Volume 5 Short Story

 In this life that isn’t all that long, today is the most restless day I’ve ever known.

The reason is simple: everything around me is new.

An unfamiliar bookshelf and bed.

A closet, and the view beyond the window.

This room, where the move has only just been completed, still hasn’t become my room.

If I were to open the cardboard boxes packed with the old me and take out what’s inside, perhaps it would begin to feel a little more like my room. But since I only arrived at this house today, I don’t have the energy for that.

“Ah, what should I do.”

My voice rises, and my breathing catches.

Still, Sendai-san, who lives in this house, hasn’t come back yet.

I feel guilty toward her, but I’m the one who made her go out.

It was simply because handling both the moving company and Sendai-san at the same time was impossible for me. If I could only manage one side, then having Sendai-san leave was the only option.

She said, “You don’t have to keep me company or anything,” but having someone else there while I’m dealing with other people makes me nervous, and I’d end up searching for reasons to keep her at a distance with one excuse or another.

When I thought about it that way, it felt easier to have her go somewhere until all the luggage had been carried in.

I sit down on the bed I bought for this room.

The way it feels beneath me is different, so I stand up again.

Even though it’s mine, this bed that doesn’t feel like mine strongly reminds me that I’ve come to a new place. My brows knit without my noticing, and when I throw myself onto the bed with an “eii” and bury my face in the pillow, a scent different from the pillow I’ve always used greets me. Even when I lift my face, I can’t escape the unfamiliar smell. It’s because this room is new to me as well, and the feeling begins to creep in that coming here might’ve been a mistake.

On the day of graduation, I was the one who decided to room-share with Sendai-san.

She was the one who laid out the choices, but I was the one who placed the necklace around her neck and chose the cherry-pink envelope. I hesitated, but I decided to become roommates with her in a new place.

Even so, I think I’m anxious.

The unfamiliar room.

The unfamiliar furniture.

The unfamiliar scenery.

And even Sendai-san, who’s supposed to be familiar.

For me, everything is new. The feelings that had been looking forward until I came here are turning backward, and I want to run away.

After my mother was gone, even though I lived with my father, I continued a life in which my father wasn’t there.

The house was a place where someone besides me was meant to be, yet that someone never came home.

But this house is different.

It’s a place where someone besides me exists, and that someone will definitely come home. Sendai-san isn’t here right now, but she’ll be back soon. Then we’ll eat together, study, read books. Depending on the situation, she might even talk with me.

So from now on, I’ll be living in this house with Sendai-san, whether she’s in the next room or in the shared space.

I already knew that, but this life is so different from the one I’ve always lived that I can’t quite settle down.

A house where someone comes home. Something like that has never existed within me.

Even so, I don’t want to return to a house where no one ever comes home either.

I turn over and lie on my back.

Here, there’s no morning or night when I’m completely alone.

I probably won’t wake up in the middle of the night anymore, afraid that someone might be standing behind me.

Beyond this wall, beyond that door, somewhere, Sendai-san is there.

For at least the next four years, I won’t have to live in fear of the darkness.

Promises aren’t absolute, and they can be broken, but as long as I don’t place huge expectations on them, it should be fine.

I squeeze my eyes shut, then open them again.

Sendai-san tries to make me choose everything, and sometimes she lies, but since I already understand what kind of person she is, it’s not a problem.

Since sharing a room was something that “never existed” to begin with, even if the deadline suddenly changes, it’ll be okay.

If I prepare my heart for that possibility in advance, I should be able to endure whatever happens.

Even if I end up living alone, as long as I’ve already thought, “that could happen,” I should be fine.

I let out a sigh toward the ceiling.

When I consider it as a whole, moving seems to have more advantages than disadvantages, yet I keep searching for bad futures, feeding myself anxiety.

This isn’t good.

Even though I don’t feel like it, maybe I should start unpacking the room.

If I just lie here doing nothing, my head will fill up with thoughts I shouldn’t be thinking.

I get up and open the cardboard box labeled “stuffed animals” among the many boxes.

From inside, I take out the crocodile tissue cover and the black cat plush.

I place the crocodile beneath the table.

It would be better to put tissues inside it, but there aren’t any tissues among the moving boxes.

If I asked Sendai-san, she’d probably bring some from somewhere, but since she isn’t here right now, the crocodile will have to remain empty for the time being.

I start to place the black cat plush on the bed, then pause to think.

This is my room, but unlike before the move, it’s a place that other people can easily enter.

I don’t think Sendai-san would come into this room without permission, but there’s always the possibility of “what if.”

“Stay over here.”

I place the black cat on the bookshelf.

One stuffed animal on an empty shelf with no books yet.

The black cat looks unbearably lonely, so I stroke its small head and tell it,

“I’ll bring books soon.”

“Which ones were they again?”

I check the boxes and open the one labeled “books.”

I place a few of my favorites behind the black cat.

Then I hear a knock at the door.

“Miyagi.”

Sendai-san’s voice reaches me, so I open the door slightly.

“I’m home.”

For some reason I can’t quite understand, Sendai-san says it cheerfully.

“Welcome back.”

I say words I hardly ever use and step out into the shared space.

I close the door and look at Sendai-san.

In the house where my father never came home, there was never an occasion to say “welcome back.”

So although I sometimes said “I’m home” to an empty house, I almost never had the chance to say “welcome back.”

Even now, the phrase doesn’t feel natural on my tongue. It isn’t a phrase I dislike.

Until yesterday, it was almost as though there was no one who needed my “welcome home.” But here, there is a person who do. It feels, in some quiet way, like one of the reasons I’m here, and it doesn’t feel bad at all. The “welcome home” Sendai-san said to me when I first arrived wasn’t unpleasant either. It made me think that this place could truly be somewhere I belong.

