The Sigh of Haruhi Suzumiya (3 page)

Haruhi glared at me with chastising eyes as I silently drank my tea.

“Hmph.”

With a flip of her hair, she returned to the chief’s desk. Slurp. She made a face like she was drinking boiling, bitter medicine.

Asahina, relieved, returned to her service, pouring tea into Nagato’s cup and placing it in front of the reading girl.

Nagato didn’t even flinch. She remained fixed on her hardcover. You should have at least showed a little gratitude. It’d probably take Taniguchi three days to finish savoring that tea.

“…”

Nagato continued flipping through the pages without looking up. Since that was how it always was, Asahina didn’t actually mind and went to put her own teacup on standby.

That was when the fifth brigade member walked in, despite the fact that no one would have cared if he never showed up.

“Terribly sorry I’m late. Homeroom lasted longer than usual.”

The one who opened the door with a seemingly harmless smile beaming on his face would be, according to Haruhi, the mysterious transfer student, Itsuki Koizumi. With a smile like that on his face, I would never introduce him, as a friend, to my girlfriend. That is, if I had one.

“It appears I’m the last one. I apologize if I delayed the meeting. Or should I treat everyone to something?”

“Meeting? What’s that? I didn’t hear anything about a meeting.”

“I forgot to tell you,” Haruhi said as she rested her chin in her hands. “I told everyone else during lunch. Just figured I could tell you whenever.”

“How can you have time to go to other classrooms yet not find time to tell the person sitting in front of you in your own classroom?”

“Who cares? It’s all the same anyway. The issue isn’t what you heard or when you heard it, but what you’re doing right now.”

Her words may sound impressive on the surface, but it has been well established that anything she does only serves to worsen my mood.

“Moving on, time to think about what to do now!”

Do a better job of distinguishing between now as in this very instant or now as in the near future. And would the subject of that sentence be a singular I or a plural we?

“Of course, I mean all of us. This will be an SOS Brigade event.”

“Event?” I asked.

“Weren’t you listening? The only event this time of year is the cultural festival!”

“That isn’t a brigade event. It is a school event. If you wanted to promote the cultural festival so badly, you should have run in the elections for the executive committee. You’d be flooded with pointless menial tasks to do.”

“That would defeat the purpose. We need to create an SOS Brigade–style activity. I’ve spent too much effort building up this brigade! Not a soul in this school should be able to say that they don’t know about this super-hot group,” Haruhi said.

What would constitute an SOS Brigade–style activity? I thought back on the SOS Brigade activities over the past six months and became a bit depressed.

You have it easy since you just throw out whatever idea comes to your mind, but what about the suffering Asahina and I have to go through? Koizumi just smiles shrewdly and Nagato is absolutely no help when it comes to brainstorming. Ah, I guess Asahina isn’t exactly normal, but she’s cute, so that makes it all okay. She just needs to stand there as a treat for my eyes and a balm for my weary soul.

“We have to meet their expectations,” Haruhi said with a contemplative look on her face.

Who exactly is expecting anything from the SOS Brigade? That’s worth having a survey about. And I don’t see how you’ve built up this brigade when our standing is still below that of a student association and our number of members hasn’t increased. Since more members would only complicate the situation, I can live without them, but the way things look now, this derailed Haruhi express is going to keep skidding on. And the only passengers are the five of us. I’d like to find a scapegoat to take my place. I’ll even pay an hourly wage. I’m willing to give a hundred yen per.

Haruhi drained her first cup in thirty seconds and requested a second from Asahina.

“What about you, Mikuru? What are you guys doing?”

“Um… you mean my class? A yakisoba café…”

“You’re probably a waitress, right?”

Asahina’s eyes widened.

“How did you know? I wanted to cook, but everyone told me to be a waitress…”

Haruhi had a contemplative look on her face again. Based on experience, that look in her eyes meant she couldn’t be thinking about anything good. And those eyes were glancing toward the garment rack. The expression on her face suggested she had just realized that she had yet to put Asahina in a waitress outfit.

Now Haruhi had a brooding look on her face.

