Book Girl and the Corrupted Angel Page 2

  “Hmmm, so you don’t like worms then. I suspected as much. I’m good at guessing where a girl’s tastes lie. In any case, it’s commonly thought that worms hibernate in the winter and stop moving around, so you needn’t worry.”

  “Grrrr. Y-you molester!”

  She balled up a piece of paper and hurled it at him, but Mr. Mariya dodged it easily. The ball landed right in my face.

  “Ow!”

  Kotobuki looked frantic, her face bright red, and she turned her back on me, muttering, “Ack—! Y-you’re such a klutz, Inoue! Why didn’t you dodge?”

  Or so it seemed until she turned to glance back worriedly and then hurriedly turned around again.

  “See? Isn’t she cute?”

  Mr. Mariya rested a hand on my shoulder and winked.

  Kotobuki…he’s toying with you, I thought.

  I felt bad for her. But…Mr. Mariya was right: Kotobuki looked cute when she was angry or flustered. So that’s the kind of girl Kotobuki is. I could see now why the boys in our class made so much noise about how great Nanase Kotobuki was…

  “Let’s take a break.”

  After we’d been working away for about an hour, Mr. Mariya poured some tea into paper cups for us.

  I thought it might be tea with milk, but the color and aroma were both rich and it tasted sweet. There was the light fragrance of cinnamon. Oh, and maybe there was some ginger in there, too.

  “This is called chai. It’s a sweet, boiled tea with milk that’s drunk in India. What do you think?”

  “It’s very good.”

  It seemed like something Tohko would like. Sweet, warm, relaxing, melting away fatigue…

  Mr. Mariya’s eyes crinkled as he smiled.

  “I’m glad. I love serving my guests chai. Did it meet with your approval also, Nanase?”

  “…It’s good.”

  “If you married me, you’d be able to drink it every day.”

  “Never! That will never, ever happen!”

  Kotobuki howled like a cat with its fur standing on end, but Mr. Mariya was undaunted.

  “Oh yes. A friend of mine sent me some tickets to the opera. It’s a student recital, but the lead tenor is a professional making a guest appearance. Would you like to go, Nanase?”

  He held the tickets up between his fingers, and Kotobuki shot a sideways glance at them, maybe a little bit interested.

  “…I have some, too.”

  Mr. Mariya made a surprised face.

  “Oh? What a coincidence. Do you like the opera? We have something in common then. Perhaps it’s fate.”

  Kotobuki quickly denied it.

  “No, I—one of my friends is performing, so I bought my own ticket!”

  “Oh my, one of your friends is a student at the Shirafuji Music Academy high school? I’m an alumnus there! Incidentally, is she pretty?”

  “So what if she is?!”

  “Oh, I just thought it would be nice for the three of us to go get Nepalese food together. Your friend is available, isn’t she?”

  “Yuka has a boyfriend! Even if she didn’t, I would never introduce a lazy music teacher who puts in earplugs in order to take naps during music classes to my best friend!”

  “I’m a student of Buddhism, so when I hear Christian hymns, a beanstalk grows out of my belly.”

  “I’ve never heard of that before!”

  “That’s because it’s not true.”

  “Grrrr!”

  “M-Mr. Mariya, maybe you should stop. Don’t start waving your fists around, either, Kotobuki. Okay?”

  Sensing the unquiet in the air, I quickly stepped into the fray. Kotobuki suddenly flushed and lowered her hands to sweep off her skirt; then she returned to the work with obvious haste.

  Through a cloud of sweet-smelling steam, Mr. Mariya smiled serenely as he watched Kotobuki’s reaction.

  “Marmar studied vocals. He studied abroad in Paris while he was in college, and he even won a competition while he was over there!”

  At lunch the next day, while I ate my packed lunch with Akutagawa, Mori and her friends came purposefully over to us and started talking about Mr. Mariya.

  “His parents are musicians, too, and I’ve heard that people called him a genius. Apparently he sings in a supersweet, liquid tenor. Marmar could have been as big as a pop star when he made his professional debut. Why did he become a teacher, you think? What a total waste!”

