Growing up

Could the soul and the body be treated separately? Which needed to come first: a thirty-thousand-year-old soul or an infant's body?

I had always wondered whether Yuanyin, who had wanted me to grow up quickly back then, had ever considered that question.

(1)

"I've made up my mind."

The child stood before me in simple, pale green pajamas, holding his feeding bowl. If I ignored his clenched little hands and the way nerves made him stand extra straight, I could picture a reserved young man standing before me, serious yet gentle.

"All right. Can you give me the bowl now?"

He froze for a moment, then looked up. As he handed me the bowl with both hands, his eyes asked a question he couldn't bring himself to voice.

I imagined it was probably something like, Aren't you going to ask what I chose? Aren't you going to ask about that memory, from beginning to end?

I took the bowl, turned away, and rinsed it clean. Then I put it on the dish rack and turned back. He was still standing there, but the confusion in his eyes had given way to relief.

That was why I hadn't asked.

When truth was bound up with pain, everything that hurt the most, everything most vulnerable, delicate, and sensitive, everything closest to one's true feelings, became an unspeakably private matter.

How could I indulge my curiosity and then use my respect for him to pry into the privacy at the very heart of his dignity as a person? Especially when I felt that, if I asked, Megumi would disregard his own feelings and endure being swallowed by those chaotic memories again just to satisfy my curiosity perfectly.

I lifted my bowl and took a rather restrained sip of coffee. It still tasted like nothing. I sighed helplessly to myself.

-All those days reading books of obscure medical facts really were a waste.

Rich, bitter coffee was as useful to my sense of taste as a bicycle was to a fish. Its only use was to keep my mind clear and all drowsiness at bay each day the sun rose as usual.

Once a person was wide awake, they wanted something to do.

I glanced at the ingredients, nearly depleted by Toji's all-out cooking over the past two days, then at the steady drizzle outside.

Rain and going out clashed and came to blows, but my sudden whim forced its way onto the battlefield. The tide turned, allegiances reversed, and rain and going out joined forces, only to fall before my desire to leave the house.

Simply put, even if thunder and lightning struck, I was going out today.

I leaned over the dining table to write a list. The pen scratched away, its tip beginning a contest with the paper-not for me, but for them.

The meat Toji liked, the ginger Megumi liked, a nap blanket long enough to cover Toji from head to toe, a drop-resistant feeding bowl for Megumi that wasn't quite so childish...

Once I finished, I folded the paper neatly, then folded it again and slipped it into my pocket. I stood in front of a drowsy Toji and held out my hand for money.

The lazy "big cat" opened only one eye to look at me. He tilted his head and rubbed against a fluffy pillow that might have been covered in big-cat fur I couldn't see, felt around beside him with his right paw, and handed me his most important "toy."

...I really did seem like a keeper.

I solemnly accepted the "big cat's" offering and picked up the child's blanket hanging halfway onto the floor. I looked at that blanket, less than a meter long and barely covering his waist and stomach, then at Megumi, curled up small and helpless in the armchair after a certain "tyrant" had confiscated his little blanket.

Buying a blanket shot straight from the bottom of my list to the top.

(2)

The drizzle falling on me felt like a brush without any sharp edges, sweeping me clean from head to toe.

I put on my hood and was pulling up the zipper when a little hand caught the hem of my jacket.

"Take me with you." A little sea urchin covered in raindrops wanted to come along.

His hair stuck up every which way, like the ornament-laden branches of a Christmas tree. The raindrops served as the colorful baubles.

I didn't dare hesitate too long, afraid I would end up with a sick child that evening.

I pulled him back under the eaves and asked, "Is there something you need to buy? I can write it down and get it for you."

He shook his head. A few raindrops shook loose from his hair and splashed onto my hand, tickling as though a cat had gently rubbed against me.

"I want to choose it myself."

"All right." I agreed, but looking at the weather, I regretted it a little. He didn't have a raincoat.

After giving birth to Megumi, Yuanyin had stopped going out with Toji on rainy days, partly because of her physical discomfort, and perhaps partly because of me.

Naturally, Megumi didn't have a child's raincoat.

I took off my raincoat and gave it to him, then borrowed an umbrella from the communal lounge downstairs. At last, we set off.

We stepped along the damp, soft earth. Limited by the child's walking pace, we moved very, very slowly, but I wasn't impatient at all. Along the way, we passed many different pairs.

A married couple shared an umbrella, holding each other. The husband had an arm around his wife's waist, and she nestled against his chest. The space beneath their ample umbrella was merely decorative as they listened to each other's heartbeats.

A young couple shared a cramped umbrella meant for one, their arms pressed together. They needed neither linked hands nor any more intimate touches. Their burning body heat was already passing constantly between them through their clothes.

A father and son: the father held the child in his right arm and the umbrella in his left hand. Seated on his father's right arm, the child listened quietly and admiringly as the adult patiently answered the endless whys he had asked earlier.

Then there was the pair of us, Megumi and me. I held an umbrella; Megumi wore a raincoat. The distance between the canopy and his hem separated us. Our only possible closeness came from the one-in-a-thousand chance that a raindrop sliding off the umbrella's tip might touch the water splashing from his swaying hem. They would merge swiftly, and in that instant of believing they could remain one for the rest of their lives, hit the ground and scatter again.

I wondered how many of those one-in-a-thousand strokes of luck could happen along this road. Or perhaps there wouldn't be even one.

