I think romance is genuinely boring.
I never really understood romance to begin with, but even now that I had a special relationship with Toriko, my general sentiment towards it hadn’t changed.
What had changed was that we were closer...or rather, Toriko stuck to me wherever I went.
We were taking the Seibu Ikebukuro Line to Shakujii-kouen where Kozakura’s mansion was. It was a Saturday afternoon, and the train wasn’t terribly crowded, but Toriko was sitting so close she was rubbing up against me anyway. If I were tall enough for it, I bet she’d have tried resting her head on my shoulder.
She doesn’t care where we are...
It’s the middle of the day. Still.
Not that it’d be fine for her to act like this at night.
And come on, it’s July. The temperature is not conducive to excessive cuddling.
Toriko looked at me and smiled.
“You’ve got a serious look on your face again,” she whispered conspiratorially.
I recoiled at the sweetness in her tone.
“You don’t want to do it? You’d rather not tell her?”
“Well... Uhh.”
“If you don’t want to, Sorawo, I’m not going to insist on it.”
“It’s not that I hate the idea, I just don’t see the need to go out of our way to tell people.”
Toriko wanted to tell Kozakura that we were “going out” now.
Was there any need? That was my question.
There was, and she wanted to. That was Toriko’s assertion.
Her follow-up question was if I wanted to keep it hidden.
There wasn’t really, but... was my (somewhat awkward) response.
This conversation had played out repeatedly. Each time the same as the last. I hated it.
Why did something happening between us give rise to a need to tell other people?
Weren’t we just causing them trouble by telling them? It would bother me if I were in their position. Like, what would they even be expecting me to do with the information. Were people really that interested in other people’s relationships?
I sure wasn’t...
But at the same time, Toriko’s view was probably the more common one.
We had given our relationship a name: nue. Inside a storm of otherworldly sensations whipped up by my right eye and her left hand, we’d reached the blue abyss, and in the excitement of our return, the name had been born. It had seemed the most fitting word to describe the relationship between us, which no one else could ever have.
But because no one else could have it, no one else could understand it. From their perspective, we were in a “romantic” relationship, and we were “lovers.”
It doesn’t matter what they think, would have been one way to look at it. I was generally the kind of person who thought that way. And yet, at the same time, being seen in a way that I didn’t intend to be was upsetting in its own way.
I mean, what did they even mean by “romance” and “lovers” anyway? Those were words used not between us to define our relationship, but to explain it to others.
Under what conditions could two or more people be said to be “going out”?
Was a romantic relationship about the permission to have physical contact? Was that what it ultimately came down to?
In a societal sense, was it the general understanding that there was consent for physical contact?
Plus, if I were to add one more factor, an understanding that the partners were one unit, and they needed to be left alone and not interfered with?
Was that all it was?
No, listen, I get it. That stuff is important.
I’m sure that Benimori-san would say so too.
But isn’t that all...kind of boring?
“You don’t like it, Sorawo?”
“It’s not like that... Well, no... Maybe it is.” I acknowledged it, but Toriko didn’t get mad. She laughed.
“That’s why you didn’t want to be ‘lovers,’ huh?”
“Yeah, sorta.”
“I don’t have the same kind of reservations about that word as you do, Sorawo.”
“Yeah, I know... I’m not forcing you to go along with anything you don’t want, am I?” I asked, suddenly worried.
Toriko fixed her eyes on me and replied, “What would you do if I said you were?”
I had to think about it. If what Toriko wanted was to be ordinary “lovers,” and I didn’t, then what would it have been like if I went along with that?
“Sorry. I wouldn’t be able to do anything about it. But...”
“But?”
I brought my face closer to Toriko’s, lowering my voice. “Don’t you think it’s more interesting this way?”
Toriko stared back at me...then slowly nodded. I returned to sitting in my seat normally, relieved.
“We’re good, then.”
“You’re no fair, Sorawo.”
“Huh? How so?”
“Don’t ask me.” Toriko turned away in a huff.
I thought about it for a moment, and figured it out. She’d mentioned before that my deep voice made her weak.
Hmm, I thought, looking at Toriko’s ear, peeking out of her hair.
I can use this. I’ll give it a shot sometime when I’m in trouble.
“We’re here!”
“We’re letting ourselves in.”
We’d come to Kozakura’s mansion in Shakujii-kouen, and were about to make ourselves at home. Kozakura had accepted our visits under two conditions: that we tell her we were coming in advance, and we ring the bell when we arrive.
