Toradora! Vol. 9 Read online

  She had too much to drink and went to bed at five in the morning. Then she woke up at eight and apparently went to her afternoon job without getting any food or rest while the alcohol was still in her system. It seemed that might have caused her anemia. Her already-low blood pressure was also a problem, and they were just lucky it hadn’t been something more serious. The doctor, in short, had said not to worry, to take iron supplements, to sleep, and to not drink too much.

  As Ryuuji soothed his heart and listened to the doctor’s specific directions and medical jargon, he thought he caught a whiff of a certain smell. It was a soft odor, like a mix between the light-brown, mushy, melted food made for the old and sick to eat and cleaning detergent. That slightly nauseating, warm air even followed them here, Ryuuji thought.

  When Ryuuji was very small, long before he moved to this town, Yasuko was in the hospital for a long time. Ryuuji still didn’t know what disease she had had, and his memories were vague because he had been too young. When he was surrounded by that smell, he immediately remembered the overwhelming odor that would wrap around his whole body whenever the automatic doors opened, and the emotions that would come with it when he saw the patchwork pattern on the roof of the daycare at the hospital he had been going to, and the duck and alligator wallpaper on the walls.

  He remembered the book he had fully memorized, the dark part on the end of a blinking fluorescent lamp, the hair and dust that gathered at the corner of a hallway, the tanks lined up next to the restrooms along the wall that had some mystery use, the plastic name plates on them, the quiet stairs leading to the basement, and the iron door with the terrifying mark.

  He didn’t like the boredom, or the unfamiliar kids and adults, or being talked to. His heart would start to race oddly, and his throat would get hot, and he would feel like sobbing and wailing. During that time, Ryuuji had been an anxious, scared, quivering kid.

  He was still about as useless now as he was then.

  “What should I make for dinner… I guess we don’t have anything… I guess I should go get something that Yasuko can eat today when she wakes up.”

  “Then I’ll stay here and watch Ya-chan.”

  “It’s okay. You’ve got to be tired, too, so you should go home. I’ll bring something you can eat at your condo.”

  Yasuko had said that she was feeling queasy, so he thought about making an easy-to-digest gruel that might be good, or maybe soup. Maybe he would make soup with some noodles. He would give her a Pocari sports drink to hydrate her and her favorite pudding, popsicles, and almond jelly. If he got her a magazine, she might even read it the next day.

  He’d do something like that.

  He had enough wisdom to select those things, but there was something even more vital he really needed that his current self couldn’t do. He had grown enough to have that wisdom, but he himself was the cause of this situation.

  If Yasuko hadn’t started a day job, this never would have happened. If she hadn’t wanted Ryuuji go to college, this wouldn’t have happened. If he hadn’t said things the way he did before, this wouldn’t have happened.

  “I said I’m fine. More importantly, I’m worried about Ya-chan, too, so…Ryuuji?”

  He held his head. For a moment, he couldn’t remember what was going on and what he was trying to do. His mind went blank, and he was in a stupor…his wallet. Right, his wallet.

  Ryuuji grabbed his wallet and stood up. He needed to go shopping for food. He slowly took a step and then started walking.

  “Hey…are you okay? Wait.”

  He left the living room light on and lent an ear for a moment to the other side of the sliding door. He felt like he could hear Yasuko gently breathing in her sleep.

  “Hey, Ryuuji.”

  “I’m going out for a bit.”

  He put on his slip-on sandals and left the front door. He went down the stairs and started walking.

  The sky turned dark before he realized it. It was night.

  The asphalt took on a glassy glitter under the circular light of the streetlamps. A woman with a small dog breathed white as she passed by Ryuuji’s side. A salary man wearing a mask was talking in a loud voice as he overtook Ryuuji. He wasn’t talking to himself but on a cell phone.

  Haah—the white cloud Ryuuji breathed out stuck around for a while as it went up above his face. When he moved his legs, he felt like he was following that breath.

  That was why his eyes were clouded and he couldn’t see well.

  He didn’t notice the incredibly loud footsteps following behind him, either.