  “Oh, but really, for a boyfriend you want a totally normal guy, not an older heartthrob with a past. Don’t give up, Inoue!”

  “Yeah. Nanase doesn’t go for brand-name stuff, so relax and go for it.”

  “Oh! Nanase’s back! Say hi to her for us, Inoue.”

  Gaping, I watched Mori and the others patter off.

  “Akutagawa, what just happened…?”

  “Pretty sure I followed, but I can’t say. Kotobuki would never forgive me.”

  Akutagawa set down his chopsticks, looking sorry.

  But…oh, I thought sluggishly, still holding my lettuce and scrambled egg sandwich. Mr. Mariya had also been called a genius.

  Classes were over for the day. After I dropped off the improv story for Tohko’s provisions in the relationship advice box that had been set up without permission in the school yard, I went to the music room, where a boy I didn’t recognize stood in front of the door.

  He was about my height. He had bright, colorless hair, was thin, and wore glasses—a perfectly ordinary student with no distinguishing features.

  He kept his face down and glided past me like a breeze.

  Huh? Didn’t that guy have some reason for being at the music room…?

  When I opened the door, I saw Mr. Mariya sitting on a fold-up chair, drinking chai. He had a finger pressed to his lip, as if he was thinking about something, and the sight of him spacing out unguardedly called to mind a certain braided book girl, and I smirked. A heavy-looking watch glinted at his wrist.

  “Hmm? By yourself, Inoue? Where’s Nanase?”

  “She said she had to take care of something and was going to be late.”

  “Ah, good. I thought I might have tormented her a little too much yesterday, and she’d run away on me. It was a chilling thought.”

  “If you realize what you’re doing, why don’t you take some responsibility?”

  “Oh, but her reactions are so much fun I can’t help myself.”

  He grinned at me, his eyes seeming to declare, “It’s a secret.”

  Ever since the day before, Mr. Mariya had been giving me that same sort of familiar look, as if he was a kindly older brother. Whenever he did, it made my chest squirm a little.

  “I heard that you won a competition abroad, and people used to call you a genius.”

  “Ha-ha, it’s been said, yes.”

  Mister Mariya laughed lightly.

  His smile was so natural I couldn’t stop myself from asking, “Why didn’t you go professional?”

  The moment it was said, a thorn shot through my heart. As I waited for his answer, I held my breath completely in earnest.

  Because I had once been called a genius, too.

  It was in the spring of my third year that I, an ordinary middle schooler, had been swallowed up by a gigantic wave.

  At fourteen years old, I won the new author’s prize of a literary magazine that I’d entered on a whim, their youngest winner ever, and because my pen name was Miu Inoue—a girl’s name—I was crowned with the exaggerated title of a mysterious genius in the body of a masked, young female author, and I became famous throughout the country.

  Now that more than two years had gone by, I was spending my days peaceably again. I’d even made friends and learned how to laugh.

  How had it been for Mr. Mariya?

  He’d been hailed as a genius by everyone around him and had great things expected of his future, so why had he become a teacher?

  What did he think about it all now?

  Through the sweet-smelling steam, Mr. Mariya’s lips bent into a
soft smile.

  “I wanted the time I spent at leisure with the person I loved to be more important than anything. Florid strangers, gut-wrenching practices, intense schedules—they weren’t for me.”

  His voice was clear and unwavering.

  His eyes narrowed in a gentle smile like gooey, golden honey, and he raised his paper cup as if in a toast.

  “So I can affirm that I have no regrets about my decision. So long as I have a cup of chai, life is wonderful, and an ordinary life beats anything else.”

  His words and his voice penetrated my heart like beams of light, and like the sweet chai that gave off the aroma of cinnamon, they seeped slowly and warmly into every corner of my body, leaving a sharp excitement behind.

  I couldn’t take my eyes from Mr. Mariya’s smile.

  Man, that would be great.

  Someday, I wanted to be able to validate my own life like he had.