“What about your class, Koizumi?”

Koizumi shrugged slightly. “We’ve decided to do a play, but the class is divided between doing an original work and a classical piece. The cultural festival is fast approaching yet they are still debating. It’s a fierce argument, so some time will be needed before a conclusion can be reached.”

How lucky of you to be in such a lively class. Sounds like a pain, though.

“Hmm.”

Haruhi’s floating gaze drifted to the remaining member, who had yet to speak a word.

“Yuki?”

The book-loving pseudo-alien looked up like a prairie dog sensing rain.

“Fortune-telling,” she responded in her usual flat voice.

“Fortune-telling?” I unconsciously echoed.

“Yes.”

Nagato nodded with a face devoid of expression, like she wasn’t even breathing.

“You’re telling fortunes?

“Yes.”

Nagato telling fortunes? Sure you don’t mean telling the future? I pictured Nagato in black pointy hat and robe and holding out a crystal ball before a couple and saying, “You will break up in fifty-eight days, three hours, and five minutes,” with a straight face. You could lie, you know.

Then again, I don’t actually know if Nagato can see the future.

“So Asahina’s class is running a refreshment booth, Koizumi’s is doing a play, and Nagato’s is holding a fortune-telling convention. They all sound infinitely more fun than the listless survey our class is doing. Yeah, how’s this? Let’s combine everything and do a fortune-telling survey play café,” I suggested.

“Stop sounding like an idiot. Let’s get this meeting started.”

Haruhi instantly rejected my valuable opinion and walked over to the whiteboard. She tapped the board with a long antenna-like pointer.

“There’s nothing written on it. What am I supposed to be looking at?”

“There will be soon. Mikuru, you’re the secretary, so take down every word I say.”

I had no idea when Asahina became the secretary. I doubted anyone did. Apparently, Haruhi just decided that a moment ago.

Asahina, tea girl and now secretary, held a felt-tip pen, stood next to the whiteboard, and looked up at Haruhi’s face next to her.

And then Haruhi suddenly spoke in a triumphant voice.

“We, the SOS Brigade, will be screening a movie!”

I really don’t know what kind of mutation is going on inside of Haruhi’s head. I’ll just not think about it. It’s nothing new. Still, this isn’t a meeting. It’s just you delivering a speech on general policy, isn’t it?

“…”

“That’s how it always is,” Koizumi whispered to me.

The elegant smile he had made me want to draw on his face. His graceful lips remained curved up.

“Suzumiya had decided what we were going to do from the very beginning. That doesn’t leave any room for discussion. Now then, did you say something you shouldn’t have again?”

Pretty sure I didn’t say anything remotely related to movies today. Maybe she saw a low-budget C-movie late last night and its crappiness put her in a miserable mood?

“There’s something I’ve always wondered about,” Haruhi continued cheerfully, convinced that her speech had touched every member in the audience.

“…”

I’m wondering about what exactly is inside your head.

“You often see people die in the last episode of TV shows and the like. Doesn’t that feel really unnatural? Why do they just happen to die at that time? It’s strange. That’s why I hate anything where someone dies at the end. I would never make a movie like that!”

“Are you talking about movies or TV shows?”

“I said that we’re going to screen a movie, didn’t I? Even those old earthen statues from the Tumulus period had better ears than you. Imprint every word I say into your memory with no mistakes.”

If I’m gonna bother memorizing your insane babbling, it’d be much more productive to memorize every last station on the rail line that runs nearby.

Asahina wrote
movie screening
in round letters that really didn’t look like the handwriting of a former calligraphy club member. Haruhi took a glance before nodding, satisfied.

“There you have it. We’re all under agreement then?”

She sounded as cheerful as a weather forecaster verifying the end of the rainy season.

“What do you even mean?” I asked.

A natural response. All I know is that we’re screening a movie. Who’s going to hook us up with a film? Does she have an acquaintance at Buena Vista International or something?

But Haruhi’s eyes continued to shine with reckless abandon.

