Another, Vol. 2 (16 page)

“That old guy is so fishy,” Teshigawara stopped to comment to me, the skewered meat halfway to his mouth. “Ever since we got here, he’s had this scary look in his eye when he’s looking at us, y’know?”

“Yeah…I guess.”

“Maybe he’s got some huge grudge against teenage boys. And maybe that lady’s so friendly to cover for her husband’s personality.”

“Why would he have a grudge?”

“You think I know?” Teshigawara answered sharply. “People are always talking about how bad juvenile delinquency is getting, but there’s plenty of old dudes who are dangerous, too. I bet you there are tons of old men who just lose it one day and kill their own grandkids or whatever.”

“Uh…Maybe, yeah.”

“Better not take your eyes off that guy.”

Teshigawara spit the words out in a whisper, who knows how seriously, then put the skewer back on his plate.

“They could have served us rotten food. Or maybe he mixed in some sleeping pills and once we’re all asleep, he’s going to go around and cut us up one by one.”

“Are you kidding me?”

I was about to tell him he watched too many B horror flicks, but…I caught myself with an
Urk.
That’s because I heard a critical inner voice say,
You’re talking about yourself there, pal.

“By the way, Sakaki.”

After a few moments, Teshigawara started up again.

“This whole time, I’ve been thinking, what if the ‘extra person’ came with us today? And if they did, then who is it?”

“I could tell it’s been bothering you.” I sat up a little straighter and replied, “So? Any guesses?”

“Well…” Teshigawara trailed off. It wasn’t by much, but his expression became even more glum than before. “Supposedly there’s no way to tell who the ‘extra person’ is by looking at them…But maybe there’s still a way. Some little sign of it or something. What do you think?”

“I couldn’t say,” I replied honestly. “They say ‘there’s no way,’ but maybe that just means ‘we haven’t found one yet.’”

“Right?”

“But still.”

I fixed my eyes on Teshigawara’s profile. His brows were tightly knit.

“What if you did find one?” I asked. Again, I was partly posing the question to myself. “What would you do then?”

Teshigawara’s brows scrunched together even more forbiddingly, and he muttered, “Yeah, I dunno.” But he just pursed his lips again, not expanding any further.

Most of the students were wrapping up their meals.

“Ms. Mikami, may I please say something?”

With those words, one of them stood up. It was the second class representative for the girls, Izumi Akazawa.

“There’s something I want to make clear, since we’re all here.”

As soon as I heard that, I got a terrible feeling.

There were three other girls at her table. In other words, all the girls who’d come on this trip other than Mei were sitting together…Which, by itself, was a worrying thing.

No question, the class had considered Mei Misaki a strange person from the beginning. From May until the beginning of June, in the name of the “strategy” to prevent the “disasters,” she had been forced to take on the role of the one who’s “not there” and had been totally alone. In a certain sense, I suspected, doing that had preserved the
positive balance
of the relationships in the class.

That period from the start of June up to July, when I had been added to the list of those “not there” as a new “strategy,” had been the same. They may have been caught up in a visceral sense of danger, but because they had excised Mei and me—the
foreign elements
—from the equation, the balance within the group of third-year class 3 had been kept stable. However…

The moment that Mr. Kubodera’s death had forced them to realize that the “strategy” of increasing the number of people “not there” had been useless, everything had changed.

Mei Misaki, no longer “not there.” Mei, the strange girl whose existence could no longer be ignored. How did Akazawa and her friends feel about her? What would they inevitably feel?

I don’t know if I should say luckily, but that was when summer break had started, so the breakdown in balance didn’t come to a head in the classroom. You could say that the girls’ emotions had been put on hiatus, too.

But today, when the camping trip was beginning…

Mei Misaki was supposed to be isolated, but now she was talking completely at her ease with me—no big deal—as well as with guys like Mochizuki and Teshigawara, too. And then she sat at our table for dinner. As if she were ignoring the other girls, and most of all Akazawa, when it was supposed to be the other way around.

How could they not be disoriented by a situation like that? How could they not be disturbed by it? Frankly, it couldn’t have been fun.

During dinner, I had noticed occasional looks they had thrown
in our direction
from their table. At the same time, in a corner of my mind I’d pictured the conversation they were having: probably
about us
and probably not very nice.

