Dairy Of Ellen

A Girl Who Was Loved (5)

It continued all through the summer after that.
On sunny days, I would visit Ellen's house. On rainy days, I would look out the window in the direction of the forest.

No matter how many times I came by, I never met the person who cared for her. It was truly a mystery how we never even b.u.mped into each other.
Did they hide when I came? She didn't seem to like her doctor very much, so she didn't pay it much mind.
As far as I knew, her parents had showed no signs of visiting. Though I was sure she'd be overjoyed if they did.
If I weren't around, Ellen would truly be alone.
Every time I saw her, my feelings for her strengthened.

I started to see that Ellen's body was getting no better since when we first met, only worse.
Lately she was unable to even get out of bed, often bedridden all day. Those beautiful, wide-open eyes were downcast. Even her eyesight seemed to be getting worse.
What would I do when she wasn't able to read anymore - no, worse than that, when she lost even the light?
She was fine before I started visiting. Was it because I started visiting?
Maybe she pushed herself to talk to me, and that made it worsen.
"That's definitely not true," Ellen said.
"So please, don't say you won't come visit," she said on the verge of tears.
My eyes widened slightly in surprise. I whispered kindly to calm her.
"I won't."
Ellen smiled, very much relieved by my a.s.surance.
That smile pained my heart.
She could have cried. She could have wailed.
But this small girl always stubbornly smiled at me. She beared the pain of her sickness.

Something, either pus or blood, started forming in her eyes. I wiped it with a handkerchief, wanting to cry.
What more would be taken from Ellen? Would even the light?
I loathed her sickness from the bottom of my heart. At the same time, I knew there was nothing I could do - I was drained thinking of it like an opponent I couldn't even fight against.
That sense of loss invited a quiet sadness in me. Heartbreak welled up from deep in my chest, came to my throat, and pushed itself out as words.

"If only I could take your place..."
I muttered to myself.
The words carried through the air and came back to my ears.
...Yes. If only I could take Ellen's place.
If only she could go out and play instead of me. To run around freely in the sun, surrounded by flowers. While I could smile in bed and sleep in the meantime.

Suddenly, I heard a rustling of clothes, and looked up. She was holding out her hand to me.
I took it. It was cold. Surprised by its coldness, I put both hands around it.
She looked at me and smiled with her eyes.
I don't know why it startled me.
She hadn't said anything. She just looked at me. Somehow, it didn't feel like I was being looked at by a girl younger than me.
"...Ellen?"
I asked it also in a sense of "what's wrong?" Because I thought she might not be narrowing her eyes in a smile, but because she was moments from losing consciousness.

I must have looked worried.
Ellen smiled in her usual way, then said "Thank you."
Her smile relieved me.
She quietly said, "You're so kind, Viola."
Wondering what she meant, I thought back on what I'd said.

...If only I could take your place.
The words had sort of just spilled out, but it wasn't a lie. I smiled and held her hand tighter.
Her eyes began to cloud up at once. I thought I'd grabbed too hard and loosened my grip.
But her expression didn't change, and I knew something else was making her eyes water.
She stared with distant eyes and said incomprehensibly:
"It's like a dream that you'd be friends with little old me..."

She slowly blinked. It pushed a big tear out of her eye, soon soaked up by the bandages wrapped around her face.
The scene seemed to grab at my chest. I took her hand and made her look at me.
"Don't talk like you're "little old me." You're sick, Ellen, but that's not all you are. That doesn't make you any different from other children."
"...Viola..."
She knit her brows.
"So don't speak so little of yourself. I think you're kind for being my friend too, Ellen. And I'm sure you'll get better soon. One day you'll be able to walk and play outside."
Ellen listened to my every word. Then she shook her head. It was very slight.

"No."
"What do you mean?"
"Because I'm going to die soon."
The words froze the pit of my stomach.

Die? Ellen? Die, as in go away? No. As in stop moving.
My hands gripping hers trembled.
My pulse quickened. My throat was dry, and I couldn't speak well.
"...Why do you... say that...?"
Contrary to me, she was calm.
"The doctor said so. He said I'd die soon. Like he knew for sure. And he sounded happy. Why did he sound so happy? But I know why. I... Once I die, the doctor won't have to bother with me anymore. He won't have to begrudgingly replace my bandages, do all my... all the things he goes through for me anymore."
Her words didn't seem to have any emotion in them.
I shook my head, looking at Ellen in disbelief. I was filled with hate for the doctor who would say such heartless things to a sick child, and pity for the girl who gave up and accepted it all.

She went on.
"...My father and my mother wish I'd just go away, too. So they'll be happy when I'm dead."
"What are you saying?!"
I nearly screamed. She looked at me in surprise. I felt awkward seeing it and reflexively lowered my head. But I raised it again, pulling myself together, and bit my lip.
"That's not true. It's not. Happy you're dead... they couldn't be. I don't know your father and mother, Ellen, but... there's no way they could be happy their own daughter died. ...They don't want you to die, they want you to live... That's why they're having you get better here, isn't it? They put you in this house so you'd get better, right?"
I looked at her face, hoping for her expression to change the slightest bit. But she just gave a little smile.
It was a face that had given up on everything. She didn't seem to be looking at me, but through me into the distance.

