“Anyway, I don’t really know anymore. We’re long-distance right now, and it’s been about a month since I last saw him,” she sighed with a slightly dejected smile. I suddenly regretted bringing up the topic, wondering if things might be better for them if the circumstances were different.
“Oh, time to turn ’em” said Kawahara-san. I don’t know if she was helping the conversation recover from my slip-up intentionally or if she had simply noticed that the takoyaki were done cooking. We cheerfully returned to rolling the takoyaki, as though the preceding conversation had never happened. I was able to manage it better that time. Kawahara-san’s timing was perhaps even superb. I regretted that the topic of Moai had gotten away from us, but if we pushed it too far, she would probably grow suspicious.
My mission was, of course, always foremost in my mind, but we were still normal college students as well. So you could bet that from that point on we drank like normal college students. We enjoyed our takoyaki and shared our frivolous conversation. There were not going to be any grand revelations about Moai tonight, so it was fine for us to get wasted.
One hour passed, then two.
I guess today we’ll just be able to enjoy a nice drinking party—no real loss or gain, I thought. I enjoyed both the tranquility and the mild tension. I’m sure everyone else felt the same. The screws had been loosened. We wrapped up the party by devouring the cake that Pon-chan had brought. We had drank quite a bit by then. My vision was blurry, Pon-chan was turning red, Tousuke kept laughing, and Kawahara-san’s head was swaying.
I wondered if Kawahara-san would be all right getting home, and asked her, “You gonna be okay?” to which she drawled, “Yeah, m’fine,” which told me that she definitely wasn’t.
Just before things wrapped up, Pon-chan suddenly leaned towards me.
“By the way, Kaede-senpai. How come you’re always so formal with Kawahara-san?” she slurred. I wondered internally why she was asking such a sensitive thing at a time like this, but I did not let the concern show on my face. Her head was tilted, and when her eyes met mine, I felt the same way I once had when I was little and learned that the other children in the neighborhood had stopped calling their mothers “Mama.”
“Um, well…at work, it isn’t clear which of us is the senpai.” I told her the simplest version of the truth. I glanced at Kawahara-san, only to notice that she was staring at me for some reason.
“What? But you’re totally her senpai at school, so I don’t see why you can’t just be casual at least outside of work?”
I nearly looked at Kawahara-san again at this unexpected challenge from Pon-chan but stopped myself. I assumed it would be far too meaningful to Pon-chan if I were to look at her face right now. However, she didn’t need any such meaningful actions from me. Her own drunken mind had already decided where this conversation was going to go.
“If you speak to her formally as her senpai, you’re gonna make her feel like you’re pushing her away.”
“Pushing…?” I had to wonder how Pon-chon interpreted the noise that had slipped out of my mouth.
It was only natural that there should be some distance between us, I thought, as I would feel equally distant from anyone else. Whether it was Kawahara-san, or Pon-chan, or even Tousuke, it was all the same. However, there was no need to address it aloud and make that distance feel like rudeness.
“Hey, Kawahara-san,” she said. Now that her name had been spoken, there was finally a reason for me to look Kawahara-san’s way. Kawahara-san’s brow was furrowed. I shuddered at the clear displeasure on her face.
“…I…”
I braced myself. I doubted she was going to say anything even along the lines of what Pon-chan was hoping for. I was sure she would just let her expression speak for itself. This was not a disparaging opinion, so much as that I merely recognized what sort of person she was.
“I…” she said again.
However, the stiffening of my body was all for nothing.
“…I’m going home, sorry, guys.”
With that, she suddenly stood up, tottering once before regaining her balance, bowed her head at the three of us, and then headed for the front door without awaiting a response. As we watched in shock, she paused, then turned to Tousuke and said, “Sorry, I’ll pay you back later…”
“No, whatever, don’t worry about the money. More importantly, you gonna be all right? You should wait until you sober up a bit.”
“Nah, I’m…fine. I’ll…I’ll give Tabata-san the money fer you later. See you.”
She wobbled toward the front door, her arm planted against the wall. I looked to the other two. Pon-chan appeared to be even more dumbfounded than either of us, while Tousuke just looked at me, gesturing with both his finger and his eyes for me to follow her. I more or less agreed with him here, and stood up, chasing after her. I quickly caught up with her as she stood in the entry trying to put her shoes on, and said, “Kawahara-san… W-will you be okay getting home?”
“Yeah, m’fine. I’m walkin’ home.”
“Uh, that doesn’t seem like a great idea… I think you should wait.”
It was then that she turned around and looked me in the eye. Perhaps it might have been more romantic to call what I felt when I looked into her eyes sympathy or empathy or something like that. But short of that, I simply wondered how I would feel in her shoes and chose my words accordingly.
“You mind if I at least…walk with you…until I’m sure you’re all right, then?”
“…Sure.”
“I’m just worried something might happen to you, is all.”
Kawahara-san nodded, resigned, then looked over my shoulder and said, “Thanks for having me,” before putting her hand on the doorknob. It took her some time to open the door and leave, as though she could not muster the strength to do so, so I took the opportunity to return to the room and tell the other two that I was seeing her home. There were no complaints from either of them.
“I wonder if I made her mad…” Pon-chan worried, but I assured her that was not the case.
I followed after Kawahara-san and put my own shoes on, then the two of us stepped out, feeling the warm air blowing across us. We walked down the stairs to the first floor, careful not to slip, and exited through the automatic doors.
“Mind if I go get my bike?” I asked.
“Go ’head.”
I collected my old faithful of a bike I had had since my freshman year from the bike racks, thinking that I would ride it back here after. I would have offered to let her ride on the back, but I had drunk a fair bit as well. It wouldn’t be especially amusing if we both fell off it.
Given her house was only a twenty minutes’ walk away, she had walked here as well. I walked beside her, pushing my bike along.
“Sorry about all this…” she said quietly, about three minutes down the main walk.
“No worries, I drank myself stupid plenty of times when I was a freshman.”
“No, that’s not…” she mumbled awkwardly. “I mean yeah, that, but also, sorry for running.”
Running? I got the feeling I knew exactly what she meant by that, but I decided to play dumb.
“I didn’t think you were running.”
“No, what I mean is…I guess she just got to me.” She did not look at me. “I hated it, but…I couldn’t deny what she was saying, and I know she hadn’t said anything wrong, but my head’s not right enough right now to explain any of that, so I just…ran.”
Her head drooped, her face a perfect portrait of the word repentance.
“I mean, I didn’t see it that way. I don’t think you need to worry so much about it.”
I had followed her partly because I assumed she would say something like this, which I don’t say as a means of belittling her. That was just the impression I had gotten back at the front door.
I looked into her eyes and saw the guilt, the desire to flee, that crops up in people in the face of having to make an emergency retreat. Somewhere deep down, I think I felt the same way.
“I’ll apologize to the two of them properly later.”
“At least as far as Tousuke goes, I’m sure he’ll find the time to see you no matter when it is.”
“Thank you.”
Though her pace was sluggish, Kawahara-san kept her eyes on the road ahead. I was glad to know that she really did seem to be okay.