Maria-sama ga Miteru:Volume3 Chapter5 1

Springtime Buds. Part 1.

-If this is how I'm going to end up feeling, I won't desire for another person, ever again.

On my sixteenth winter,

I experienced a farewell so painful it cut my body apart.

I first met Shiori during a spring day. One morning that I arrived at school far earlier than I usually did.

Why did I come to school early that day, despite not having anything planned? Frankly, it's because I thought it was time to wake up, that's all. I went through all of my morning preparations an hour early, hopped on the earliest train, and didn't realize my mistake until I noticed how much less crowded it was.

I hated keeping time, to begin with, so I don't really double-check what time it is. I'm the type that thinks I'd rather get to school late than hear the alarm clock ringing, so I've come to accept this sort of mistake happens.

When I stepped off of the circulation bus from JR's M Station in front of our school, the sunlight was blinding to my half-awake eyes.

Shielding my eyes from the sun, I walked through the high gate. The blue sky looking down on me through the thick roadway of gingko trees looked like it was etching out a soft pathway, like Milky Way.

(Milky Way…)

It had an embarrassingly romantic echo. If I were to say that during class, what kind of faces would everyone make?

-How unexpected. That twisted Satou Sei-san has a cute side to her, too?

But I had no intention of pleasing them.

Flipping my long, back-length hair, I muttered, "Idiotic."

(What is?)

But the closest word to the answer to that was "everything," as well as "myself."

Like the innocently smiling students at this school, like they were saying, I have no dissatisfaction with this world.

Like those pathetic parents that never questioned if they were raising their children properly.

Like the school that didn't bother labeling me a delinquent because I always had top-notch grades.

Like myself, living normally on a daily basis despite being annoyed by everything.

All of those, everything.

If I can't find anything to love in this world, including myself, the biggest problem probably lay in myself.

This world existed long before I did, and so it probably headed toward a better place by majority vote. People who can't conform to that world, then, bear responsibility for being unable to conform.

I'd figured that much out, so I've been lying low. But a sixteen-year-old adolescent sometimes rejects having to play out the role of a "pure maiden."

Why do I have to laugh with everyone?

Why do I have to involve myself in conversations that I don't care about?

So I keep myself silent.

Nothing I can do. Because this is the meadow of angels.

So Maria-sama, standing in the middle of the fork in the road, looked to me like Nio.

(See…)

She looks so serene, so kind, but in reality, she was dividing students walking into the school into good or bad.

I formed a pistol with my right hand and pointed it at the white Maria-sama statue. The holy maiden Maria stood in front of the small, green forest, and prayed to heaven for the sake of her students every second.

"Amen."

"Bang!" I sounded in my mind, and I ran, laughing.

Rapture.

Running down the pathway of freshly-budding trees was invigorating. I'd always wanted to do it once, when there was no one around.

I didn't mind people seeing me, but being questioned for it was a pain.

I didn't believe in Maria-sama, so I wasn't afraid of divine punishment. Jesus of Nazarene and his mother Maria were both real people that died long, long ago. After 2000 years, even ghosts must have gotten bored.

And if Maria-sama was really that close to God, she was supposed to save these bad sheep. Now, come, save my aimless soul!

-Amen!

I ran, shouting that, over and over again.

It was the middle of spring.

I'd just become a second-year in high school.

It wasn't that I had any dissatisfactions. I just had no warmth. I was wandering in the dark, in a dried, vast wilderness.

I didn't know what I should do.

I didn't even know what I wanted to do.

Panting, I leaned against the sanctuary wall. I'd somehow ended up here. My subconscious seemed to have run me the opposite direction from the school buildings.

Oh well. I'll rest here for an hour, and I entered the sanctuary.

After a few steps into the dark, silent corridor, the first thing you saw when you opened the thick, decorated door was a wooden statue of a crucified Jesus Christ. When you glanced to its left, a full-colored Maria statue. And to its right, a stained-glass window of brilliant colors. Long, wooden benches were on either side of the passage down the middle.

The morning prayer of the sisters must have ended, as there was no one inside.

I chose a seat by the wall on the second row from the back and leaned back. A picture of angels was painted on the ceiling. It was the first time I'd looked at it, relaxed, like this.

I wasn't a Christian, but the sanctuary was a beautiful place, I could say that much. I didn't dislike Buddhist temples, either, so I might simply have a liking for religion-based architecture.

I wrapped my arms around my shoulders and closed my eyes. It soothed me. It felt like I was rolled up in a ball, surrounded by a tough shell.

Don't touch me. Forget about me.

My body wanted sleep, but my mind was unusually active. But that's alright, I rolled over to my side.

How much time passed? Eventually, I lost track of time, and I didn't even know if I was awake or dreaming, when I heard something.

Like an herbivore that was at rest, my body immediately reacted, and I jumped up like a spring-powered doll. Who cares if someone saw you, a voice whispered inside my head.

And they were apparently surprised at my sudden movement, as the person who'd made the noise before spun around. –She sat in the front seat, near the middle.

Both of them had spent time not realizing they were there.

She had probably been kneeling and praying, and I gulped my own breath after watching her stand up slowly.

With the stained-glass window's light shining upon her right shoulder, she looked so white, so divine.

"… Gokigenyou."

Smiling, she walked toward me. She was wearing the Lillian Girls' Academy high school uniform, and her straight hair reached down to her waist. And her skin wasn't as pale as I'd first thought.

"… A first-year?"

I might have been looking at her like I was appraising something.

"Yes. I'd just arrived at Lillian this year."

Her bright voice sounded soothing.

"-Probably."

I didn't remember each and every face in school, but I probably wouldn't have forgotten her if I'd seen her a single time.

"Your name?"

"Kubo Shiori."

Kubo, Shiori.

I carved that name in my heart. It was just a name, but it was curious, how the fact that it belonged to her made it so much more special.

I'd never bothered with other people before, but when it came to the first-year student named Kubo Shiori, I became incredibly curious. So I smashed my feelings right at her. Not satisfied with her name, I asked about what class she was in, what middle school she attended, where she lived, I kept asking such impolite questions.

At first, Shiori looked bewildered. But because my questions were borne out of curiosity rather than being critical, she politely answered each and every one of them.

Shiori graduated from a school in Nagasaki, and she was recommended to Lillian. But her lack of an accent was because she was originally from Tokyo. Her parents died in a car accident when she was in third grade, so she was taken in by her uncle in Nagasaki, and now that her obligatory education was over, she decided to return to her home. She had no relatives in Tokyo, so she attended school from the school dormitories.

Shiori bluntly spoke of her tragic fifteen years of life. At the very least, that moved me. Her tolerance for an rude upperclassman, who she was meeting for the first time, and her willingness to accept me, it felt incredible.

She was mature, and she looked like even my twisted, thorny self could hold her hand, and she would be so divine that not a scratch would befall her.

"Will that be all?"

After a moment of silence, Shiori looked at her watch and spoke.

"I must be going now."

I was conflicted, by the desire to stay like this, and the realization that it was becoming awkward. But I nodded anyways. And after I nodded, I felt incredibly heartbroken.

"I'm sorry for having taken your time."

"No worries, I'm used to it."

Transfer students from other schools were often questioned like this, she smiled, with no hint of bitterness.

"Oh, my name is-"

"I know. Rosa Gigantea en bouton, Satou Sei-sama."

"What…?"

"During the first-year ceremony, you were introduced."

After answering thus, Shiori politely bowed her head and stepped out of the sanctuary. Having lost Shiori, the sanctuary felt like it had lost some of its luster.

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