"So my father and mother won't come see me, will they? They won't come because I'm sick. They won't look at me. They'll abandon me. ...They didn't put me here for my sake. They're..."
Perhaps growing more pained as she spoke, she sucked up some saliva, then continued.
"Hiding me."
It was a low voice.

Hiding her.
I felt that carried many meanings.
"Because... The adults in the village all know me. But they pretend they don't, and hide me in the forest."
Everyone knows Ellen?
That unexpected comment stirred my heart.
"...You didn't know me either, did you, Viola?"
It was true.
I closed my mouth as if it had been punched.
I had never even heard of a house in the forest.

Hold on. Father's voice came back to my mind. Don't go deep into the forest, he always told me. Was it to keep this girl hidden?
There was a ringing in my ears.
...A troublesome sick child. Yet they couldn't just abandon her. So they isolated her deep in the forest, where people would never see her.
The villagers were paid to keep it secret. I could feel myself tracing the adults' thought process.
Then, was father among them?
An unpleasant feeling spread through my whole body.

As if guessing my thoughts, she looked at me with upturned eyes.
"...Your father isn't at fault, Viola. Because I'm just a sick girl. Everyone's afraid of me. They think it might be contagious. ...I wouldn't want to be with such a girl. I wouldn't want her around. ...I just want to hide her away."
"Don't say that," I pleaded, holding her hand tighter.
I didn't say it out of pity.
I just didn't want to hear any more. About how my father, with the other villagers, might have worked together to hide her. But I didn't realize that was the real reason.

I was confused.
On the other hand, Ellen was calm.
She had thought about things more than I realized. Living alone for so long, she had come to understand some things, and she had come to accept being alone.
I did what I could to clear father from my mind.
For now, I had to think only about her.
"If that's true... Even if everyone is looking away from you, Ellen, and wishes you'd just die... I'd be sad. I'd be so sad if you died, Ellen."
That was the undiluted truth.
My honest feelings, bubbling up from the bottom of my heart.
"Hm..."
She cast her eyes down and nodded slightly.
Perhaps my feelings had come through; I felt the dark mist in her eyes parting.

"You know..."
Ellen mumbled. It didn't sound gloomy, but rather was in her usual cute tone.
"Even if I can't leave here, and... even if no one notices me. Even if no one plays with me. ...And even if I'm not cured..."
Ellen looked at me.
With her usual honest eyes.
"Just having you here is enough for me, Viola."
"Ellen..."
I felt like I'd been saved by those words. I knew my eyes were radiating a little light.

Suddenly, Ellen wrinkled her eyebrows and scrunched her face. As I wondered what she was doing, she sat up.
And then, as if falling over, she feebly hugged me. It really was lacking in energy, so I caught and firmly hugged her in return.
I felt her silky hair and her temperature. Her fingertips were very cold, but her chest still warm.
Ellen buried her face in my neck like a child clinging to her mother. And her whole body trembling, she whispered.
"I love you, Viola."
Those words vibrated not in my ear, but my bones, shaking my very core. The backs of my eyes warmed up, and instead of replying, I held her shoulder.

What an honest girl.
I love you too, Ellen.
But why couldn't I voice it directly? Maybe I was embarrassed. Or maybe I was still concerned about father.

At any rate, while I couldn't say it, it didn't change that I did love her. So instead, I continued to tenderly hug her.
I smelled medicine, blood, and pus, but I wasn't scared. Because it was all Ellen.
She accepted the short remainder of her life, but I couldn't. What would I do?
She was crying, I felt. Just without showing it.
It was always this way.
She was always desperate to endure it. She'd never bother me with her wailing. She kept the tragedy going on in her little body all within that body.

...Oh, G.o.d.
I closed my eyes tight. I felt a tear come out and roll down my cheek.
If only I could take just a fraction of this girl's pain.
If only I could share half that pain and walk with her.
The adults before Ellen who encouraged her death. What horrible people they must be.
Ellen's parents. They might have already abandoned her entirely.
She tried to act like she had given up, but she must have loved them unbearably.
If only they just came to visit. Just a hug would save this girl's heart. Why could they not even do that for her?

I felt an estrangement from the world of adults.
I wasn't sure if it was strong enough to call hatred.
Perhaps it was closer to disappointment.
I felt like adults were on the other side of a high wall from us.
And only we knew the truth.
We trembled holding each other. We thought of each other and cried.
This s.p.a.ce between the chair and bed was my and Ellen's sacred place, never to be intruded upon.

Meeoh.
As if breaking up the moment, the black cat meowed low.

I hate...
women who don't know they're loved.

I hate...
women who won't accept when they're loved.

I...

On the way home that day.
I thought I left Ellen's house with time to spare, but by the time I exited the forest, the sun had fully set.
Hoot, hoot, came the voice of distant birds.
I didn't feel the night path, which I usually found eerie, was at all scary. I felt my heart had gotten stronger.
My chest hurt when I'd hugged her. Why? I felt like there'd been a hole poked in my chest.

