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DIVE!! (Light Novel) - Book 3 Chapter 11 - SS Special ‘99
Book 3 Chapter 11 - SS Special ‘99
This chapter is updated by NovelFree.ml
When Youichi invited Kayoko to the “Natural House” in the back streets of Higashikitazawa on a Saturday afternoon, almost a week had passed since the Sino-Japanese Goodwill Competition.
“Please eat whatever you like. Today I will also go along with you.”
It was an organic restaurant that had an interior of only plain wood and cream. Youichi, sitting at the seat by the window, presented Kayoko with the menu, which was listed with the names of bland-sounding dishes, and mainly organic vegetable-and-fish-focused.
Turnips and homegrown ganmo, thoroughly boiled. Bok choy covered in crab sauce. Daikon and mustard spinach with yuzu flavor. Salad with sweet potatoes and lemons. White fish and hen-of-the-woods steamed in foil. Homemade yose tofu…(1)
“I feel like I’m getting healthier just looking at this,” Kayoko said, without hiding her confusion at this foreign culture. “I can feel my blood getting thinner.”
“I can guarantee the flavor. I basically don’t eat out, but I come here sometimes. Because it’s my treat today, please eat whatever you like.”
After hesitating, Kayoko ordered a “lunch of buri daikon and mizuna with small fish dressing plus brown rice,” and Youichi chose a “lunch of grilled fish and heated vegetables plus cha soba.” (2)
“So, what is it today? Lately, it seems that you’ve escaped from the worst of the slump that you’ve mentioned before.”
“Thanks to you.”
Indeed, this person had seen through everything. Youichi spoke, while remembering the eeriness of feeling like he had been seen through to his stomach.
“Today is my gratitude for that, and I have a request afterwards…”
“Request?”
“First, with this, I wanted to say that I’m truly grateful for all your help. I think it was you, Coach Asaki, as expected, who opened the first breakthrough for me when I was driven into a corner.”
Youichi bowed formally to Kayoko. He set aside his disposition, and he, who had an impeccable figure, hung his head gracefully, drawing a curve that was as elegant as a moth orchid.
“The issue with the commercial before was wiped clean with your recommendation, right? Since that weird commercial doesn’t exist anymore, I was really relieved.”
“My opinion was just requested. All I said was that Fujitani Youichi seemed to be quite the eccentric oddball, but how would he be as an image character for Mizuki? And that it should be ended for both parties’ sakes. When you refused the nomination in the first place, I am sure that story spread all over the place, like that was the essence of it.”
“I suppose.”
“Even with the uproar over the nomination cancellation, even if I wasn’t here, you surely would have done the same thing in the end. That’s why you shouldn’t be thanking me. What you did seemed rather stupid, but it’s also somewhat exhilarating. So isn’t that okay? Even if they don’t say it, there should be plenty of people who were thinking the same things. And besides…”
Kayoko rarely hesitated to say something. She sipped her blue-green colored tea.
“Besides?”
“Besides, on that day…after the competition when you and Okitsu-kun came back with Sakai-kun who disappeared, I thought something when I saw the three of you laughing while walking. You would never say it, and perhaps you haven’t even realized it yourself, but isn’t the reason for why you gave up the nomination is surprisingly simple?”
“What is it?”
“Well, I wonder.” Kayoko smiled meaningfully. “With that, the story’s already over. I was never very interested in what’s ended. I feel like I’m doing an evaluation meeting voluntarily after the competition. But more importantly, I’m interested in what your request is.”
Youichi, with an embarrassed face, tilted his head, having suddenly gotten nervous with that one sentence. He breathed in quickly. And then, as if to give himself a boost, he pushed out his elbows, and awkwardly began.
“I like self-reflection well enough, so I thought about this slump again on my own. I think it was exactly as you said, but I feel like that’s not all there was… I feel like that I was unconsciously protecting myself somewhere. How I made my techniques my own, how to dive perfectly—I always pondered over those things without feelings of attack, and forgot how to take on something new… That isn’t good.”
Youichi’s voice strengthened, as if he was telling himself that.
“First of all, I think that I will change from here on out. Like Tomo, like Okitsu, I want to take on something new again. And, if possible, I want it to be the event that I was never good at—reverse somersaults.”
“Reverse somersaults…”
“Surprisingly, no one noticed this, but I have never done reverse somersaults for my strong point, pikes. I always made do with the easier-to-dive tuck position. I was in an accident when I was little, and I’ve been dragging that trauma out, but I want to end that soon. So, what I mean is…”
Youichi breathed in heavily, and spoke.
“Could you teach me the reverse 2½ somersaults in pike position?”
Kayoko’s mascara-boldened eyelashes fluttered.
Reverse 2 ½ somersaults in pike position—
That event, which had a degree of difficulty of 2.9, was an extremely difficult dive even for divers who didn’t feel like they weren’t good at reverse somersaults. Since the success rate was so low in addition to the danger, one rarely saw it in a competition.
“I teach you the reverse 2½ somersaults in pike position?”
“There’s two weeks until the qualifying trials where the representation right could be obtained. If I am to master this troublesome technique in such a short time, you are the only coach there is for that.”
