Interlude: Erythronium japonicum
“Riō, why are you so full of yourself?”
When someone finally said it straight to my face for the first time, rather than feeling shocked, I actually felt relieved.
She finally spoke her true feelings. The reason they disliked me and ignored me wasn’t because I’d done something critically wrong.
It wasn’t because I insisted on conducting a vegetation survey in drizzle despite poor weather, or because I tried to increase our twice-weekly activities, or because I turned down a sudden confession from the boy Sana liked—
It was simply because I was full of myself.
I myself had considered that possibility.
Of course, I hadn’t been going around proudly saying “I’m superior.” Studying hard for high school entrance exams. Taking on the class representative role that no one else wanted. Running for student council president because a teacher recommended it. Volunteering to be club president to liven up the Science Club’s activities. The accumulation of such things inevitably made me seem “full of myself.” But that was my way of life.
“You always talk about such weird things. It’s really exhausting talking to Riō, you know.”
Sana even said such things to me. That’s why they ended up ignoring me, she said.
I’d talked extensively about science with my Science Club friends. I thought it was fun, but apparently everyone else felt differently. While I thought I was chatting about topics I liked, perhaps I was one-sidedly, arrogantly, showering them with knowledge.
I was simply sad that I’d lost friends because of something I thought was enjoyable.
Even though I was the president, I couldn’t go to club activities anymore.
“You’re just so bad at living, you know. Despite having such high specs.”
Yūka made a horizontal frame with her fingers and captured my face within it.
Lunchtime behind the middle school building, just the two of us. I swallowed the rice I’d been chewing mindlessly.
“Am I bad at it…?”
Yūka was the only one with whom I didn’t need to insert modest words like “that’s not true.” Yūka knew me well. She was much cuter than me, had excellent athletic ability, and grades just as good. Same grade but a life senpai. I could always accept Yūka’s compliments honestly.
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“You choose things with bad cost performance too often. I’m not saying it’s wasteful, but you’re deliberately taking the hard road. With your grades, Riō, you don’t need to worry about evaluation points at all, right? Being class representative or student council president. Same with the Science Club. Even if you work hard there, you’re just adding weirdo points.”
“I see.”
After accepting it once, I said:
“But the Science Club is different. I don’t think it’s difficult. It’s something I like doing. Yūka, you play basketball because you like it, right? It’s the same thing.”
The cost performance might be bad, and what I might earn might not be popularity points, but cost-benefit calculations shouldn’t matter when trying to do what you love.
“Pursuing what you love is good, of course. But there’s also the option of not putting it out there. Do you need to stick with the Science Club? In a club full of nothing but losers. Riō, you don’t have to work hard there. Even in elementary school, you did research on your own, right?”
Yūka was a strong-willed person, but never the type to badmouth others. She was speaking this way about the Science Club members because she was trying to help me with the fact that I’d been called “full of myself” by my Science Club friends.
“On my own, huh…”
“Yeah. You don’t have to change your way of life, but do it a bit more skillfully.”
In the end, I didn’t need to quit the Science Club. Shortly after that, I became the only member. While first and second years were required to belong to some club, that rule didn’t apply to third years. In spring, as soon as they became third years, everyone—even the boys—quit the club.
There were no kouhai.
“New students coming in would just increase the trouble. So I kept turning them away.”
That’s what I heard from Sana on graduation day.
The katakuri that Del-chan gave me has been flattened, completely dried and faded.
Yet every time I look at it, that beautiful memory comes back to life. Spring, the vivid pale crimson that calls insects.
But I think the essence of katakuri is actually underground.
The pressed specimen has everything from flower to roots. The thin bulb carefully dug up evokes the long hardships of katakuri, steadily storing up starch only in early spring.
Eight years.
The time it takes for a sprouted katakuri to bloom.
I don’t know what plants feel—or rather, plants without nervous systems shouldn’t have feelings at all, but if hypothetically feelings did dwell in them, wouldn’t katakuri spend those eight years dreaming of the day they’ll bloom?
That day when they’ll shyly present the results of years endured deep underground on spring’s stage.
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