Monogatari Series - Volume 10 - Chapter 1.22

022

“Okay then, where to begin? It would speed things up if we just started with that district tournament three years ago when I lost the use of my leg, but that would be a little hasty if you’re going to properly understand the complexities of my outlook on life. I’m a firm believer that haste makes waste─as you well know─and I could not care less about making things easier to understand. As you also know, Kanbaru, my playing style consists of doing everything in my power to use up time, the great equalizer.

“I would hate for you to get the impression that my accident was the source of everything─it did end my playing career, of course, and took my life in a completely different direction, but even before that I had been interested in ‘the unhappiness of others.’

“In a very different way than I am now, though.

“The complete opposite, in fact.

“Lately I’ve thrown myself into my activities as Lord Devil and so forth, searching for ‘people unhappier than me,’ but back then I was comparing ‘my happy self’ to ‘unhappy people’ and puzzling over the contrast.

“Why do I have this gift? Other people don’t seem to have this gift─like that. And by ‘this gift,’ I mean my reflexes.

“You might call it a gift for ball handling.

“Or─no, if we’re getting down to it, maybe it’s ‘excellent footwork’ that we’re talking about.

“You might think that, as an athlete, I was a one-trick basketball pony, Kanbaru─and you wouldn’t be far off. But actually, that’s not strictly true. That is, they didn’t actually have a basketball team at my elementary school.

“Just like you started out in the sprint, even though you didn’t technically belong to the track-and-field team, I started out in a different sport─in elementary school, I played soccer.

“I had a good time kicking the ball around along with the boys. Like Captain Tsubasa says: I wasn’t scared, the ball was my friend─but, sad to say, in the end my friend betrayed me.

“Friendship can be a scary thing.

“Really I just overdid it, that’s all─maybe things are different these days, but we’re talking about a long time ago here. If a girl played soccer with the boys, and on top of that, kicked their asses, they hated you for it.

“I was the queen of what you might call the Goal to Goal. They call it the Coast to Coast in basketball, right?

“All the boys in the school hated me. And if the boys all hate you then the girls all hate you too, so in those days I was public enemy number one.

“Does that sound like an exaggeration? For a kid that age, though, there’s nothing more terrifying than a ‘school without allies,’ is there? From what you’ve told me, it sounds like you’ve been there yourself.

“But being in that environment made me think. If everyone was gifted, they wouldn’t hate me. So why do there have to be people in the world with a gift, and people without?─and from there on out, I strove to keep my gift hidden. I gave up on flamboyant Goal to Goal-type plays and devoted myself to defense. I still do: my Quagmire Defense or whatever people call it is the continuation of that.

“Did my gift feel like a burden? Of course it did, no matter how I try to play it off. You must have felt the same way, Kanbaru. You seem to fancy yourself the hard-working type, but you’ve got it completely wrong. Your latent gift blossomed, that’s all─‘effort’ is nothing but a pat on the head for all the unhappy people. Look, all this is a result of our effort paying off. We’re no different from you, we just tried a little harder, we weren’t born like this, we didn’t just luck out─when all the while, what we’re really saying is so please don’t ostracize us.

“The nail that sticks up gets hammered down─that’s the traditional ceremony of human society that gifted people need to fear more than anything else. Because the world contains far more talentless, unhappy mediocrities than them. The few happy, gifted people, like I was in elementary school, will always be crushed by majority rule, no matter how great their gift.

“It’s truly terrifying.

“A gift is happiness in and of itself, but by that same token it becomes unhappiness─it’s only because of where I am ‘now’ that I can look back on that period of my life and understand.

“At the time I could only scratch my head at divine caprice. Or maybe that’s when the world started to seem more diabolical than divine to me. In which case, I guess it was the caprices of the Devil I was experiencing.

“Though it’s only natural for the Devil to be capricious.

“Even with that in mind, the reality is that the match is fixed from birth; the reality is that the same effort won’t yield the same result; and that reality is overwhelming. It’s the most deplorable thing in the world.

“The boys on my team would talk about their dreams. I don’t think the J League existed back then, so they’d say, Someday I want to start in the World Cup…or something? Sure, it’s a wonderful dream. But listening from the sidelines, I knew. That it would never happen. It might be possible for me, but never for them.

“I didn’t just think it either, I said it, which is why they hated me. Around fifth or sixth grade I learned to keep my mouth shut.

“I say the ball was my friend, but it can’t be everybody’s friend─be it a soccer ball or a basketball.

