Chapter 24:

XXIV. to care

to be red and yellow like a cloud

I kind of wished it'd rained that day.

It should have, actually. That's what the forecast had said. My teammates hung teru teru bozu the night before as though those did anything. The coach complained about the weather, over and over again, like that did anything. Nothing we did could control the clouds, of course—like friendships, it'd been all about luck.

...and genetics, I supposed. Also luck. I hadn't told anyone that my knees had been hurting lately, my fingers, my wrists, because I wanted to go to the trip. I wanted to win. I wanted to feel the wind as I ran, the thrill of scoring, the warmth of belonging. Under a sheltered, ignorant view of the world, it'd been so, so easy.

The next day, against the threat of a storm that wouldn't come, our team went for a hike. It must've rained the day before, for mud turned the road into a slide. Several teammates slipped. I laughed at them. It hurt, though. Everything hurt. Why? Bad luck.

They'd laughed when I slipped, too, but this ceased once I couldn't stand up anymore. It hurt. Too much. The coach, who'd been leading the group, slid down so he could yell at me for clowning around. He didn't actually believe I was serious until my friends at the time helped me up and I started to cry, which is, to date, the most embarrassing thing I've gone through.

Some guy whose face or name I didn't care for helped me back to the camp, then the infirmary. The rest of the team marched on. How couldn't they? We had a title to protect. Some of them had high schools to impress.

It took hours for my dad to show up. They ran preliminary tests, checked to see if I'd broken anything, but no. Not even a sprain. Nothing. Then what, they wondered, was going on?

It took way too many tests to find out. After all, given my age, how likely was that to be the cause behind things? But no—no matter how many times they tried to prove facts wrong, they couldn't. 'That's impossible', my dad had said after the nth time, naively. 'It makes no sense. Why him? Nobody else in the family...'

To that, the doctor had replied: 'Sometimes it just happens.'

And it certainly did.

I had to accept it at some point. Sometimes it just happened. I had to move on. It wasn't even that bad. I could still walk. I could still hold a pencil. I could still dream about the days where I could feel the wind against me as I ran, the thrill of scoring, the warmth of belonging.

So I did; I started to play games I didn't give a shit about before, collect cards from players whose names I'd only begun to learn, follow teams whose countries I couldn't locate on a map. It was, to date the most self-destructive thing I've gone through. And that was saying a lot.

The second most self-destructive thing was to follow my former team as 'support'. Horrible idea. They didn't need support. Also, they sucked without me. That's what I told myself to cope. Also horrible idea. It made me go from rooting for them during games to calling them names because they sucked, sucked so bad, couldn't even aim correctly, couldn't dodge, couldn't stop the ball if their life depended on it.

Still, they must've been a better team than I thought, for many of my friends went to their high school of choice despite sucking. I went to whatever dump accepted me because my grades plummeted like a skydiver without a parachute. I couldn't bring myself to care anymore. Why would I?

Said dump had John, and Kenji, and Izumi, so I supposed it could've been worse. Too bad John did the same as my former team and cut contact the moment he didn't want support anymore. They were all like that. Even family could be like that. If so, why care? About anything?

During the day of the club fair last year, I went to sit at the bleachers of the soccer field. Somebody asked if I was interested in joining. I told them that it was impossible because of my illness. They didn't know what it was, but gave their condolences anyway. Same. I would've done the same in their position.

Thus, I watched.

I kind of wished it'd rain.

It didn't. A group of twats had showed up to yell about their idol of choice, like they wouldn't replace him the next year. Thus, I left. I already talked to John at the time. He refused to join any clubs for some reason, so he hadn't showed up that day. Without him, I was a shadow with no source, so I walked aimlessly.

Sometimes, when you drift, to find fellow shadows brings solace. To see her sit alone among a crowd of colorful strangers caught my attention when nothing else could. Students here, students there, but not at the drama club's stall. The sole member representing it read a book, as though she, too, had given up.

I kind of felt bad for her, so I joined the club. I was one out of three to do so last year. I supposed that's why Murase had become the club president even though she had exams to study for.

Stupid club. Hated it. No wind, no thrill, no warmth, just... pretending?

That's where I learned that to laugh like a villain in a 90's kids' movie had its advantages, though. Dressing up could be fun. To improvise was fun. To watch someone fall thirty times in a row because it never 'seemed' realistic enough was very, very fun. Still, it was lame, and it'd stay lame until I could finally accept that I'd never do this again after graduating and that it'd be another memory best left to rot, lest it come back at the worst time, like a fever dream hours before a 'test'.

I didn't care. I didn't care I didn't care I didn't care I couldn't I refused to. No.

It'd be unkind to Hanamura to waste her time and unkind to my past self to show up for nothing, so I still went to the theater after school. To their club. Not mine, not anymore, probably. "Where's Murase?" I asked the first kid I found roaming around at the entrance.

She looked at me, blinked, then asked, "Are you okay?"

"No. Where's Murase?"

"You should..." she trailed off. Yeah, I should rest. No, I would not. "...she's next to the stage, I think. You're going trying out for the queen, right?"

I nodded.

"Cool, good luck. Also, um. Your..."

I nodded, then shrugged. After the (not) nap, I didn't sound like a demon anymore, just a fraud pretending to be a ghost on TV. The proof? That this nameless entity could understand me.

Murase sat at the usual spot, doing the usual, reading... scripts. Maybe? "Prez," I said, upon reaching her. She nearly ripped the page she read (?) in half.

"...oh. Watanabe-kun." She adjusted her glasses. "What are you doing here?"

"Audition."

"Pardon me?

"A-U-D-I—"

"Ah. Sorry. Um. I told you the last day was yesterday."

"You did."

"But you didn't show up."

"I didn't."

"Why?"

I almost shrugged. For obvious reasons, I didn't, yet without that, I had no response.

That said, she didn't look as mad as she'd been the other day. If anything, she looked pained. "Then answer me this," she said, pleaded, ordered—didn't matter. "Why are you here today?"

"...because I want to audition?"

"Why?"

"Why not?" Fuck. That was almost as bad as shrugging.

"Why today? You weren't sick yesterday, were you? I saw you sneak out at the last second."

I said nothing.

"Can you even do it today? You sound like you can barely, um. Speak. I'm very sorry."

I said nothing.

Murase toyed with the corners of the page, which annoyed me. "I-it's not that I don't want to, obviously, but you have to understand. Other members have complained. Why do they have to show up, but not you? That kind of thing. If, um. If you'd... please don't look at me like that."

I looked away.

'Sometimes it just happens'. Sometimes it happens because of you, though. "Right," I said. "Yeah. I understand."

"Watanabe-kun..."

"That's fine. It's my fault. Thank you for, um, having me around. It was..."

Yeah, this was my fault.

"...fun."

I had no excuse.

"Very fun."

I bowed. It shocked her, naturally, for I'd gone off-script. To her, and to everyone, sometimes things happened, too.

I just had to apologize and leave.

I just had to thank her and leave.

I just...