Saturday, June? 18?, 2011
If there is one thing this world is good at, Nikki-chan, it is finding new ways to make sure Niko cries every day. If a day is missed, that's only incentive to make the next day even more sad. Niko was recovering from her surgery last night, and Mama came to visit. She was on her way from her weekend job so the siblings were not with her. Niko made the mistake of asking if she knew why my ghost members had gone away. Mama said Rin was going to another school by choice and Yuzu-chan had transferred schools because of her father's job. That's the kind of thing that Nozomi is worried about, because that happened to her a lot.
Rin has a cousin who is a year younger than her, Ayabito Kaoru, that Niko was planning on having join the idol club after they were successful in Niko's second year. Niko met her twice with Rin, who Niko did not know very well, and Niko and Kaoru-chan got along well. She was cute and more enthusiastic than Rin. She said she really wanted to be in an idol club. Niko mentioned her to Mama and asked if she was still going to go to Otonokizaka. Niko would still like to see if she wanted to be in the idol club. Mama sighed and looked at Niko very seriously.
"The girls, Ageha and Mimi, were told by Rin that Kaoru was missing after the tsunami and where she was traveling was hard hit. It is assumed she is no longer with us, Niko-chan."
With all the sadness in Niko's life, she was not thinking about the recent disaster, but I guess I can't get away with anything, huh? Niko thinks that, like Rin, Kaoru-chan was very big on makeup and clothes and hair. At first Rin was excited about idol club, but when she found out it was a lot of work and sweaty and grubby, she changed her mind. She was determined to find a handsome, rich boyfriend who would marry her. She said Kaoru was the same.
It's funny to think of a girl almost my age, with her goals, and now she's nowhere at all. It's terrifying and it's depressing. Mama said Nozomi knew but felt it was better if Mama told Niko if she asked. Over break Yuzu said she and Rin would be full members of an idol club, but then Rin told her to tell me she could only be a ghost member to let Niko start the club. Kaoru-chan being missing must have affected her. And since she was friends with Yuzu, maybe Rin saying she didn't want to be active convinced her to just be a ghost member, too.
So Niko cried and Mama held me as much as she could with all the things in Niko. Sometimes I think Nozomi and Maki both wouldn't hold it against Niko if she cried. Not everyone is an audience, and not everyone is Niko's job to make smile all the time. Even making people smile needs a break now and then. Someone could say a girl only talked-with a couple of times in middle school being gone is not a tragedy, but it is very sad.
And tomorrow or the next day, Niko starts physical therapy, which is said to be strenuous and very painful.