Chapter 30

She laughed as if recounting a funny episode, her cheeks gaunt. I had thought she was going to confess she was suffering from a serious illness or something. The hard feeling leaving my chest—was that relief? In any case, I didn’t get the sense that Ms. Chitaira had made that story up. She’d worn herself out walking for three days. Her face did speak volumes, but I’d misunderstood the message. Ms. Chitaira was crazy. Totally crazy. There was no other way to describe it… I did try, but the only other words that came to me were stupid and idiotic, and they didn’t quite fit. I knew she didn’t have her bag—I’d noticed that right after we’d gotten back home—but I had assumed she had at least her wallet with her. Nobody in their right mind would have done what Ms. Chitaira had in that situation, but then again, I knew she wasn’t normal. Umi, who’d been stressing out thinking her sister was ill, only managed to mumble “Oh… You walked home…” in response. She was back to acting the way she had been before the whole sister thing had come up. “Yes. I’m not sick, but I’ve been a bit under the weather and stayed in bed for a couple days.” Ms. Chitaira smiled a little sadly, her eyes unusually sharp. “But I’m fine now. I was only sleeping in today. Gosh, I have bed head,” she added, pinching a strand of her hair that was sticking out and examining it with amusement. It certainly looked like she’d been in bed until we’d dropped in. “By the way, I brought your bag…” Umi reverently handed it over to her sister. “Thanks.” Ms. Chitaira smiled as usual and graciously beckoned us to come even closer, even though I thought we were already at her bedside. Umi shuffled across the floor. I sighed, not sure if at Umi or Ms. Chitaira, wondering whether I should just stay back as Ms. Chitaira pulled Umi into an embrace. “Did you miss your big sister, Umi?” Umi raised her head as if she were going to say something defiant, but then she thought better of it and buried her face in her sister’s bosom instead. “…Yeah.” “It’s cute when you’re so honest, but it leaves me a little unsatisfied.” “What do you want me to do…?” Umi’s long hair draped over her back, its dark river spreading into many little streams. Ms. Chitaira gathered it with her hand and watched it slide back, smiling. “You come over here too, Takasora.” “Wait, what…?” “No!” Umi snapped, clinging to her sister. It wasn’t even like I was yearning for her sister to hug me, I didn’t know why Ms. Chitaira wanted me to join in, so I really didn’t appreciate the hostility. I narrowed my eyes, glaring at the jealous Umi. Girlfriend, sister—it didn’t seem to matter to her what Shiho Chitaira was; she was hopelessly obsessed with her regardless. “Don’t say that, Umi. She came all the way here with you.” Ms. Chitaira was insisting on this group hug. So who should I please, Umi or her? Honestly, I didn’t want to listen to either of them, but there was no third choice. While I was hesitating, Ms. Chitaira made a move. She shuffled toward me, pulling her covers with her, and wrapped an arm around my shoulders. I didn’t get to choose in the end. Ms. Chitaira pressed both me and Umi to her chest. “I get all the girls,” she said with satisfaction. She wasn’t holding me in a viselike grip, so why didn’t I just shake her arm off and wiggle free? I stole a glance at Umi. She was watching me, pouting angrily. Cute. “So, Umi, did you come with her for company?” “…Kind of.” I’d tagged along because I didn’t want the two of them to be alone together, but which of them was I really guarding? Umi? Or Ms. Chitaira? My head was spinning, and I couldn’t tell anymore which of them mattered to me more. When I was hanging out with Umi, I was in love with her, but whenever I was with Ms. Chitaira, things weren’t so clear-cut. It gave me the most awful headache. I shouldn’t really be comparing Umi with this wicked woman, but somehow, I was putting them on the scales, and they weren’t tipping one way or the other. Ms. Chitaira was like a modern-day witch, exploiting your psychology to keep you under her spell. “Umi, Takasora is a really nice girl. It’d be a terrible waste for you two not to be friends.” Ms. Chitaira spoke softly, not in an older sister voice, but in a motherly tone. Now she was being the mother with us as her babies? I thought my head would explode. “I’ll be friends with her if she doesn’t get friendly with you.” Umi treated both of us to a silent, accusatory stare. Ms. Chitaira stroked her back, unruffled. “I get all the girls,” she repeated. “I don’t want to be friends with her…” I hated that woman, didn’t I? Yet somehow I was sitting on her bed, being cuddled. She always got me to do exactly what she wanted, as if she’d cast a spell on me. “How did you know where to find me…? Ah, Ms. Izumi must have told you.” “Yeah, I got it from Mom.” “She remembered the way after all those years? That scatterbrain?” “I also worried she’d have forgotten…” Umi’s mom used to work here, but…I couldn’t really picture her holding down any kind of job. Not to be rude, but, well. At least she’d started helping out with housework a little recently, but normally she seemed to spend her days out walking in town, sleeping, or goofing around with my mom. I did wonder if my mom had something going on with her. “Well, it’s nice of you to come to visit me, but…” Ms. Chitaira paused. Her fingers on my shoulder felt warmer, as if blood had rushed to them. “I never wanted you to come to this house,” she continued in a stern voice I wasn’t used to hearing. “Only bad people live here, and that includes me.” I often called her bad or wicked in my head, but I was jolted when she said that about herself. It reminded me that I’d grown up in an environment free from conflict, where people didn’t make scathing remarks about themselves or their family. “Do you mind waiting while I get dressed? I’d like to go out somewhere together.” She got