  I wanted to spend every day in easy normalcy while cherishing the gentleness of the ordinary.

  Mr. Mariya, who I’d only thought of as a weirdo, seemed like a very broad-minded, generous person.

  Finally Kotobuki appeared, out of breath.

  “Hello, Nanase. You were so eager to see me that you rushed that much to get here?”

  “N-no, I—”

  “Oh no, is that a worm?”

  “Eek!”

  “Kotobuki, worms are hibernating right now.”

  “Er…shut up, Inoue!”

  Mr. Mariya was teasing Kotobuki the same as he had yesterday.

  Kotobuki was getting red faced and angry. I was getting into the middle of things…

  This kind of trivial interaction was fun, warm, and comfortable.

  Hello, Konoha.

  Thank you for the snacks in the mailbox.

  For the essence of fresh mint jelly in “school gate,” “whale,” and “bungee jumping.”

  The jelly was sweet, and it was more like a thick milk tea than mint, but it melted away on my tongue and tasted like cinnamon and ginger and tasted great. It was just like chai. The last words were jelly made gooey by the heat, dropping warmly into my belly. I felt so happy. Thank you.

  I got an F on my prep class practice test, so I was a little depressed. Eating your story cheered me up, though. Write me another good one.

  Tohko

  Whoa! She saw right through me.

  After school, I read the letter from Tohko that was in the mailbox, and my cheeks grew slowly warmer. It tasted like chai…Well, of course it did, though I hadn’t been aware of it.

  And then she got an F. Are you going to be all right, Tohko?

  If you upset your stomach before an exam, you’ll be in a real jam, so you should lay off the special platters of ghosts for a while.

  I dropped off the new snack I’d put together during class and headed to the music room.

  The angel brought me a fir tree.

  Last night I was so depressed about my job, he probably wanted to cheer me up. My angel knows everything about me. And I can tell my angel anything.

  Things I can’t even tell Nanase—ugly things, dirty things, everything.

  It’s still early for Christmas, but the angel and I dug a hole in the ground and planted the fir tree. Our precious Christmas tree.

  Tomorrow I promised I would decorate it with angel wings, crystal churches, gold bells, and stars, and then we would have to put up lights.

  The angel doesn’t believe in God, so he says that he hates Christmas and hymns. Whenever I sing them, he covers his ears and screams for me to stop. I can’t believe in God, either, but I like Christmas. I could stare at the lights on the tree all night long. When I do, it feels very pure and holy, even though I don’t believe in God. It’s like my spirit is being sucked up into the light.

  I wish I could have lived in the tree. If I had, I’m positive my ugliness would melt away into the white light.

  I’m spending Christmas Eve this year with my boyfriend.

  I’m spending Christmas with Nanase.

  I wonder if things are going well with Nanase and Inoue? Although yesterday on the phone, she was depressed because she said, “I glared at him again” and “I said something mean again.”

  Nanase is supercute and nice, so if she was just a little more proactive, I’m sure Inoue would fall for her.

  When I told her I thought it would be nice to be able to go on a double date—her and Inoue and me and my boyfriend—I felt like an awful person for lying. My heart hurt, and I felt like crying. I didn’t know what to do.

  “You’re really close with Mr. Mariya, huh, Kotobuki?”

  “Wh-what?! How can you say that?! Of course, I’m not.”

  One hour later I was working with Kotobuki in the music room, which was warmed by the light of the sun.

  Mr. Mariya had something to do in the teachers’ office and had left, so Kotobuki and I were all alone in the room. Kotobuki was next to me, rummaging through papers, and she growled, “You sure there’s nothing wrong with your eyes, Inoue?”

  “Maybe. When you’re with him, you seem more talkative than usual.”

  “W-well…”

  She started to say something else, then turned sharply away with an “Am not” and fell silent.

  She continued her work with tremendous energy in silence.

  And now I remembered that there was something I wanted to ask her. How could I do it? I just had to commit and ask right now, I guess.

