“It’s not that I’m suffering from insomnia. And the problem isn’t internal. Surely you can see. We understand each other, after all, so let’s save the circumspection for a different topic.”
Koizumi’s narrowed eyes glinted seriously—how unusual. He usually loved talking in circles, but had he decided to change his habits? Well, fine. He was right that we knew each other pretty well. Although I didn’t know if I’d trust him more than I would Nagato or Asahina.
“You’re talking about closed space and
That was pretty much the only place where his powers worked.
“Quite right. Of late they have been appearing with greater frequency, beginning during spring break and continuing up to today. To be accurate, they started on the last day of spring break, but that’s why my little part-time job now has me on twenty-four-hour alert.” Koizumi let slip a self-deprecating sigh. “I truly thought I had gotten used to it. After all, fighting
It was true that Koizumi had reported the lower incidence of
And then to make up for it, somebody else had done something totally crazy.
“No, wait a sec—” I sensed an inconsistency. “Koizumi, didn’t you see Haruhi just now? She was totally happy. I had to check to make sure her feet were physically touching the ground. It was like she had wings on her shoes. And you said that closed space nonsense and those stupid blue monsters appeared because of her pent-up stress. But she’s so busy these days she’s got no time to be bored, so it just doesn’t stand up to reason.”
“It’s true; Suzumiya looks quite happy to my eye as well. She certainly doesn’t have too much time on her hands. But I’d like you to think back to the events of the last day of spring break.”
I’d been thinking back to it constantly, I told him.
“Doesn’t anything stick out to you? Surely something does. Something quite important.” Koizumi shrugged. “It was on the last day of spring break. That was the day Haruhi began to shift at a subconscious level. So what happened?”
More subconscious stuff, huh? As if Koizumi’s pseudo-psychological quackery didn’t cause me enough trouble already. “That was the day we went to the flea market, right? Haruhi said she wanted to get in on a flea market, so we took a train to the next town over—”
“It was before we boarded the train. What I’m trying to point out is…”
His roundaboutness was so irritating.
I closed my eyes and drifted out again into the sea of memory.
It was early in the spring break, and we were in the clubroom getting ready to shoot the trailer for the sequel.
Once she’d gotten Asahina into the waitress outfit and Nagato into the witch’s cap and cloak, Haruhi lined them up in preparation for the shoot and regarded them, yellow megaphone in hand, whereupon Koizumi and I returned from our voluntary exile. Haruhi looked up at us.
“Don’t you think there’s too much stuff in this room? I was just looking for my Director armband, but it’s gone somewhere. It’s probably just mixed up with other stuff somewhere, but maybe it’s time to deal with the clutter.”
Haruhi was the one who was always collecting random crap like some kind of crow. Nagato had her books, Asahina had her tea utensils, Koizumi had his retro board games, but it was definitely Haruhi who was responsible for the bulk of our miscellaneous junk.
She flopped down in her special brigade chief’s chair.
“I pretty much keep any flyer for any event I happen to get, but I totally forgot about this one.” Haruhi produced a flyer from within her desk. “It’s an ad for a flea market. It’s a little far, but if we get on an express train we can get there in fifteen minutes or so. I’d really wanted to participate right away, but we’re so busy right now, and it seems like the application would take some time to fill out.”
We were only busy because Haruhi decided we were, but whatever.
I took the flyer Haruhi was waving at me and sat in my own chair. A flea market, huh? Given the season, I supposed it would be a way for people to clear out their old inventory.
I glared at the flyer that had inspired Haruhi to decide upon a new destination.
“Here, have some tea.” A full teacup was placed before me on the table.
Ah, Asahina, how magnificent you are! Even dressed as a movie waitress, you’re still considerate enough to serve us tea, your face adorned with a humble smile—it brings a tear to my eye! The waitress outfit is somehow a fresh and novel change from your usual maid clothing, and… Come to think of it, this kind of job is a much better fit for that outfit, since waitresses don’t actually fight space aliens, as a rule.
Asahina giggled. “I actually kind of like this outfit, as long as I don’t have to go out in it. It’s cute.”
Apparently mindful of her short skirt’s length, Asahina kept her legs close together as she trotted happily back, tray in hand, to where the teapot and teacups were stored. There she carefully poured tea for each club member. Though Asahina fans throughout the school might drool at the prospect, the only people in this wide world who were privy to Asahina’s maid duties were the members of the literature club. The same went for Nagato the witch-costumed bookworm. I felt like I should probably take a picture to remember the scene.
Just as I was immersing myself in the task of wetting my parched throat and eyes—
“Hey, Kyon!” Haruhi had polished off her tea in about five seconds, slamming her teacup back down on the desk and jumping suddenly to her feet. She certainly was busy. “Maybe it’s impossible this time, but next time we gotta sell some stuff at that flea market. Before then, go through your house and fish out anything you don’t need that you think will sell for a good price. You’ve got stuff like that, right? A collection of stuff you don’t use anymore but can’t throw away, or a present you never wound up opening.”