up without waiting for an answer. Umi was still clinging to her. Ms. Chitaira unceremoniously peeled her off and pushed her toward me. Umi bumped into me shoulder-first, and we both fell over onto the futon. Even when someone is much smaller than you, it hurts when they hit you with a bony part of their body. Umi quickly got up, her long hair getting in my face and sticking to it. I brushed it off, but it got caught on my fingers. I accidentally pulled it, making Umi cry out. Her hair was like a tangle of seaweed, and I was finding it difficult to free myself from it. “Hey, stop pulling my hair!” “Sorry.” I was still struggling with disentangling myself. “Ow, jeez!” “Huh?” I was surprised to hear her swear. “Oh… Um… You were hurting me.” “Yeah, I got that…” I wondered if she actually swore often in her head. She stopped trying to get away from me and moved closer instead, leaning in so her chest pressed against mine. Her soft scent wafted up to my face. I opened and closed my mouth like a fish puffing out rings of smoke. Completely unperturbed, Umi set about pulling her tangled hair off my fingers. As we repositioned on the futon to make that task easier, Umi suddenly yelped with surprise. My heart racing, I looked up to follow her gaze, and I was assaulted by yet another unexpected sight—Ms. Chitaira had taken off her sleeping yukata and was standing there stark naked. My head went blank. “Put some clothes on!” Umi and I shouted in unison. “Why are you upset?” She turned toward us unashamedly, tilting her head to the side quizzically. Then she looked down at her exposed body. “Ah, I see… But we have all seen each other naked before.” “We have, but…” Umi shot me a warning look. “Don’t be naked in front of Sora.” “Why not?” “I think she likes you too much.” “No I don’t.” “Aw, I’m sad to hear that.” That awful woman didn’t sound sad at all as she said that. She wasn’t even trying to act. She put her hand on her hip, zero shame whatsoever, and smiled with satisfaction. The thought that I’d felt the breasts of both of these sisters somehow filled me with embarrassment. Well, rightly so. It wasn’t a dress or a blouse Ms. Chitaira chose, but a neatly folded yukata in a light purple color. She began to put it on in a practiced manner. I watched her sleek back, her shoulder blades, her soft…um, derriere disappear under the fabric, not knowing what to do with my eyes. I felt like she was putting on a show for me… I was restless, my heartbeat matching the gentle movements of Ms. Chitaira’s fingers. I was having strange palpitations. This woman was so bad for my heart. I sensed something and looked to the side, meeting Umi’s sideways stare. “What?” I asked. “You perv.” I realized she’d been watching my eyes, and it took a lot of willpower for me to appear unmoved by her accusation. “Who are you calling a perv?” “You. Ogling my sister’s body.” I had ogled her. “It’s not my fault she was standing there naked, is it?” I protested weakly. I didn’t have the guts to confidently deny everything. I wouldn’t have gotten myself in this whole situation if I had a more confident personality. “And you think it’s okay for you to look at her?” “…Why, do you get to decide who looks at her?” Umi was normally so timid, pretending she didn’t exist, but she was fierce when it came to her sister. It was as if her humanity was entirely dependent on her sister. Without Shiho Chitaira, Umi was a mere shadow. It wasn’t a healthy way to live, but she seemed to thrive on it. It was too late to change her. “Don’t fight, girls. It’s simply too hilarious to have you so hot under the collar because I let you see my naked body.” “You shouldn’t be naked with anyone other than me.” “Oh, is that so?” Ms. Chitaira asked with delighted mischief in her voice. “Yes.” “I didn’t know that!” She’d obviously said that only to placate Umi. “Are yukatas your go-to outfits?” I asked to change the topic. “Hmm. It depends on what mood I’m in and what I have planned for the day.” “I love how you look in yukatas, Sis.” Umi just had to get a word in. She was like a small dog, always yapping. “I’m glad you do! Tonight, I’ll have to go somewhere with a traditional dress code. It’s a bit of a tiresome affair if you ask me,” Ms. Chitaira explained, tightening her obi sash. She got her wallet and pulled us up to our feet. “Let’s go!” Then she wrapped her arms around our shoulders and walked us out of her room, leaving the AC switched on—but it was her house, so it shouldn’t have bothered me. We walked out of sync in the external corridor around the garden. My sweat quickly evaporated, cooling my body. I noticed Ms. Chitaira had to walk hunched a bit to keep her arm around Umi, who was shorter. Ms. Chitaira easily spotted a tanned figure among the garden vegetation. “The old man told you where to find me?” Her tone was as calm as usual, but I was surprised by the rude way she referred to her grandfather. “Yes. That guy was the one who let us in.” Based on Umi’s reply, she still hadn’t put two and two together. “Of course it had to be him. Anyone else would have turned you away.” “…What about your grandmother?” I asked, remembering she had been raised by both her grandparents. “She passed away a long time ago,” she said without emotion. “Besides, she wouldn’t have let you in, either, even though she was an oddball.” Was it only oddballs that let guests into this house? We left without saying good-bye to Umi’s grandpa. As soon as we walked past the gate, Ms. Chitaira’s hands slid down from our shoulders, and her fingers found ours. We carried on walking while holding hands, me on Ms. Chitaira’s left side, Umi on her right. At first, I was a bit taken aback when the woman took my hand, but at least her touch took my mind off the summer heat. Only the cicadas were loudly reminding me of the season. “Now, where shall we go?” Flanked by me and Umi, Ms. Chitaira was in a terrific mood. There was a