Volume 7 Interlude

I'd made a promise with Miyagi to go somewhere together, but no destination came to mind.

Wanting to make good on that promise with somewhere she'd actually enjoy, I'd asked, "Isn't there anywhere you want to go?" only for her to reply with something along the lines of, "I'll just stay home." After that, time slipped by without us ever deciding on a destination. Home was where she wanted to be, not somewhere she wanted to go. That was so like Miyagi, always tossing me answers I never saw coming.

Because of that, a promise that would've been simple to keep with anyone else had already run into trouble before we'd even settled on where to go.

I flopped onto the floor, pulled the platypus tissue-box cover closer, and rested it on my stomach.

"Don't you know any good places?"

I asked the platypus, taking its soft little hand in mine.

The platypus sprawled across my stomach was the one Miyagi had picked out from a mountain of tissue-box covers when we'd gone shopping for an electric kettle. Looking at its vacant little face made me think it might be nice to visit somewhere filled with things like this, but the only image that came to mind was Miyagi saying she wanted to go home. She didn't seem to dislike cute things, but she'd never once said she liked them, either.

"Hmm... cute things. Tissue-box covers, platypuses, crocodiles... a zoo."

It wasn't just the platypus tissue-box cover. Back in high school, Miyagi had kept a crocodile tissue-box cover in her room, and she'd even known about a dog breed called a borzoi, which I'd never even heard of. I'd asked her once if she liked animals, and she'd denied it, but I still couldn't shake the feeling that she probably did. Cute things seemed to catch her eye too, but animals felt like the stronger connection, so a zoo didn't seem like a bad idea. Crocodiles weren't exactly unusual, but if there were a place where she could see a platypus, I thought it might make her happy.

There was just one problem.

A zoo in the middle of summer would be unbearably hot. I couldn't picture dragging Miyagi around beneath the blazing sun, and if possible, I wanted to take her somewhere cooler. Besides, she'd already used the heat as a reason she didn't want to go out.

"...I wonder if there's anywhere besides a zoo where you can see a platypus."

I picked up my phone and searched for indoor places where I might be able to see one.

The results disappointed me almost immediately.

"Platypuses... there isn't even anywhere in Japan where you can see one, let alone indoors."

That brought me right back to where I'd started, and I let out a quiet sigh.

If there wasn't anywhere in Japan to see a platypus, then I couldn't think of a place that might make Miyagi happy.

"Platypus, crocodile, platypus, crocodile..."

It wasn't exactly a word-association game, but as I stroked the platypus's head, I searched for something those two animals had in common.

That's it.

The connection surfaced all at once.

Both platypuses and crocodiles lived near water.

"An aquarium."

Given the things Miyagi seemed interested in, it didn't sound like a bad choice.

Unlike a zoo, most of an aquarium was indoors, so even if it was packed during summer vacation, it wouldn't be nearly as hot. We probably wouldn't get to see crocodiles, but I didn't think they were what she really wanted to see in the first place. I had no idea whether Miyagi liked fish, but she'd never said she disliked them, either. And if there was even a chance they'd catch her interest, then an aquarium felt like the sort of place where we might still enjoy ourselves even if we hardly talked.

I sat up and settled the platypus in my lap.

Then I searched for aquariums on my phone.

So many appeared that I couldn't decide between them, and absentmindedly tugged on the platypus's hand.

I couldn't pick anywhere that required an overnight stay. If I was going to stick to Miyagi's conditions, it had to be somewhere we could visit and come home the same day.

That narrowed the list considerably.

"I wonder if there's somewhere nice nearby."

I searched for aquariums within the range Miyagi wouldn't complain about and found several that fit the conditions she'd laid out. One by one, I opened their official websites.

If we were going, I wanted to choose the aquarium most likely to make Miyagi happy.

The surest option would've been to let her choose herself, but I couldn't imagine her giving me an honest answer. If I asked, she'd definitely just say, "You decide, Sendai-san."

Big fish and little fish.

Dolphins, seals, penguins.

There would be plenty of other things to see, too, but I wanted to take her somewhere that displayed whatever might make her happiest in the most beautiful way possible.

"I wonder what's the most fun thing to look at in an aquarium."

I held the platypus's hand.

I couldn't picture Miyagi smiling.

If it were me...

What would I want to see?

I'd been to an aquarium before.

But I was little then, and the memories had long since grown hazy.

They weren't memories I particularly wanted to revisit, either.

Because every one of them included my family.

I'd gone to aquariums several times.

The most recent memory was from when I was in the second grade of elementary school.

Standing beside me was my older sister, two years ahead of me.

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"Onee-chan, there's a weird fish."

[T/N- Onee-chan = Big sis]

Standing in front of one of the tanks, I tugged on my sister's sleeve.

"Which one?"

"That long, skinny one."

I pointed at a slender silver fish that shimmered beneath the lights.

"Hmm... that's a cutlassfish."

"What kind of fish is it?"

"Apparently it's really good to eat."

"Oh, really."

Watching my sister cheerfully explain it, I nodded.

"Yeah. It said so in a book."

"Then what about that one?"

This time I pointed toward a tank where countless tiny fish swam together so closely they looked like a single giant fish, just like the one I'd seen in a picture book.

