May 20th. A cola-giving stalker appeared before me.

…Well, since I haven’t discover his true ident.i.ty or grasp a complete understanding of the entire business, it might be too early to make the conclusion. Uhh, let’s focus on the direction of ‘thinking’ first.

In the Wagashi shop I work at, I discovered Poc*ri bottles filled with cola left by someone in the backdoor when I was throwing the trash out. There were five bottles. ‘It isn’t poisoned, just normal cola. I can’t drink soda, please take it.’ The memo with retro handwriting stuck under the bottles claimed so. It didn’t say if this was a present for x.x.x, or ‘I’m your fan, please keep up the cosplaying’ — things that could explain the source.

“…”

If we were to let the thing known as ‘the view of an educator’ function, I seem to need to find out the admirable things first. Isn’t the att.i.tude of not dumping unfinished food into the sink important? I think so at least. Then don’t buy or take it. It’s kind of worth complaining, but what should I do?

The environment around hadn’t desertify to a point where I’d chug one of these bottles of suspicious fluid.

Although I thought about using them as bowling pins, I probably shouldn’t play around too much during work time. Since keeping these outside would probably attract more attention, I decided to bring the bottles inside. It’s heavy — like a third of Maekawa-san. Who the h.e.l.l could lift all this c.r.a.p?! Complaining as I did, I still completed the onerous process without falling over. “Ah, shoot.” After shuffling the bottles, lining and cleaning them, I realized. Mindlessly shaking bottles filled with carbonated drinks might not have been too bright.

“What are those?”

Komaki-san, the subst.i.tute manager, asked about the items I brought in while slowly stirring the pot’s content with a wooden scoop. She’s probably making some uiro-mochi.[1]

I reported after sitting down on the chair with red-bean coloured covering: “It was left outside with a note.”

Komaki-san is a beauty older than me; she is also the subst.i.tute manager who works harder than our actual manager. Out of the people I know, she"s considered the serious type. Though the part of her that"s too confident is worth noting as well. The primary source of income from the Wagashi shop I work at comes from purchasing and reselling food made else where. But Komaki-san makes her own snack in the shop. She doesn"t make too much, but she still puts them in the display case for sell. Customers aren"t scarce, but I think the manager wouldn"t really blame us for not selling anything. Perhaps because it"s been running since long ago, this shop has a very deep bond with the locals; the majority of our income has always been regulars. Red and white manju for gifting or celebration, or funeral manju: we"ve a hand in all of them. I"ve only learned recently that even if we don"t perform well, this shop won"t just go broke. To be honest, I"ve been coming to observe the store since long ago. I"ve never seen people go in, so I"ve always thought it was unbelievable.

“What about the drinks?” Komaki-san looked back to the pot and spoke indifferently.

“Hand them to the police?”

“No, it"s fine. Leave them in the fridge, I"ll have them later.”

Her index finger pointed firmly at the refrigerator.

“Eh? You"re gonna drink them? This stuff?”

“Well, we already took them in.”

“We don"t even know where it"s from though!”

Even though I spoke so, the perpetrator candidate still appeared in my head. "Maybe…"

Someone"s been shooting bottle rockets lately. Making one of those requires roughly five plastic bottles; it"s surprisingly difficult to prepare one of those. For example, in the arts and craft cla.s.s in elementary school, we"d go collect bottles before recycle day to avoid the trouble of collecting.

“It"s fine. It"s not going to kill me.”

Rather than with the cola, she appeared more absorbed with making pastries — even the way she spoke seem to be unconcerned.

“When the mix thickens… Mm.” Komaki-san cross-checked the book on the side with the content in the pot, and then stopped scoop"s motion. Looks like she"s about to proceed onto the next stage. As for me, it was about time to go back to work.

“So...”

“Yes?”

Komaki-san once again turned around. Chewing while staring at my stark-white body, she asked. The hint of doubt appeared around between her brows:

“What is that?”

“My goal is to become the store"s mascot.”

Ah, forgot to mention, but my current outfit was a cosplay of a white dango.