“Why did I give up soccer and start playing basketball? No particular reason. When I graduated from elementary school, I graduated from soccer as well, that’s all.

“I wanted to try playing other sports. We only get one life, and it seemed like a waste to spend it devoting myself to just one thing.

“When I was recruited for a scholarship, I told them, If I can play basketball instead of soccer. At first the scout scolded me─what the hell is this kid talking about? But after I showed him what I could do for three hours, he changed his tune.

“I felt all torn up that, because I got a spot on the basketball team, there must have been a student out there who didn’t. I agonized over the unfairness of talent.

“Why basketball, out of all the sports I could have chosen… I wonder. Since soccer is all about the legs, I guess maybe I wanted to try a sport where you use your hands. If there had been a handball team at my middle school, maybe I would have joined it.

“Look, I told you that footwork was my forte, right? So I thought I would try upping the difficulty level.

“From Easy to Normal.

“Yup, Normal. Basketball was pretty basic to me… Don’t scowl like that, Kanbaru. If you hate it so much when people call you serious, then don’t get so worked up over a little light conversation. Anyway, I figure it was because my motivation for starting basketball was so shallow that I was punished, that I lost the use of my left leg. It was the Wrath of God.

“I don’t regret it, but I get it.

“I can recall that game even now.

“Or maybe not. It was three years ago, so the memory has kind of faded─time has healed that wound, I guess.

“What’s that? If time heals all wounds, then it’s a contradiction for me to comfort myself all these years by collecting unhappiness? Hahaha, you may be right─but wipe that smug look off your face. It’s not such a great point that I’ll take damage from it, I won’t even flinch.

“It’s not like I think I’m absolutely right or something. I don’t think I’m wrong either, but even if I were, I wouldn’t go about things any differently. We all live with contradictions.

“Or maybe I should say we all die with contradictions. Even after death, the contradictions go on forever.

“Calling out contradictions is just childish, inelegant nitpicking.

“You should understand that, o most serious Kanbaru.

“Since no one’s more contradictory than you─no, never mind.

“Forget I said anything.

“Back to that game. First, though, would you like to know how I stood with my teammates?

“Oh, you can imagine? Yeah, you probably can. Given that I turned that prestigious team into my own personal one-man show─yeah, not a great position to be in. But even though I was the number one player on that team by any measure, the number on my uniform was always 15. Bullying in sports is insidious, isn’t it. Which is why I hate it so much when people spout nonsense about a sound mind in a sound body.

“Speaking of which, you and Higasa fit in really well with the rest of your team, didn’t you? No, just let me compliment you on that. I think it’s amazing to be able to get along with mediocrities when you’re talented. How did you kiss their asses to make that work?

“Mostly telling dirty stories and playing the lovable clown, I imagine─the unwashed masses can’t stand a wholesome hero, after all.

“I told you, don’t glare at me. You wanted me to talk, so I’m talking, obediently opening my heart to you, that’s all. Would you rather I lied? No, you want to hear the truth. Wait, you couldn’t possibly have thought that you were going to hear a ‘moving story’ from Roka Numachi, the unhappiness collector herself, the girl with a devil in her body, could you?

“If you want a nice, moving story, go read some manga or a novel. You’ll find plenty of them at a bookstore.

“What’s that? You want me to go on? Really? Okay then, here I go.

“I’ll tell you about when I wrecked my leg.

“Who was it we were playing against… I’ve actually forgotten. I’m pretty sure it was some ordinary team, not championship material or anything. Though since they managed to take me down, quite literally, I would be embarrassed if they hadn’t gone on to do well in the tournament.

“Wha? The team felt responsible for injuring me and forfeited the next game? No shit… And they were scheduled to play your team next? Wow. Well, if you say so, it must be true, but what the hell were they thinking? So stupid. Forfeiting is a dangerous ideology.

“No one is to blame for my leg getting broken but me.

“The doctor diagnosed it as a stress fracture.

“The location of the fracture sealed my fate─it wasn’t overwork that caused it, I think it happened because I neglected my cooldowns.

“People who rely entirely on innate talent end up like that all the time.

“The breaking point happened to come during a game, that’s all. It could have come during practice, or even while I was just lazing around with my legs in a foot-warmer.

“Huh? No, in my house we keep the kotatsu going all year round. Is that bad? Think they’ll start selling an air-conditioner that works the same way? They already have a heater that looks like a fan, after all. And now that they’ve got bladeless fans, an AC that works like a kotatsu ought to be next. I should pitch that idea. I wonder how much they’d buy it for? I’m getting excited just thinking about it.

