A shared sense of unity.
“Mor…ning.”
Out of the corner of my eye I caught sight of Yano, wrapped in a slightly large tracksuit that she had probably borrowed from the nurse’s office. She greeted everyone with a smug grin upon her face, but no one responded. On the contrary, Takao clicked his tongue loudly. That was odd in and of itself.
Unconcerned, Yano placed her bag down on her desk, a smile still upon her face. She took her seat, only to stand straight back up with a soft shriek. I looked over and saw that the bottom portion of her red tracksuit was soaked. Someone must have poured water on her seat before I arrived. After staring at it in confusion, Yano wiped her chair with the sleeve of the borrowed tracksuit and sat back down.
I doubt Takao’s group did it. If they had, they’d have done it while announcing their involvement with the umbrella incident. The perpetrator was someone else.
With the exception of a single individual, all of the members of our class were humans, day and night. They didn’t all think and act in the same way, like some kind of hive mind. We all had our own individual attitudes toward Yano, but in general, everyone fell into one of three categories.
The first type were the ones who harmed her overtly, those who relished in it. Motoda and Takao and the girls who had harassed Iguchi the day before, they were all this type.
The second were the ones who clearly didn’t like Yano but only bothered to show it whenever she came near them or engaged in some more subtle type of antagonism. My neighbor, Kudou, was of this type. The majority of the class fell into this category.
The third type were the ones who thought that Yano was in the wrong but who mainly just ignored her, not going out of our way to do anything about it, such as Iguchi, Kasai, and myself. We were a rare breed, our numbers few.
With the exception of Yano and Midorikawa, the rest of our class could be divided up into those three categories. The one who had wet Yano’s seat was most likely one of the first two types. It was the type-twos who were probably the most bothersome for Yano, acting only when their enemy couldn’t see them, unlike the brazen Motoda and Takao.
None of us were about to go nosing around for the culprit. There was a shared sentiment between us that we were all in it together and an implicit agreement that, unless the culprit should out themselves, no one was going to bother searching for them. Now that I thought about it, there had been a teacher during our first year who said that ratting out a friend was worse than bullying. Whether or not one thought that was true was a matter of personal opinion.
When the bell finally came, everyone began filing into their seats. As I thought, the classroom was a little noisier than usual, but when I looked around at what seats were still empty, I realized: Iguchi wasn’t there.
That was unusual. She always came to school early, carrying on hushed conversations with the girls she was closest to. I was pretty sure that I’d seen her brought to school by car on rainy days, but even so, she was still late.
As I chatted with Kudou about which high schools we wanted to attend, I began to grow worried about Iguchi. Was she that torn up about what happened the day before?
When the last bell rang, two latecomers arrived. Motoda came running in from morning practice, and Midorikawa had returned from the library, book in hand. They both took their seats, and just behind them came the teacher. Our class representative gave the usual commands.
The word truant floated through my head. Just then, I heard a small voice say, “Pardon me.” Iguchi entered from the door at the front of the room and took her seat three places in front of me.
Seeing the swaying of the Totoro key chain that always hung from Iguchi’s bag put me at ease, but at the same time, I understood—she had likely arrived just now on purpose. She was probably afraid that she would be harangued again before class, the way she had yesterday afternoon.
“Today’s duties are assigned to Adachi and Iguchi.”
Just as I was managing to catch my breath after sitting back down again, my name was called. Right, we did have to deal with those today. Whenever our class had to relocate during first period, whoever was on duty had the key to the classroom handed over to them. Today’s first period was music. Iguchi was busy taking her textbooks out of her bag, so I stood up to handle it. “I got it, I got it,” I told her, going up to take the key. I said it twice, so as not to seem like I was showing off.
When I turned around, Iguchi extended a quiet thanks, so low she was nearly mouthing the words. I returned the sentiment with a smile, and she hurriedly continued preparing for class. As I passed by her seat, my eyes were still on her for some reason.
That was when it happened.
Iguchi slammed her desk loudly, as though she had a spasm or something.
For a moment, all the air stopped flowing in the classroom, until Kasai joked, “Well, that was startling,” and the incident was quickly forgotten. Thus, I was probably the only one who had noticed it.
The reason that the top of her desk had been raised, and then come down with such a sound, was that she had slammed it shut with violent force.
As I sat down at my seat in the back of the room, key in hand, my heart raced violently, making a terrible sound in my ears.
What was that?
I had seen it.
Iguchi had been reaching for a notebook that she had left in her desk. Then, when she saw the front of it, she immediately slammed her hands down to try to hide it.
There was no mistaking it. Her notebook looked exactly like the ones I’d burned for Yano the night before. There were terrible words written all over the front of Iguchi’s notebook in magic marker.
Sense. Of. Unity.
Even after homeroom ended and we exited the classroom, I could not quell the pounding of my heart.