Editing Maria-sama ga Miteru:Volume20 Chapter1 (section)

=== Part 4 ===

"Let me tell you something," Yoshino said pointedly, striding angrily into the room. "Acting superior &mdash; we're their future 'onee-sama.' Looking down on them? That's fine. Nothing wrong with that."

That's true. If a person didn't have that sort of resolve inside them, they could not find a petite s&oelig;ur. In an audition, the final decision would be down to one of two applicants. One should know their tastes if they plan to pick a petite s&oelig;ur. If there is some concern that a person may not be able to make her choice, then she shouldn't be calling for people to audition for her. If anyone gave it enough thought, when a girl decides to accept the invitation to audition, it means the same thing as the petite s&oelig;urs having chosen their grande s&oelig;ur. As the grande s&oelig;ur chooses the petite s&oelig;ur, so does the petite s&oelig;ur choose the grande s&oelig;ur.

"What's wrong with you! We're in the same class, but you still won't wait for me?"

Yoshino slammed her lunch on the table and glared at Yumi-san. After fourth period ended, Yoshino went to the bathroom and came back to no sign of her. She had to ask around, and a classmate finally told her that Yumi-san had taken her lunch and headed to the Rose Mansion.

"Huh? Didn't you tell me that you had a Kendo Club meeting today at lunch?"

"The meeting is for the regular fighters only. I told you because Rei-chan wouldn't be able to come to the Rose Mansion today because of it."

"Oh, is that why. . . ."

"Hey, pay more attention to things outside of yourself, will you!"

Unfortunately, not every Kendo Club member participated in the interschool kendo tournaments. Only five people were allowed to go to the tournaments, and they would probably be the only ones going to the meeting to decide how to manage the team. Yoshino, in spite of being a second year, was just a beginner. The latest addition to the club would have no chance of being nominated to represent the school. If you combine her genes and her upbringing, then she should have become a regular shortly after joining the club &mdash; but reality often doesn't go as expected.

"So, what's wrong? You really hate the auditions, don't you, Yumi-san?"

"Well, 'hating' may be too strong &mdash;"

"What's with that look on your face? If you don't like something, just say that you don't like it! I want to have your input in the way the auditions are going to be run!"

Yoshino began halfheartedly putting some pressure on Yumi-san to speak her mind. Yumi-san put up a face that said "I wonder what I should tell her," when suddenly her savior came from behind.

"I understand why Yumi-san keeps worrying about the auditions. I also don't like having to judge people like that in contests."

Shimako-san was the one who came to Yumi-san's defense.

"So? What does that mean?"

Yoshino folded her arms onto her chest and raised an eyebrow.

"Even though we're both students, how would you feel if someone else judged me over you?"

"Well, Shimako-san, earlier when we were deciding whether we should hold an audition or not, you had said that you weren't opposed to the idea, did you not?"

As Shimako-san nodded her assent, Yumi-san confirmed that something had happened between Shimako-san and Yoshino, although she didn't know what it was about.

"Let me ask you something else then, Shimako-san! When people are elected to run for the student council, isn't that an issue of students picking students?!"

"The elections are different. It's when every student in the school votes for a voice that will represent them in student affairs."

When Shimako-san became forward about her opinion, it would occasionally bother Yoshino. It wasn't enough that she disagreed; Shimako-san would do the things that Yoshino herself couldn't do easily, which would leave her admiring and jealous. But admiring was the opposite of what she wanted to be now.

"Okay . . . then, if everyone in the school were to vote for who a person's s&oelig;ur should be, would you agree then, Shimako-san?"

"Everyone? Picking s&oelig;urs?" Shimako-san tilted her head.

Yoshino knew that what she had said was simply a hypothetical retort, but she hoped that her retort would have some effect.

"But, Yoshino-sama." 

This time it was Noriko-chan who spoke from behind. "Could a person accept a s&oelig;ur who had been picked by majority rule?"

"Of course not."

It'd be troublesome to be handed someone and told, "Here, this is your petite s&oelig;ur." It wasn't like getting a mass-produced doll as a gift.

"Then it's useless to continue any further with this line of thinking."

"Geh," Yoshino groaned, as she opened her lunch box. Noriko-chan seemed as if she had been seduced by Shimako-san, but she knew she had to stop this here.

Eventually, the three others also began opening their lunch boxes. It seemed that they had been so entranced by the debate that they had forgotten about their lunches.

"Sachiko-sama isn't here," Shimako-san whispered.

"That's right, huh."

Yumi-san took her chopsticks out from her chopsticks box, and inclined her head. Yoshino hadn't heard anything from Rei-chan about this.

