Chapter Four: The Guilty (Part Two)

But now, it meant she could win back her little sister's smile.

Ichinose Honami's hand reached for one of them, but the sudden sound of voices nearby made her snatch it back as if she'd been shocked.

She hurried away with her head down, roaming among the counters. Staying in one place too long would arouse suspicion.

Even now, Ichinose Honami was thinking rationally. It made her feel so sick with self-loathing that she wanted to throw up.

She mingled with the disorderly crowd. At school, she had stood tall and confidently delivered speeches under the gaze of hundreds, even thousands, of students countless times. But now, instinctively, she wished she could turn invisible, reducing her presence bit by bit until it was as small as possible.

In those few short minutes, every casual conversation nearby boomed in Ichinose Honami's ears like thunder. Even if someone merely glanced her way, she would anxiously scrutinize herself from head to toe.

In every second of the past fifteen years, Ichinose Honami had never associated herself with the word "criminal."

She wasn't committing a crime. She was doing it for her little sister.

The thought suddenly welled up inside her.

There was nothing wrong with doing something bad for her little sister. So many people in the world did bad things; compared to them, she was the one who deserved forgiveness most.

The thought took over her mind, and Ichinose Honami's hand grew steadier. From deep within her soul, an unfamiliar and strange sense of relief slowly emerged.

Ichinose Honami needed that insubstantial self-comfort, as if it could make her actions seem a little less shameless.

She took hold of the hair clip, wearing the most natural expression she could manage. No one would suspect a girl like her of standing at this counter and browsing.

Her little sister's smile had now solidified into this tiny hair clip, which Ichinose Honami clutched tightly in her hand. Her graceful figure seemed to grow heavier all at once, as if dozens of pounds had been added to her. Her feet felt almost as if they'd been hammered into the spotless floor tiles.

Ichinose Honami's heart hung rigidly in midair, yet her hand moved against her will, slipping the hair clip into a compartment of the bag in her right hand.

She turned with difficulty and walked into the nearby restroom without looking back.

In a restroom stall, trying to make the package smaller, Ichinose Honami tore open the little box, somewhat awkwardly—or perhaps roughly. After flushing the packaging down the toilet, she tucked the small hair clip inconspicuously into her inner pocket.

Of course, having the stolen goods on her made Ichinose Honami feel ashamed and guilty, but much heavier feelings pressed down on top of those.

As she left the restroom and headed for the exit, Ichinose Honami felt as though something inside her was missing. It was like the mythical heavenly dog had bitten a piece out of the full moon. Every step felt like a needle piercing her heart. Enduring the torment, she chose a brand of gum at the checkout counter that she normally wouldn't have even glanced at, as if she were trying to atone.

Ichinose Honami's body was still there, smiling as she handed money to the cashier, but her soul seemed to be floating away. Only when she stepped back out onto the street, beneath the blazing sun, did she finally come to her senses.

Ichinose Honami.

She had stolen something.

She stood dazed beneath the trees for a while. Sunlight slanted through the crisscrossing branches above Ichinose Honami, stretching her shadow out long behind her. Then she dragged that long shadow along with her, trudging toward home as if she'd just returned from a battlefield.

Ichinose Honami walked numbly for a long time on the way home, so long that even she found it strange.

So she finally lifted her head and looked around. The road to her right was still packed with traffic, while her hazy reflection appeared in the glass window of the clothing store to her left.

Although she'd walked all this way, it seemed that only now did Ichinose Honami realize what she had done. It was as if the effect of some anesthetic had suddenly worn off, as if she'd abruptly woken from a nightmare. Staring at her blurry reflection in the window, Ichinose Honami suddenly felt a burning pain.

She reached out and touched the glass.

To passersby, the girl seemed to be admiring the gorgeous outfit displayed high in the window.

Ichinose Honami gripped her own neck. In her vision, the person in the mirror wasn't herself. Instead, a nightmare from some past dream had suddenly emerged clearly from the darkness, leaving her momentarily dazed with fear.

For an instant, she actually thought of returning the hair clip.

But Ichinose remembered her little sister and her mother. She imagined handing the hair clip to her little sister, and a tremendous pride suddenly surged in her heart. The blood rushed to her head, filling her with a brief, illusory thrill.

Caught in that dreamlike feeling, Ichinose Honami quickened her pace.

As if fleeing a murder scene.

Beneath the painfully blue sky, the girl ran home.

Chapter Four: The Guilty (Part Two)

The Kitagawa Family's front door across the hall stood open. Kitagawa Ryo leaned lazily against the wall outside, while the white cat on his shoulder opened its eyes a crack. Its pure, brilliant eyes shone like fluorite, breathtakingly beautiful, before it closed them again and curled up into a soft white ball, seemingly uninterested.

"Good afternoon."

Kitagawa Ryo looked at the somewhat breathless Ichinose Honami.

"It looks like you're having some trouble, Ichinose."

Kitagawa Ryo was the slightly odd neighbor who had moved in at the beginning of the month.

Ichinose Honami didn't like labeling people, but she couldn't help making that judgment about Kitagawa Ryo.

