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DIVE!! (Light Novel) - Book 3 Chapter 8 - Old Boy’s Ambition
Book 3 Chapter 8 - Old Boy’s Ambition
This chapter is updated by NovelFree.ml
Youichi was using the washroom on the lobby floor when the old man walked in. Despite the fact that it was virtually empty, the old man went out of his way to stand shoulder-to-shoulder to him, and rudely stared at the scene that Youichi didn’t want to be looked at very much.
The old man looked like he was in good shape and was wearing a dark grey suit. The bright blue shirt seemed a bit too colorful against his grey head, but the chic grey necktie helped hold back the impression of gaudiness. His eyes had a reptilian coldness, but his thick, connected eyebrows gave off a mammalian warmth. He gave the impression that everything was on a delicate balance.
When Youichi finished, the old man suddenly began to do his business. When Youichi looked without thinking at the surprising force of the released fluid, the old man crooked his lips into a smirk and proudly flared out his nostrils.
Youichi left the place, feeling an indescribable sense of defeat in his chest, and made his way quickly through the lobby to get on the elevator. He did not try to take his finger off from the “open” button.
He waited some ten minutes. Before long the old man appeared, and stood right next to him again.
Youichi took his finger off the “open” button and spoke.
“To the twenty-seventh floor?”
The old man nodded.
“You are Chairman Maebara, am I correct?”
He had that feeling from the first time that he saw him.
The old man raised his wristwatch to his eyes, confirmed the angle of the minute hand, and nodded.
“It seems that it is exactly ten o’clock. This is only my opinion, but people who are careless about time cannot be accepted in the world of water. Competitive swimming is a race that competes for point-one seconds. You are battling, and conquering time. Compared to that, diving is a battle with the self confined within one-point-something seconds. The one who makes the best use of those one-point-something seconds becomes the victor. Either way, people whose sense of time is slow should stay on land.”
He was talking only to talk, and Chairman Maebara turned to look at Youichi without asking for agreement.
“You’re Fujitani Youichi-kun, aren’t you?”
The elevator door opened silently in front of the two of them before Youichi could nod.
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The chairman led him to a room on the twenty-seventh floor that was, contrary to Youichi’s expectations, was a very simple twin room. As soon as they entered, there was the unit bath and the washroom, and in the back of the room there were two queen-size beds. Salmon-pink lined curtains hung from the window, and two chairs stood on either side of a side table. The wallpaper, the rug, the bed covers—all of them were in that light pink colour. As soon as Youichi stepped foot into the room, he felt like he’d been wrapped in the peel of a strawberry daifukumochi (1). A woman dressed in a red two-piece suit—maybe to match the décor—sat a desk near the wall, perhaps doing deskwork.
The woman, who he thought was around thirty, saw the two of them, quickly tidied up the documents on the table and stood up.
“This is my lover.” he said solemnly.
“I am his secretary, Mizusawa.” She corrected with a smile. “Please take your time. Until the time for the interview approaches, I will be in the lounge on the first floor.”
The secretary left the room carrying the documents. The chairman looked into the mini fridge while grumbling that she should have made some coffee at least, and took out a can of coffee and Oolong tea. Then he prompted Youichi to go the chair by the window, placed the Oolong tea in front of him, and gave himself the canned coffee.
“I have said this earlier, but I am very particular about time. I’m directly asking you: What are you coming here to do?”
While lifting the tab on the canned coffee, and gave Youichi a sharp look.
“The time given to us is one hour. To be exact, fifty-six minutes. You must make the most of this time. Let’s dispense with bothersome things, like first interview greetings and talks about the weather, for this occasion.”
Youichi nodded. He said that, yet he thought that it was necessary to spare time to reach for Oolong tea.
“I came because I have a request.” Youichi cut to the point. “I…I (2) want my Olympic nomination to be returned to a blank slate.”
His cool mask fell apart, and his voice shook faintly.
“Could you start it from scratch, and re-determine it through a competition?”
“Through competition?”
“At the Olympic representative qualifying trials. Fighting with everyone else, and the winner gets the right to represent, just like how it is always done until now. Could you let me go to Sydney that way?”
“Why do you want to repeat the Sydney Olympic representative selection once again? It is quite a strange idea.” Chairman Maebara hmmed, as if savoring that strangeness. “But, it is lacking in reality. Did you think that such a thing is possible?”
“I don’t know. The Olympics themselves are too big and lacking in reality for me. It doesn’t really feel like it’s mine…so, in order to make it mine, I want fight with everyone once more, and take the representative right with my own hands.”
“I don’t understand. Is there such a big difference between us deciding the representatives and the representatives being chosen through competition?”
“It is different. There is a big difference. It’s really important.”
“I don’t understand. I don’t understand at all. But, well, I suppose that you are voluntarily giving up your representative spot, so it probably is quite a serious matter.”
At those words, Youichi relaxed his shoulders in relief. “But, Fujitani-kun,” Chairman Maebara continued. “Even if it is an important matter to you, what about the diving world as a whole? Don’t you think that this is just the selfishness of one person?”
Youichi was at a loss for words.
“That may be. But, it is a fervent selfishness. I have tried to think differently from various people’s standpoints, but somehow, I’ve only gotten disconnected from the important things, and so, I have no choice but to do what’s appropriate for me. (3) That is how I feel.”
“If I reject that fervent selfishness, what do you plan to do?”
“First of all, I plan on not participating in the Sino-Japanese Goodwill Competition at the end of this month.”
“Not participating?”
“Based on the results of that competition, you were going to announce mine and Teramoto-san’s Olympic nominations. But, you won’t be able to nominate a diver who wasn’t in the competition.”
