Monogatari Series - Volume 26 - Chapter 1.29

029

“The person I respect is my father, and the person I respect is my mother.

“I have to say, it’s those college seniors on the job hunt that can answer the interviewer’s questions with those words that I truly respect and love.

“That I hold in high esteem.

“Somewhere inside me, I have the feeling that familial love is a wonderful thing. But, you see, it was only inside me.

“It wasn’t in the house.

“And it wasn’t in the cage.

“We talked about something like the cycle of abuse, right? You know, where you aren’t able to love your children because your parents didn’t love you… But, in that sense, my parents were fine people.

“They were a fine pair.

“They got their dream jobs, were active in a foreign country, and even obtained citizenship there… I believe they were respected and loved even by the people around them.

“They were a fine pair, and it was just that that pair couldn’t become a fine trio.

“Daddy was a pediatrician, and Mommy was a fashion designer for children’s clothes… I’d never really thought about it in this way, but in a way, they were both specialists of children.

“Specialists.

“And I think they were good at it. Daddy didn’t let me die, and Mommy used to make clothes for me all the time.

“Hagoromo is a pretty unusual name for my generation, don’t you think? It’s a name that Mommy gave to me. Meaning ‘a robe of feathers’.

“The legend of the hagoromo.

“I can go on and on about how they came to Switzerland, how they achieved success there, or perhaps even the romantic tale of how they met, but, yeah, I’ll stop here.

“I don’t feel like bragging about my parents. I wouldn’t do something so embarrassing. For reasons beyond just embarrassment.

“But, well, when I look back on myself, it’s like I’ve done similar things, in a similar position, right?

“I wonder if they’ve been through something terrible, too. I wonder if that’s why they gave me such a hard time.

“The apple doesn’t fall far from the tree.

“There’s a saying like that, right?

“There’s also a saying that goes, ‘The child is father to the man’—I’ll quote this saying again later, so remember it.

“Because I want you to warn me if I forget to do so.

“I said that it was time for class to begin, and I’m starting to use the same tone of voice as in my lectures out of habit, but, well, I’m not really qualified to teach… I say ‘habit’, but it’s really in spite of me.37 I said it as a metaphor, but at the same time, it means exactly what it sounds like.

“If I’d been an honest person, I wouldn’t have been able to work at a national university. Even if you don’t manage to decipher this letter, Araragi-kun, I’m sure someone will eventually find out. That I was a fake teacher.

“Don’t get me wrong. My parents definitely loved me. Thinking like this could be a form of Stockholm Syndrome, and you might criticize me for being complicit in my parents’ actions, but still, even if it was a bit warped, I would say that was still love.

“Although the idea that parents will always be parents to their children, even if they are abused, makes me sick.

“At the very least, even though I had never attended any kind of school, not even for a day, I was still provided enough education to be able to teach at a foreign university. Although it’s a bit ironic to think that my longing for school was what made me a university professor.

“They did love me.

“But, they didn’t pay me any respect.

“Do you get it? In other words, they didn’t treat me like a human being.

“They treated me like a doll.

“They took care of me like a toy.

“I was a teddy bear to those two.

“Bears are cute, aren’t they? I wonder why they’re so cute?

“But, it’s only the children that are cute.

“Adult bears are scary. You can’t call them with ‘-chan’. You end up wanting to use ‘sir’ or ‘madam’.

“I’d like to say that only pandas are cute even when they grow up… But even pandas are cuter as children.

“Have you ever been told that, Araragi-kun? ‘You used to be so cute as a child.’ Well, children don’t grow up the way parents want them to. Like how characters move on their own in the culture of Cool Japan, I guess?

“Anyway, about my parents.

“About my home. About my cage.

“I was their little teddy bear… and they didn’t want their little bear to grow up so quickly. They really, really didn’t want it—they wanted me to stay their adorable little baby forever.

“So.

“They stopped raising me.”