Hikaru No Go Fan Fiction ❯ The Invitational ❯ A Lost Smile ( Chapter 5 )

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As you probably know, I don't own Hikaru no Go and appreciate the owners letting me play in their universe. I definitely don't make any money from this fic.
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Akira and his parents sat around the traditional dining table eating. His mother was waiting for the right moment to ask him something. “Akira-san, I happened to see something in that Weekly Go of yours. You know I don't normally look at it but the paper was folded to the page and I saw the article about a `Young Professionals title,” Touya Akiko said. “I see your friend Shindou 3-dan won the title and then defended it this year against his peers.”
 
“His peers? Humph. Those players are not Shindou's peers. I would have been appalled had he lost,” Akira said then looked abashed when his father frowned at him with disapproval in his narrowed eyes. His father never approved of insulting any Go player. “Shindou is a rival I keep behind me, mother. He is not a friend.”
 
“Yes, dear,” she said, not believing a word of it. She and Ichikawa exchanged notes on how much Akira and Hikaru debated over the goban, fought and then defended each other against anyone else. That sure sounded like a friend to her. Ichikawa had even witnessed Hikaru drag Akira out of the go salon in search of ice cream.
 
“Did you enter this Sai Cup?”
 
“Of course not, mother. It's not a real tournament. It is nothing. It is just some insei and new pros getting together to play games. To even call it an unsanctioned tournament dignifies it beyond what it deserves. It is not sanctioned by the Go Institute and I have no idea why Kosemura wrote about it in Weekly Go. Perhaps it was a slow news week. I have no time for that sort of thing. I play in real tournaments.” He bit his lip. “Besides, it was an invitational.” Akira deliberately sipped his tea.
 
Akira's mother did not play Go and had knowingly never learned a lot about the inside life of the professional go player, but she knew when her son was hurt and her heart ached to realize once again that Akira's special talents had kept him out of the circle of friends his own age.
 
He truly was so busy he could not have made the time for the unsanctioned round robin, but she knew it still hurt him to be excluded deliberately from a tournament of his age peers. He may be a brilliant go player, but he was still her son and it worried her to see him keep so much inside. He needed a friend or he would become cold and uncaring. She knew Ogata sensei was cold inside, and she didn't want her son to become like him. Her own husband was stern and quiet on the outside especially in public, but she knew the private Kouyo whom no one else saw. Inside he burned with feelings and passion. He was not truly cold like Ogata-sensei. Touya Akiko wanted her son to grow up more like her husband and not like Ogata.
 
Akiko remembered when Akira was in the 6th grade before he went to that Kaio middle school. She wasn't a fool. She knew something ugly had happened there at the Go club even though she didn't know any of the details. Whatever happened had caused him to shut down inside and not be as open to others, especially children his own age. Then he became totally focused on the pro exam and left childhood behind forever. Before Kaio, when he was still in the 5th and 6th grade, he had had the sweetest, most wonderful smile in the world. It was a bright smile which reached his eyes. He was a little bit of a miniature adult even back then, but she had seen the occasional grin and he always seemed pleased to play go with another child even if they couldn't play as well as he could play. She missed Akira's beautiful smile.