Monogatari Series - Volume 17 - Chapter 1.06

006

If you were to ask me what kind of person Koyomi Araragi was during his first year of high school, I guess a self-evaluation finds someone less difficult than I am now, while a self-examination finds someone more honest and straightforward than I am now. I also hadn’t been attacked by a vampire, of course, so I could state with confidence that I was a human day and night.

Now, then. Naoetsu Private High School, which I attend and which Ogi transferred into, is quite the prep school─we even have classes on Saturdays, and it’d be hard to call it an average high school in that sense. The exam to get in is fairly hard, too. Maybe it was a miracle that I overcame this barrier─no, “miracle” might be going too far. It’d be more accurate to say that I passed thanks to some sort of mistake. I mean, I had to pay a pretty high price to compensate for the mistake of doing whatever it took to get in─it wasn’t long before I couldn’t keep up with Naoetsu High’s over-the-top curriculum. From the time you’re a freshman, you’re in classes that are preparing you for college entrance exams. No fun allowed, and that was a pretty big culture shock for me. Still, I’d gotten in (due to some sort of mistake or not), and in those days I thought I should accept my fate and stick it out. Yes, until the end of our first term, right before summer break. Until just after finals, I guess I should say? Well, whatever the case, until what happened after school on July fifteenth.

July fifteenth. The day I gave up on being serious, on being an honest and straightforward student─and decided to sink to being what Tsubasa Hanekawa would call a delinquent. The truth is, I just became your standard washout. Even if that day and its events never happened, I’d have fallen behind before long.

In any case, on July fifteenth two years ago, I finished ignoring my incomprehensible classes (I wasn’t even trying to keep up. I mean, I was leaving my textbooks at school) and, mentally exhausted, was getting ready to make my way home. It’s almost summer break, it’s almost summer break, it’s almost summer break, I chanted in my mind like a spell─not that summer break boded well, considering how much homework we’d be getting.

I’d somehow survived our first term, but couldn’t stand the thought of going on that way until graduation. In fact, I hadn’t made it through first term yet─and in the end, wouldn’t.

Shadows. Three of them─blocked my path as I walked down the hallway. Feeling drained, barely noticing them in time, I almost collided with them.

“Araragi,” a voice called.

When I finally lifted my downturned eyes, I saw three of my classmates.

“Got a second?”

It was Arikure who said this as I stood there─Biwa Arikure. A mean girl who seemed to find a way to complain about everything. To be honest, a type I don’t really like─and I doubt any boys had a favorable view of her. She always had her hands in her skirt pockets, and it wasn’t some blatant attempt to act bad. It was to protect her hands─when she did take them out, they were gloved, still fully protected. Something about her wanting to become a pianist─good thing you can’t hear her personality, you might badmouth her, but apparently, she was reasonably accomplished. Not that I’d ever heard her play, but rumors aren’t always just rumors.

In any case, getting stopped by a girl I didn’t like when I felt so drained was pretty rough.

“Sorry, there’s something important I have to do now, called going home…”

“What, you think you’re better than me?” she said as if to pick a fight─I didn’t think I was, but she must’ve thought I was messing with her. That’s one part of me that continues to stay the same.

Two girls stood behind Arikure─whose nickname, I believe, was Arikui, or anteater─and one of them, Kijikiri, was silent. In fact, spaced out somehow, she wouldn’t even look at me. That’s the kind of person she was, proceeding at her own pace, or maybe laidback. Sometimes she’d stay behind for no reason, and come to think of it, even be absent without telling anyone. Hoka Kijikiri was a capricious girl with a strange way of life─people even said she lived in a different world. That’s why I was surprised. Why would she team up with Arikure to block my path? Not that she’d strayed from her indifferent stance, just standing there and looking away.

“No, I really do have to get home. I have an obligation to. Going home is one of my three great obligations. I haven’t told anyone else, but my little sister in sixth grade got herself mixed up in a huge fight─or actually, stirred up a huge fight, and I can’t afford to take my eyes off of her.”

“Huh? Stop with the jokes already. I hate that kind of stuff more than anything,” Arikure complained like I’d truly offended her─it wasn’t a joke, but to be fair, my beloved little sisters had yet to be known as the Fire Sisters of Tsuganoki Second Middle School. My words must’ve come off as nothing more than a lie.

