Goodbye

“Betty could you please get Kasumi some tea?” the infatuationed Dr. Ono Tofu said through his fog of delusion. He gazed at the gorgeous young woman through his steamed up glasses and longed to tell her what was in his heart, ‘I love you’ he thought desperately as if trying to convey his feelings through mental telepathy.

Kasumi laughed, delighted at the young doctors antics, his buffoonery making what she had to tell him all the more easy for her. She had had a huge crush on him once and used to write secret love letters to him that she never sent. She used to write the words ‘Mrs. Kasumi Tofu and Mrs. Tofu’ over and over again in her secret diary that not even Nabiki knew about. The main reason why being that she thought her sister to be too dull to really hold any secrets that she could use for blackmail.

When Kasumi first learned to cook she had blushingly left a bowl of soup on his doorstep, she had known him her entire life. She had dreamed about marrying him and living with him. He seemed so fascinating by being so intelligent one minute and acting like a jackanapes the next.

She giggled when he put a patient’s file on his head and wore it like a hat while he told a teenaged boy that he suspected that he was developing menopause; this caused all the patients in the office to flee for their lives. Even the ones in casts ran away with their crutches held over their heads, leaving the befubbled doctor and Kasumi alone. She laughed even harder when the doctor started dancing with Betty, even though it felt like her heart was breaking.

Taking a deep breath, she said “Dr. Tofu I have something to tell you. I wanted you to be the first to know because you’re always been a dear friend to me. Sometimes I even thought that someday...” she said and blushed, unable to continue so large a revelation for the shy young girl. “Dr. Tofu I’m nineteen now and want to start a family of my own. I don’t want to have to look after my father until I’m old and grey. Now that Mrs. Saotome’s staying with us, my family doesn’t need me so much” she said to the still capering doctor as he spun Betty around in a waltz, complete with elaborate dips, while he sang along tunelessly. “Even Akane’s almost a grown woman and will be moving out for college soon. I have a suitor that I met at the library” Kasumi paused. “He’s from America and he’s asked me to marry him. I’d hoped that someday you and I would.....never mind. I’ve accepted his proposal and will be leaving for America in a week, so that we can get married on his family’s ranch. He’s a gentleman and will make an excellent husband and father; he has a good job and has the same old fashioned values as myself. I was hoping that you would give me your opinion, am I doing the right thing? I doubt that I will get this opportunity again and I don’t want to wait anymore. What do you think doctor?” she implored Dr. Tofu.

Dr. Tofu turned his fogged up glasses on her and declared “I think that Betty’s the best dance partner I’ve ever had. But she never got you that tea” while his heart begged ‘no don’t go, I love you, I love you, I love you. Marry me, don’t ever leave me!’

Kasumi smiled through the tears that ran down her cheeks, even now when she was trying to make the most difficult decision of her life, he was trying to cheer her up. Even at the height of his foolery, he looked so handsome with his large powerful body, dark ponytailed hair and dark gentle eyes. The hands that held Betty were large and capable, how she longed to hold his hand just once, to feel his calloused palm in her own. He had healing hands; hands that she’d imagined cradling their baby one day. Kasumi then realized that all she’d ever felt for him was a childish crush that he could never return. He was still her wisecracking family doctor, who would never see her as a woman and let her dreams of them go.

She would marry Sean, who she loved in her own way. She would move to Montana and into his family’s ranch house, to help with their cattle business. She would learn English and that would be the language that their children would speak. She would learn to love Sean in the way that he, as a good man deserved. He would her husband, not Dr. Tofu.

Ono tried to get himself to protest, to come out of the haze that she put him in, but every time he opened his mouth more lunacy came pouring out of it.

Kasumi waited for him to speak his mind, but he didn’t seem to want to besides his cheerful nattering. She smiled at him patiently and gave up. “Dr. Tofu, you’ve brought much joy to my family and myself. I thank you for being a friend and I wish that you someday find that person who is meant for you as I did” she said and boldly kissed him on the cheek.

She smiled and dried her tears when he started leaping around the room like a monkey, joyfully singing a song about kissing and then flopped on the floor unconscious. Kasumi, assuming that he was still fooling around, turned and left him. She wasn’t looking forward to telling her father about her decision, but didn’t want to sacrifice her youth acting as a maid any longer.

It wasn’t until an hour later that Dr. Tofu woke up with his mind uncluttered and anguishedly shouted “Kasumi!”