I had a complete set of model robots from some anime I’d never seen before that I’d gotten as part of a magazine promotion, back when I was a kid. Something like that? I asked.
“Yeah, that’ll do.” Haruhi snatched the flyer back out of my hand and smoothed it out carefully. “I bet those models would be much happier with somebody better than you to build them.”
Forget about the kiddie-level models, I said; what about the laptops she’d plundered from the computer club? I bet those would sell for real money.
“Those are precious assets! I’ve gotta call the computer club guys over and get ’em upgraded.”
Haruhi next turned the force of her attention to Asahina, who was blowing on the teacup she held in her cupped hands.
“You seem like you’d have all kinds of stuff, Mikuru. Clothes you don’t wear anymore or pointless cooking utensils. You seem like you’re always going shopping.”
“Ah, um…” Asahina turned her lovely eyes up. “I suppose so. I just can’t help buying cute things. But sometimes when I wear them they don’t look good on me or they feel strange… Wait—how did you know?”
“It’s so obvious! Whenever we walk past shops, your eyes light up, like you’re thinking to yourself, ‘I gotta come back here and buy that.’ You radiate waves of it, like a kid wanting a trumpet. I’m surprised you ever have any pocket change left.”
Asahina looked abashed, but Haruhi soon directed her attention elsewhere. “I bet Yuki’s got a lot of books. We could open a used book stall at the flea market, easy. The bookshelves here in the clubroom are already packed tight and all. I swear, they’re about to break through the floor.”
“…” Nagato slowly turned her head to regard Haruhi, then the bookshelves, then finally me, befor
e looking back down at her book.
I seriously doubted that Nagato would be willing to part with her personal library, and anyway it wasn’t that Nagato had a lot of books at her place, it was more like she had nothing but a lot of books at her place.
“So when we do this, Kyon, you take a cart to Yuki’s place. And help her pack up books too.”
Nagato again turned her head to look at me, and I was struck by the message in her eyes—a familiar sensation. When had I felt this before? That’s right—the winter break, back when Nakagawa had inflicted that idiotic phone call on me. We were cleaning out the clubroom, and as far as the books overflowing from their shelves went, Nagato had maintained a strict no-comment policy. I very much doubted she would be willing to part with a single book from her home either.
“Yes, well,” said Koizumi, teacup in hand, “I did go to the trouble of bringing all these games in, but I’ve had no luck finding people to play with. It might be good to take this opportunity to scale back my collection a bit.”
I wished he would’ve refrained from aiming his pained grin quite so directly at me.
Haruhi restlessly sat herself down on the brigade chief’s desk. “Okay, everybody, make sure you’re free on the last day of spring break. We’re gonna go check out the flea market. And if we spot anything interesting there, we’ll use club funds to buy it!”
It went without saying that those “club funds” belonged not to the SOS Brigade, but to the literature club.
In any case.
Although the school gates were closed during the break, as if to tell the students to relax for a little while, Haruhi made sure the SOS Brigade was not given the luxury of afternoon napping. She dragged us all over the place, and even on the last day of the break, we had to assemble at the station-front rendezvous point.
“So you’ve finally managed to arrive at that point. I was starting to wonder if it had been erased from your memory.”
What good would it do anyone if I’d lost that memory? I asked.
“I can’t guess at the possible profit or loss, but if I could erase it, I would very much like to.”
That didn’t make any sense. I’d never heard anything about Koizumi being able to control memories, and anyway, if he could, then he ought to be doing something about Haruhi’s head.
“You are quite right.”
He didn’t have to sound so wistful about it, I said. Spending his energy worrying about Haruhi’s problems was a waste of a perfectly good life.
“That is not the case. Haruhi’s problems are my problems,” he said, spreading his arms in a gesture of resignation as I returned to my recollection.
The morning of the flea market, I obeyed the cry of my alarm clock and got out of bed.
And that was the part that was bothering me. Leaving behind a nice warm bed was bad enough, and seeing Shamisen still curled up in the blankets made me want to haul him out too, but I would’ve felt bad—so I headed downstairs alone.
As soon as I looked into the kitchen—
“Ah, Kyon! Good morning! Where’s Shami?” said my sister past a piece of toast she held in her mouth.
I opened the fridge and got out a bottle of barley tea, poured myself a cup, and drank it. “He’s sleeping.”
“Want me to make you some toast? There’s fried egg too.”
“Yeah, thanks,” I replied, and headed to the bathroom. When I got back, I saw my sister stick a slice of bread into the toaster, then put a plate with ham and eggs on it into the microwave. It wasn’t that she was being especially considerate—she just enjoyed using the kitchen appliances.
Incidentally my sister—eleven years old and entering sixth grade the very next day—had been invited over to Miyokichi’s house for the entire day, and she wouldn’t be returning until the evening. She’d already dressed up for the occasion in her own way and was waiting for the arrival of her friend, who despite being the same age certainly didn’t look it.
Regarding Miyokichi—three days earlier, I’d happened to run into her on the street, and although it had not been so very long since I’d last seen her, in that short amount of time she’d become even more beautiful and mature, such that when I imagined her walking around with my sister, I couldn’t help but see them as the “big sister” and “baby girl” in a matched set of dolls. What were they feeding her to make her turn out like that?
