Monogatari Series - Volume 17 - Chapter 3.14

014

The epilogue, or maybe, the punch line of this story.

The next day, I was roused from bed as usual by my little sisters Karen and Tsukihi and headed to school─as I did, I asked my sisters something. I was able to hide her name from them because it had changed in the interim, but I asked them if they remembered a girl who had stayed at our home back during elementary school. Neither of them remembered. Just as I thought that’s how it goes, it turned out the circumstances were different. There were so many children like that during so many different periods that they didn’t know who I was talking about─it seemed I had many other forgotten childhood friends. I was disgusted with myself. I felt embarrassed about ever saying I wanted a childhood friend who’d come to wake me up every morning when in reality I’d had so many childhood friends. There’d be no point in hating myself any more than I already did, though. Oikura would hate me plenty.

She ended up not coming to school─I went to school that day but didn’t find her there. While this meant she’d scrapped our promise, I couldn’t exactly blame her.

“Like I said earlier…they were just barely overlooking my situation. And they said no more,” Oikura told me.

I’d returned to her single-occupancy room after all that.

“The person who came from Town Hall…told me that I can’t keep living on my own. They said they’re going to cut my assistance by about half, so I can’t keep living here. Apparently, a family is going to live here next─but that’s fine. It sounds like they found public housing that’s a little smaller…so I’m going to move.”

I’m going to transfer out of Naoetsu High─she said. She was shockingly calm─could her strength have left her after the conversation with Town Hall, with her life alone coming to an end, with this announcement that it was over? No, that’s not it.

It was probably how Oikura was when it was just the two of us, the two of us talking─like over summer break during our first year of middle school. I understood now that her violent behavior in class was forced and a way to threaten people because she was in public─she was the type to get flustered in crowded places. In that sense, Hanekawa made the right decision when she tried to get me to visit her alone.

She also briskly accepted all of our speculation about her mother when I told her, and it was almost deflating.

“Oh─yeah, I should’ve known,” she said.

It was how I’d reacted in the locked classroom when Ogi said the culprit was Komichi Tetsujo.

So she more or less knew? Unconsciously? No─probably not. She might have said the same thing no matter what.

She should’ve known.

Those were her thoughts on life.

“I knew I’d need to leave this town soon… But just as I found out, I went to school because I learned that Tetsujo would be taking time off. I thought that something might happen, that something might change. Then…”

Then.

Did something happen─did something change? Maybe nothing did, nothing changed. Maybe she only grew to hate me more. In the end─maybe she should’ve known. We spoke for a little longer, and I went home. I didn’t stop anywhere on my way back.

So… To summarize, telling her, my childhood friend, the truth did nothing to improve our relationship, but it didn’t do anything to make it worse, either. She would suddenly disappear, just like six years ago, just like five years ago─which is why I headed to school without any concerns about running into her in class… I walked over as always, but as I did, the rousing sound of a bike’s wheels began to catch up to me.

It was Ogi.

So she gracefully biked her way to and from school?

It was a pretty nice bike, too.

“Hiii, Araragi-senpai.”

“Hiii? Ogi, why’d you leave before I got back yesterday? I told you to wait.”

“Miss Hanekawa said we ought to leave.”

“Why would Hanekawa say that?”

“She meant it in a nice way. Like, we ought to give those two some space…”

“No, she wasn’t being nice. I left her apartment pretty soon, you know… But you weren’t anywhere to be found in that plaza. Do you have any idea how surprised I was?”

Whatever.

It wasn’t serious enough to criticize her over.

I wonder what Ogi and Hanekawa had talked about. While I doubted they hit it off…I wished the two could at least come to some kind of understanding.

“I was the loser yesterday,” Ogi said.

As she did, she gave a little bow─though she didn’t get off her bike.

“I’m sorry. To be honest, I underestimated you. I was convinced you’d run off with your tail between your legs─you showed me some guts that I didn’t know you had at the end there.”

“…I don’t really understand your standards when it comes to wins versus losses. You got me worked up, and Hanekawa too. What were you trying to do?”

A basic question.