“Hmng.” With a hand back on her chin, Komaki-san asked with a tilted head: “What"s your name?”

“People call me Maekawa.”

“I see. Then, Maekawa, go clean the front.”

“With this thing on?”

“With that thing on.”

“Aye, aye sir!”

I picked up the broom and dustpan, and wobbled my way out of the kitchen.

“Eh, is she serious?” Though mumbling seemed to come behind me, I paid it no mind.

I decided to go check out the scene after school tomorrow if I see a rocket flying tomorrow.

Why shoot rockets in the afternoons of weekdays? I"m somewhat interested too.

I usually eat lunch at the school cafeteria. Because if I ask for bento from my parents, it"d basically be the leftover from the store. My parents run a bar, as for what reason I don"t know.

We eat the leftover for breakfast too. Plus when I help out in the pub, I have dinner there as well. Hence, it became possible for me to have the same thing for all three meals; therefore, I decided to have lunch at the school cafeteria. Also, for some reason, the transfer student sat across from me today.

“The oyakodon here is pretty good!”

Scooping up the oyakodon I recommended with a spoon, he happily described his thoughts. His right hand was still wrapped in cast. Unfortunately, he broke his arm last month.

“It"s a bit too sweet though.”

“Really?” Hearing me, transfer student quizzically tilted his head. It would appear the transfer student likes food with a lot of flavor.

Not that it will ever be useful, I still took a mental note:

“What"s the matter, transfer student? How come you"re not eating with Ryuushi today?”

“I thought that I should try the school food sometimes. Also, I don"t eat with her all the time. The girls in basket ball are having lunch together today too.”

Pouring the egg-and-rice into his mouth, he spoke quickly as if defending himself. He doesn"t have be concerned for me — shouldn"t he worry about Ryuushi instead?

Ryuushi seems to call him by last name… Uh… Miwa...san? Probably, I think.

“Oh, yeah.”

“Hm?” Spoon in his mouth, transfer student looked up to me. Oh, that"s kinda cute!

Should I bring the transfer student along to the rocket site today?

The opponent will be, after all, a stranger suspected of being a stalker.

If the person is a burly man like one of those astronauts, would I become a subst.i.tute javelin, or be stuffed into a tube and squeezed out like at a performance for a banquet? I"m pretty scared, especially of the latter one, The fragile Maekawa-san (sounds like a joke just looking at my appearance, but an unfunny truth once you know) needs a reliable guy to protect her… But looking closely, the transfer student can"t use his dominant hand. I don"t want to lose sleep knowing that his injury got worse because I brought him to places. Hm~ but I don"t know any other guys.

“Never mind, just forget it.”

“Hrm?” He replied with the spoon still in his mouth.

We departed without ever mentioning the after school plan.

“See ya, Miwa-kun.”

I called his last name when we parted. Before I got a response, though, he gave me a weird look with a twitch.

For just a second, he had a "who the h.e.l.l"s that?" look when your name has been mixed with someone else"s, or like "what a shame!" kind of disappointed look. Maybe he"s actually not Miwa-kun?

Either way, I don"t think that suited me. I decided to still call him transfer student next time I see him.

My favourite food is the banana Swiss roll. Next time someone asks me that, I"m going to answer that.

“I love this~” Honestly, it"s so good — so good that I regretted neglecting it every time I pa.s.s it in the super market.

After school on the 21st, I received one of these from my boss, Komaki-san. After casually eating it, I gladly complimented. Komaki-san lightly smiled after hearing me, and spoke with her chopsticks moving:

“Awesome.”

Today Komaki-san baked two pieces of pancakes for herself. She called them the replacement for lunch. Since there weren"t knives or forks here, she cut the pancakes with disposable chopsticks. She was even drinking the cola from yesterday. Up until now, Komaki-san showed no signs of change: the only thing that bubbled was the cola.

“Now I wanna go work at a bread factory.”

“I won"t say no.”

“Starting tomorrow, I will wear a banana costume.”

“Give up on that or give up your job.”

With warm exchange like such, I pa.s.sed my meaningful time off school.

