The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya

by Nagaru Tanigawa

  She stopped so suddenly she almost fell forward. She turned to me with a pale face devoid of emotion, like Nagato’s.

  “Have you ever realized how insignificant your existence is on this planet?”

  What are you talking about?

  “I have. It’s something I’ll never forget.”

  Haruhi began to speak as we stood on the sidewalk of the small road along the railroad tracks.

  “During elementary school, when I was in sixth grade, my whole family went to watch a baseball game at the stadium. I wasn’t particularly interested in baseball, but I was shocked once we got there. There were people everywhere I looked. The ones on the other side of the stadium looked like squirming grains of rice packed together. I wondered if every last person in Japan attended this game. And so, I asked my dad, exactly how many people were in the stadium? His answer was that a sold-out game meant around fifty thousand people. After the game, the path to the train station was flooded with people. The sight stunned me. So many people around me, yet they only made up a fraction of the people in Japan. Once I got home, I got a calculator and did the math. I had learned in social studies that the Japanese population was a hundred million and some. Divide fifty thousand into that and you only get one two-thousandth. I was stunned again. Not only was I just one little person in that sea of people in that stadium, but that sea of people was merely a drop in the ocean. I had thought myself to be a special person up until that point. I enjoyed being with my family, and most of all, I thought that my class in school had the most interesting people in the world. That was when I realized it wasn’t like that. The things that happened in what I believed to be the most enjoyable class in the world could be found happening in any school in Japan. Everyone in Japan would find them to be ordinary. Once I realized this, I found that my surroundings were beginning to lose their color. Brush my teeth and go to sleep at night. Wake up and eat breakfast in the morning. People do those things everywhere. When I realized that everyone did all these things on a daily basis, everything started to feel so boring. And if there were so many people in the world, there had to be someone living an interesting life that wasn’t ordinary. I was sure of it. Why wasn’t that person me? That’s all I could think about until I graduated from elementary school. And in the process, I realized something. Nothing fun will happen if you sit around waiting. So I figured I would change myself in middle school. Let the world know that I wasn’t a girl content with sitting around and waiting. And I did exactly what I wanted to do. But in the end, nothing ever happened. Before I knew it, I was in high school. I thought something would have changed by now.”

  Haruhi said this all at once, like a contestant in a speech competition. Once she finished, she stared up at the sky, looking like she regretted saying all that.

  A train passed by on the tracks. The roaring noise gave me some time to decide if I should make a witty comment or quote some philosophical anecdote to fill up the silence. I pointlessly watched the train disappear into the distance, leaving behind a Doppler effect.

  “I see.”

  My inability to say anything else made me a bit depressed. Haruhi silently patted down her hair, which had been blown around by the gust from the train.

  “I’m going home,” she said, and headed back the way we came.

  As for me, it would be faster to go home that way, but I got the feeling that Haruhi’s back was silently yelling, “Don’t follow me!” so until Haruhi was out of sight, I just stood there.

  What am I doing?

  When I got home, I found Koizumi waiting for me outside.

  “Hello.”

  The way he was smiling already like we’d been friends for ten years was awfully fake. Between the uniform and bookbag, he looked just like a person on his way home from school. He waved familiarly.

  “I wanted to fulfill my prior promise. I’ve been waiting for your return. You were earlier than I expected.”

  “You sound like you know where I went.”

  Koizumi had one of those “smiles are free” looks on his face.

  “Could I have a bit of your time?” he asked. “There’s somewhere I want to take you.”

  “Suzumiya-related?”

  “Suzumiya-related.”

  I opened the door to my house and dropped my bag in the entrance. My sister happened to be walking by, so I let her know I might be home late. I then went back and joined Koizumi outside, and a few minutes later, I was a passenger in a car.

  Koizumi hailed a taxi that just happened to pass by with unbelievably perfect timing. The freak and I got in the car, and it took off east on the highway. The destination Koizumi named was a large city outside the prefecture. I was pretty sure it would have been far cheaper to go by train, but oh well, he was the one paying for it.

  “Incidentally, what prior promise were you talking about?”

  “You wanted proof that I was an esper, correct? An opportunity has arrived, so I thought you might want to come along.”

  “Is there a point in traveling so far?”

  “Yes. I can only demonstrate my powers as an esper in a certain location, under certain conditions. Our current destination happens to fulfill those conditions.”

  “Do you still think Haruhi is God or whatever?”

  Koizumi, sitting in the back with me, turned my way. “Are you aware of the anthropic principle?”

  “Never heard of it.”

  Koizumi exhaled a chuckle before speaking again. “The condensed version is as follows. ‘If something must be true for us, as humans, to exist, then it is true simply because we exist.’ That’s the theory.”

  “I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

  “ ‘I observe, therefore the universe exists’ would be another way to put it. Basically, humans, the intelligent life forms of this planet, discovered the laws of physics and other physical constants and through those discoveries, became aware for the first time of the existence of a universe bound by those observations. Therefore, if the humans on Earth who observed this universe had not evolved to our current level, there would be no one to make those observations and consequently, the existence of the universe would remain unknown. In other words, it wouldn’t matter if the universe existed or not. The existence of humanity permits the existence of the universe. This would be the reasoning from a human basis.”

