It’s still Day Three of JR Week (somehow. In my time zone, anyway), which is Jeffrey’s Day.
(Yes, I know I skipped Day Two; I didn’t have any thoughts, okay)
Jeffrey is represented by the Alexandrite stone, which in addition to symbolizing wealth and prosperity and good fortune is basically a Magic Color Changing Stone: the color shifts depending on what light you view in under.
The first sections obviously mark Jeffrey’s place as probably the wealthiest and most ostentatious of the Claremont family that we see in the series. Jeff tried to use his money to help save his brother, it destroyed his relationship with Richard, he uses it again to seek information on Richard and damages Richard and Vince’s relationship, he works in some vague financial role in America…
Well. There’s a reason Richard calls him a talking wallet.
But the color-changing thing is more interesting to me. Before volume ten, it seemed to be representing the way Jeff betrayed Richard and caused Richard to switch from seeing him as his dearest brother and one of his most important people in his entire life to…well, someone he never wanted to see or hear from again. Someone he viewed as danger.
But after volume ten…
Well, Seigi never trusted Jeffrey originally. He knew enough of Richard’s family by the time he met Jeff not to trust him until he got more details.
And after we discover that Jeffrey is a closeted gay man who has been hiding himself from his family for…well, decades, honestly, at that point, the light shifts.
And we see him different. And we see the way his alexandrite represents him differently.
Jeffrey can’t really be his full self…anywhere, not for a long, long time. His family and his job and his public self can’t be gay, and anything he does with romance or sex has to be divorced from his identity so rumors and scandals don’t spread. He cannot be seen as who he is all at once in one setting. It’s too dangerous.
This starts to break down a little–at least, his family learns what he’s been keeping to himself and Joachim is apparently just traveling the world with hm, but even then Jeffrey is a fairly private person. The people close to him may be able to see the full spectrum of his colors, but I really quite doubt most of the world does.
And I just still am floored that Tsujimura-sensei pulled that one off.
One of Richard’s (multiple) birthstones in Tanzanite. Tanzanite in Jeweler Richard usually symbolizes Seigi: Tanzanite means “Rebirth” and is the chapter in which Seigi begins a huge transformation. He suffers pretty serious trauma, has to get therapy, and when we see him next, it’s years later, he’s grown up, he has new skills, he’s graduated college, and he’s starting life over anew in a completely different country. And, he can be mistaken for Richard.
Wow.
But you know, Richard had a rebirth of his own. It’s in backstory, and the anime skips a lot of Richard’s backstory, but he does, well, have one. He, too, was deeply traumatized and ran off to Sri Lanka. So for his birthday, let’s talk a bit about how he was reborn from Richard Claremont to Richard Ranasinghe de Vulpian.
The chapter with the bulk of Richard’s backstory is actually Zircon, which, among many other things, is known as a time capsule stone because it’s the oldest stone ever found on Earth, and it just. Does not destroy easily. It usually just grinds down to…smaller zircons. It’s ancient and it holds the memories of when it was formed and what it was formed of for…well, forever.
And where and when Richard Ranasinghe de Vulpian was formed was in a house in Sri Lanka with a young girl who was dealing with her own trauma and healing and a grumpy Sri Lankan gem dealer who expected him to pull himself back together out of the stuff that was once Richard Claremont and the stuff that Richard could be. Saul wouldn’t let himself throw “Richard” away—where he came from still mattered. And Richard Ranasinghe de Vulpian carries those memories and the person he allowed himself to become there for the rest of his life.
In Sri Lanka, he took care of someone. He found his career in gemstones—as an honest gem dealer. He learned he couldn’t run away from his past completely, but it also didn’t need to continue defining himself by it. He found a new purpose in life and instead of being a language tutor for a traumatized rich girl with a fiancée he proposed to for fear of losing a friend, he was a bright young gem dealer and international businessman who found beauty in life and helped make sure others saw it too.
Sure, he’s still made of the same stuff as he was before. But he was recreated in Sri Lanka, and he became a new man, with a new name, just as Seigi became a new man with a name that wasn’t part of his biological family, either.
Just a random thought but Jeff just breaking down and crying at Etra’s wedding because, after he had betrayed Richard’s trust, he hadn’t expected Richard would ever be willing to have him around in his wedding of all things.
Yet here he was, watching his precious little brother getting married to the person he loves more than anyone else, and Jeff isn’t able to hold back his tears because he never expected to be allowed to witness this moment and see Richard looking so happy.