“Kyon, you’re not too bright. We’re going to make a movie. And then we’ll screen it at the cultural festival. With
Presented by the SOS Brigade
in the credits!”

“When did we turn into the film society?”

“What are you talking about? This will absolutely be the SOS Brigade. I don’t remember turning into a stupid film society.”

If the film society people were to hear those words, they’d probably be pissed.

“It’s already been decided. Double jeopardy! Plea bargaining will be ignored!”

If the SOS Brigade jury foreman says so, then I guess the verdict won’t be overturned. Who the hell put Haruhi in the leadership position… or now that I think about it, she put herself in that position. Looks like loud and eager people are the ones who become important no matter what world you’re in. Consequently, good Samaritans who tend to go with the flow like Asahina and me end up being abused. That’s just one of the contradictions in the reality of this cruel and heartless world.

I pondered the profound subject of what could be considered an ideal society.

“I see.”

Koizumi interrupted like he had just figured something out. He smiled at both Haruhi and me.

“I understand perfectly.”

Hey, Koizumi. Don’t just accept the bomb Haruhi dropped on us. Don’t you have your own opinion on this?

Koizumi gently flipped the forelocks of his hair.

“In other words, we’re going to make an independent film, gather an audience, and screen the movie. Am I correct?”

“You are correct!”

Haruhi continued tapping the board with her antenna, and Asahina’s shoulders flinched. Regardless, Asahina mustered the courage to voice her question.

“But… why did you decide to make a movie?”

“Last night, I was having trouble getting to sleep.”

Haruhi waved the antenna in front of her face like a windshield wiper.

“So I turned on the TV, and there was this weird movie on. Didn’t really want to watch it, but I didn’t have anything else to do, so I did.”

Figured as much.

“And it was such a horrible movie, so bad I wanted to make an international prank call to the director’s house. So then I thought”—she stuck the tip of the pointer at Asahina’s petite face as she continued—“if this is the best they can do, I can make a movie that’s much better!”

“…”

Haruhi puffed up her chest, full of confidence.

“So I figured that it was worth a shot. You have a problem with that?”

Asahina furiously shook her head like she was terrified. Even if she did have a complaint, she would never voice it. Koizumi was just a yes-man. Nagato never said anything to begin with, which meant it was inevitable for me to speak up.

“I don’t care if you’re aiming to be a movie director or to be a producer. You can do whatever you want with your life. And so the rest of us can do whatever we wish and want, right?”

“What are you talking about?” Haruhi puckered her lips like a duck’s bill.

I patiently explained to her, “You say you want to make a movie. We haven’t said anything yet. If we say we don’t want to, what would you do? A director isn’t enough to make a movie.”

“Don’t worry. I’ve got most of the script thought through.”

“No, what I’m trying to say is that—”

“There’s nothing for you to fret about. Just follow me like always. No need to worry.”

I’m worried.

“Leave the planning to me. I’ll take care of everything.”

Now I’m even more worried.

“You sure complain a lot. I said we’re gonna do it, which means we’re gonna do it. Our goal is to place first in the cultural festival’s best-event poll! Then that unreasonable student council may even recognize the SOS Brigade as a club—no! I’ll definitely make them recognize us. Which means that first, we need public opinion on our side!”

Public opinion and poll results aren’t necessarily correlated.

I attempted to put up resistance.

“What about production costs?”

“We have a budget.”

Where? I can’t see the student council giving a budget to this brigade, which moves rather openly for an underground organization.

“We have the literary club’s cut.”

“That would be the literary club’s budget. It’s not for you to use.”

“But Yuki said it was fine.”

Good grief. I looked at Nagato’s face. She deliberately looked up at me without saying a word before returning to her book.

You sure nobody wants to join the literary club? Not that I’m gonna ask, but I wouldn’t be surprised if Nagato had driven this club to the verge of being cut. Apparently, she knew beforehand that Haruhi would be showing up. I sure feel sorry for anyone who had their heart set on joining the literary club. If you’re out there, do work hard to reclaim what was originally the literary club back from Haruhi.

Haruhi, oblivious to my inner monologue, waved her antenna around.