The Grape Event
"Hana! Let me have that cup ramen!"
Maru carried off the cup I had finished. I had polished it off with tidy thoroughness, broth and all, so there was nothing left inside—not even the usual scraps of garnish.
"Why...?"
I asked, genuinely puzzled. The answer didn't take long. She pulled out a plastic bag and began packing away the trash from everything we had eaten, piece by neat piece.
Perhaps because this was no famous summit, there was nothing at the top at all. That might have been why so few people were around, and why there wasn't a single building.
Which meant there was nowhere to throw anything away. You couldn't just dump trash wherever you pleased, so Maru had brought a bag herself, gathered it all inside, and meant to carry it back down. Once everything was in, she cinched the mouth tight and tucked the bag into her pack.
Her care for nature was genuinely lovely. I couldn't quite say why, but watching her filled me with a quiet pride. Looking after an ecosystem might seem like a small thing, yet that didn't make it unimportant. If every single person carried even a little of that same care, wouldn't the earth grow cleaner?
Of course, my thoughts had ballooned somewhat. All we had done was refrain from littering on a mountaintop, and here I was leaping all the way to the planet. I took Maru's hand, and we started down from the summit.
The way down was far lighter underfoot than the climb had been. Somewhere I had heard that descending a slope carried a much higher risk of injury than climbing one, and maybe that was why Maru took her time coming down. I, who had practically bounced my way to the top, now placed each step with care. Twist an ankle out here, and it would be no small trouble.
And so my brief hike came to an end. The fortunate part was that plenty of the evening still remained for dinner—and that Maru would still make it off work on time.
"Hm-hmm~"
I was lying in bed, scrolling on my phone. Waking early and spending the morning on my phone was a beautiful way to live. If the food hadn't tasted so good, I probably would have slept in late, the way I used to when I was unemployed. And maybe because I was in a child's body now, sleep came for me before the night ever tipped past dawn.
Back when I was a man, living as a shut-in, my whole day had consisted of falling asleep around three or four in the morning and creeping out of bed sometime in the afternoon. Now it was different. I woke in the morning and ate. I filled my stomach properly, then came back to my room, and after a thoroughly satisfying breakfast, sleep fled entirely.
So lying in bed on my phone, or watching TV, became the natural routine. The place I felt the generation gap most sharply was vacation homework. In my day, I remembered there being quite a lot of it. Keeping a diary was the bare minimum, and turning in reports or crafts made out of drinking straws was simply part of life.
I could still vividly remember clutching my head and cramming the whole pile like a last-minute exam, starting a full week before vacation ended. Things were different now. Maybe because I was in first grade, all the teacher had handed out was ten sheets of A4 math problems.
They were problems I could finish in ten minutes. As the years had passed, the very idea of vacation homework seemed to have faded. Kids these days didn't even know what a free Saturday was. Send the ones who insisted that having Saturday off was just "common sense" back to a school from twenty years ago, and they would learn soon enough. There had been an era when going to school on Saturday was perfectly normal.
Of course, this was a generation gap only someone attending school for the second time could feel. Short of university, going through school more than once was impossible. It was the sort of thing you could manage only by dying and waking up again. Search the entire world, and I was certain I would be the only person attending elementary school twice.
I was still rolling around with my phone when the door opened and someone came in. I hid under the blanket and peeked out to see who had entered my room.
"Hana... are you asleep?"
Haru had come in. Wrapped in the blanket with only my face poking out, I answered.
"No! I'm not sleeping!"
I grinned and welcomed her. Haru hovered around me as if she had something she needed to do. My patience ran out, and I asked what she wanted. She clearly wanted something, but the words didn't seem willing to leave her mouth.
"Haru, what's wrong? Is there something you want to ask me?"
"Um... yeah. It's something I really hope you'll say yes to."
"What is it?"
Haru sat on the bed and stroked my hair. I liked the feel of her hand, so I didn't pull away or refuse.
"I was hoping you'd take part in an event."
"An event?"
"Yeah. President Sehee is holding one today."
"Then I want to go too!"
"Really?"
"Yeah!"
An event meant something fun and exciting, didn't it? My whole body was already warming with anticipation. I couldn't even remember the last time I had gone to one, and since it was vacation, I had time to spare. I nodded at Haru's words and started getting ready to leave. Lolling around in bed from morning onward didn't suit me.
Of course, lying there on my phone was entertaining enough in its own right, but joining an event hosted by President Sehee looked like it would be pretty fun too. Still, I was curious what kind of event it was, so I asked Haru.
If it turned out to be something academic—the sort of event that required using my brain—I was fully prepared to flee on the spot. People say you can't take back words once you've spoken them, but I could. I was a third-grader, and if I dug in my heels, I had every right to skip the things I didn't like. Anyone who envied that was welcome to go from being an adult back to third grade. Not that anyone but me could actually pull it off.
"Um... they said it's a grape event? The grapes that came from you ripened so well they're holding a whole event for them!"
"Grapes? Those sound delicious!"
From what I gathered, they were holding the event before the grapes officially went on sale nationwide. All sorts of press were coming, too. Draw everyone's attention once, then starting next week ship the grapes across the country. Classic President Sehee. When nothing stood in her way, her drive was no joke.
"Then let's get ready!"
"Okay!"
I changed into the outfit Haru had put together for me. The way she dressed me was very much in a princess style, which didn't suit me at all. It felt a bit like cosplay. Of course, when I looked in the mirror I was undeniably cute and pretty. The base material was just that good.
Frankly, even if I wore something sewn from shoddy fabric, the body underneath was good enough that it would still look like luxury. No matter how the times changed, the finishing touch of fashion was the face. A good face made any outfit look refined. Truly awful clothes would still look bad, of course—but put those same clothes on an ordinary person, and they wouldn't merely look bad. They would look like trash.
"Hm-hmm~"
Humming, I studied my reflection. A cute child in a skirt looked back at me from the mirror. It felt like dressing up a character in a game. This body didn't feel like mine. I was probably the only one who could feel this way, since there was no one else living in a different body the way I was.
"Hana! You're all ready, right?"
"Yes, ma'am!"
I snapped her the salute I used to give in the army and looked her straight in the eye. Surprise crossed her face as she took my hand.
"Hana, where did you learn a greeting like that?"
If I said I had learned it in the army, she would think I was out of my mind, so I told her I had seen it somewhere on the internet. At that, Haru nodded as if it made perfect sense.
"There are so many people..."
The moment we reached our destination, Haru said it at the sight of the crowd. Just as she had said, people were packed in shoulder to shoulder. Fortunately—whether someone had arranged it in advance—the place we were heading was a parking lot with hardly anyone in it. The other lots had been completely full, but this one, perhaps reserved for VIPs, had only a few cars parked.
"Hana, let's get out!"
Once we were parked, Haru said it as she unbuckled her seat belt. I undid mine and climbed out of the car. The event already seemed to be underway. Eager to look around, I took Haru's hand and started walking.
Grapes were laid out everywhere, as if inviting people to eat their fill. Curious about the taste myself, I tried one.
"Oh, it's good!"
"Yeah? I've never actually had grapes before."
Haru ate some with me. They were delicious enough to make her eyes go round.