m going to tell you something. Actually, there’s one more reason why he humbled himself to his father so much.”

“What is it?”

“He’s making Sasagiku his wife. It seems his father said that a girl from Yoshiwara is fit to be a mistress, but the young master stubbornly wouldn’t agree. He said that that couldn’t be a 'true lover.'”

Sadaji stared outside the gates of Yoshiwara with a distant look.

The feelings of the young master were quite considerable. No matter how much he was resisted, no matter how much he was condemned, he determinedly and persistently worked to persuade his father. That was solely to become “true lovers” with Sasagiku-neesan.

“Did you see the lining of his haori?”

“No, I didn’t see.”

“It had a horse pattern. Nine horses were running in one direction.”

“What about it? Horses…”

When I began to speak, I noticed.

Nine horses running in one direction. –Things will turn out well. (Note: It’s a play on words. uma=horse, ku=nine, iku=go. Together, “umakuiku” is a phrase meaning “to turn out well.”)

“Since Sasagiku said she came to Yoshiwara when she was four, so this would be her first time out free in the world in seventeen years? She probably feels like Urashima Tarō.” (Note: “Urashima Tarō (浦島 太郎) is a Japanese legend about a fisherman who rescues a turtle and is rewarded for this with a visit to Ryūgū-jō, the palace of Ryūjin, the Dragon God, under the sea. He stays there for three days and, upon his return to his village, finds himself 300 years in the future.” https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Urashima_Tar%C5%8D)

“You’re right,” I answered.

Sasagiku-neesan is probably gazing at the streets of Edo for the first time in a long time right now. And she would probably nurture this happiness forever.

–Suddenly, I remembered the distant past.

I remembered when I was still living with my parents and little sister. The town of Edo. Every day was happy. Unexpected sorrow. And then… A kind person who worried about me and protected me.

The moist wind blew again, entering inside me and dampening my empty heart.

“Kasane.”

Sadaji suddenly put something in my hand. I felt a rustling, dry sensation. When I dropped my gaze to what was in my hand, Sadaji abruptly lowered his voice.

“It’s a secret letter from Sasagiku.”

I couldn’t believe my ears. When I asked, “Why from you, Sadaji?” he sharply asserted, “Quiet!”

I reflexively gasped at his force. Sadaji swiftly examined the surroundings, moving only his eyes. It looked just as if he were on watching out for something.

“This is an important letter. Don’t show it to anyone. Don’t tell anyone. When you’re done reading it, burn it right away. Promise, got it?”

–

That’s the end of chapter one, and probably as far as I’ll go, at least for a while.

I’d like to change this paragraph in the previous part I think:

Sadaji was born and raised in Yoshiwara, and has never left. His mother is a former-prostitute, and his father is unknown. I’ve heard that his mother used to always say that his father was probably the master of a large store. For this reason, Sadaji couldn’t help being curious when the gentlemen of large stores came.

Sorry for that.

Thank you for reading!

I meant to do it sooner… between the themes and my wording I started to feel embarrassed orz

Thank you for the encouragements ^^

This takes serious effort, ahaaa… I hope nothing was missed.