spring in her step, as if she were walking on clouds. Even her voice was bouncy. Her fair skin seemed to reflect the sweltering heat, keeping her cool. “My star and my ocean…” Without slowing down, she looked from me to Umi and back again as if she’d only just noticed us. “Why don’t we admire the starry sky today?” My heart skipped a beat as I wondered if she meant it figuratively or if it was a reference to my name. Umi gave me the stink eye. But I supposed Ms. Chitaira was being literal and was only talking about stargazing. “The ocean’s well worth seeing, too, but let’s plan for it. That way, we’ll all have swimsuits.” Ms. Chitaira’s lips stretched into a wide smile as she very obviously stared at Umi’s boobs. That kind of stare could get a person accused of sexual harassment, but when the perpetrator was a beautiful woman with a pleasant, gentle smile, somehow she got a free pass to ogle as much as she wanted. Some people were born more fortunate, and they could get away with more than normal people. Perhaps for the first time, I was annoyed I had a name that was also a common noun. Like Umi. When Ms. Chitaira talked about the ocean or the starry sky, my first thought was always that she meant Umi or me, and I looked for hidden meanings she might not have even intended. “How are we going to see any stars? It’s daytime,” I said. “If you know where to look, you might see a star right now,” Ms. Chitaira replied. Again, I couldn’t help wondering if she was being playful with words. That’s how smart people let you know they’re oh-so-clever. “Where I’m going to take you, though, anyone can see stars at any time of the day,” she added. “…Ah, I know where that is.” I figured there must be a planetarium nearby. Umi was staring blankly, but soon enough, she gave up on thinking about it. Her gaze dropped to her hand, clasped by her sister’s, and she smiled with contentment. What did I want to give Umi? She already had what she wanted, and now she was jealously guarding it. She was full of love, and there was no room in her heart for anyone else. I was too late to ever see a gap I could squeeze into. My love was stillborn. I walked on, holding hands with the girl I loved and her sister-slash-girlfriend. Neither of them loved me. It was glaringly obvious I shouldn’t be there, but it was too hot for me to resist. I was feeling too sluggish to tear my hand away. Not one to give in to resignation completely, I raised my head and looked up at the sky to search for any stars hidden in the sunlight. I couldn’t see any. We passed by the public library and through a park, and then we walked some more. Eventually, we arrived at a building with structures that looked like giant slides and a silver globe. The globe shone in the sunlight, as if it were a miniature sun that had dropped down on Earth. The path to the entrance was lined with all sorts of curious metal objects. When we got closer, I saw that the globe was a model of Earth, with “Children’s Museum” written at the front. We went in, and there was a ticket desk across from the entrance. “Let Big Sis buy you tickets,” Ms. Chitaira said to us, triumphantly raising her wallet. “Big Sis is only mine,” Umi said dumbly, always jumping at every opportunity to assert her exclusive rights to Ms. Chitaira. I didn’t have the energy to feel annoyed. Ms. Chitaira turned and smirked mischievously at Umi, making the peace sign with her hand. “Two adult and one child ticket, please,” she said to the receptionist. “What?!” Umi tapped her on the back, but Ms. Chitaira ignored her. “Ha! They believed me!” she rejoiced after we left the ticket desk. She had bought three adult tickets in the end, though. Just as the receptionist had entered the amount due, she’d confessed that the short girl behind her was a grown-up, too. The receptionist had given her a frustrated look, but Ms. Chitaira didn’t mind—she’d had her fun. “Do I look like a middle schooler? Is it…just because I’m short?” Sulking, Umi put her hand on her head, and then raised it to her sister’s height. “I don’t stand a chance, do I?” she muttered, dropping her hand. Ms. Chitaira smiled softly at her little sister. It was a terrifying smile, irresistibly charming, drawing her victims to her like a flame attracts moths. How many high school girls had been burned by her? Chillingly, even her own sister wasn’t immune to it. Even inside the building, Ms. Chitaira held our hands. We walked down a spiral staircase, and the walls were painted to look as if we were going inside an ancient shell. In the basement, trees were painted on the wall for a forest background. The basement was an exhibition hall with all sorts of items on display. There were masks and folk outfits from different periods in history, a stand where you could measure your temperature, a table with lots of toys I’d never seen before, and a giant egg at the center of the room. Kids were poking that egg. Its peeling label informed us it was a model of a dinosaur egg. “Oh, this takes me back! The display hasn’t changed at all,” Ms. Chitaira said happily, squeezing in between the children to look at the egg. “Do you come here often, Sis?” Calling Ms. Chitaira “Sis” had become pretty natural to Umi. “I used to. Nowadays, I always go to the third floor.” She told us she’d just felt like taking a look at the basement first that day. We did a full circle around the room, and then Ms. Chitaira started walking back up the stairs briskly. It wasn’t the first time I’d thought she walked with the same energy as a child, as if nothing in life ever made her tired. Maybe some people were just like that. Or maybe she had energy to spare because unlike us, she’d slept in late. “Our destination’s on the third floor. Let’s go!” Our hands swayed back and forth as we walked. How much longer was she going to hold our hands? Why was she doing it anyway? We walked back up the stairs and passed by the ticket desk. An