NOVEL WEB Chapter 14.3: Sink III
This email… c-can I delete it?
No, even if I deleted it, the next time I meet her, she would probably ask me about it, but simply in another way. How terrifying…
While I was lost in thought, Takenaka came over with a dish with a high rim that was steaming hot and a plate with a bunch of watermelons cut into slices on it.
“Your sister was here about two hours ago.”
“Huh!? She came!?”
Oh, no. As always, she came unannounced, that idiot!
“So I explained the circumstances to her, and she just left this here and returned home,” Takenaka said, putting everything on the table.
“Did she say anything strange…”
“…Not really…”Not shared on aggregator sites
That prick most certainly said something…
“Excuse me… you even go through the trouble of cooking for me…”
“No, it was something simple anyway.”
Can you get up? Takenaka asked me subsequently, but after looking at me for a bit, he concluded that it would be impossible for me to get up, so he went around to the futon and supported me as I weakly raised my arms.
Here we go. He gave me a brief signal and helped me up slowly so as not to burden my body unduly, yet with a steady and stable supporting way. At that moment, I casually surmised that he was highly experienced in handling sick people, however, I must have been lying on the bed for too long, for my head immediately started to pound.
Ah, how pathetic for a 25 year old man to be taken care of by a man a year older than him. Even my own mother wouldn’t be this devoted to nursing me.
He probably helped me change my clothes as well. How much have I been taken care of? Was it too much… Huh. Wait, hey.
Come to think of it, this guy cleaned up my vomit before this…
I mean, wasn’t this beyond the point of indebtedness?
“…I am really sorry.”
“What?”Translator: MadHatter
When I apologized with my voice wavering, he was startled.
On the table was a plate of Pocari Sweat and watermelon, plus this…
It was not porridge. It was too colorful for it to be porridge, and it smelled fancy.
“It’s summer vegetable risotto. I hope it suits your taste.”
My appetite had been waning lately, and I didn’t feel like eating anything at all, but the steam, the savory aroma, and the vibrant visual appeal of the dish gradually stimulated my appetite, which was almost nonexistent at the time.
It has been a long time since my throat has rumbled.
“Bon appétit.”
Scooping it up with a spoon, I let it cool down slightly before pouring a small amount into my mouth.
The consommé-based flavor was refreshing, and the acidity of the finely chopped tomatoes spread softly.
De… Delicious.
It was palatable.
This was amazingly divine.
Despite the cold making it taste a little bland, I found it to be the most delectable meal I have ever had when being sick.
Small chopped carrots, onions, cabbages… corn that popped in my mouth… what was this, courgettes? S-Somehow, all sorts of fancy ingredients were there…
Perhaps my body was pleased because I had hardly consumed any vegetables recently, and it hurried to absorb them, causing me to take a succession of them and shove them down the back of my throat.
Fortunately, the ingredients were so mushy that I didn’t have to chew much to swallow them. This was what nutritional intake was all about… I thought to myself.
“It’s extremely tasty… Takenaka, you are like a pro at this.”
“No, I think it’s normal… I’m glad you have an appetite.”
If this is the case, there is a chance for recovery. Takenaka smiled as if he was slightly reassured.
The expression on his face was a definite comfort to me at that moment.
The spoon, which had been moving back and forth between the plate and my mouth, ceased moving.
The saltiness in my mouth rose. I tried to control myself, but couldn’t do so.
“Hakamada…”
“Oh, it’s so tasty… Wow, it’s insanely tasty…”
It was a mistake of mine to speak out.
I intended to say something normal, but I was all shaky and stilted, and there was no way I could conceal it any longer.
“Are you crying…?”
“The food is…”
To avoid being caught, I lowered my face and concealed it with the hand that was holding the spoon, but once I turned my head down, the stream of tears that had been forming was unexpectedly thick.
Two drops of tears fell on the table.
“The food is good… and it makes me feel great.”
Because the food tasted good. Because the rice tasted good. For a while, I kept on saying incomprehensible things.
That wasn’t the actual reason.
I was so emotionally beaten down that I was even at a loss for words.
…That woman.
Since the news report, I have been researching the identity of the deceased woman with a faint hope that she was someone else.
On the Internet, on-site, and by interviewing people.
However, as it turned out, the fact was that the woman who had committed suicide in her apartment was the young woman I had stopped that night.
I had encouraged her that day, cried to her and begged her. That woman.
She was indeed dead. She had killed herself.
Even though I thought I had made her quit, even though I thought I had prevented her from doing so… It was all my own self-serving, deluded idea.
Deep down inside, I was slightly proud that I had pulled one person from the brink of death, but it didn’t work out that way.
She died. Just like Hyuga.
The one who got involved was me. I was the one who made contact. What I did was for the best, but the result of what came… was the worst.
I have done the exact same thing again.
Again I… I had made a person to…
At last, I grasped what Ayame was saying at this point. I couldn’t possibly understand the feelings of someone who was suffering to the verge of wanting to die.
What did I say to her?
Wasn’t it mostly self-serving consolation from someone else’s perspective?
I couldn’t say anything, I couldn’t say… I may have… forced her into a corner and pushed her back…
That was all I could dwell on ever since I saw the daily news reports. Nevertheless, I couldn’t discuss this with anyone, so I went through a never-ending struggle within myself.
After that, I began to experience those dreadful dreams night after night. When I closed my eyes at night, I would find myself in that dream, and when I woke up, it would be morning. I never even felt like I had slept, regardless of how much I had done so.
Each time I suffered a nightmare, I felt as if I were being told by Hyuga.
Be aware of it. Feel more pain.
Truthfully, I was suffering and terrified. I wondered if I should talk to Takenaka or Ayame about it. But…
If that was Hyuga’s appeal, then I felt I had to accept it.
Even so… perhaps this was the limit of what I could do. I couldn’t help but feel wrench. After all, I usually couldn’t voluntarily seek help.
In reality, I had already reached the end of my rope and wanted to give up but I was still obstinate.
In front of a being like me, there was someone who, if I wanted to lean on him now, would let me do so without refusing. Thinking like that was naive, stop it… Don’t rely on this person. I thought I hit the brakes a few times, but I was defeated…
The expression Takenaka cast on me crushed everything. The vulnerability that I had never revealed to anyone before was brought to the surface.
“…Ugh…”
“It was a rough situation, wasn’t it…”
Ayame told me roughly everything that had happened, Takenaka said to me as if to console me, as I was trembling and gnashing my teeth.
“I don’t know what to… do anymore… The thing I intended to do for the best turned out to be the worst thing I could have done… That person’s sign, I should not have missed it… I… left someone to die again… I killed someone indirectly…”
“What are you talking about? Hakamada… you killed someone… those kind of words…”
“I killed her… because I… I… I didn’t handle the situation properly…! That’s why that person died… too!!”
Tears spilled down my face like a waterfall the instant I hysterically yelled that. It was the moment when a grown man of a good age started crying like a little child. Just like the previous incident with the cat, only this time it was all my own emotions.
“I… What was I supposed to do at that time…”
Even if I had shouted out of the blue like that, he wouldn’t have been able to catch what I was saying at all. What was I crying for? It would not be surprising if he laughed at me.
When it came to Takenaka, he was neither withdrawn nor astounded. Without batting an eyebrow, he listened to everything I said, including my screams. Like an immobile wall, he was motionless.
“Let’s calm down, shall we?”
After a short period of silence, he said in a voice like ice water.
I continued to cry wordlessly.
During high school, no matter how frustrated I was at baseball games or how harsh things got, I would by no means let my tears show in front of my friends and yet…