Episode 49
Why am I here, exactly?
The girl in front of me was grinning, positively beaming, and had pulled me by the hand into the room without asking.
Today was only supposed to be studying, and yet Fujishiro was in regular clothes with the choker wrapped around her neck.
Well, I’d come in casual clothes myself, if I’m honest, and I’d even brazenly packed pyjamas for staying over.
What was I even doing?
I’d been so firmly resolved not to come to Fujishiro’s today.
I wanted to smack my own weak-willed head, but having already come here, that seemed pointless, so I gave up and sat down at the desk.
Glancing sideways, there was Fujishiro, grinning far too happily, and something about it irritated me, so I gave the choker a tug, tightening it just enough to make her throat uncomfortable.
But it seemed to backfire. Fujishiro placed her hand over mine and smiled, delighted.
“You can do more, if you want.”
“You absolute pervert.”
“Pervert’s fine. Hey, if you’re going to do it, strangle me with your own hand.”
“Are you stupid?”
She has a way of letting whatever I say slide right past her.
No matter how awful the thing I say, she never takes it seriously.
I think Fujishiro’s a genius at getting under my skin.
Not knowing anything about how irritated I was, Fujishiro moved my hand onto her own throat.
Testing it, I pushed her, and she toppled easily, her back landing on the floor.
I should have held her life in my hands right then, and yet Fujishiro’s cheeks had gone red, smiling happily.
Fujishiro, popular at school.
Fujishiro, clever at her studies.
Thinking that her fate right now rested entirely in what I decided to do with my hand, a kind of excitement rose in me, and my hand tightened without my meaning it to.
Squeezing her throat gently, the soft skin gave under my fingers, and her pulse came through against them.
It’s obvious, of course, but this confirmed that Fujishiro was alive.
“I like it when Morishita strangles me. It makes me feel like I’m alive.”
“You’re insane.”
“You’re the one who made me this way.”
Fujishiro said that and laughed again.
My own heartbeat had climbed from touching her, and Fujishiro’s pulse came through my hand at the same time.
My own sound seemed about to catch up with hers, and that frightened me, so I let go of her.
“You’re supposed to be studying.”
“Right.”
We spread our notebooks and reference books on the same desk and began studying as usual.
After what had just happened, Fujishiro settled beside me to study without a second thought, as though nothing at all had occurred.
I wanted to tell her to have a little more sense of danger, but saying it felt pointless.
*
The morning passed quickly once we got into studying, and before long my stomach was making noises.
Fujishiro headed for the kitchen looking pleased about something, and sensing that nothing good was about to happen, I followed behind her.
Just as I’d expected, she was rolling up her sleeves, standing at the sink. I put a hand to my forehead and looked down.
I didn’t particularly care what happened to Fujishiro, but watching a dangerous scene like this wore me out just as much.
While I was standing there worrying, Fujishiro came close, peering up into my face.
Her face was suddenly right there, and I flinched.
“Don’t make such a disgusted face.”
“It’s not disgust, well, actually it is.”
“Morishita sometimes says things that really cut deep, you know.”
Fujishiro puffed her cheeks out, unusually annoyed.
She’s smaller than me, with a childish face, and puffing her cheeks like that made her look even younger, which unsettled something in my chest.
To cover the restless feeling stirring there, I loosened the choker at her throat, then tied it again, tighter.
It seemed to be a little uncomfortable, because Fujishiro’s face twisted slightly.
I patted her head lightly for it.
“I’ll do what I can to help.”
“Eh?”
“I’m not shameless enough to do nothing at all.”
“O, okay.”
Of course, part of it was not wanting to seem shameless, but I also thought I needed to become more capable, for what’s coming.
Fujishiro spread a cutting board out in the kitchen and waved me over.
On the counter sat carrots, potatoes, onions, pork.
Fujishiro pulled a box of curry roux from the cupboard, looking pleased with herself.
“Even I can make this.”
“I don’t think Fujishiro could make anything, even something this simple.”
“That’s genuinely awful. Just watch.”
She handed me a knife.
I decided to start with the potatoes, which looked like the harder job.
Fujishiro began peeling the carrots.
Both of us holding knives, standing close enough that our shoulders nearly touched, cutting vegetables, it struck me as strange we were even allowed to be doing this.
Glancing sideways, Fujishiro was handling the knife with more skill than I’d expected, competent and precise, and something about that felt wrong.
Maybe I’d been staring with too strange a face.
Fujishiro was watching me, laughing softly.
“Don’t look at me like I’m some kind of monster.”
“But you can actually use a knife…”
“How rude. I’m better at it than Morishita!”
The blade suddenly passed close in front of me and a startled sound nearly escaped.
Still just as dangerous as ever, evidently.
But Fujishiro had definitely changed.
