Durarara!!, Vol. 4 (novel) (11 page)

“Kururi…Orihara.”

Despite it being the first day of school, she was wearing gym clothes, which immediately made her stick out like a sore thumb. Raira allowed its students to wear their own clothes even at official ceremonies, but most kids chose to play it safe and wear the official uniform or jacket.

Yet this girl wanted to wear gym clothes.

As she started to sit back down, the teacher asked, “Is there anything else you wish to say about yourself?”

“No, there isn’t…,” she said in a tiny voice, then sluggishly sat down.

The thin fabric of her shirt accentuated the size of her breasts, which, combined with her taut limbs, attracted the gaze of all the male students.

But given that her personality was already questionable based on her choice of outfits to the ceremony, none of the boys opted to stare for too long, lest they attract the disgust of the other girls in the class.

She had a healthy, vibrant outfit and figure. But her expression and manner were gloomy and sickly.

After telling the class nothing but her name, the girl quietly sat down in her seat and resumed staring at her desk.

A boy sitting to one side of her—Aoba Kuronuma—glanced at the girl in the strange outfit and idly thought,
She seems gloomy. But what’s with the gym clothes?

That was the extent of his curiosity, however. He looked around and noticed other boys sending curious glances at the girl and looks of disgust from the girls in the class.

Well, as long as she doesn’t get picked on.

But that would ultimately be her problem, not his. Attention turned to the next student’s introduction—not just from Aoba, but from most of the class.

There was just one student adrift from the crowd, that was all. Eventually, the remaining classmates turned their attention to the continuing introductions, and that was all they thought of it.

Given that they were in separate classes, the rest of the school didn’t realize that the two odd girls who appeared in Class B and Class C, if
you ignored their glasses, hairstyle, and bust size, had essentially the same face and build.

There was also the matter of the last name Orihara.

The teachers who had been around since before the name change to Raira experienced an instinctual
danger
signal when they saw that name.

“Well…just because he was their brother doesn’t mean they’re just like him. It wouldn’t be right to discriminate against them because of that,” a veteran art teacher said, sipping tea in the faculty room. “But…compared to when Izaya and Shizuo were here, it’s so much more peaceful now.”

The elderly teacher grinned wryly, thinking back on the problem child of the past wistfully.

“We don’t have barrels of gasoline rolling down the third-floor hallway anymore, for one thing.”

At that moment, apartment building, Shinjuku

“Now that I think about it,” Namie said with a softer than usual expression, but without stopping her work, “today is the entrance ceremony and start of school for Raira Academy.”

She sounded oddly happy about it. Izaya did not look up from organizing his e-mail, however. “That’s right. But why would you bring that up out of the blue?”

“Seiji’s starting his second year of high school… I wish I could have rushed to the ceremony to celebrate with him…”

“The first day of school? He’s in his second year, so parents and guardians have nothing to do with it.”

“Well, I want to see it,” Namie answered without hesitation. Izaya shook his head in disbelief. Namie normally played the role of the coolheaded beauty, but when it came to her younger brother, Seiji Yagiri, she proudly exhibited a level and depth of love that was abnormal.

It wasn’t the platonic love of a family, but the physical, lusty love
between a man and woman. But her brother reciprocated none of that; in fact, he seemed to find her obnoxious. Yet even those cold glances were lovable to Namie.

A look of bliss stole over her suddenly pink cheeks as she imagined her brother growing up, and she continued her work in a better mood than before.

Izaya glanced at his assistant, sighed, and muttered, “Raira Academy… That place has totally changed since they merged and got a new name.”

“Oh, you went there?”

“I graduated about six or seven years ago. Back then, it was just Raijin High School.”

For an instant, Izaya smiled with wistful longing—and the expression turned to a cruel, hateful smirk just as quickly.

“But…it was all horrible there, including the fact that it’s where I met Shizu.”

“You really do hate him, don’t you?” Namie replied, then had an idea. “If you graduated high school six or seven years ago… Didn’t you say that you’re twenty-one right now?”

“I’ve been telling people I’m twenty-one for several years. Do you really think I’d just give out personal information like that?”

She ignored him, exasperated, then abruptly stopped and turned to look at him. “Does that mean you do trust me a bit?”

“I wouldn’t call it trust. It’s more like giving out just a little bit of information to keep a subordinate from leading a mutiny.”

“You ought to die,” she spat, returning to her work. “By the way, your sisters are starting school there today, too,” she shot back.

“…I’m surprised you know that.” Izaya’s face went just a bit hard.

“I can do a bit of research on the king I serve, too.”

“…Fine. It’s the same thing I do to you.”

He didn’t like the turnabout, a fact he made clear with a pained grimace. Eventually, he gave up on his work and leaned back in the chair to mutter, “I don’t know how to handle those two.”

