Bakemonogatari: Hitagi Crab 001

Everyone in class knew that Senjogahara Hitagi was sick. She never once took part in gym class, and whenever there was an outdoor assembly, she would sit by herself in the shade...afraid of passing out, probably. I'd been in the same class as her for all three years of high school, but I had never once seen her move in a manner that could be described as lively. She was a regular in the nurse's office, and frequent doctor's appointments often left her arriving late, leaving early, or not showing up at all. To the point where people wondered aloud if she lived at the hospital.

She was obviously sick, but that in no way suggests she seemed feeble. She was brittle, like she'd break if you touched her, but in delicate, ethereal way that had earned her a small but devoted following among a certain segment of her male classmates. There was something about her that reminded them of a character from literature -- a convalescing heiress. I could not claim to disagree.

When she came to class, Senjogahara sat in the corner of the room, reading. She read anything from hardcovers with daunting titles to comics with a cover design that suggested reading them could actually made you stupid. She was indiscriminate, to say the least. If there were words, she would read it -- I could descry no other logic behind her choices.

She was, apparently, brilliant. One of the best students in the school.

When they posted exam results, Senjogahara Hitagi's name was always in the top ten. No matter what subject. I was getting failing grades in everything but math, not even in sight of her league. I was sure there must be something fundamentally different about the way out brains were constructed.

She had no friends.

Not one.

I had never seen her so much as speak to another human being. If you looked carefully, you might even begin to suspect the reason she was always reading was to make it harder for people to talk to her. Deliberately building a wall around her. I sat right next to Senjogahara for two years, and I can safely say I never once heard her utter an unsolicited word. I'm sure she didn't. My full knowledge of her voice came from those rare occasions when a teacher called on her, in which case she would only murmur, "I don't know." Even if she obviously knew the answer. Schools are fundamentally very strange places -- in school, people with no friends wind up being friends with each other. Even someone like me, until last year. Senjogahara proved to be the exception to that rule. And yet, she was not ostracized. There was no persecution or hostility directed at her, seriously or in jest. Not that I ever saw. Senjogahara was just always there, reading, as if that was her place in the world. Behind that wall she made.

As if she belonged there.

As if she did not belong there.

And the truth was, it didn't matter. Three years of high school, two hundred students a year, two years above you, two years below you, faculty and staff -- a thousand people, give or take. Out of which, how many could ever really matter to you? A question designed to depress just about anybody, I know.

Even if, by some fluke, I found myself in the same class as someone three years running, I could not see the point in caring that I'd never spoken to them. That's just the way things turned out. Looking back, I'm sure that's what I thought. I was graduating in a year, had no idea what would happen to me then, and frankly...I could not have remembered what she looked like, nor would I have thought to try.

And that was fine. I'm positive Senjogahara was fine with it too. Anyone in the school would have been equally fine with it. Getting depressed about something like that is probably cause for concern.

Or so I thought.

But then...

One day.

To be precise, my third year freshly started, my hellish joke of a spring vacation concluded, and my nightmarish trip of a Golden Week narrowly escaped -- May 8th.

Late as always, I was bounding up the steps to school, rounding a landing...when a girl fell from the sky.
Senjogahara Hitagi.

Okay, not literally from the sky, she had simply missed her footing on the stairs and fallen backwards towards me. I could have moved out of the way, but instead...I caught her.

I believe this was the right choice.
But it may have been entirely the wrong one.

You see...

When I caught Senjogahara, her body...was incredibly light. Unbelievably, unimaginably, unnervingly light.

As if she did not exist at all.

Yes.

Senjogahara literally weighed next to nothing.