And you shouldn't choose.
You really shouldn't make that kind of pick.
Because the second you choose—your wish stops being a wish and becomes a strong will.
kind of strong will that's apt to wound you, and others.
You've got to be conscious of that.
You can't just lightly, childishly pick a wish like you're blowing out the candles on a birthday cake or sitting on Santa's lap.
Even three wishes is narrowing it down too much.
You should be choosing, not from among wishes neatly lined up on a shelf—but something else entirely.
Like who you are.
Or how you live your life.
Or what path you're going to take—that kind of thing.
I want it to be—that kind of thing.
“Only one, huh? I think I know what it would be. If only Karen weren't my sister…”
“Anything but that.”
“No, you're right, if she wasn't my sister anymore that would defeat the whole purpose. Maybe if she was my stepsister... No, but the stepsister thing would be like exploiting a legal loophole, I'd feel guilty. I want her to be my real sister, all open and aboveboard. In which case, yeah, I'd want the law to be changed instead—”
“Is Karen...going to be okay?”
He took my casual question seriously and sank into thought, which made me seriously worried.
“What are you worried about? Karen's going to be fine,” he assured me. “I'm going to take good care of her, for the rest of our lives.”
I was speechless.
Where was life going to take this guy?
I was more unsettled than worried.
But—as long as they're mere wishes and nothing more, then no restrictions.
Never mind three, have however many you want.
“In any case,” my senior Araragi switched gears—he acted as though all of it had been idle chatter, which I don't think was true, but in any event, he switched gears. “It doesn't matter whether wishes come true or not. Wishes are something you grant yourself, which means they may not actually come true, but I think the act of wishing is already worthwhile in and of itself.”
“Wishing—in and of itself?”
“Yeah. Whether or not you can get what you wished for, knowing what it'd be is a good thing to learn about yourself. What do you desire, what do you want to be, what kind of person are you—if you don't learn that about yourself, you'll lose your way in a snap.”
“I wonder if that's why that person left me the Monkey's Paw..
“That person? Oh, you mean your mother? Yeah... Actually, who knows. Children will never understand what the hell goes on in their parents' heads.”
He sounded oddly emotional about the subject.
Maybe he was thinking about the car his parents bought for him—because he'd always said he didn't get along with them.
I didn't know what the deal was, and I wasn't going to ask.
Hmm.
I see.
I always thought that person had never treated me like a child—but actually.
She may have treated me like a daughter all along.
As her dear and only daughter.
…Well, that's what you call wishful thinking.
It took hours to remove all the strata of useless junk from my room, and when that was out of the way, my plans for the day were only half complete.
After enjoying a little tea with my grandparents, I spread out some newspaper on the floor of my now sparklingly clean room, put a towel around my shoulders, and turned my back towards my senior Araragi, who stood there with scissors at the ready.
“You sure this is what you want?”
“Yup. Go wild.”
I decided on this second half of the plan only the night before, so he hadn't known—opening and closing the scissors with a snip-snip he said, “What a waste. This hairstyle really suits you.”
“Yeah, I like it too, but it's no good for playing sports.”
“You know, this is the third time I've cut a girl's hair.”
“What a life...”
“So I'm actually pretty used to it. But don't you have a salon you go to?”
“I do,” I said, “but I wanted you to cut it.”
“How come?”
“Because this is a watershed moment.”
Huh, he nodded.
I don't think he had any idea what I meant, and I truly appreciated that he didn't ask.
“Oh. Araragi-senpai, do you mind driving me somewhere?”
“Sure, where?”
“I was thinking of visiting Numachi's grave.”
“Ah... In that case, we can have Tsukihi find out where it is for you.”
“Yes... Part of me wants to carry on Numachi's legacy and find the remaining pieces of the devil, but I don't think I'll actually do it.”
“That's for the best. You can't take the whole burden on yourself. With devils, it's safer to have them scattered in pieces anyway—okay, ready? Here I go.”
He announced his intention to begin—and misted my hair with a spray bottle.
“…”
Roka Numachi.
She'd compared her own life not to a tale but to an afterword— I guess she thought of it like the reminiscences of a former thespian looking back over her career, in which case her collections (both unhappiness and devil) were like the hobbies of a retiree.
I don't believe for a second that I saved her.
In no way is it true that I rescued her.
Sure, maybe I liberated her from an unproductive pastime, but who in the world could deny her that wasted time?
I'm certainly not her parents, so who am I to deny someone her right to waste her time?
So in the end I feel like I butted in—and what an ungrateful wretch that makes me, if Numachi was the one who returned my left arm to me.
But what else could I have done?
And now, what else can I do but pray?
Pray that our showdown—our first showdown ever, was fun for her.
Like putting faith in God, like importuning the Devil.
All I can do is pray.
Even if her end as a human was wretched, her end as an aberration wasn't—I can only pray.
I like to think that what was keeping her was the regret that she'd never seriously pitted herself against me, Suruga Kanbaru.
She didn't want to play with a devil.
She wanted to play with me.
Thus those three years of hers.
It would tie things up nicely if I close with some pretty line like, From now on I'll play for the both of us. But I'd never be so shameless.
I'm not that kind of person.
Still, I want to learn from her tenacity. Because the tenacity to cling to your pursuits even beyond the grave is something I lack.
Which reminds me, I haven't checked the newspaper yet today.
Oh well, one day's probably okay. Or two days, or three.
And maybe I can sleep soundly?
Blaming yourself isn't the same as remorse.
Nor is beating yourself up.
That kind of self-flagellation isn't punishment.
Having immersed yourself in an unproductive pastime, constantly looking back over your shoulder, reviewing the past—you need to turn around and face up to the rest of your life at some point.
Meetings and partings.
Seat assignments and class assignments.
By learning, and graduating, and then doing it all again, I'll become an adult.
Obtaining something, losing something, experiencing, forgetting—that's how I'll shape my future self.
I will almost definitely forget this feeling.
That's why I have to live out my current, and not past or future, self.
No.
I want to live it out.
The blades Araragi-senpai held began their work on my hair.
Shhhk.
It pained me, like it was my flesh and not my hair he was cutting, but that pain was a rare gift.
The experience I couldn't have wished for.
“Kanbaru. I'm sure all kinds of people will think all kinds of things about what you did when they find out. There'll be people who think you did the right thing, and people who think you did the wrong thing. But that's not what this is about. Don't pay any mind to what anybody else might say. Because you didn't do the right thing, and you didn't do the wrong thing,” my dear senior told me, evening out the tips of my hair. I couldn't think of another time when he'd spoken so kindly to me. “What you did was your youth.”