"Those are probably sardines."

"Sardines! I know those. They're the fish you can eat, right?"

"Yeah. We had them for dinner the other day, remember?"

"Yeah, they were really good."

"I want to eat them again."

My sister smiled as she said it, and together we watched the school of sardines for a while before moving on to the next tank.

Then we stopped.

"Onee-chan. What's that?"

Resting on the bottom of the tank was a strange-looking fish I'd never seen before.

"It's a bullhead shark."

The answer I'd been waiting for came back from my sister without the slightest hesitation.

I didn't know much about fish, but my sister had proudly announced, "I studied up on them," the moment we entered the aquarium, so every question I asked was met with an immediate answer.

My sister was amazing.

No matter what I wanted to know, she could always teach me.

She was almost never wrong.

"Is it called a bullhead shark because it looks like a cat?"

"They say it's because those bumps above its eyes look like a cat's ears."

"Really? They don't look much like cat ears to me."

"Maybe they'll start twitching and it'll go, 'Meow.'"

"Fish don't meow."

I declared it with complete confidence, and my sister laughed.

"That's true."

Hearing her laugh made me laugh too.

You weren't supposed to make a lot of noise in an aquarium, so we giggled quietly as we wandered over to a tank that looked like a coral reef. Brightly colored fish swam through it, far more vibrant than the ones in the other exhibits, and even I recognized some of them.

"Onee-chan, Onee-chan! There are clownfish!"

I tugged excitedly at her sleeve, and she answered in the same cheerful tone.

"You're right. They're so cute."

"...Can you eat fish like those too?"

"Hmm... I'm not sure. Maybe..."

"Um..?"

"It looks like you've really taken a liking to them, Hazuki. So even if people can eat them, let's make them off-limits."

She beamed at me as she gently ruffled my hair.

My sister wasn't just someone who knew everything.

She was kind.

That's why I was always glad she was my big sister.

There was another pair of sisters standing a little ahead of us, and the older one was explaining something to her younger sister too, but mine was definitely better.

And definitely kinder.

"Then clownfish are fish you're not allowed to eat."

I smiled back at her as I said it, and she pointed toward the next tank.

"Hazuki, there are more cute fish over there."

"Oh, you're right! Onee-chan, let's go!"

"Hazuki, wait. You'll get lost. Want to hold my hand?"

As I started toward the next display, lured away by the fish, my sister held out her hand.

The aquarium was dimly lit, everything tinted the same deep blue as the water inside the tanks. There were people everywhere, and if I wasn't careful, I felt like I'd lose sight of her in an instant.

So I squeezed her outstretched hand as tightly as I could.

"There. Now we'll be fine. Getting lost would be awful, so let's stay together."

Her gentle voice reached me.

What I really wanted was to dash toward the next tank as if I were diving straight into the sea.

But you weren't supposed to run through an aquarium, and running was dangerous anyway.

So we waited for our parents to catch up before quietly taking our first steps together.

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"Cute fish, huh..."

I nearly squeezed the platypus's bill hard enough to crush it before catching myself and letting out a quiet breath.

I reached toward the tissue sticking out of its back, then sighed once more.

It wasn't as though I'd wanted to sharpen the blurred outline of that memory.

But once the past brushed against my thoughts, it spread of its own accord, pulling my mind back toward the child I'd once been.

I clenched my hand tightly.

That was all in the past now.

My sister and I weren't the people we'd been back then.

Our parents' attention had gradually shifted until it rested on my sister alone. The conversations between us, once so effortless, disappeared. The memories we'd shared had been torn apart and discarded like a notebook filled with secrets.

Even so, scraps of those memories still surfaced from somewhere deep inside me, just like today.

I threw those fragments aside and buried them beneath newer memories.

"Hey, platypus."

I spoke to the platypus Miyagi had brought into this room and hugged it close.

The fluffy tissue-box cover she'd discovered when we'd gone shopping together for the electric kettle.

The soft little companion we'd brought home that day.

The platypus that had witnessed me piercing Miyagi's ears.

This fluffy little thing was filled with memories of Miyagi and me, and there would be even more to come.

The crocodile tissue-box cover that was probably sitting in Miyagi's room right now held memories too.

That crocodile had watched over both Miyagi and me throughout our high school days.

"An aquarium really is perfect for us."

Maybe it was a bit of a stretch to lump platypuses and crocodiles into the same category as fish, but they all shared one thing in common.

Water.

That alone made the connection feel real enough.

I probably couldn't choose the thing that would make Miyagi happiest and then find the place where it would look the most beautiful.

I hadn't talked with her enough to know her that well.

Even so, going to an aquarium together would still mean something.

Every new memory we made together meant learning one more thing about her.

I kept scrolling through aquarium websites on my phone.

Some had dreamlike jellyfish exhibits.

Others let visitors feed the animals.

One even advertised "flying penguins," and that alone sounded like fun.

The old me probably would've never chosen an aquarium.

But the more I thought about Miyagi, the more I wanted to go there with her.

My heart turned away from the hazy memories of my family and toward a future where Miyagi was waiting.

"Thanks."

I leaned down and gently kissed the platypus's bill, grateful to the little creature that had led me to the idea of an aquarium.