by Nisioisin
“Unsettling? Terrifying?” she said. “No one’s ever called Nadeko that before.”
“…”
I couldn’t for the life of me figure out why that would make her happy, but then she continued, “Nobody ever says anything but Nadeko’s so cute.”
Finally I started to understand.
A one-percent glimmer of comprehension.
Maybe a tenth of a percent.
Being called cute wasn’t a compliment to this girl anymore, it no longer made her happy. In fact, the word must have limited her in many ways. An insult, or badmouthing her, looped around to become a compliment─a blatant example of how her value system was all screwed up.
In that case.
In that case, continuing to be a god, a mountain god whose visuals might make even Medusa turn pale, definitely suited her better than becoming human again.
The thought gave me a heavy heart, but then I realized that, even if it were so, it had nothing to do with me. I gave that heavy heart the heave-ho and felt as light as ever. It wasn’t my job to rescue this poor, pitiful middle school girl.
In fact, it was my job to deceive her─and that was something I could do without an ounce of guilt.
Naturally, Nadeko Sengoku’s parents and friends had to be hoping that she would return to town (as a human being), but that wasn’t my business. If they wanted me to make that happen, maybe I would, but not without due compensation.
Anyway, I had gotten a taste of Nadeko Sengoku’s personality, probably enough to give me heartburn. Since she was a god, “personality” wasn’t exactly the right word, but it didn’t seem wrong applied to an all-too-human serpent deity.
“Wow. So Nadeko is terrifying and unsettling. Do you think it’d be better for Nadeko’s image if the snakes were tied back with a scrunchy?”
I responded by informing her that it was getting late and that I had to start heading home.
“No-o-o-o!! Talk with Nadeko some more, Mister Kaiki! If you leave Nadeko’ll be SO LONELY!”
Thinking to myself how annoying a god throwing a tantrum was, I felt around in my pocket. And what I found there was a loop of string. Simply put, it was a cat’s cradle.
Cat’s cradle is a hobby of mine, and I always keep one concealed in my pocket─yeah right. The string was from one of the packages I’d acquired out shopping that morning, and my idle hands had toyed with it on the way, that’s all.
I handed the string to Nadeko Sengoku.
“If you’ve got some time to kill, play with this.”
“What is it? Wait, a cat’s cradle?”
“Oh, you know about it.”
I thought kids these days weren’t familiar with such pastimes.
I’d been meaning to smugly explain to her what it was, my mistake.
“Yeah. Nobita likes it, right? His specialties are cat’s cradle, nodding off, and the quick draw.”
Superb.
Even if cat’s cradle is out of fashion, Doraemon culture endures. In this age of upheaval when Deputy Manager Tomii is promoted to manager and Ryo the cop gives up gambling, the constancy of Doraemon is like a salve.
Though she might not recognize Nobuyo Oyama’s voice.
“Nadeko doesn’t actually know how to do cat’s cradle, though…”
“I’ll teach you a few techniques. When you’ve mastered those, I’ll come back.”
“Really?”
“Really. I’ve never lied.”
I honestly said that.
I went on with the black-hearted whitewashing.
“After all, I’m your very first believer.”
018
I’m probably going to hell. Not that I give a damn.
Nadeko Sengoku innocently waved goodbye as I left and headed for the station, from where I rode the train back to the shopping district, returned to my room at the business hotel, and collapsed onto the bed. Tiiimberrr, you might say. Climbing the mountain had been a lot of work, of course, but going shopping and searching the Sengoku home had also provided their own sorts of exercise, so I was exhausted.
Phew. It’d been a long time since I took on such a hectic job. Maybe I was being a little impatient… Not sure why I was holding a one-man activities review board immediately upon returning to the hotel, but there’d been no need to visit the Sengoku place and Kita-Shirahebi Shrine on the same day.
Was I over-extending myself?
Was I excited about this job I’d gotten from Senjogahara?
I hated the very thought.
I hated it, but I had it anyway, which pissed me off, so I called her to improve my mood.
It was basically a prank call.
“What do you want, Kaiki…at this time of night?”
She didn’t even try to disguise the fact that she had been asleep. She was probably at her own home, but since she said my name out loud, I assumed her father wasn’t sleeping nearby.
Maybe her elite businessman dad had gone back to work right after New Year’s Day. He probably still had some debts to pay off, after all.
“This doesn’t qualify for ‘at this time of night.’ The trains are still running.”
“I don’t know where you’re from, but in the boonies we go to bed early.”
“I see.”
Then was her previously-hinted-at rendezvous with Araragi over?
