The Empty Box and Zeroth Maria
Book 1: Chapter 13

0^th Time

Until I was sixteen, I didn’t realize “love changes everything” isn’t just a figure of speech.

How many times had I thought that life was too long as I trudged along by force of habit? My fingers and toes probably aren’t enough to count the number of times I seriously thought I would be okay with dying.

I was bored. Bored beyond all hope.

I never breathed a word of it to anyone, though, and I kept up the pretense that I was as happy as always. Exposing my true feelings only led to trouble. That’s why I did my best to get along with anyone and everyone, regardless of who they were. It’s not that hard to do. As long you aren’t too picky about your likes and dislikes, what you are and aren’t into, you can be friends with anybody.

Everyone flocked to me, and they all said the same thing:

“Oh, you’re having so much fun. You must not have a care in the world.”

Why yes, you’re right. Thank you so much for letting me fool you all so easily. I really appreciate your ever-so-considerate ignorance of all the awful things inside me. Thanks to you, I’m ready to give up everything.

I think I know when this stagnation took hold of me.

I told a boy my e-mail address. When I responded to his messages as I normally would, he got all excited and told me he liked me. When I tried to be nice and reached out to a boy who didn’t have much luck with girls, he got the wrong idea and confessed his feelings for me. A boy invited me to a movie, and when I went because I found it hard to say no, he professed his love for me. A boy and I happened to share the same path back from school, and after we walked home together several times, he declared his affection for me.

Each one acted so betrayed, selfishly allowed his feelings to be hurt, and started hating me. The girls who liked these boys took it upon themselves to despise me, too—for their own self-centered reasons. The pain stung each time, until one I day noticed I had so many wounds that I could no longer tell which ones were fresh.

I decided not to worry about how I dealt with others and treated them as casual distractions only. I’d maintain a proper sense of the mood and keep my conversations shallow. I’d never show anyone what I was like inside. Like a clam, I’d close my shell tight to protect my tender body.

That was when the boredom started.

No one noticed I was letting them see my outer shell only.

They all kept saying, “Oh, you’re having so much fun. You must not have a care in the world.”

My efforts were a huge success.

I just wanted everyone to disappear.

It all started one unremarkable day after school. I stood surrounded by strangers pretending to be my friends, and I was making the same frivolous comments as usual with a smile on my face. It was sudden. Nothing prompted it, really.

But the force of it was undeniable. My understanding of my current state took shape in a mere moment, and I was presented with the word that embodied it perfectly:

Loneliness.

Oh. I’m incredibly…lonely.

Solitude. That’s what it was. Despite having so many others around me, I felt alone. The term fit so perfectly that I felt a strange sense of comfort in it.

But it wasn’t long before that word turned on me with savage fangs. I learned for the first time that unfathomable solitude is inevitably accompanied by pain. My chest hurt, and I found it hard to breathe. Even when I did manage to draw in a breath, my lungs stung as if the air were filled with needles. Everything went black for a moment, and I would’ve been fine with my life ending right then and there. But my vision soon returned to normal, and my life continued on. I had no idea what I was supposed to do. No clue.Help me. Help me, everyone.

“What’s the matter?”

Someone realized I wasn’t feeling right and called out to me.

“That’s quite a smile. You must be having so much fun.”

Huh?

I’m smiling…?

Without understanding why, I reached up and touched my cheeks.

They were lifted in a smile.

“I swear you always seem like you’re having the greatest time. You don’t worry about anything, do you?”

I laughed out loud. “Yeah, I’m having fun,” I choked through the spasms. I laughed without even knowing the reason why.

That was when the color began gradually fading from the people around me. One by one, they became transparent. They faded and faded, until I could no longer see them. I could hear voices addressing me from someplace that had nothing to do with me. Then I couldn’t make out what they were saying, but somehow I could give a proper response. None of it made any sense.

Before I knew it, the classroom was empty. I was all alone. Somehow, I knew I was the one who had made it that way.