“Don"t you have the day off today?”

“I do! But I came for some tea.”

“Then why are you eating in the store front?”

“"Cuz this is the best spot!” I won"t be able to see the rockets inside the kitchen.

From the entrance of the store I could see the rocket flying through the sky clearly. Even though it"s more than a hundred times smaller than the scale of a rocket shown on a TV screen, the projectile piqued my interest during work more than the birds or planes. I had pretty much pinpointed the location.

The place is the abandoned farm school not far away from here. The campus closed down around the time I became a middle-school third grade, so about two years ago? Hmm, I miss the fifteen-year old Maekawa-san… Setting that aside for now, I finished the banana Swiss roll. A bit got on my hand, so I licked the b.u.t.ter off when Komaki-san wasn"t looking. Neither of us was eating food related to Wagashi! Now then, what was I saying? Oh, rockets. The topic almost went to s.p.a.ce since the beginning.

"Bottle rockets should only be used in the field or an open s.p.a.ce!" Grade school teachers once taught me that. But they"ve never told me to keep the room bright and keep a distance from it. Duh. I"ve learned that you can"t see well if it"s not bright enough, and people beside the one responsible for launching the rocket have to be away. It"s just common knowledge.

In simple terms, what I"m trying to say is that the only place open enough that"s not too far away from here would be the abandoned school. If the rocketeer is someone with common sense, then he must follow that rule.

If not, then it should have already been a big problem.

“Ah, a rocket!” Hearing Komaki-san"s words, I lifted my chin. Above the house in front of the store, the rocket grew. It appeared suddenly and soared through the air.

“Why do they launch that?”

After catching wind of my mumble, Komaki-san paused the hands that were busily glazing the pancakes with maple syrup and gave an answer. Her eyes focused onto the bottle rocket:

“Maybe their target is s.p.a.ce?”

“Even though it"s water-powered?”

“I think the goal of anything going upward is s.p.a.ce.”

“Really?” For some reason I imagined myself jumping in front of a mirror.

“To completely leave gravity, and fly out with a boom. But s.p.a.ce isn"t exactly friendly to live, so it"s just make-believe in the end. Does this mean to emulate the real deal isn"t any easier?”

With a mature sigh, Komaki-san sent a piece of pancake into her mouth.

Had there been a past event that made her resent gravity? However, I have no way of knowing that, since it"s got nothing to do with what"s happening, and I"ve no reason to ask.

Is it about time to go? It would be inconvenient if the rocketeer left.

“I"m going now. See ya.”

“Good bye~”

Waving the chopsticks in place of her hand, Komaki-san drank the cola again.

I thought to myself as I left… I hope Komaki-san doesn"t get a stomachache and not show up tomorrow. The concern for a possible increase in work ached dully.

I parked my bike outside of the high school; without caution whatsoever, I went in through the gate.

From the surrounding greenhouse and field that been completely neglected, the remnant of the agriculture school reverberated. Since no one came to clean up, plastic bag for bread that was probably blown in from the outside pushed against leaves covered in dirt. About a year ago, people of the shopping district were concerned with hobos living here. Maybe someone still lives here?

Animal husbandry is an education too, I realized as I headed toward the field.

There was, naturally, a cow in the barn. It mooed, eating some grain. Was it abandoned here? Or maybe someone is feeding it? It might even be the rocketeer"s pet.

The cattle tag on its ear signified it"s ident.i.ty as a livestock. The cow"s name was Hana-chan. A girl?

“Moo~” I called out to it since it stared at me. But that"s all it did.

I backed away three steps away from the barn. It"s still staring; three more steps. Still doing it. Two more. Ah, there she goes.

Looks like I"ve exited the cow"s alert zone. I"ll try wearing a cow costume in front of it next time. I wrote the future prank into my mental notebook.

Other things I saw on the way include a black dog lying on the window of the second floor cla.s.sroom… I think it was a dog, probably. It seemed to be panting with its tongue out. Did it take over the cla.s.s for itself? ...Ah, could it be "that?"