Apart from his courteous visit when he first moved in, their occasional chance encounters and the customary greetings they exchanged, the boy—only a year older than Ichinose Honami—had always kept to himself. Their conversations had been limited to those first few encounters.

"Thank you for your concern, Kitagawa. It's nothing."

Without giving it much thought, Ichinose Honami instinctively turned down his offer to help.

A little clumsily, she took out her key. Ever since her little sister and mother had argued, Ichinose Maki had kept herself shut in her room. It was summer vacation, so that wasn't a problem for now, but Ichinose Honami was more worried that her sister might still be sulking when school started.

So she needed to give Ichinose Maki the hair clip as soon as possible, as a belated birthday present.

"Um, Ichinose, your sister's in my living room right now. She got tired playing with little Hotaru and just fell asleep."

Kitagawa Ryo turned to the side. Standing outside, Ichinose peered in and soon spotted her little sister asleep on the large sofa in his living room, still half-drowsy, with a thin air-conditioning blanket draped over her.

Ichinose Honami knew that her little sister liked Kitagawa Ryo's white cat, named "Hotaru." It seemed that Maki had been even more attached to Hotaru since her mood had worsened these past couple of days. Whenever Ichinose Maki came over to pet the cat, Kitagawa Ryo would leave his door wide open.

"Sorry for the trouble..."

Ichinose Honami collected herself, and her hurried breathing gradually settled. She bowed to Kitagawa Ryo.

"It's fine."

Kitagawa Ryo silently shook his head. At first, Ichinose Honami had thought he was the aloof type. Ichinose Maki had once told her that "Kitagawa Ryo is a very kind big brother," but hearing that he didn't blame her still made Ichinose Honami breathe a sigh of relief.

"Your sister's been a little strange these past couple of days. I know it's a bit forward of me, but would you mind telling me what happened?"

The emotions that had just settled surged up again. Ichinose almost instinctively replied:

"N-no, nothing happened."

Her answer had been too abrupt, so Ichinose Honami quickly offered a rueful apology.

"Thank you for looking after Maki lately, Kitagawa. Anyway, I'll take care of it as soon as I can."

Since she'd put it that way, Kitagawa Ryo didn't press her further. After Ichinose Honami quietly thanked him, she woke her little sister, and the two sisters said goodbye to Kitagawa Ryo before closing the door to their home.

Since she still had to bring dinner to her mother, Ichinose Honami hurriedly prepared the ingredients. Ichinose Maki, yawning, showed no desire to talk with her sister and went straight back to her room.

After setting dinner on the table and leaving a note for her little sister, Ichinose Honami packed their mother's portion in a lunch box and returned to the hospital.

Before leaving, Ichinose Honami slipped the hair clip into her textbook, planning to surprise her little sister with it when she got home that night.

She stopped thinking about where the hair clip had come from. Ichinose Honami had already decided to bury the matter in the deepest corner of her heart. Her steps inexplicably grew lighter, and her mood brightened a little.

On the way to the hospital, Ichinose Honami looked up and saw the setting sun. It hung heavily on a branch like a blood-red fruit, while the irises in the green belt shone as brightly as spring and grinned at her.

Ichinose Honami ate with her mother. Her mother sat on the bed, and now that she was feeling a little better, she kept insisting that she be discharged. Ichinose Honami could only soothe her like a child. She knew why her mother had fallen ill this time, so she sat on the edge of the bed, held her mother's hand, and said:

"Maki... will be better in a couple of days."

It sounded like comfort, and like a promise. But coming from Ichinose Honami, it became an unshakable fact.

At last, her mother was reassured. She trusted her daughter, a trust that had accumulated in every second of the past fifteen years.

Then they smiled and began to eat. Mother and daughter ate one bite at a time, while the two silhouettes cast by the lights on the glass window repeated the same motions. It was almost like a feast for four.

Her mother noticed the sheen of oil at the corner of Ichinose Honami's mouth and carefully wiped it clean with a handkerchief.

"You're just like a little kid."

Ichinose Honami blushed a little. She lowered her head and poked the corner of her mouth with the tip of her right index finger, as if afraid there might still be oil there.

By the time Ichinose Honami left the hospital, silvery moonlight had spread across the land. The streets at night were nearly as lively as they had been during the day. Groups of office workers, drunk after leaving some izakaya or other, shouted and made a racket. A Shibuya-style woman in high heels and heavy makeup stood by the roadside, smoking as she waited for someone. Couples around Ichinose Honami's age pressed their heads together and whispered.

But her heart seemed to have grown quiet. Ichinose Honami followed the patterns of moonlight toward home, without a care in the world.

Several hours had passed, and she still hadn't heard any rumors about something going missing. When Ichinose Honami passed the department store, it was still brightly lit. The enormous crowd was no smaller than it had been during the day, weaving in and out between the shelves.

Ichinose Honami was only one insignificant person among them, and that hair clip was only one tiny item among countless products.

Right?

Ichinose Honami held a flyer she'd just received. The midsummer Fireworks Festival would be held at the end of the month.

