—O sacred Head, now wounded…—
My skin is cold. I open my eyes.
—With thorns, Thine only crown…—
A hymn is playing. I’m sitting on a hard bench, a pew. I must be in a church. Yes, it’s Pádraig Aoba.
—Be Thou my consolation, my shield when I must die…—
Something’s wrong. I don’t remember attending this service. I look around. The pews are packed tight with people. My thighs are touching the thighs of the women on either side of me. This isn’t right. The hymn keeps playing, but no one is singing.
—Mine eyes shall then behold Thee…—
A man in a black gown stands at the altar, his back to us. He has chestnut-brown hair. Aoyama?
“Aoyama.”
I call to him, but he doesn’t reply. He just spreads out his arms.
“Aoyama!”
I call again, a little louder this time. Clap. He brings his hands together.
“Silence.”
That’s not Aoyama’s voice. It’s distorted like a call with bad reception, making it grate. I instinctively cover my ears. Then I notice something else.
“I’m sorry, Mommy.”
The lady next to me is mumbling something over and over again, almost too quiet for anyone to hear.
“I’m sorry, Mommy.”
“I’m sorry, Mommy.”
No, not just her. It’s all of them. Every person in the packed pews that populate this church, all these women the same height and build, they’re all desperately repeating those same words. Their mouths are dry. I’m the only one who’s different. Without warning, the man in the black robe who’s not Aoyama disappears.
“I’m sorry, Mommy.”
“I’m sorry, Mommy.”
“I’m sorry, Mommy.”
“I’m sorry, Mommy.”
“I’m sorry, Mommy.”
My head is starting to feel fuzzy. I remember now. The story Nanaka Yokozawa told me about the Haruko apparition. The first night, she takes you to the Pádraig Aoba Church. That’s where I am. She must be in my dreams now. But I never went to Aoba South Elementary. I haven’t been an elementary school kid in over twenty years. So why am I having this dream?
Haruko’s tale was put together a little too well. It’s not an account of actual events; I knew it was a made-up story right from the start. Even so, its influence has spread remarkably quickly, and now it can affect someone with no connection to the school, like me. According to the story, Haruko should be appearing and telling me to help her find “the boy,” but there’s no sign of her anywhere. Now the man in black is gone, and I’m alone with these rows of identical women and their disturbing voices.
I stand up. I know I have to find Haruko one way or another. But my head hurts; it feels like it’s going to split apart.
“I’m sorry, Mommy.”
Knock it off. Do you have to keep saying that?
“I’m sorry, Mommy.”
You realize apologizing is meaningless, don’t you?
“I’m sorry—”
Mothers think they can do whatever they want with their kids. Apologizing won’t fix it. What’s there to apologize for? Nothing. It’s pointless. If she’s going to criticize me for even being born, whether I apologize or not won’t change anything. Why are these women so hell-bent on apologizing? I want them to stop.
“I’m sorry, Mommy.”
I’m having trouble breathing. Just like in the dirty apartment that rattled whenever trains passed by, and the even dirtier closet inside it. The palace that I created for myself. I waited. I waited for so, so long for my mother to open that door. I grasp my left wrist. There’s no bracelet there. Of course, I gave it to Nanaka. My precious, precious bracelet.
The woman I now call my mother made that bracelet for me. The two of us aren’t related by blood. My birth parents were complete garbage and have long since disappeared from this world. I met my mom at a kind of foster parent–child mixer set up by the Nozomi Center, the orphanage I was sent to after my parents died.
At the time, I didn’t understand the kindness that the people from the hospital or the orphanage tried to show me. I was just a piece of garbage, like my parents. I thought my powers meant I could do whatever I wanted. I was selfish and violent, like a wild monkey.
Even when the event began, I was placed in a different room from the other children. I didn’t mind; it was all the same to me. It wasn’t like anyone would want to adopt me. Not this time or any other time. The people who wanted to become foster parents didn’t get to choose the children they fostered. The orphanage would carefully assess their suitability based on things like income, gender, and home environment.