The interschool kendo tournament obviously shouldn't have any effect on Sachiko-sama's plans, so maybe she hadn't arrived for different reasons. Obviously if you had no specific invitation to come, you didn't have to. But in the days before the School Festival, she had come to the busy lunch meetings and paid attention to every detail, and ever since then, her regular attendance had become customary. 

"Can I ask you something?" Yoshino asked, as she put down her chopsticks.

"All three of you oppose the audition happening at school, right?"

She had thought about the issue again from bottom to top. Yumi-san gave her response.

"Well, isn't it like picking the lead actress of the school play?"

Yumi-san looked quickly around and saw Shimako-san and Noriko-chan nod deeply. Yoshino steeled herself and asked again.

"Well, you're doing something personal in a public place, so. . . ?"

"Umm." Yumi made several, complicated faces. For some reason it resembled the look she got on her face when she faced the blackboard in math class and had to answer a question. But honest Yumi-san finally came out with an answer. "If you're talking about a person's feelings, well . . . each person has their own internal sense of what's too little and what's too much. For example, if you do this much, then it's okay. If you do more, then it's not okay. Something like that. But people don't think about this individually, and instead give vague reactions like 'I don't really like it' or 'I don't know why, but I'm okay with it,' and other people live with these vague responses."

"Yeah."

"That's why I'm not sure about making it 'official.'"

Indeed. Yumi-san was talking about putting human instincts into words.

"So, then, what if I decided to hold a tea party at my house? And I said that people who wanted to be my petite s&oelig;ur were welcome to attend? Would you be in that? Or not?"

"I guess I'd be in? But if you put up posters around school, or advertised in the school newspaper, that would be no good, I think."

Taking this into consideration, Yumi-san's objections may be along the lines of, "Don't do private things in public."

"So if it spread by word-of-mouth, that would be okay. I kind of get what you're saying."

"Yoshino-san, you can't mean &mdash;"

"No, I won't have an audition at my house," Yoshino laughed dryly. She had only asked the question in order to understand what the others in the room where thinking.

She was being more self-conscious than usual. Maybe because she was used to being the center of attention with relatives and friends, Yoshino hadn't noticed this slip of hers. Of course, there were different degrees of her selfishness. She didn't treat Yumi-san and other close friends like everyone else. But for people like her who loved themselves, it isn't a bad thing to put yourself before others. This was embarrassing though, so she didn't want it known. 

But from the beginning, Yoshino had something else to say that she hadn't.

"But you know, I never really thought of the audition as a competition. If everyone thinks of it like that, then obviously they'd have reservations about the audition. There's no reason to treat the audition as if it were some tournament that you have to win in."

Yumi-san, Shimako-san, and Noriko-chan immediately turned towards Yoshino as if bewitched.

"What?!"

"It's just that, the moment you came into the room, it seemed as if some lever had been pulled, and that you were irritated from the start," Yumi-san dryly explained to Yoshino.

"It's because I have unwavering confidence in myself. So I'll fight whenever I'm challenged. But if I have no strong personal opinion on the subject, I'll also listen to what others have to say about it."

And then.

"Fine then! I'll decide, right here, right now!"

Yumi-san stood up in a sudden revelation. Not only did she stand, but she balled her hand into a fist, and thumped it into her chest.

"If there's no other way for me to find a s&oelig;ur, let's have this audition right now! Let's do it! And I'll probably understand how the audition works after I start doing it!"

Why, that Yumi-san! Her sudden declaration was so uplifting, that Yoshino could do nothing but applaud.

Shimako-san grinned.

"After school today, let's hold some real talks about this, okay? We won't just discuss the big picture, but also the little things that we forgot to talk about, the things we need to do first, and other stuff like that!"

"Will you help us too?"

Yumi-san asked Shimako-san happily.

"Of course. Won't we, Noriko?"

Noriko-chan's onee-sama had agreed, so she went quiet for a second, and then said, "Yeah." But Noriko-chan hesitated. "Yumi-sama, um, are you sure I should help out?"

"Huh? Of course! If Noriko-chan helped out, we would be that much stronger!"

After seeing the smile that lit up Yumi-san's face, Noriko-chan could only say, "I'll help then. To all the best." Perhaps Noriko-chan had wanted to say something else.

&ndash; Or so Yoshino thought absentmindedly. Or maybe it had been her imagination. But if it wasn't her imagination, then Noriko-chan had chosen not to say something, and it made Yoshino wonder what she had left unsaid.



Sachiko-sama did not come at all that day to the Rose Mansion.