There"s been an increase in stray animals disappearance recently. Could it be that someone"s been feeding them here? Or is there now a special residence in this abandoned school for stray animals? If it"s the former, and the purpose is abusive… I"ll check it out later to see if there"s a crime scene. If they"re just living here, then I don"t care if it"s some weirdo"s hobby, I won"t get involved. It didn"t seem like a bad thing, after all.

Maybe he just didn"t have anywhere else to keep them.

I hurried across the campus and the runway for horses, entering the wastefully large field. Obviously it was bigger than the one at my school. I even thought that maybe everyone at school should just come here instead.

The first rocketeer revealed before the nation seemed to insist that he no longer needed to hide, sitting in the middle of the field. A guy wearing a suit sat cross-legged —the sight was somehow both the sign of freedom and umemployment.

Holding a blue hose connected to the drinking fountain, he sprayed freely at the ground. Like a burst dam, water squirted out from the pinched tube.

Laid on the side was a plastic bottle that"s presumably used before — he must be the launcher himself. I closed in onto the back that was slightly curled up. Despite me getting so close, the rocketeer never looked back. Perhaps because the water"s stream drowned my footsteps. I got extremely close to him, then walked three big steps away. After hesitating for a sec, I spoke:

“Yo.”

I used a greeting learned during the April of first year when I was being kicked around like a ball in sports clubs.

“Whoa!” The rocketeer flew up like a rocket himself — a cla.s.sic expression of surprise. He twisted to look back, the water from the hose wet the ground in a semi-circular pattern. He kept the posture, looking up at me with his neck turned in an uncomfortable way, then was shocked.

“You are...” He shut his mouth at this point. I didn"t think he"d be so surprised, and for a second I worried "maybe he doesn"t even know me?" But his apparent att.i.tude was very different from fear of strangers, so that"s impossible.

Must be that kind of people: the kind that you"d occasionally see on a walk in front of where I work.

“It seems that you know me, but I don"t know who you are.”

“Of course you wouldn"t. Eh, you don"t? Uh, but no, that should be correct.”

For some reason, he questioned himself twice in that statement. Um, have I met this person before? Anyway, his mien didn"t come across as a dangerous person, being thin and short.

“I"ve got questions for you, so I came.”

“Ahh. What is it?”

“Was it you who left the cola at the store?”

“Mm, I did.”

He admitted frankly. Looking at the way he nodded, it didn"t seem that he thought he did something either virtuous or malicious.

“Did you drink it?”

“No, it"s sketchy.”

I answered bluntly. “Sketchy?” The rocketeer appeared shocked at my response, resting the hose on the ground. As if replacing it, he hugged the rocket into his chest and onto his laps.

“Didn"t I leave a note there?”

“Thanks to that, it became even more so.”

“Really?” Perhaps fairly confident in his own writing, he questioned the negative response frankly.

“Well, things of questionable origin are kinda...”

“When I was still a kid, we"d eat anything that looks like food.”

“Those generous days are well past over.”

Again, with a pause this time, the rocketeer mumbled: “I see...” His voice sounded even more austere.

Hm, however, the shopping district still has that kind of atmosphere to it. But it"s kind of considered by the city folks as the obsolete and shunned part of the city. As for me, who lives in the city but works in the shopping district, the position is quite the special one. Not that I"m aware of it all the time.

Even in cla.s.s we can find people who live in the old houses bullied in grade school.

But that has nothing to do with what"s happening.

“Why me?”

“Because I"m your… Uh, yes, fan!”

The rocketeer attempted to rely on this eureka, on-the-spot answer to rationalize his action. Rubbing the bottle rocket lovingly, he exposed his loss of cool.

“...You"re lying.” And you"re even fishier now.

“No, I"m not kidding, seriously.” If seen from a certain angle, this might carry a certain connotation. Hm, indeed, however, when it comes to giving me something, besides personal attachment, I can"t think of any other reasons. In that case, is he asking for prost.i.tution? For the Maekawa-san who"s inherited half the characteristics of the pure-hearted shopping district, if somebody ever asks me that, it"ll be determined as s.e.xual hara.s.sment!