Incidentally, even I’m not sure where I’m from. I was definitely raised in Kyushu, but I tend to forget about the past.
It’s not a problem that I do, either.
“I’m reporting back about the job.”
“I know I said something about staying in touch, but I meant that I would contact you.”
“Oh, really? I misunderstood you. Well, can you pop over here while the trains are still running?”
“Huh?”
“There’s something I want to talk to you about, in person. As soon as possible.”
“…”
Senjogahara lapsed into sullen silence for a while, but finally said, Okay.
How tough was she, anyway? And she was only a high school girl. I’d been expecting her to hang up on me, angrily. Nor would I have abandoned the job if she had.
“I’ll do whatever you say,” she insisted. “I’m your dog, at least for the next two-and-a-half months.”
“Hahaha, glad to hear it. I’m staying at…”
I gave the station, but not the hotel.
It wasn’t that kind of hotel, but a grown man inviting a high school girl up to his single room wouldn’t do. Times being what they are and all.
I told her I’d meet her at the station.
Even the boonies usually had an all-night diner downtown─as an adult, I would have preferred an izakaya, somewhere I could get a drink, but that was also dicey with a high schooler in tow.
“Hmph,” grunted Senjogahara. “Listen, Kaiki. There’s something I want to ask you. How does it feel, as a middle-aged man, to have a high school girl at your beck and call?”
“Good question. An uppity brat bowing down before her betters certainly does me no harm.”
“Drop dead.”
I’d been told to drop dead. What happened to bowing down?
But hanging up, I muttered to myself, “What are you doing?” I was shocked at myself. Appalled by my own behavior.
I saw myself objectively, then, as a petty person tormenting a child who’d made herself vulnerable to me, and I felt so low that I might sink right into the bed─yeah right. Senjogahara had sold me down various rivers, so this was nothing but a serves-you-right.
Still, it’s true that I was appalled.
I had just regretted overdoing it from the start, or at least taking on too much for one day, so why was I giving myself more work? And even if Senjogahara could come, how would she get home? The trains would stop running while I was bringing her up to date.
If that happened, she’d have to take a taxi… She probably didn’t have any money, so I’d have to pay the fare, and I couldn’t rightly include that
expenditure in my expenses.
It didn’t make any sense, it was akin to profligacy─well, I have nothing against spending sprees, and seeing it in that light made me less upset.
Having added another item of business to attend to, though, despite the fact that all I wanted to do was shower, eat a meal alone, and have a nice long sleep, I really had to ask myself what the hell I was thinking.
Talk about a workaholic.
I considered blowing it off, but I couldn’t leave Senjogahara there alone at the station in the middle of the night.
Sighing deeply, I left the hotel.
When I arrived, she was planted in front of the ticket gate like one of the vajra kings, her expression unhappy and unwilling in the extreme.
It was so intense that I didn’t even want to speak to her.
More intense than 3D.
At any rate, an expressive face is a wonderful thing.
“Evening, Kaiki. I didn’t recognize you for a second, with your hair down like that. And those clothes make you look almost decent,” she said as soon as she noticed me. I assumed it was meant to be sarcastic, but if my “disguise” worked on her, then I could stop worrying for the moment about being beaten up by a mob of middle schoolers.
“Look who’s talking. What are you doing wearing your school uniform in the middle of the night?”
Senjogahara was wearing a coat over her uniform. With the addition of a knit cap, scarf, and gloves, her protection against the cold was complete. In many ways, she seemed more grown up than she had two years ago, but the way a puffy coat looked oddly becoming on her hadn’t changed.
“I want to show you as little as is humanly possible of my personal fashion. I’m wearing my uniform to emphasize the fact that we’re meeting in a strictly professional capacity.”
“Huh.”
Come to think of it, she’d also been wearing her uniform the day before. I had somehow taken for granted that a high school student would wear one, but actually, it was absurdly out of whack for the holidays. Not that she needed to put on a festive kimono…
“Miss Hanekawa, too, always said she hates being seen in regular clothes by people she doesn’t like.”
I had no idea why Senjogahara tacked on that anecdote. Maybe it was supposed to be a joke─some private joke, since she was the only one who chuckled.
Well, how kids chose to dress themselves wasn’t my concern, so I wasn’t going to complain. If she wasn’t wearing anything just to deny me any glimpse of her wardrobe, that would be an issue, but as long as she had something on, be it a uniform or anything else, then no problem.
No problem at all.
Bringing our mutual fashion appraisal to a close, I asked, “There any family restaurants around here?”
