Brave Story - Miyuki Miyabe [6]
“It didn’t sound like it was all that urgent, so I told him he could talk to you tomorrow at school. I believe I’ve mentioned before that elementary school students shouldn’t be phoning each other after nine o’clock.” His mom put her hands on her hips. “Katchan’s parents run a bar, so they may see it differently, but this is my house.”
It always irritated Wataru when she said this—like she was pinching the thinnest patch of skin on his body with the tips of her fingernails. She didn’t have to get all snippy for him to know that she didn’t think much of Katchan. He knew she didn’t like his parents. All because the Komuras ran a bar, which, as anyone could tell you, attracted the “wrong sort of people,” according to his mother.
But Katchan was Wataru’s friend. His best friend.
Maybe his father was a bit seedy. Once, he had come to a school function having drunk too much, his face bright red. Wataru had heard the teacher telling him off. And Katchan’s mother often wore so much perfume you could tell when she was out shopping by the pungent trail she left—even when she was on the other side of the supermarket. He even said that everyone at the local cosmetics shop knew her by name. Still, none of that made Wataru hate Katchan’s parents. At sporting events they would cheer for both Katchan and Wataru, and during spring parents’ day in third grade, when Wataru had solved a difficult math problem at the math bee, Katchan’s father had shouted out “Way to go!” Even if everyone had sniggered, it made Wataru happy. He had never been praised like that in public before. Even now, years later, that day stood out in his memory like a shining piece of colored glass in a sea of mud.
When his mother looked askance at the Komuras, he always wanted to tell her how good they were, and how nice they had been to him, but somehow the words caught in his throat until they dissolved away into nothing. That he couldn’t stand up for them made him feel like he was somehow betraying Katchan and his parents. Yet he couldn’t bring himself to contradict his mother on this point. Maybe because he saw the logic in what she was saying. Wataru didn’t know much about people who went to bars, but judging from Katchan’s comments they weren’t the same class of people that, say, worked at his father’s company. Once he had asked Katchan if he wanted to take over his family’s business when he grew up, and he shook his head, and muttered something about doing some research at a university, or maybe becoming a lawyer. Regardless, the long and the short of the situation was that relations weren’t exactly great between the Mitani and Komura households. That much was painfully clear.
Katchan had probably called to see if Wataru really could make it out of the house that night. The only phone in their house was out in the living room, so it was impossible to sneak a call. Wataru felt suddenly guilty.
What if I’m the “wrong sort of people” too?
He sat with his chin in his hands, his elbows propped up on the desk, staring blankly at the chart of class periods he had stuck on the wall above. The first hour tomorrow was Japanese class. They would probably have to write another essay. Katchan was particularly bad at writing, and he was always asking Wataru for help. Of course, if Wataru stood him up tonight, he probably wouldn’t bother him tomorrow at all. He’d be too angry.
“Of course he won’t be, silly.”
The voice was high and sweet—a girl’s voice, coming from right behind him.
Every muscle in Wataru’s body tensed. He jumped out of his chair, the four casters creaking loudly beneath him. He whirled around. There was no one in his tiny room. He glanced down at his television, a fourteen-inch his parents had bought him after much wheedling and begging last summer. It was turned off.
He looked around some more, then looked back at the desk and sat down. He must have dozed off while he was looking at his class chart. He remembered a scientist