“What happened…? Is there some reason you’re trying this hard?”
I asked carefully, and Fujishiro’s expression turned wistful, staring at the carrot in her hand.
A short silence passed, and then she opened her mouth.
“I suppose.”
“Because you’re going to live alone?”
“That’s part of it. And I thought I wanted to make Morishita something delicious.”
“For me…?”
The answer wasn’t what I’d expected, and I couldn’t hide my confusion.
Fujishiro gave an awkward smile, looking at me with something like embarrassment.
“That’s right. For Morishita.”
“Why?”
“I wonder why. Even I don’t really know.”
Fujishiro said that and started roughly chopping the peeled carrot.
Her hands moved with an eerie competence even there, and I thought that in less than half a year, she’d become someone I didn’t recognise anymore.
Thinking about how much time we’d spent together, more than anyone else probably had, and yet I hadn’t known this about her.
Carrying that unsettled feeling, I finished cutting my own potatoes and handed them to Fujishiro.
We started on the onions together, and before long both of us were sniffling, and when our eyes met, tears had gathered in both, and it struck me as funny enough that a laugh burst out of me.
The two of us, acting like fools just to make curry.
And yet, this time was comfortable for me, all the same.
I cut the meat into reasonably neat pieces and gathered it in a bowl.
Fujishiro heated oil in a small pot and started frying the meat and vegetables together. Even the sight inside that pot felt strangely off.
The vegetables weren’t burning.
Evenly browned to a golden colour, looking delicious even without seasoning yet.
Fujishiro no longer had room to spare any attention on me, facing the ingredients in the pot with a genuinely serious expression.
Not like the composed, put-together Fujishiro from school at all.
But I thought I liked this version of Fujishiro better.
At what seemed like the right moment, she added water, and it seemed all that was left was to let it simmer.
Fujishiro looked relieved, resting a hand against her forehead.
“Somehow, I managed.”
“It’s not finished yet.”
“This part was the biggest hurdle.”
“You sound like you know what you’re talking about, but you definitely don’t.”
“Ahaha! Caught? Cooking with Morishita is fun.”
The moment she turned that full, beaming smile on me, something thudded deep in my chest.
Not knowing how to respond to her smile, I turned my face away.
Even ignored, Fujishiro didn’t seem to mind at all, checking on the pot. At some point she even started skimming the scum off the top, moving with the genuine motions of someone actually cooking.
It simmered down nicely, the roux dissolved cleanly, and the curry was finished.
It was hard to believe Fujishiro had made it, sitting there in the pot. And somehow, without my noticing when, rice had appeared, fully cooked, in the rice cooker too.
Fujishiro, of course, wore a thoroughly self-satisfied expression.
But there wasn’t much time to bask in it, and she quickly plated the food and carried it to the table.
“Morishita, don’t just stand there, eat.”
“Ah, right…”
I followed after her and sat down.
The delicious smell of the curry in front of me tickled at my nose. The scent reached all the way down to my stomach, and saliva welled up in my mouth.
I pressed my hands together in front of my chest.
“Itadakimasu,” we said together.
Was that on purpose?
Fujishiro, sitting across from me, had said it at exactly the same moment.
Having someone’s itadakimasu overlap with my own felt strange, an odd, unfamiliar sensation.
I picked up my spoon and took a mouthful of curry.
I don’t really know what the “correct” taste of curry is supposed to be.
Since Fujishiro made it, I’d probably assumed it would come out below average.
But the curry Fujishiro made was delicious.
All that came to mind was simply, plainly, that it was good.
I’d heard on TV once that food tastes better eaten with someone else.
I’ve always thought that was just a nice-sounding lie.
Because meals eaten with my mother usually had no taste at all, and eating alone was almost always more enjoyable.
But the curry I ate with Fujishiro was, I realised, the best meal I’d ever had.
A single tear slid down my cheek and dropped onto the table.
Why was I crying now?
The tears had simply spilled out of my body on their own.
Not wanting Fujishiro to see anything else strange about me, I scrubbed at my eyes hard with the hem of my sleeve.
I’d rubbed too hard, and the skin beneath my eyes stung.
When the tears stopped and I looked up, Fujishiro was watching me with a soft expression.
“What?”
“There’s more if you want it, just say so.”
“Okay.”
After that I quietly kept bringing curry to my mouth.
I finished quickly and said “I want more,” and Fujishiro happily scooped out another serving and brought it over.
“…Thanks.”
“Thank you for eating it.”
“It’s weird for Fujishiro to be the one saying thanks.”
“Not really. You helped make it too.”
Fujishiro just kept watching me, purely, openly pleased.
Ignoring her irritating gaze, I kept bringing the curry to my mouth.
For the first time in a long while, I ate second helpings until my stomach felt like it might burst.