Chapter 1:
There’s No Freaking Way My Mental Health Can Handle This!
SINCE DAY ONE, Amaori Haruna just had it. Like, she took one look at something and it clicked for her. Back when we were little and got caught playing way past our bedtime, she was always crafty enough to look sorry. Like a good little girl. Guess who got told off twice as much, since I was older and supposed to know better?
And from that moment on, there was no looking back. She was great at everything. From the moment she started junior high, her athletic ability turned her into the star of the badminton team. She made it to tournaments at the…well, not the prefecture level, since we were in Tokyo. I dunno what you’d call that. The city level? She made it to that. And even though she ran herself ragged with hours of daily practice, she still got great grades.
So what tanked her mental health? Why did she stop going to school? If my little sister was the type who didn’t have any friends, couldn’t meet anyone’s eye, and clung to my sleeve sniveling and whimpering “Oneechan…” that would have been one thing. That would’ve been kinda cute, actually. But my sister was the polar opposite. She had tons of friends. I mean, duh. She was friendly and bright, and she wasn’t scared of anyone or anybody. Her badminton gave her great legs and a toned body. Not to mention, she was taller than me now! Worst of all, she was way, way more fashionable than me. And much prettier. Come to think of it, a good half of my mental hangups could be attributed to her. I’d lived my entire life being compared to someone who was both younger and better than me! Like, what the hell, man?
…Honestly, it was pretty impressive that my mental health had held up as well as it had, what with living with her for so long. Maybe I was the better sister this whole time. Or at least better when it came to sucking.
See, Amaori Haruna was such a fantastic little sister that I couldn’t stand her one bit.
I rolled out of bed when my alarm went off and slouched to the bathroom, where I struggled to tame my mess of bedhead and sluggishly brush my teeth. It was quiet this morning. More quiet than usual. Normally about this time, my little sister would have already been ready to go and yet still would have been fighting me for the bathroom. (For what it’s worth, I usually lost that fight.) But today I had the bathroom all to myself.
I didn’t know why, but I felt uneasy. As I walked back to my room, I happened to glance at the door to my sister’s bedroom. I hesitated, then sighed and opened it a crack. When I peeped in, I saw a lump in the bedsheets. She was still asleep. If she didn’t get moving soon, she’d be late for school. She must have been serious about this no school thing.
I closed the door. Now I felt even weirder. I didn’t want to deal with the fuss of asking my mom what was going on with Haruna, so I slipped past her and out the door.
“I’m leaving!” I called.
“Have a good day at school!” my mom yelled back, but I was already on my way.
It was only then that the obvious thought hit me:
This shouldn’t be possible. My little sister can’t be too depressed to go to school. I mean, she’s Haruna. But that’s what’s happening. Isn’t it?
I didn’t have plans with any of my friends that day, so I hurried right home from school. When I stepped inside, I called, “Hey, I’m home!” I wasn’t worried worried, but you know.
My sister’s shoes sat in the foyer. Well, no shit, Sherlock. She hadn’t gone to school today; where else would they be? But this made it feel real.
I gave myself a minute to decompress and ditch my backpack in my room. Just as I was about to venture back out into the main house, there was a knock on my door.
“Hey, Oneechan?”
“Hm?”
My sister opened the door and peeked her head in. She was wearing casual loungewear and a noticeable absence of any unhappiness on her face. Seriously? Skipping school like it’s NBD? I thought to myself. There’s ballsy, and then there’s whatever the heck this was.
She held her hand out. “Let me borrow one of your games.”
“Huh? My video games?”
“Yeah, to pass the time. You never realize how long a day is until you’re stuck at home all day, you know?”
“Uh…”
As I waffled, my sister came all the way in. She looked over my beloved video game collection with the same face one would adopt when dragged along on a friend’s shopping spree for something one had no interest in.
“I don’t know what any of these are,” she said. “What do you have that’s fresh?”
“You sound like a sushi shop regular.”
I refused to get up off my desk chair and join her. For someone sitting in her own bedroom, I couldn’t shake an inexplicable feeling of unease.
“Hey, I didn’t get around to asking this yesterday…” I began.
“What’s that?”
“Uh…why aren’t you going to school?”
My sister fixed me with a long stare. Eep.
“Is that any of your business?” she asked.
“I-I guess not. But still.”
She was so cold! It was like grabbing a block of ice with both hands. Every part of me wanted to abort mission and end the conversation there. But I didn’t.
“Y-you know, you’re gonna freak out Mom if you keep this up,” I told her.
“Said the pot to the kettle.”
You know what? That was fair. As an ex-truant and depressed recluse myself, maybe it was time to throw in the towel.
“Just because you’re going to school now,” my sister said, “doesn’t mean you can pretend it never happened. I’m sure you don’t want to go dredging up those bad memories either.”
“Urgh… Yeah, but still…”
“Just leave me alone.”
My sister shooed me away with a flap of her hands, all but telling me she was done with this conversation. Thank god. But at the same time, what was I supposed to do now?
“So, are any of these any fun?” my sister said, turning back to the games.
Somehow, I found myself going along with her. “I think all of them are pretty fun…”
“You think? What, does it feel good to shoot people with guns?”
“Once you start, there’s no going back,” I told her.
“Cringe.”
What, I was just being honest! But she looked at me like I was some kind of criminal. I guess my sister was one of those people who couldn’t tell the difference between fiction and reality.
“Which one’s the best?” she asked.
“I dunno. Let me think.” I put my hand to my chin and went over to take a better look. Which was the best? The ultimate question, really.
My sister knew nothing about games, so there was no point in giving her a detailed explanation filled with lots of gamer lingo. That would just have been showboating on my part. All she wanted was for me to pick one and go, “Here, this is the best out of all of them.” Look at me, mastering the art of self-control.
Feeling pretty darn pleased with myself, I said, “This FPS offers online play for up to three players. It’s great fun, but as it’s been out for so long, the community has developed a complicated meta that presents a high barrier of entry to newcomers. Conversely, this title is so new that it has a very active playerbase and promises a fantastic gameplay experience. However, beware the balance; the devs clearly have some more work to put in. Still, I have high hopes for this game after the next patch. It has some great onboarding, and I recommend jumping in while the hype is still fresh. Some hardcore gamers may be turned off by the child-friendly graphics, but this is truly a classic FPS and a worthy addition to every fan of the genre’s library.”