Otorimonogatari

by Nisioisin

  Nadeko closes the door to Koyomi’s room and decides to take a look under his bed first─though it can’t be hidden there.

  If the Hawaiian-shirted expert─in other words, Mister Oshino─really entrusted it to him, Big Brother would hide it somewhere and not display it.

  “Now that i think about it, it’s really true…” i muse. “Nadeko likes people who are kind to her, and she hates people who are mean to her…”

  “…”

  “Liking someone who thinks nothing of Nadeko, let alone someone who dislikes her… It’s just not possible. When you’re dealing with people, the way someone feels about you is very important.”

  “And if the way you feel about them is just as important to them─I wouldn’t want to be friends with anyone with feelings like yours, dear.”

  “…”

  “Speaking of which, Nadeko, you don’t remember anything about the boy who told you he liked you, do you? Not his name, not his face, nothing. You didn’t know who he was until then, sure, but not remembering the name of someone who said he liked you? Don’t you think that might qualify you as someone with personality issues, hmmmm?”

  “…”

  “And it must be to hide this personality of yours that you never tell people how you really feel, always looking down at the ground and falling silent─hsshh, hsshh!”

  “…Right.”

  Oh ho, the Serpent reacts oddly.

  Is he surprised that Nadeko nodded like an honest girl? Maybe.

  Because Nadeko isn’t an honest girl.

  i didn’t like telling people how i really feel.

  i didn’t like doing things.

  And that’s probably─because i’m not kind.

  i’m not easy to deal with─at all.

  “You’re right. Probably,” i say to Mister Serpent as i search through Koyomi’s room─well, it seems like i’m conversing, but maybe it’s more like Nadeko talking to herself.

  At least, i wasn’t expecting a reaction.

  “What Tsukihi said was correct.”

  “Hmmmm?”

  “Nadeko likes Big Brother because, that way, she never has to get hurt… Well, i mean, romance takes up so much energy─not to sound like you, Mister Serpent. Falling in love with someone, being loved back… An unrequited love where you just ‘yurn’ might actually be easier… You don’t have to be distracted, and you don’t have to feel lost, just like Tsukihi said.”

  “…”

  “That’s the only explanation that makes sense, right? i tried to make all those excuses this morning…but a girl as unserious as Nadeko spending six whole years really loving a friend’s big brother who she barely knows, and him alone… It’s a stretch, isn’t it.”

  It’s not like there was something in particular.

  There were various things, but there wasn’t anything, either─no big story behind it all.

  Although Tsukihi was convinced by her own words, it’s not like there was a key episode back when i was in second grade─Big Brother saving Nadeko when she was about to get hit by a car, or stepping in to help when Nadeko was being bullied─we just played games together in Tsukihi’s room.

  If i have to give a reason.

  It’s all because he was Tsukihi’s big brother─all because he was Koyomi Araragi.

  In other words, the only explanation is that it felt safe to like him because he was so beyond Nadeko’s reach.

  “i think being in love with someone is a very wonderful thing─a feeling like that’s all you need in life, all you need to be cheerful and to make everything soft and fluffy.”

  “…”

  “The world is such a tough place, with so many things that are annoying or that don’t go your way, and what you think will always be there for you might crumble at a moment’s notice, and the rules you think you could rely on turn out to be less reliable than you thought, and your body and mind get so easily tired, so exhausted that you might just find yourself wanting to slump over on the ground, but even so, it’s like you can keep pushing yourself if you love someone.”

  “…”

  “It’s like you can smile even when you want to cry─which is why…” Nadeko pauses like she’s advising someone. “Which is why Nadeko fell in love with Big Brother, maybe─just to feel more stable by being in love.”

  “To feel─more stable.”

  “i mean, isn’t it gross if you think about it? That’s all it is, right? Gross. i bet Tsukihi, too, wanted to say that. Staying in love with someone when you haven’t met him in six years… It might be beautiful and romantic if it was some tale…but to be frank, you’re just a stalker. That’s just heavy,” Nadeko rambles. “i’ve been thinking…about what Tsukihi meant. It was tiresome, but it’s not like there was anything else to do─so i thought about it.”

  “…”

  “Ideals that are too lofty can ruin people─well, i guess she said they were actually Miss Hanekawa’s words… Anyway, isn’t that like chasing after a dream without any worries since it’ll never come true?”

  A dream that can never come true.

  An ideal that you can never reach.

  A lost object you can never find.

