July’s story features Anna, Kuroh and Neko, with a brief cameo by Kusanagi.
The original j.a.panese text is still kindly provided by
Become a Star by Raikaku Rei
Those who died become stars and watch over you from up above.
Someone tried to comfort Anna by telling her that when her parents died.
Anna was only 6 at the time, but she already knew that dead people couldn’t turn into stars. Stars were stars, and they were there long before someone went and pa.s.sed away, existing irrespective of people’s life and death.
From when she was a very young child, Anna, gifted with an empathic superability, was way more knowledgeable about the world than your average kid had any right to be, and she had no innocence required to believe the pretty but empty words of comfort said to her.
“Let’s go gaze at stars!” declared Neko with her big almond-shaped eyes sparkling when she dropped by bar HOMRA.
Anna tilted her head to the side a little. “Stars?”
“Kurosuke said you can see lots of stars from his village, and they’re really pretty! So we decided to go there for Tanabata and stargaze! But Shiro is busy grading end-of-term tests or something, so he said for the two of us to go on our own, but it’ll be so boring with just Kurosuke, so I came to invite you along with us, Anna! Eheh!” Neko threw out her chest with pride at her great idea.
Anna blinked a few times, then slowly shifted her gaze to Kusanagi behind the counter.
Kusanagi gave her a little wry smile, not stopping his hands polishing a gla.s.s. “Well, if Yatougami-kun is coming, then I don’t imagine there will be any danger to you even at night, so if you want to go, Anna, you should.”
Neko would drop by bar HOMRA every so often, whether her objective was Kusanagi’s snacks (the pervy gla.s.ses’ snacks were all glittery and the type she’d want to eat from time to time, as she put it, while Kurosuke’s were the type she’d eat every day) or she just genuinely wanted to see Anna. Every time Neko came, Kusanagi, his face reading ‘oh well, can’t be helped’, would smile and take snack requests. Even Yata, who at first never failed to look annoyed askance along the lines of "why the h.e.l.l is she here again!’, got used to it and even started greeting her with simple interjections like "Hey’ or "Sup’. He had trouble dealing with females, but it appeared that he had learned not to be overly conscious of Neko being a girl, treating her as something of an oft-visiting stray cat so long as she didn’t start stripping in the bar or taking off her panties and forgetting them in the bathroom.
To Anna, Neko was a girl who, despite being technically slightly older, didn’t really feel older. But Anna had no experience with being invited to hang out with other girls to draw on in the first place.
Anna, gazing into Neko pure, sparkling eyes with no sliver of agenda behind them, finally gave a small nod.
The prospect of going out at night was exciting.
Neko and Kuroh were supposed to come pick her up at dusk, so Anna had finished her preparations before then. For a change of pace, she braided her hair and put the thermos and the snacks she had Kusanagi make for the three of them into her bag.
“Anna! We came for you!” Neko entered the bar, boisterous as ever and sporting the same braided hairstyle as Anna, mysteriously enough. Perhaps she wanted to look different, too? Seeing Anna, she exclaimed, “Oh, we match!” and brandished her own pigtails, grinning widely. “Shiro braided my hair for me.”
Anna, watching the happily grinning Neko, showed a smile of her own and complimented her look, “It looks good on you”.
“Well then, as of now, I take Kushina Anna under my care and promise to keep her safe and sound.” Kuroh, who quietly entered the bar behind Neko, walked up to the counter and bowed to Kasanagi from the waist with all seriousness.
“Yes, yes, I’m counting on you. Call me if something happens,” Kusanagi waved his hand lightly, and Anna exited the bar after Kuroh and Neko.
On the train on the way to their destination, they ate a bento that Kuroh made.
“The triangular onigiri are with plum filling, the round ones with salmon, and the rectangular ones are filled with grilled walleye pollack roe.”
“I want salmon~!”
Swaying in their box seats, they chewed on the onigiri that Kuroh made.
The triangular one that Anna chose had just enough firmness to deliciously crumble in her mouth, letting red pickled plum out and making Anna smile.
“I apologize for Neko suddenly coming and inviting you on such short notice,” Kuroh smiled at Anna.
“No,” Anna shook her head. “I was happy that Neko invited me. The place we’re going to is your old home, Kuroh?”
Kuroh smiled broader and nodded. His old home must be the place where Miwa Ichigen, the late Seventh King, lived.
“Stars you can see from that village make an amazing sight. Besides, I was thinking it was about time for me to visit Ichigen-sama’s grave in any case. After we stargaze tonight, we will stay at Ichigen-sama’s house for the night, and tomorrow, after I have paid respect to his grave, I will go greet the villagers, while you two can play together for the time being.”