  “That’s just ridiculous. It doesn’t matter if humans are around or not. The universe is the universe.”

  “Precisely. Which is why the anthropic principle cannot be considered scientific. It is merely speculative theory. However, it brings some interesting facts to our attention.”

  The taxi stopped at a traffic signal. The driver just looked straight ahead. He didn’t pay any attention to us at all.

  “Why did the universe happen to be created to accommodate human life? If there were a slight increase or decrease in the gravitational constant, the universe would most likely not have facilitated the development of the sun. Or take Planck’s constant or particle-mass ratios. They exist in this world at conditions most suitable for humans. Consequently, this universe is what it is, and humanity is what it is. Don’t you find that curious?”

  My back was starting to itch. Koizumi sounded like a brochure for one of those new pseudoscience religions.

  “Don’t worry. I do not believe that an omniscient, omnipotent God created humans. Neither do my colleagues. However, we have our suspicions.”

  “About what?”

  “Perhaps we are just clowns standing on tiptoe at the edge of a cliff?”

  I must have had a really weird look on my face. Koizumi chuckled like a rooster with asthma.

  “I kid.”

  “I don’t understand a thing you’re saying.”

  I got that out in the open. I didn’t have time to waste on little stories that weren’t funny. Let me out right now or turn the car around. I’d prefer the latter.

  “I brought up the anthropic principle to draw a comparison. I have
n’t gotten to Suzumiya yet.”

  “So tell me already. Why do you, Nagato, and Asahina all like Haruhi so much?”

  “I believe her to be a charming person. But let’s set that aside. Do you remember? I once said that the world may have been created by Suzumiya.”

  “It annoys the hell out of me, but I guess I still remember.”

  “She has the ability to realize wishes.”

  “Don’t make that kind of a statement with a straight face.”

  “I have no choice but to make such a statement. The situation is changing the way Suzumiya wishes.”

  “Like that’s possible.”

  “Suzumiya is positive that aliens exist. She wished it to be so. That is why Yuki Nagato is here. Similarly, she wished for time travelers to exist. That is why Mikuru Asahina is here. And I am also here for the sole reason that Suzumiya wished it so.”

  “Like I said. How do you know that?”

  “It was three years ago.”

  Screw three years ago. I’m sick of hearing those words.

  “One day, I suddenly became aware of the fact that I possessed certain powers. For some reason, I knew how to use those powers. Other people with the same powers experienced similar awakenings. Furthermore, we also knew that Haruhi Suzumiya was the cause. I cannot explain why. We just ended up with that knowledge.”

  “Let’s say I give you the benefit of doubt. I still don’t see how Haruhi can do all that.”

  “Indeed. We found it hard to believe ourselves. How could a single girl have transformed the world, no, perhaps even created the world? And that girl finds this world to be a boring place. This is a terrifying situation to behold.”

  “Why?”

  “Didn’t I tell you? If she is capable of creating this world at will, she could undo the world we know and create her desired world from scratch. That would quite literally be the end of the world. Of course, we have no way of knowing if it has already happened. The world we believe to be unique may actually be the latest in a string of reincarnations.”

  Like I’m gonna believe that. I said something else out loud, though. “Then reveal your true identity to Haruhi. Once she knows that espers really exist, she’ll be ecstatic. She might stop thinking about changing the world.”

  “That would pose another problem. If Suzumiya believes the existence of espers to be a common occurrence, the world would really end up that way. The laws of physics would be bent. As would the law of conservation of mass and the second law of thermodynamics. The entire universe would erupt into chaos.”

  “There’s something I don’t get,” I said. “You said that Haruhi wished for aliens, time travelers, and espers, which is why you, Nagato, and Asahina are here.”

  “Yes.”

  “Then why hasn’t Haruhi noticed yet? You people know it. Even I know it. Isn’t that kind of odd?”

  “You believe it to be contradictory? The contradiction would be within Suzumiya’s heart.”

  “In English, please.”

  “To be concise, her desire for the existence of aliens, time travelers, and espers contradicts her common sense, which says they cannot exist. She may be eccentric in her speech and conduct, but she is a normal person with rational reasoning. Her sandstorm-level of energy during middle school has alleviated substantially the past few months. I would have preferred that she continue to calm down, but once she came to this school, a tornado touched down.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “It is your fault.” Only his mouth was smiling. “If you hadn’t given Suzumiya that strange idea, we would probably still be observing her from afar.”

  “What did I do?”

  “You were the one who gave her the idea to form this questionable club. Your conversation gave her the inspiration to create a club made up of unusual individuals. The responsibility is yours. As a result, low-ranked members from the three forces interested in Suzumiya have gathered together in one group.”

  “That’s a false charge.”

  One of my weaker denials. Koizumi chuckled.

