Chapter Two

When the bell rings, I wait at the door of the classroom until Megumi comes out. She walks in my direction with slow steps, and when she speaks, her voice is filled with worry:

“Tsurugi-chan, what happened?”

I take a deep breath. “My Chūkon got out of control,” I reply. “I would have been able to calm myself down if she hadn’t banged the table. It was her fault she almost got beheaded.”

“Yes, but…” She hesitates for a moment, then speaks again: “You’re going to get expelled at this rate, Tsurugi-chan. Don’t you worry about it?”

“No,” I say, crossing my arms behind my head nonchalantly. “At least I will have made a difference for not bowing to this bullcrap.”

Steps hurrying towards us. I already know who it is before I actually turn around.

“Hayashi-kun, you’re going to be charged for stalking at this rate,” I say as the boy enters our field of view. “Don’t you worry about the effect this might have on your rep?”

Hayashi Makoto is the student council president of Seiran Academy’s middle school division and also the class representative for class 9-A, who bears the highest grades the division has seen in a long while. He is the most popular boy in said division and, for some reason, a candidate for becoming friends with me and Megumi—but more with me.

“I’m not stalking you, Hoshidake-san,” he says, practically pouting at me. “I’m just trying to get to know you better.”

“Yeah, and I didn’t see you trying to bribe Jouhou-san from the elementary division to get information about the things I like,” I say, crossing my arms over my chest defensively. “Why are you even trying to get close to me? Everyone and their moms know I’m a ticking time bomb. Being my friend will only hurt you, in the long run.”

I watch as he distractedly tucks a strand of hazel hair behind his ear and replies, “I don’t know why people avoid you. Yes, I know about your Chūkon, but I seriously cannot fathom why would this define who you are. And besides,” he adds, a guilty look in his eyes, “I admit I’m a little curious about you, Hoshidake-san. So, I want to get to know you better, because I do not believe that you are as terrifying as people say.”

If this was an anime and I was your average shoujo heroine, I would have melted with this speech. But since I am Hoshidake Tsurugi, well-known problem child and apparently a tsungire (whatever that is). I am unfazed.

Beside me, Megumi claps her hands. “That was a good speech, Hayashi-kun,” she says, “but it will take more than this to move Tsurugi-chan. She’s a titanium wall.”

I throw her a grateful look before turning to face Hayashi-kun.

“Megumi’s right,” I say. “It will take more than your little speeches to get me. I may be socially stunted, but I’m not a hajidere that will get moved by a buncha honeyed words.”

His expression reverts to the pout again. “I am hurt by these words! I was being serious, you know!”

“Yeah, yeah, whatever.” I sigh. “You know I just got kicked out of the classroom for the fifth time this month, right?”

“For almost blowing a hole into Kaburagi-sensei’s head? Yes, I know,” he replies almost instantly. “The student council will have a tough time toning this down. Shinsō-san herself looked rattled when we were given the news.”

Shinsō Nozomi is the student council vice-president and Hayashi-kun’s advisor. She’s the one who is in charge of telling the parents whatever goes on in here, and mostly what gets out is heavily glossed over. Makes sense that her surname literally means “truth manipulation.”

And Hayashi-kun, being Hayashi-kun, doesn’t point out what she does because he owes his life to her. Or so it seems to me.

“Yeah, she’s going to have a tough time glossing over that,” I say with a sigh. “Isn’t that her actual job as vice-president and PR manager?”

Hayashi-kun eyes me questionably for a moment, then sighs.

“If only you would help yourself, Hoshidake-san, then maybe this wouldn’t happen,” he says. “At this rate, you shouldn’t hope I’ll change my own ways if you keep acting like this.”

Yup. He’s definitely a masochist.

“Hayashi-kun, do you really enjoy being showered with verbal abuse?” I ask him. “Because that’s the only thing I know how to say and yet you keep coming back to me. Are you a masochist, by any chance?”

I can feel Megumi’s eyes boring holes on the back of my head now.

“I wouldn’t be so… extreme, Hoshidake-san,” he says, genuinely confused. “I am not that kind of person.” Then he stares at his shoes. “It’s not… masochism that keeps me coming back, you know.”

Suddenly he’s red on the face. By the looks of it, he might just have caught the flu variant going around.

“Hayashi-kun, if you’ve caught the flu, then go to the nurse’s office,” I sigh. “I don’t want you collapsing on the hallways because you want to talk to me, being a masochist or whatever’s pushing you here. You’re the president, you have more important stuff to do than talking to a verbally abusive delinquent.”