I’d been asked about this before, so I thought I may as well drop this here!
In the bits of free time I can find I’ve been translating some of The Case Files of Jeweler Richard’s short stories, focusing the ones outside the fanbook. I intend to add to this bit by bit, translating whatever story strikes my fancy, but for now you can find the four extra stories included with the blu-rays, plus three other stories from various sources.
They’re definitely worth the read if you haven’t read them before, so I hope you enjoy!
Compilation of all the short stories from Tsujimura-sensei’s site centered on Jeffrey so far (aside from the ones featured in the Fanbook). Feel free to message me about possible corrections. Please consider supporting the creators by purchasing digital copies of the official releases: Novel||Manga||Fanbook. If anyone is feeling generous: Ko-fi|PayPal. ( ╹◡╹)っ’･*
Someday’s June 28th
“Now, with all my heart, happy birthday—”
“Uwah, stop it already.”
“—tooo yooou.”
“Stop with those trailing notes too.”
“Happy birthday—”
“And stop imitating Marilyn Monroe.”
“—tooo yooou.”
“I don’t like it.”
“Happy bir—check out this falsetto I’m doing with all my might. BAAAH—”
“You sure are good at doing it for a joke.”
“—FAAAH—!”
“How long are you gonna hold that?”
“—FAAAHTH DAAAYAAAYAAA—”
“You really are good at doing it for a joke.”
“—AAAY, DEAR—”
“AH, AH, AH! I CAN’T HEAR IT!”
“………………”
“AH!! AH!! WAH!! Is it over?”
“Je—”
“AAAH! CAN’T HEAR IT, CAN’T HEAR IT! I CAN’T HEAR A THIIING!”
“Then let’s omit that part; happy birthday to you. Congratulations. The end.”
“Thanks. Whew, finally over…”
“You didn’t have to make me sing if you were gonna be looking like an ascetic monk.”
“I had a dream that I was a B-rank ascetic monk being tortured by an A-rank one, y’see, so I’m devoting myself to enduring penance every day. All right, all right, the cake! Foo! The candles are all off now. Good work~”
“Good work for you this year too.”
“True, that. How long do you think this is gonna go on?”
“No idea.”
Someday’s June 28th Part 2
“It’s past midnight, huh. Your birthday is today! Congrats!”
“Thanks.”
“Congraaats!”
“Thanks a lot.”
“You’re too calm. I can do anything you want.”
“You don’t have to. We don’t even have that kind of relationship.”
“What kind of relationship are you talking about? Celebrating a friend’s birthday is just the obvious.”
“………………”
“Hey.”
“………………”
“Heeey? Hellooo?”
“It’s nothing; I was just thinking, ‘So we’re friends’.”
“To me, if I meet someone once, they’re an ‘acquaintance’; if I meet them twice, they’re a ‘friendly acquaintance’; if I meet them thrice, they’re a ‘friend’. Therefore, we’re friends. We’ve already met about ten times, haven’t we? That’s what I mean.”
“Ah, so you had this kind of ‘Joachim code’?”
“I did. Now, what do you want me to do?”
“It’s okay; you don’t have to do anything.”
“I could dance for you.”
“It’s all right. There’s nothing in particular. That I want you to do, I mean.”
“Hmmmph. Well, that’s fine. I already knew. Your birthday’s probably the perfect day for celebs from all over the world to want to gather up, party and push stuff onto you anyway, right? You’re oversaturated, then.”
“It’s not like that. Besides, the people who send me presents are just the kind who make their secretaries do it in their stead, through arrangements and the like. It might actually be negative in the sincerity department.”
“Things are things. There are no pluses or minuses to them. An apple is an apple, no matter whether it’s a produce from a nun’s orchard or something cultivated by the great nemesis of the century, and it will satisfy your hunger. Accept them with gratitude.”
“Yessiiir.”
“Well, I don’t have anything ‘material’ to give to you. So do I really not have to dance?”
“It’s fine.”
“I’ve got new stuff, though.”
“It’s fine.”
“Something sexy.”
“I said it’s fine.”
“Are you being stubborn or what?”
“That’s not it. If I were to say it, I’m getting a present from you right now.”
“Right now?”
“Yeah.”
“………………”
“………………”
“………………”
“Say something.”
“You really don’t have any friends, do you?”
