Episode 5: True heart
Midori flees from Mishima’s arms and returns home. Feeling shaken and guitly, she lies to Jun the next morning that she consulted Noda at the hospital about her checkup because Mishima has returned to Paris. Remembering how Mishima had been about to talk about their painful breakup 16 years ago before they were interrupted by Noda, she cannot help being conscious of her mobile phone although she resists the impulse to call him. So does Mishima.
Meanwhile, Chika approaches Professor Ebina on the pretext of profiling Mishima who has been voted one of the top ten doctors that patients would like to consult, for a magazine article. However, it soon becomes clear that she means to pursue Mishima’s expulsion from the hospital following the post-surgical death of a 2-year-old girl 16 years ago. Was Professor Ebina the one that persuaded Mishima to assume responsibility in exchange for the opportunity to study in Paris? Chika speculates that it was his financial support that enabled a poor Mishima to train in Paris and ended in Mishima’s subsequent marriage to his daughter, Sachie. An angry Professor Ebina tells her that Mishima devoted himself to surgeries at the hospital in Paris 24 hours a day, 365 days a year to improve his skills. In 10 years, he performed more than 3,000 hepatectomies and liver transplants. That is why, he is the man he is now.
That night, Kenta informs his parents over dinner that a female classmate professed her love for him on the way home from school today. When Jun observes that this is first love, Kenta turns to his mother to ask about her first love. “It wasn’t dad, was it?” Midori hesitates, then casts a glance at Jun who answers on her behalf. She gives an awkward laugh and deflects the question to him.
Several days later, Midori receives a call from Mishima who has come to a hospital in Numazu for a live-surgery demonstration and asks to see her. He is about to give up waiting at the French-style inn and restaurant and leave when she finally arrives. Midori concedes that she has always wanted to know why he seemed to be a stranger to her on that day 16 years ago. She came all the way to visit him at the hospital, but he did not listen to her and left her with harsh words instead. Mishima confides what happened at that time.
16 years ago, Yukimura Kana died the day after an operation by the late Professor Emeritus Okakura to treat a hepatoblastoma tumour. During the surgery, she was at risk of cardiac arrest because of excessive bleeding, a rising pulse rate and falling blood pressure. Hearing from Professor Okakura that Mishima wanted to leave the hospital, Professor Ebina chastised Mishima for throwing away his future as a surgeon and offered him an alternative: studies abroad at a medical university in Paris. He would recommend him if he wished to go. Mishima chose Paris, and in doing so wanted to forget his ties to the hospital and his hometown. Midori ruefully reflects on the timing of her visit and the cruel hand of fate.
“I’ve wanted to tell you everything.
I’ve always wanted to apologise for hurting you.
If I could, I wish to return to the person I was back then and say sorry.
I wish … … I had met you much earlier.”
After hearing these words from Mishima, Midori is about to tell him the reason why she went to see him on that fateful day. However, she changes her mind and swallows them back.
At the bus stop, Mishima offers to send Midori home even though he knows that he should not. He reveals the promise he had made to Hirose to stay away from her happy world. Midori tells him that she made the decision to let him operate on her because she wanted to live on for the sake of her husband and son. Jun was the one who saved her when she had lost faith in men and also the one who had run about looking for a doctor when she fell ill, and yet … … She breaks down in tears as contradictory feelings of guilt and yearning assail her. Mishima gently puts an arm on Midori’s shoulder as he reaches a decision. “I won’t torment you any longer,” he vows.
Mishima, who has decided to return to Paris, sends Midori a farewell text message that night, “There hasn’t been a day since we met when I’ve not thought about you. Goodbye.” Reading this overwhelms Midori with emotion. “Thank you. Goodbye.” she replies and deletes the message after a moment of inner struggle.
The two of them go back to their previous lives.
A year has passed since Midori underwent surgery. She has been healthy enough to return to work as a speech therapist. Her family and the Hiroses mark this first year anniversary with a celebration and Kenta reads from his essay titled “My dream for the future”. He was so worried about Midori when she was hospitalised one year ago, that he lost his appetite. But she was able to return home because of the successful surgery by a great doctor. When he grows up, he wants to be a doctor too, so that he can save many patients like his mother. Jun is moved to tears.
On the other hand, Mishima has resigned from the hospital in Paris and moved to another which specialises in surgery. He speaks to Sachie who gently chides him for becoming a drifter, before passing the phone over to her father. As Professor Ebina compliments him on a newly published dissertation and asks him to come back to give a lecture to his juniors, Mishima suddenly collapses.
Mishima regains consciousness in a hospital ward. He had suffered a brain haemorrhage. Although his limbs are not paralysed, he has lost the ability to speak and struggles out of the grasp of the nursing staff as they try to bring him for a detailed checkup. He cowers against Sachie, who has arrived to take him back to Japan.
A month later, Midori is asked to examine a new patient brought to the rehabilitation centre by relatives. She is told that the patient has been undergoing rehabilitation after a surgery for brain haemorrhage two months ago, but refused both tests and treatment.
Midori enters the speech therapy room with the patient’s clinical record and is so shocked when she sees the patient that she shoots out of the chair she has just sat in and staggers backwards. After a hurried scan of his record, she asks if he recognises her but his eyes remain cast downwards. As worried Midori tries to get him to say something, he finally looks up with a blank expression on his face … …
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