It was early morning.
The sun was only starting to rise when Mizuki woke up. She had seen a horribly nostalgic dream. It was a dream about when she was young, and still had her family.
She had stayed home from kindergarten with a fever, and had snuggled up next to her mother. She had been coughing and looking up at her mother as she gently stroked her forehead with a cool hand.
Her mother’s face was vague, as if it had been hidden by a shadow. But even still, her mother gazing at her wrapped her in a sense of security. Clinging to that warmth, she had resisted waking up.
However, her consciousness was mercilessly dragged back to reality. The fragmented images of her dreams began to melt away as the appearance of her younger self faded from her mind. With her efforts to remain asleep in vain, and left with a sense of loss, Mizuki slowly starts to regain her sense of self.
She opens her eyes. In her eyes, an inorganic white ceiling is reflected. She was in a room on the 3rd floor of the supermarket. Mizuki stiffens, takes the blankets off of her, and sets them beside the sofa.
(……Ah.)
The tears which had built up in her eyes, spilled out of the side. The reality of where she was had just now fully come back to her. Reeling from the gap between her current situation and her dream, Mizuki sits there for a while.
“……..Haa”
Letting out a sigh, she wipes the tear trickling down her face. As she was lifting her body,
“Kushu–” (TL: Sneeze)
As she sneezes, snot drips from her nose.
“Uwaa….”
The wet towel on her forehead also came crashing down. She looks around for a tissue, but is unable to find one. Hesitating a bit, she blows her nose into the wet towel. She folds it and puts it on the table.
She notices the glass of water on the table and gulps it down. She feels the water spread through her body.
“Fuu…….”
She had removed the blankets, but the heater appeared to be on as she didn’t feel cold. While sneezing again, Mizuki’s head starts to ache. Beside the glass on the table was a bowl of rice porridge. Yesterday she didn’t have an appetite, so she had only eaten one bite of it. Because of that, her belly was completely empty.
She could reheat the porridge on the stove in the hot water supply room. Carrying the dirty towel and bowl with her, she leaves the room.
In the sink in the hot water supply room, tableware for three people were sitting, filled with water. While she warmed up her porridge on the stove, she rinsed off the dishes in the sink. There were no grease stains, so just rinsing them with water was fine. As she finishes rinsing off the dishes, she stacks them one by one on a nearby dish towel.
After she was done, her hands had become cold from the cold water.
“Hekushu–”
Once again snot dripped out. She uses face wash to clean her face. The face-washing lotion she had brought from downstairs. She dries herself with a nearby towel and lets out a small breath.
“……”
She spaces out, recalling the fragments of her dream, trying to make them clearer.
Worried about her brothers, she snaps out of it, and goes to look for them, and finds them wrapped up in blankets asleep in the corner of the office. They probably didn’t sleep in the same room as not to catch a cold. Several big books were lying next to them. They were typical over-sized full color picture books.
She flips through a couple of them and sees pictures of mountains and seasons. There were also animals and insects. The photos helped kids understand the difficult to read kanji in the text.
Yusuke most likely gave it to them to kill time. Her brothers liked these kinds of picture books. There has hardly been any entertainment in their lives lately, so they must have been overjoyed.
(…………)
Making a some what complicated expression, Mizuki gently closes the picture book.
(Takemura-san is kind towards kids huh……)
‘Though he is cold towards me’, Mizuki takes a breath. Even after she had surrendered her body to him, his attitude did not change.
It’s not like she particularly liked Yusuke, but until now she hadn’t been treated so coldly by very many people. Yusuke’s overly impolite attitude caught her off guard.
She sets down the picture book, and returns to the hot water supply room.
Grabbing the porridge and heading to her room, she notices Yusuke asleep in a chair. Leaning on the backrest, his neck bent back as he slept. It looked as if his neck was in pain. He had wrapped himself in blankets, but with the heater on, it wasn’t cold in the room.
Mizuki approaches the sofa she had been sleeping on, and folds the disheveled blankets, setting them down next to her. Sitting down on the sofa, she begins her meal. Using a spoon, she scoops the rice and blows on it before placing it in her mouth. Her stomach had been aching in hunger, so the seven minute porridge was delicious.
(……..)
Mizuki indulged herself in the feeling of the porridge slowly warming her belly.