“Now, now. Calm down,” said the last girl, Tone, to soothe her, as if she were a wild mare. “We’re sorry to bother you when you’re busy, but please come back to the classroom with us. We won’t take that much of your time. You’d be a great help.”

Won’t take that much of your time. Those words ended up being a lie, but I’m sure she didn’t mean to deceive me.

Jiku Tone. Her nickname was Icing─not the frozen kind, but after the character for “sugar” in her name (stay with me, but Year 1 Class 3 also had a boy, Higuma, with the character for “ice”). She always looked happy, infectiously so. The healing type, to use a once-fashionable term. Her name and nickname suggested that she liked sweets, but she was an all-round glutton. While she never seemed unhappy, according to herself she was happiest when she was eating. A regular customer at all-you-can-eat buffets.

“…”

I knew the basics about each girl, having studied hard alongside them for an entire term, but wasn’t aware that they operated as a group. Actually, I think this was the first time I’d seen them together.

As I wondered what could have brought them together, Arikure ran out of patience. “You’re being so irritating, Araragi,” she accused angrily. “Are you coming or not? Decide already. It’s fine with me if you don’t.”

“I will. That’s all you want, right?”

If I were a little wiser, I probably wouldn’t have agreed─I did sense the menacing mood. I had yet to give up on my life as a high school student, though. Why these three? I wondered, but looking back on it, what a good team they made. The unpleasant, pardon me, the aggressive Arikure in front; Kijikiri behind her, untouchable, or simply hard to communicate with; the healing Tone. A lineup you’d rather not face in a fight, handling them the wrong way could hobble the rest of my high school days. I ended up crippling most of my future as a high schooler anyway, but my only option at the time was to go with them.

We returned to the classroom, Year 1 Class 3’s, on the fifth floor of the school building facing the gym. Two students stood by the door, waiting for us, and that’s when it all made sense. One boy and one girl, and the boy wasn’t the problem here. The issue was the girl glaring at me with open hostility─a sharp stare as if her parents’ murderer stood behind me.

Her name was Sodachi Oikura. While she wanted people to call her Euler, they actually called her How Much. This was of course because her name, Oikura, could also be read as “how much”─which was quite fitting for someone who looked at you so appraisingly. Not that we were on good enough terms to call each other by any nicknames─if anything, I was her enemy.

She was the class president. These days, that could only refer to Tsubasa Hanekawa, globally speaking (at least for me), but her reputation had yet to spread so far. Hence…

“Class President Oikura,” I said, judging that the situation called for her title. “What’re you doing here? Are you the one who asked for me?”

“Hurry up and go inside. Everyone’s waiting for you,” she replied coldly and entered the classroom. The boy with her followed behind─if you’re curious, this was Tsuma Shui, our class vice president. If you took dead seriousness and molded it into a high school freshman, the model Naoetsu High pupil, you’d get him. I touched on how Oikura was with me, but she was harsh overall, and I personally saw him as more of a class president than her. According to him, though, he was more of “the bureaucratic type” who preferred to play “a supporting role.” What kind of high schooler is the bureaucratic type, I thought and didn’t believe him at first, but he stayed in Oikura’s shadow during that entire first term, helping her lead the class─so I guess that sort of talent exists. I did see him just once at an arcade, where he moved with incredible precision for a dancing game. I felt like I’d seen a side of him I shouldn’t have, but ever since I couldn’t hate him even if he wasn’t the type I got along with. I carefully avoided any conflict with Oikura partly for his sake, but I bet he barely noticed me…

“You heard her, Araragi. She said to come in. Go,” Arikure prompted me. I shrugged and entered the classroom as I was told. Oikura never answered the question, but she must’ve asked the trio to fetch me─instead of doing so herself. Why? Because we would’ve gotten in a fight, and she wanted to maintain her dignity? In any case, it made perfect sense if she was the mind behind the well-selected team. What gave me pause, though, were her words─everyone’s waiting for you. What did that mean? Was I the kind of hero who could make everyone eagerly await me? Who was “everyone” in the first place?

I went in and learned that “everyone” was quite literal─every last member of Year 1, Class 3 was assembled there.