“Oh? To think that you would have trouble handling anyone other than Shizuo Heiwajima.”

“Don’t tease me. I’m only human, you know? I’m not perfect,” Izaya said, sighing heavily. He began to explain some of his background to
her. “My sisters…who are named Kururi and Mairu, by the way… Well, my parents are normal. Except for their naming choices. But I was raised in normal circumstances—and turned out like this.”

“So you’re aware that you’re a freak.”

He ignored Namie’s barb and folded his hands, entwining his fingers. “I turned out weird, despite my normal upbringing. But them, on the other hand—I feel like they turned out weird because of my influence. I won’t deny that I feel a bit of responsibility for that.”

“What do you mean by weird?”

What are those girls like, if this freak thinks they’re weird?
Namie wondered, stopping her work for a minute to pour some tea from the teapot in the kitchen. She stood there, ready to hear more, which prompted a tired look from Izaya.

“What they’re trying to be is…human.”

“…Huh?”

“They want to represent the human being in a microcosm. The Japanese human being, specifically.”

“I don’t understand what you mean,” she said cautiously. Izaya’s grimace was barely visible.

“It’s a very difficult task they’ve set. Basically, they think that as twins, they make up one person.”

“…I see. It often feels like twins add up to a single life-form when taken together, from our perspective. But…I suppose other twins would find that idea quite offensive.”

“Normally, perhaps. But as I said, my sisters are not normal.”

Izaya closed the laptop and steadily got to his feet. He flicked the window blinds open and narrowed his eyes at the light that filtered through.

“You know how video games have character parameters? Stats, and so on. They say that you’re good at magic but terrible at fighting or a good brawler but a total nimrod. When you make up a party in an RPG, you have to balance that party out, so that each person makes up for the others’ shortcomings.”

“That’s not so different from reality. The very first step to rational optimization is ensuring each person has the right role.”

“If only it were an issue of rationality.” Izaya leaned over and put his hands on the table, envisioning his sisters. “Anyway, they’re trying to
create this RPG party themselves. As if one were the fighter and the other were the magician.”

“…I don’t understand what you mean.”

“It’s simple. They decided to intentionally fashion different personalities for themselves. They actively turned themselves into identical twins with totally different personas! And they assume that by acting together, this makes them better… They’re under the illusion that they can do
anything
that way.”

He grinned as though seeing something funny, but there was no humor in his eyes. “When they were in elementary school, they chose their looks and personality at random. With no regard to logicality! That’s why Kururi, the elder of the two, plays the silent, gloomy type, despite her gym clothes outfit. And Mairu the younger is a bright and talkative character, yet she looks like a bookworm.”

“But…that makes no sense. Why would you separate your looks and personalities?” Namie wondered, stunned.

Izaya nodded. “Exactly. It makes no sense. But to them, having your appearance and personality match doesn’t make sense to begin with. In the end, they’re still combining themselves into one person. They think that as long as all the parts are present, there’s no problem. They’re just special enough that they can pull it off. I mean, talk about a bad case of eighth-grader syndrome.”

“What’s eighth-grader syndrome?”

“Just do a search on it. I mean, they could have it worse—they could claim that they can use psychic powers or they were warriors of light in a past life—but at any rate, they find a way to stand out, no matter the group.”

“I see. And given your desire to be the hidden puppet master, you’d prefer to be far away from them,” Namie calmly surmised.

He looked away, surprised at being pinned so accurately. “Anyway, it makes you embarrassed just to listen to them talk. I’m sure you’ll understand if you ever meet them… It’s
really
painful. And that’s coming from me, so you know it’s true.”

“If you already understand that you belong within the realm of painfully embarrassing people, I’d hope you would act on that information.”

“I’d prefer not to get that lecture from a woman who did plastic
surgery on an unwilling girl for the sake of her own brother,” Izaya shot back.

Her lips bared in a tiny smile. “I have absolutely no intention of coming clean to Seiji.”

“…”

“Didn’t you know that love doesn’t need an accelerator or a brake? Just caring about the other person puts you right at their side,” she answered—though it wasn’t an answer at all—her cheeks glowing a rosy red. Namie looked like the very picture of a slightly older maiden in love.

If only it wasn’t with her own little brother
, Izaya thought, leaning back into his chair.

Namie turned to him, her expression proper again, and asked, “Will they be all right? Kids who stick out like these guys are likely to be bullied, don’t you think? And the bullies these days are quite nasty.”

The words themselves were full of sympathy and care for Izaya’s relatives, but her voice was completely devoid of emotion. She clearly did not actually care.

Izaya, meanwhile, only seemed half-interested for his part. He conjectured, “I suppose. I hope there’s no bullying…but I very much doubt that.”

The information broker sighed…then grinned.

“The poor things.”