“Grave…”
Now that she thought about it, Anna hardly ever got to visit her parents’ graves. Cold-hearted as it may look, Anna had no religious faith and, like with her educated conviction that dead people didn’t turn into stars, didn’t feel a need for graves. But the way Kuroh treasured Ichigen’s grave and the village where he lived with the Seventh King so dearly looked very beautiful to her eyes.
In the village where Kuroh grew up, a modest celebration of Tanabata was being held, with big decorated bamboo and paper lanterns in sight.
The Miwa house was situated on the edge of the town, on the side of the mountain. Guided by Kuroh, Anna and Neko were making their way up on an unpaved hill road, holding hands.
Before long, a one-story house surrounded by a wooden fence came into view. The Miwa house, no doubt, but the group went past it, continuing on their way up. When the already spa.r.s.ely lined up poles of street lights disappeared completely, Kuroh took out a flashlight.
Neko appeared to have good night vision, confidently walking in the dark, and Anna squeezed her hand harder. The temperature of Neko’s hand was a little higher than Anna’s.
When they reached a small clearing on the mountainside where you could hear the sound of running water, hinting at a waterfall possibly being nearby, Kuroh stopped.
“Here should be good.” Producing a big picnic sheet out of his luggage, he spread it on the ground, “Lie down on it and look above you.”
Anna settled down on the sheet face up next to Neko. “Wow…”
“So many stars~!”
In the darkand with absence of light in vicinity, the starry sky up above made a picturesque view.
“This is my first time seeing the Milky Way…” Anna whispered quietly, gazing up at the sky.
Countless small stars cut across the night sky like a river of light. And on the two opposite sh.o.r.es of it, two stars shone especially bright. They were Vega and Altair. Gazing at the great expanse of the sky full of stars that was impossible to see in Tokyo, Anna let out a breathless sigh.
To Anna, only the red color was visible. Although she tried to avoid having a hangup about it, but when she thought that there probably was little difference between how this magnificent view of mixed darkness and pure light appeared to her and to Neko and Kuroh, she felt just a little bit happier.
Neko at first couldn’t contain her joy, chattering away excitedly, but soon she quieted down. Suspecting that she might have fallen asleep, Anna peeked at the girl lying next to her, but surprisingly, Neko’s big eyes were wide open and directed at the sky above.
“Dead people become stars. Someone told me that long ago. …Although I don’t remember who it was.”
Anna’s eyes widened in surprise when she heard Neko’s quiet voice that she didn’t know Neko was capable of. It apparently surprised Kuroh as well, as he rose up on his elbow.
Neko, looking much younger than Anna and as innocent as a newborn infant, c.o.c.ked her head to the side, “I wonder if it’s true?”
Anna was lost for words, just gazing at Neko’s profile until a quiet click resounded, like some kind of switch turned on.
"Feelings lighting up your heart will become stars,’ a deep voice recited what sounded like a haiku, coming from Kuroh’s recorder - the recorder that contained records of Kuroh’s mentor, Miwa Ichigen.
Kuroh smiled gently.
“If you ask me, if someone gazes at the stars in the sky, remembering a person who pa.s.sed away, that’s when the late person turns into a star,” he said, tone serene. “I believe that Ichigen-sama can be found in the stars twinkling in the sky, and in this recorder, and in the wind that blows when I lose my way, and in the first rays of the morning sun I bask in… he’s always there for me.”
Anna knew that dead people didn’t become stars. Stars were stars, and they were there long before someone went and pa.s.sed away, existing irrespective of people’s life and death. But like she believed that Mikoto’s red and Tatara’s memories were alive in her heart supporting her, maybe dead people could become stars when someone looked up thinking of them.
“Hmmm,” Neko made a non-committal noise. She didn’t appear to be feeling about the whole deal very strongly, the expression on her face really reminding that of a child.
Anna lightly clutched at the hand of the sprawling Neko next to her. Neko returned the gesture, clasping her hand in turn. The red-eyed girl felt a tender feeling spreading from their interlinked hands. She also sensed that to Neko, pretty things were just that, pretty. And that Neko was becoming slightly sleepy. Neko was honest and true to herself like that.
There was a time when Anna, through her empathic superability, felt Neko’s past. Neko had a lot of sadness and loneliness inside, but also just as much joy, fun, and affection. Neko was a person who lost a lot. And so did her companions, Kuroh and Shiro. They had been through a lot of sadness and loneliness, and it’s because they intimately knew those that they valued and loved things they had at the moment.
“Neko.”
“Meow?”
“It’s pretty.”
“Yup. But I’m getting sleepy.”
“Neko.”
“Mew-mew?”
“Thank you for inviting me along.”
Stars were stars. But they reflected the feelings of those who gazed at them.
Still clasping her friend’s hand, Anna squinted as she took in the whole expanse of the starry sky above.