Monogatari Series - Volume 11 - Chapter 1.04

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By the way, Nadeko ignored Miss Ogi’s outstretched right hand a moment ago─but that’s not to say i didn’t actually look at it.

Avoiding Miss Ogi’s eyes, casting mine down, i did see her hand─in fact, you could say her hand was all i could see exactly because i was looking down. Unless i was mistaken, Miss Ogi seemed to want to shake Nadeko’s hand.

While she pulled hers back with a smile as if nothing happened, it’d normally offend people.

No, i think i must have offended Miss Ogi.

All of that hard-to-understand stuff she brought up before leaving, about victims and victimizers, about everyday life and narratives, might have been her way of spiting Nadeko for her rudeness.

Making people feel uneasy by insinuating things is a common and effective tactic in conversations.

But.

Nadeko can’t do it.

She can’t, even if it offends people.

She can’t be touched by people.

She can’t touch people.

A handshake is out of the question, and i can’t stand physical contact like being tapped on the face or arm, either─it makes Nadeko flinch.

It makes Nadeko flinch and flinch.

No nudging Nadeko.

That’s a Nade-no-no.

i know i’m taking this too far, but i think i’d prefer getting hit.

Because getting hit only takes a moment─there’s not enough time for us to mix.

Mix what? Our temperature. Body heat.

That’s right.

Nadeko can’t stand other people’s body heat─she can’t stand the warmth of human skin. Nadeko can’t begin to stand her body heat mixing with somebody else’s.

For example, the warmth from someone’s hand─or maybe the chill─from shaking it is just too stressful.

It makes Nadeko break out in a cold sweat.

To keep going into the details, that could be why Nadeko’s actually fine when people touch her over her clothes.

“An excessive dislike of contact with others is a manifestation of a strong sense of self-consciousness. It would follow that while you seem quiet, Sengoku, you might in fact have a strong will that refuses to rely on others.”

─That’s what Miss Hanekawa told Nadeko when i asked her for advice, but i think she was being kind.

i think she was being tactful.

All i really am is a coward.

Nadeko is even afraid of relying on people, that’s all.

Of course, if you were to ask Nadeko how she saw it, everyone else seems a lot stranger─why do they do it?

Why are they so ready to let their guard down around others? And to be touched?

Nadeko doesn’t want people touching her, and she doesn’t lower her guard.

All right, i’ve made it to school. i have arrived.

Nadeko’s traffic accident with Miss Ogi (or Miss Ogi’s accident with herself, as it played out) didn’t make her late─while we may have spoken for a lot longer than i thought, Nadeko always leaves home quite early so that no matter what kind of trouble she encounters on the way to school, she’ll be fine.

Of course, i only started looking out for trouble like this after what happened in June.

Maybe i didn’t get any more cautious and am just being my usual timid self.

…Speaking of which.

i wasn’t too bothered when that happened.

That experience of a snake wrapping itself around Nadeko’s bare skin─oh, right.

It’s like i learned in science class. Snakes are coldblooded─so body temperature doesn’t really come into play with them.

Today is October thirty-first. We haven’t seen snow yet, but it’s easily cold enough to say that it’s already winter─it’s so chilly out. In fact, snakes, which are reptiles, might already be hibernating.

Nadeko enters her school and changes her shoes.

From outdoor to indoor shoes.

Nadeko can’t reach her Year 2, Class 2 shoe cupboard, second row from the top, without stretching a little─i wish i was a little taller every time i arrive at or leave school, in other words, every time i use this cupboard.

Nadeko takes off her shoes, stands on the wooden slats next to the cupboards, and reaches.

Nadeko’s fingers poke around the cupboard and─

“Ee…aghh!” i scream again. It’s the second time today.

Nadeko’s voice is usually small, but her screams are, of course, loud.

While i froze when Miss Ogi nearly ran Nadeko over, her bottom falls right to the floor this time around.

A somewhat indecent pose.

A certain kind of observer might have seen a girl overstretching, losing her balance, and slipping on the smooth slats because she was wearing socks. Like a dummy.

But it was something else. That wasn’t it.

Unable to get up, Nadeko looks at her right hand─the hand that was just poking around her cubby.

“…”

Nothing seems to be wrong with her right hand, and Nadeko’s eyes turn to the cupboard next─but all i see is a plain old cupboard.

Nadeko’s indoor shoes are poking out a bit.

So she can’t see it.

There’s no─white snake there.

“…”

But i could feel it.

Nadeko might call it a familiar feeling─that of a snake wrapping around her bare skin.

Soft yet hard.

Smooth but scaly.

And while it has no body heat.

You can feel its vitality─that enwrapment.

“…”

Fearfully.

Nadeko gets up, stands on her toes, and tries to look inside her shoe cupboard─but i don’t have the height for it, after all.

It would be nice if i had a platform to use, but i don’t see anything that convenient.

Nadeko’s only choice is to use her nails to nervously pull her indoor shoes, nearly falling out of their cupboard, down toward her─and to check inside them.

Empty. Nothing’s inside.

No socks, no human ankles, and of course─no white snake.

It’s not there, nor do i see it.

“…”

Sure, Nadeko has fewer friends than the average person, she’s reserved and silent, and she’s such a bad girl that she doesn’t like human contact and even thinks it’s gross, but it’s not like i’ve been particularly bullied─so i don’t see why anyone would ever put a snake in Nadeko’s shoe cubby.

Actually, that would go beyond bullying. i’d be scared of anyone who’d do that, more than any bullying.

Um, so what i’m trying to say is that Nadeko doesn’t matter enough to be subjected to a prank as elaborate as a live snake snuck inside her shoe cubby.

Being hated is its own kind of talent, a fine personality trait.

Even what happened in June─was all kinds of stuff happening without Nadeko’s involvement.

While Mister Oshino and Miss Ogi this morning called Nadeko a “victim”─i think you could say that Nadeko isn’t even a victim.

Maybe the word is bystander.

It just feels more on the mark.

Given the miserable condition of Nadeko’s second-year class─i can’t help but think so.

That’s right.

It’s not about Nadeko’s personality or character─there’s no way that any bullying could take place in Year 2, Class 2 right now.

“…Maybe it was Nadeko’s imagination.”

Just to be sure, i hop up and down a few times to take a (tiny) peek inside Nadeko’s shoe cupboard, but nothing seems out of the ordinary after all.

It’s strange, though.

If it was Nadeko’s imagination, it was Nadeko’s imagination, and i of course would prefer it that way─we’d have a happy ending, so why? If that sense of being enwrapped by a snake was all in Nadeko’s head─then why did she feel that a snake she couldn’t even see was a white snake?

“What’s the matter, Sengoku? Is everything all right?” a girl in Nadeko’s year calls out to her, worried about (what must look like) the bizarre way she’s acting by the shoe cupboards.

“i’m fine,” Nadeko replies in a tiny voice and looks at her feet. “i’m fine.”

i don’t know if Nadeko spoke loudly enough, but the girl seems persuaded and proceeds to her classroom─the two of us are assigned to different classes, so she naturally heads to a different one from Nadeko’s.

Nadeko’s shoe cupboard is for Year 2, Class 2, so there are of course a few students from class around─but they don’t bother saying anything about her bizarre behavior.

They don’t even look in her direction, they don’t even speak to one another. They just head to our classroom.

Yes.

This is how it is.

The current state of Year 2, Class 2.

A meloncholic school life, in other words.