When I got home, father was leaning against the door, looking scared.
Since I'd started going to Ellen's house, there had been many days I'd come home late. It seemed to be reaching father's limits.
When I saw his face, her words came to mind.
...The villagers are hiding me.
Welling up with bitterness, I didn't look at his face.
"Hey! Viola!"
I ignored father and forced my way inside.

A silent dinner table.
The food father prepared had gone cold.
There was only the sound of clinking cutlery and munching bread.
Father was first to break the silence.
"You've been coming home late."
"..."
"Where are you going?"
"..."
I didn't want to tell him about Ellen. I opened my heavy mouth and said the name of another girl I was friends with.
"x.x.xX's place."
"x.x.xX said she didn't know anything."
I promptly looked up.
"Did you ask?"
My face probably showed disdain. My father briefly faltered, then frowned as if saying "fine, then."

I felt my face heat up.
It wasn't because my lie had been seen through. It just embarrassed me imagining my father going to my friend's house and asking.
He was so over-protective. That embarrassment gradually turned to irritation.
Father asked again.
"Where are you going?"
"To visit someone."
"Then who?"
My words were momentarily caught, and I hesitated whether I should say it. Finally, I spat it out.

"A girl named Ellen."
After saying it, I quickly looked for a change in father's expression.
He lowered his eyebrows and thought.
"Ellen...? Is there such a girl?"
I was disappointed.
So he didn't know?
But I soon braced myself.
Because maybe he was just pretending he didn't know.
Maybe the villagers had forgotten even the sick child's name in an attempt to hide her.
I was staring at him, so he gave me a weird look.
"What is it?"
It seemed somehow antagonistic, and I felt unpleasant.
Though that was only because I was looking at my father with suspicion.

"Father, are you hiding something?"
"Hiding what?"
"Everyone in the village is hiding something, aren't they?"
Father put down his spoon and was silent. Had he thought of something? Or maybe he hadn't, and was thinking.
The silence only lasted seconds, but it felt like eternity.
"What're you talking about, Viola? Why would that be?"
Father finally said with a sigh.
He looked a little concerned.
So was I. About the fact I couldn't believe father. I hated this feeling. I wanted to cry. But if I did, I couldn't speak.
I thought back on Ellen, and endured it.

I asked at father and asked.
"Then why do you say not to go deep into the forest?"
"Well, because..."
Father seemed taken aback, lazily scratching his hairy chin.
"... ...Because it's dangerous. The roads aren't clear, there are beasts... Of course it's dangerous."
I felt something hidden in the gaps of his words.
As I stayed silent, father suddenly sharpened his eyes.
"Could it be you're going deep into the forest? Is that where that girl's house is?"
My shoulders stiffened. Because I thought I was the one blaming him. Suddenly being blamed myself, I was bewildered.
"Hey! Viola! ...Is it true?"
Well, it was. But why was he mad? Surely, then, the villagers were hiding her. They didn't say that warning out of concern for me, but to hide that sick child - were they afraid the children would figure that out?

Still staring at father, I shook my head.
"I'm not going there. Ellen's house is..."
I looked down.
"Near the forest," I lied.
"I see..."
Father looked like he wanted to say something more. But he didn't push me any further. Maybe he paid heed to me, or maybe it was too troublesome.
I wish he'd just tell me. But I was glad it didn't turn into an argument. It seemed contradictory that I was satisfied with that.

Tick, tock, the clock quietly resounded.
Without saying anything to each other, a warm air flowed between us. Yet today, it was a little strained.
I didn't feel like eating anymore and got out of my chair, turning to my room.
"...Hey, Viola!"
I hesitated briefly when he called me. But I didn't turn around, went into my room, and locked the door.
I heard father sigh, now alone at the dinner table, through the door.

I stumbled to my bed and collapsed on it.
I thought back on what I'd said.
...It's fine. Ellen's house is near the forest.
I'd lied.
My chest ached with guilt.
The truth was, it was in the forest. And maybe it'd be more accurate to say it was deep in the forest.
But I didn't say it.
I was scared of him knowing the truth.
I didn't want to see father's reaction to being told where her house really was. Maybe he had been kept from speaking about her. Maybe he would have desperately kept me from going there.

Ellen said she was going to die very soon. She told me she loved me. I was all she had. I didn't want to stop going to see her, or to be stopped from going.
I thought my father was scary when he condemned me. Yet he was always so kind. I wanted to believe him. But he didn't understand.
I held my pillow tight and pushed my nose into it.
I'm sorry, Ellen. I wasn't brave enough to say it. I couldn't confirm that you existed.
I couldn't even say it to father. I don't have the courage to condemn the villagers.
But that's why - that's why I'll be with you to the end. Beside you, always being your friend. I won't let you be lonely.
Determined to do so, the guilt of my lie seemed to fade.
I stopped grabbing my pillow so tightly, and fell asleep.