The B.G.S.'s part 16

16^th July 2025

 

Hi Kiki. Yuko and Kouhei went out to find some B.G.S.’s today. I got the story from them when they returned. They went to Shibata at Miyagi prefecture, at some old lonely street.  

“Hmm this is quite an old street,” said Yuko “most of the buildings here look like they could do with some new coats of paint and fixing up a bit”.

“I agree with you on that,” said Kouhei “well we better get moving on looking for any B.G.S.’s”.

As Yuko and Kouhei were walking down the street, Yuko noticed an old fashion wooden built boarding house.

“Wow you don’t get many boarding houses like this anymore” said Kouhei.

“That’s a nice place,” said Yuko “I wouldn’t mind living here myself”.

“With how this old boarding house is still standing, the owners must take pretty good care of it” said Kouhei.

Just then a middle aged woman with a scarf over her hair came out of the building. She was the landlord and her name was Ms Mayumi Hana.

“Oh hello there, what are you children doing here?” said Ms Hana.

“Please excuse us but we couldn’t resist looking at this building as it looks so nice” said Yuko.

“Oh that’s okay,” said Ms Hana “are you children on some kind of errand?”

“Eh more like a quest really,” said Yuko “you see my little sister lost some toys of hers that look like the one I’m holding now”.

Ms Hana looked at the blue B.G.S. in Yuko’s arms. “Hmm well I haven’t seen anything like that around here,” she said “but you are welcome to look into my lost property shed. I always find lost items around here so I made a lost property shed a few years back to store the items in. I even get people bringing lost items from the park or other places here too”.

So Yuko and Kouhei went into the lost property shed. There were many lost items in there; lost toys, lost gloves and other things. I always find it amazing how much stuff people can lose Kiki. Anyway as soon as Yuko and Kouhei started to look around the shed a cherry-red and a Barbie-pink B.G.S. came out from hiding between some toys.

“Ha we found them rather quickly this time” said Yuko.

“You know what they say; better now than later” said Kouhei.

Yuko and Kouhei picked up the two B.G.S.’s and told them to be quiet and still, and got out of the shed. Ms Hana was happy when Yuko told her they found the toys.

Yuko couldn’t help but continue to look at the boarding house. “I’m amazed how you’ve managed to keep this old wooden building standing,” she said “I mean I’ve heard it can be tricky to keep old wooden buildings standing, especially when wood can start to rot in a few years or so”.

“Ah that’s because the tenants and I work together to keep this place standing,” said Ms Hana “we all love this building too much to ever let it rot away or get torn down”.

“I can see that” said Yuko.

“And to tell you the truth I promised the original landlord I would continue to look after this place,” said Ms Hana “and keeping that promise is something I intend to do for the rest of my life. I owe a great deal to that man after all the help he had giving me”.

“Why did something happen?” asked Kouhei. The way that Ms Hana spoke made him get the feeling that Ms Hana went through something bad during her life.

“Well it’s a bit of a long story and it’s a sad one too” said Ms Hana.

“Kouhei and I don’t mind long stories and we’ve heard lots of sad stories before” said Yuko.

Ms Hana agreed to tell her story. The story was she used to be married to a man named Jirou Kubota. She was divorced now which was why she was a Ms and was now called by her original surname instead of her married surname. Ms Hana and her ex-husband had a daughter together called Akane and they were a happy family at first. But then sometime after Akane turned five years old everything changed; Ms Hana and her ex-husband would yell and fight with each other when ever things went wrong between them.

Yuko recognized this familiar story at once.

“The arguments I had with that man were the type of arguments that seemed to go on forever,” said Ms Hana “and there were times I would throw things at him in anger. But it’s all because of those stupid fights of ours that we lost our daughter in the first place”.

“She ran away?” asked Kouhei.

“Worse, she died from a traffic accident” said Ms Hana.

Ms Hana explained Akane went through a phase of throwing terrible tantrums while at kindergarten and bullied her classmates.

“Oh this means Akane became very upset due to your arguments and took out her frustrations on other children” said Yuko, understanding Akane’s feelings. Yuko never took out her frustrations on other children Kiki, just got upset.

“Yes and the stupid thing is my ex-husband and I never noticed how our daughter felt until it was too late;” said Ms Hana “we got so distracted by our arguments we failed to notice our daughter, never mind her feelings”.

This really was familiar to Yuko because her parents neglected her feelings too.

Ms Hana explained next that one day when Akane was seven years old; she was having another argument with her ex-husband at a park. That made Akane upset and embarrassed because lots of people were listening to the arguing. Akane got so angry that she shouted out she wished her parents would get divorced and then she ran off, crying. But she ended up running into the road and she was hit by a car, and she died from her injuries.

“That’s sad,” said Kouhei “what happened to you and your husband then?”

“Things got no better;” answered Ms Hana “we kept on blaming each other for Akane’s death. I couldn’t take it anymore so I asked for a divorce at once. We divorced not long after Akane’s funeral”.

“I don’t blame you for that,” said Yuko, understanding Ms Hana’s feelings, “but how did you end up living in this boarding house?”

“Well a friend of an old friend of mine introduced me to this building and she suggested that this was the perfect place for me to find my feet after my divorce,” said Ms Hana “and she was right. I made many friends with the tenants who live here now and who lived here before. The original landlord and his wife were kind to me and they always listened to my problems whenever I felt down. To me they were like having new parents around since mine had died quite a long time ago”.

That sounds nice,” said Yuko “I hope you don’t mind me asking but did you ever get married again?”

“No my heart was so broken after losing Akane and from my divorce I became afraid to ever get married again in case I got my heart broken even more,” said Ms Hana “I was also afraid of becoming a mother again because of how I failed as a mother to Akane”.

Yuko and Kouhei understood. “I take it you haven’t seen your ex-husband since the divorce?” asked Kouhei.

“No but I’ve heard that he got married again and he has a new family with his new wife so no doubt that he is happy now” said Ms Hana.

Yuko couldn’t help but feel sorry for Ms Hana. Just then Kouhei looked at his watch and said it was time for him and Yuko to get back home.

“I understand,” said Ms Hana “just tell your sister not to lose her toys again and you children take care of yourselves”.

“You as well Ms Hana” said Kouhei.

Yuko and Kouhei walked to a corner of a house where no one could see them. The Kouhei got the remote out from his backpack and pressed the button. And once Kouhei and Yuko teleported back to Prof Largos house, they told everyone the whole story about Ms Hana.

“Sounds like Ms Hana and her ex-husband were hit by karma” said Shizuyo.

“I agree, especially since they lost Akane due to their errors too late” I said. Everyone agreed.

With how Yuko, Shizuyo and I have met people whose pasts were like ours Kiki, I’m getting the feeling that my friends and I will meet more people who had the same troubled pasts as us.