The Intrigues of Haruhi Suzumiya

by Nagaru Tanigawa

  Asahina ascended rather perilously, being forcibly dragged behind Haruhi, Nagato guarding her from tumbling back down.

  We soon reached the spot. As soon as Haruhi emerged into the flat clearing on the mountainside, she sat down on the gourd-shaped rock as though it were a favorite chair.

  “Kyon, Koizumi, this is treasure hunt round two! When you think about it, giving up after just one day of digging doesn’t show much dedication. Treasure hunting is about keeping at it until you find something!”

  Haruhi smiled brilliantly and produced two garden spades from within her coat, offering them to Koizumi and me.

  “To be honest, I wanted to use big shovels and dig up every corner like last time, but I’ll let you off the hook this time. You can use those spades and just dig right here.”

  Haruhi indicated the spot right in front of her—in other words, directly beside the gourd rock. It was the same spot Koizumi and I had dug fully two meters down. But before I could complain that we’d already dug there—

  “It’s pretty common to find lost items in places you think you’ve already looked, right? Well, treasure’s the same way. You’ve got to look over and over again in the same place for it. And if I say there’s treasure, there’s treasure.”

  Haruhi sounded more confident than the dog in “Hanasaka Jiisan,” like she was sure we were bound to meet wealth and good fortune. For whatever reason, Asahina just nodded happily in agreement, with Nagato being the only one whose expression was unchanged. There with the spade in my hand for no particular reason, I finally began to understand the meaning of Koizumi’s smile.

  The digging didn’t take much time or effort. The soil had already been dug up and replaced once, so it was soft enough that our spades were more than adequate for the task. We hadn’t dug very deeply when our spades’ tips bumped into the edge of something hard.

  As Haruhi grinned down from above, I dug the object loose and pulled it out of the ground. The rectangular box did not, it must be said, look like something from the Genroku era. It was more like a tin that cookies or rice crackers would come in. It hadn’t been here three days earlier, when Koizumi and I had been searching. Someone had to have come up here since then and bury it, I was sure of it—no points for guessing who.

  “Open it,” said Haruhi, looking like the “Tongue-Cut Sparrow” watching the old man pick the smaller basket. The folktale was about greed and how the smaller basket was filled with treasure instead of monsters, so in this case, she was definitely thinking this was treasure.

  I took the tin in hand and popped off the lid.

  “…”

  I saw neither jewels nor gold coins—but I doubted anyone would dispute me were I to call it “treasure,” nonetheless.

  There were six small boxes delicately wrapped in beautiful wrapping paper—and tied up with ribbon, obviously.

  Finally—finally, was all I could say.

  I remembered what day it was. Or maybe it would be more accurate to say I realized. It was a day even more important than July seventh, Tanabata—at least it was for high school guys.

  Today was February fourteenth.

  In other words: Valentine’s Day.

  “They’re handmade,” explained Haruhi, looking askance. “We worked from noon to nightfall to make them. Mikuru, Yuki, and I pulled a late shift for you guys! A late shift! Originally I wanted to make them from pure cacao, but then it was like, ‘Let’s not get too crazy.’ So we went with chocolate cake.”

  Each of the three girls had written our names on the labels that adorned the wrapped packages—both of us got a cake from each of them.

  Koizumi put down his spade, and after carefully brushing off his hands, he picked up one of the packages. “To Koizumi, from Mikuru,” it said. Asahina had made treasures just for us.

  “You bet she did!” Haruhi fired off like a machine gun. “We all did! It was pretty fun, and we really gave it our all! But whatever, I was just worried that everything was going to get out of hand, and it was making me space out all the time, and to be honest I was sort of worried I was just falling into society’s trap, but so what? It’s such a broadly accepted tradition; I feel bad for the people who think it’s just a conspiracy by candy companies! It’s fine! Yuki and Mikuru and I had fun; that’s what’s important. We were thinking of putting hot peppers into them, but—Hey, Kyon, what’s that look?”