  Then, even if it doesn’t come true, even if you don’t find it, even if you don’t reach it─you never have to get hurt.

  You won’t have to change. You won’t have to do a thing.

  “i mean, it’d be such a shock if a reasonable dream never came true… Lofty ideals are probably a way of protecting yourself. Because when they don’t happen, you can always say, ‘i knew it.’”

  Don’t dream. Look at reality instead.

  How many setbacks has Tsukihi had to experience? Just how much did she need to learn before she could talk to Nadeko the way she did, like she knew it all?

  Experiences that would make Nadeko fold if she had them even once─knowledge that would cause her life to end.

  Yes.

  Snapping on her teacher and turning the rest of her class against her the way i did─must be nothing to Tsukihi.

  Tsukihi wouldn’t even leave school early afterwards─she’d probably sit through class like nothing happened.

  It’s that Tsukihi that Nadeko─

  “You know, it just might have been Tsukihi that i fell in love with first. Maybe, by falling in love with Big Brother, i wanted to become Tsukihi’s sister…”

  “…”

  “Sometimes i notice that i’m working to find Koyomi’s good points.”

  “…”

  “Mm…”

  Nadeko’s hands are moving the entire time she’s talking, but i still don’t find anything resembling Mister Serpent’s object of worship.

  Maybe it’s not in this room?

  On the other hand, Koyomi’s room is the absolute furthest I’d be allowed to go in searching this home… Hrmm.

  In any case, when i look at it like this, his room lacks individuality.

  i guess you could say that i don’t feel anything Koyomi-ish from it? It’s not really showing Nadeko anything about the person who’s always using it.

  There are barely any items that could tell you about his hobbies or tastes. All the books on the shelves are famous, and i don’t get a glimpse at anything like his more fanatical interests.

  It’s almost like a hotel room.

  With the bare minimum in it…like he’s ready to leave at any moment─and has already gotten ready to do so.

  …

  If a family member’s room looked this way, you might feel uneasy─i have that thought.

  “Wait.”

  And then.

  Right when i’m quietly having that thought, i discover an item that makes his hobbies and tastes very obvious.

  A dirty magazine.

  A number of them, in fact, together inside his bottom desk drawer.

  “Yikes. Yikes. Yikes.”

  “Hey, Nadeko?”

  “Th-This really would make your family feel uneasy…”

  i take
the top one from the stack.

  The cover is unbelievable.

  To describe it to you, it’s… How do i put this…there’s a girl with pigtails and…no!

  Nadeko can’t say more.

  “W-Wow. This is so tailored… i should have expected as much from Big Brother Koyomi… No joke… W-Well, it’s fine, in its own way…”

  “Hey, Nadeko.”

  “Be quiet. Your object of worship might be in between the pages of this magazine.”

  “Nah… It’s definitely not that flimsy…”

  “Hrmm.”

  i take a careful look through it.

  i examine each page so as not to miss anything.

  It would be a big deal if i missed Mister Serpent’s object of worship, you see.

  “Nadeko…” i mutter.

  “Hm?”

  “Nadeko─doesn’t like to say ‘I’ or ‘me’… Why do you think that is?”

  “How should I know? Figure it out for yourself.”

  “That’s it.”

  “Hunh?”

  “That must be it─it’s because Nadeko doesn’t have a ‘self,’” Nadeko states, reaching for a second magazine after finishing the first.

  This second one, completely different, is about foreign affairs.

  H…How scandalous.

  i can’t do this. i can’t even start to do this.

  “Nadeko…doesn’t have a self,” i mutter.

  That’s something else i’ve been thinking, as much as i didn’t want to think it.

  “A self? Are you sure you don’t mean self-confidence, my dear?”

  “No. A self.”

  “What are you saying, Nadeko? The person right there is you, and no one else.”

  Those hands. Those legs. That body.

  Down to every one of the hairs on your head─all of that’s you, Mister Serpent details.

  “So of course you have a self.”

  “Yeah…of course there’s someone named Nadeko Sengoku. A someone they call Sengoku. Someone they call Nadeko. That someone you call ‘dear,’ Mister Serpent─she’s right here. There’s definitely a girl in her second year of middle school who’s searching through Big Brother’s room right now.”

  But that’s not me.

  i can’t see that as being who I am.

  “Nadeko is someone else as far as I go─which is why Nadeko never calls herself me.”

  “…”

  “I’m not the person everyone takes to be Nadeko Sengoku─if they think Nadeko Sengoku is cute, they’re not talking about me.”