  “Hey, your coat?! You even forgot your keys and phone! And your eco bag!”

  “Ah…huh?”

  He staggered at the sudden impact from behind him. Taiga had run into him like she meant to jump onto his back. When he turned back around, she was breathing white like a runaway engine.

  “Get back to your senses! You idiot!”

  She thrust the down jacket that Ryuuji always wore at him. Then, for the first time, Ryuuji realized what he was wearing. He had taken off his school jacket and cardigan and was only wearing his school uniform’s shirt and slacks. He had put sandals on his bare feet. When he looked down, he was more surprised by the absurdity of it all than the cold.

  “Seriously! Here, hurry and put this on!”

  Taiga practically threw the jacket at Ryuuji’s chest. Then, she stuck out her hand at him. She was holding his usual eco bag, which she had probably thrown his cell phone and keys into. Taiga likely grabbed it as quickly as she could and was out of breath from running after him in the cold.

  Then he noticed Taiga, whose nose was red.

  “What’s…with your feet?”

  “Huh? What!”

  She wasn’t in a coat. She only wore her uniform with thick tights, and Yasuko’s slip-on sandals. Taiga looked down at her skinny-looking legs.

  “I messed up!” she wailed in a low voice.

  “You wear it.”

  Ryuuji put the jacket he had just taken from Taiga’s hands right on her shoulders, but Taiga wriggled as though she didn’t want that.

  “No! I’m fine! I’m going home, so you wear it!”

  Her sandals clip-clopped as she jumped to the side and ran to the end of the road. No, you wear it, Ryuuji tried to say back, but he got caught on his words. He still had the jacket in his hand as he tried to get her to wear it, and then he stood stock-still as though he was spacing out.

  He couldn’t get his voice to make a sound.

  His throat was dry.

  He was just dead tired from that day.

  “Ryuuji…?”

  He noticed Taiga looking up at him. Her hair moved with the sub-freezing northern wind, and she tilted her head ever so slightly as she opened her eyes wide and asked him how he was doing.

  You wear this and go home first. I’ll make something for you for dinner. Thanks for bringing it, ’kay—he couldn’t even form those words with his mouth.

  It was as though a lid sealed Ryuuji’s throat. He remained silent as he half-forcefully bundled Taiga in the jacket where she was standing along the wall. Then, without letting her say anything, he turned on his heel.

  He had the eco bag in one hand as he walked through the town at night.

  What would he buy? He looked at the time on his phone. It was still before eight. It was earlier than he thought. The supermarkets would still be open. He headed to the store-lined streets and looked down at his own toes, which were freezing. He could hear the clip-clop of slip-on sandals.

  He knew that was Taiga without even turning around. Taiga had sneakily followed him.

  She probably actually thought he hadn’t noticed her yet. When Ryuuji stopped at a crosswalk, Taiga hid herself behind an electric pole a short distance before the crossing. When the light turned green and he started walking, she waited a moment, and then he heard the clip-clop of her feet again.

  I see right through you, just go home, he wanted to say, but the lid that covered Ryuuji’s t
hroat was still holding back his heart. Ryuuji forged ahead, and Taiga acted like a spy. Like dunces, the two of them continued to walk through the town at night like neither of them noticed the other.

  The reason why he couldn’t say anything was probably because once he started talking, he didn’t know what would come out. That was why he needed to keep his throat lidded.

  You never bothered to notice me. Ryuuji wanted to repeat back the words Ami had yelled at him at the park during sunset. In that case, how do you know how I’m feeling right now? It’s not like you’d ever even try to find out.

  That was because he would never let her know.

  It was hard. It hurt. He couldn’t put that into words. Ryuuji didn’t want anyone to know. He wouldn’t tell anyone. He didn’t want anyone to figure it out. If someone did figure it out, that someone who asked him about it would—

  “Achoo!”

  That certain someone who cared about him would try to do something about it.