  It was nothing. I was just—grateful. It was true. I’d forgotten entirely that today was that day that made men the world over nervous. If I’d remembered, maybe I would’ve prepared an appropriate reaction, but having weathered this surprise attack, I had nothing to say to the three brigade girls. It was hard to ad-lib clever words to hide your embarrassment. I doubted I had enough life experience to pull it off.

  The strength drained from my body. All the riddles had been solved. Haruhi’s strange mood and behavior starting in February. Asahina traveling back in time but finding it difficult to talk about the treasure hunt. Taniguchi’s sulking and insistence that he envied me.

  Haruhi had been thinking about this all along—how to give us chocolates on Valentine’s Day. She seriously couldn’t get over herself, not even a little. How twisted did someone have to be to make us go on this treasure hunt, dig all these holes, then fill them back up again, instead of just giving chocolate to us in the clubroom? Wait, that meant—ah ha. Tsuruya was in on it too. The treasure map had been a pack of lies. The reason Haruhi had given up on the treasure hunt was because she already knew there was no treasure. The treasure Haruhi had in mind had yet to be buried at that point—the chocolate cake of which Koizumi and I now each had three pieces. That had been the cause of the weeks of uncertainty on Haruhi’s part. Nagato and Asahina had gotten dragged into it as well.

  What fools we were—both Haruhi, for coming up with such a plan, and me, for not seeing through it.

  “These are just friendly chocolates, though! Just friendly. I don’t actually want to have to say stuff like ‘just friendly,’ though. And chocolate cake counts as chocolate, right?”

  Haruhi’s voice echoing in my head like insects chirping in a thicket, I summoned my strength and looked up.

  Haruhi glared at me with an angry face. Asahina wore a gently teasing smile, and Nagato regarded me expressionlessly.

  “Thank you very much. I will savor every bite.”

  Koizumi beat me to the punch.

  Haruhi’s lips twisted into a smirk. “I recommend eating them as soon as you get home. Just gobble ’em down in one go—don’t leave them on the family shrine for your ancestors to eat, got that?” She turned her head away hurriedly, then stood. “Okay then, let’s go home. The event’s over, and if we don’t leave right away, we’ll get stuck in traffic. I’m sleepy. We worked on those until sunrise, I’ll have you know! And then we came up here in the morning and buried them, and I only caught a couple of hours of sleep at Yuki’s place. The same goes for Mikuru and Yuki!”

  We were on our way home. As we stood waiting at the bus stop, Haruhi stood as far away from me as possible, gazing off in the distance, avoiding my eyes. Oh, brother.

  I whispered to Asahina, who stood next to me.

  “You didn’t give chocolate to someone you have a crush on? Just friends?”

  “No,” she replied, sounding a bit desolate. “Even if I did have a crush on someone here, I’ll eventually have to return to the future. Our separation would be inevitable. It would be so sad…”

  It was an extremely honest view to hold. I couldn’t think of a single rebuttal. And yet it was the position’s obvious correctness that made me hesitate to agree with it.

  “You could just stay here,” I said. “This time period’s not so bad. You could visit the future from time to time, but just keep your home here.”

  Asahina giggled. “Thanks.” Her lips formed a soft smile that made me want to steal a kiss. “But I wasn’t born in this time. My home is there, in the future. No—to me, this is the past. I’m just a visitor. The fut
ure is my present, my home. I must return someday.”

  Just like the princess from “The Bamboo-Cutter’s Tale.” No matter what measures were taken to stop her, when the time came she had to leave Earth. It wasn’t where she belonged. I guess I agreed with Asahina. If I jumped a hundred years into the past, I might find it interesting at first, but I’m sure I would miss the culture and technology of home. I’d want to play video games with ridiculous graphics, heat convenience-store chicken bowls in the microwave, and send stupid text messages with my cell phone. More than anything else, I’d want to nap in my own room and enjoy my own time at my own pace.