  Somehow it feels like i’m living another person’s life.

  Like i have no self.

  Nadeko lives her life doing what others say.

  She only reacts to what others say.

  She never does anything herself─of course she doesn’t.

  Because Nadeko has no self.

  She’s not even empty─there’s someone on the outside of Nadeko who’s a question mark, and on the inside too─

  “Talk about stupid. So in other words, you’re a kid,” the Serpent pooh-poohs.

  “…”

  “That really is why little brats call themselves by their first name. Everyone else calls them that, so that’s how they ‘understand’ themselves─basically, it means they haven’t formed an ego. Oh, and that’s why your teacher refers to himself in the third person, too. Because calling himself ‘your teacher’ gives him a sense of actually being your teacher.”

  “In other words, Nadeko not having an ego…not having something she can call herself…”

  “There’s nothing wrong with that─not on its own. Living a life that’s true to who you are isn’t all that valuable, actually.”

  “But…if i don’t have an ego, if i don’t have a self…then there’s no point in being here.”

  “That point is too much for you to bear, Nadeko, right?”

  “…”

  He’s right.

  It’s not like Nadeko wants an “I” at all.

  If there’s anything she wants, it’d be─

  “Magazine number three…”

  Uh oh.

  Is it okay for a high schooler to be in possession of this? Your entire life could be ruined if it got out that you owned such a thing.

  “Maybe we should say this is your object of worship and take it home with us…”

  “Is that how you view my object of worship?”

  “Ah.”

  Flutter.

  Something floats down from inside the third magazine─a bookmark?

  Koyomi is more meticulous than i thought if he’s using a bookmark in a centerfold collection… If he used a bookmark, does that mean that he likes this page in particular?

  In that case, i need to check it out.

  Let’s see, here.

  “Really, Mister Serpent, like you said once─Nadeko doesn’t feel that bad about it.”

  “Hm?”

  “About your breathren? Your brothers? Your underlings…thralls? In other words, about killing all of those snakes…and in such a cruel way.”

  i don’t regret it. i don’t feel any remorse.

  i don’t─do a thing.

  “Nadeko just thinks she couldn’t help it…because Nadeko thought she’d die otherwise. There’s a possibility that Nadeko just might feel remorse, but I don’t.”

  “…But your massacre was meaningless, and in fact, only made things worse for you, didn’t it?”

  “Still, i couldn’t help it…because Nadeko didn’t know.”

  “…”

  “i couldn’t help it. Yeah. Nadeko can deal with anything that way. Because everything that happens to her is someone else’s problem.”

  Even the way i’m trespassing on Big Brother Koyomi’s home now─i feel like there’s nothing i could do about it. If he gets mad at Nadeko─she’ll probably apologize.

  After all, someone is mad.

  Of course i’ll apologize.

  Like it’s someone else’s problem.

  “And it’s because you’re mad, Mister Serpent─that Nadeko is atoning like this.”

  “No, I’m not particularly mad at you─”

  “i bet Nadeko could kill a person and still say, ‘i couldn’t help it’─”

  “Nadeko!” Mister Serpent suddenly shouts─surprising her and freezing her hand before it can flip another page.

  “Wh-What… Is it something about the girl on this page?”

  “No, no… The bookmark that was inserted there.”

  “The bookmark?”

  The one that fell on the floor?

  Could it be a special first-run bonus with a girl’s photo on the opposite side? Nadeko does as she’s told and picks up the facedown bookmark.

  And then─

  “Ah…”

  Drawn on the front side─is the picture of a snake.

  One that’s eating its own tail.

  A picture─of an Ouroboros.

  “And wait…is this not a bookmark…but a talisman?”

  i think back.

  Yes, the talisman that Koyomi stuck on Kita-Shirahebi Shrine’s hall in June─the talisman that Mister Oshino supposedly entrusted to him.

  That’s what it looks like. It’s almost “identacle.”

  Wasn’t the work of putting that talisman on the shrine worth more than five million yen? Of course, there were characters written on that talisman, while there’s an illustration on this one. To say that they’re similar might not make logical sense.

  But.

  The red ink used─to draw the image, and to draw those characters, is similar─the strokes of the brush are undeniably─

  “I see,” Mister Serpent says. “So that’s the form it was preserved in─my object of worship was saved not in material form but as an image… I didn’t expect that one. Hsshh, hsshh.”

  “An image…”