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DIVE!! (Light Novel) - Book 2 Chapter 5 - Where To Go?
Book 2 Chapter 5 - Where To Go?
This chapter is updated by NovelFree.ml
He wondered if the rain was a temporary evening shower. As soon as it rained fiercely, it was like nothing could pass through it. He wondered how long it had been since he came to this room. Although not much time should have passed, a silence like midnight was piling up in the AV room where there was only two people.
The special smell of a midsummer night steadily approached from the current darkness. But it wasn’t like the strong fragrance of the summer in his hometown.
The scent of grass that was still young. The scent of wet dirt. The scent of the sun soaked into skin. Wandering stray dogs. Ice that someone had dropped on the roadside. Watermelons on the beach that had been smashed apart. The gunpowder odor of fireworks. The carcasses of bugs. Vibrant life dwelled in all of them, even the carcasses. That was Tsugaru’s summer—
While chasing those things that came into his mind and disappeared, Shibuki thought absentmindedly that it was only after the evening shower that his hometown and the city had the same smell.
His thoughts flew everywhere. He knew there were other things that he had to think about right now, but apparently, he didn’t want to think about them. Avoid them. Avert your eyes. His brain was giving those instructions.
However, his opponent was Asaki Kayoko. Since it was just the two of them, she carried a pipe chair to sit in front of him. Her way of sitting was like a test of endurance, where she silently matched her forehead against his. Even if you dodged the issues yourself, you couldn’t escape from this woman, Shibuki thought as he slowly gave up.
“Truthfully, I should have decided after I had consulted with you. I know that.” Kayoko was the first to break the silence. “But, if I had consulted with you, would you have still tried to go to Beijing no matter how unreasonable that was? I couldn’t let you commit such a suicidal act. I can’t bear the risk of your future as a diver being spoiled just because of one training camp.”
“Isn’t that one training camp the only shortcut to the Olympics?”
“The Olympics aren’t just next year. They come around again in five years, and in nine years as well.”
“In other words, it’s hopeless for next year? Is my back that bad?”
“We don’t know unless a specialist examines you. However, to whatever extent your injury is, I think that it will be difficult to heal your back once it was damaged. After that is the question of how to compromise with your back.”
“Compromise?”
“About ways for you to practice so as to prevent it from growing worse. In that condition, you can’t try any new techniques, and I’m saying very clearly that right now you can’t do 3½ somersaults. More importantly, in order to decrease the burden on your back even a little now, it is important to master saving completely. Even so, pain will definitely follow you around. There are quite a lot of active athletes fighting against lower back pain like you, but the question is, can you endure it?”
“…”
Shibuki now understood for the first time the reason why Kayoko taught Tomoki the 3½ but not him. And that reason deepened his despair.
It was a diver’s instinct to take on new skills. Just like how a swimmer tries to swim faster, the diver tries to soar with more advanced techniques. If that was stolen away, what was left for them?
“To tell the truth, we should have talked about this earlier, shouldn’t we?”
Kayoko’s voice was unusually tinged with pity, which also despaired Shibuki.
“From the time I knew about your back problem, I knew that we’ll have to talk about it like this one day. But, I was afraid. Speaking of which, I felt like you’d quit diving and go back to Tsugaru. That’s why I took a bet.”
“Bet?”
“I asked Coach Fujitani to begin this talk after waiting for the qualifying trials of the training camp participants. I wanted you to experience a competition even once for yourself before being hit with the harsh reality. That was what I was betting on. Whether or not you can grasp that momentary thrill in that competition.”
“Momentary…thrill.”
“If you grasped it, you can withstand the long challenges after that. I believe that you can do it for that momentary thrill.”
“Tell me,” Kayoko whispered. “Have you grasped that momentary thrill on that day?”
Shibuki did not deny nor affirm that.
But his heart answered honestly.
He had felt it.
It was true, on that day, he was enveloped by that momentary thrill and set aflame.
The cheers from the main pool. A wave of applause. The exhilaration of his heart beating undauntedly to the gazes of a huge crowd, rousing up his willpower to defend his ordinary self to the death, and using up everything in order to soar. That was definitely something that didn’t exist in the sea. Shibuki should even have a craving for it when he wanted to taste that something that had overpowered and fascinated him. Even so, if he could, he wanted a bigger stage, a bigger and bigger thrill—
It looks like that while I was that prejudiced against the pool, it performed the magic of competitive diving on me in just one competition. While amazed at his own simplicity, Shibuki acknowledged the growing desire in his heart of hearts that he was not able to ignore. He wished to go to Beijing. No, he wanted to rush all the way to Sydney.
But, he knew that it was essential to acquire more advanced skills for that purpose.
“Tell me. Did you grasp that momentary thrill?”
The fault lied only with him to destroy his back that much. Shibuki didn’t particularly bear a grudge towards Kayoko, who continued to question him persistently. But, as for her way of going ahead with things as she pleased without him knowing about, as usual, he couldn’t stop himself from getting upset about it.