  Even if she could do all of the same things, Asahina would always be aware that this wasn’t her time. She was in the past. It was an unnatural place for her to be in, and I could imagine that she might never really feel comfortable.

  “Oh, but—!” she began hastily, waving her hands. “It’s not that I don’t like being here! It’s very important, and I really have to do my best. I’m just really glad you’re here with me, Kyon.”

  It certainly made me happy to hear her say so. I thought I’d try something out.

  “So when you go back to the future, how about you take me along?” Not that Haruhi would keep quiet if something like that happened. “We could take everyone on a trip to the future. Ha-ruhi and Nagato and Koizumi too. I wouldn’t complain. Heck, I’m starting to think that moving to the future wouldn’t be a bad idea.”

  “Wha—?” Her fairy-like eyes widened; she was totally taken aback. “N-no, definitely not! That is completely forbidden. It’s just…”

  Asahina’s face looked surprised for a while, but eventually she noticed my own expression. She closed her mouth, and the tension drained from her tensed shoulders.

  She giggled. “Gosh, Kyon. If you’re going to tell a joke, make sure it’s jokier next time. You really surprised me!”

  “Sorry.”

  Yes, of course it was a joke. This was my time, my era. I’d encountered terrible challenges, especially the repeated time travel to three and four years ago, but I always came back to this time and place, in the SOS Brigade’s clubroom. I hadn’t even been a high school student for a year yet, and I was sure Haruhi had a lot of things she still wanted to do here and now. I wondered if the day would ever come when she would finish it all. It was a bit too early to be planning an escape to the future.

  The day would come when Asahina had to return to her own time. But for the moment, she was here. That was enough. So long as we kept having fun here, the future would surely become a fun place too. She had once compared different time planes to pages in a flip-book, and if I thought about it that way, if all the pages were full of gags, the last page couldn’t possibly be horror. I’d never accept that. I mean, who would?

  I’d once lost my friends in the SOS Brigade and gotten them back. I’d never forget the determination I had then. Whatever happened from here on out, whether I stumbled or was defeated, I’d always face ahead. I wasn’t such a lightweight that I’d easily go back on a decision I’d made only two months before. But leave me my “Oh, brother.” That’s special.

  In other words, no matter how cheap my pride was, it would have to be a little cheaper before I’d sell it off completely. As long as I faced forward, I could say, “Oh, brother,” if I wanted to. They were just words, after all. The same went for, “Haruhi, you idiot,” “Take me with you,” or even saying nothing, Nagato-style. In a three-legged race, you had to tie your leg to your partner’s leg. It was easier for five people to run a six-legged race than it was for one person to do three.

  If there was one thing I’d learned this week, that was it.

  I’d spent the last several days going back and forth between my house and the train station. I would probably enjoy a respite from that for a while. Haruhi continued to ignore me, her back turned, not so much as giving me a proper goodnight. Our honorable brigade chief took large, resolute steps, but I wondered what sort of expression she would wear tomorrow at school.

  I gave my thanks to Asahina and Nagato as I reassured myself of the weight of their packages in my pocket. “I’m really sorry I couldn’t tell you. Suzumiya made us promise not to say anything,” said Asahina, looking particularly regretful, her head bowed. I was impressed that Haruhi had the ability to silence even Nagato. Although I suppose it wasn’t that difficult, since it was me who’d forgotten such an important day in the first place. Although things had been complicated for a while, it was as though I’d simply dropped the concept of Valentine’s Day entirely.

  When I got back to my room, I immediately opened the three packages, though I did not intend to eat them in lieu of dinner as Haruhi had suggested. Inside were plastic cases containing chocolate-coated pieces of cake.

  Haruhi’s was round, Asahina’s was heart-shaped, and Nagato’s was in the shape of a star. Each one sported white chocolate lettering on it.