“It kind of strikes me as strange. Just as soon as you transferred here, Tetsujo went on maternity leave, Oikura started coming to school, and then she went off and transferred just as suddenly. All these things that had come to a pause, these things we were pretending not to see, have suddenly started to move again, as if we suddenly remembered them…”

“Huh, Miss Oikura’s going to transfer? I didn’t know,” Ogi said, ignoring my question. “I did think she made a good casting choice─in a way she was like the origin of all the heroines we’ve seen so far. I guess you could say she had the perfect character to get you all shaken up? Still, not everything went according to plan. That was a miscalculation─or rather, a missed expectation, which is to say, you deserve the credit here. I did expect Miss Oikura to add a little more chaos to the mix, though. I hope things go well for her at her new school. I’m sure she’ll be able to succeed in a new world where nobody knows her. And that’s thanks to you. It’s all thanks to you.”

“…What are you doing here, Ogi? Do you live nearby?”

Feeling that we were going nowhere fast, I changed the subject.

“Oh, you. Are you trying to figure out where I live? Remind me never to let my guard down around you.

“I was just looking for a lost child,” she continued. “That’s where it all started, after all.”

“…”

Looking for a lost child? What a strange thing to say. Didn’t she mean─she was lost, and looking for the right way? I could show her the way to school if she didn’t know it, I thought─but she’d already begun to pedal again before I could say anything.

“I lost this time around, but if you’ll allow me to be just a little bit of a sore loser, my first move was only exploratory. I managed to meet my goal of seeing how you’d act around a childhood friend, so you could even say that losing was the perfect thing for me to do if I wanted to maintain a balance. Do be careful. There’s no guarantee things will go this well next time. Journeys at night aren’t the only time in life when every new step is taken into darkness.”

She pedaled off in the opposite direction from school… Was she okay? While I worried about her, it wasn’t as if I could do anything. I decided to stop seeing her off and to head on to school.

On my way there, I ran into Hanekawa. Or rather, she was there waiting for me at the school gates─she must have been waiting for a while, I thought, but when I asked, she said she’d only been there for about a minute. As if she’d predicted when I would come to school─the minute she was off must have been the minute I spent talking to Ogi. Did this mean that an invisible battle between Hanekawa and Ogi was still playing out? Whatever the case, I told her about what happened with Oikura.

“I see… That’s too bad. I thought we could become friends.”

Hanekawa did sound disappointed, but at the same time, she looked somewhat relieved. The sort of relief you might feel when you’ve escaped some kind of nightmare scenario─but I probably didn’t know the nature of the nightmare scenario Hanekawa had in mind.

“Well, I guess we should celebrate this new step in her life,” she said.

“Yeah. Ogi said the same thing.”

“Could you go ahead and go to class, Araragi? I need to submit a notice of absence.”

“Yeah, sure… Wait, a notice of absence? Huh? What, are you leaving Naoetsu High too?”

“Nope. I said absence. You know how I’m planning on wandering around after graduation. I thought I’d go scout out some locations for that. Just a little trip around the world. I’m going to be leaving you on your own for about a month, so take care of things while I’m gone, okay?”

She was sure leaving a lot in my hands…

And a little trip around the world?

She made it sound like a lap around the athletic field.

Yes, I’d heard about her graduation trip, but…location scouting for it? Methodical people’s brains really do work in a different way… She far surpassed my imagination, like an airplane flying overhead.

“I’ll be sure to say hello if I come across Mister Oshino during my trip.”

Oshino? I didn’t see him going overseas too often… I had a hard time imagining him with a passport. Oh, but a trip around the world would include Japan, so it did at least seem like a possibility that they might meet.

In any case, I had no reason to stop Hanekawa. She may have brought it up far too suddenly, but I guess it was just another example of her quick footwork. I felt a little sad to know I wouldn’t get to see her for a whole month, but I did everything I could to let that not show and send her off with cheer.

“Okay, then. If you do run into Oshino somewhere, let him know we met his niece.”

“Yeah. Well, that’s basically what I’m trying to do.”

And so I arrived at my classroom, alone once again─and of course, I sat in my empty seat. The moment that I did, my cell phone rang. Uh oh, I’d forgotten to turn it off because I’d met Hanekawa by the school gates.

What a blunder.

Phew, that was dangerous─Hanekawa would have been shockingly mad if it had gone off around her.

