Sometimes, I have to wonder what the four years we spend at college are all about.
The time of your life when you possess neither the feeling nor the responsibilities of truly living, when you can be almost nauseatingly free, not giving up your boyish spirit or latent pessimism. If it was a university student’s privilege to wear that freedom as a badge, strutting around like you own the place, then maybe I wasn’t a university student at all.
I used that freedom to accomplish nothing. I attained nothing. I just surrendered myself to that environment, waiting for the time to pass. Even my job hunting had only successfully been completed by imitating what those around me did right.
Was there anything I did that was of any real meaning?
If there was anything at all, it was what I had done in these past few months. These months of putting one foot in front of the other and truly living, twisted though they might have been.
And so, I wanted to know for certain that those few months had not been for nothing.
The day of the debriefing from Moai’s management arrived. In the end, I could not think of any way to sneak into the meeting, given that both Akiyoshi and Ten knew my face. I at least wanted to be able to hear their voices in that case, so I decided to aim for secretly eavesdropping. It wasn’t as if I could just slip a mic to someone in the crowd. Incidentally, I had decided to set my alarm for four hours before the meeting, thinking I could show up early and lie in wait for them somewhere and catch a glimpse of Akiyoshi and the others.
It was being held in a certain hall—one that I had not approached since that day.
I woke up from a pleasant dream and ignored the oncoming nausea to immediately wolf down two onigiri I had purchased at the convenience store, which I washed down with a dangerous tasting beverage called a “Monster” in order to beat my brain and body into shape. The sugar and caffeine made my whole body feel like it was on fire, and I could feel my heartbeat, which had been on the rise since I woke up, all the more clearly. Some of the nausea still remained, but there was nothing I could do about that.
No disguises this time. I was sure it would only make me stand out too much. I would have to be stealthy moving through campus, but I would head to this final battlefield as myself. This was my message to the twisted Moai.
Loitering around the house waiting was not making me any less fidgety or anxious. I downed the final sip of the energy drink and decided it was finally time to head out.
I slipped on my sneakers and stepped outside. Though it was still morning, the sun was already steadily beginning to warm the asphalt and concrete. I locked the door, cutting off my own retreat.
No one else in this great wide world knew that, at this very moment, I was heading into battle. No one knew—not the people in my neighborhood, or even Tousuke, or Pon-chan, or Kawahara-san. But why would they? It was better this way. I had spent most of my four years alone. No one ever stood beside me. No one except for her, that was. But that was all in the past now.
Right now, I was well and truly alone.
Once alone, once I accepted and resigned myself to that solitude, my body felt all the lighter, as though it were wrapped in a thin shell that made me all the more resistant to the outside air. It made me realize some things as well. When I was a freshman, I never admitted the fact that I was alone. I was only affecting a quasi-lonesomeness.
Unlike me, however, I’m sure that at that time, she was truly alone.
Ever since the day I met her, she was capable of believing in herself. That was how she could always stay strong, no matter how things really were. She didn’t need anyone to stand beside her. I had foolishly believed that somewhere deep down, she and I were the same. In reality, we were just as different as we appeared. She had forgotten all about me.
How had the past two and a half years been for her, years I hadn’t seen? She had been lifted onto a pedestal and flattered into losing sight of all that really mattered, but surely that was not all. Still, given how fundamentally I had misunderstood her, I wondered what she had been thinking. I wanted to know, but I also didn’t. I was getting tired of disappointment.
I passed by other residents of the apartment complex as I headed down the stairs. We greeted each other with nothing more than a simple bow. I’m sure that not one of us ever once thought very hard about the others’ lives.
My head was filled with thoughts of her.
My friend, who was no longer herself. Neither the sharp lines on her face I saw the day of the meet-up, nor the boring social feeds she updated every day, nor the washed out smile she wore in that new photo belonged to the real Akiyoshi who I knew back then. It made me sad, and though somewhere deep down I knew it was unreasonable, I resented her for changing.
Truth be told, the thought had occurred to me that if luck were on my side and a bond still existed, perhaps I could have a conversation with her. I had even tried calling her. However, luck aside, it seemed that bond was long ago severed as the number I dialed was no longer in use.
What would I have said though, if the call had gone through? Could I have told her she was wrong? Could I have demanded she go back to her old self?
It was her after all, so if that call had gone through, she probably would have said something like, “What’s up, Kaede?” as though nothing were wrong. I’m sure she would have no idea that her performance was anything but perfect.
But it was obvious. During our very last conversation, she had tried, ever so passively, to keep me from leaving, but in truth, she didn’t have the time to care about someone who was not an active member of her group. The proof of this was the way she only grabbed my sleeve to show her regret, but then swiftly let me go.
That was all.
It would be a lie to say that I was not at all sad, but some part of me knew this was inevitable. She was a special person. I was someone who had only moved into her field of view. So it wasn’t as though I hoped she would remember me.