The new house is filled with things I still haven’t grown used to, but the way “I’m home” and “welcome home” are connected doesn’t seem like a bad thing.

“Miyagi, how’s your room? Do you think you can unpack on your own?”

“Yeah, probably. For now, I’ve at least made the bed usable.”

I haven’t opened most of the cardboard boxes yet, but there’s still time before university starts, so I can take it slowly.

“Do you want some help unpacking?”

“No, it’s fine. Sendai-san, you should finish your own room.”

“I’m basically done already, so I can help.”

“It’s okay. I can manage by myself.”

It’s not that there’s anything I’d be embarrassed for her to see, but I want to arrange my own belongings myself and shape my own space. I once made Sendai-san organize my bookshelf, but this is different. If I’m going to build a room from nothing, I want to handle every part of it on my own.

“Can I see your room, Miyagi?”

Sendai-san points behind me.

“No. It’s not properly cleaned yet.”

I have no intention of showing her a room cluttered with scattered cardboard boxes.

If I’m going to let her in, it’ll be after everything’s been neatly arranged, not now.

“Oh, right. Miyagi, where did you put your bed?”

As she says that, Sendai-san smiles brightly.

“Why are you asking something like that?”

“Just curious. Mine’s along this wall. What about yours?”

The finger that had pointed behind me earlier now indicates a different place. Judging from the direction, “this” must mean the wall that separates my room from Sendai-san’s.

“Same. Along this wall.”

I didn’t have any particular preference about where to place the bed.

Still, somehow it felt better knowing someone was close by, so I set it against the wall adjoining Sendai-san’s room.

“Then maybe we could talk through the wall at night.”

Sendai-san says something absurd.

“That would bother the neighbors, so I’m not doing that.”

“I’m joking. If we made enough noise for the neighbors to complain, that’d be a problem.”

Still wearing that bright smile, Sendai-san sits down on one of the chairs in the shared space. Then she looks at me and says, “It feels a little strange, doesn’t it?”

“Strange how?”

“That I don’t have to go home anymore.”

“…Sendai-san, do you want to go back?”

“I’m not going back. That’s why I’m here.”

“…For all four years?”

“For all four years.”

The conversation comes to a halt, and Sendai-san’s voice fades from the shared space. Since I don’t speak either, an odd silence settles between us, heavy and faintly uncomfortable.

“Sendai-san. Is there any boxed tissue in this house?”

If I let the silence stretch any longer, it’ll only grow more uncomfortable, so I bring up the small thing I’ve just realized is missing.

“I have some in my room. Should I bring it?”

“Not right now, but if there’s extra, I’d like a box.”

“Got it. I’ll give you one later.”

Sendai-san says it softly, and almost at once the silence settles over us again.

We’ve only shifted from being former classmates to being roommates. Nothing significant has truly changed. And yet, whenever we’re alone together, we don’t seem to know how to fill the time.

“Ah, that’s right! Miyagi. Why don’t we celebrate moving in?”

Sendai-san must feel it too, because she suddenly speaks up in a bright, raised voice.

“You don’t have to. … I’m going to the convenience store.”

This is unbearable.

Rather than staying here and sitting through this atmosphere, it’s better to step outside.

“The convenience store? Is there something you need?”

“I’m just hungry.”

“Then let’s go eat together.”

“The convenience store is fine.”

If I’m going out, it has to be alone, or there’s no point. If she comes with me, I’ll only carry this vague awkwardness along, and nothing will change from staying here.

“I see. Then take me with you too. You don’t know where it is, right?”

“I do. I saw one on the way here.”

“You might get lost if you’ve only seen it once.”

“I won’t. And you don’t have to come just for me. I’ll buy something for you too. What do you want?”

“I want to decide when I see it, so I’m coming with you.”

Sendai-san rises from the chair and smiles.

No matter how I look at it, she’s completely determined to come along, and it’s irritating. It’s not as if I urgently need to go to the convenience store, so I could just let Sendai-san go alone. But if I say, “Go by yourself,” she’ll definitely reply, “Then I won’t go either,” and refuse to move from here.

Even after all this time apart, Sendai-san is still such a handful.

And yet, at the same time, I think that’s precisely what makes her Sendai-san.

“Miyagi. Since it’s our first day as roommates, let’s go together, okay?”

She says it lightly, with no intention whatsoever of backing down.

But I don’t like the idea of making a “celebration” out of it. Having someone unilaterally decide that today is some kind of special occasion is troublesome.

“Today’s just an ordinary day.”

“Well, even on an ordinary day, people usually go to the convenience store together, don’t they?”

“…I guess.”

With Sendai-san blocking every escape, I find myself out of arguments.

At this point, continuing to refuse something as trivial as going to the convenience store together makes me feel like I’m the unreasonably selfish one.

“Then it’s settled. I want to stop by my room for a moment, so wait here.”

With that, Sendai-san returns to her room.

She really is pushy.

Even after graduating high school, she still decides my answers for me.

I let out a quiet breath.

A new life carries all sorts of anxieties, yet the fact that Sendai-san remains exactly as she’s always been brings me a small sense of reassurance. I don’t know whether we’ll manage living together smoothly, but I do think I’d like our days to be at least as ordinary as they were in high school.

I’m not confident, though.

I go to my room and pick up my bag.

Then, in the shared space, I place my hand against the door of my new room.

“I’m heading out.”

I murmur it under my breath and sit down in the chair she had chosen, waiting for Sendai-san.