She raised her head and waited amid the crowds in the street, beneath the starry night sky, for the fireworks to rise.

When Ichinose Honami returned home, her little sister had already turned off the lights. The plates had disappeared from the table. Ichinose Honami opened the cupboard and found them stacked there, clean. It looked like her little sister had washed the dishes after finishing dinner, as she usually did.

Once again, she was sure that her little sister wasn't a bad kid.

Her mother wasn't at fault, and neither was her little sister. All they needed to make up was one small opportunity. Their cold war was just a child's tantrum.

Feeling the heat of the water from the showerhead on her skin, Ichinose Honami first shivered instinctively, then quietly closed her eyes and let the hot water wash over her.

If she gave her little sister the hair clip tomorrow morning, she'd be happy, wouldn't she? Then Ichinose could naturally suggest that she go visit their mother...

With that thought in mind, Ichinose Honami lifted her clear eyes. Above her was the featureless white ceiling. Her wet hair clung to her face as she stood up and reached past the bottles arranged on the shelf to pick up the body wash.

The morning dew was cradled by a leaf. In that brief moment, it was so beautiful, reflecting the sunlight with crystalline clarity, as if it too were gilded in gold. The proud droplets grew fuller and fuller, their weight bending the leaf.

Until the moment they shattered.

Ichinose Honami knelt dazedly before her mother's hospital bed. The woman in front of her had stopped crying, but the sound of her sobs seemed to linger in Ichinose Honami's ears. Like dust floating in the air, those cries swam into her ears and burrowed into her brain, lodging there for a long time.

An hour ago, Ichinose Honami had seen her loved one at her happiest. That joy shining from deep within had been like a spring breeze, almost sweeping away the guilt in her heart. But now, an hour later, she was facing her loved one at her angriest.

Ichinose Maki naturally had no idea that the hair clip was something her sister had stolen. And, just as Ichinose Honami had expected, after receiving the hair clip, she had agreed to visit their mother. Honami had only just made her promise to keep the secret.

But her little sister clearly hadn't given it a second thought. As things stood, she probably wanted to show the hair clip to the whole world.

Except for one person.

Their mother bit her lip and stared at Ichinose Honami. The hair clip lay on the bedside table. Her face suddenly turned stern.

"Where did this come from?"

"...I took it from the department store."

"Where did you get the money?"

Perhaps she was still trying to struggle against the truth, or perhaps she simply couldn't believe her daughter would steal, but her mother asked a question that didn't need asking, her lips trembling.

"I stole the hair clip."

Ichinose Honami confessed, then closed her eyes and waited for judgment.

Her mother had never hit her or Maki. Even when Maki had thrown a tantrum and cursed her with the cruelest words, their mother had only apologized desperately.

But this time, Ichinose Honami received a heavy slap.

Where her mother had found the strength, Ichinose didn't know. Or perhaps she had already let go of control over her own body. Ichinose Honami's body trembled and fell to the floor.

The hospital room fell unnaturally silent, as though time had stopped in that instant. Ichinose Honami sat on the floor in the position she'd fallen for a long time. The one who pulled her up was her mother, who rose from the hospital bed with a grim expression.

Though her mother was still ill, a commanding presence suddenly emanated from her. She took Ichinose Honami by the hand and pulled her outside.

Ichinose Honami knew what her mother intended to do. She understood her mother's way of teaching a lesson, but she didn't have the courage to speak up, much less any reason to refuse.

She felt as though she were standing at the edge of a cliff, suspended in midair. Ichinose Honami, who could do anything, had for the first time looked helpless. But that look met her mother's gaze, and she felt cold all over.

Ichinose Honami had stolen something, going against everything she'd believed in for the past fifteen years.

Her mother would make her burn everything from those past fifteen years to the ground.

Her unyielding mother dragged Ichinose Honami to the department store. The day before, another unyielding girl had stood there.

In full view of the public, her mother revealed her daughter's crime. She was convinced that only such a painful consequence could make Ichinose truly reflect on what she'd done.

Ichinose Honami knelt on the ground in a dogeza, and her mother knelt beside her.

Among the onlookers were people in suits, students in uniforms from the same junior high as Ichinose, and, more than anyone, housewives out shopping.

Ichinose Honami suddenly realized that the person she'd built, "Ichinose Honami," was burning. All her memories, experiences, and relationships were like piles of firewood. She had done an exceptionally good job of building them up, stacking them exceptionally high.

And so the flames burned terrifyingly bright, crackling as the thing called trust turned to ash and dispersed.

Ichinose Honami was put on display like a statue. The onlookers' gazes were blades, slicing away all her dignity. Their lips ground the truth into a sticky mess, then whispered it to yet another ring of people gathering around.

Ichinose Honami was both a strong and brave girl. All of this shook her to the core, but she knew it was the consequence of her own crime. She pressed her lips together and endured it.

What truly destroyed her was the mother who knelt beside Ichinose Honami a moment later.

Perhaps her mother believed this was the punishment for failing to raise her properly.