15 – Aptitude

A piercing gaze that reminded me of a bird of prey scanned back and forth between Tateha and me.

"Um, it’s not what it looks like..."

I couldn't find the words to keep going, since my mouth moved before I could get my head in order. I searched my mental filing cabinet for the best explanation for the situation, but every drawer I opened was empty.

A violent gasp in search of oxygen echoed by itself in the classroom when I took my hand away from Tateha's face. The sobbing mixed with her coughs explained the situation far more vividly than anything I could say. Blood dripped from her ear. The piercing was in my hand. Kururu's grimace seemed to become the air itself.

My heart thudded with every step Kururu took towards me. I was found out. It was over. As I felt my heart skipping beats in my chest, my thoughts—unlike my frozen body—began to move. Can I cover this up somehow?

The only thing you can do to pretend that a person's thoughts, their awareness of a situation, never existed is to kill the person in question. I'm not sure how I knew that was why criminals went on crime sprees, but I did, somehow. My right hand unconsciously clenched.

"Kururu..." The trembling voice didn't sound like it was mine.

I started to feel terrified. What would I have done I'd been holding a knife in my right hand instead of a piercing?

"Stop, you can explain later. Getting medical treatment for Asami-san's more important."

Kururu turned and hurried over to Tateha, who was crouched down and clutching her ear. If I was the type of person who could kill without a second thought, maybe I could've already killed her. She was too trusting.

"Asami-san, I'm going to call an ambulance now."

No, I was wrong about that. She was just more concerned with Tateha's well-being than she was the growing danger. That was exactly who she was—a person who would risk her own life to protect others. The very definition of virtue. Righteous. So what did that make me?

I was someone spurred on by ill-formed logic and justifications—not even a hypocrite.

"No, it's fine, Kururu-chan. Thanks though."

Kururu, who was trying to call an ambulance on her phone, stopped when Tateha flashed a smile that was still in the process of forming.

"But you're bleeding."

"It's already slowing dooown! Basically, I didn't know how to take my earring out and Ruri-chan gave me a hand. But then my foot slipped and it got ripped ouuut."

"Ripped out...?"

"Right, Ruri-chan?"

The ringing in my ears was awful. My nose was filled with the smell of blood. I was at least aware of my eyes shooting open, despite feeling completely overwhelmed by a headache and dizziness. My muted consciousness was still frantically looking for a way out of the situation.

"Yeah, that's right."

I sighed in relief. There was nothing good-natured about that relief. I'm sure it was just because I'd protected myself.

It was the same thing as when I stabbed Tateha in the eye, for sure. I only thought about myself. I got the cold sweats worrying about what would become of me, and not a thing about Tateha or the blood coming from her eye.

I thought I had changed. That I was different from who I was back then. That my wanting to be a virtuous human had made it this far.

—That's the sort of thing... they call irreversible.

It can't be changed. It wasn't possible for a person to change their true nature, no matter how many years passed or how much they struggled.

"So you don't need to worry, Kururu-chan. I'll get some gauze from the office and bounce right back."

"If you're okay with that... I guess it's fine. But you're okay, really?"

"Jeez, I already told you I was fiiine. And sorry, Ruri-chan, it's all my fault. That really scared you, didn't it?"

"Huh? Oh... yeah, I was scared. Tateha, uh, missed a step and... fell. That happened."

A kakaka mixed in with Tateha's laughter. I was... laughing.

After Kururu gave Tateha a once-over, she went to her own seat and took a water bottle out of her bag.

"So why was your hand on—"

Kururu looked for an explanation with a grimace like she was tackling a hard question. Although she was terrible at studying, it's not like she was stupid. I wonder what her image of me was in her crystal-clear pupils. The same close friend as always? Or...

"Nevermind, the cheerleading contest starts in the afternoon, so make sure you're not late. You *are* a sports festival committee member, after all."

"Gotcha! Already on my way~"

My voice was back to normal already. I wasn't sure how I was pretending to be composed. Lying wasn't my forte. Managing my behavior to camoflage my own thoughts and feelings was where I excelled. What's the word for making fun of a human like that again? The letters suddenly flashed through my mind, but vanished as if they were carried off by a wave.

---

We all started putting away the chairs brought out to the field once the sports festival's closing cermony was over. After we were done, everyone started going their separate ways, but the class was getting excited by talk of an afterparty.

"You're coming too, right, Ayama-san?! I mean, I want you to come!"

"Of course I am! Ah, I know a good karaoke booth, let's go there! It's suuuuuuper cheap!"

Let's go home, then meet up in front of the station. I quickly took over that conversation. I was good at making plans and handling the preparations, which was why I always took care of them. I'm at the center of groups and run them like a natural leader. That hadn't changed since elementary school. Everyone relied on me because of that, and they came to me whenever something happened.

I also gave advice to worried girls. I never said anything dismissive, but it was nothing more than empty chatter and tall-tales that got praise. It was the opposite of the criminal things I did in my dark past.

Everyone has their own opinions, their own likes and dislikes. But it's not good to speak ill of people. That ill will is bound to get worse. So find compromises. If you can't do that, ignore them. Yeah, the worst thing you can do is hurt someone.

"Hey, Tateha."

Tateha was left behind as the only one in the classroom when all of our classmates rushed off for the afterparty. Did that mean she'd been intentionally left out? Or had they just forgotten to invite her?

"Will you come to the afterparty?"

"Is that okay? I wasn't invited."

"I think everyone's invited. I'm sure they want you to come, too."

That's how people should be. That's how people should behave. My opinion was molded by knowing that kind of thing, so it was only worth as much as an imitation.