“Anyway, sorry, I got off track there. Or maybe I’m actually still on track, since despite having the honor of being my team’s ace, I was a real layabout at home─I was careless with the gift that God, and the Devil, had bestowed upon me, so they got tired of waiting and took it back.

“Like, Oh, you don’t need this gift? Okay then.

“Ever since elementary school, I’d been relying entirely on my gift and pushing it too hard. My gift felt like a burden to me, so I punished it. Huh? Like my brown hair? Haha, nicely put. After all, a woman’s hair is her life, her most precious treasure. Yes, a special talent should be treated like a treasure, handled with the utmost care.

“But they forfeited, huh?

“Yeah. I mean, I get feeling some sense of responsibility when an opposing player goes down during a game─but you can just ignore that feeling and run away from that responsibility.

“The weaker they are, the more serious.

“No, maybe you can’t call such people serious. If anyone really felt responsible, they would have come to apologize to me while I was in the hospital. They only went halfway, no question about it.

“Don’t misunderstand me, I’m not saying that I hate weak people. In fact, I prefer them. Which is exactly why I wanted everyone to run away from that responsibility, to think some idiot had just fallen over on her own. To laugh at me, even.

“C’mon, it was meant to be funny, I wanna say.

“See, that’s the part you’re misunderstanding, Kanbaru. When I say ‘run away,’ you’re picturing something negative, something pessimistic, but you’re wrong.

“It takes courage to run away. Maybe more than it does to stand tall, more than it does to fight.

“…Don’t be persuaded by my little word games. Running away is obviously cowardly. No way is it a courageous act. Still, you’ve got to accept your cowardice.

“This is real life, after all.

“It’s fine for characters in manga or whatever to act like they despise cowardice and timidity.

“But this is real life.

“I guess you could say I wronged that other team, in some sense. Because I squandered my gift, I planted a sizable trauma in the garden of their precious middle-school hearts.

“But it’s not my fault that they made it worse for themselves.

“I want to push them away saying, Not my problem.

“But if they came to me for help, I would shoulder their unhappiness as well─by the way, Kanbaru, you might not understand this since you were only pretending to be injured, but the me who went into the hospital with that stress fracture was an empty shell.

“No, no, it’s all thanks to collecting unhappiness that I can strut around like this now, all free and easy. I’m human, too.

“I feel down, I get depressed.

“My feelings get hurt, I have regrets.

“I’d only taken on the challenge of playing basketball to up the difficulty level for myself, but it wasn’t until after I’d lost out that I realized how much I loved that game.

“The gift that I’d treated so haphazardly was an irreplaceable treasure. I came to understand that what had felt like a burden had in fact been very precious to me.

“Yes.

“However much I’d been despised at school, however disconnected I’d felt from my teammates, I’d been happy.

“And now I was unhappy.

“I’d become an unhappy, pitiful person.

“The funny thing is, the teammates I’d always butted heads with and the teachers who thought I was a pain in the ass all turned strangely kind and came to wish me well.

“Sorry for everything, we pushed you too hard, shit like that.

“No, I was moved, I cried. I clasped hands with those girls and we apologized to each other.

“But after they left the hospital and went home, I started wondering what the hell I was doing. Sure, I had been moved, but so what?

“Moved or not, nothing changed the fact that my left leg would never be able to stand the strain of playing sports.

“So I quit school. I didn’t even want to be near it anymore, so I asked my parents if we could move, and they agreed─that is, we had moved there in the first place so I could go to that middle school, my dad had been so excited about it.

“A parent’s love is an amazing thing, I guess.

“My mother was annoyed by it, though─come to think of it, she was maybe the only person who didn’t say anything kind to me after my injury.

“What the hell were you thinking, didn’t I tell you to take better care of your body? Now you’ve ruined everything─something like that? That was more or less how it went.

“Hahaha, moms are really something, aren’t they?

“I’m not complaining, mind you. I really didn’t want people to be kind to me at the time, I wanted them to tear me a new one.

“Thanks to my mother’s criticisms, I was able to run away without any false shows of courage or anything.

“But before all that, before we moved and before I escaped, came the event that kickstarted my habit, my bad habit, of ‘collecting unhappiness.’

“It was a teammate of mine, who came to visit me in the hospital. She showed me the path I should take. I really owe her my gratitude.