“Uuh? I have lots. You said ‘meet someone thrice and they’re a friend’, right? I’m full of friends from all over the world.”
“………………”
“………………”
“Hey, you, say something. We’re friends, aren’t we?”
“‘Something’.”
“You’re so saltyyy.”
“Even if you say that we’re ‘friends’ using that context from just now, I kind of don’t wanna acknowledge it.”
“You’re truly nice, huh.”
“You’re only realizing that now?”
“Only now.”
“Aren’t your glasses lacking degree?”
“My, did I not tell you? The glasses are fake today.”
“Uh? Why?”
“I thought I was gonna take them off anyway. I wanted to see your face even when I didn’t have them on.”
“………………”
“‘Cause it’s my birthday.”
“………………”
“Say something.”
“‘Something’.”
“Hey.”
“What?”
“Hm. Thank you.”
Ogier le Danois and La Hire
“Hot. Hella hot. Too hot. Whoever said that it’s easy to spend the summer in Japan is a big liar.”
“Nobody’s ever said that.”
In a well-cooled hotel room, a man dismayed another man with long, mane-like, ashen gray hair styled in a ponytail. Seeing this, the man chuckled and brought him something to drink. He poured cold tea from a PET bottle into the hotel’s glass cups.
“I didn’t mean to say I’m tired or anything, okay? I’m the one out of the two of us who’s in a business where I need to keep my body in shape.”
“I trust that. It was my first time seeing someone make a round trip to Kiyomizu Temple’s stage without running out of breath. I was surprised.”
“And I was surprised that you were so friendly with those young Japanese tourists.
“Rather than ‘tourists’, they were more like ‘students on a field trip’…”
“What’s that?”
“Something like a Kyoto specialty of sorts, I guess. It’s hard to explain, though,” the man laughed in Queen’s English, to which the long-haired one replied with, “Aah, ‘s that so?” in a Brooklyn accent.
The former capital of Japan, in East Asia, located far from Britain and the United States, was surrounded by neon lights. The night view from the top floor of a large hotel connected to the Kyoto Station was somewhat more humble, calm and quiet than the ones of New York or London.
“Was today fun?” sitting on the hotel’s one-person couch, the man with droopy eyes asked the long-haired one, who was swaying his glass of green tea.
The long-haired man sat on the opposite couch for two people while gazing at the night scenery.
“It was fun.”
“Why the stiff language?”
The long-haired man played with his hair, and after sinking into silence for a moment, he spilled out in intervals, “You always… buy a lot of stuff, huh?”
“Uh, do you hate shopping now? Today, we visited temples, practiced Zen meditation, drank tea, observed the making of resist dyeing and Kyoto pottery, watched the workshop of a Kyoto jewelry crafter…”
“I didn’t hate any of that. We recently got ourselves a place to keep our stuff, too.”
“See, just as I told you. It was best to buy a house first.”
“You talk like we bought a storeroom.”
“We need somewhere to leave our things. There’s no such thing as a hotel without a storage, right?”
The long-haired man clenched his back teeth. As the droopy-eyed one gave him a look that asked what was wrong, the long-haired man held his knees on the couch and curled up his body.
Standing up, the droopy-eyed man planted a kiss first on his ashen-gray hair and then on his forehead. “Why’re you crying? Did I do anything that upset you?”
“Why’re you always thinking of goodbye?” As the droopy-eyed man became quiet, the long-haired one wiped his tears roughly, putting some strength into his hazel eyes. “Stop doing that. I can’t handle it.”
“I’m doing my best, though.”
“Cut down your monstrous black card limit.”
“I did. You told me just a while ago to do that.”
“Cut it down even more.”
“If I go that far, I won’t have any freedom in my everyday life…”
“To me, your definition of ‘everyday life’ is… Aah, no, that’s not what I want to say. Sorry about this talk. I’ll change my request. The money you use for my sake – make it less than a tenth of what it is now.”
“But I want to see your happy face.”
“It’s becoming quite a ‘conflicted face’, though.”
“More like the face of someone who’s ‘conflicted but happy’.”
“Whichever. It’s clear what you’re thinking. ‘I’ll leave behind as many tax-free goods as possible for him, so that he can turn them into cash after I’m gone’, right?”
“Well, that’s the basics of financial tech.”
“You don’t have to think about that stuff.” While the droopy-eyed man fell silent, the long-haired one stood up, and after making his companion sit down, he sat on the latter’s lap. “I have a lot of fun traveling with you, but it’s not like I’m doing that just to make a photo album to look through after we break up. Get that?”
