Katou Shigeaki:「Pocket」| Part 1
Extracted from Ikitakunai - Katou Shigeaki "Pocket"
"Go by yourself"
"I don't want to, Jousuke, please come with me"
"It's awkward, like what would I be there for anyway"
"You don't have to sit with me, just be there to watch"
"And what would I achieve by just watching"
"If it gets dangerous, come save me"
"They're someone who could do something dangerous? In that case, I don't wanna go"
"They're usually nice, but I'm not sure what they'd do in times like these"
There were a lot of students on the path, so it was hard to talk. Ann seemed like she was in the same situation, which explains why her voice over the phone was soft.
"Please"
Ann, who was walking a few meters ahead, turned around with her phone sandwiched between her ear and her shoulder, and clasped her palms together. Compared to the distance between Ann and I, the voice that whispers into my ear was mismatched and unbalanced, and her voice felt like it reaches directly into my brain.
"But I have work today"
"At the supermarket?"
"Yep"
"I see. That makes it hard to convince you, now that you've said that"
Ann stretched her neck, swishing her head side to side. The truth is, she doesn't think it's hard to convince me the slightest at all. "But I still beg you. On top of helping me if it gets dangerous, I want you to tell me how I did after everything has ended."
Usually, one would not want anyone to see themselves breaking up with someone, but Ann persistently asked me to watch her. She even wants to hear my thoughts on it.
It was rare of Ann to want to hear the opinions of others. She always thinks with herself as the focus, and believes that everyone around her is just nice to her. That part of her hasn't changed ever since kindergarten. Which is why, she doesn't even imagine the worst-case scenarios, and is certain that I would go.
"Jousuke is the only one I can ask to do this"
As my feet instinctively came to a stop, the students around me shot an unpleasant look and continued walking past me.
"Please, skip work today"
After letting out a small sigh, I started walking again.
"I haven't been able to attend work because of tests, so it's about time I went"
I spent the entire Golden Week lazing around at home, so even though school has started again, it was hard to get back into momentum. I frantically rushed to study before our mid-term tests, and managed to score slightly above average, but in turn, I had also been neglecting my part-time job.
"I get it, I do. I'm begging you despite knowing that Jousuke wants to study abroad. I'm sorry to waste your time when you could be making money, but please, just today."
The last time she asked me why I was working, I randomly said that it was because, "I want to study abroad". But truth be told, it's not like I wanted to go overseas anyway, and there wasn't a specific reason to why I was working part-time. It's not as if there was something specific I wanted to do either, I just thought that since I had time on my hands, I might as well converted that into money.
"I'm counting on you. I'll go to your class after lessons"
Ann seemed like she was going to hang up. "Wait," I said, but the conversation ended without my voice reaching her.
Ann, who was walking in front, walked towards the school building and waved at me. There were some of my female classmates peeping through the windows, as I wondered, "Why me?" and thought about how I should properly decline her request later.
During 2nd period that day, Mochisugi, who had been absent since just after New Year's, suddenly came.
He was a serious person and a hard-worker, so there were various speculations flying around about his absence. Things like his parents divorcing, his sibling attempting suicide, him taking peeping-tom photos and being held custody by the police, there were really a lot of rumours going around, and none of them were good ones. The faint existence, or close to non-existence, of him had slowly started building up, and changed the image of the Mochisugi we had inside of us.
Which is why the sudden return of him left the students, and also the teachers, dumbfounded. Mochisugi seemed oblivious to all of these, and went to his seat as if he had attended class just yesterday.
After that, classes went on as per normal, but once it came to break time, the class wasn't as rowdy as it always was. It's as if everyone was avoiding being in his vicinity, rather than all our classmates avoiding him, it was more like they acted as if they didn't see him. The people who were once close to him were now intentionally harshly bumping into him, and deliberately talking in front of him.
But they had their reasons for doing so. I once heard one of them say that, "I can't forgive Mochisugi because he refuses to tell us why he's absent from school". I can't say that I don't feel the same, but Mochisugi seemed to not react to it, so they were just getting more and more irritated.
It became lunch time, and I invited Mochisugi to have a meal at the cafeteria together.
It happened around 2 weeks ago. Mochisugi had dropped by the supermarket I was working at. He was dressed in an oversized parka, and had headphones on as he picked out snacks to buy. Since I was so used to seeing him in school uniform, I couldn't take my eyes off his rough outfit for a while. For someone who had been absent from school to be walking around this freely, even though I knew it was prejudice, it was hard for me to swallow.
Mochisugi brought the items he picked out to my counter. For some reason, my heart was pounding and my hands were shivering as I tried to hide it and scanned the barcodes. Mochisugi didn't seem to notice me, until I told him the price of his items.
"Ah," Mochisugi said. And his eyes darted around as he took out his wallet and paid the exact amount. As I took the money, I asked, "Are you not going to come to school?" I was unable to withstand the awkward silence.
"I think I'll be going to, soon"
"Soon?"
"Once I'm done"
With that said, Mochisugi took the basket of items and left.