  He stopped and turned around. He switched directions and finally managed to tell her, “Go home.” Taiga rubbed at her nose and opened her eyes wide, as though shocked. It seemed she really, genuinely thought he hadn’t figured out she was following him.

  “Go home, really.”

  “No!”

  He repeated his words to her and pushed back at Taiga’s shoulders as though trying to have her go back the way she came. Even though Taiga was small, she was heavy, like she was made of steel, and he couldn’t push her back at all.

  “No! You’re acting weird!”

  She narrowed her eyes as though menacing him. She said it vehemently and stubbornly.

  “Just go home!”

  “I said no! I won’t talk to you! I won’t walk with you! I’ll just go with you! What’s so wrong with that?! It’s what I want to do!”

  He didn’t want her to open her mouth anymore.

  “You’re a nuisance! There’s nothing you can do, so just go home!”

  He was fed up with people working so hard they collapsed for the sake of his future. Whether it was anemia or a serious disease, he didn’t want to feel like this ever again.

  He didn’t want anyone to ruin their body for his sake—no one, not again, not ever again. He didn’t want to make anyone do that.

  “I’m not going home! I’m going with you!”

  “I said to go home!”

  “I’m staying here! Let me go, you balding pig! Don’t touch me!”

  They were at the street before the line of stores when Ryuuji and Taiga started having a pointless pushing match. When Taiga resisted him, Ryuuji half-seriously hit her shoulders and desperately bit his lip. You’re nosy, a nuisance, in the way, noisy, self-centered—all kinds of complaints came springing into his head, but he didn’t say them out loud. He was close to letting an actual shout slip out of his throat.

  What am I supposed to do if she dies?!

  Like an idiot, exactly like a kid, Ryuuji had jumped to that hasty conclusion and was actually seriously feeling that fear. He was close to yelling, desperately keeping his mouth closed as he bit too hard on his lip and split it open.

  Forever ago, an eon ago, an incredibly long time ago—he was terrified. “What’ll I do if my mom dies?” That thought had been the root of his fear.

  They had walked while holding each other’s hands in the moonlight, faced each other as they read picture books at night, swung on the swings in the sun as he sat in her lap. He’d been taken in by the words she repeated over and over again, “It’s going to be okay.”

  He’d believed that it would be okay, but suddenly, the time when the spell’s effect wore off had come. Terrifying thoughts circled in Ryuuji’s head again and again and again.

  “It’s fine. So just! Go home!”

  “Ryuuji!”

  He cut Taiga off and pushed her away. He ran away as fast as he could.

  Like he was avoiding the light of the stores on the streets where people passed by, he ducked into a dark back path. He desperately escaped into the gaps between the dark houses he had seen from the school window, which looked like the crests of waves on the sea. He panted like a dog and swallowed back the whimper that would occasionally try to find its way out. No matter how he ran and ran, it felt as though the anxiety and fears of his childhood were following after him. If he kept like this, he would immediately be caught in its hands.

  This probably wasn’t something he could run from.

  Ryuuji’s world had been nothing but Yasuko for so long. Yasuko, too young to be a mother, had held him, and it was as though the two of them had been sent alone together on a safe boat into the sea in the middle of night. Ryuuji clung desperately to Yasuko, and their family traveled the endless waves. He thought letting go of her hand would mean the end. If the one and only person who would hold his hand disappeared, that would be the end of everything. He would be alone for eternity. He had been feared that for so long.

  But Ryuuji slowly got bigger. He almost drowned several times but became more courageous at swimming through the waves each time. He felt letting go of Yasuko’s hand would be okay. He could swim by himself, eventually find a safe boat all on his own, and then pull Yasuko up with him.

  That was what he thought.

  Then his mother’s hand had reached out to him as though saying, “You can’t let go yet.”

  “Takasu-kun, you’ve never rebelled against your mother until now, right?”

  When that happened, he brushed aside Yasuko’s hand.

  “Sit with me.” “Be a good boy now.” “Wait until I get home.” “Make sure you study.” “Eat dinner with me.” “Don’t work.” It was the first time Ryuuji had rebelled against something Yasuko had told him. Deciding he wouldn’t go to college and would work was rebellion. He had done it because he wanted to brush away Yasuko’s hand in order to rebel.

