日常 - nichijou, Arawi Keiichi


It's 7:18 pm.

Mio has spent the last 15 minutes frantically trying to retrieve her hard work.

There's an cold, twisty feeling in her stomach in her stomach. She leans back in her seat and slowly exhales, trembling. "It's gone… I can't find it anywhere…"

Mio throws up her arms, flipping over the keyboard. "Okay, never mind that! Never mind the computer! I'm just going to write this out by hand! Who cares about computers, anyway?"

She jams her hand into her tote bag, pulls out a binder, and takes out a sheet of lined paper. She takes out her pencil case and begins writing her name and the date on the sheet of paper.


It's 7:26 pm.

"Ah, I made a typo," Mio mutters. She reaches into her pencil case, searching for an eraser.

A few seconds pass.

Her hand is still rummaging.

More seconds pass.

Mio leaps out of her seat, yanks her pencil case wide open, and dumps the contents onto the floor. Mio scours the items on the ground with wide eyes.

No eraser.

She looks in the upside-down pencil case once more, just in case the eraser got caught on something inside. The pencil case is completely empty.

No eraser.

Mio's eye twitches. She walks over to the door. "Onee-chan, do we have any erasers!?"


It's 7:42 pm.

No, they don't.

There aren't any erasers at all in this entire household.

Resisting the urge to rip the assignment paper into shreds, Mio picks up a brand new piece of lined paper. She begins copying the text she's written so far onto the new sheet of paper, excepting the mistake.


It's 7:50 pm.

Mio's pencil snaps in half. She just made another typo, and she needs to start again.


It's 8:05 pm.

Mio leaps out of her seat, takes a few shaky steps backwards, and leans against the door. She takes a deep breath. She just made another typo, and she needs to start again.

The full moon looms outside the window, as if mocking her.


It's 8:25 pm.

Mio's assignment is halfway complete. She made sure to write extra slowly this time. So far so good. No mistakes yet.

If this were Yukko, that girl probably wouldn't care. She would just cross out the mistake and write the correction above. The double-spacing is useful for that. However, Mio is far more of a perfectionist than Yukko, and she just can't stand any mistakes. They just look bad, y'know? This is supposed to be a good copy, after all.

If she were Yukko, then she would've been done hours ago.

"Hello?" Mio speaks into the phone. "Ah, Yukko."

"Are you going to come over soon?" says Yukko's voice. "We're holding a last-minute study session for the science test at Nano-chan's house! In fact, Mai-chan may or may not be coming as well. I'm not sure though because she just stared at me when I asked her..."

"Ah ha… yeah." Mio loops the phone cord around her hand. "I've just been having all sorts of trouble with that English assignment. It's like the universe doesn't want me to finish it."

"Oh, that English assignment?"

"Mm. As soon as I've finished, I'll come over."

"Wait, which English assignment?"

Mio stares soundlessly for a few seconds.

Yukko's talking to someone on the other side of the phone. "Oh, that one! Mn, thanks for reminding me, Nano-chan!" Her voice returns. "Uh yeah, Mio-chan, no hurry, right? I'll finish that assignment right up, and then we can get started on that studying. Yeah."

"… Yeah."

Yukko hangs up.

After a long pause, Mio hangs up the phone as well. "Well… At least I'm not behind."


It's 8:36 pm.

"Mio! Dinner!"

Mio sets down her pencil, smiling. "Just one more paragraph to go! I'm almost done. Heh…"

She walks out the door, gazing at her paper. This is her fourth try at writing it out by hand. Her fourth paper. And it's going to be her final copy. She won't make any more typos. She's practically done.

Heh… Who said that four has to be unlucky anyway? Mio thinks as she trips over the Ethernet cord, tumbles uncontrollably down the stairs and slams into the ground on top of her right hand, breaking several bones in her fingers.


日常 - nichijou, Arawi Keiichi