  Smack-dab in the middle of Haruhi’s was a simple, blunt, “chocolate,” while Nagato’s sported “Gift” in a neat serif font. Asahina’s said “Just Friends” on it, which seemed a bit uncharacteristically blunt to me until I noted another message hidden in the bottom of the cake’s plastic case, hurriedly scrawled out on the corner of a paper towel. “Suzumiya made me write that,” it said. I imagined the scene of the three of them having a lively time making the cakes in Nagato’s kitchen. I put the three cakes in the refrigerator. I couldn’t forget to tell my sister not to go and eat them.

  Once the sun was down, I got on my bike and started to pedal.

  The last checkpoint was a certain bench in a certain park near Nagato’s apartment.

  The park was dark and deserted, and there sat the bench, unoccupied, beneath the streetlight. I stopped my bike, and as I pushed it into the park, I still did not see a soul.

  I sat on the chilly bench and raised my voice to the empty space.

  “I know you’re there, Asahina.”

  The evergreen shrubs behind the bench rustled, and slowly around the bench came the person I was waiting for.

  “May I sit?”

  But of course. I expected this to be a long talk, I told her.

  She giggled. “I’m afraid I won’t be able to tell you much.”

  I confirmed that it was Asahina the Elder’s elegant form on the bench beside me. The winter-wardrobe version of adult Asahina didn’t look any different from a random person on the street—assuming you didn’t count her heart-melting beauty.

  I breathed in the winter air, then spoke. “But you’ll explain things, won’t you?”

  “Where shall I start?”

  “The first errand Asahina and I ran—the prank.”

  We’d pounded nails into the ground, then covered them with a can, and thereby sent a man to the hospital. It seemed like ages ago.

  “There was a reason you had to do that.” Asahina’s face had a faintly visible smile that I could see from an oblique angle. “Kyon, I want you to imagine something. If you could go back into the past, years or even decades”—she sounded serious—“imagine that you could go back and witness history. But what if that history wasn’t the history you knew? What if it were different?”

  “What do you mean, different?” I didn’t understand.

  “For example, suppose you traveled exactly one year into the past. What were you doing then?”

  Probably playing video games in my room, I told her. I certainly didn’t have any memories of getting chocolate from anyone.

  Asahina nodded slightly. “Think about if that were different. If you went to your house of a year ago, but you weren’t living there. What would you do? Neither you, nor your sister, nor your parents are there. Strangers you’ve never met live in your house. And your family doesn’t live in the house you know, but instead live a totally different life, somewhere far away.”

  That was absurd.

  “When we come to the past and find that the history we’re expecting is subtly different, can you see what we in the future w
ould think? Assuming that the past is constantly subject to intervention from the future. Assuming that if left alone, our future will never come to be, and instead a different future will happen.”

  Asahina’s voice sounded distant. As though she were lost in thought.

  “A past where a person dies when they were meant to keep on living. A past where two people who were supposed to meet never do. If we knew that, left alone, that past would never lead to our future.”

  A shadow fell over her already lonely-sounding voice.

  “I’ll get to the point. The man who injured himself kicking the can you placed will meet a certain woman at the hospital. They will get married, have children, and those children will have children. That is all because he went to the hospital. There is no other point in history where they can meet.”

  My mind flashed back to the image of the man smiling pleasantly as he looked up at Asahina and me.

  “That memory device was the same. The data on it needed to be sent in that form. The person you sent it to ends up accidentally discovering the same data. But in this past, that coincidence wasn’t going to happen. Perhaps it was deleted. So we had to send it to him. In as coincidental a form as possible.”

  Someone picks up the device after it’s been dropped in a flower bed and happens to send it to a random address—his address, Asahina explained.

  I didn’t know what to say. There was no way something like that could be a coincidence. Plus that jerk had shown up and handed us the data. What had been the point of his interference? I wanted to know.

  “He wasn’t interfering. That data was necessary for his future too. That’s how he was able to come back to this time.” Asahina spoke very clearly. “For us in the future, that was a predetermined event. But for you, and the person who will receive the data, it was a mere coincidence. That’s just how time works.”

  “…”

  I felt dizzy, possibly because the limits of my imagination had been so easily shattered.