  He didn’t know which direction to head or where to go, but Ryuuji wanted to try swimming on his own. He wanted to win. He wanted to be superior. He knew that he was taking the “virtuous route.” Ryuuji wasn’t sacrificing college in order to work. He didn’t even know what his aspirations were, only that he was so afraid of finding them that he was using self-sacrifice as an escape. He also couldn’t deny that there was something appealing about the idea of sacrificing his own future as he ran away.

  He’d known he was hurting Yasuko by doing that, but he still went through with it. He had gone over the head of his one and only mother. He wanted to become larger and stronger than his mother—strong enough that he would be fine even if she were taken from him.

  Did he really have the strength to swim by himself? He didn’t know. It was precisely because he didn’t know that he wanted to try. But he’d endangered himself, and when the adults had offered him their hands, he’d pulled away. Yasuko hadn’t believed that he would be okay, and she’d tried to pull her son back as he left her in the waves. Then Ryuuji was caught again. He was caught by the anxieties and fears from his childhood.

  However, this time his fear wasn’t of the cold sea that could steal his mother from him, but that his own faltering swimming would be the cause of his mother sacrificing herself and drowning.

  It wasn’t just because of the cold that the fingers he put to his mouth were trembling.

  “I-I caught youuuu!”

  He felt something latch onto his elbow from behind, and he staggered. Taiga, who was still in sandals, and whom he hadn’t expected to follow him this far, took hold of him with a terrifying force. She spun him around with an intense momentum, and he wasn’t able to hold out as he stumbled.

  “Ryuuji! Stop! I said stop!”

  “My—”

  “It’s fine, so just stop, you idiot! That was close! Didn’t you notice the car coming by you just now?!”

  When he still tried to run, she ended up aiming a deadly kick at his behind. It didn’t hurt, but it made him collapse so he finally couldn’t run away.

  “It’s all my fault… This is my fault, isn�
��t it?”

  He crouched pitifully before an electrical pole. In his mind, he wailed, Give me a break. He didn’t want to show Taiga his face, so he desperately grasped at the electrical pole and buried his head in his arm.

  “What’re you saying?!”

  “Yasuko collapsed because of me. It’s my fault. I was wrong.”

  “You…you feel like you’re to blame because she pushed herself too hard for you? But, but, um…you couldn’t do anything about it! It was anemia and her health. No matter how much you look after her, she’s human and she’ll get sick every once in a while! There’s nothing and no one to blame! Plus Ya-chan is your mom! No one can stop Ya-chan from doing stuff for you, right?!”

  Taiga was breathing hard, and her voice seemed to vibrate desperately. She was saying that even though her own parents probably never did anything for her before. It was because she didn’t understand how a parent’s feelings could build up that she could so innocently just tell him to accept things as they were. When Taiga did that in front of him, Ryuuji felt even more cornered. He was being confronted with his absolute weakness and how spoiled he was.

  “How would you know?” His voice grated and pitched up, and his lips trembled. “Yasuko ended up like that because of me. If I had gotten myself more together, she would have actually believed I could do it, and she would have relied on me more, and she wouldn’t have ended up like that.”

  “I…I don’t…really get it…”

  He felt her touch his shoulder slightly with her small hand, as she was unsure of what to do. Her hand was probably rising and falling near his back as she hesitated.

  He tried to push away her hand. Just as he had brushed aside Yasuko’s hand, he tried to ward off Taiga’s, now.

  “What am I supposed to do…?!”

  “Ryuuji—”

  They touched for just a moment.

  Her warmth, her body heat transferred over to his frozen fingertips, but it was too intense. Even then, Taiga stayed next to him. His instincts told him that this was his final saving grace. Everything he was thinking about burned away in that moment.

  Even though he had been trying to brush Taiga’s hand aside, he ended up gripping it instinctively. In the ring of indifferent light from the streetlamp, Taiga’s eyes opened wide.