WHEN SHE WOKE UP, MS Kitajima was still there, sitting next to her.
Kokoro felt the scratch of the starched bedcover over her as she lay on a bed in the nurse’s office. The warmth of the space heater was not far away.
She looked around to see if maybe another student was in the other bed. But she didn’t sense anyone else beyond the partition.
‘Are you OK?’
Ms Kitajima looked into her eyes.
‘I’m – OK,’ Kokoro said, less to report her condition than because she was embarrassed to find someone gazing at her as she lay there defenceless on her back.
She’d never fainted before. She had no idea how long she’d been out. Her throat was parched, her voice hoarse.
‘Ms Kitajima?’
‘Yes?’
‘Why are you here?’
Ms Kitajima’s smiling eyes met Kokoro’s.
‘I came over because your mother told me you’d be at school today.’
‘I see.’
She came because she was worried.
Kokoro and Ms Kitajima were alone in the office.
Ms Kitajima must have been keeping in touch with the teachers at the school, coordinating things.
Kokoro had already resigned herself to the fact that she would not be seeing the others. But pinning her last hopes on one final question, she asked, ‘Was I the only dropout student that you heard about today?’
Ureshino and Masamune had both said they’d met Ms Kitajima.
Ms Kitajima brushed away the hair that had fallen over Kokoro’s eyes.
‘That’s right,’ she said.
She was simply answering the question she was asked, and didn’t seem to find it at all significant.
‘So you didn’t hear anything from Ureshino-kun or Masamune-kun’s families?’
‘Hm?’ was all Ms Kitajima said in response. Kokoro shut her eyes tight. It was just like the nurse had said – there was no one by those names in the school. Kokoro couldn’t believe it, but there it was.
‘Nothing,’ Kokoro said.
So it’s true, she thought, as her mind reeled.
What had it all meant – all these days up till now?
Was the world of the castle in the mirror not real?
Now that she thought about it, it seemed like an all-too-convenient miracle.
How could her bedroom connect up so efficiently with a different world?
Meeting these kids, thinking they were her friends – wasn’t it all just wish fulfilment?
And then she thought: Is there something seriously wrong with me?
Masamune and Ureshino and Aki and Fuka and Subaru and Rion.
Had she been living since May, without realizing it, in this delusion of being with them, when in reality she’d been alone the entire time?
The thought that she’d gone crazy chilled her, but another thought frightened her even more. From tomorrow I may not be able to go to the castle, ever again.
‘Kokoro-chan, I’m sorry,’ Ms Kitajima said. ‘When you fainted a while ago you dropped a note, and I’m afraid I saw what it said.’
Kokoro slowly bit her lip. The contents of that letter came rushing back. The rounded handwriting on the envelope. Miori calling herself horrible. The boy she’d referred to obliquely as you-know-who was, of course, Chuta Ikeda. Kokoro didn’t care that he might have been Miori’s boyfriend, or that they’d broken up.
They didn’t understand each other at all, Kokoro realized despairingly.
What Kokoro had been through, and the way Miori Sanada saw things, didn’t mesh at all. Had they even happened in the same world?
She’d agonized over whether to come today, thinking she might be killed, and here was Miori settling the whole matter by saying, in a throwaway fashion – of a boy that Kokoro had nothing to do with – I thought if you still like him, I’d cheer you on. Kokoro couldn’t put into words how frustrated it made her feel. It was so humiliating her insides felt like they were on fire.
I want to kill her, she thought.
She shut her eyes as tears of frustration welled up.
‘I spoke to Mr Ida a few minutes ago,’ Ms Kitajima was saying. ‘The letter doesn’t really address what went on.’ Her tone sounded unusually stern.
Kokoro kept her face covered with her forearm. The tears felt hot on her sleeve. ‘I’m sorry,’ Ms Kitajima said.
Kokoro had never expected a teacher to apologize.
‘Ms Kitajima … Moé Tojo … was there … a little while ago.’ Her convulsive breathing made the words come out in fits and starts. ‘She was … at the school entrance … and saw me … and she … blanked me. She didn’t say a thing. She used to bring letters from school to my house every day, but when she actually sees me, she ignores me.’
Kokoro wasn’t sure what she was trying to say.
But she was sad. So terribly, terribly sad, and her chest felt like it was going to burst apart.
Kokoro almost shouted: ‘Ms Kitajima, if it was Moé who put that letter in my cubbyhole, what should I do? If Miori asked her to, and Moé did as she was told?’
As she spoke, she understood what she was really afraid of, what she hated here.
Last April, when the kids had surrounded her house, Kokoro hadn’t been able to verify if Moé had been among them. She might have been. But the very thought was too painful, and she wanted to cling to the possibility that Moé had not been there.
She couldn’t bear the thought that Moé had turned into an enemy. She hadn’t been willing to think Moé hated her. Until today.
‘Kokoro-chan …’
Ms Kitajima clutched Kokoro’s arm so hard she let out a little cry. Then she brought her face right up close.
‘It’s OK.’
Ms Kitajima’s grip on her arm was so firm, Kokoro felt encouraged.
‘It’s OK. Mr Ida told Sanada-san to put the note in your cubbyhole. Tojo-san had nothing to do with it. I mean, Tojo-san was the one who explained to me what’s been going on.’
Kokoro had been sure that none of the kids who hung out with Miori would ever dare betray their ringleader.
But if it was Tojo-san, then—
‘She bumped into you so suddenly, so perhaps she was too surprised to speak. But believe me. Tojo-san is worried about you. Truly worried about you.’
But why? Kokoro couldn’t help still wondering.
If she was that worried, then why look the other way?
But at the same time, a part of her felt like she already knew the reason.
Because she felt guilty.
Tojo-san must have been among the kids who’d surrounded her house, after all. She was there, yet she didn’t try to stop them. And now she felt extremely bad about it. The possibility made Kokoro feel she could breathe, a little.
‘Kokoro-chan,’ Ms Kitajima said. Kokoro had stopped crying. ‘There’s no need for you to fight.’
The words sounded like a foreign language.
Eyes shut tight, she didn’t know how to respond, and just gave a firm nod.
The very idea that she didn’t need to fight made her whole body feel enveloped in peace.
When she next opened her eyes, she felt more in control of herself. Ms Kitajima was gazing at her, and Kokoro gazed back.
‘What I want to do – is go home.’
Ms Kitajima nodded.