arts-and-crafts workshop for children was taking place in the area at the back. There was a signboard with “Tickets Sold Out” written on it. No one had ever taken me to an event like that, so I marveled at how good those kids had it. Ms. Chitaira led us up another spiral flight of stairs to the circular second floor with bluish lights, which created the illusion that the AC was stronger there. The room featured a lot of desks, with PCs showing some space-related images. Monitors on the walls displayed orbits of the planets in the Solar System and played back prerecorded commentary. To me, it was weird to see so many screens around—we didn’t have a computer at home. Kids were sitting there talking, not even looking at the PCs. Apparently, they were there just for the AC. I couldn’t help staring at their slender, tanned arms. I’d never had a tan when I was a kid. My household situation hadn’t nurtured a love for the outdoors in me, to say the least. I’d spent my summer holidays diligently doing homework, house chores, and sitting in front of the fan. I’d been a very well-behaved child. Nobody had praised me for being good, but praise was due, and I gave it now to my past self. There were no stairs to the next floor. We had to take the elevator, which was already waiting in a dim corridor leading to the emergency exit. It was smaller compared with the one at the hotel, without any decor. It shook disconcertingly as it transported us a little closer to the sky. The elevator moved for a long time, but when it stopped, the floor number displayed was still only “3.” The door opened, and we stepped out into a long, narrow corridor going in a circle along the outer wall of the building. We passed by posters advertising summer events and went through a purple door. “We’re in the globe you saw outside,” Ms. Chitaira explained as if she were a tour guide. “Huh.” The room had purple walls, a purple floor, and an atmosphere of mystery. The floor slanted down with several rows of seats. Many were still empty. Ms. Chitaira wasn’t letting go of our hands, so we had to find three free seats next to each other. “Do you mind if I’m in the middle?” Ms. Chitaira asked us before sitting down in a row on the right side of the projector. “I don’t mind,” Umi said, looking at me. I guessed she didn’t care where she sat as long as it was next to her precious sister. If I tried to get in the middle, she wouldn’t have it. “Sit wherever you like,” I said. It was less hassle to keep our formation than to change who was holding whose hand. Why were we still holding hands anyway? “I don’t get all the girls, so I can be on the edge,” I added. The center seat wasn’t my place. “Takasora, you could be immensely popular if you wanted,” Ms. Chitaira said with a sigh, adjusting her reclining chair right next to me. The upholstery was purple, and so was Ms. Chitaira’s yukata. She was blending in. “You’ve been dealt the winning hand right at the start of the game, Takasora.” “I’m not sure what you mean, but something tells me your mind’s in the gutter,” I said, verbalizing what I’d been thinking. She’d say anything with that charming smile plastered on her face just to get your attention. Maybe she even did that with the full knowledge you could see through her. Umi moved the backrest of her seat into a reclining position and stared at the purple around us. “Why are we sitting here? What’s gonna happen?” she asked her sister. I looked past Ms. Chitaira at Umi, in complete disbelief. Had she never heard of planetariums? Did she live under a rock? It was a miracle she could hold a conversation and attend school like a normal person. “You’ll find out soon. I promise, it’ll be fun.” Ms. Chitaira didn’t tease Umi. Far from it—she spoke to her with a gentle patience that could deceive you into thinking she was a caring older sister. “I’m sure I’ll like it. I always like it, wherever you take me.” “…Heh-heh-heh.” A lecherous tone found its way into Ms. Chitaira’s laughter, which was how I knew it was probably sincere. The lights suddenly darkened like a candle being blown out. The show repeated throughout the day was about to start again. There were still many empty seats around. It was actually my first time in an observatory’s planetarium. We sat there in pitch-darkness. Why is it that your shoulders feel heavier when it’s dark? I felt something touch my collarbone—it was only the cold air from the AC, but it made me shudder. I couldn’t see anything. The hand I was still holding over the handrest was my only anchor. It irritated me to think this woman was happy to hold my hand when I hadn’t yet established what my feelings were toward her. …She thought I was attractive enough to be popular, huh? I’d agree with that, except that somehow the girl I wanted treated me like air. So much for Ms. Chitaira’s assessment of my appeal. I sank back into the plush seat and gazed at the darkness, thinking about how much the tickets to this place cost. A few moments later, we saw the five-hundred-yen starry sky. I heard a mechanical noise diagonally above us, but it was still dark in the room. I felt like I was floating in the dark, with only my sister’s warm hand to keep myself oriented. Something was about to start, but what? Was this a movie theater? I’d never been to one, but I knew they switched the lights off before the screenings. I’d rather watch my sister’s profile than any movie, though. I hadn’t seen her for an entire week. I’d known her as Chiki for much longer than I’d known her as a sister, but it felt more natural for me to think of her as my sister. Whenever I thought, “This is my sister,” my heart ached from emotion. My jaw started quivering. I wanted to call her “Sis” so bad. I wanted to cling to her arm and cry on her shoulder. I didn’t know what to call this tight feeling in my chest. Being away from my sister, by any distance, made me impatient. I leaned in toward her