“We weren’t close, of course. Quite the opposite. We’d hardly ever spoken before that.

“Her name? I don’t remember. I called my teammates by their numbers, not their names, same as with my senseis.

“I feel like it was some ordinary, average name, but I also feel like maybe it wasn’t─which is to say, it’s the kind of info that we could easily do without. I won’t give her an alias either, it would just make things more complicated.

“Once I was myself again after people visited me and gave me their sympathy, I’d feel shell-shocked. I didn’t mind it while it was going on, though. After all, people saying kind things to you doesn’t feel terrible, which is why I was happy when that girl suddenly showed up by herself to see me in my hospital room. But to my surprise, she wasn’t there to offer any sympathy.

“She was there to ask me for advice.

“After some perfunctory get-well nonsense, she dove right in and said, ‘Can I get your advice about something?’

“It was all typical middle-school-girl stuff. One of the girls in her class did this, some boy she liked did that, that kind of thing. Unlike her name, I remember exactly what it was she asked me about─it’s Item #00 in my collection, after all─but out of respect for her privacy, I won’t get into the details.

“Typical middle-school-girl issues.

“I’ll just say that it wasn’t far off from whatever you might be imagining, Kanbaru, having been a middle school girl yourself.

“What I really want you to try to imagine right now, Kanbaru, is my psychological state at the time. Sure, I may have brought it on myself, but when I broke my leg it upended my entire life, even if that had only been fifteen years at that point. So why the hell is this kid opening up to me? What’s she up to? That’s what I thought.

“I assumed her story would end up having something to do with me, with my future, but it never did. Well, what could I tell her? She wanted my advice, but whatever I might say, I’d devoted my entire life to playing sports and didn’t know a damn thing about being madly in love.

“And with a broken leg, how could I solve the problems of a typical middle school girl? I thought to myself─she chose the lousiest possible person to come to for advice.

“But that wasn’t the case.

“After she’d given me her spiel, I tried my level best to be sincere, but in the end all I could manage was some muddled nonsense. When visiting hours were over, the girl went home. That night I kind of beat myself up about it, feeling guilty that I hadn’t been able to give her a decent answer, scolding myself that she’d never come visit me again─but she came back the very next day. Crazy, right?

“Not to visit me. She wanted my advice.

“And she just repeated the same stuff she’d told me the day before─I’d felt bad during the night, but having to listen to the same stories two days in a row, stories that had nothing to do with me, I got bored.

“I’m sure she’s having a hard time, but why should I be filling my mind with her problems? I’ve got my hands full worrying about my own future─that’s what I thought.

“And when I did, everything became clear to me. Perfectly clear.

“She hadn’t chosen the wrong person to come to for advice. I wasn’t the lousiest choice; as far as she was concerned, I was the best possible choice.

“Because she wanted advice from someone who was clearly less happy and fortunate than herself. Yes, from someone like me, for instance─someone whose life seemed like it was basically over.

“Do you understand what we’re dealing with here, my dear, serious Kanbaru?

“No, it’s not a riddle. As proof, I’ll give you the answer right now.

“Let me spell it out for you: that girl may have had worries, may have had troubles, but she didn’t want to be pitied. It was the same as it was for me, with my broken leg, feeling annoyed by everybody’s kindness.

“She had troubles, but she didn’t want some kind of holier-than-thou advice from on high─so she came to me, who clearly seemed to be lower than her, afflicted as I was with grave concerns that the average middle school girl didn’t have to deal with.

“The psychology of it is easy to comprehend.

“I mean, it’s no different from you acting the clown and getting your teammates’ support because of it. Stars and heroes will never be embraced if they don’t have foibles that allow the masses to feel even superior to them. The logic is more or less the same. Pretty much every teenager basks in the satisfaction of finding fault with great historical figures.

“But just because I understood where she was coming from doesn’t mean it didn’t piss me off. I was angry more at myself than at her, though. Would you look at that, there goes Roka Numachi. Another one bites the dust. I was pissed at myself for being looked down on by teammates whose names I didn’t even remember, for being solicited for advice I was totally unqualified to give.

“Huh? Why didn’t I get angry at her when I realized what was going on?

“Well, because she’d gotten one thing very wrong. She assumed that someone like me who’d broken her leg and lost all prospects of an athletic career, who’d never take to the court again, who had to give up on school and was at her absolute nadir─wouldn’t look down on her, wouldn’t pity her.

“But she was wrong.