(……….)
She thought about the porridge and the towel –which had been placed on her forehead– in front of her. The fact that Yusuke had been so accommodating for something like a cold was surprising.
Mizuki viewed Yusuke as someone who was selfish and rational. When she caught a cold, she thought he would just toss some blankets to her and that would be it. That he would display this kind of gallant behavior, Mizuki would have never imagined it.
Only, her pride was too wounded to openheartedly accept this random kindness. Mizuki and Yusuke were complete strangers. Up until recently they hadn’t even had a friendly relationship. This act of kindness, as if becoming family, it was completely out of the blue.
Spacing out, staring at Yusuke as he slept in the chair across from her, and thinking about various things; Mizuki inadvertently recalls something.
(……..Ah that’s right, Takemura-san, was all alone.)
He had said that there were no survivors other than her and her brothers. Unlike her and her brothers, he had been living in this world all this time by himself. At that realization, Mizuki once again tries to correct her way of thinking.
If she had been in that kind of position, what would she have done? The sight of her brother’s troubled faces have forced her to go on until now, but what if she had been alone? It wouldn’t be strange if she fell into danger at anytime.
Without her parents or friends, all alone at night with those monsters that eat humans roaming the streets; she would be so afraid she couldn’t bear it. Mizuki wasn’t that strong. Her entire world ended that day.
When it happened, she started to find comfort in death, but the presence of her brother had kept her together. She was their guardian, but they were the ones protecting her. For her brothers sake, she had to forget about her broken self and look after them.
If they hadn’t been there, if she had lost her family and had been forced to live alone in this new cruel world…
(That…. would be lonely, and difficult……)
Surely Yusuke’s wasn’t as weak as Mizuki. Even so, there must be times were he can’t remain calm. If you think about it, compared to what Yusuke had given him, it was as if she hadn’t returned the favor at all. He even saved her life. She never thought about how much that meant in this world which reeked of death.
Yusuke could be acting cold as a cry for help.
(He got involved with us because he was lonely….. Something like that…..?)
Somehow she felt as if she had touched a brittle part of Takemura-san. (TL: Laughing pretty hard right now)
Asleep in that chair, he looked as if he was overcome with resignation and fatigue.
Of course, she could just be overthinking things. If your body is weak, so is your heart. She could just be conveniently interpreting one of his whims. However, she couldn’t deny that, as if she had found something human in his strong outer presence, had become interested in him.
This could be the first time she looked at him as a peer. As a fellow human struggling to survive at the end of the world.
(…….Un. I’ll work harder to be less depended as well.)
Finishing her meal, Mizuki carries the tableware out of the room.
Once she washed the dishes off in the hot water supply room and returned, Yusuke was sitting up in the chair while stretching. It seemed he just woke up. Noticing her presence, he lets out a surprised voice.
“Ah?”
Yusuke stops moving and stares at her. It was a gaze as if looking at an enemy. Without understanding the meaning behind that strong gaze, Mizuki began to worry if she had done something wrong.
“Ano….?”
At Mizuki’s voice, Yusuke’s rigidity melts away and he sits back in the chair.
“Ah……”
He shifts his line of sight to the clock and reads the time. 6:00 A.M.
After that, as if he had lost his spirit, he speaks.
“It was just a normal cold after all…..”
At those words which sounded like he had given up, Mizuki’s eyes sparkled.
(Could it be he was worried about me?)
With a wry smile, Mizuki bows her head.
“I’m sorry to have made you worry.”
“No, to say I was worried….. well, it’s fine.”
Yusuke waves his hand.
“Have you recovered?”
“I do have a little bit of a strange feeling, but overall I feel a lot better.”
“…..Fuun.” (TL: sighing)
Thinking about Mizuki’s words, Yusuke has a premonition. Remaining silent, he gets a bad feeling about her strangely warm and cozy behavior. What kind of attitude should he take in response to this overly youthful girl? He was suddenly at a loss.
“…..Etto, thank you, for preparing food for my brothers yesterday.”
“Ou. Be sure to wear a mask. Don’t go sneezing all over the food.” (TL: “Ou.” is like “No problem.”)
At those rough words, Mizuki only smiles wryly. Her uneasiness had already disappeared.
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