I had rejected them all.

“Well, I’ve got stuff to do, so I’m taking off.”

I couldn’t see anyone, but I smiled and said it anyway as I grabbed my bag.

That was how my relationships with others were—my conversations worked whether I was speaking to someone specific or not. I might as well be talking to a wall.

But still, why?

“…Um, are you okay?”

I was sure no one was there, but I heard the words all the same. I had just walked through the school gates, but the voice pulled me back for a moment, allowing me to see the invisible people.

I turned around to find one of the boys from my class gasping for breath. He must have run after me.

I was pretty sure his name was Kazuki Hoshino. We weren’t really friends, and nothing about him made much of an impression, so his name was basically all I knew about him.

“What do you mean?”

He would’ve asked only if he noticed something wrong with me. That meant he’d sensed my shifting attitude, even though nobody near me did.

“Uh…you seemed really…faraway, I guess… I mean, not that I would know, but it’s like you’re not all there in your life…”

He stumbled over his words. I had absolutely no idea what he was trying to say.

“Anyway…if I’ve got it wrong, that’s okay. Sorry for being weird.”

The boy awkwardly started moving away from me.

“…Wait.”

He stopped, tilting his head slightly.

“U-um…”

I’d stopped him from leaving, but what was I actually going to say?

Also, how had he been able to describe me as “faraway” as I stood there grinning in that empty classroom?

“……Hey, do I look like I’m always having fun?”

If he answered this like everyone else, that meant he was no different from them.

Oh. I was actually incredibly hopeful. I really, truly wished that he would give me a negative response, that he would understand me.

“Yeah. You, um…seem like you are.”

It seemed like he struggled to say that.

The instant I heard his answer, I became disenchanted with Kazuki Hoshino. He was meaningless to me. I hated him. I despised him. I was surprised how rapidly my emotions changed, like a pendulum swinging in the opposite direction, but that exemplified how much I’d hoped he would be different.

But then this boy, who I had instantaneously come to hate, finished speaking:

“You’re working hard to appear that way, aren’t you?”

Again my emotions swung like a pendulum, this time away from loathing. My change of heart didn’t show on my face, but my chest grew strangely warm.

I was working hard.I was trying so hard to look like I was having fun.

He was correct. More perfectly correct than if he had simply answered no.

That was how I fell in love.

I was well aware that it was just a convenient assumption on my part. Just because he acknowledged my effort didn’t meant that he fully understood me. I knew that. But I still couldn’t completely dismiss the belief.

At first, I thought my feelings would pass with time, but it wasn’t long before I knew there was no going back to the way I was before. My feelings for Kazuki grew and grew, like a pile of snow that never melts, until they engulfed my heart entirely. The possibility that he would soon become my everything weighed on me like a stone, but strangely, I didn’t find it unpleasant at all.

Kazuki Hoshino had freed me from my solitary classroom and driven off my ennui.

I knew that if he disappeared from my heart, I would slide right back to where I was before. Right back into the schoolroom of isolation.

The world had changed. It was as simple as that. My previous dull existence seemed like a dream now. My emotions surged as if they were hooked up to a high-powered amplifier. Just exchanging hellos with Kazuki made me happy, but I was sad that it was all we did. Talking to him made me happy, but I was sad we could only chat a little. Something was clearly broken inside me. It was troubling yet pleasant.

Yes! I’ll make friends with him no matter what!

My first move is to get on a first-name basis with him.

………

“Do you have a wish?”

I was in a place that could be anywhere but also nowhere. The figure that addressed me at once resembled everyone and no one. I couldn’t tell if they were male or female.

Did I have a wish?

Of course I did.

“This is a Box that can make any wish come true.”

I accepted the Box with my blood-soaked hands.

I could tell it was real the moment I touched it. I knew there was no way I could ever give it up.

Who would? There isn’t a person on earth who would refuse something like this.

I made my wish.

I knew it wasn’t possible, but I made it.

“…I don’t want regrets, ever again.”

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