“Bruno’s a bit of a pervert, and you wanted to get Annie away from him because she means so much to you. Is that right?” I asked.
“Excuse me? You’re asking about that now? Of course I—”
“Okay,” I said, interrupting. “But is that the only reason?”
For the first time, Cattleya looked shaken.
I pressed the point. “There’s something else going on, isn’t there?”
As I asked, I thought about what had happened today. It was right after I had taken Annie and Bruno’s photo.
“There! All set!” I’d said, handing it to them. The camera I had used was capable of producing a photograph right on the spot—that was its effect as a sancta. But that was all. The reason I had chosen this particular object for my mission today was simple: I’d wanted a chance to talk with them.
“Wow! That’s awesome! This is a terrific picture!” Bruno said, inspecting it. He sounded so genuinely excited, you never would have guessed he forced his servants to indulge his peculiar whims.
“Yeah, it’s great!” Annie grinned. Her smile was beautiful; she was every bit the sweet, outgoing girl that she looked.
From up close, I was more sure than ever: No matter how you cut it, they seemed like a caring couple. That was all they had seemed until I talked to them in person. But there was one thing I never would have noticed simply observing them from afar.
“Thank you so much! I’m thrilled you took this picture!” Bruno gave me the most gentle smile and a bow. Then he said, “I’ll treasure this even after I leave this country.”
Wasn’t that sweet? Even after he left this—
“Huh?” I stood there, trying to process what he had just said. After he left this country? What did that mean? “Are you, uh, going away?” I asked. I sure hadn’t heard anything about that.
The answer came from Annie, who nodded. “Yes, he is.” She stood close to Bruno, still looking sweet but now, also, somehow sad. “He’ll be moving off our island very soon.”
Cururunelvia, the land of prayer, is a small island that has very little interaction with the outside world. There’s only one chance per year to leave this country: the scheduled ship that departs each spring. In other words, if you happened to stumble thoughtlessly into this land, you were stuck here for at least a year—and the reverse was true, too.
Now I discovered that young Bruno was going to board that ship and head out into the wider world.
“We found out about a year ago. My family learned that we were all going to have to move off the island for my dad’s job. I’ve only got a few months left here.” Bruno sounded perfectly calm as he explained; he seemed to have already accepted the reality.
It was winter now, which gave him about three months until the ship left in spring.
“I know it’s sad, but I’m sort of looking forward to it, too. There’s supposed to be all kinds of fun things outside this island,” he said. Food to eat, places to see, people to meet—there had to be so much more beyond our small island than within it. Bruno, his eyes filled with optimism and hope, told me he was sure that on the other side of the sadness would be joy.
“Um…” Standing there, I suddenly started to feel like a friend who had abruptly been told someone was leaving.
Bruno was moving away?
“So…does everybody know that?” I asked.
“Well, sure. We told the household servants, and I let all my friends know.”
“Would that happen to include the girl who was your childhood friend?”
“My childhood friend?” Bruno looked at me, surprised, but then he said, “Wait—are you Cattleya’s friend?”
“Oh! Yeah. Yeah, kinda.”
“Anyway, yeah, she knows. In fact, she was the first friend I told. It must’ve been at least six months ago now.”
“Oh yeah?” Well, it was news to me. Why hadn’t Cattleya said anything about this?
As I pondered, Bruno looked ever so slightly uncomfortable. “The thing is…I never saw Cattleya again after I told her I was moving.”
“Hmm?”
What was that? Never saw her? I pitched question after question at Bruno, like some kind of gossip columnist, but he never looked the least bit bothered. He just answered patiently.
“When I tried to tell her what was going on, she burst into tears and ran off.”
And that was it. No matter how hard Bruno tried to talk to her, she never really responded. Gradually, a gulf opened between the two of them.
I knew that had to be why Cattleya had hidden the facts from us.
Now, as she sat on the sofa across from me, I said, “I have a theory, Cattleya. Are you in love with Bruno?”
The request she had made of us was to save her dear friend Annie from dating that no-good loser, Bruno. And yet the main thing she seemed concerned about was the simple fact that the two of them might be dating. She didn’t appear motivated by hatred of Bruno personally so much as the fear that he and Annie might stay together forever.
If Bruno was leaving the country in a few months, then—well, forgive me for putting it this way, but if Cattleya just stood by and did nothing, Bruno and Annie would be wrenched apart anyway. There was no need for her to go out of her way to break them up. What’s more, Bruno had told Cattleya he was moving six months ago—right about the same time she was first becoming friends with Annie.
If all that was true, then I could propose an alternative interpretation of events.
Bruno tells Cattleya that he’s moving. The news comes completely out of the blue, and shocked by the sudden revelation, Cattleya is unable to accept the fact that their remaining time together is so short and leaves in a rage. This leads to the gulf between the two childhood friends.
Enter Annie, who gets close to Bruno, stepping into that gulf.
Of course, all that was merely my speculation.
“But is it possible that’s what happened?” I said.
Everything else would have gone pretty much the way Cattleya had told us. Annie and Bruno had quickly grown close and now were practically dating.
To take a different view of the situation:
“Cattleya, you’re jealous—because you feel like your last few days with Bruno are being taken from you by your best friend.” Once again, I pulled no punches.
Cattleya was wide-eyed. “Wh— What? What are you talking about? Like, seriously, what are you talking about?”
“Wow! You said the same thing twice.”
“Sh-shut up!”
“I mean it, though. What’s the real story?” I shuffled close to her. Time for answers, if you please!