With the corner of my eye, I catch Megumi slapping her own forehead, her expression somewhere between annoyed and shocked. I raise my eyebrows at her questioningly, and she sighs.

“A-anyhow,” Hayashi-kun continues, “I’m not sick, don’t worry. I’m actually healthier than the average student.”

“And the average student is?”

“Just take a look around.”

I glance at the hallways and see the people, boys and girls, dragging their feet to the cafeteria with bags under their eyes from lack of sleep. When I turn back around to look at Hayashi-kun, however, he’s gone.

***

When I open the door to the two-floored apartment later, neither HE or SHE are in the living room. Rather, I hear grunts and other… strange noises from upstairs, and quickly conclude that I should not disturb them at the moment.

Carefully, I tread through the halls until I reach my own room and survey how it looks like at the moment.

It’s thrashed. There are books on the floor, the bed is a mess and I vaguely register blood on the wall (no, I’m not going to think about when did that get there). Sighing, I pick up one of the books from the floor and look at the contents—immediately regretting it a few seconds later.

It’s a photo album, one of the things I brought with me from Yukimura. There’s a picture of two-year-old me with my actual parents. A picture of me and Dad under the cherry trees from about one or two years later. And…

On the bottom of page 20, frozen in a large picture, there we are. Me… and Kouki-kun.

We’re smiling, standing beneath a beautiful flowering wisteria, holding hands. There are some pink petals stuck between his snowy locks, which match a bit those on my own hair. A picture of the times when we’d just fool around together and laugh while the adults took care of the rest.

When was this picture taken? Nine, ten years ago? Probably. Yes, I remember now. We took this picture two days before the last time I saw him. Two days before my fifth birthday.

Two days before that smile was wiped off the face of the Earth.

My stomach churns and I clamp a hand over my mouth. Why? I want to scream. Why did this happen? He didn’t do a thing to deserve this!

Behind me, the door creaks open. Wrapped in a white silk robe, SHE stands at the entrance looking absolutely disgusted.

“Where were you?” She demands. “Don’t you care about telling us when you get home?”

She isn’t saying this out of worry, I know that by experience. She’s saying it because otherwise she might get reported to the Child Protection Services.

“You seemed like you were having fun, so I left you alone, Himeko-sama,” I say, calmly, not to press any of her buttons simply because I don’t want to. I’m not in the mood to be angry.

Of course, she gets mad anyway. “Don’t you DARE talk back to me!” She shrieks, and a hand flies in my direction. My face flares upon impact and the grace period of numbness quickly gives way to a burning pain.

“I’m sorry, Himeko-sama,” I mutter, closing the album gingerly. SHE notices it, though.

“What is this?” She asks, pointing with a perfectly trimmed nail at the album in my hands.

“One of the things I brought with me from home,” I say, because the last time I said it was nothing she threw one of my MP3s out the window. Thankfully I had three more. “Why?”

“Specifically?”

I sigh. “A photo album,” I say. “It’s not a diamond you can sell to the jeweler to pay your nonexistent debt.”

Another slap that stings just as much as the last one. “You’re disgusting,” SHE says. “We feed you, give you a roof to live under, and this is what you repay us with?”

Actually, you don’t feed me, I want to say, but I don’t. Instead, I say, “I’m sorry, Himeko-sama.”

Right then HE appears. His face twists with concern. “Himeko, what happened?”

“Oh, darling!” She squeaks. “That girl is being rude to me. She says I’m making up our debts to sell off her things!”

“How horrible.” He then glares at me. “How disgusting,” he says. “We accept you here despite not being wholly prepared to keep a child, we feed you and put you in a good school, and in return you spread lies and rumors about us!” His face is red with fury. “Today, as punishment for your ungratefulness, you are not having dinner.”

Then they slam the door behind them, making me wince involuntarily.

It takes me five minutes to realize I’ve been crying this entire time since SHE slapped me.

***

The next day is Sunday, so I have the day off from school. Trying to be as quiet as possible, I grab my phone from the drawer and call Megumi.

“Megumi,” I whisper once she answers the phone, “are you free today?”

“Sure!” She says, in a hushed voice. “Where do you want to go?”

I hesitate for a moment. “What about that manga fair that’s being held at the Shunka Memorial Park?” I ask. “You said you wanted to go, one of these days.”

Megumi immediately brightens up. “Good idea, Tsurugi-chan!” She exclaims, still in a low volume. “Do I fetch you at your place or…”

“Yours. If I wake them up they’ll quite literally murder me,” I reply. “I’ll be at your house in fifteen minutes.”

“Okay. Bye!”

