Chapter 2.5 (2/2)

“Why would I be angry over something like that?” I couldn’t understand her way of thinking at all.

“I think about it all the time. I’m always just saying selfish things and causing you trouble. So before long, you’d get sick of me, and one day, you’d just suddenly stop coming, Takuya-kun. And that would be the end.”

“That won’t happen,” I said without any deep thought, to calm her down.

“Hey, one day, if I said don’t come anymore no matter what, would you still come and see me?” Mamizu asked.

Her absurd question put me on the spot.

… She seemed to have become weak-hearted. I didn’t know whether it was because her inspection went badly or because of something else, but she seemed to have lost her presence of mind and become disheartened.

“Don’t worry about strange things like that.” To end this conversation, I handed Mamizu the paper bag that I’d been entrusted with. “I met your mother at the entrance just now. She seemed busy, and she told me to give this to you.”

“My mother isn’t really a bad person. Takuya-kun, I’m sorry about the other time. She was a gentler person in the past. She’s probably tired. Because of me, you know,” Mamizu said, taking out what was inside the paper bag. It was a pair of knitting needles and a partially-knitted piece of clothing.

“What is that?” I asked curiously.

“I started this just after I entered middle school, and then kind of got discouraged from finis.h.i.+ng it soon after that. I suddenly remembered and thought that while I’m at it, I might as well finish these kinds of things too, so that I don’t leave anything unfinished.”

For some reason, Mamizu gazed at the incomplete ma.s.s of wool, as if at a loss for what to do. It hadn’t taken on a proper shape yet.

“Back then, I thought I’d knit a sweater, but it wouldn’t be finished in time, would it?”

“In time for what?”

“Winter. There’s no point in having knitted clothes in spring, right?” Mamizu gave a deep sigh and flopped onto her bed. And then she looked at me with depressed-looking eyes.

“Hey, what do you want to do next?” I asked, as if it were only natural for me to ask this.

“… Well, then. I want to go stargazing! I like stars,” she added in a spoiled voice, smiling as if she knew that she was asking something unreasonable.

It’s the first time I’ve heard her voice like that, I thought.

Perhaps the distance between us had shortened a little. Or perhaps it had shortened too much.

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