"Sure. Thanks, Ruri-chan."

The gauze wrapped around her ear was a bit red from bleeding.

"You should go change that real quick."

"Huh?"

"There's blood seeping though."

Someone will ask what happened if you leave it like that. That's why you should replace the gauze. We'll be found out.

It didn't matter how much of a detour I had to take if there was a purpose for it. It was okay to take a while. I was patient, like a hyena circling around a weakened fawn. I was scary like that.

How should I say this... Sometimes my personality, my thoughts, detached from my body and went off in a totally unintended direction. It seemed like bullying Tateha was one of those times.

I met all kinds of people between elementary school and high school. The chemistry you have, what you like and dislike, can change a lot depending on the person, and that kind of thing is how rifts between people are born. It's a really common sight, and anyone can go down that road. But bullying and trying to ostracize someone just because you didn't take a liking to them isn't a common sight. You endure it and deal with it, even if it's a kid no one likes or you're awkward around. People like me are a tiny fraction of the whole.

What makes a kid who bullies someone different from a kid who doesn't? It seems there is a certain percentage of  incredibly thoughtless humans who hurt others that can disappear into the crowd. And I was one of those kid bullies.

When society reports on criminals who hurt someone, it asks what kind of person they were as children. If you look at statistics, it seems easy enough to judge.

When Kururu found us today, I thought about what I could do to use the object in my right hand to hurt and kill someone.

Isn't my other, detached side eventually going to hurt someone important to me? Aren't I eventually... going to kill someone? After all, I had the personality for it.

My eyes hurt like they were being crushed when I thought about it.

"Tateha!"

I shouldered my bag and grabbed her by the arm as she tried to go home. She had a blank look of puzzlement and glanced at my lips.

"What's up, Ruri-chan?" Her eyes were bloodshot, filled with expectation as she imagined what could happen next. Only her right eye, the eye I killed, didn't have the blood pumping through it.

That's right, I killed it, didn't I? If I'd done that already, going back to a normal human was unreasonable. Impossible, right?

—If you're atoning for a crime, I'm happy to help. I had been carrying the weight of Kururu's words and was about to be crushed by the weight of them. I bit my tongue from the sensation of my own warped sense of ethics being forced back in line.

Right—I wanted to atone for my sins.

Saying I wanted to change was selfish. I wasn't thinking about Tateha, I only wanted to justify myself. If that was had been thinking about her, I should have asked if she was okay and run over to hold out a hand. Like Kururu did.

"I want to stop this already."

Her sparkling eyes turned cloudy, like they were filling with mud. The low voice she occasionally used leaked from the opening between her lips.

"Why?"

"I feel like it's bad to keep going like this. If we keep it up, I... I'm eventually going to end up killing you."

Stabbing her thigh, strangling her, ripping off an ear. So, what next...?

The reality was that I never questioned any of my actions as they escalated. My sense of what was safe to do was also becoming blurrier. I didn't even have to think about where this was headed. Eventually, I might squeeze her head off with no remorse.

"So let's stop... with that kind of thing already."

"You won't do it even if I ask for it?"

"I understand why you want to do it—you like being in pain, you want to make memories, and stuff like that. But come on, but do you really have to be in pain to make memories?"

"That's not possible anymore..."

"It is possible! It absolutely is."

"Well then... you're fine with that?" Tateha made a gruesome smile. It felt like I could see white fangs in her mouth. "Should I spill your secrets to everyone?! We even managed to go another day without being found out, too..."

Maybe our relationship had already gone past a point of no return.

The eyes that watched me from now on might change for the worse.

"Maybe that's how you'll never get invited to afterparties again, Ruri-chan. You'll lose everyone's trust, live with stares that look down on you, and school will drag on and on... Do you want to deal with the swarms of horseflies when you're all by yourself at that Shinto shrine again?!"

I said I would atone for my sins, so I definitely won't hide my past crimes. To face your sins is to clean. Spending day after day doing nothing but scrubbing away at tiles coated in filth is my only path to innocence. I can't think about protecting myself. It's natural for me to feel worn out and bitter. Keep scrubbing. Believe filth comes off eventually and that one day those tiles will be a sparkling white.

"That's fine."

I had the aptitude for killing someone. That was why it was easy for me to bully people. I was born incapable of feeling guilt, even when I saw faces contort in pain. That's how my brain was structured.

"Even if you tell the others, it's fine."

"...Everything you've through pains to build will come crashing down. You’re even okay with that?"

I was definitely the same type of insane person that police arrest on TV. The truth was, though, I thought seeing a person like that was hideous. I absolutely didn't want to end up being treated like that.

"I don't want to hurt you anymore. Even if it's painful or difficult for me. I'm done with all of it, no matter how much you beg me."

"Even if you stop, you won't change. Here, Ruri-chan, look. Look at my right eye. You're the one who crushed it! It's impossible to change after that, you're the type of person who can do that and you can do it when you're asked and it has to be you that does it!"

I shook my head. "I won't do it."

A wave crashed over Tateha's eyes and they began to ripple. The bewilderment and longing spreading on that watery surface were about to splash against my heart.

"So, do what you want. Go ahead and tell the others about me."

I didn't empathize with peoples' pain, but I wanted to become someone who could. I wanted to become a person who can control my distress and conflicts, as well as the anger and destructive impulses that followed. I wanted to change.

"I'm going to shoulder the past and move on."

Let all of the empty chatter and lip service I've given people fall back on me as a curse.

While the depths of Tateha's stared at me in disappointment, she muttered 'fine', then turned her back on me and disappeared into the hallway.