Today was the last Sat.u.r.day of summer vacation.
There was no Yamayurikai work or club activities today, so it was my first true day off in a while.
It hit me suddenly that Yoshino and I should go on a day trip to the beach.
It took a train trip and a bus ride to get there. A bit of an outing.
I"ve been thinking it"s about time I got a driver"s license, but I"ve been so busy with the Yamayurikai and kendo club that I haven"t found the time to go on a training course. I guess I"ll have to give up on it happening this year.
It was already midday by the time we arrived at the coast.
We quickly unfurled a tarp on the beach and ate lunch. As she was stuffing herself with my handmade onigiri rice b.a.l.l.s wrapped in nori seaweed, Yoshino muttered, "Plain onigiri would have been fine." Apparently the smell of the beach was an adequate subst.i.tute for the nori seaweed - what a cute thing to say!
Since we hadn"t brought our swimsuits, we rolled up our jeans and skirt and submerged just our feet in the ocean.
Yoshino was playing like a kid on the beach.
Seeing her so happy, I was pleased too.
It was like a dream.
Up until last year I was unable to enjoy myself fully when we went out because I"d always be worried about Yoshino"s heart. But it"s different now.
Places I want to go, places Yoshino wants to go.
We don"t have to plan everything out in detail, we can just wander aimlessly like this.
After all, today was a first step in a way.
Yoshino was undoubtedly thinking about making one last good summer memory too.
* * *
"Hey, Rei-chan. Why don"t you write your diary when we get home?"
"Huh?"
Rei stopped writing when Yoshino called out to her. It felt as though she"d been in something of a daze. Looking around, it was already getting dark.
"I know it was a bit of a shock. But isn"t it a bit pointless whitewashing things in your diary?"
"Whitewashing?"
"That"s right."
Yoshino plucked the notebook out of Rei"s hands, opened it to the page she"d just written and said, "Starting with this."
"While I did make a remark about plain onigiri, it was because I couldn"t stand the smell of the sh.o.r.eline. You must have known that by my tone, Rei-chan. It wasn"t cute at all."
"&h.e.l.lip; Mm, yeah."
"And this. You haven"t even come close to describing what the beach was like. You make it sound like we came to a deserted beach and played in the water together."
"- Is that wrong?"
"Ah, so you weren"t going to write about it after all."
"Well, when I picture it, that"s what I see."
"Rei-chan, are you that ignorant of the way the world works? The last weekend of summer holidays on a beach that"s a day trip from Tokyo? How could you not see that it would be packed with people?"
"&h.e.l.lip; I see. Now I understand why you looked so sour when I said we should go to the beach."
"I thought you were fine with that and still wanted to go."
The weather was good (a catastrophe?) and there was a ma.s.sive turnout at the beach. Which led to the equally ma.s.sive confusion.
A deserted beach. That would only happen in the middle of winter. But playing in the water in the middle of winter would be a bit nippy.
The number of people on the beach had dropped dramatically now that it had started to get dark. But in the empty sand of the beach there remained all sorts of things that had been left behind by people.
"You have to face reality."
As she said this, Yoshino tossed a supermarket shopping bag to Rei.
"I had to do something, you"ve been sitting there motionless. While you were hiding from reality, I bought a bath towel, change of clothes and some underwear. Look, you can change behind that beach hut. I"ll keep you hidden."
"Alright."
Rei feebly agreed and did as she was told.
"Then we should go home, Rei-chan. Since we have to catch a bus and then a train."
"&h.e.l.lip; Yeah."
After stripping off her soaked T-shirt and ripped jeans, she opened the shopping bag. It was a small mercy perhaps that she hadn"t been injured.
Rei sighed as she put on the clothes that still had their price-tag attached.
"Tomorrow we"ll go to the manga cafe like you wanted, Yoshino."
They"d gone over to the rocks where there were comparatively fewer people and while they were playing around she"d slipped and fallen into the sea.
This was Rei"s "reality" that she couldn"t write in her diary.