"A Broken Heart Heals with Time?"
Chiose's pronunciation of "broken" came out strange, and at first Taki thought she'd said "Pocky."
Not that playing the share-one-Pocky kissing game with Little Chiose would be entirely off the table, ahem.
Chiose's eyes rolled around and around, and then, as if she'd hit on something delightful, Taki caught the faintest little-devil smile on her face.
"Feels like it should be… Taki's Song, though. After all, I wrote it for Taki."
"Ehh!?!?"
[No, no, no, that's way too embarrassing. Anything but that!]
Taki got the distinct feeling she was being played with… no, she'd figured it out: Chiose was always teasing her in that light, deniable way, like someone dangling a cat wand and flicking it back and forth. She just had no proof.
Maybe saying that much at once had worn her out, because Chiose picked up the sketchbook at her side and began to write:
[Then let's go with A Broken Heart Heals with Time. I super love the title Taki came up with, it sounds so good, that's our Taki for you… love it. It was love at first sight with that title.]
So she really had been teasing! So mean, Little Chiose!
Taki leaned back against the windowsill, and her hand bumped into something.
She turned her head and found what looked like a woven bundle of grass, shaped like a bird's nest.
[Huh, Little Chiose, what's this?]
After studying day and night, Taki's sign language had improved by leaps and bounds. The value of a one-week crash course speaks for itself!
[That's a new house for the crows. There are tons of crows around my place, and every time a few new friends show up, I make some nests and hang them in the trees.]
She pointed at a tree in the courtyard, not especially tall but thick with leaves, and sure enough Taki spotted nest after nest among the branches.
Little Chiose really does love crows.
[I do. A lot of the time they're the ones keeping me company. Crows are really cute.]
A smallish crow happened to swoop past just then, letting out a coaxing waah, waah before vanishing into the shadows of the tree.
In the instant it crossed the sun, Taki saw the colors hidden in its wings.
[So pretty…]
Just as pretty as Little Chiose.
Taki looked at the tree, then back at Chiose, then at the tree again, until her eyes could barely keep up.
[Why do you keep staring at me, hey! Do you like me that much?]
Now that Taki had learned basic sign language, Chiose was thrilled. She finally didn't have to type or write out every single thing.
Not that handwriting had lost its uses. After she died, Taki could take those notes out and pore over them again and again, driving her regret index that much higher.
But signing now and then to save herself the effort was nice too.
Taking Taki's shoulder as her origin point, Chiose Noshiro circled all the way around to stand in front of her, settled herself by the window, and hooked both arms over Taki's shoulders.
From this angle, Taki would be able to take in her very best side.
Although Chiose was quite certain she looked her best from every angle!
[I—] [I…]
Taki kept swallowing, straining to turn her head away and failing completely.
"Taki is the first friend to come to my house and hear me play. Do you like it? I've studied for more than ten years, and this is the first time I've written a song for a friend. I want Taki's most honest reaction…"
Easy for her to say. There was no answer Taki could give that wasn't praise.
Ever since she'd finished playing, Chiose had asked over and over whether Taki liked the song. Taki did like it, and she swore to herself she answered seriously every single time.
[I love it. Chiose's piece is amazing… but there's one thing I'm curious about.]
There was one question Taki had been dying to ask.
"Wh… at?"
[Why does Little Chiose love the piano so much?]
There she ran out of words, so she quickly grabbed the sketchbook Chiose had just been using and went on:
[Doesn't Little Chiose get lonely? Everyone our age picks some easier way to spend their youth. Why would Chiose choose the one hobby that's least kind to her…]
Taki genuinely wanted to know.
After all, every thread connecting her to Chiose ran through music. Without Chiose's music, the two of them would never have met at all.
And Taki couldn't picture what Chiose's days were like. Locked in a soundless prison, one day after another, when even writing would be so much easier than playing.
[Why would Chiose choose to walk such a hard road…]
"Waah?"
The question startled a crow's cry right out of Chiose.
She swore that one had not been anywhere in her plans.
But no matter.
She had a flawless answer waiting for Taki.
"Because… I don't know how to put it… every time I play, it makes me feel like I'm still alive. Burning with everything I have in front of the piano is different from that incomplete kind of burning you feel watching a performance from the audience. I love music. More than anything."
Light rippled across Chiose Noshiro's eyes.
"Does Taki know that feeling… while you're playing, just for one instant, that streak of dazzling crimson that comes pouring out. That's what I've been chasing all along."
The words came out halting and broken, yet they rang like struck metal. Taki had never imagined an answer like that.
"Burning?"
She turned the word over and over. For the first time, something Chiose said outside of music had moved her.
And yet, even so, Taki Shiina still couldn't understand what that burning meant.
She couldn't grasp what sort of experience would make a hearing-impaired girl resolve to keep playing anyway. Even wearing her hearing aid she couldn't hear her own piano clearly, and still, for the sake of that feeling, she would build the sound back up inside her own head from memory.
[Little Chiose, I'm curious. Could you let me experience that feeling?]
In truth, she wasn't quite that curious.
But Taki Shiina believed that if she wanted to be Chiose's closest friend for life, she had to understand what Chiose felt.
She wanted to know Chiose better.
"Really?" Startled and delighted at once, Chiose let her hands roam all over Taki's waist.
[Really. I've noticed my interest in music getting stronger and stronger. Little Chiose, this time let me play music together with you. I think I'm ready.]
Before, she had studied music because of her sister. This time, Taki had a different reason.
And when she gathered Chiose into her arms, she realized that all that talk of achievement didn't matter much anymore. Nice if it came, no loss if it didn't.
Listening closely to the sound of Chiose Noshiro breathing against her ear, Taki finally understood what it was she wanted.
"This kind of friendship is what I, Taki Shiina, deserve to have…"
This was the youth worth remembering.
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