“Because listening to everything she had to say was such a consolation.

“Other people’s misery is like sweet nectar. And that didn’t change a bit, even after I’d broken my leg. The thought that I’ve got big problems, but so do other people was a balm for my wounded soul. I could tell it was warming my heart.

“I’ll admit upfront that I didn’t recognize what was going on with my own psychology until I understood what was going on with hers─I believed that, in my own way, I was dispensing earnest advice.

“My god, humans are ugly creatures.

“Licking each other’s wounds, comparing and contrasting their misery. But man, things got fun after I figured that out. I investigated how to draw out her pain and suffering most effectively from every angle, then put my findings into action. I suppose you could say those were the salad days of Lord Devil.

“I devoured that girl’s troubles, telling myself all the while how despicable I was─but also feeling the first hints of salvation.

“I couldn’t just listen and leave it at that, though, so as she was leaving that day, I said, ‘I understand your problems.’ It wasn’t a lie. And I went on─‘I’ll take care of everything, so you don’t need to worry anymore.’

“That part was a lie. A massive lie. I was in the hospital and had no idea what was going to become of myself, let alone anyone else. How the hell was I going to solve whatever problems befell her at a school that I’d already decided to leave?

“And it wasn’t a kindly lie, told with her feelings in mind. I told it because I’d already thoroughly plumbed the depths of her problems and couldn’t stand the thought of her coming back the next day and rehashing them for me a third time. It was a selfish lie. A self-centered lie.

“…Come on now, that’s not fair. Don’t forget that what she did was pretty insensitive in the first place. Anyone else probably would have shouted her out of the room. So even though it wasn’t a kindly lie, I’d argue that I was extending her a courtesy.

“She looked puzzled, like something didn’t sit quite right, but nevertheless she said thank you and went home. What the hell was she thankful for? Anyway, I thought what I did had been in pretty poor taste, even if I did feel some hint of salvation, and that night I busied myself with worthless remorse, telling myself I’d never do it again.

“But after some time─I’m pretty sure it was right before I was discharged from the hospital, a surprising thing happened. She visited my room for a third time.

“She had the revitalized look of someone who’d been possessed by a spirit and was finally free from its influence. This time when she said ‘Thank you!’ she was smiling from ear to ear.

“She was in such high spirits that I could barely make sense of anything she said, but I got the gist that her problems had been successfully resolved.

“She kept saying, ‘Thank you so much, it’s all thanks to you!’ But I hadn’t done a thing, how could I? I’d just been lying in my hospital bed like a rock the whole time.

“This is my clear, easy-to-understand example illustrating that ‘time heals all wounds.’ Even if she didn’t swallow everything I said to her, she seemed to trust me at least halfway─enough that she entrusted her worries to me, and once she stopped worrying herself, the problems went and took care of themselves.

“The girl in her class had blah blah blah, the boy she liked was blah blah blah─and I guess maybe her feelings about everything also just cooled off a little as time passed.

“Either way, whatever spirit that had been possessing her was gone.

“I guess you could say a devil had been exorcised─and her worries now existed only within me.

“Excusing her leave-taking, I told her, ‘Come on, there’s no need to thank me. I just did what anyone would do.’ She probably took that as an expression of my humility, but the fact is that since she had no more troubles, I simply didn’t need her anymore.

“And the whole thing came into focus.

“Try thinking it through for yourself, Kanbaru.

“I had relished listening to her problems. And it had helped ease my pain. As for her, not only had she been able to ask me for advice without a second thought now that she felt superior to me, she had liberated herself from worry by entrusting her problems to me, and time─or from her perspective, I─had even seen fit to take care of those problems.

“Right, everybody wins, nobody loses.

“Or rather, everyone finds salvation.

“What is it again, the Pareto Optimum? Or the Nash Equilibrium─whichever.

“Two birds with one stone: I help people, and it eases my pain─not to mention that the cost performance can’t be beat.

“So it didn’t take me long to make up my mind. I wasn’t possessed of either the conscience or the morals to worry about it─and I do mean worry about it─for even a single night. I may very well have had them before I broke my leg, but if I did, they shattered along with the bone.

“I decided to make collecting unhappiness my reason for living from then on. No, ‘reason for living’ makes it sound too sunny. It was more like I’d found a place where I could lay my life as an athlete to rest. Yeah, I decided to make it my gravestone.

“And so, the Unhappiness Collector.

“Roka Numachi, the misfortune-picker, was born.”