A Cheeky Junior Denied Me My Entire Life, so I Tested What Would Happen if I Jumped off a Rooftop to Vent My Anger
─ ─ It was raining
A hot summer day. I rented a cottage at the foot of the mountains, far from home, to paint, and just looked up at the sky.
I loved painting the sky. The shining morning sun in spring, the swallowing blue sky in summer, the lonely autumn sunsets, the sinking night sky in winter. I loved them all, all of them.
But what I loved the most was the distant sky in my head. In my head, there was a sky more beautiful than any view in the world. I wanted to show it to everyone, so I painted.
“…… not the same.”
The night sky was a beautiful sky to look up at from the low-lit cottage. But that’s not the sky I want to paint. It’s not …… focused. I needed some trigger to output what was inside me to the outside world.
To find that trigger, I had been holed up in a cottage with a beautiful sky for a long time.
At the time, I had just won a prize at the Etoile painting exhibition and was attracting public attention. I had high expectations. So no one objected to me, a junior high school student at the time, staying alone in a cottage away from home.
It was summer holidays, and for a long time I kept looking up at the sky alone.
One day, it started to rain heavily. Only after it started pouring did I learn that a typhoon was approaching. When I checked my phone, there were many incoming calls from my father and mother.
I rushed to call them back and they said it was not safe for me to be alone at the cottage, so my dad and mom were going to pick me up by car.
…but, I was still looking at the sky.
While being hit by the heavy rain, I kept looking up at the sky alone, as if searching for something.
“…………Ah.”
Suddenly, I came into focus. I was certain that I could make it now. I put the typhoon out of my mind and picked up the brush.
My clothes and hair were soaking wet from the rain. But that didn’t stop the urge to paint.
I painted the picture as if I was slamming the brush down. It’s as if time has stopped …… or as if time is accelerating. The sky, which should only be in my head, floods out into the world from the tip of the brush.
“Haha. I’m sure my dad and mom will be happy again when they see it …….”
I smiled to myself as I pictured the finished picture. I could only draw in such a way.
When I was a child, Rengo, Usa-san and I went to a painting class in our neighbourhood. But at the time I was worse at it than anyone else, and I was often scolded by the teacher. But even so, I didn’t want to force myself to draw something that wasn’t in focus, so I always ignored what the teacher said and drew what I wanted to draw, the way I wanted to draw it.
However, even the pictures I drew freely in this way were so bad that even I was appalled by them, and when I showed them to the teacher and Rengo and the others, they laughed at me and said that they were no good. No one believed me when I told them that I had more beautiful scenery in my head.
I decided to quit painting.
I immediately told my father and mother that I wanted to quit painting. Mom looked at me with a worried face. Dad smiled kindly and put his hand on my head.
“Susumu, do you hate painting?”
Dad asked. I shook my head.
“I don’t hate it, but I’m not good at it, so I want to quit.”
I looked down and he said.
“If Susumu really wants to quit, that’s fine. But no matter what anyone says, if you like it, you can hold your heart out, you know?”
“────”
I couldn’t say anything. I was …… happy. I was very happy that they affirmed my feelings of liking it, regardless of whether I was good or not. I felt strongly that I wanted to show these people the beautiful world in my head.
From there, I immersed myself in painting.
I quit the inconvenient painting classes, learned what I wanted to learn on my own, and painted what I wanted to paint, the way I wanted to paint it. My enthusiasm was so great that my mother and father were worried about me, but I still didn’t stop painting.
Then, in the second year of junior high school, I drew the best picture I had ever drawn. It was more beautiful than any scenery in my head, and it was so good that I felt I was born to draw.
I wanted more people to see it, so I sent it to a famous international competition that came to my attention at random. As a result, the painting won a prize and I became the man of the moment.
I got a lot of press coverage and was hailed as a genius by many people. ……I was happy at first, but this soon turned to irritation and dismay. Critics who don’t understand me talk confidently about misguided things, and the public believes them and makes a fuss.
It’s …… annoying.
I started turning down all interviews, leaving the management of the paintings to a curator I happened to know.
“I thought people would be more happy about it.”
People only make a fuss in the distance and don’t even look at my paintings. The same goes for my father and mother, who were always happy to see my drawings, but they looked fed up and didn’t seem too happy about it.
… But that’s why I decided to try to draw more and more beautiful things.
If I did that, if I painted more beautiful things, surely no one would be able to say anything. My father and mother would be happy too. Believing this, I went to the cottage.
And I painted.
“…… haha, it’s great.”
I hear the sound of rain. The only sound I can hear anymore is the sound of the heavy rain. I hear no more of the annoying outside noise, no more of the misplaced praise, no more of anything. Only the sound of the rain echoes. Such a beautiful world.
Me and the world, we switch places. The heavy rain washes away the impurities that have settled. This is my own world. No one can disturb me.
The sound of the rain was extremely pleasant. I still remember it well.
I realised that the painting was finished. I looked out the window and saw that the rain had stopped. I thought I could hear the rain all the time, but everywhere I looked, there were no clouds. Apparently, the rain had stopped long ago.
“…… Huh? Oh, I thought my dad and mom said they were coming to pick me up. ……”
I checked my phone and found a number of incoming calls from unknown numbers. I felt kind of bad and tried to call them back. The …… phone connected.