“What, you’re escorting a lady out at night, but you don’t have a reservation anywhere?”
“I’m an uncouth boor, ignorant in the ways of the world, but when I’m escorting a lady out at night I always make a reservation. Which is why I don’t have one now.”
“…”
“This way,” Senjogahara said, clicking her tongue loudly enough for me to hear. She had a long way to go before she could engage in a war of words with a con man.
Or so I thought, feeling superior to a kid.
The place that she led me to was not a family restaurant but a fast food chain: Mister Donut. Open 24 hours. I didn’t know Mister Donut even had 24-hour locations.
Maybe high school students of the Senjogahara type feel more at home in fast food joints than in family restaurants. They’re easier to go to by yourself. Or maybe she was just trying to harass me, a grown man, by taking me to a sweets shop, but I like sweets, so the joke was on her.
Senjogahara didn’t know this, but the second time I met up with Araragi was also at a Mister Donut. He and his loli slave were regulars there, though, so I needed to give the place a wide berth.
“I’m just going to have water, Kaiki, so you’d better order something.”
“I’ll treat you, you know?” I offered, not meaning it at all, and got exactly the reaction I expected.
“What a bad joke. And if you’re not joking, I’d never let myself get treated by you.”
“Then cough up yesterday’s plane fare. Which reminds me, I ended up paying the bill at the coffee shop too.”
“That’s…” she started to say, then left off. She must have wanted to mouth some retort. After clearing her throat, she simply requested, “Please give me a little more time.”
“You should try to think before you speak,” I chided. For once I had the other person’s interests at heart. “I bet you spoke to Nadeko Sengoku with the same lack of forethought.”
“…”
Judging by the lack of a response, I must have guessed correctly. My impression of the Hitagi Senjogahara of two years ago had been that she could only think about what was right in front of her, for better or for worse; there was no later, there was only now. Finding a boyfriend only seemed to have exacerbated that tendency.
Come on, Araragi.
That’s what you should be working on.
I perfunctorily ordered some donuts at the counter and an iced coffee to go with them. I thought about ordering a drink for Senjogahara, but if she said water was what she wanted, then water was what she would get. I had no obligation to be more solicitous towards her than that.
By the way, I went for iced over hot based on the supposition that I might throw my beverage in her face again.
In other words, just in case.
While I was ordering, collecting my points, and collecting my order, Senjogahara saved some seats for us─it’s not like there was much competition at that time of night, of course, but I thanked her anyway. Thanks don’t cost a dime.
I sat down and realized that something felt off.
The heat was turned up, but Senjogahara made no move to take off her coat, her hat, or her scarf.
I’m sure everyone had excused this sort of behavior on Nadeko Sengoku’s part as “cuteness,” but my own sensibility was different, and this was Senjogahara, not Sengoku, so I pointed and said, “Why are you still wearing all of that, it’s making me hot just to look at you.”
“I want to, but this isn’t Okinawa…”
“Huh? Obviously not.”
“No, I mean…I’m outside town, but I might still run into someone I know, so…that’s why.”
Ah, so it was a last-minute disguise.
True, she was much harder to recognize wearing that hat and scarf. At the same time, it was making her stand out and might get some stares…
“Wouldn’t it just be better to tell Araragi the truth? He’s not such an obstinate jerk that he’d refuse to listen if you explained it carefully and logically and didn’t get emotional.”
“Right, but… He has some misconceptions about my relationship with you.”
“Misconceptions?”
“He’s under the mistaken impression that you were my first love. Thanks to your unwelcome, or should I say, malicious lies.”
“…”
Misconceptions. Mistaken impressions. Sure. Pretty much.
People want their current love to be their first love. They fell in love for real for the first time. If that’s what they want to believe, then who am I to say otherwise?
“Sorry about that, especially since you were only being led down the garden path,” I said out of kindness, trying to make her feel better, but Senjogahara’s lips curled as if she were in pain, and she didn’t respond.
What the hell was her deal?
What did she want from me? No, she’d already told me.
She wanted me to “deceive Nadeko Sengoku,” and that was it.
No need to mind the other stuff.
“Hey, Senjogahara. There’s something I want to ask you.”
“What.”
“When you’re sitting at a table like this, do you take your handbag with you every time you get up?”
“Huh? Where
did that come from? Yeah, I guess so, at least when I’m sitting at a table with you. Who knows what you might do?”
“Don’t make assumptions about me. So, for instance, you were celebrating New Year’s at the Araragis’ today. When you went out into the hall to talk to me on the phone, did you take your bag with you?”