I felt like I had experienced this particular sequence of events before.
“It’s just…you know.” As Senpai faltered, and then continued in a hushed voice, my sense of déjà vu intensified. “The truth is, Sayaka-chan…”
“You’ve never been to karaoke before, right?”
When I predicted what she was about to say, Senpai frowned grumpily. But then she sighed. “No, I haven’t.”
“Where exactly have you been before, Senpai?”
I asked her that as a joke, but to my surprise, she thought about it seriously. Then, her gaze started to drift away.
“Convenience stores?”
“Then you’ll be fine.”
I think. The truth was, I hadn’t gone to karaoke before, either.
“I’d be sooo happy if you came, though, Sayaka-chan.” She grinned, her smile pointed right at my face like the barrel of a gun.
“You just told me that.”
“I’m nervous, all right?”
Even now, she seemed like she was about to latch on to the sleeve of my uniform. Was it somehow less scary if I was around? I was starting to grow concerned about what she thought I was.
“Karaoke is, well…you just have fun singing there. It’s the same as choir club.”
I hadn’t gone before either, so I was purposefully vague. I knew there was a karaoke place in front of the station, and I occasionally saw girls in school uniforms go into it. I more or less thought of it as a place that had nothing to do with me, though, so I never really paid attention. I suspected that it was probably the same way for Senpai, too.
“Ooh, I want to sing with you, Sayaka-chan.”
Senpai suddenly lit up, as though she had discovered her saving grace.
“Aren’t we always singing together?”
“Yeah, but that’s over now.” She straightened up from her usual slight slouch, which made her height just a bit taller than mine. “This might be the last time I get to do anything with you, Sayaka-chan.”
“………”
That’s such an unfair card to play, I thought.
People have a weak spot when it comes to endings. Nothing motivates people to prioritize things more than knowing they won’t ever happen again. If I were to try to ignore her, I’d end up feeling strange and restless, as though something were being taken from my heart.
“I suppose if I don’t have anything I need to do at home…”
I relented a little, exposing a bit of weakness as I gave an indecisive answer.
When I really thought about it, I didn’t have any reason not to go, other than that it was slightly inconvenient. If something as silly as that was making me drag my heels, then maybe going for Senpai’s sake wasn’t such a bad reason.
In the end, I ended up attending the closing party because of Senpai’s invitation.
Through the haze of sleep, I heard some sort of skittering sound. Listening with my eyes still closed, I realized it was the sound of rain. It’s raining, huh… It took a moment before the information really sank in. When it finally did, I sat up with a start.
Getting out of bed and opening the curtain, I saw rain pelting down hard on the trees in the garden.
“This is terrible.”
Of course this would happen on the one day I was actually planning to go out.
I tuned in to the weather report on the news. When I heard that the rain was unlikely to let up, I felt a lead weight settling over me. It felt like my bangs and eyelashes were already soaked with rain, even though they had yet to feel a drop.
This is such a drag. The negativity that I thought I had dispelled reared its ugly head again.
As I sighed, a cat peeked into my room from the hallway beyond the sliding door. It looked at me, so I looked back at it, but then it immediately lost interest and wandered away.
If I were still in elementary school, I probably would have gone after the cat right away. But now I just watched it leave. What about me had changed, other than my height? How had time transformed my identity?
Well, the urge to stay inside on rainy days certainly hasn’t changed, I thought as I absentmindedly took in the scene.
Regardless, I got ready and put on my shoes.
“Are you going out?”
Standing at the front entrance with the cat in her arms, my grandmother called out to me. Those cats were always on their best behavior with my grandmother. Maybe they understood who their owner was.
“Yeah, for club stuff.”
“Don’t stay out too late.”
“Okay.”
She sounded more like a mother than a grandmother. I took an umbrella off the shelf and told her, “I’ll be off, then.”
Since it was such a rainy Saturday, I didn’t pass many people on the way to the station. I felt strange without the weight of my school bag in my hands or the scarf from my school uniform swinging at my chest, and cold water splashed my ankles from time to time. The sticky heat that was characteristic of summer in Japan gradually surrounded my body, only compounding my discomfort.
The sound of the rain was very different under the umbrella than it was all around me. Outside the umbrella it was harsh, but underneath, it sounded quieter. It was like slowly forcing my way through a waterfall.
When I got to the station, I went through the ticket gate as always and boarded a train that had just arrived at the platform. There were significantly fewer people riding on the train compared to weekdays during prime commuting hours, and the air conditioning inside of the train car was working all the better for it. I felt relieved. It had been a while since I had been able to get a seat on the morning train.
I opened the book I had brought with me to pass the time until my arrival, wondering when I had last traveled in a group. It might have been during an elementary school trip. Where did we go back then, anyway? As my thoughts wandered, the words seemed to drift off the page, eluding my focus.