As soon as we were in the entranceway, I knew something was off. The lights were turned on even though it was the middle of the day. Despite being more timid than the average person, bright lights made Kozakura uneasy, so her mansion was always gloomy. There had been one period that was an exception to that, though...
“You think Kozakura’s okay?” Toriko asked, worried.
The last time it had been like this was after she’d suffered an emotional shock in the other world. Back then, she’d left all the lights in the house on and had been unable to sleep without sleep meds.
“Did anything happen recently?” I wondered aloud.
“Hrmm... Nothing’s coming to mind. Have you been here recently, Sorawo?”
“I was here last week, but everything was normal then.”
As we were talking in hushed voices in the area where we were supposed to take off our shoes, someone poked their head out of the combined dining room and kitchen. It was the expressionless face of a child, with long black hair that almost reached the floor.
“Oh, it’s Kasumi—hey there,” Toriko greeted her. Kasumi remained impassive.
“Hello,” she replied casually in English, then walked over to us, her feet slapping against the floor. She was holding an ice pop with a white layer of frost on it, freshly plucked from the freezer. When Kasumi reached the front door, she looked from Toriko to me.
“Greetings!” she exclaimed.
“Huh?” I replied, confused.
“You need to greet people. Properly.”
Toriko burst out laughing at this. “S-Sorawo... She’s mad at you because you didn’t greet her.”
“Wait, at me?!”
“I mean, yeah. That’s gotta be what it’s about...”
Slightly miffed, I said, “Yeah, yeah. Hello.”
“One yeah is enough,” Kasumi said before turning around and running off.
“What was that all about?” I grumbled.
Yep, I knew I hated kids.
Feeling aggrieved at Toriko, who was leaning against the shoe box as she tittered, I took off my shoes and headed further inside. “Hold on, hold on,” Toriko called after me as she followed.
The brightly illuminated hallway had a fresh coat of wallpaper. The white paper had a crayon drawing of a train running through the grasslands. It was immediately clear it must have been Kasumi’s handiwork.
Kasumi opened the door on the left and went in. That was Kozakura’s room. We followed her.
“Hey, Kozakura-san,” I greeted her.
“We’re here,” Toriko added cheerily.
“Hm? Oh...”
Kozakura, who had been staring at her multidisplay setup, typing away without even a glance in our direction, turned as if she had just noticed our arrival.
Then she spoke. “Hey! Don’t walk around while you’re eating an ice pop! You’re supposed to sit down.”
“Mmm.”
“If you trip, the stick will get rammed up your throat and you’ll die, okay? If I catch you eating them like that again, I won’t buy ice pops anymore.”
“Hmmm.”
“Where’re your words?”
“’kay.”
After giving the infuriating responses of a child, Kasumi plopped herself down on the sofa. She licked her ice pop, and began playing around with the tablet that had been sitting on the sofa, apparently having lost any interest in us.
“She’s gotten kind of talkative, hasn’t she?” I remarked.
“I know, right?” Kozakura replied. “She’s coming along, even if it’s just little by little.”
I felt like, compared to before, there were more natural responses mixed in with Kasumi’s borrowed utterances. Those were no doubt also borrowed from Kozakura’s speech, but they lent a certain “conversationality” to the way she spoke now.
“We noticed the lights were on in the hall,” Toriko said with a note of concern. “Did something happen?”
“It’s not safe if it’s too dark. For Kasumi,” Kozakura explained in an offhanded manner.
Wow... I couldn’t help but stare at Kozakura’s face.
“What?” she challenged me.
“Uh, I dunno what to say... You’ve sure changed, huh?”
“Yeah, of course I have. I’ve got a kid depending on me.”
“Well, yeah, maybe it does work that way, but still...”
“You’ve really settled into the mother role, huh?” Toriko commented, somewhat insensitively, earning her a snort from Kozakura.
“Maybe it’s ’cause I’ve had two brats to look after all this time. Even I’m surprised by how naturally I’ve picked all of this stuff up.”
I was sure it must’ve been exhausting to look after a child who could appear and disappear at will, but Kozakura seemed more energetic than I would have expected. Her previous irresponsible and careless attitude had receded into the background, and if anything it was fair to say she was brimming with vitality.
“It’s hot with four people in here,” Kozakura said, turning down the AC with a remote. “You two want some ice pops as well?”
“Yes!” Toriko exclaimed.
“Uh, sure, I’ll have one,” I answered in a more subdued tone.
“Well, then get one for me while you’re at it,” she said.
I was being used.