“Until now, I’ve been doing what you’ve told me to do because of our contract. I came to Tokyo when you told me to, and I practiced when I was told to. I went to the competition because I was told to. So, if I’m told to turn down Beijing, then I’ll turn it down. However,” Shibuki continued, “it’ll be different from now on. I can’t aim for next year’s Olympics with my injury. Seeing that I can’t fulfill our contract, I have no use to you anymore. You already placed all your hopes on Fujitani and Sakai since you don’t care about me anymore.”
“My hopes for you haven’t disappeared completely. Even if you can’t go to Beijing, if you continue patiently with treatment and practice, it’s possible that you’ll make it in time for the Olympics…”
“Anyways.”
Shibuki cut her off, as though he didn’t want to listen to anything anymore.
“Give me some time. From now on I’ll decide on my future.”
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The Asia Joint Training Camp turned into a short-lived dream.
If he were an adult, then would he have drunk away his sorrows this night, gotten dead drunk and lost himself, then finally returned home? If he wasn’t good at drinking, there was always the coping mechanism called pachinko, and if he hated gambling, then there was always the refuge called the red-light district. Because people got older whether they liked it or not, until now Shibuki had never thought that he wanted to hurry up and become an adult or anything impatient like that, but today was the first time that he felt that it was inconvenient to be a minor.
Nevertheless, when Shibuki returned home reluctantly after losing interest in searching for a destination, he was met with a surreal scene that made him speechless.
On the counter of the cramped dining kitchen, an apron-clad Ooshima had set down a cooking stove, and working hard at preparing sukiyaki.
They were two men living together. Naturally it had been a long time since they had staple foods other than convenience store bentos on their dining table, not to mention being away from home cooking for a long time. When thinking about nutrition, for one or two times a week Ooshima took him out on vegetable-focused meals, but this was obviously the first time that this seemingly clumsy man was preparing something like dinner.
“This is just unnatural.”
Although he had no appetite at all, Shibuki reluctantly stood across from Ooshima and the pot of sukiyaki. But, he couldn’t stomach Ooshima’s affectedness, who didn’t mention the training camp at all, and instead brought up topics like which celebrity got married or divorced, and purposely distant jokes.
“You talk about sukiyaki, and you’re acting like you don’t know whether to be reserved or not. That actually makes you even more unnatural.”
Ooshima indignantly stuck out his bottom lip.
“What’s wrong with the sukiyaki? I spent a lot of money on buying good meat, you know.”
“That’s why the sukiyaki isn’t the problem…”
“Yes, yes, after all I’m a man who can’t worry casually. I’m a no-good man who can’t talk wittily, and I can only think of sukiyaki when talking about cooking.”
“Sukiyaki isn’t cooking.”
“What?”
“It’s just cutting up meat and vegetables and then pushing them into a pot. You can’t call that cooking.”
“Well then, just call it sukiyaki.”
Ooshima looked desperate as he stuffed his mouth with a huge amount of shirataki noodles (1), and since he washed them down with a large mug of beer, his stomach seemed to caved in.
“So, what are you going to do from now on?”
“About what?”
“‘What’, he says. About diving, dummy.”
“Then, you were going to ask me?”
“You said I was unnatural, didn’t you? I’m in charge of the elementary schoolers, and if you don’t want to, you don’t have to take anything about diving back home. But, if you want to talk, then talk as much as you like.”
“This is home?”
“I always wanted one. I was divorced once, so I never had any kids. This is like a conversation with my son.”
“I’m glad I’m not your son.”
While beating off his insults, Shibuki’s chopsticks gradually gained pace. The two silently picked at the pot of sukiyaki, and added udon when there weren’t enough ingredients and added it to the soup, still sipping it silently.
“You’re only going to the doctor.”
When Ooshima opened his mouth again, Shibuki stood up to carry the dishes to the sink, and in that moment, he grabbed his back, and that was when the bottom of his eyes spasmed.
“I was supposed to go when I was picked to be a training camp member.”
“I thought you had no choice but to go if you were picked as a training camp member…”
Shibuki hesitated to say it. “I feel like I don’t need to anymore.”
“What do you mean?”
“…”
“No way, you…”
Shibuki turned back to his room faster than Ooshima saying what he was about to say.
At that moment as he sat in front of the pot that only had tofu and shirataki left, the bad premonition that swept Ooshima’s heart came true and solidified into something real the very next day.
On that day, Shibuki took a break from MDC’s practice without permission for the very first time. In addition, when Ooshima came home in the evening, he found a piece of paper on top of the beautifully polished sukiyaki pot.
“I will be going back to Tsugaru for a little while. SHIBUKI LOVE”
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Translation Notes
1. Shirataki noodles are thin noodles made of the konjac yam.