The moment the call turns off I get to work. Opening the closet door, slowly and soundlessly, I fetch the blue-black dress and flat shoes I only wear on special occasions and get changed in the bathroom after checking no one is up. When I finally find myself in the hallway connecting apartments safe and sound, I breathe a sigh of relief.

“Alright, Tsurugi,” I whisper to myself as I press the elevator button. “Time to run.”

***

Thankfully I do get to Megumi’s house on time. She’s wearing a bright red dress with a bow tied around her waist, a red anemone flower hairclip, and a pair of black All-Stars. Might sound weird, but these All-Stars are Megumi’s pride and joy and she’ll fight a banshee unarmed to protect them. The fact she’s wearing them means she really is taking this outing seriously.

“Hi, Tsurugi-chan!” She exclaims once she sees me. “You look pretty today!”

“Really? Huh, thanks.” I grin. “So, shall we go?”

“Yes!” Megumi looks around. “Wait, you went up here on foot?”

“Yeah, why?”

“Don’t you have blisters from walking so much with these shoes?”

I sigh. “Megumi, you forgot that more than once I literally had to walk over burning coals to get to my room. My feet are made of titanium.”

“Oh… sorry.” She lowers her head apologetically.

I shrug. “It’s nothing. Let me pay the taxi.”

“Oh, no, I’ll pay for it!” Megumi exclaims hurriedly. “I made you walk all the way here. Besides, did you even bring your wallet?”

“You mean the one that was ransacked the last time I went to school and left it unattended?”

She pales. “What?”

“Don’t worry, I refilled it.” I grin dumbly. “Besides, it’s not like it had a lot of money. Just three Sosekis and a bagel.”

When I say ‘three Sosekis’, I mean three 1.000 yen bills, and when I say ‘a bagel’, I mean a 50 yen coin.

Megumi is enraged regardless. “They’re stealing your money?!” She shrieks. “If I was anyone else, I would have reported them to Child Protective Services ages ago!”

“Yeah, but the issue is that my dad wants me to live with them,” I say with a sigh. “Not something I can argue much. But I do piss them off sometimes, just to get some audio evidence.”

“Audio evidence?”

“I’m recording as much as I can of their craziness,” I tell her. “When I get ten terabytes of recordings, I will report them.”

When the taxi finally arrives and we get in, Megumi squeezes my hand tight.

“If anything happens, remember I’m here,” she says.

I smile. “Of course. I will always tell you if something happens.”

With that in mind, I finally allow myself to relax as the taxi drives to the Shunka Memorial Park.

***

“We’ve arrived, Tsurugi-chan!”

I wake up to Megumi shaking me. My eyes, still half-closed, widen at the sight of the unmistakable memorial statue behind her.

I get out of the taxi and it drives away, leaving me and my friend standing in the sidewalk. A sign behind a bush reads: Shunka Memorial Park.

“Hurry up, Tsurugi-chan!” Megumi says, grabbing my hand and dragging me towards the statue. “Or Kibō-Deshō will be sold out!”

Megumi is a huge fan of a shoujo manga called Tomorrow Will Be Hopeful, nicknamed Kibō-Deshō, which talks about a girl who’s a hikikomori, or someone who’s isolated themselves from society. In the story, the girl meets a guy in a MMORPG she plays and falls in love with him, but by the third quarter-half of the story she discovers he’s terminally ill. Of course, this is what I know, but I don’t think Megumi got to that point of the story yet.

She drags me through the park until we finally get to the table belonging to Yoshichō Kana, the author of Kibō-Deshō, where the woman herself is currently sipping on a vanilla bubble tea, a direct reference to her manga where the main character enjoys this particular flavor. She is short, her brown hair styled in a bob cut, and wears a baby-look white shirt with bell-shaped long trousers.

“Hello,” she greets us. “Are you here for the latest volume?”

Megumi’s practically beaming now. “Yes,” she says. “At… at which volume the story is now?”

Yoshichō-san smiles. “Currently, the latest release was volume 20,” she replies. “How many do you have, young lady?”

“Fifteen, um… Yoshichō-sensei.”

She smiles at us. “Since today is the manga fair and also the release date of the twentieth volume, there is a 40% discount on all volumes. Would you like to buy any?”

“Yes! Um, are the 16th, 17th, 18th, 19th and 20th volumes still on stock?”

“Yes, surely.” Yoshichō-san smiles again as she picks up one of each volume Megumi just mentioned and signs an autograph in each. She then grabs a calculator and presses a few buttons. “Discount applied, the total will be 15.000 yen.”

“Here.” Megumi pulls out one Shibusawa (one 10,000 yen bill) and five Sosekis from her wallet. Yoshichō-san then puts the five volumes inside a baby pink bag with a cute butterfly design—a wave to her name and manga—and hands it to Megumi.