The rocketeer spent an unusual amount of time eying me from the bottom to top, and smiled. It"s better if you don"t smile like that too often, so people might like you more. The thought drifted in my head, but I said nothing. Whether it"s for his own good or not is currently irrelevant.

“You"re not wearing a strange outfit today!”

“Now that"s rude, calling me strange. I"m actually a serious cosplayer.”

“Oh, then my bad.” Confused, he apologized perfunctorily.

He"s real sketchy, this guy~ Doesn"t quite smell like a fan~ Or rather, he obviously wasn"t one — this isn"t how a Maekawa-san hobbyist speaks. Should I, therefore, relax? Or let this sense of danger further expand?

The reason of him giving me cola mystified again… Uh, hold on. Maybe it wasn"t actually for me? Eliminating the suspicious possibility that he"s my fan, the motives for gifting me also dissipates. There are also others working in the Wagashi shop… Maybe he"s trying to shift focus or make an excuse by saying it"s for me. Like, maybe the true target is Komaki-san or someone? Most likely.

I"m still unsure what the rocketeer thought of my astonished look; he raised the rocket in hand to his forehead:

“Did you see this rocket going upward?”

“Uh… Sure, yeah. So why the rockets?”

“Ah… Hm, it"s just my interest. Since I can never launch a real rocket into s.p.a.ce, I use this as a subst.i.tute to fly into the sky.” He rubbed the tip of the rocket.

“...s.p.a.ce, huh?” The word somehow soothes me in a conversation. This might be the sign of a critical condition.

“s.p.a.ce is great, right? The sea hides many secrets, so it is just as amazing.”

“Hm...” I exhaled to regain the posture of my excited stomach and face muscles.

He"s born in this town, right? Now I understand, in every way possible. Here, plenty of weird cosmophiles exist. Like Touwa. But, there is rarely a bad person.

I feel that everyone holds some sort of dream for wonders and mysteries — parts like an innocent child — all while playing grown-up.

“You, uh, quite good with your hands, yes?” The rocketeer asked in a strangely fast speed.

“Hm… I guess. I"ve always gotten five for my crafting cla.s.ses.”

But only one for P.E, and last place for marathon. "Cuz of air resistance and stuff.

The rocketeer"s face beamed. “Excellent.” He muttered the words and brought an abrupt request:

“Actually, I wish for you to help me make rockets.”

“Wha?”

“Have you made one before?”

“Yeah, during art cla.s.s of elementary school.” Don"t look down on modern kids, I can even sharpen a pencil using a knife!

During elementary school, I seemed to have sunk into the quagmire of repeatingly chiseling on pencils because I refused to use the sharpener like everyone else. Suddenly, it hit me as life — "amendment is vital," it was a divergence into the current personality of Maekawa-san. If I"ve never learned that, I might still be an overzealous person.

“Ah, I thought so too. It"s been kept since our time!”

The weakness of nostalgia belonging to the guy"s generation had been promptly hit; he smiled brilliantly. If I kept quite, I predicted that the cherry blossom of memory will bloom.

“But can"t you make it yourself?” Instead of using my finger, I pointed with my eyes at the rocket on his knees.

“I can.” The rocketeer agreed, but stopped halfway and scratched the back of his head.

“Uh, it"s, um, I"m busy both at work and private, so I can"t dedicate all my time on my hobby.”

Yeah, just keep up the B.S. I almost said it outside. However, I had to keep silent.

Because after that, the rocketeer brought up the price of each rocket: it was enough to make my part time income seem like pocket change.

“I expect you to make more, but I also want you to bring each one as soon as it"s complete, since I want to test-fly them.”

“Hm...” Hesitation was just an act, even I knew that.

As dubious as he was, he didn"t seem like a bad person. More importantly was the attractiveness of this job.

To control the scale tipped with risk, the fastest way is to have reward on the other side.

“I understand, please let me make the rockets.”

I agreed to the job at night.

After all, when you"re troubled, just find Maekawa.