I arrive at the café after noon.
I’m a little early, and the person I’m supposed to meet isn’t here yet. I order an iced coffee and sit in an open seat by the window.
I didn’t choose the meeting place, but I knew the way here. By chance, this is the same café where I waited for the girl on the day she died.
Or maybe this isn’t chance, I think as I drink my coffee. The pair probably went here often.
Just as on that day, I gaze out the window. Just as on that day, all kinds of people pass by, living all kinds of lives.
Unlike that day, the person I’m supposed to meet shows up right on time. Ah, good. Her arrival comes as a relief. Not just because of residual trauma; I also thought I may get stood up.
Without a word, Kyōko-san sits down across from me at the table and immediately turns her puffy, red-eyed glare at me.
“Well, I’m here,” she says reluctantly. “What do you want?”
I don’t falter. I force my nerves down and respond to her glare by opening my mouth. But before I can say anything, she interrupts me.
“You… You didn’t come to Sakura’s funeral.”
I don’t say anything.
“Why didn’t you?”
“I…”
I’m searching to find an answer and failing when she slaps her hands on the table. The noise resounds through the café, and for a second, time seems to stop.
When time resumes, I avert my eyes and say in a small voice, “Sorry.”
I clear my throat and begin speaking again. “Thank you for coming. I guess this is the first time we’re having a real talk.”
She doesn’t say anything.
I continue, “You’re here because I told you I needed to speak with you, but where should I start?”
“Just get to the point.”
“Yes, right. Sorry. I have something to show you.”
More silence.
What I want to talk about is, and could only be, the girl. She’s the only connection between Kyōko-san and myself. I took almost all of last evening deciding to do this.
Up until the moment I arrived at the café, I’d been considering how to approach this conversation. Should I start with my relationship with her? Should I start with her sickness? In the end, I decided to start by showing her best friend the truth.
I take Living with Dying from my school bag and place the book on the table.
Confused, Kyōko-san says, “A book?”
“It’s titled Living with Dying.”
“‘Living…with dying’?”
I remove the plain book protector and show her the cover.
Kyōko-san’s somewhat hollow eyes open wide with recognition. I’m both impressed and jealous.
She says, “That’s… That’s Sakura’s handwriting.”
I nod sharply. “This is her book. She wrote it for other people to read after her death, and she gave it to me.”
“What do you mean, after her death?”
I feel a weight on my chest. This won’t be easy to say. But I can’t stop now.
“Everything she wrote inside this book,” I explain, “is all true. This isn’t one of her pranks, and it’s not one of mine. She mostly used the book like a diary, but in the back, she wrote goodbyes. One is for you. Another is for me, too.”
“What are you saying?”
“She was sick.”
“You’re lying. I would have known.”
“She didn’t tell you.”
“Why would she tell you, but not me?”
I had the same question once, but now I know the answer.
I say, “I was the only person she told. She died a different way, but if that hadn’t happened to her, then—”
I’m interrupted. My ears ring, and pain blossoms in my left cheek. I’ve never been slapped before, so it takes me a while to realize what happened.
Kyōko-san’s eyes water, and she pleads, “Stop.”
“I will not. I have to tell you this, Kyōko-san. She wrote in this book that you’re the most important person to her. That’s why I want you to listen now. She was sick. If she hadn’t been killed, she would have died within six months. I’m telling you the truth.”
Kyōko-san weakly shakes her head.
I slide the book toward her. “Read it,” I say. “She liked pranking people, but you know she would never hurt you as a joke.”
I decide not to say more.
I’m a little worried she won’t read the book, but after a little while, Kyōko-san reaches out her hand and dispels my concern.
Hesitantly, she takes the book and opens its pages.
“It’s really her handwriting,” she says.
“I swear to you, it’s genuine.”
Eyebrows furrowed, Kyōko-san begins slowly reading the first page. I focus on waiting for her.
The girl told me once, before she died, that her friend didn’t read very often. Kyōko-san would need time to read. Of course, her reading speed alone won’t be the only reason she might take a long time.