“Thank you for your time!” She says as we walk away.

***

“Can you believe it, Tsurugi-chan?” Megumi is ecstatic as we circle the Shunka Memorial Statue and make our way through the park. “We met Yoshichō-sensei in person! And she even autographed the volumes I bought!”

“Congratulations, Megumi,” I say happily. But as she continues her cheerful rant, I catch something odd with the corner of my eye.

It’s a person, a girl that looks about my age, huddled up in a corner between two tables. She has silky ash-blonde almost white hair and creamy purple eyes, and wears a Gothic lolita-style creamy white dress with black frills, which make her seem younger than she is. Her feet are encased in gray thigh-highs and black flat shoes. She looks somewhere between lost and frightened.

“Um, Megumi, wait here just a moment,” I say and hurry in the girl’s direction. As I get closer, I can hear her whimpering.

“Yuri,” she’s saying repeatedly. “Yuri, where are you?”

When I get there, she looks up, and I see tear streaks on her cheeks. “Hi,” I say to her. “Are you looking for someone?”

“Did you overhear me?” She asks.

I nod. She takes a deep breath. “I got separated from Yuri in the fair,” she says. “I panicked and now… now…” her voice breaks.

“Hey, it’s OK,” I tell her. “Can you describe Yuri to me?”

The girl blinks twice, then breathes in again. “She’s a plushie rabbit, about this size,” she begins, moving her arms almost a meter from each other. “White, with very fluffy fur and an X-shaped mouth. Wherever she goes, there’s this strange little buzz in my ears.” She looks at me pleadingly. “Please, could you find Yuri and bring her here?”

“Sure,” I reply, standing up. “Wait just a moment.”

As I walk, I run through the girl’s words again. According to her, Yuri is a white plushie rabbit about a meter in height—Jesus Christ, what a big rabbit—with very fluffy fur and an X-shaped mouth. And this buzz she mentioned…

I know what she’s talking about. This is the sound that something makes when it contains a large amount of Aether.

A plush rabbit with a lot of Aether? What kind of girl would carry around something like that?

Suddenly a buzz enters my ears. I concentrate on the sound, over the sounds of the fair, and finally make out the frequency.

There’s no doubt about it, it’s an Aether buzz. And a loud one. Whatever is emitting it surely has a lot of Aether in it.

I follow the sound until I finally find the source, a large plush rabbit that’s sitting in a corner between two takoyaki stalls.

Found it.

I grab the rabbit and immediately feel tingles all over my skin. Judging from the sensation, and the purple gleam coming from the plushie, it’s transferring a massive amount of Aether into my body.

Reflexively, I drop it to the ground. The tingling vanishes like magic. Inhaling sharply, I retrieve from my purse the gloves every citizen has to carry that people use to manipulate objects with a higher Aetherial density. Putting them on my hands, I pick up the rabbit a second time and carry it back to where the girl is.

When she sees me, her purple eyes immediately light up with excitement. “Yuri!” She exclaims. I give her the rabbit and she hugs it. Probably, she’s the type that can take in a lot of Aether easily, to carry it around without gloves on.

“Thank you!” She exclaims.

I smile. “It’s nothing,” I tell her. “Oh, by the way, what’s your name?”

She blinks a few times, then looks at me with an innocent expression that makes her look even younger. “Hakana,” she says. “Kuroyume… Hakana.”

“What a beautiful name,” I whisper. “I’m Hoshidake Tsurugi. Nice to meet you, Kuroyume-san. And Yuri, too,” I add, smiling at the rabbit. “I have to go. Bye!”

“Bye, Tsurugi-san!” Kuroyume Hakana says, waving at me as I walk away.

***

“Where were you, Tsurugi-chan?” Megumi asks me when I finally rejoin her next to the statue. “I waited a lot of time.”

“Sorry,” I say. “I was helping a little girl find her plush toy. Actually, she was not a little girl, she looked about our age,” I add quickly, “but she did act like one, though.”

Megumi smiles. “If someone like Hayashi-kun ever found out about this tender side of you, they’d never leave you alone.”

“That’s why I never do that in front of anyone I know,” I sigh. “Except you, of course.”

Suddenly she holds out a large cotton fabric bag. “I bought these for you,” she says. “Try to guess what’s inside.”

I open the bag and my eyes instantly widen at the sight of the books inside. “Puella Magi Madoka Magica?!” I gasp. “Where did you get this?”