—-I was told that my father and mother had died in an accident.
I don’t remember much after that. It felt fluffy, like I was dreaming. I feel helplessly frustrated, like I’m being shown a …… long unending nightmare.
I feel like I should do something, but it’s all too late. My father and mother who died. My beloved parents, who were kind, but a little worrying, and they died because of me …….
I can hear the sound of rain. It never stops, no matter how long it takes. ……
I believed my father and mother when they said they would pick me up, and I kept waiting for them in that small cottage. They didn’t come for me no matter how long I waited for them.
Suddenly, I looked up at the sky. It was a beautiful blue sky. The rain had long since stopped. I cried. I cried and cried and cried. …… Still, the sound of the rain did not stop.
I couldn’t paint anymore.
…… I didn’t like drawing, I liked the smiles of my father and mother who were happy to see my drawings. Even if I realised that later, it was too late for everything.
From then on, everything started to go wrong. I was always shunned by the relatives who took me in, Usa-san, who I was dating, started to avoid me, and my best friend, Rengo, became blatantly hostile towards me.
As I recall, the media sometimes come, ‘don’t you draw new pictures?’ they asked me. I didn’t give any answer to that. Then some reporter wrote an article about him, ‘A tragic genius who lost his parents,’ and people I didn’t even know started sympathizing with me.
Nothing is ever fun anymore. There was no one on my side anymore. Even after I entered high school, that didn’t change. Through a relative, I was admitted as a special student and received a scholarship.
But I still couldn’t draw, and when I realised that I couldn’t draw, I was shunned by everyone around me. I began to avoid people and was always alone.
I tried to draw. But I couldn’t. I thought I had to draw. But I still couldn’t draw. My hands have always been unfocused. In the past, I still had as many beautiful views in my head as I could. There were people I wanted to show those beautiful views to.
But now I have neither of them.
I wanted to throw away the paintings, forget everything and run away somewhere far away. But I can’t even find a reason to live that long. In the end, I might have remained a child, waiting for my father and mother to come and pick me up in the sound of the rain that never stops.
Then, I reached my limit with Kamiya-san’s words that day and jumped off the roof. That rainy day, I did indeed die.
There was no pain. There was no suffering. A sense of relief that it was finally over filled my heart. …… but I couldn’t die. The sound of the rain still hasn’t stopped.
Wet with rain, I heard a voice in my blurred vision.
“─ ─ You, why are you crying?”
A girl was looking at me. She was a very, very beautiful girl. …… The girl was beautiful, as if the drops of rain that overflowed from the flowers had been dolled up as they were. I remember seeing her several times at school, a girl with white hair. Asama Ion. She looked at me and smiled.
“…… I see. Was I crying?”
Seeing the girl’s smile, I realised for the first time …… that I was crying.
“Actually, I have something I want to ask you for. A special favour that only you can do.”
On the day I woke up, Asama-san told me that. I still haven’t heard what she said. I still don’t know what she wished for. I’ve been thinking so for a long time. But she had told me her wish on that rainy day when we met.
“- I want you to kill me.”
Hearing those words, I thought. This beautiful girl was not just a beautiful girl. She was a person, not a flower. I don’t know anything about this girl. But I know that this girl is a person, just like me, who can never forgive herself.
I wanted to help her.
To me, this girl looked like she was crying. A girl who is strong and never gets hurt, but still a human being, not a monster, who certainly feels pain.
So I decided to live for this girl. I wanted to live and make her smile. …… So, to put it bluntly, it was just love at first sight, but at the same time it was also fate.
—I wanted to live and paint a beautiful world for her.
“…… hahaha, I look like an idiot.”
The running lights I saw on the verge of death were the memories of a shameful love, but …… they were memories that I must not forget, so much so that I thought that alone was enough to live for.
I certainly don’t know anything about Asama-san. I can’t even imagine what she was thinking when she killed her father. …… But behind that beautiful smile of hers, there was a weakness that made her wish to die herself.
“…… haha.”
That could just be a convenient delusion. Maybe that man is right and Asama-san is really a bad person. …… but I thought she was beautiful. She was beautiful. I wanted to help her. No matter who denies it, that feeling is not a …… lie.
—-If that’s the case, then that’s all that matters now.
“You …… are quite persistent, aren’t you?”
The man clicks his tongue, disgusted.
“Why do you stand up? Why do you resist death, when death will save you? Why are you so devoted to that murderous witch? Are you seriously going to say that you’ll fight and …… live for a woman you don’t even know?”
I laughed, seeing the displeased look on the man’s face.
“…… apparently you don’t know.”
I shake off the gathering crows and stand up. No more questions and answers. I’ve made up my mind, I’ve remembered the most important thing. No matter what anyone says now, I’m not going to be ashamed in the slightest. No matter how much anyone denies it, if I like it ……, I can be proud of it.
Asama-san is surely making a mistake. But I …… like her like that. Even if she and I are incompatible, no one can deny that feeling.
I looked the man squarely in the eye and said.
“—Come on, birdman. I’ll show you my world.”
man the chapters that don’t focus on the fights are really nice. thanks for the translations.