Takashi Natsume's Mother

Takashi Natsume's Mother
Kana/Kanji	夏目
Rōmaji	Natsume
Characteristics
Gender	Female
Age	Young Adult
Hair Color	Black
Personal Status
Status	Deceased
Relative(s)	Reiko Natsume (Mother) † Unknown Father Takashi Natsume's Father (Husband) † Takashi Natsume (Son)
Appearances
Manga Debut	Chapter 44 (Picture)
Anime Debut	Season 4, Episode 11 (Picture)
Voice Actors

Takashi Natsume's Mother (夏目, Natsume) is a minor character of the Natsume's Book of Friends series.

She was the daughter of Reiko Natsume and the wife of Takashi Natsume's Father. She died shortly after her son was born, and so far has only appeared alongside her husband in the only photograph he has of them.

Appearance

At the time of her death, Takashi's mother has the appearance of a young woman probably in her early to late twenties. Unlike her mother and son who have light hair (either blond in the anime or silver in the manga), she has black hair, cut short above her shoulders. However, according to Satoru Nishimura, she still does look a lot like Natsume.

Personality

Having not yet properly appeared in the story, almost nothing is known about Takashi's mother's personality. However, when Seiji Matoba coerce Natsume into talking about his family, he says that he heard his mother was a "normal, quiet and kind person."

Once, when Natsume asked one of his relatives about his grandmother, she replied that "neither she [Reiko] nor her daughter was close to anybody," implying his mother might also not have been a very social person like Reiko.

Natsume remembers his father saying his mother was very happy they had a yard and that she planted flowers there, so she must have loved gardening and flowers.

History

Takashi Natsume's mother was the only child of Reiko Natsume. Reiko had her daughter out of wedlock without ever marrying, keeping her family name 'Natsume' her whole life and thus giving it to her child. Natsume's mother never knew who her father was, so Reiko's lover must have left or died when she was pregnant or when Natsume's mother was a baby. According to what Natsume heard from his relatives, he doesn't think his mother was born with any spiritual power like Reiko and so that she couldn't see yokai, but there's no confirmation of it.

Reiko was a single mom who raised her daughter alone at least for some years until she died. It is unclear how old her daughter was when Reiko died, but at the start of the story Natsume mentions that "not many people even remember her [Reiko], since she died so young. Not even her own daughter," implying that, if Reiko died so young her own daughter didn't remember her, then she was likely still a little child when it happened. The circumstances around Reiko's death and how much Natsume's mother was involved or knew about it still remains unknown, except for the fact that Reiko was apparently found dead under a tree. Natsume once mentions that he's always been afraid to ask about Reiko because he didn't want to hear about how lonely she must have been or the bad things his relatives could say about her, and he wonders if it was hard on his mom as well.

As an adult, Natsume's mother met and married a man who took her family name, 'Natsume.' Before or after that, the both of them bought a small house with a yard. Natsume's mother was very excited to have a garden, so she decided to surprise her husband by planting flowers there. They must have taken the only picture Natsume has of them around this period, as it was before he was born.

At some point, the couple had a son: Takashi Natsume. His mother then died shortly after he was born when he was still a baby, which is why unlike his father he doesn't remember anything about her. The cause of her death, however, remains unknown.

Plot

Natsume's mother is first mentioned in the manga shortly after Natsume and Nyanko-sensei's first meeting, as the boy explains why he wants to keep the Book of Friends: he mentions that "not many people even remember her [Reiko], since she died so young. Not even her own daughter"; thus noting that Reiko is his maternal grandmother, and implying that she likely died when her daughter was a child. This was cut from the anime.

Natsume then mentions briefly his parents to Tama, telling him how he doesn't know what "his real parents were like either," and how he often felt very sad until he came to this town, met people who loved him and how he doesn't feel sad anymore. This is the first time his parents are explicitely mentioned in the anime.

Takashi Natsume's only picture of his parents.

During the Eastern Forest arc, Matoba corners Natsume and asks him about Reiko and her daughter, wanting to know if his mother was as powerful as her (only in the manga, not the anime). Natsume denies it and replies that she was just a "normal, quiet and kind person," meaning that according to him his mother must not have been able to see yokai. However, as Natsume has never known his mother it is unsure how true that could have been and if this is just assumptions he's making because of what he heard from his relatives.

When his old house finally get sold by his relatives, Natsume has to deal with the remnants of his grief; he remembers his father talking about how happy his mother was about their house's garden and her planting flowers there. He has only one picture of his parents that he couldn't bear to look at when he was a child, so he hid it in a book that he only now decide to dig up again. However, after going out with his friends, he lost it in the forest; but thanks to Tanuma's intervention, he realizes he cannot just repress his memories of his parents and have to deal with his grief properly, so he decides to go back to his old house. There are only flashbacks with his father, however, while his mom is just shown in the photo.

One day, Natsume decides to build a flower bed for Touko Fujiwara - which makes him think again about how his father used to say that his mother loved flowers.

Relationships

Reiko Natsume

The relationship between Reiko and her daughter has yet to be revealed. It was said that the Natsumes became even stranger since Reiko had given birth to her.

Takashi Natsume's Grandfather

Natsume's mother didn't know anything about her father, and her feelings on him are also unknown.

Takashi Natsume's Father

Although very little is known of Natsume's parents, his father seemed very fond of his wife, and they must have had a loving relationship. He seemed touched as he told Natsume about the flowers his wife had planted to surprise him and how excited she was about the garden, and how he wished the flowers would "keep blooming every year and forever." In the house, Natsume also seemed to have drawn a family picture of the three of them on the walls as a child, implying his father must have talked about his mother a lot for him to draw her even though he was a baby when she died.

Natsume's father deciding to take his wife's surname could also be seen as a particular sign of love and respect to her.

Takashi Natsume

As Natsume's mother died shortly after her son was born, she was unable to raise him and it is not known what she thought of him. Natsume himself remember nothing of her, unlike with his father. He does however seems to instinctively think of her when flower beds are brought up.

Trivia

• Just like her husband, her given name and cause of death is unknown.
• As 'Natsume' was Reiko's family name that she kept her whole life, it seems that Takashi's father is the one who took his wife's surname upon marrying instead of the more common opposite. In Japan, this generally happens when the wife's family is from a wealthy family or that the family has a legacy to preserve and no male heir, or that the husband's family disowned him. It doesn't seem to entirely fit the Natsume family's case though, so the reason as to why Takashi's father decided to take his wife's surname is unknown.
• Given unlike her son and mother, Takashi's mother had black hair, it seems to be implied her father had probably black hair as well.