to be closer. Another emotion, not the love I’d been feeling before, had stuck its fingers into the mesh fence around my heart and started rattling it. Rattling me. Sis… I was breathing that word in and out instead of oxygen. Maybe that was why my chest was hurting. My stream of thoughts was interrupted by dots of light appearing in the darkness. It took me a moment to understand those lights were meant to be stars in the night. There were too many of them, like pretty, shining grains of sand scattered over the dark sky. That was how the sky was supposed to look, I guessed. I hadn’t really seen real stars much. For most of my nights, I had curled up small and hoped to survive by not making any sounds to draw attention to myself. The sounds I heard at night made me nervous. They reminded me why I was there and what it cost. They caused me physical pain. The image of the night sky didn’t make me feel anything. It was just an alien sight. But when I looked up, I shuddered, suddenly sure I was doing something bad. The muscles in my neck tensed up, and so did my shoulders. My sister must have felt it, because her hand tightened around mine. Her face was lit up by the fake night sky. I was happy to see her lips were gently curving upward. None of the stars could compete with my sister’s sparkling eyes. The sky above us started to change, and a staff member, whose name I didn’t catch, started explaining what we were seeing, beginning with the stars we’d be able to see that night—what constellations were visible and where they were in the sky. What would they talk about if tonight’s sky was gonna be too cloudy to see anything? I wondered, half listening to the fancy names of stars that I had no hope of remembering. I didn’t know any constellations, or where I’d been born, or even my blood type. It wasn’t the staff’s fault I was bored. The stories about the stars were weird, but kind of poetic, maybe… I wasn’t engaged because I had no interest in the stars, so I just sat quietly through the show. The star talk was simple enough for anyone to understand, but I didn’t have the basics to really wrap my head around it. I kept taking my eyes off the stars and looking at my sister instead. As she happily admired them, she was radiant. She was my star. Sometimes, when I was looking at my sister, my eyes would meet Sora’s. She always looked at me like she wanted to say something, but whatever it was, it wouldn’t spill out. Like tears when you were holding in too much. She’d say nothing, or she’d say something that wasn’t what I saw in her eyes. Sora listened to reason, and she was a good person. Better than anyone else I’d met. My sister was unendingly kind to me, but was she a good person? There were arguments against that. Like, a good person wouldn’t be hitting on other girls when she already had a girlfriend. My sister couldn’t help herself. Where was I…? Right. Sora—she was a good person. And she loved me…apparently. That was kind of a problem. Maybe I was being heartless calling her a problem, but I had no idea what to do about her loving me. I’d learned how to deal with nasty people, scary people, my mother, and my lover, but I had no experience with friends or classmates. Sora didn’t think of me as a classmate or a friend, though. When she’d timidly felt my breasts, I’d seen it in her face. Her cheeks flushed, and her eyes darkened with desire. I could hear the wild thumping of her heart. She couldn’t hide it. I knew what it felt like—I’d been like that, too, with my sister. I didn’t feel that way about Sora, though. She didn’t melt anything in my chest. My caring, sweet, loving sister was all I wanted. It was my sister who had taught me about all those things that were good, shaping my understanding of them until nobody else could fit into those shapes. This might be wrong on many levels, but…if Sora could be caring, sweet, and loving exactly in the same way as my sister, I’d totally fall in love with her, but that was impossible. Maybe, if I’d met Sora before Shiho, I’d have felt differently about her. But if I hadn’t met my sister that day, I probably wouldn’t have met Sora, either. So Sora and I just weren’t fated to be a thing. I liked Sora, but in a way she wasn’t happy about. Like I mentioned before, I felt like I’d be comfortable living together with her for a long time, but it would probably be best for both of us if I moved away. If my sister didn’t reciprocate my feelings, I’d probably just die. And Sora might be feeling the same way about me…so it wasn’t good for us to be near each other. I should move out soon, even though I didn’t dislike sleeping next to Sora in that stuffy room. Those were the thoughts running through my head when I was looking at Sora, who sat on the opposite side of my sister. I only knew Sora from one side. She was looking back at me for a while, but in the end, she escaped my gaze, looking at the fake night sky again. Feeling left out somehow, I also turned my head to look at the stars and spaced out again. “…” So many little lights that did nothing for me. Why was I looking at them? Not that there was anything wrong with the stars; it was me. I didn’t want to think about my past, but it was something I could never forget, and it was killing me to think I’d have to go back to living like that again. The only places I’d go were the houses of strangers and whatever school I was attending. Straying from the path home could end in the lights getting kicked out of me. I remembered getting yelled at—“What if someone finds out?!”