part1 c13 (1/2)
Chapter 13 : The Summer Recluse[edit]
I burnt a mosquito-repellent incense. A strand of smoke gradually floated, and flew around the damp living room.
“Mmmah. That’s so fragrant. Menma thinks that the smell of mosquito-repellent incense is the best smell in the world!”
Menma was aberrantly excited when I returned home. It was blatant she was just pretending to be joyous, so my look tensed under the action of my subconscious.
Perhaps, Menma was very wary of my look. I have no means to reproach her for this, yet she sang out the happy things happened today.
“Ah…ah. Menma wants to look at Menma. Too bad!”
“…”
“Will Menma Luigi wear the same green dress? Ah, but Menma doesn’t have a bit of red.” [1]
Everyone believed in the presence of Menma.
As I had imagined, everyone changed their faces and didn’t talk after that. They left without leaving a word about Menma. It seemed like they at least believed what I said, like Hisakawa.
“Will Menma Luigi get taller than Menma Mario?”
Even she freaked me out at first. There was no way around.
I could see Menma and talk with her. That was the reason I could accept her presence. But even if I said Menma was there, perhaps to they, who couldn’t see spirits, will imagine Menma as a zombie who was incessantly throwing off flesh bits.
She drew ‘infinity’ in the air. At that time, the Menma they knew wasn’t their best friend, Menma they had in their memories.
It was a spirit.
“If Menma Luigi is a quiet beauty, then will Jintan think Menma Luigi is better?”
If they would take her as a spirit—to take her as something with obvious bias—I rather let them reckon Menma as just as my hallucination.
Yes, I hated the fact that she was crowned by another name.
I hated her being crowned by any name other than Menma.
“Hey, Jintan?”
“Ah…eh? What?”
“You’re not listening to what I’m saying! Hmph. I’m telling you…Menma Mario...”
“…Menma, let me ask you.”
“Ah! You’re asking me questions again! You didn’t even reply to what I said!”
“Why…should I apologise?”
“!”
Fu. Menma lowered her head.
She thought about it with her head lowered for a while, then slowly, bit by bit, she replied in a soft voice as if unwrapping a messy bundle.
“Menma is better of being secluded.”
“Eh…”
Being secluded?
“When I returned home, mother gave Menma…she put curry on Menma’s shrine.”
“Ah…”
Menma’s face became wan.
Menma had returned home. This wasn’t any thing inconceviable. But why was she saying this with such a tone and such a lamentable face?
“Mum said Menma is a bit stupid, so she might return home. Mum acting like this will surely make father, Satori, and everyone sad.”
Menma said while she clenched the palms put on her kneecap, trying her best to cease the tears rus.h.i.+ng into her eyes.
Why did I ask such a cruel question? I wanted to switch our topic immediately, but I knew I must listen to Menma when I saw her trying to weave some words while trembling.
“So, Menma thinks that perhaps it’s better to let everyone feel that Menma is already dead and have returned to heaven.”
“…”
“This is because no one could see Menma. So, Menma thinks that it’s better to be secluded.”
Ahah…I sighed.
She was always like this. She said words of fools, did acts of idiots, yet her behaviour was always embedded with the care to her surroundings.
She observed how everyone felt and looked, even when she would become the clown.
“As a result, I did that carelessly. I told everyone I was here. I even ignited the fire rod. If I don’t let them see it when they shouldn’t…everything would certiainly…”
Tears affluently rushed out from Menma’s eyes out of her control.
But, Menma, aren’t you very strange now? That is because…
“You couldn’t be a recluse.”
“Jintan…”
“This is because I can still see you. I’ve already believed in your presence; I can’t believe more.”
“Ah!”
Menma looked at me as if seeing something peculiar, such as a spirit, staring at me blankly.
“I’m very happy,” Menma murmured in a quiet, surprised voice.
“I’m turning the lights off.”
“Okay. Goodnight!”
Menma slept on the bed, and thus I had to sleep on the sofa. I chose another pose to sleep today—my waist aches.
The only light in the dark room was the moonlight spilled through the curtains. The moonlight gently and hazily fell on Menma’s white shoulders.
Was the moonlight that bright?
My recent life was basically playing games until I fall asleep…twenty-four seven. The lights in the house were always turned on. I didn’t even turn them off even in days when they are not needed.