The rain grew heavier. On the umbrella, it sounded like soybeans scattered onto a drum; on the raincoat, it turned that thin layer into a drum being struck.

I quietly moved closer to the silent child, raising the chance of those raindrops merging from one in a thousand to one in a hundred. I quietly tilted the umbrella toward him, keeping that drumming from disturbing his wordless thoughts.

Still thinking alone amid the loud white noise, Megumi looked up at me. Rain kept seeping through the gaps in his oversized hood, parting the bangs that had partly covered his eyes and revealing their watery sheen.

"Yuanli, am I causing you trouble by coming along?"

"What makes you say that?"

Megumi pressed his lips together instinctively, something he did whenever he was conflicted or hesitant.

"I've made the journey longer."

"No, you haven't. The distance stays the same. Whether I walk fast or slowly is my choice. I want to walk slowly with you."

Tiny ripples seemed to stir in his sea-blue eyes. He blinked, looking as though this was the first time in his life-no, in his previous life-that he had heard anything like that.

I bent slightly to meet his eyes and asked, "Megumi, will you tell me what you're thinking right now? What you want, what you want to do-will you tell me freely?"

I had figured it out: with the Zenin father and son's personalities, unless I asked first, I could forget ever learning what they really thought.

"..." He pressed his lips together again. After a long silence, he said, "I want to grow up quickly. I don't want to cause you trouble."

This time, I was the one who fell silent.

(3)

"Yuanli, you need to grow up quickly."

Hands on her hips and head tilted, Yuanyin looked down at me and spoke each word distinctly.

Why?

Newly reincarnated, I didn't ask aloud. I quietly asked her in my heart, Why?

I was two that year, too. I wobbled when I stood and couldn't speak clearly, but my soul was exceptionally steady as it recorded the scene, tone, and expression of the first time she said those words. I waited for the next time she said them, when I would summon the courage to ask why.

The next time came soon enough.

A year later, Yuanyin was in a gunfight with a local gang. Bullets crossed, muzzle flashes flickered. Three-year-old me hid behind an overturned table, clutching a dagger.

Explosions roared, and Yuanyin ducked over to my side. She didn't actually say anything. Truly, I remembered it all too clearly.

She merely glanced at me without thinking. That glance might have lasted no more than 0.001 seconds. But I remembered it for a lifetime.

Her eyes conveyed one word: burden.

In my third life, having lost the memories of my first two, I was a burden starting from zero.

I lacked the combat skills I would accumulate in later lives, the knowledge of humanity and philosophy I would gain from reading countless books. I didn't know how to comfort her or provide positive emotional support. I was even still hung up on asking why.

I thought that, from the moment of that glance, I was no longer a child. Even if my body still was, my heart and soul would never have that chance again.

From then on, I began looking after Yuanyin with maturity at all times, tending to her feelings, forcing myself to be dependable however I could, and handling everything she refused to face.

I did it only because I was afraid of causing her trouble, afraid she would abandon me.

But later, after reading many books, I suddenly wanted very much to ask Yuanyin a question. When she had looked at me that way, had it been my soul she despised, or my three-year-old body? Or had it been my very existence?

Until she was gone for good, I never had a chance to learn the answer.

(4)

The rain soaked my left shoulder. Water struggled to gather into a stream in my left hand, only to slip helplessly between my fingers, over and over, again and again.

Looking at Megumi felt like looking at another me. The me who had forced myself to grow up, who had spent my entire life trapped in the task of having to grow up.

I didn't know whether Yuanyin had ever regretted urging me to grow up. But now, after years, after centuries, after exploring countless books and questioning many renowned people, I had found an answer.

The soul and the body had to be treated separately.

After a long silence, I asked, "Megumi, what was your surname when you were fifteen?"

"Fushiguro... When I was fifteen, my name was Megumi Fushiguro."

I took a deep breath, then set the umbrella on the ground. Ignoring the way the child's body tensed, I crouched down and held his shoulders in both hands.

"Fushiguro, listen carefully. If we treat the body and soul separately, then I don't want two-year-old Megumi Zenin to grow up quickly. I know fifteen-year-old Megumi Fushiguro is afraid of causing me trouble, so he's eager to show an adult's composure. But that's very unfair to my Megumi Zenin. He hasn't experienced a happy childhood yet. So can I ask you not to rush, Fushiguro? Don't rush to grow up, don't rush to be composed, don't rush to endure the ways of the world. Give this body of yours, give two-year-old Megumi Zenin, give fifteen-year-old Megumi Fushiguro a little more time to grow up slowly. Give me a little more time to protect him properly and take care of him, all right?"

The child's hood fell back behind his head. The increasingly dense rain made it impossible to tell whether the water on his face was rain or tears, but his slightly reddened eyes were enough to convince me that, at this moment, we shared the same feelings.

"All right."

I picked up the umbrella and held it in my left hand, sheltering us from the wind and rain. We joined the crowd of pairs again. But this time was different. The raindrops that had had a one-percent chance of merging now had a hundred-percent chance. And the rainwater that had once ended by scattering into rivers and seas would never again separate after coming together.

Because my right hand had been taken, held tightly. And the child who had reached for it told me, "This is what two-year-old Megumi Zenin wants..."

Did you think that was the end? My hearing was very keen. I heard the child's final murmur to himself perfectly clearly.

It's what Megumi Fushiguro wants, too.