  “Well, that isn’t the only reason.”

  And with that, he stopped talking. Before I could tell him to go on, the driver spoke.

  “We’re here.”

  The car stopped and the door opened. Koizumi and I got out into the crowd of people. The taxi driver drove off without collecting the fare, but I wasn’t particularly surprised.

  If anyone living in this region says they’re going out on the town, they probably mean that they’re coming here. A typical local urban area you could find anywhere in Japan with department stores and complex structures lined up all around and a jumble of private railway and Japan Railways terminals. The setting sun lit up the pedestrians rushing by the intersection with color. Once the traffic signal turned green, a sea of people so big you had to wonder where they all came from, started walking. The two of us had been let off at the edge of the crossing and we quickly slipped into the crowd.

  “It may be a bit late to say this after coming all this way.” As we slowly walked across the crossing, Koizumi spoke while looking straight ahead. “You can still back out now.”

  “Just a bit late, eh?”

  Koizumi, walking right next to me, grabbed my hand in his. What are you doing? You’re freaking me out.

  “I’m sorry, but could you close your eyes for a bit? It won’t take long. Just a few seconds.”

  I dodged some sprinting businessman in a suit who was obviously late to a meeting or something. The walk traffic signal began counting down.

  Fine. I complied and closed my eyes. The sound of many footsteps. The roar of car engines. Constant chattering. A tumult of noise.

  Koizumi led me by the hand. One step. Two steps. Three steps. Stop.

  “That’s enough.”

  I opened my eyes.

  The world had turned gray.

  It was dark. I unconsciously looked up at the sky. The bright orange sun was nowhere to be found. The sky was covered with dark gray clouds. Were they even clouds? It looked like flat seamless space that stretched on forever. My surroundings were covered in shadows. The gray sky emitted soft phosphorescence in the sun’s absence, the only light preventing this world from falling into total darkness.

  No one was around.

  Aside from Koizumi and me, standing in the middle of the intersection, the crowd of people covering the crosswalk had vanished without a trace. The traffic signal continued counting down in the dim light and had just turned red. Yet not a single car moved. It was so silent you might wonder if the earth had stopped rotating.

  “The void within a dimensional fault. A place separated from our world. Closed space.”

  Koizumi’s voice echoed rather loudly through the silent air.

  “The middle of this crosswalk happened to be the ‘wall’ of this closed space. Here, like this.”

  Koizumi’s outstretched arm stopped like it had run into an obstacle. I followed suit. It felt like I was touching chilled winter sky. My hand pressed softly into an elastic, invisible wall but met firm resistance before even making it ten centimeters in.

  “Its radius is approximately five kilometers. You cannot gain entry through ordinary, physical measures. One of the powers I possess is the ability to enter this space.”

  Not a single light was on in any of the buildings protruding from the ground like bamboo shoots, nor in any of the stores in the shopping district. The only artificial light was from the traffic signal and the dimly lit street lights.

  “Where is this?”

  Maybe I should have asked what this is.

  Koizumi calmly said he would explain as we walked.

  “The details are unclear, but this would be an alternate world slightly off from ours… at least, you can think of it as such. A dimensional fault sprung from the place we were just at. We have entered the resulting gap. Right now, everything is happening as normal on the outside. The average person will be unable to stumble into this place… most o
f the time, at least.”

  We crossed the street. Did Koizumi already know where we were going? He seemed sure of himself.

  “Picture a dome-shaped space rising from the ground. We would be within that.”

  We entered a multipurpose building. Forget people. There wasn’t even a speck of dust.

  “Closed space occurs in a completely arbitrary fashion. There have been instances where they occurred every other day. There were also times when months went by without incident. Only one thing is certain.”

  We climbed the stairs. It was really dark. If I hadn’t been able to see the faint image of Koizumi walking in front of me, I probably would have tripped over myself.

  “This space is created whenever Suzumiya becomes emotionally unstable.”

  We stepped out onto the roof of the four-story multipurpose building.

  “I am able to detect the emergence of closed space. So can my colleagues. The reason we are able to do so is a mystery. But we know the location and time of emergence without knowing why. And the method for entry, as well. I am unable to express this sensation in words.”

  I placed my hands on the railing of the roof and looked up at the sky. There wasn’t even a breeze.

  “You brought me all the way here to show me this? It’s just an empty place, isn’t it?”

  “No, the crux of the matter is yet to come. It should begin soon.”

  Stop acting so superior. But Koizumi just pretended not to see the sour look on my face.

  “My powers are not limited to detecting and entering closed space. You could say that I’ve been granted powers which reflect Suzumiya’s rationality. If this world is like a pimple resulting from her unstable state, I would be the medicine that treats it.”

  “Your metaphors are hard to understand,” I replied.

  “People often tell me that. In any case, you are quite impressive. Not a hint of surprise after witnessing all this.”

  I recalled the erased Asakura and the gorgeous Asahina. I’d already been through a lot.

  Koizumi abruptly looked up. His eyes gazed beyond my head at some point far off in the distance.