New text message.

It was from Senjogahara.

“DEAR KOYOKOYO STOP MY FINGERS SERIOUSLY WERE FRACTURED SO I WILL BE GOING TO SCHOOL TODAY AFTER VISITING THE HOSPITAL STOP”

Why write it like a telegram…

The message might have started off cute, with that “Dear Koyokoyo,” but it said she’d actually broken her fingers when she punched Oikura. Well, she probably did deserve that level of comeuppance…which explained why she was going to the hospital instead of relying on my blood. It did seem like she would attend school today, though she’d be late. Did the thought that she might see Oikura never cross her mind? I still hadn’t told Senjogahara about what happened─I thought, as the next message arrived.

“DEAR YOKOYOKO STOP”

Yokoyoko? Had she developed dyslexia? No, she must have just typed “Koyokoyo” wrong. First the telegram-style message, then this. She amused herself in strange ways…

“MISS OIKURA CAME TO APOLOGIZE TO ME THIS MORNING STOP I FORGAVE HER STOP I AM OKAY NOW PARENTHETICALLY THOUGH MY FINGERS ARE FRACTURED STOP”

These messages were so annoying to read… Hm?

What? Oikura had gone to apologize? How did she know where Senjogahara lived? Senjogahara had entered a false address into the school’s records, and as far as I knew, she hadn’t corrected it… Oh, right. Oikura had gone to take care of Senjogahara back when she was sickly during our first year. Now that I thought about it, Oikura knew that Senjogahara would be going to college on a recommendation… If she knew that, did it mean she’d been concerned about Senjogahara even during her time as a shut-in?

Going to apologize, though…

Oikura had apparently kept her promise to make up with Senjogahara. And since the issue was resolved, Senjogahara could come back to school starting today─whatever the case, good. I needed to forward these messages to Hanekawa before she went off on her journey.

Then the third message arrived.

“SORRY FOR MAKING YOU WORRY KOYOKOYO STOP I WILL GIVE YOU LOTS OF SLOPPY KISSES DURING OUR NEXT DATE SO FORGIVE ME PLEASE OKAY STOP ☆☆☆ I AM A FREAK FOR YOUR FRENCH KISSES ☆☆☆☆☆☆ STOP”

How was I going to forward them to Hanekawa now?!

Just as I thought about putting my phone away, the fourth and final message arrived.

“A MESSAGE FROM MISS OIKURA STOP UNDER YOUR DESK SHE SAYS STOP BEST FISHES HI TIKI.”

Best fishes hi tiki?

What kind of ending was that? Was she trying to say we should get fish at a Polynesian restaurant? And maybe “Yokoyoko” was part of that, some sort of South Pacific greeting? But no, it was probably just another typo, and she meant to say “Best wishes, Hitagi.”

Great, now I began to wonder if she’d misspelled anything else. A message from Miss Oikura? Under your desk? What could it all mean, I wondered, but tried feeling around under my seat anyway─and.

I found something stuck there. Something like a piece of paper, held in place with masking tape─I peeled it off and took it in my hands.

It was an envelope. A thin, modern envelope with a design on it that I couldn’t remember ever seeing before─but while I didn’t remember seeing it, the envelope did feel familiar. Couldn’t I have found a similar envelope under a low table in a derelict house five years ago, during summer break?

That envelope was empty.

Feel alone told me this one held a note─the envelope may not have listed a sender or recipient on either side, but someone had stuck it under my desk.

Sodachi Oikura.

She’d kept every one of her promises.

She must have come to school so early that even most of our teachers hadn’t arrived yet─and she’d placed this envelope under my desk.

The kind of girl who suddenly disappeared, without any warning. That was the kind of girl Oikura─no longer seemed to be. A small change, but a change in her. It made me happy, but also a little sad. Like she’d gone ahead and left me behind.

In that case, I needed to prove that I’d grown, too. Instead of tearing the envelope apart like I had five years ago, I opened it as carefully as I could─and extracted multiple sheets of paper. Now then. Did they contain a math quiz, or was it an uncharacteristic letter of thanks─perhaps an insulting, abusive message? It could be all three─let’s take a look.

“Heh.”

I broke out smiling.

Hey.

What do you think it said?