Junichiro

Diary

Junichiro arrived at the yakiniku with the posture of a man who once measured a blade's edge to the micron, now measuring only the char on someone else's short ribs and finding it wanting. He turned his critique on Itsuki first, as always, dissecting his grill technique with the clipped precision of a general reviewing a failed campaign, because ridiculing another man's flaws was easier than confessing his own portfolio was down bad and his discipline was rugged months ago. But the smoke curled up thick with garlic and marinated beef, the shochu kept arriving unbidden, and somewhere between the third plate and the fourth insult his resolve to eat clean and drink nothing quietly folded like a paper crane in the rain. He ate everything, drank everything, mocked everyone, and by the time the bill came he sat in the wreckage of tongs and empty cups doing what he does best, grading himself against the ghost of the disciplined son he used to be. Walking home unsteady under the lantern light, he wondered, not for the first time, what could have been if the wars had never ended and he'd never learned that a full stomach could feel this much like defeat.