Epilogue

One year later...

Ever since Chieko and Miki ran into Emiko and Yoshi at the fertility clinic, they had become close friends with each other, going to each other’s homes for dinner or just to visit. After their children were born, Miori, Siori and Airi were starting to play together now that they were getting older. Emiko’s daughters were about eighteen months old now and Miki’s Airi was almost a year old, Tiny Airi could walk in between Miori and Siori as the older girls held her hands and walked together. They had pretty much grown up together and acted more like sisters than friends.

Everyone was getting older. Emiko and Chieko were now eighteen, Yoshi was twenty and in his second year of medical school. Miko was actually sixteen, headed for seventeen, but on paper she was eighteen.

Emiko was attending college online at the Johns Hopkins University studying for her bachelor’s degree in pediatric nursing. Chieko and Miki had built a thriving and successful clothing boutique that provided them with a great income, and the freedom and joy of owning their own business with flexible hours for Airi.

About forty kilometers [twenty-five miles] southeast of Tokyo in Chiba, both Kiki and Baby Girl were eighteen, while Little One just passed forty-one. Kiki and Baby Girl finished high school with Stanford University’s online program and continued to get their degrees from Stanford, which is a great accomplishment because its acceptance rate was 4% ― one percent lower than Harvard!

Kiki worked as a nurse practitioner for a clinic affiliated with Chiba University Hospital. She wanted to become a pediatric nurse like Emiko. Baby Girl was interning with a clinic as a child speech pathologist, working towards her degree in the same field.

Little One elected to stay home and care for Mika and Yuishi, and soon, another little girl. Kiki was thirteen weeks pregnant carrying Baby Girl’s child. They weren’t expecting it, but they were wondering if they could get another blue-eyed little princess.

Everyone was happy and heady for Hanami, the annual Cherry Blossom Festival. The two families wanted to go to Shinjuku Gyoen, one of Tokyo’s most popular parks known for its exquisite gardens to enjoy the festivities. Emiko, because she didn’t work, took two big blankets, and spread them out in a very beautiful spot under the cherry blossoms to reserve their place for the festival the next day. It was a good she arrived early because lots of people had the same idea.

Cherry blossoms are Japan’s national flower a symbolic of the spring, a time of renewal, and the fleeting nature of life. Their life is very short. After their beauty peaks around two weeks, the blossoms start to fall ... Hanami literally means “watching blossoms,” and the tradition can be traced back at least a thousand years.

The next day, Emiko, Yoshi, Chieko, and Miki sat side by side on their blankets watching their three children scamper around with other children and picking up anything that happened to catch their eye. The twins played double mommy with Airi, holding her hand, and leading her around.