Maria-sama ga Miteru Volume 25 Chapter 7 Part1

School life could be viewed as a connected series of events. After Christmas came the winter break, then when the third term started in the new year it was the election for the next student council. As soon as that was over, it was Valentine's Day.

She realized during cleaning time, as she swept the cla.s.sroom floor, that the gathered dust and particles were a lot more colorful than usual.

At first she hadn't paid it any attention, thinking that it was just a one-time event. However, it was the same the following day, and as the days progressed it somehow kept increasing.

Typically, it was things that were too small to carry to the bin that were left on the floor - mainly dirt brought in from outside and strands of hair. So when she swept the floor, the whitish, blackish and grayish particles would form a small monochrome mound.

But recently, there were reddish, yellowish, greenish, and all sorts of different colored specks of fiber mixing together, not forming any single shade.

What was going on there?

After peering at the dustpan for a little while, she finally understood the meaning behind the colors.

(Ah.)

They were fibers from the wool her cla.s.smates were knitting with during breaks.

But even so, would knitting alone make these dustb.a.l.l.s? Well, it wasn't completely impossible. If there were some students that were frequently undoing and redoing their knitting, and some that were using fluffy mohair yarn. If about a third of her cla.s.s were knitting things for Valentine's Day, it would probably result in about that amount of dust.

And some of their friends who weren't knitting would borrow some yarn and play cat's cradle, so the first-year camellia cla.s.s was swimming in wool fibers.

Conversations about chocolate were springing up all over the place. Students getting together to look through recipe books and writing down ingredients for sweets, or poring over the catalogs from famous confectionery shops in their magazines. Everyone was having fun, whether they had an onee-sama or not.

It was their long-awaited high-school Valentine's Day. It was probably more strange not to be enjoying it.

After school on Sat.u.r.day.

With the cleaning finished, and her hands washed, she went to take her handkerchief out of her pocket and something else came flying out with it and landed on the floor. After picking it up and unfolding it, she saw that it was the special edition of the Lillian Kawaraban that had been distributed that morning. Touko smiled. She'd completely forgotten that she had it in her pocket.

"It's on again - the Treasure Hunt!"

The headline jumped out at her.

But despite the sense of urgency in the announcement, there were hardly any details provided. When she'd first read it, she thought that the newspaper was planning on releasing the information little by little in order to drum up enthusiasm, but apparently they hadn't settled on the final details.

"Mami-sama said they'd publish the rules as soon as they were decided."

Noriko had explained at lunch time, while trying to escape her cla.s.smates.

Noriko's life had become a lot more hectic since the student council elections. Of course, some of that was Yamayurikai council work, but her cla.s.smates would also gather around her during breaks to ask her about the upcoming events.

As a result, for the last few days, Noriko gave the impression of always rus.h.i.+ng from one place to another. There was no end to the people she had to deal with. Just what on earth had happened to the "Unapproachable Noriko-san" from the start of the school year?

Thinking about it, Touko grimaced.

It was the same with her - "Touko-san the innocent meddler" was a thing of the past too.

At some point they'd swapped.

No. It wasn't like they'd switched roles. They'd both gradually changed over time, until they'd finally settled like this.

"Treasure hunt &h.e.l.lip; huh."

Touko returned the paper to her right pocket. Her hand remained there, in her pocket.

She hadn't been able to partic.i.p.ate in last year's treasure hunt because she'd been in middle-school. She'd declined her cla.s.smates' invitation to race over there as soon as school was over and had pretended to go home, but then curiosity got the better of her and she had walked over to the high-school area. And then -

(What an idiot.)

From inside her pocket came the sound of the newspaper being crushed. It was no longer folded in four, it was now just a paper ball.

(What an idiot.)

She walked quickly down the hallway. Like she was trying to shake off the ghosts of the past. Why did she have to remember that scene?

(What an idiot, what an idiot, what an idiot, what an idiot!)

She ran and ran, but it just kept chasing her.

The image of that girl running through the school, exactly one year ago. Her desperate expression as she ran, pursued by those other girls. But, the way it was framed, she looked like the lead racehorse, pursued by the rest of the field.

That girl was the one that Sachiko-onee-sama had chosen.

Touko thought it was frightening. But she didn't understand what it was she feared. She was just vaguely scared. She couldn't get close to that person.

(It's hopeless &h.e.l.lip; )

The more she tried to shake it off, the more the vision of Yumi-sama remained. Touko gave up and slowed down. Before she knew it, she was back at the first-year camellia cla.s.sroom.

"Well then, gokigenyou everyone."

A voice called out from within the cla.s.sroom, then Noriko emerged.

"Ah, Touko."

Noriko said cheerfully, spotting her friend.

"You look busy, are you on your way to the Rose Mansion?"

"Nope. There's no meeting today. I'm in a hurry because there's a special on Buddhist statues on TV today and I forgot to set the recorder. Unfortunately, my great-aunt's out today too. Well, I wouldn't really want to rely on her anyway."

It wasn't clear whether she didn't want to bother her great-aunt, or she didn't think she'd be able to work the machine.

"What time's it on?"

"Umm &h.e.l.lip; two, I think."

"Then you'd better hurry."

Looking at her watch, Touko saw it was already well past 1pm. She remembered that Noriko's house was a couple of stops away on the train from M Station. If she didn't have to wait too long for the train she could still make it home in time, but the bus from school was often late so she couldn't be too careless.

"Yeah. Well, gokigenyou."

Noriko turned to go.

"Ah, Noriko-san."

Touko called out instinctively.

"Huh? What is it?"

Touko had put the cart before the horse, calling out to her before she'd thought about what she should say. But she'd called her to stop on reflex. Perhaps it had just felt wrong for Noriko to say something completely trivial like that, since usually they had weighty conversations when it was just the two of them.

"It must be tough on you. You have to hide one of the treasures this year, right?"

Sad to say, what came out of her mouth was the same sort of thing that her cla.s.smates had said when they crowded around Rosa Gigantea en bouton.

"Nope."

Noriko smiled as she denied this.

"The three second-years are hiding the cards. Ah, right. I think I've got one &h.e.l.lip; "

As she said this, Noriko put her hand in her pocket and fished something out.

"See, it says "next year's Roses," right?"

What she'd retrieved from her pocket was the special edition of the Lillian Kawaraban. Noriko explained as she pointed to the article.

"Last year it was the boutons, so it seems like a lot of people made that mistake. Do you have one of these?"

"&h.e.l.lip; No."

"Then you can have this. I've already read it, and we should have one on file at the Rose Mansion, so I could read that any time."

Noriko refolded it and pressed it into Touko's left hand, before saying, "Catch you later," and quickly disappearing down the hallway.

After returning to her cla.s.sroom, Touko wondered why she had just accepted another copy of the Lillian Kawaraban when she already had a copy. On her desk, she placed the copy she'd just received next to the crumpled copy from her pocket.

(This is Noriko, this is Touko.)

She tapped each of them, and then put both of them in her pocket.

There was nothing else she could do.

Because, at that time, she absolutely did not want Noriko to see that crumpled piece of paper.