—being knocked off my feet and landing on my elbow, which hurt so bad I couldn’t move at first. I thought I’d gotten a bad bruise or something, but the bad part turned out to be the pain slightly higher than my armpit, which didn’t go away for a very long time. It hurt to breathe, so much I thought I might throw up, and I made a strange wheezing sound. I had to curl up and force myself to stop breathing to ease the pain for a moment. I did that at night so I could fall asleep, and it’d turned into a habit. Thinking about it now, I’d probably cracked a bone. The person who’d done that to me was family, if you called the people you lived with family. They were all basically like that. My mother did nothing to protect me from the temporary families who despised me. I was the outcast, loved by nobody, the target for violence. But then I’d found family that was different—my sister. Saying that word, even just in my head, filled my chest with something warm and sticky. I lapped up that feeling. It was sweet, in between sugar and chocolate, and thick. I was addicted to it after the first taste. That was why I’d had to come and find my sister that day. When my sister was holding me, I was full. There were no gaps left for bad thoughts. Shiho filled them all. My idea of perfect happiness was her taking over every cell of my body. It must’ve been because I was sitting in that dark room that all those memories and thoughts kept coming to me. The image of the starry sky kept shifting, and a long line like a river of light appeared. For some reason, my eyes teared up when I saw it. Maybe I’d forgotten to blink, and my eyes had gotten so dry that they’d gone watery. Or it was from relief, that a day had come in my life when I could relax gazing at the stars. I shut my eyes, but I could still feel the stars on the undersides of my eyelids. A little later, the staff member who had been telling us about stars came into the room, and there was applause, so I opened my eyes. The starry sky was gone, and the light came back as abruptly as it had disappeared earlier. “It never gets old,” said my sister. She beamed, satisfied with the show. Even her voice had livened up. “Did you enjoy it too, Takasora?” “…No.” Sora’s eyes were dry, but I heard tears in her voice. After replying to my sister, her eyes fell on me, and she froze awkwardly. My sister noticed and turned toward me, too. I guessed I still had tears streaming from my eyes. Shiho didn’t try to wipe them, though. The other time I’d had a big cry, she hadn’t wiped them, either. She didn’t see crying as a bad thing. She smiled at me with acceptance. “Umi,” she said. “You’ve seen so many stars today. Why not make a wish?” “Make…a wish?” Speaking made more tears gush from my eyes. “People have been wishing on stars since ancient times.” The show was over, and the ceiling above us was a starless purple. The only shining star left was next to me. Whenever I looked at her, my shoulders trembled. There were so many feelings inside me, I was drowning in them, but I didn’t know what to say. My sister watched me, silent and dazzling as the distant stars. She’d asked me many times what I wanted from her, what I expected from her as my sister. What did I wish for? Just to be close to her. Just to be with my sister. I wanted to have a place next to someone who would be happy to have me there. I wanted someone to care about me. “I want to have a sister that’s all mine.” My wishes started pouring out of me like they were bleeding from a wound in my shoulder. My voice was wobbling like an earthworm. “I want someone who accepts me. Someone that won’t hit me. Someone caring and not scary, just caring, caring, caring, caring, caring. Warm and caring. Accepting. Who accepts me.” Not sure how to say what I meant, I simply let my wish tumble out of my mouth in my pathetically limited vocabulary. My head was on fire as I scrambled to find the right words, drawing a blank every time. Memories of the past pummeled my temples, knocking me back. Bad memories were piggybacking on one another, and I couldn’t think about anything else. I’d had so many good, happy times with my sister since I’d met her—although I hadn’t known she was my sister at the start—but I couldn’t recall those good feelings. There was only this anxiety I could never shake off. The anxiety of knowing I couldn’t keep my sister with me. Every time we said good-bye at the station, I felt like I was being shoved away toward the end of my life, alone. I hated the “byes,” the “take cares.” I didn’t want to be constantly anxious. I wanted certainty. I wanted to get rid of my fears. Basically, I wanted… “I want to be happy.” When I finally said it, something snapped in my brain. My head dropped, my eyes opened wide, and muffled grunts escaped from my mouth. I couldn’t move my eyelids, and my eyeballs were drying up. My neck was hot, like blood was rushing up to my head. I could hear it bubbling. “Hmm…” I heard my sister hum thoughtfully. “Happiness means something different to every person, unfortunately.” Was she talking to me? “Yeah, whatever,” came an irritated response. “Finding your own happiness is easy, but making someone else happy is a difficult task,” my sister continued. “That’s a line from that novel. Have you finished reading it yet?” “What do you care…?” the angry voice came back. “Umi’s my little sister, though… I suppose it’s on me to rise to the task.” I glanced up at Shiho and saw her close her eyes and smile with satisfaction. “Besides…I have to keep my promise,” she said. “What promise?” I asked. My sister raised her chin higher and smiled. Her warmth made flowers bloom, and it made their petals scatter in a gust of wind. She knew how to dose it just right. “Umi, would you like to come live with me?” She put her hands over mine, like that first time when my hand had been hurt. “…What?” “Not in that house, of course. We’d rent an apartment together. Just you and me, without your mother.” I slowly, fearfully raised my head, and I saw pure light. My eyes honestly saw just whiteness, nothing else. My sister’s voice floated to me through that white light. “I cannot think of another way to make you happy, my dear… Although I wish I could.” I didn’t understand why she’d added that last part, but it didn’t matter. What did