by Nisioisin
Okay, not because it wouldn’t be mature. If I bragged about a card costing three million yen, such an erudite young lady might quibble, Oh, but, since you could rack up 200,000 miles with that, if you converted it into Edy or into tickets, you’d get a much better bargain.
I’m not even imprudent with my spending, it’s more of an easy come, easy go thing. I had no hope of getting the better of someone like Tsubasa Hanekawa, who strides firmly down the sunny side of the street and keeps out of the shadows.
In fact, working her fingers to the bone was like bragging to me. I almost wanted to pick a fight: people who lead decent, respectable lives need to realize that that, in and of itself, is deeply hurtful to people who don’t lead decent, respectable lives.
“People who lead decent, respectable lives need to realize that that, in and of itself, is deeply hurtful to people who don’t lead decent, respectable lives.”
I picked it.
At which Hanekawa took off her coat and hung it in the closet. With a decent, respectable smile, she said, “Yes, that’s one way to look at it.”
I wanted to punch her in the face, but I wasn’t sure I could salvage the situation afterwards, so I restrained myself.
“Listen, Hanekawa. You need to talk to me about something, and vice versa. I’m ready and willing to discuss those things, and very much want to, but before that, how about we sort out a unity of purpose?”
“Unity of purpose?”
“Yeah. ’Cause all kinds of people with all kinds of motivations seemed to be mixed up in this.”
Not to mention my “tail” (a possibility), Gaen-senpai’s “watchdog” (a possibility), and the person who wrote the mysterious letter (a certainty).
“For someone in my line of work, how people feel is important.”
“Uh huh,” Tsubasa Hanekawa, who of course knew that my line of work was swindling, gave a most, or the most, equivocal reply.
So what. If that was going to make me fold, I couldn’t call myself a swindler. You’re no good until you’ve had a million NOs thrust in your face.
“Which is why I want to know up front. Hanekawa, you’d prefer for Senjogahara and Araragi to be ‘saved,’ right?”
“Isn’t that obvious? Didn’t I just implore you to save her?”
“But to play devil’s advocate, maybe you want me to save them because you don’t want to save them yourself. By leaving it to somebody else, you get to double down on closing your eyes to the problem. Also, you might have gone overseas searching for Oshino just to get to him before Senjogahara and Araragi─to pull the wool over his eyes and make him not come back to Japan under any circumstances, or more directly, to ask him not to save them.”
“So you’ve managed to live this long being that suspicious of people,” Hanekawa said, turning a little pale. Just that level of mistrust was something of a culture shock for her, it seemed.
What a way to think of me.
What an honest life she must have led.
But being the grounded person that she clearly was, Tsubasa Hanekawa kindly came down to my level. “I want to save Miss Senjogahara and Araragi, but I don’t have to be the one to save them. I just don’t want them to die, so it doesn’t matter who saves them. It could be me, or Mister Oshino, or you.”
“Swear to god?” I asked.
Given that we were dealing with Nadeko Sengoku, this was meant to be arch. “Swear to cat,” Tsubasa Hanekawa replied with a straight face.
What the hell? Not an expression I was familiar with, but maybe it was some recent high school girl slang? Dammit, I’d fallen behind the times.
“Any questions on your part?” I ushered.
“Hunh?”
“Don’t you want to ask me about my perspective, how I feel? My client, at least, is terribly concerned. Don’t you want to know why I accepted this job from Senjogahara, or confirm that I intend to see it through?”
Even as I harassed her, I didn’t have a clever response lined up if she threw those questions back at me. If she actually asked me, “Well, why did you?” or “If I asked, are you going to tell me?” at that point, I’d have been at a loss for words. And who knows, I might’ve gotten pissed off and washed my hands of the whole thing.
Back to Okinawa, done with Hitagi Senjogahara and Nadeko Sengoku, and through with cold climes.
I might have told Senjogahara that an adult doesn’t just abandon a job, but that was yesterday, and this was today.
Hanekawa didn’t ask either question, though. She just smiled and said, “I’m not going to ask you anything.”
“…”
“Okay then, if you don’t mind, I’d like to get down to business─”
“Hang on. Why aren’t you? Are my feelings so transparent to you?” I ended up asking her instead, belligerently, more than a little annoyed, even though the girl was over ten years my junior.
But Hanekawa just kept on smiling. Stuck in a room with an older man who was trying to intimidate her, she showed no sign of fear.
“You don’t even need to ask, huh? You know everything, don’t you, missy.”
“I don’t know everything. I just know what I know,” Hanekawa replied, still smiling.
That shut me up. I was overwhelmed by those words, so reminiscent of Gaen-senpai─nope.
Not a chance. Hanekawa didn’t have Gaen-senpai’s oppressive aura.