But seriously, if Miyokichi were my sister she definitely wouldn’t do stuff like barging into my room and borrowing stuff without permission, and I bet she’d employ a more refined method of waking me up in the morning too. She probably wouldn’t chase a traumatized Shamisen all over the house, and I was starting to wonder more and more why I couldn’t have been born as Miyokichi’s older brother…
“No need to brag about your girlfriend,” Koizumi said flatly as he held up a single cherry blossom petal. “It may be that whoever possesses Miyoko Yoshimura as a younger sister is fortunate. But if you regard things from a different perspective, the view that your own sister has qualities enough to recommend her will also emerge. Nevertheless, could you tell me in more detail about someone else? Tell me what happened once you left the house and proceeded to the rendezvous point.”
He was being a little harsh, I said. Having never himself laid eyes on Miyokichi, it was easy enough for him to be indifferent.
But whatever. If he wanted to know about the last day of the spring break that followed the end of our first year in high school, I’d hurry the story along. But Koizumi himself was a character in that story, so he himself should have known full well what was going to happen.
“I have no interest in myself,” he said, continuing to play with the petal between his fingers. “The person I’m interested in cannot be found there. To be blunt, while I do worry about how I’m perceived through your eyes, in the end it is a triviality.”
He flicked the petal away.
“Do continue.”
As usual, I got on my bike and rode over to the train station.
When it came to excursions, rule number one of the SOS Brigade was that whoever was last to arrive had to treat the other members. This rule was still active, and thus far I had yet to be treated by anyone other than myself. The possibility that I might yet enjoy a feast with someone else paying the bill—especially if that person were Haruhi—urged my legs on as usual. Yet somehow Haruhi always managed to beat me. It was like that was her true goal, that she was hiding somewhere and watching me, waiting to strike.
As such thoughts occupied my mind, I searched for an empty spot in the bike racks next to the train station when a voice rang out from behind me.
“Heya, Kyon!”
“Wha—”
It was so close it felt like a surprise attack. I mean, the voice was right behind me. I’d been vaguely pushing my bike into the rack, and it was hardly surprising that my legs suddenly propelled me into the air.
I turned around reflexively, and as soon as I saw the voice’s origin, a name rose to my mouth even before it appeared in my mind. “Oh, it’s you, Sasaki.”
“ ‘Oh, it’s you’? What the hell kind of greeting is that? It’s been forever!”
Sasaki also held her bike by the handlebars and had a gentle expression on her face, quite in contrast to her words.
“Hey, come to think of it, Kyon, I was just on the phone with Sudou. Seems he wanted to have some kind of get-together with the people from our third-year junior high class. He didn’t come right out and say it, but given the nuances of the conversation and various other pieces of evidence, I think he’s still carrying a torch for one of the girls in the class. From what I can tell, I’m wondering if it isn’t Okamoto—she got into a girls’ high school. Okamoto as in the one with the curly hair, from the rhythmic gymnastics club. Anyway, he wanted to know if we could do it this summer vacation, and I was thinking that’d be good. I mean, not that it really matters to me. What do you think?”
I thought if they put it together, I’d go. There were sev
eral classmates I’d been decent friends with but hadn’t seen since graduation. And since I couldn’t quite remember Okamoto’s face, I’d be happy to leave the seat next to her open for Sudou.
Sasaki’s lips curled into an inscrutable smile. “That’s what I thought you’d say. But Kyon—I suppose I would be one of those good friends you haven’t seen since graduation, wouldn’t I? In fact, the last time I saw you was when we received our diplomas together. It’s been a full year.”
Sasaki had taken one hand off her bike’s handlebars, and she now rotated her palm over to indicate the passage of time.
“You got into North High, right? How is it? Are you having a pleasant high school experience?”
Pleasantness wasn’t necessarily related to something’s value, but at the very least at the moment it wasn’t especially unpleasant. I could almost say it was fun. Although, I said, explaining all the wondrous things I’d experienced during my first year at North High would take some time.
“Well, that’s good. I don’t have much to talk about. It’s not boring, exactly, but there’s nothing happening at my school that’s violating any laws of physics.”
Well, that was a relief. If anything like that were happening at a high school somewhere, it would go right past “fun” and straight on into “national panic.”
I fixed my former classmate’s face in a firm gaze, trying to determine if anything had changed since junior high. “You went to some fancy private school outside the city, right? The one that gets people into famous colleges.”
The hue of Sasaki’s smile shifted. “I’m relieved you haven’t forgotten all the details. Yes, that’s right. Which means I’m going crazy trying to keep up with the classes. Even today”—she said, pointing in the direction of the train station—“I’ve gotta get to cram school. On a train. It’s seriously like I’m studying just to study more. Doesn’t feel like I got a spring break at all. And tomorrow an even longer train ride to school is waiting for me. I haven’t gotten used to riding a packed train, nor do I really want to.”
The Dissociation of Haruhi Suzumiya Page 4
