13 – Mask

Students who were worn out or got heatstroke during the sports festival could take a break under the tent in the rest area. I brought Tateha there after she scraped her knee, but the school nurse said they had just run out of antiseptic and told us to go get some from the infirmary. I wondered why they were making an injured person do it, but saw the teacher was encouraging a team of cheering students. When I turned to Tateha and gave her a look asking if she was okay to walk, she awkwardly smiled and nodded in response.

Her badly scraped knee was bleeding after a nasty fall during the class relay race. Sand and gravel stuck to the open wound, and if it wasn’t cleaned and sterilized, it was going to get infected. Turning our backs to the sounds of the starting gun and cheers coming from the field, we eventually made it to the infirmary. Gauze and antiseptic were set out where they were easy to find.

“Maybe it’s best if we wash it off first, okay? Go stick your leg under the tap over there. It’s fine, no one will see.”

Aside from the bathrooms, the interior of the school building was marked off limits with cones. Visitors weren’t allowed past, and all of the students were absorbed in the relays taking place. It was weirdly noisy even though there wasn’t a trace of other people, enough to make me feel a little uneasy.

Tateha put her leg in the sink. She was startled by a spray of water when she turned the tap. It was nothing like the stream from a water fountain. Come to think of it, the faucet in the science classroom also sprayed water like that.

“I got wet.”

Even though she was only rinsing the wound on her knee, the blast of water left her leg drenched. The running water streamed down her calf and soaked into the sock bunched up around her ankle.

“Ruri-chan?”

“Oh—yeah. Let’s dry it off and disinfect it. Sit over there, I’ll do it for you.”

Tateha sat on a stool while I applied gauze. Her knee twitched when I dripped the antiseptic on it.

“Does it sting?”

I examined the wound, which had some pretty deep cuts that might scar for the next month. When I looked up at her face, a watery pupil quivered drunkenly.

“…I want you to keep doing that.”

The sound of distant cheering was drowned out by the sound of tinnitus. The ringing turned into the only thing I could hear around me, and I was no longer sure whether I was in a dream or reality. Antiseptic gushed onto the open wound as I squeezed the bottle tight. The liquid was well past being useful. It’s not like an injury gets more sterile the more you put on, and I started to worry the teacher would get mad at how much I’d used.

Once I got the bandage on, I looked up at the clock and saw it was already lunchtime. The schedule had a lunch break coming up once the footraces were over.

“Anyway, how about we go to the classroom?”

Tateha nodded at my suggestion without hesitation. She was so quick, it was like she was about to suggest the same thing.

Obviously, there wasn’t anyone in the classroom, either. Everyone was enjoying lunch in ways they normally couldn’t, like eating on the blue tarp stretched out over the field during lunch or in the clubrooms. It seemed like we were pretty much the only ones who were sticking to routine and had gone through the trouble of coming back inside.

“You were incredible as the relay anchor. I thought we were going to lose because I fell down, but like, you managed to save it.”

“Yeah, I’ve always been fast. I’m not sure why.”

It’s not like I’m an athelete, but I’m as fast as the boys in the 50 m races. I wonder if that’s what they call natural talent. It’s wasted on me, though, because even if I had a talent for sports, I never had the motivation.

“You were so cool when you ran by me that fast.”

I wondered how Tateha saw me. I was no longer the bully I was back then, and I would’ve been thrilled if she saw me from a different perspective now.

“I brought a bento like I said I would.”

You were so cool—I didn’t know what to say to that, so I masked my speechlessness by fetching the lunchbox from my bag. It was a little on the large side since I’d borrowed Father’s. It didn’t fit in Tateha’s small palm.

“Thanks, Ruri-chan. You’re something else. Who would’ve thought a beauty like you would be good at sports and at cooking, eeeeh?”

A beauty? Me…? I put a hand on my cheek and felt my bone structure.

“I think that’s why everyone adores youuu.” She let out a small ‘wow’ when she opened the bento I made.

First, Kururu taught me how to make the braised burdock root, then a meat and potato stew. Later, I was able to make a healthy broccoli and chicken stir fry. I’d garnished the meal with nori and cod roe.

“Is this… a butterfly?”

At Kururu’s suggestion, I first tried to make a heart with the cod roe. But, well… making a bento with a heart in it… yeah, no. I did actually try making a heart with the nori, and it was cute, but… it would mean that… and well… you know… I felt sheepish and changed the shape to hide it.

“You liked butterflies, didn’t you?”

“Huh? I… don’t know about that.”

“Didn’t you wear a butterfly hairpin back in elementary school?”

“Ah, yeah. You’ve got a good memory, huuuh?”

It was only then that I got flustered thinking about just what it said about a woman who remembered the shape of her classmate’s hairpin seven years later. A cold sweat broke out on my back.

“If I had to say, I’m not sure I like butterflies all that much.”

“Oh, really?”

“That… I had something like that for a long time.” For a moment, Tateha looked a little childish as she poked around the edges of a side dish. “Someone got it for me when we went somewhere. I probably… said I wanted it? But I can’t remember more than thaaat.”

“Well, I guess it’s important to you.”

“Maybe? I don’t remember at all.”

I watched Tateha smile at the taste as she ate the meat and potato stew. I felt my heart turning to mush like the potatoes had done when they boiled.

“Hey, Tateha?”

“What’s up, Ruri-chaaan.”

“Did you fall down on purpose during the relay today?”

How should I put it… It was more like her center of gravity was below her instead of in front of her. If someone is running and they trip, they usually fall forward. And yet, it seemed like Tateha intentionally fell in a way that would scrape her knee with as much friction as possible. She didn’t answer, just gave me an ambiguous smile I knew was meant to hide something.

She ate everything in the lunchbox. I was happy to hear her say it was delicious. What a relief. The truth was, though, that there was still an emptiness somewhere in my heart that was never filled or happy, just hungry.

“But… as long as you’re here, I won’t forget anything. I want to turn all of today into a happy memory.”

“Yeah, let’s do it! Let’s make today unforgettable! I’m happy to be here with you if you’re okay with me.”

Tateha’s memories, which had blurred and faded, were connected to personal experience. I didn’t think normal things were good enough to stick. If that was what she wished for, then I wanted to help all I could. If it was something like giving her a piercing like yesterday, I’d happily lend a hand. I wouldn’t just nod along to a request to stab her with a mechanical pencil or choke her, but… I was almost certain I’d probably end up doing it anyway. If it was for Tateha’s sake, I…

“So… I have a request.” Tateha brushed her draped bangs aside and tucked them behind her ear. The transparent stud I put in yesterday was embedded in her plump, round earlobe. And, next to it… was one more piercing.

“You got another one?!”

“Uh-huh, I did it last night. I thought I could use the piercer again, so I did what you did.”

“What? But those are single-use! I think it breaks the spring or something.”

“I see. No wonder it didn’t go all the way through. I had to brute force it.”

Tateha was smiling, but that must have been pretty agonizing. She’d pushed that needle through her ear slowly and deliberately, even though it was designed for a quick, painless puncture. Her new piercing was a hoop-like design that didn’t look like anything I’d ever worn before. It had an austere, machine-like quality to it.

“Even though I got it in, it’s too close to the edge of my ear. It might get torn out by accident.”

The piercing was fairly close to the thinnest part of her earlobe. I wondered if there was much cartilage around it. If not…

I had an idea.

I realized that I might be starting to understand Tateha a little better, though the understanding didn’t make me all that happy.

“Yeah, you catch my drift. So would you?” Tateha gently touched the earring and smiled at me. “Can you yank it out?”