matter was that I could be together with my sister. For the first time since I’d met her, there’d be no more long separations. I’d have my sister from morning until evening, and from evening until forever. I tried to reply, but I only made gargling noises like I was clearing my throat. Blood was still gushing out from the part of my brain that had broken earlier. It was a blessing, what my sister had said. A blessing that would last forever. A red torrent spilled over the glowing whiteness, and I could see the outlines of what was around me again. Another star came into focus in this dramatic two-color world. A star that had been hidden by the supernova of my sister. Sora’s eyes glistened like polished stones, but there was no light inside them. Ms. Chitaira had walked us back to the station…or at least I thought she had. My head was cooked from the heat and from what had happened earlier, so my memories were hazy. When I snapped out of the shock, I was getting on the train back with Umi, shuddering while gallons of sweat poured out of my back and forehead. “I’m going to move in with my sister,” said Umi, looking out the window at the station. “I’ll be happy with her.” “…Okay.” I couldn’t think of anything better to say. I sure as hell wasn’t going to tell her what I really thought about it, but I couldn’t bring myself to fake feeling happy for her, either. I had nothing more to talk about with Umi. I’d be spending the journey staring out the window. I’d known it was going to come to this, but I’d been completely powerless to stop it. It was like knowing a meteor was going to hit Earth in a week and everyone would die—you couldn’t do anything to save yourself in that situation, either. Nobody had any right to tell two sisters they couldn’t live together, including me. Before leaving the planetarium, the wicked woman had apologized to me. I didn’t want to think why. “What about school?” I asked Umi. “Dunno. I’ll ask Shiho if we could find a place near my school… Actually, no, I don’t care if I have to move to a different one…” Ambivalent as always. She was unable to think into the future, as if she didn’t really believe it would come. Meanwhile, I’d made the mistake of allowing myself to dream. That woman had crash-landed in the dreamless desert of my life, and now look what she’d done to me. “I bet you care a little… And are you going to look for a job?” Maybe she wouldn’t need to work? Maybe all she wanted from her life was to be living together with her sister and doing nothing else. If that was the case, I’d just have to let it go. “I don’t need to worry about it…” “No? Why not?” She giggled. “Because I’m planning to die after leaving high school.” The rumble of the train sliced my head in half. For a moment, my ears shut down, and all sounds disappeared. I stopped resting my chin in my hand and very slowly, carefully lifted my head. I was used to looking away from Umi, but this time, I held my gaze on her beautiful profile. “What did you say?” “Huh? I’m planning to die.” The word pierced my ears, refusing to be drowned out by the thrum of the train running on the tracks. Hair rose on my back and arms, and I had the urge to flinch away. But I couldn’t do it while I was sitting down. “You want to die…? Seriously?” “Yeah. I’ll have to do it myself. I can’t ask anyone for help with this.” Umi’s forehead creased as she stared into space. “What’s the best way to kill yourself without causing anyone trouble…?” Was she muttering that to herself, or was she asking me to brainstorm with her? Please no. I struggled to find my words, as if my head had been stretched out, like, seven meters behind me. The thinking cells were too far from the rest of my body. “Sorry, but…what are you trying to say?” “I’m saying what I’m saying? My sister won’t love me anymore when I’m not a high schooler.” She was calm like a windless sea, while I was barefoot on a scorching-hot beach. “I don’t think she’s that intense…” I didn’t get the impression her sister was completely ruthless. She wasn’t being nice to her sister just to spite me; she did have a heart. Umi shook her head at me. “I’ve lived long enough now to know I’m useless. I know better than anyone there’s no good future for me. I know if I work really hard and make a lot of effort, I might be able to make a living. But it wouldn’t be better than what I have now, because now I have a sister who loves me. This is as good as it gets,” she said, sticking her big chest out. The silent, massive waves of her resignation were coming at me, while I was stranded on the beach with no escape. “She might still love me as a sister, but that’s no good for me. I want all her love, including her love for high school girls. When I’m too old, I won’t be able to stand her loving other girls. But that’s how she is, and I can’t change it. I can only die.” “N-no…” No, no, no! This was too much for me. I couldn’t wrap my head around what Umi was saying. This was worse than any exam question. It made no sense. There was so much wrong with it, I didn’t even know where to start. She’d told me why she wanted to kill herself, but how was that a reason? How could she think that was her only option? Seriously… Who’d kill themselves for a stupid reason like that? Weren’t people supposed to want to live until old age, until their bodies and minds wore out…? Although, was that the right goal for everyone? If a movie’s boring, you might want to switch it off before it gets to the end. But wasn’t it more satisfying to make it all the way to the credits? Get your money’s worth. Your life’s worth. At least, that was how I saw it… Although maybe life wasn’t like watching movies. If not, what was it like? What did I know? “Do you even know what it means to die?” She was so casual about it, talking about taking her own life without batting an eye, that I started to doubt she realized what death meant. I looked at her arms. They were