Chapter 8: Silently Speaking
Something about the resignation in the tone of her voice when she’d said she could not go inside had said to him that she didn’t mean she’d been evicted for not paying her bills, but that it ran deeper like a sword through her heart. He could see the barrier between the home and her eyes as she’d looked upon it, as if it were a tangible thing before them.
So, being the typically tactless man he would no-doubt fully admit to being, he cracked a joke about the importance of paying bills on time and then asked Sayaka if she would like to accompany him for an early morning cup of tea. To his great surprise she’d accepted, the resignation in her eyes silently conceding What else am I going to do? Curl back up on the ground here?
Still, once there, Sayaka proceeded to sit across the table from him with her arms folded across her chest and her eyes narrowed in an I’m not convinced you’re not a sicko but this is a public place and I’d like to see you try and rape me here in front of these witnesses, JUST TRY IT! way. He found it intriguing, the way that she could say so much with so few words. She could scream and spit at him in dead silence and cry mourning the loss of something he could not yet put his finger on without even shedding a single tear. Looking into her eyes, he saw beyond what she was saying-- words he would not be able to repeat back in five minutes, if asked-- and listened to what she was not saying. That was what he would remember for years.
She began to become restless sitting there, however. First, her knee started bobbing steadily up and down beneath the table, clunking now and again against the leg of the table so that the tea in their cups trembled. Then, a poor, helpless paper towel succumbed to a shredded fate at the will of her fingers. Finally, she spoke up, “I think I should go home now…” and then, as if to deny out-right that she was restless, as he seemed to be so certain of, and prove other motives for wanting to leave, she added “She’ll worry about me for being out so late, you see.”
His eyes opened wide at this turn of events. There was someone waiting at home for her? Someone someone someone. Someone sister? Someone mother? Someone… girlfriend? “She? Ah, so you live with someone, then? Your mother? Your sister?”
“You’re awfully nosey. It’s not really any of your business, is it?” She refolded her arms across her chest, lifting her chin defiantly against his inquiries and diverting her eyes away, looking at anything in the room but him. Just as quickly, however, her shoulders sagged and she peered out the corner of her eyes at him with a nod. “Well, you did treat me to tea... And though you could later use this information to my disadvantage, I suppose I will tell you.”
She breathed in deeply, as if in preparation for some great ordeal, and then spoke. “Yoshiko is waiting for me. She’s very loyal and devoted to me and I have neglected her all night, so I really should go now.” Standing quickly, she bowed and murmured a quick “Gochisou-sama. Arigatou.” before turning abruptly and bolting like a frightened colt toward the nearest exit.
Abruptly, he jumped up from his seat and just about leapt over the table, shouting after her “I’ll walk you home!” Though she audibly groaned in response, she did not refuse and it encouraged him. Keeping pace with her-- she practically flew home, short legs taking long strides that could put even the tallest of people to shame-- he glanced every now and then to the side at her. She was suddenly in such a hurry to return to that place it had been so difficult for her to be before.
Rounding the corner onto the street where Sayaka lived, they were at her house in no time, standing again in the spot where they had met just a couple hours before. This time, though, something was different. He could see it in her eyes. Following the wide-eyed mixture of alarm and relief etched across the features of her face, he turned toward the house and saw a girl sitting on the front steps, splayed across them in a peculiarly kakkoii way. And if he didn’t know any better, he could have sworn it was Yoshizawa Hitomi.