Why? Why were they all crying? I just couldn’t understand it. But it would be odd for one person to be unperturbed while the rest of them wept. I had to act like I was crying. My face was tense, so I couldn’t cry very convincingly. My cheeks burned. What would I do if someone realized I was faking my tears? I just wouldn’t lift my face. Hang your head and look upset. Ah, and now everyone’s guffawing. I wonder what’s so funny. I have no idea. But if I don’t do the same as everyone else, they’ll think I’m strange and cast me out.
Laugh. Laugh. Laugh. No, cry. Cry. No, laugh, you have to laugh.
I did my best to smile pleasantly at my parents, my teachers, my classmates; I acted the clown to make them laugh. Oh please, don’t notice that I’m a monster who doesn’t understand human emotion. I’ll pretend to be a person so stupid they redefine idiocy, and while everyone is laughing at me and pitying me and forgiving me, please let me live on.
No one saw through my act, until I started middle school and met S.
Breathing raggedly, I ran up the stairs to the roof.
The third letter had been written not by Shuji Kataoka, but by Takeda.
How could I have been so stupid?
I’d only been able to see Chia Takeda within the bounds my common sense had dictated: as a silly, simpleminded girl.
Why had she been searching for S? Was she so obsessed with Shuji Kataoka’s last moments?
I’d lacked the imagination necessary to understand.
Takeda’s plump face, her wandering eyes, her childish mannerisms, her cheerful smile, her puppylike innocence, her single-mindedness, my desire to help her; I had seen only how they all appeared on the surface.
I’d never even considered that they could all be an act.
Why don’t I tell you about S?
S was the person who understood me better than any in the world, was my nemesis, my best friend, my other half, my eternal opponent.
The terrifying wisdom S possessed penetrated everything.
My act, which hoodwinked everyone I ever met, failed to convince S.
I feared S accordingly.
The more fear I felt of S, the less I was able to escape.
In classes and after, I was with S.
I felt as though S’s gaze was a judge employed by God to check me—a thought which caused my limbs to tremble and sweat to break out with fear and shame.
This world is hell.
I was a slave to S.
On my fourteenth birthday, S gave me a mug with a duck on it as a gift.
S told me that the duck’s clumsy, stupid face looked exactly like me.
I giggled and agreed, and S glared at me, demanding to know if I really thought that was okay.
It scared me.
It pained S to think that I was a monster playing the part of a duck.
I rattled off a few jokes in an effort to reassure S somehow and appear lighthearted.
But S didn’t laugh. S told me, “Quit it, Chee. I don’t care if you’re never anything more than a clumsy duck,” and she stormed away.
I ran after S.
If S turned away from me, she might tell everyone that I was a monster.
I had to get S to laugh.
I had to stop her.
I would have preferred death to S leaving me.
As these thoughts ran through my mind, I let S see me fall in the middle of the road.
S turned back in surprise, then frowned in annoyed resignation and ran over to me.
Just as relief began to wash over me, a car sped toward us. S’s slender body was thrown into the air, then fell to the earth and went still.
Shizuka Saito died to save a monster named Chia Takeda.
That day, when tender flesh was pulverized and red blood spread its tangy aroma across the black asphalt, I watched with an empty heart.
I had killed a person.
I doubt that God will ever forgive me.
I’m just an ordinary kid.
Even after I read No Longer Human, I didn’t understand.
I’m just an ordinary, dumb kid, really, really ordinary, and so, so awful, so I couldn’t understand why Osamu Dazai or Shuji would want to die, no matter how hard I tried. I read No Longer Human five times. But I still couldn’t sympathize with them at all. Finally, I just started to cry.
What had been going through Takeda’s mind, I wondered, as she told me that she couldn’t understand No Longer Human?
I just started to cry.
What had she been thinking when she said that?
That’s weird. It’s deluded. There was no reason for him to ever suffer like that.
What had she been thinking as she spoke these words that cut into her?
I told the boy that I would go out with him.
He smiled, as naively as a puppy.
He had placed an innocent trust in me.
An uncorrupted, pure-hearted, gentle, happy white sheep beloved by God.
I envied him, was repelled by him, but at the same time I couldn’t help but adore his simple effervescence.
But, perhaps, just such a boy might be able to change me.
They say that love changes people.