“Apparently the author of the manga adaptation decided to walk around for less than 30 minutes but thankfully had some tankōbon with him,” Megumi replies calmly. “I know that this is the only type of magical girl you can stand, so I decided to give you a little surprise.”

“Thank you, Megumi!” I can’t hold back a giddy smile. “Did I tell you I have always wanted to read this? It’s the only take on the magical girl concept that actually interests me because it’s not all pastel pink and happy. It’s a hecatomb.”

“And you’re right again, Tsurugi-chan,” Megumi sighs as she watches me fawn over the bag in my hand. “I just wish you would like something more normal.”

***

As we walk home, later, we talk about the fair and other things, like the new school system or—not a subject I’m actually fond of—boys. Megumi rants on and on about the boys of the high school division, but her words for some reason don’t seem honest. It seems more like she’s reading from a script. But why would she? It’s not like her to pretend.

“Tsurugi-chan, is there anyone you have a crush on?” She asks me.

I take a deep breath. “No,” I say. “I didn’t move on from my childhood sweetheart yet.”

“Happens,” she says with a sigh. Unaware I’m being honest.

“And you?”

She stares at her shoes. “I have someone,” she says, after a moment. “But I don’t think they see me that way.”

I pat her back reassuringly. “Don’t worry, you’ll find someone that loves you, Megumi,” I tell her. “I bet he’ll be a really kind guy.”

For some reason she doesn’t look at me. “Yeah,” she says. “Hopefully.”

***

When I get to the apartment later, HE and SHE are watching television. To my surprise, it’s not a cheap erotic rom-com like usual, but instead the evening news. The headline reads, in big bolded letters: MAGICAL GIRL FOUND DEAD IN SHUNKA MEMORIAL PARK.

My heart jumps to a thousand-mile pace as I flop to the nearest chair and drag it close to the TV. The reporter’s saying that a girl in a magical girl outfit, identified as Miko Honda, fourteen years old, was found collapsed in Shunka Memorial Park, right behind the statue of Haruka Kobe. She had several broken bones and her neck was broken as well, apparently from a great fall, but the actual cause of death had been Chūkon collapse from external Aetherial trauma.

“We still don’t know what destroyed this girl’s Chūkon,” the forensic doctor says. “The post-mortem exams are still ongoing, so the exact ‘murder weapon’ is unknown.”

SHE clamps her hands over her mouth. “How horrible,” she whispers. “She was so young…”

HE says nothing, instead merely wrapping an arm around his wife’s shoulders while she begins to sob. I just stare at the screen numbly, absorbing all information like a sponge.

Miko Honda was a student at Setagaya Daiichi Middle School. She was the girl fighting the banshee that delayed mine and Megumi’s bus to school. She had four cute little sisters. She had a boyfriend who loved to play the violin and was in a concert at her estimated time of death. And she had a note in her pocket asking her to come to the park at sunset.

This was right after me and Megumi left the park. And around fifteen minutes later, Miko’s Chūkon collapsed, and she died.

Fifteen minutes after I left the park, a girl my age was killed there. This thought makes a chill run down my spine.

SHE turns her head and sees me. For once, she doesn’t look at me with scorn.

“This girl was your age, Tsurugi,” she says, and I’m genuinely shocked because this is the first time she’s said my name in nine years. “It could have been you, you know.”

Is she… worried? No. She couldn’t. She’s saying this because my father would be outraged if I died under their care. Yes, that’s it.

“I know,” I say, and get up to go to my room. When I get there, a freshly prepared cup ramen awaits me. A post-it on it says, “Don’t tell Himeko I made this. Have a nice dinner.”, written in HE’s polite handwriting.

I grab my favorite hashis from my cupboard and eat it. It might have laxative in it—or not—, but it’s food.

***

The next day, when I wake up, the thin string I tie to my door to check if someone broke in is snapped, my room is a mess, and there is a note glued to my door. It reads:

Don’t forgive either of us.

— Saika Ouji

I blink, once, then twice. Why did HE write this? To not forgive either of them? Then, when I go to the bathroom, I finally understand why.

A discarded pack of sleeping meds, with most of the contents empty, along with things I only see in the movies SHE likes to watch.

And the small silver watch that I supposed never left its hiding in my left stocking.

I run out of the bathroom and check every room. There is no trace someone ever lived here. Hanging from a small hook on the wall are the house keys that belong to SHE and HE.

Did they run out on me?

Then I remember an odd detail. I run back to my room and look myself in the mirror.

I’m still in yesterday’s clothes, though something seems to have happened to my stockings because the left one has a large tear on the inside. And the ramen cup on the floor smells dubiously like medicine.

Huh. They knocked me out and ran out on me.

How ridiculous.