The flashy fluorescent light always glittered at the dark me, but now…
The natural and gentle brightness covered Menma…
“Jintan.”
“Eh…?”
Lying on her side, Menma spoke to me with her back facing me.
“Can I ask you something?”
“What is it? Ahah. Do you have to ask Menma Mario?”
“School. Are you not going to school because of Menma?”
“…”
So soft was the sound that it was about to disappear. What was that?
“Are you very mindful of what Matsuyuki said?”
Matsuyuki did say that I didn’t go to school because of Menma’s absence, but I didn’t have the stamina to bother about every word he said after being said so many bad things by him.
“Yeah. But… but this isn’t because of you.”
I didn’t know what the reason was.
Menma was gone. Mum was gone. I failed my exams. There were so many reasons for refusing to go to school, but…
“…This is because I hate to be bothered. That’s all.”
“Yes. Oh…”
Menma turned around, the blanket curling around her leg. She looked at me with her eyes flas.h.i.+ng with a mischevious beam.
“Ah. Perhaps, this is Menma wish? It’s to hope Jintan could go to school!” She said with a playful tone.
“I’m telling you. You’re exploiting your wish just to weave reasons.”
“Hehe…”
Menma had a bright smile that was obviously pretended.
I spoke as if I wanted to get away with another possibility of mentioning the things that happened in school…
“Well then. Goodnight for real!”
“Yeah. Goodnight.”
After a while, Menma’s breathing patterns became regular and long.
A lot of things had changed while Menma wasn’t here.
My age, height was different from then.
The friends.h.i.+p of the Super Peace Busters was also different. But it would be great if only a bit…no, it would be great if we could be as close as back then.
“Eheh. Jinta-kun. What’s the matter?”
The living room was filled with the morning air. During this time, I rarely would wake up before dad goes to work…and I was even wearing my high school uniform. Dad glared at me while I walked downstairs.
“No. Nothing. Nothing special.”
“No. Nothing.”
Dad repeated what I had said like a parrot mimicing the words of someone. Although he pretended as if nothing had happened, he looked fidgeting apparently.
“H-Have you eaten your breakfast?”
“Yeah. No.”
“Is that so? But, eat somehitng. Oh, there’s some sour milk.”
“Okay…”
I directly walked to the sink and spread a thick paste of toothpaste on my toothbrush. After all, I just wanted to use some stimuli to get away with things that had happened in the past.
I could see dad was preparing for his work through the mirror. He was indeed restless, spying at me occasionaly, and then averting his eyes away when he met his eyes with mine on the mirror.
“Pat.”
I spat the peppermint-flavoured saliva out of my mouth.
I was going to school, yet dad seemed not so happy about it.
Having seen dad’s response, I was even sure I had given him much trouble. At that time, when I said I didn’t want to go to school, he must have been very puzzled…
“Wuaghh!”
Suddenly, Menma was kneeling down beside my feet.
“Eh. Jinta-kun?”
“Ah…No. Nothing.”
“This again? You alien from planet No-nothing!”
Exploiting the fact that dad couldn’t hear her voice, Menma spoke to me loudly as usual. I could only reply softly, “You woke up so early…”
“Menma was joking.”
“Heh?”
Joking—Menma stared at me and said sternly this unappropriate word.
“Menma was joking yesterday about having a wish for Jintan to go to school.”
“Eh…”
“It’s fine if you don’t. Don’t push yourself so hard.”
As if about to cry, yet trying to provoke me…Sigh. I’m fed up with her already.
“Idiot.”
I lightly poked Menma’s forehead from an angle dad couldn’t see.
“Ah!”
“I just think it’s about time I get to school. It’s the same as I not going to school: there isn’t any specific reason.”
“Jintan…”
I definitely would fulfill Menma’s wish.
Of course, I don’t reckon that Menma’s wish was for me to go to school. After all, this had nothing to do with ‘everyone’.
But, if I don’t do anything, I’ll get restless and impatient.
I wanted to be more like myself back then. That’s it.
The elongated, nasty, disturbing buzzing sounds of cicadas mixed with the disturbing, iditoic laughing sounds of some blokes. In this ensemble, the voices of those blokes were even advantagous.
The road to school was so short. I gasped in surprise. Of course, this wasn’t that surprising. After all, the times I had gone to school aside from the few times for examination were just few and far between.