  “Hey, Kotobuki.”

  “Wh-what?!”

  “Where was it that you and I met in middle school? I’ve been thinking about it, but I can’t remember.”

  Well, I’d said it.

  But I wanted to take this opportunity to clear things up—the things Kotobuki had rambled tearfully about at our play rehearsal for the culture fair—

  “I’m sure you don’t remember, but it meant a lot to me.”

  “The girl who was always with you was the author Miu Inoue, wasn’t she?!”

  Why had Kotobuki mistaken Miu for Miu Inoue?

  Why didn’t I remember meeting Kotobuki?

  Maybe the reason for her unnatural stubbornness lay there…

  Her head hanging down, Kotobuki was as still as a stone. She bit down on her lip and paled.

  Maybe I shouldn’t have asked…

  Just as I was beginning to regret it, she forced out a pained response.

  “…the school emblem.”

  “Huh?”

  “School emblem…still doesn’t help you remember?”

  “Um, you mean the school emblem that’s a patch you stick on your uniform, right?”

  Kotobuki’s shoulders twitched.

  “Hold on, I’m remembering right now. The emblem…hmm…hmmm…”

  My middle school’s emblem was in the shape of a maple. The color changed depending on the class year, and Kotobuki had met me in the…winter of my second year? In that case, the emblem was blue, so…

  “God, just forget it.”

  Her agitated voice interrupted my thoughts.

  Kotobuki’s hands were balled up fiercely, and she was shaking.

  “Y-you don’t need to force yourself to remember,” she said.

  The air was frigid. I was bewildered.

  Just then, Mr. Mariya returned.

  “Sorry about that. I swiped a salty rice cake from the teachers’ office, so let’s have some tea. Oh—Nanase, what’s the matter?”

  Mr. Mariya’s face closed in on hers to the point he was almost kissing her, and Kotobuki jerked away in a panic.

  “I—it’s nothing!”

  “Oh, were you sad that I wasn’t here?”

  He laughed brightly, but she wailed, red faced, “I hate you! You pervert! No!”

  She seemed slightly better, but Kotobuki didn’t meet my gaze after that.

  When the school building was tinted an angry red by the sun, the three of us left the music room together.

  “Tomorrow and the day after, I’ll be out on bu
siness, so we’ll see each other next on Thursday. I know you can handle things.”

  “Okay. Bye, Mr. Mariya. Bye, Kotobuki.”

  “…Bye.”

  I parted ways with Mr. Mariya, who was going back to the teachers’ office, and Kotobuki, who was heading back to the library. I was just starting to walk when I thought I felt someone watching me.

  A gloomy, piercing face looked in my direction, but there was no one there.

  Where was it coming from?

  Standing in front of the stairs, I scanned the area when overhead I heard someone clucking his tongue and whispering low, as though the moaning of the wind.

  “…What a heartwarming scene.”

  A shudder ran down my spine, and my skin prickled.

  I turned my gaze upward and searched the stairs that circled up to the fourth floor, holding my breath, scouring them with my eyes. But there was no one there.

  What…was that voice just now?

  Who was it talking to? Me? Mr. Mariya? Or maybe Kotobuki?

  I listened closely, but I couldn’t even hear footsteps anymore.

  I got a call from my teacher about my customers. He’s worried about me for a lot of reasons.

  He is such a kind, wonderful person.

  It’s been so long since we’ve been on a date; he was kind of in a bad mood. Even if I touched his hand, he wouldn’t loosen his fingers from around mine. He told me moodily to quit my job.

  To cheer myself up, I decorated the entrance to the castle with lots of pictures.

  Pictures of Nanase and me. Pictures of my angel and me. In every picture I was smiling happily, and whenever I looked at them, I could think, Wow, the girl in these pictures is so happy, and I became happy.

  But the pictures with him were the only ones that made me feel like my heart was ripping in half, and I couldn’t put them up.

  Instead, I put up photos of blue roses.

  It was a lie of a color, a white rose that someone had dyed blue, but it was pretty.