And yet I’d been silenced. How can I put this, it felt silly, being so cautious, probing every intention; she’d suddenly put things into context.
“Fine…”
“I’m sorry?”
“Let’s get down to business. We’re exchanging information, aren’t we, Hanekawa? That said, you’ve got your own ideas about how to settle this, don’t you, quite apart from me and Senjogahara’s plan. I’ll give you the info you need for that─and you’ll tell me everything you know.”
031
And that’s how, at long last, I got a sense of what precisely had been going on in that town over the course of the past few months.
It was a more objective view than I could’ve gotten from Senjogahara, for sure. I learned in detail how Nadeko Sengoku had become a god, and about the harm her transformation had caused.
And what Gaen-senpai, what Izuko Gaen, had been doing there─even the half-vampire Episode had gotten dragged into it, the whole thing was just bananas.
Unfortunately, it’d be a stretch to say that Hanekawa got some useful information from me in return. That was unfortunate for her, of course, not me, so I wasn’t particularly chagrinned.
Though our meeting wasn’t too beneficial for Hanekawa, she didn’t seem all that disappointed.
So grounded.
Enviable. Maybe.
Well, her position was that it didn’t matter who saved those two as long as they were saved, so I guess providing me with useful info was enough to satisfy her.
“Hmm…” Having heard everything, I nodded. “I mean, here’s the thing. From what you say, it’s not because Kissshot Acerolaorion Heartunderblade came here that the town got screwed up spiritually, Kissshot Acerolaorion Heartunderblade was drawn to the town because it was screwed up already.”
“She didn’t come right out and say it, but Ms. Gaen at least seems to think so─which is why she wanted to install a new god at Kita-Shirahebi Shrine. And I guess when Araragi rejected her plan, an innocent middle school girl ended up with the job instead.”
“An innocent middle school girl.”
“What is it?”
“Nothing,” I deflected Hanekawa’s question with a shake of my head, since there was no point in discussing it. I asked her, “That reminds me, have you interacted with Nadeko Sengoku much? And if so, what was your impression of her?”
“Interacted…would be an exaggeration. We’ve met, but she’s really Araragi’s friend… So a friend of a friend. Plus she’s a lot younger.”
“Hmm.”
A lot, no. A high school senior and a middle school second-year are only a
bout four years apart, but I guess when you’re in your teens, that seems like a huge difference. Sengoku probably seems like a kid to Senjogahara and Araragi and Hanekawa in the same way that they seem like kids to me.
“But you have met. Let’s hear it, what was your impression of her?”
“Timid, or, bashful, or, shy, or, quiet…”
As Hanekawa started listing off the words, I thought, Hunh, here we go again. I’d already heard the same thing from Nadeko Sengoku’s parents. I’d hoped Hanekawa might have a different take, given how she’d shut me up earlier, but the world wasn’t such a convenient place, I shouldn’t expect too much from a child.
But the inimitable Tsubasa Hanekawa proved me wrong. After pausing for a moment, she continued:
“…and so on and so forth, wasn’t the impression I got.”
Wasn’t the impression.
“I’m sure that’s what most people think when they see her… I’m not saying they’re wrong, but the main impression I got was of being ‘shut out.’”
“Shut out?” I cocked my head. “Like the other kids at school giving her the silent treatment?” I asked in clarification. The girl in the pics I’d seen definitely had the air of a kid who might be bullied─though now that she was a god, that vibe was totally gone.
“No, that’s not what I meant. I felt as though I was the one being shut out. Me, and everyone else.”
“…”
“That girl’s world is hermetically sealed─nothing anybody says actually reaches her. Mister Oshino was very concerned about her, too…but in the end, his concern didn’t reach her either. She says she loves Araragi and apparently wants to kill him and Miss Senjogahara because of that, but at this stage I think it’s safe to say that she doesn’t really love anyone. She doesn’t even see anyone besides herself.”
“…”
Well, quite the keen insight.
Even so, it’d be a mistake to lay the blame on Nadeko Sengoku or to attack her on a personal level. It was everyone else’s fault that she became who she was, her parents and everyone else who celebrated her as “cute cute cute,” who treated her like a mascot.
But it wasn’t like Hanekawa was blaming her for that, either, because she added, “I’d like to save her as well, if we can.”
“Well, don’t expect me to do that. Deceiving her is the job I signed on for.”
“I’m aware of that. It’s just my selfish hope.”
“Araragi probably feels the same way, huh?”
“I imagine he does─but the problem at hand is her desire to kill him and Senjogahara. That’s definitely got to be dealt with first. We don’t have to rescue everyone in one fell swoop.”
Her words were as rational as her desires were idealistic. Any teacher faced with a student like her would have a hell of a time.