If so, that boy might be my salvation.
I might become a normal human being, rather than a monster possessing neither love nor kindness.
Oh, how I wish that I could.
I wished it so ardently that my heart seemed on fire.
Let me come to care for that boy.
Even if at first it’s only an act, I know that eventually it would have to become true.
I replayed all the things Takeda had told me in my mind. They had mutated into new words with completely different meanings.
I had seen her look sad, like the day she had clung to me outside the school in the rain, or when I had told her that Shuji didn’t exist as a way of hurting her.
But I had completely misinterpreted the source of that sadness.
I coddled the boy, smiling cheerfully at him and telling him over and over again how much I liked him.
It seems to have made him like me even more, but with each day that goes by I feel sadder.
Even when I continue my performance and seem the same as always on the surface, my spirit is like a terminally ill patient, growing ever more feeble and exhausted, and at times I experience suffering that torments my entire body.
One day when it was raining, the boy awkwardly touched his lips to mine behind the school building, and something burst inside me. It was not happiness; all the hair on my body stood up in antipathy.
I laughed for him shyly and told him I hadn’t expected him to do that, then I ran away.
My mind was racing, and I felt a warm lump rising in my throat, pulling my nausea with it. I wiped my mouth off again and again and just kept running through the rain.
I hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it,
hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it, hate it.
I hate it so much. I hate everything, all of it, completely.
Why did my life continue after I killed S?
Shouldn’t it have been the other way around?
Shouldn’t I have been killed by S?
Hadn’t I enslaved myself to S and heaped flattery on her because I wished for exactly that?
I hated S and also feared her. But deep in my heart, I wished she would destroy me.
Only S could have killed me; she should have!
But S is no more.
Unable to face the disappointment, the reproach, the rejection of others, too petty and fragile, I have no choice but to spend the rest of my life as a mime in order to fool the rest of the world.
That is a hell far more cruel and even further beyond salvation than the time I spent with S.
“I don’t think there’s anything wrong with being ordinary.”
“I suppose…”
Why had I said something so thoughtless?
I didn’t know. I hadn’t known anything.
How much Takeda must have despaired, how it must have hurt her to hear me say, “There’s nothing wrong with being ordinary.”
I read a letter by someone very much like me.
It was like seeing myself. My heart was filled with it, and tears streamed from my eyes.
Finally, I’d met someone with the same spirit as me.
I was sure he would have understood my suffering and misery.
He inspired me to begin this letter.
I feel that as I write this letter, I grow closer to him.
It was not because Shuji Kataoka had something that Takeda lacked in her life, that she had been drawn to him so powerfully that she needed to discover the truth about his death.
It was not because he was her opposite.
It was because once she discovered that he had been created with the exact same soul that she possessed, Takeda had needed to find some proof of his existence.
I wonder who his S is.
How can I use S’s weakness?
How can I move S’s heart and drag out all of its secrets?
Only S knows about his last moments.
How did he die? Did he choose death for himself? Did S kill him? What did he whisper in his last moments? With what expression did he meet his end?
What answers had he found, this boy with the same soul as mine?
He will be my guide, whether I should live or die.
I have to know. Whatever it takes, I need to know.
I turned the problem over incessantly, but I stumbled upon the key to destroying S when I wasn’t even looking.
As pain seared vividly through my chest like an iron brand, I finally understood.
Takeda and Shuji Kataoka were the same.
They both wished to be destroyed by a person named S, who was both their confidante and their enemy, and they had both lost people close to them through their own blunders.
They berated themselves unflaggingly for that, and it finally broke them.
Ever since losing her best friend, Shizuka Saito, Takeda had suffered only from her need for atonement. To her, Shuji’s letter seemed like a map to escape her pain.
That was why Takeda acted as she had.
She brought me before the archery team alums and then sent letters to Soeda, whom she’d pegged as S.
Like poison falling—drip, drip—I watched with naked awareness on my face as—little by little—S went insane.
I can tell that S’s usual ease has disappeared.
And that S’s eyes are roving skittishly, and that S’s voice is quavering.
Now and then, S has begun to sigh when no one is around and to tear at his hair, and to spin around to look over his shoulder in surprise.
What had been in Shuji Kataoka’s mind just before he died, this boy who was her double?
How had he died?
Was it murder, or suicide?
