How We Met Again

Chapter 40: He Wavers

Chapter 40:
He Wavers

"Uesugi-kun, have I told you recently that you're an idiot?"

"Incessantly," I replied drily.

"Good," Itsuki said, popping a hard candy into her mouth. "Let me do it again -- you're an idiot."

We were sitting on a bench on the roof of the school, grey cloud cover overhead giving the expanse of concrete a deeply gloomy feel. A harsh wind had picked up in the last ten minutes, whistling through the metal fencing that guarded the edge from the vicious drop beyond.

Leaning back against the wiring, I closed my eyes. Unprompted, Yotsuba's face swam in front of me... and, not for the first time, I felt sick.

"That said," Itsuki sighed, "Yotsuba's an even bigger idiot. Things should never have reached this point. You both should never have let things reach this point."

"Mm."

My eyes still closed, I could feel my chest clenching... and from deep within my core, the quiet acidic snake of anxiety began to slither its way up my spine once again.

Since Yotsuba had left the library the previous day, it hadn't truly gone away. Even in the moments when I'd been distracted, it had simply slid into hiding in the shadows. The warmth of her smile wasn't there to disperse my fears; consequently, the darkness in the corners of my body had become its refuge, deadly strands of adrenaline and cortisol whispering wordless threats to me.

It was lunch now, and I wasn't at my usual table.

Somehow, going there felt like too much.

I'd emailed her when I got home. Apologizing. Trying, in my fumbling way, to explain myself.

Yotsuba hadn't responded.

When I'd read my emails again in the cold light of day, I'd cursed myself -- because they'd not conveyed any of what I'd really wanted to say. They'd felt like platitudes, and meaningless defenses... and I'd felt nauseous.

"Uesugi-kun? Are you listening to me?"

"Sorry," I said, opening my eyes and focusing on Itsuki. "I just... I zoned out for a second there. What were you saying?"

"I was saying that you both needed to stop this way earlier," Itsuki said, pouting slightly at my dissociation. "Things should never have reached this point, or gotten this bad. She should never have driven herself to this state, and you should have put your foot down weeks ago -- and to her face, Uesugi-kun, not behind her back."

"I--"

"You were enabling her," Itsuki said pointedly. "I'm not saying most of the blame rests with you, or even the majority of the blame. This is probably seventy... no, eighty percent on Yotsuba. That said, you need to take responsibility for your own part in this."

I stared at her for a long moment.

Then, I sighed, closed my eyes, and nodded.

"You're right... to an extent. I don't think wanting to respect her goals and her dreams was wrong, though."

Itsuki frowned. "That... isn't really what I meant."

"I know, and I don't disagree with you. I'm just trying to figure out what the right thing to have done was. Is it really as simple as 'talk to her and put my foot down earlier'? That seems... naïve."

Itsuki shifted, and popped another candy in her mouth. "I think it is that simple. You definitely shouldn't have tried to go behind her back."

"Maybe."