At first, Kyōko-san seems to have trouble believing her eyes, as she reads and re-reads the same pages several times. Sometimes, I think I see her mouthing, It’s not true. Then a connection is made, her reading pace slows, and like a switch has flipped, she begins crying.
I don’t feel the slightest impatience when Kyōko-san starts to cry—just relief. If she had refused to believe the book, this meeting would have been for nothing. The girl’s goodbye wouldn’t have reached her, and my other goal would have failed.
While Kyōko-san reads, I finish two cups of coffee. I order her an orange juice, and she drinks from the glass without a word.
As I wait, I don’t think of the girl. Instead, I think about what I can do with what she gave me. Since I’m only used to thinking about myself in isolation, it doesn’t come easy, and time passes quickly as I try.
At some point, I notice the daylight has begun to fade. I haven’t found any more concrete answers than I had the night before. Things that come naturally to other people are difficult for me.
Kyōko-san’s face is a teary mess, and a pile of damp tissues sits on the table. She is about halfway through the book when she starts to close it. I do the same thing as the girl’s mother did yesterday.
“There’s more,” I say.
Kyōko-san already looks tired from crying, but she reads through the end before closing the book, this time for real. She begins weeping, loudly, oblivious to the people around us, and I stay with her, as the mother did for me. Kyōko-san calls out her friend’s name, Sakura, Sakura, over and over.
She cries even longer than I did the day before, and before she’s stopped, she looks up at me, her eyes every bit as hostile as before.
“Why?” she says with a raspy voice. “Why keep it from me?”
“It’s like she said, she—”
“Not her. You! Why didn’t you tell me?”
Taken aback by her anger, I can’t find any response. Any words I might possibly say wither away beneath her messy, yet deadly-sharp glare.
“If you’d told me… If you’d only said something, I could have had more time with her. I would have quit volleyball. I would have quit school! I could have been with her…”
Now I understand the source of her anger.
“I’ll never forgive you,” she says. “I don’t care how important you were to her, or how much she needed you, or even if she loved you. I’ll never forgive you.”
She hides her face again and her tears begin falling to the floor. In this moment, a tiny part of me is ready to accept her hating me, just as I would have before. She can hate me, I don’t mind. But I shake my head. No. That’s not who I need to be.
I resolve myself to speak, even as her head hangs low.
“I’m sorry,” I say. “But I would like you to forgive me, even if it takes a long time.”
Kyōko-san says nothing.
I push aside my nervousness and somehow continue.
“And…if it’s all right with you…I…”
She isn’t looking at me.
My throat tightens, and my heart seems to stop as I say something I’ve never said to anyone before.
“I would like to be your friend.”
I try steadying my breath. The effort takes all of my focus, leaving me no way to gauge her reaction.
She’s still silent.
“I’m not asking because she wanted me to. This is my choice. I want us to get along. I want to get along with you.”
Nothing.
“Or is that…just not possible?”
I don’t know how else to ask. So now, I stay quiet. Silence falls between us.
I’ve never felt so nervous waiting for another person’s answer. All my thoughts remain on myself, selfishly so, as I wait for her to respond. Eventually, still looking down, she shakes her head several times, stands, and leaves without looking at me.
As I watch her leave, it’s my turn to hang my head.
I failed.
My bill has come due, I realize. I’ve spent my entire life never trying to interact with other people, and this is the cost.
I mutter to myself, “This is hard.”
Or maybe not to myself—to the girl.
I pick up the book from the table, put it back in my bag, and clean up the accumulated trash before stepping outside into the darkness.
What should I do next? I feel as if I’m trapped in a maze with no exit. From the maze, I can look up and see the sky. I can see there’s an outside, but I can’t get there.
What a tangled problem. How amazing that other people can navigate and solve these kinds of issues on a daily basis.
I ride my bicycle back home.
Summer vacation is almost over.
This is one assignment I know I won’t be finishing before school starts again.