Was he killed by another, or had he brought about his own death?
Takeda had needed to know that.
Whatever it took to do so.
Very soon.
My preparations are complete.
All that remains is to turn the key and open the door.
In order to decide her own future, Takeda needed to know, at any cost.
I have written a letter to S.
I’m waiting on the roof.
Let’s discuss the truth.
On the last page of Takeda’s notebook was written:
Shuji has given me my answer.
It’s time to go to the roof.
Second floor—
Third floor—
Fourth floor—
The stairs seemed to continue up and up forever, and I was worried, terrified, that I would never be able to reach Takeda.
It seemed as though the farther up I went, the longer the stairs became, and waiting at their end might only be an irreversible tragedy.
Wouldn’t I just wind up standing there, watching without an inkling as to a course of action, as Takeda threw herself off the roof, like I had with Miu?
My heart was about to burst, and I felt light-headed, tempted to stop and rest.
It was no use.
I wouldn’t make it there in time, just like before.
It was better not to go to the roof at all. I would only witness something I didn’t want to see again. I would feel awful.
Don’t go.
My lips and fingertips were tingling, my breathing animalistic, and white dots were swimming over my vision.
I hadn’t had symptoms like these since starting high school. But when Soeda dragged me up to the roof, I’d been unable to breathe.
Just like last time, I was assaulted by a vicious hunger and unease; my entire body went cold; painful, whistling breaths escaped my throat; my body listed to one side, and I bent over the stair’s handrail.
It hurt.
I was going to die.
I wasn’t going to make it. There wasn’t any time left. I shouldn’t be going up there anyway. Everything about this was wrong. This situation was just going to make everyone unhappy. There was nothing to be done about it now. I was too late.
No, that’s not true.
Just as I was being sucked into a morass of despair, an invisible hand took hold of my own and lifted me out of it.
Maybe it was Tohko’s hand.
Tohko was the one who’d brought me this far, tugging on my apathetic hand and never giving up on me.
Tohko would never abandon me.
When I sobbed that I hated everything, that I didn’t understand anything, she told me that I needed to find the answers to my questions on my own.
That even if it hurt or made me sad or tested me, I needed to get there on my own two feet.
Like Melos trusting in Selinuntius, I picked myself back up and sped recklessly up the stairs.
If it hurt or stung or my heart came close to rupturing or I couldn’t catch my breath or my eyes clouded over, I couldn’t feel any of it. I could only run towar
d my goal, my mind busy elsewhere.
At the end of the staircase I’d imagined might spiral on forever was a heavy door, and I practically threw myself against it to open it.
The May sky was as lovely and clear as ever.
Takeda was standing on the other side of the railing.
Her wispy frame seemed horrifyingly unstable.
“Takeda! Don’t do it!” I shouted, running over, and she whirled around in surprise. When I saw the duck mug she cradled in both hands, my heart constricted with the certainty that she intended to die.
“Don’t do it, Takeda. You can’t kill yourself. It can’t end that way! You’re not Shuji! You’re Chia Takeda, a totally different person! Just because Shuji killed himself doesn’t mean you have to die, too!”
Takeda looked like she was about to cry.
I grabbed hold of Takeda’s arm through the railing.
My shoulders heaving with each ragged breath, I snapped, “You have to find a different path than Shuji did!”
When she saw her rolled-up notebook in my hand, Takeda smiled ruefully.
“You read my notebook… didn’t you, Konoha? I didn’t want anyone to find it for ten years. It’s a message to myself ten years from now. Just like the letter Shuji left for himself—for me—ten years later…”
“Don’t be stupid. There’s no reason you have to follow the same path he did. Get back here!”
Translucent beads welled up in Takeda’s eyes. Her tears seemed to spring from the pain that her feelings would never be understood.
“But, Konoha, it would be too bitter and shameful for me to keep living. There’s no other way.”
Her restrained voice hid within it a scream of anguish, and it ripped into my heart, tossing aside anything I might have said.
Konoha, I don’t think you would ever understand.
So I’m just repeating what happened with Miu, then.
“You know, Konoha, Shuji didn’t die because he felt guilty about Sakiko’s death. When that car killed her, he was disgusted with himself for not feeling even a hint of grief.
“I’m the same.
Book Girl and the Suicidal Mime Page 13