“I get it.”
“Doesn’t seem like it.”
“I do. It’s just… huuum—”
“‘It’s just’ what?”
“Just wondering how much I’m worth if I reduce my budget to a tenth of what it is.”
“I’m begging you, don’t say such sad things.”
“Sorry.”
“What’s with you? Get a grip. You’re like a ‘whole package’ of a man, but that’s why you’re caught up with a guy like me.”
“Meaning it’s all good in the end?”
“‘Cause if I say something like that, you reply with this.”
“That goes for both of us.”
“You’re seriously so cute.”
“You’re just as cute.”
“I know; thanks.”
“I’m glad.”
Silence.
“I’m so glad.”
After they exchanged a light kiss, the long-haired man settled down beside his partner. The modest nightscape lay below his eyes.
“They say that Antonius and Cleopatra were once having so much fun together that they slipped out of the royal palace in the middle of the night and went around knocking on the doors of Alexandria one by one. It’s what we call ‘ring and run’ today. Such an inconvenience, huh?”
“The one who was most inconvenienced was the servant forced to go through with it. The two definitely wouldn’t have managed to slip out by themselves, yeah?”
“But when I’m with you, I sort of understand the desire to do that kinda thing.”
“Hey, knock it off. I’m absolutely not gonna do that. The outcome would be people taking pics and labeling us as ‘problematic foreigners’ on social media.”
“I’m not gonna do it. It’s just an analogy.”
“Just to confirm, did Antonius and Cleopatra’s love have a happy ending?”
“A wonderful happy ending at that.”
Silence.
“You’re making one hell of a face.”
“Your face is too cool when you’re lying and I hate it.”
“Sorry.”
Once again, this time after a deep kiss, the two parted and sat on the same couch, both looking upward.
“Honestly, I can’t keep this up sometimes. Don’t you ever feel like trying to have a simpler love life for a little?”
“That’s a challenge. Try to put yourself in the shoes of a businessman who hasn’t had a decent relationship until his near forties. I have no idea what to do at all other than provide financial support.”
“Don’t we make out naked, though?”
“We do! But I don’t know what to do other than that and using money.”
“Like going on a trip?”
“We already are.”
“Like meditating together.”
“We did.”
“Like always holding my hand when we’re taking off and landing after I said that I was scared of flying.”
“We always do that, but were you scared for real?”
“What else did you think it was for?”
“I thought it was to cheer me up.”
The long-haired man slowly placed his hand on the knee of his partner, who was seated on the couch next to him. The droopy-eyed man smiled and rested his own hand on top of his, holding it tight.
After a moment of silence, the one who opened his mouth first was the long-haired man, “Well, one way or another, we have a good relationship. The two of us.”
“I agree with that one. But, and I think you already know, I can’t do much to make you happy.”
“I’ll believe that as much as I’d believe an oil magnate saying, ‘My dinner yesterday was a one-dollar Mac’.”
“It’s the truth.”
“Just to put it out there, I’m full of motivation to make you happy. If you don’t make me just as happy, I’ll sue you for one-sided exploitation.”
“Quim.”
“Just go take a bath already.”
“If we can go in holding hands, I will.”
“Whoa~. Now you’ve started talking like a teenager.”
“Don’t make such an obviously disgusted face. Even I can feel hurt by that.”
“My, I’m surprised you could tell.”
Laughing, the droopy-eyed man let go of his hand, took off his jacket and threw it onto the empty couch. “I’m not the least bit afraid of getting hurt. That’s what I used to think, and it indeed didn’t scare me before, but I’ve been scared of it lately.”
“I wish you’d gotten scared sooner.”
“People have all sorts of circumstances to them.”
“Like what?”
“Since long ago, I’ve been an expert at hiding that I was hurt. But I got myself a very sharp-eyed acquaintance recently and I can’t hide it from him. So even if I say, ‘I’m completely fine!’ when I’m hurt, he makes a sad-looking face. But I don’t want to make him do that.”
Silence.
“That kind of circumstance,” the droopy-eyed man said, laughing.
Suddenly, he realized that his right hand was occupied. The hand of someone with a skin color different from his was wrapped around the hem of his shirt, which he had been about to take off.
“What’s wrong?”
Staring back at the face of the droopy-eyed man, the long-haired one untied his hair and laughed, “Then, shall we get going?”