“Are you trying to start the representative nominations over again by yourself? That is also a strange idea.”
Nodding like he was partly impressed, the chairman downed his canned coffee in one gulp. It was as though he drank to replenish the energy he needed to continue talking.
“It is a lonely story though, isn’t it, Fujitani-kun. Even if you did decline the representative nomination, we could just have another diver to fill that spot. Certainly, you’re the best choice to go with Teramoto Kenichirou to Sydney. However, it does not necessarily have to be you.”
“There are no substitutes for Teramoto Kenichirou, but there are plenty for me. Is that it?”
“There aren’t plenty. The Japanese diving world is not blessed with many talented athletes. But, there are some divers who could perform well enough to not give the judges a bad impression of Japan.”
“I see, so you will choose a new safety blanket from them.”
Chairman Maebara replied carelessly. “It’s quite bad for you, Fujitani-kun. I feel that if it’s for medals, I’d gladly offer my soul to the koalas.”
“Koalas?”
“That’s about it…well, if I’m borrowing your words, that’s how much I fervently want medals. And that fervor isn’t just mine, but the entire Japanese diving world’s.”
Chairman Maebara reached for his canned coffee again, and when he noticed it was empty he slowly lifted himself up. He discarded the empty can into the trash can next to the desk, and as if he suddenly thought of it, went to open the curtains next to the refrigerator that were flapping around like a folding fan.
The sun, trying to reach its zenith soon, was a brilliant paintbrush that dyed the pink room a lively orange.
“Fujitani-kun, do you know how many divers there are in Japan?”
Youichi gestured with his head to tell him to go on.
“It is perhaps about the same number as the number of students in your high school. Six hundred people. Only six hundred people across the whole nation.”
“That is not a lot.”
“It’s very little. Indeed, it’s catastrophically small. It could even be said that they’re on the verge of extinction. With these numbers, we are trying to compete against countries like the US, which has around ten-thousand divers. What’s more, the number of children starting to dive does not appear to be increasing. Children love sports like soccer and baseball. Who would be interested in a sport where even its Olympic finals are almost never shown on TV?”
Chairman Maebara sighed deeply onto the window reflecting the hazy high-rise building streets.
“We aren’t blaming TV for this. Diving does not get much attention because it is weak. The 1932 Los Angeles Olympics were the first Olympics that Japan sent diving representatives to, but even after over seventy years, we haven’t won a single medal. We have winners. But the winning is useless. We need medals. We need a hero who would move people to tears from hearing just one story about his hardships. If that is what diving is, we need a hero who would broadly appeal for its beauty and magnificence.”
The chairman held his tongue, which could have kept turning forever if let loose, with the force of his will. He turned languidly towards Youichi.
“This is my fervor. It is the fervor that the Japanese diving world had handed down in an unbroken chain for eighty years, since the first diving board in Japan was installed in 1917.”
The chairman’s eyes pierced Youichi. His back was lit from behind by the golden rays of the sun.
Youichi could only avert his eyes from that strong gaze.
It appeared that he, who had only lived for seventeen years, had his own fervor crushed by the Japanese diving world’s eighty-year older one.
“That’s why I want medals. I want to send someone who would definitely aim for a medal to Sydney. Do you understand that?” Chairman Maebara asked him, but Youichi opened his mouth with difficulty.
“So…so, that means for the sake of medals, you’re only going to protect Teramoto-san from now on?”
“If other divers who could aim for medals appear, I will protect them with all my power, no matter who they are.”
“And thus, you’ll sacrifice everyone else. You’d limit participation in international meets, decrease the number of representatives to the Olympics, in order to shut down any opportunity to enter the outside world. Is that the right way…?”
“You’re asking if that is right or wrong, Fujitani-kun?” Chairman Maebara said while scratching the side of his nose. “Well, it’s not up to me, but the medals that will decide that. If Japan wins medals at the Olympics, then my way of doing things would be right. If we don’t get medals, I will be blamed for making the mistakes. The referee confers the result in an instant, and history will spend a long time examining it. But to be honest, I don’t care about that. For me, even if I fell into hell, I would want medals.”
Even if I fell into hell, I would want medals.
By that single phrase, Youichi was completely defeated. He had completely lost the words to at least reply back to him with. When he talked the old man, he felt like he was diligently throwing small pebbles into a bottomless swamp that swallowed up both clearness and cloudiness.
“Well, I have finished my story.”
When Youichi, who seldom broke his posture, listlessly slumped his shoulders, Chairman Maebara left the window side and sat in his chair again.
“But, there’s still thirty-nine minutes left. So now let’s hear your story.”
“My story?” (3)
“As I have talked about the current situation of the diving world, you should also talk about the current situation of you as a person. How you were born, and how you have lived until now. What do you associate with diving. It doesn’t bother me if you can’t say it well. Just be careful about how much time you use. I hate stories that end with “to be continued,” which is why I have never seen anything like a serial drama.”
“But, why is it my story…”
“I’m simply interested. I’m interested in the eccentric high school student who came by himself to visit the medal ghoul with a bad reputation. I’m very interested in the psychology of the one who threw away the extremely-hard-to-obtain Olympic representative spot. And also…” Chairman Maebara stared at the ceiling for three seconds before continuing. “Your story might become a clue that would convey to me some of your fervor.”
Something tense returned to the space between the two who were facing each other.
Youichi straightened his posture, reached for the Oolong tea on the side table, pulled the tab and quenched his dry throat.
And then he spoke.
“I will tell you.”
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Translation Notes
1. A type of small round rice cake with sweet filling.
2. Youichi switches his pronouns from ore to boku here, to sound more polite. He switches back sometimes during the chapter.
3. He switches back to ore here.
