On the day she died, Mayu shouted that her mom is an idiot, demanding to know why she didn't come to "Parent Participation Day" at school. Satoru's mom explained to her that Satoru suddenly came down with a cold, so she couldn't help but stay home with him. Satoru's mom says that Satoru has always been on the sickly side, so she and Mayu were always arguing about it. When Mayu ran out of the apartment screaming about how she hated her mother and brother, Satoru's mom thought she would be gone for a while like always. She was alerted by neighbors on the way home from the grocery that her house was on fire and they called the fire department, but she had to run inside to get Satoru still in bed.
She carried her son out of the apartment before emergency services arrived, but at the time she had no idea that Mayu was also inside. The firefighters found her in the dining room and asked Satoru's mom to confirm that it was indeed her daughter. Satoru's mom tearfully says that she would have gone back inside to save Mayu too if she had known she was there.
Kagome has determined that Satoru's mom can't possibly be lying and remembering how Mayu said that her mom hated and abandoned her, thinks that this interpretation of events can't be how it went down. A crash sounds at the hospital behind Satoru's mom and she looks around toward it.
Even Mayu is a bit speechless at her own actions, and this gives Kagome time to jump right into things. She asks Mayu to try and remember, and whether she can really say that her mother abandoned her when that mother had no idea she was in the apartment. Mayu looks contemplative as she flashes back.
The memory shows Mayu coming back in from the cold and slinging her scarf over a line hanging above a radiator. Satoru weakly tells her that she shouldn't hang wet clothes over the stove when there aren't adults around, but Mayu tells him to shut his trap. She turns to instruct him not to tell their mother that she's back too, wanting to make her mom worry, but Satoru is already fast asleep again.
Mayu's rage is so powerful that a ceiling light cracks, she throws Kagome against the wall, and makes that final tip on Satoru's bed to send him flying straight out the window. Kagome sees this and lunges for the falling boy, but it's too late. When she gets to the window, she only sees the wall of the building fading into the black ground below, and thinks that he fell as her heart pounds mournfully.
A voice from above mockingly asks if she can do ANYTHING right.
A trembling Kagome takes Satoru in her arms and haltingly expresses her amazement that Inuyasha came around. Outside the hospital now, Mayu floats in the air, head in hands, but surrounded by swirling dark energy. Inuyasha swings inside the hospital from Tessaiga's sheath that he shoved into a crack above the window, explaining that THIS is why he told Kagome not to get involved in this mess.
Mayu thinks about how she understands all of the circumstances that led to the fire and her death, but she still didn't want to die thus. Inuyasha says that even though Kagome points out the truth to her, Mayu won't just go obediently to the afterlife, because it's not that simple. Kagome is still shaking as she agrees. Inuyasha glares at Mayu with the assessment that her spirit has degenerated so badly that she's only one step away from becoming an evil spirit.
A sound emits from the dark night, Inuyasha and Kagome peering out into the black looking for its source.
Kagome turns to Inuyasha and urges him that they need to get going after her, and Inuyasha asks her if she still doesn't get it. He tries to tell her that this isn't a situation she can handle anymore, but Kagome turns to run out the door, no longer holding Satoru, Inuyasha indignantly reminding her that he was talking. Irritation is written all over his half-lidded glare as he grumbles.
He grabs Kagome by the back flap on her sailor blouse, asking why she always has to make things more difficult. Inuyasha deposits her on his back and prepares to leave through the window, Kagome uttering his name in gratitude.
So, what did I think of this chapter overall? I really liked the fact that it wasn't that easy to convince Mayu that she wasn't wronged in some way. Kids are difficult to reason with specifically because reason and logic are LEARNED skills. Even if kids understand facts and get what they mean, it doesn't automatically translate into a reasonable conclusion. She's still angry, still feels neglected and abandoned because dying alone with an unresolved fight with her mother hanging over her head is more emotionally compelling than facts to her. She's not stuck on the facts surrounding her death, but the argument before that that led to her coming home early to hide in order to make her mother worry. The abandonment she's REALLY still sore about is her mom skipping out on "Parent Participation Day" because she sees THAT as the catalyst. THAT was the betrayal that she's been irritated with for six months, and being unable to resolve it and her feelings surrounding it just made her twist the importance of the events of that day into something unrecognizable so she could sustain her anger and hurt.
I'm a little miffed about the fact that NO ONE else came into the room during this interlude with Mayu. This isn't an abandoned building, but an active hospital with staff there night and day - SOMEONE else should have come into the room to find out what all of the commotion and screaming was about.
But it might have been inconvenient for Mayu to spend all her angry energy flinging hospital staff around, huh?
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