In that moment when her permission was sought, Ms. Mikami’s reaction was sluggish enough to make me worry whether she was feeling all right. After several beats, she replied, “Oh…sure. Okay. Go ahead, Akazawa.”

Akazawa nodded mutely. Then, just as I’d expected, her eyes narrowed into a glare and turned on our table. Her voice came at us sharply. “Misaki! There’s something I want you to hear tonight.”

I watched Mei’s face in profile. She looked…calm.

“You, Misaki…And you, too, Sakakibara.”

Akazawa’s words came smoothly and her diction was perfect. She was like a spirited prosecutor standing in a courtroom.

“Several unfortunate things have happened since May, and that terrible thing that happened to Mr. Kubodera last month…I don’t have a clue if going on this trip will get things back under control, but at least for all those ‘disasters’ that have struck up until now…I think you bear some of the responsibility for them, Misaki.”

Mei, responsible for…?

Before I could challenge her to explain why, she said, “I think you have the same responsibility, Sakakibara.”

Throwing a glance at Ms. Mikami, Akazawa added harshly, “If Misaki had carried out her role as the one who’s ‘not there’ like we all agreed at the start, then no one would have died. The reason she couldn’t do that was because Sakakibara talked to her. That’s why we—”

“Hold it.”

The one who cut her off was Teshigawara.

“Don’t you think that was, I dunno, kind of inevitable? Something no one could help happening?”

“Who knows.” Akazawa put one hand on her hip before continuing in a totally dismissive tone. “Maybe we screwed up by not telling Sakakibara what was going on ahead of time. When I think about how I was out sick the first day he came to school, it’s gut-wrenching…But even so, if Misaki had stuck to her act and completely refused to deal with him, if she had just ignored him, the ‘strategy’ should have worked. Tell me I’m wrong.”

“I don’t…”

“Even if I acknowledge that we failed when the ‘strategy’ of having two people ‘not there’ didn’t work…Still, the original blame for the failure lies with Misaki, in my opinion. Am I wrong?”

For a moment, Teshigawara looked cowed, but then he came right back at her. “And? So what? What are you saying we should do about it now?”

At that, Akazawa gave a conspiratorial look to the girls at her table, then ran her gaze over the boys at the other tables.

“An apology,” she proclaimed. “We still haven’t heard a word of apology from Misaki. And yet, Misaki, the
second
you stopped being ‘not there,’ you were acting like nothing had ever happened, as if…”

Her ferocious gaze pounced on us. I felt rage and hatred and resentment in it, but more than that, I detected a fierce irritation…However.

How irrational can you get…
I couldn’t hold back irritation of my own.
Mei’s gotta be…
I looked over at her again. But she was as calm as before—no, she looked icy.

“For Sakuragi dying.”

It wasn’t Akazawa who spoke those words out of nowhere. It was Sugiura, the girl sitting next to her. She had a “loyalty first” look to her, and was constantly glued to Akazawa’s side.

“My seat was by the hall window, so I saw what happened that day. How she…”

…Ah.

I couldn’t help remembering it myself. That day, the last day of midterm exams, when Mei and I, and Yukari Sakuragi…

“When she found out about her mom’s accident, Sakuragi ran out of the classroom in a huge hurry. At first, she started going toward the East Stair like usual, but then you and Sakakibara were standing in front of the staircase. So Sakuragi panicked and changed direction, and she headed for the West Stair…”

…Yes. Sugiura was right about that.

“When she saw Misaki and Sakakibara together even though Misaki was supposed to be ‘not there,’ she must have gotten scared. That because they were together, the
talisman
hadn’t worked and that’s why her mom was in that accident…So in order to avoid you two, she ran the opposite direction down the hall.”

“If you two hadn’t been there right then—”

Akazawa picked up Sugiura’s argument.

“If Sakuragi had gone down the East Stair like usual, that accident might never have happened. That’s what I’m talking about.”

“You can’t be…”

The words came out of my mouth unconsciously.

“The same kind of thing happened to Mizuno’s older sister, too.” Akazawa pressed on. “After it happened, Mizuno told me that his sister was friends with you, Sakakibara. And that you’d been spilling all kinds of details to her about this problem in third-year Class 3.”