Well, best of luck to them. I was here to do my job, and nothing more.
“But Hanekawa, if by rescuing her you mean turning Nadeko Sengoku back into a human being, think again. I’m pretty sure you haven’t spoken to her since she became a god, but─she seems happy.”
“Just because someone thinks they’re happy doesn’t mean they are.”
“Oh really?”
“Yes. That’s what I think.”
Apparently. And obstinately. Could she be speaking from experience? She’d had her own run-ins with aberrations─she’d been bewitched, and maybe that was the lesson she took home from it.
If so, it was a valuable lesson.
She should take that lesson to heart, but she didn’t need me to tell her that. Tsubasa Hanekawa had clearly done so.
“Well, if that works for you, go ahead and think it. After I’m done pulling the wool over her eyes, feel free to jump in and save her.”
“What? That ups the difficulty level of my job, doesn’t it?” Hanekawa complained playfully. “I’d intended to take up the peripatetic life right after graduation, but I guess things aren’t going to go as planned…hmmm.”
“…”
Should I advise her to forget about imitating Oshino? I waffled a bit but figured I’d be overstepping my bounds and kept my mouth shut.
Never mind overstepping, it was simply no concern of mine. It’s every person’s right to decide what kind of life to lead─up to and including becoming a god, I thought, but no point in wielding that opinion at Hanekawa.
Instead I said, “I meet a lot of people like her in my line of work─people whose hearts are sealed shut. And yeah, you’re right, she definitely does ‘tune out’ everyone else. Ultimately, people like that think only of themselves… If you ask me, they deserve my deceptions.”
I delivered the villainous line in part so I could observe Hanekawa’s reaction. I meant it, but I also exploited my genuine feeling to try and sound her out.
But Hanekawa just let it pass. “I was under the impression that no one’s immune to your deceptions. Though all bets are off when it comes to a god… I want to ask you something, Mister Kaiki, but I’m afraid you might think it rude.”
“What’re you talking about? We’re well past the point of worrying about being rude.”
“Do you really think you can help her fall for it?”
“A strange way of putting it.”
Help her fall for it?
That made it sound like an act of mercy, like I was kindly lying to Nadeko Sengoku for her own sake─ridiculous.
“I already told Senjogahara this, but duping that girl is going to be a piece of cake. Don’t you worry, Hanekawa. I’m not one to put my seal on any kind of document, but that one has my full seal of approval.”
“Okay… Great. Well, strictly speaking, I’m not concerned about that in particular. It’s just…”
Suddenly Hanekawa became inarticulate. She started to say something, then thought better of it, then seemed about to speak again, then stopped again.
It drove me crazy. It made me want to force it out of her. Not that I’d ever get violent with a high school girl.
Then, although I have no idea whether it was what she’d been about to say, Hanekawa faced me and fired out of left field: “Mister Kaiki, will you tell me about Mister Oshino’s family?”
Her question seemed totally unrelated to the matter at hand─or no, maybe she wanted to talk to Oshino’s family because she needed to find him? That would be the right way to go about it─if the missing person was anyone other than Mèmè Oshino.
“He doesn’t have a family.”
“…”
“Neither do I. What about it?”
“No… Then, um…” Hanekawa searched for the right words. What, had she really pinned her hopes on Oshino’s family? Because she was being wildly optimistic if she thought that drifter had anything like a proper family. “What about─a niece, for instance?”
“A niece?”
That came out of the blue as well. Needless to say, a niece would be his brother or sister’s child… Oshino’s brother or sister? Where did she get that idea? I told her the truth, at least to the best of my knowledge.
“He doesn’t have any brothers or sisters. None. It’s not that his family died, it’s not that they’re estranged─he’s a man without a single relative, and he always has been.”
“…”
“Something the matter?”
“No─um, Mister Kaiki. I’m willing to pay, so please don’t tell anyone that I asked you about Mister Oshino’s private life.”
“Now, now, I can’t condone that kind of bribery. Starting so young, god only knows what the future holds for you,” I said, simultaneously thrusting out my right hand.
Without a word Hanekawa took a 500-yen coin from her wallet and laid it on my outstretched palm.
“Five hundred yen?”
“I’m sorry… That’s all the cash I have on me.”
“Fine.” I felt around in my pocket and handed her whatever I found there as change. It may well have been more than 500 yen, but if it was, so be it.
“What’s this?”
“Your change─plus a little extra for everything you’ve told me. Payment for services rendered.”
“I don’t want money─but I guess this isn’t an amount worth quibbling over.” Hanekawa counted the coins in the palm of her hand. “Your really are decorous, Mister Kaiki.”
“No such thing as a decorous swindler. I’m just serious, that’s all.”