so slender and delicate, it seemed she shouldn’t be able to lift anything with one hand. How was she going to take her life, exactly? “Do you know, Sora?” she asked back, shutting me up. I couldn’t know, never having experienced death myself, but everyone said suicide was bad, and thinking about dying made me shiver. The idea that death was to be avoided at all costs was visceral for me, and it was driving me insane that I couldn’t logically explain it. Like having an itch you can’t reach. People just shouldn’t kill themselves, and you shouldn’t need to explain why. If someone didn’t understand that, maybe it was too late to help them. I eventually said, “When you die, it’s all over.” Umi nodded. “I want it to be over.” She cut me off before I’d made it to the end of the maze of her motivation. Here was a beautiful girl who had her mind set on suicide. What should I say? The mental load was too much for me. Umi was my first love, and I still loved her, but she didn’t want my love. What could I say to make her reconsider throwing her life away? “I think if you keep your uniform, you can pull off the high schooler look until you’re twenty, at least,” I heard myself say without any involvement from my brain. “…You think it’ll work?” “Worth a try…” I had to turn my eyes away from Umi, who was seriously considering my suggestion. The views outside the window were my escape. The train was crossing a metal bridge over a wide river that sparkled in the sunshine. Outside the window, it was a perfect summer day, but from my upper arms to my back, I felt a disquieting chill. Umi was going to kill herself after graduating high school? She really meant it? As that slowly sank in, I felt so shocked and confused again that I did a double take at Umi’s calm resting face. Once Umi got an idea in her head, that was all she could think about, and so the next day, she packed her stuff and was ready to move out. She didn’t have much to pack, so it didn’t take long. She’d arrived in my home suddenly at the beginning of summer, as if blown in by a strong gust of wind. Summer wasn’t over yet, but she was already leaving. That was what I’d wished for a long time ago when I had been a completely different person. Umi was staring at the supposedly-five-million-yen ring on her middle finger. Was it going to be the last day I saw her childlike face framed by unruly, wavy hair? She didn’t care about school anymore. She was on the self-destructive course she’d chosen. What didn’t make sense was that she was the calm one while I was losing my sanity. Unable to stand how she was looking at that ring with her expression of total fulfillment, I asked her, “And what does your mom think about it?” Her mom wasn’t invited to move in with Ms. Chitaira. I wondered what she was going to do, but that wasn’t the biggest of my worries. “She said if I was sure I wanted to do it, she was okay with it.” “She’s okay with you killing yourself?” I snapped. Umi interlaced her fingers behind her back, as if she wanted to hide her precious ring from me. “I didn’t tell her that.” I’d figured as much. Even her mom would try to stop her…right? Or did she not even have the strength to do that? I didn’t know any other mother who’d be as powerless as Umi’s. “You want to say my decision is wrong.” She cut ahead of me, like that one other time I had been attacking her with questions. “Because it is.” I didn’t have any supporting arguments, but that was what I thought. Umi nodded, acknowledging my opinion and her right to disregard it. “I told you this earlier, but I’m not smart enough to do the right thing even when someone tells me what it is.” “…” I said nothing. I was guilty of the same thing, and besides, I didn’t really care if suicide was morally wrong or not—I just didn’t want to lose the star of my life. “My sister is everything to me. She comes before good or bad.” Umi’s tone was unclouded by doubt. It was chilling how she could be so calm while I was losing my mind. She picked up her bags, then turned to me as if she was remembering something she’d forgotten. “Thanks…and sorry for everything. I’m not gonna let you have my sister, though.” It was clear to me she was pushing me away. The wall between us was built. In the end, this was it. She could only see what was between us distorted through the lens of her sister. Like straw catching fire, the flame of anger rose in me fast and bright, but it quickly burned itself out. I just felt powerless, resigned, and eviscerated after the faint thread of hope had irrecoverably slipped through my fingers. “…Yeah, whatever. Just go already.” A mean-spirited good-bye, I knew, but I couldn’t summon the energy to say anything friendly. Besides, what she’d said, if she really meant it, amounted to telling me to fuck off. “’Kay.” She left the room, indifferent to my crushing despair. For a moment, I kind of wanted to go after her, but my legs and arms felt too heavy to move. I fell backward onto the futon, spreading my arms and legs. My room was back to how it used to be, without the extra inhabitant and her stuff. I sure wasn’t—I’d been permanently affected… Actually, my room wasn’t completely the same as before Umi’s arrival, either. Her dry scent lingered in the air, like an afterimage of her body only my nose could see. It didn’t feel to me like the Umi chapter of my life was finished, but it definitely was. It was all over. What a sucky summer. A massive wave had washed over me, soaking me through, nearly drowning me, taking my breath away, and now I was miserable, lonely, anxious. As the wave moved on, it pushed me down to the bottom of the ocean alone, unable to bob back up to the surface. It taught me how infinitely beautiful stars could be when you saw them from the depths. After the ocean had cruelly played with me, it spat me out on a beach. I might as well just say it now. That was the last time I saw the Umi Mizuike I thought I knew.