“Uh, that’s…”

“Maybe
because you talked to her about that stuff, she wound up
as one of the ‘deaths of June.’ You could interpret it that way, right?”

“Uh…”

…My fault.

It was my fault that Ms. Mizuno had died in that accident.

Having someone point it out officially made the sadness, regret, and self-reproach—though faded—rear their heads as fresh as ever. Yeah. Maybe Akazawa was right. I hadn’t understood anything about what was happening then, but still, blazing in and getting Ms. Mizuno involved was absolutely my fault…

“This is irrelevant.”

Just then, Mei spoke. In the cold, detached voice she always used, that I knew so well.

“However much you want to talk about these things, it’s not going to solve anything.”

“‘Solutions’ aren’t what we’re looking for right now.”

Akazawa’s words were pretty harsh.

“What we’re trying to tell you, Misaki, is that you need to recognize your own responsibility and apologize to everyone.”

“And if I do, it’s going to mean something?”

Mei quietly rose from her seat and returned her accuser’s gaze straight on.

“If so, I’ll do it.”

“Misaki—” I tried to stop her. “No…You can’t apologize for this kind of—”

If anyone needed to apologize, it was me. If I had never transferred to North Yomi this spring, then none of this…

Mei ignored me, though. Without waiting for Akazawa’s response to her question…

“I’m sorry.”

She said it matter-of-factly, then slowly dipped her head.

“I’m sorry. This is my fault…”

“No!”

I shouted the word without thinking.

At almost the same moment, a loud voice cried out, “Stop it!” It was Mochizuki.

“This is stupid.”

That from Teshigawara. He banged both hands down on the table angrily.

“It doesn’t mean anything having her do that. The only thing that matters is finding out who the ‘extra person’ is!”

Hold on.

No, Teshigawara—wait. I know how you feel, but if you tell them about it at a time like this…

…Just then.

A fresh commotion started, clearing the foul air of the place.

“Hey, Wakui—are you okay? What’s—”

Someone cried out suddenly, drawing our attention.

It was the table next to us. Tomohiko Kazami was one of the four sitting there. The voice belonged to the kendo club member Maejima, who was sitting across from Kazami. Wakui, the person he was talking to, was sitting to his left, and something was visibly wrong with him. His chair was pushed back and he was doubled over, facedown, pressing his forehead against the edge of the table. His shoulders were heaving in obvious pain.

“Hey—Wakui!”

As he called Wakui’s name, Maejima chafed the boy’s back.

“You okay? Can you breathe? Come on.”

A second later, Mr. Chibiki had run over to them. As soon as he’d gotten a look at Wakui, he murmured, “Asthma?” then turned back toward Ms. Mikami, who’d run up behind him. “Does this student have asthma?”

But all Ms. Mikami did was dither; she couldn’t answer right away.

“Yes,” Kazami answered for her. “Wakui’s got asthma. His medicine is always…”

Kazami pointed at Wakui’s right hand, which was thrown across the table. He was clinging to a portable inhaler.

“Your medicine…Can you take it?” Mr. Chibiki asked Wakui, but his shoulders were heaving more and more painfully. He was in no condition to answer the question.
Heeee, heeee…
The bizarre sound of his breathing was audible. He was wheezing—no, this was closer to whistling.

Wakui sat in the seat in front of me in class, but this was the first time I’d seen him have an attack like this. Since I’d suffered a collapsed lung twice this year, his difficulty breathing wasn’t hard for me to sympathize with. Pneumothorax and asthma were different, but seeing him, I felt my own breathing start to get more strained…

Mr. Chibiki picked up the inhaler and operated it to pump out the medicine. It made a soft
hssh
noise.

“Ah…It’s empty.” He brought his face close to Wakui’s ear and asked, “Did you bring any spare medicine with you?”

Through his labored gasping, Wakui barely shifted his head from left to right in response. It conveyed his meaning:
No.

“Call an ambulance!” Mr. Chibiki ordered in a loud voice, straightening from his crouch. I had a flicker of memory of the time he’d come running into the classroom immediately after Mr. Kubodera’s suicide. “Ms. Mikami, can you please go and call an ambulance right away?”