But it wasn’t just the potential parents they vetted. It was the children, too. Sometimes, children who have suffered abuse have psychological wounds that haven’t quite healed yet. Kids like that can end up acting out and causing trouble for everyone. It’s not their fault, really. Well, with me, it was.
I was different back then. Even if my parents hadn’t been such garbage, I probably still would have turned out like trash myself. I was ugly and ill-tempered and threw tantrums and broke things and hurt people with my strange powers. It was clear for everyone to see that I was totally unsuitable for foster care.
“What are you doing in here?”
My first impression of the woman who was to become my mother was that she was some fussy fat lady. Like me, she couldn’t have been called attractive by any stretch of the imagination. She was wearing girly clothes and an eminently kind smile. Think of the kind of cute chef lady you see on the packaging of premade stew, and you get an idea of the vibe she gave off. It seriously annoyed me. I ignored her.
“Don’t you want to play with your friends?”
“They’re not my friends.”
I wanted them to be my friends. They were all really good kids. They never picked on me; they simply let me be. They were probably playing games with the potential foster parents who were visiting right now. But that had nothing to do with me.
“Why don’t you go back to them, lady? Just leave me alone.”
I spoke without taking my eyes off the floor. Then I focused my power and made the clock on the wall fall down. It was made of plastic, so it didn’t make a loud noise, but the front cracked, and the hour hand went flying to a far corner of the room. I’d been able to do that much since I was little. This was how I distanced myself from anyone who tried to treat me kindly.
“Get out.”
No matter how kind a person might be, if they were dealing with someone fundamentally incompatible with such kindness, they were better off staying away.
“Next time, I’m aiming for your head.”
I looked up, but I didn’t see her face pale and twisted with fear like I expected.
“You like ‘The Little Mermaid,’ don’t you?”
Her gentle smile hadn’t faltered at all.
“I do, too. But it’s quite sad. She turns into sea foam at the end.”
I couldn’t say a word. I just stood there, swaying unsteadily on my feet. This woman had seen right through me.
Until a short while ago, my palace had been ruled by a being I referred to as the Little Mermaid. When I was very little, my birth mother had bought me a picture book about a mermaid on a whim. I treasured it and read it over and over again. I thought about the Little Mermaid over and over again, and one day, she actually appeared. Inside the closet where I spent the better part of my days, I built a palace for her out of rotting meat and old flyers.
When my birth parents died, I thought it was because the kindly Little Mermaid had granted my wish and gotten rid of them for me. But all that had just been in my head. I’d killed my parents myself with my power. I’d never talked to anyone about it. Their deaths had been ruled an accident. I’d been present at the scene, but naturally, people only viewed me as a victim of their abuse who happened to escape harm this time.
Why was this woman bringing up the Little Mermaid? How did she know?
“Shut up.”
I started putting pressure on a wooden chair. The legs buckled and flew off.
“It wasn’t your fault.”
She took a step closer to me.
“It wasn’t your fault the rabbit died. Or Kanae. You didn’t do it on purpose. It wasn’t your fault.”
“Shut up!”
Kanae. Kanae Hashiguchi. The elementary school girl who’d bullied me. She was a terrible child who’d cut off the ears of one of the school rabbits and tried to feed them to me. I’d said I didn’t need her and wished for her to disappear. A signboard came flying out of nowhere, impaling her through the torso. I killed her just like I killed my parents. Once again, I was viewed as nothing but a victim to be pitied. Nobody said that, but they didn’t need to. It was obvious they believed it.
After I killed Hashiguchi, I came to believe my power was absolute. I had the means to do whatever I wanted to other people, and the world was full of human scum like my parents and Hashiguchi. Why shouldn’t I kill them? Yes, I should kill them. At the orphanage, I lorded over everything with a kind of righteous omnipotence.