When I arrived at the supermarket in question, I found an empty cabbage stand beneath a sign proclaiming in bright red letters, “Advertised Item!”
“Too late, huh?”
My shoulders slumped in disappointment. As they did, I caught sight of the penguin from before, firmly gripping a sliced half of a cabbage and looking my way. It silently handed me the cabbage half, and then waddled off.
“Hey, wait a minute.”
I glanced at the cabbage in my hands to see a tag with the words “Organic, Pesticide-free. 350 yen.”
“That’s expensive,” I muttered unconsciously. Was the penguin trying to make friends with me? I hadn’t done anything that would deserve this kind of gesture. Just then, the image of Himari’s penguin-patterned hat flashed suddenly to mind. Nothing but penguins these days. All in ridiculous
forms.
I returned the expensive cabbage to its place, but I hadn’t been able to get my hands on the cheap ones either, so I bought a more mid-range cabbage. I stuffed other cheap ingredients and daily essentials into a fold-up nylon bag. I had a lot of points racked up at this supermarket. I grinned to myself.
By the time I left the market, it had already grown quite dim outside, and a light drizzle started to fall.
“So, it was supposed to rain, then? Wonder if they brought the laundry in…” I looked up at the sky and sighed. I could make out soft, faint trails of gray clouds in the pale sky. Just then, again I heard the pattering of little feet. I looked down, to find a round little penguin holding out an opened umbrella.
I really didn’t think I was that exhausted.
I called out to a mother and child who were exiting the supermarket.
“Um, pardon me.”
“Yes?” answered the woman.
“This is kind of an odd question, but this thing is a penguin, right? Or, what is it?” I asked, pointing to the penguin who loitered absently nearby.
“What?” A clear look of suspicion spread across the woman’s face, and she pulled hurriedly away from me, as if to protect the small child.
“Mama, what’s that man saying?”
“Shh, don’t look at the man. Come on, let’s go,” she said, throwing in as a bonus the sort of line I had only ever heard on TV.
I looked down at the penguin, only to see its expressionless black eyes staring clearly back up at me. Declining to take the umbrella, I stepped away from the penguin at once, turned my back, and hurried away.
The smell of dampened clothes and vegetables and asphalt. The chilled air. Without even realizing it, I had begun running from the penguin. My wet bangs clung to my forehead.
“What the hell was that?!” Though the house was not far at all from the market, the rain grew stronger by the minute, and I was already soaked through. Along the way, I looked back timidly, to see the penguin waddling full tilt behind me, the still open umbrella wobbling back and forth. Now terrified, I ran as fast as I could to the front and opened the familiar sliding door.
“Yo, you finally home?” asked Kanba, poking his head out from the kitchen. “How’d you get so wet?”
“Hey. I’m beat. Something weird happened,” I started to call inside, when I looked up into the doorframe and stopped. There stood another round little penguin, the spitting image of the one that followed me around, blinking at me with its little black eyes.
“What, did he not make it to you? We sent him out with the umbrella and everything,” said Kanba, his expression blank.
“Did who not make it to me?” I asked, shuffling out of my loafers. As I stepped into the parlor, detouring around the penguin at my brother’s feet, my eyes fell upon Himari, sitting on the sofa beside another identical penguin, doing some knitting. I felt dizzy.
“They’re the ‘living things’ that came this morning,” said Kanba in a way that suggested that was obvious information, pointing at the open cardboard box.
“‘Living things’?” No way. Did he mean those cold, round things that had been inside the package?
I heard the front door open quietly behind me. A penguin folded its umbrella, and quietly shut the door, stepping right up into the house.
“What is going on here?”
“You should go dry off already, you’ll catch a cold,” Kanba said.
“I know that.”
I headed first to the kitchen, putting the cold items I purchased today into the refrigerator.
“Welcome home, Sho-chan. Here’s a towel,” said Himari, draping a bath towel over my head.
“Hey there, Himari.” A smile popped to my face at once.
“We took all the laundry in!”
“Thank you.”
A penguin was following along restlessly at Himari’s feet, but she did not appear especially surprised at all, merely patting it gently on the head.
Why was I the only one surprised here? Things were starting to grow absurd.
I changed into dry clothes and sipped some warm tea while toweling off my hair. Kanba sat cross-legged, quietly drinking his tea as well. My body was warm, and the sound of the rain was a comfort to my chaotic, confused mind. It finally seemed like things were calming down.
Himari was playing with one of the penguins. The penguin, who had now been decorated with a felt cap with a big ribbon on top, sat opposite her. She grinned, poking its cheeks and touching its tail, offering her stuffed animals to it. The penguin stared at her face, and then pecked at the stuffed animals in her hand with the tip of its beak.
“So, what is this? Why are these penguin-y things wandering around our house?” I asked.
“What do you mean? Can’t you see? When we thawed out that delivery from this morning, these came out. They seem to understand what we’re saying, so we can probably use ’em for gofers.”
Hearing the word, “gofer,” I thought of the train pass and the cabbage, and the umbrella. I glanced at the penguin sitting quietly at my side.
“I guess? But I mean, this is weird, isn’t it? Having three penguins tumbling around the house. And besides, they…”
If I was not mistaken, we three were the only ones who could see them.
“You’re gonna say that no other humans can see ’em, right?” Kanba said promptly, nodding toward the table. There sat a familiar bundle of traditional sweets from the Ikebe household.
“Uncle Ikebe was by, then?”
Our uncle’s family ran an old sweets shop, and he worried about our family, not having any adults around, so now and then he stopped by to check on us. He always brought some sweets with him.
“Yeah, he came to see how Himari was doing. These guys were wandering around right in front of him, but he didn’t seem to notice at all,” said Kanba, casually opening up the bundle.
The sweets had a familiar taste, and though this variety was not especially delicious, they were comforting in their mediocrity, the kind of thing I craved now and then.
“Even if that’s true, the two of you seem way too relaxed about this whole thing. How can you act like this is completely normal?”
“It’s not like making a fuss would change anything. Plus, you seem just as chill with it, sitting there holding a cup and staring off into space.”
The packaging rustled as he opened the box of sweets, unwrapped a manju, and began eating.
“I am not chill about this. I just have no idea what to do,” I argued, but I could not deny that I sat there as calmly as my siblings, resigned.
I shut my mouth and breathed in deeply.
“Survival Tactiiiiic!!”
Kanba and I whirled around at the sudden scream.
Himari, who moments ago played with a penguin, was no longer there. Incidentally, neither was the living room we had just been standing in.
A blast of white winds disrupted my vision. I quickly tried to cover my eyes with my hands, but something warm brushed against my forehead and cheeks ceaselessly, and I forgot whatever I’d been about to say. I timidly opened my eyes to see that it was not the wind touching my face, but countless layers of fine lace.
I was in a place I had never been before, darkness stretching as far as the eye could see, with brilliantly twinkling stars scattered throughout like beads. It was like outer space, though of course I had never been there.