“It can be done if it’s me?”
“If it’s you, and me.”
Kayoko’s cheeks slackened to the revived self-confidence in Youichi’s eyes.
“Don’t say such funny things.”
“I was extremely serious. I must take back the representation right at next month’s qualifying trials, by all means. Otherwise, I can’t show my face to the MDC, and my home environment will grow worse and worse. If the MDC is forced to close down, that might even be what will sever the father-son relationship between me and the old man. Every time we pass by each other at home I feel an extraordinary bloodlust. My mother’s so stressed from interposing herself between us that her jaw hasn’t stopped clenching.
“Oh my.”
“It’s a temporomandibular joint disorder (3). Anyways, I absolutely cannot lose next month’s competition because of this. I must perfect the new event, and I would like to face the qualifying trials with my body and mind in the best condition. And so…” Youichi declared with conviction. “I’ve named that reverse 2½ somersaults pike…’SS Special ’99,’ and I’ll work hard to carry it out successfully, and go to Sydney.”
“‘SS Special’?”
“The great pike position—it stands for the Super Shrimp Special.” (4)
“…”
Kayoko was at a loss for words. She then spoke with a tone that sounded like she was trying to find out how serious he was.
“The reverse 2½ somersaults pike has been called the reverse 2½ somersaults pike since forever, and even now everybody calls it the reverse 2½ somersaults pike. Was it necessary to specially give it a new name?”
“It’s to get me into the mindset. It’s a new type of image training.” Youichi said unreservedly.
Kayoko was speechless again, and looked around the restaurant like she was seeking help, but there was nothing there but things and colours that were good for the body.
Walls in an eye-pleasing cream colour. The plain wood ceiling that looked as though they would smell good if you approached it. The incandescent lamps that gave off a natural light, gently embraced by conical paper hats. Just like the ceiling, the plain wood floor looked like it had been carried in from the forest just a short while ago, and the tables—.
As Kayoko stared unblinkingly at each one of those things, at that moment, her mind recalled a phrase.
“‘So out of the ground the Lord God formed every animal of the field and every bird of the air, and brought them to the man to see what he would call them; and whatever the man called every living creature, that was its name.’”
“What’s that?”
“A passage from the Book of Genesis. I was made to memorize it when I was a child. Because all things were named by man, they belong to man. So it is with ‘SHEEP,’ with ‘COW,’ and also with ‘SS Special ’99’…” Kayoko said the names with the beautiful accent that she picked up in America. “That might be nice. If that technique becomes yours because of that.”
“Then…”
“I will also cooperate. Of course, while teaching the other children as well, as usual.”
“Thank you very much.”
When Youichi vigorously brought his head down, a waiter in a vegetable-dyed-style apron appeared holding a serving tray, placing the different lunch sets down in front of them.
Kayoko had already scrambled for the chopsticks when he lifted his head up again.
“It’s true. This really does taste good.”
Influenced by Kayoko’s enthusiasm for the food like the conversation was already over, Youichi also reached for the chopsticks.
The two silently moved the contents of the tray to their mouths like they were plant sister and brother who were having a conversation with alpha waves.
After eating up her buri daikon, mizuna and brown rice, just before hurriedly getting up from her seat like usual, Kayoko spoke, like she had just remembered Youichi was there.
“One day, I would like to let you eat something like greasy spare ribs, or beef stew with plenty of demiglace sauce.”
“I’d like to eat them,” Youichi nodded.
“But, it looks like that day is still far away.”
“I suppose it is.”
“Do you regret it?”
“Regret what?”
“Driving yourself to your very limit again and again, in this extreme world.”
Needless to say, Youichi was shaking his head.
“It’s what I’ve decided for myself.”
The final decisive battle, where the victory was fought for with the additional harsh condition of earning 600 points and more. Facing the stage where his last hope for the Olympics was wagered, it was true that right now, Youichi was at the very limit. Pressure will rise with each passing day, and if he began to train extra hard for the “SS Special ’99,” it’ll be apparent that every night he was exhausted to the point of vomiting gastric juices.
But this is none other than the snow that I let fall myself, Youichi thought.
From now on, he would be rolling it with his own hands, and he would make his own, true snowman that didn’t belong to anyone else.
Even if the shape was somewhat bad, it will surely be cold when it is touched, and when it melts and gets washed away, it will surely leave a trace behind—.
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Translation Notes
1. Ganmo is deep-fried tofu with thinly sliced vegetables. Yuzu is a kind of citrus fruit that grows in East Asia. Hen of the woods is a type of mushroom. Yose tofu is a type of tofu that has no water surrounding it, and a coagulant added to it to help it keeps its shape. It has a more “tofu” flavour.
2. Buri daikon is a dish where yellowtail fish and daikon are cooked with soy sauce. Mizuna is a type of mustard plant that grows in Japan. Cha soba is soba flavored with green tea.
3. The full name for TMJ disorder, where there’s pain in the jaw muscles. For some reason it cracks me up that Youichi knows this
4. Pike position in Japanese is 蝦型 (ebi-kata), which literally means “shrimp type.”
