The Cat Who Saved Books(13)

No one had ever praised him so directly before. People had always laughed at Rintaro, called him spineless or weak. He was used to being avoided because he was always so glum, but now he was strangely unsettled by these new descriptions being thrown at him. He was so unsettled that he found himself unable to sit down with a book in the dim shop as usual. He grabbed the duster again instead and put all his energy into cleaning off those shelves.

He’d just about finished when he heard the front doorbell. He looked over to see Sayo Yuzuki, his neighbor and class rep, wrapped in a warm, red scarf. She peered into the bookshop and raised one perfectly shaped eyebrow when she saw Rintaro standing there.

“What are you doing?”

“What do you . . . ?”

For a moment he was confused, but then when he thought about it, he realized he should have been the one asking her the question.

“It’s seven in the morning. What are you doing here, Sayo?”

“I’m going to band practice. I always leave around now.”

She raised her left hand to show him a black instrument case.

“And as I was passing, I happened to notice that Natsuki Books, which ought to have been closed, was actually open. I popped in to see what was going on.”

She stepped across the threshold, her breath white in the chilled air.

“If you’ve got enough time to clean the shop this morning, that must mean you’re planning on heading into school afterward?” she said, her hands on her hips.

“Well . . . But I—”

“But nothing! If you have nothing better to do, then come to school. Are you really planning to miss the rest of your classes before you move?”

“Yeah, I guess so.”

Sayo gave the stammering boy a dangerous look.

“Hey, think about how I feel—I’m the one at my depressed classmate’s house, dropping off homework. I’m trying to be nice.”

Rintaro realized he’d never thanked her for bringing his homework by the day before. But as soon as he mumbled, “Thank you for yesterday,” Sayo got a puzzled expression on her face.

“Did I say something wrong?” asked Rintaro.

“No, I’m just surprised. You didn’t look happy at all about it yesterday, and now you’re standing here, thanking me to my face.”

“I wasn’t unhappy about it. You’re the one who looked pissed . . .”

“Pissed?”

Sayo was taken aback for a moment, but then added: “Not especially.”

But now she did look a little mad.

“I was just worried about you, Natsuki.”

“Worried? About me?” Rintaro said, surprised.

“Of course.”

Sayo looked sharply at him.

“Your grandfather dies, and now you have to move away—I got all worried about you. But then I find you just hanging out with Akiba like everything’s fine. That really bugged me.”

I hadn’t realized, thought Rintaro. Selfishly, he had thought that Sayo had been coming by out of duty. Even though she had told him straight out that she was worried about him, he assumed she had just said it out of politeness. But it seemed that wasn’t the case.

One moment Sayo was staring at him in amazement, then suddenly, she looked away.

“Did I really look pissed?” Sayo asked.

Rintaro was lost for words. It wasn’t because of her question—it was because, despite seeing Sayo hundreds of times, he’d never noticed before how bright and beautiful her eyes were. When he thought about it, he realized that she lived right around the corner, but he’d never had a face-to-face conversation with her before.

“What, did I seem like that big of a jerk?”

“. . . I didn’t think that at all.”

“You’re a really bad liar, Natsuki.”

Rintaro had no answer for that. He reached up with his right hand and fiddled with his glasses for a moment.

“I’ve got Grandpa’s old tea set,” he said finally, pointing awkwardly toward the back of the shop. “If you have time, I could make you a cup.”

Ugh, thought Rintaro. What a stupid line that was. His clumsy invitation was met with a mild grimace from his cheerful classmate.

“What’s that? A pickup line?” Sayo asked.

“Of course not!”

“But as an invitation to someone who came all the way here to bring you your homework, it’s not bad.”

It was a slick response. She moved over and plopped down on the stool next to Rintaro.

“I’m going to give you points for effort,” she said.

“Thanks for that.”

Rintaro barely had time to sigh with relief before Sayo continued, “I’ll have a cup of Darjeeling with plenty of sugar.”

Her upbeat voice was like the unexpected arrival of spring in the midst of winter.





The Second Labyrinth

The Mutilator of Books

Rintaro’s grandfather had always been a mysterious character.

He seemed to inhabit a slightly different reality than the one Rintaro knew. A man of few words, elusive, but not standoffish or cold. He came across as a quiet, wise old man.

He would get up at 6:00 a.m. and finish breakfast by half past. By 7:00 a.m. he would have prepared bento lunch boxes for both Rintaro and himself. Then he’d open the doors and windows to air out the shop and water the outside plants. From morning time when he saw his grandson off to school, to the early evening when Rintaro returned, he never surfaced from his ocean of secondhand books. His daily routine was regular, unchanging, like a river flowing steadily to the sea.