“Floating” High School Girl Ibuki Shimizu, Taking Off. #05

Chapter 5: Free Floating Altitude: 1.3m, Buoyancy: 45NF

The Ceiling I Call Home, The Daily Life Drifting Away

It was only a few days ago that I started bumping my head on the ceiling.

When I get to school, I adjust my rope to be shorter and tie it to the hook by the classroom window. By the time morning homeroom starts, my body is floating softly in the air, reaching the same height as the fluorescent lights on the ceiling.

“Ibuki, you should just live on the ceiling.”
“Doesn't the space above the ceiling look surprisingly comfortable?”

Lunch break.
While swaying on her rope high above the classroom, Ibuki was opening her lunch box alone.
Kazusa says with a laugh.

“Lunch in the ceiling seats again today, Princess of the Stars?”
“Shut up, what if I spill it?”

The two of them laughed together as they ate lunch in the classroom, where the spring sunlight was streaming in.

The moment she opened the lid, Ibuki blinked suddenly.

“...Ah.”

Cod roe spaghetti and a rolled omelet.
Both were her favorites.
She realized they had been in her lunch every day since she started floating.

Her mother says nothing.
She just sends her off as usual with a “Have a good day.”

However, Ibuki knew.
That it was her mother's way of showing care, and a modest resistance to “staying normal.”

“...Thank you, Mom.”

She whispered softly and took a bite of the cod roe spaghetti.
Even while swaying on a rope, that taste was no different from when she was on the ground.

A place for Ibuki had already been established in the classroom.

A rope hook for floaters.
A desk suspended from the ceiling.
Handouts pulled up on a string.
Kazusa takes photos of the blackboard and sends them to her via smartphone.

She participates in all classes except P.E. and never misses an assignment. Ibuki looked down at everyone from the sky, laughing.

“A high school girl with no feet on the ground... or ‘Groundless JK’ for short!”
“Ibuki... you really have nerves of steel.”

The joking conversation was bringing a sense of normalcy back to the classroom.

During lunch break one day, the teacher handed out the school trip guidebooks.

“Kinkaku-ji, Kiyomizu-dera... ah, I’m so excited!”
“What should we do about souvenirs? Matcha-flavored things? Yatsuhashi?”

Amidst the noisy classroom, Ibuki stared at her own guidebook.
Her name was not on the floor plan for the lodging rooms.

The homeroom teacher said, looking a bit awkward.

“Shimizu... this time, due to some safety concerns... you know?”

Ibuki smiled and nodded.

“I understand. I’d probably float right out of my futon, anyway.”

Someone laughed. But that laughter was tinged with a faint sense of loneliness.

After school, she tied a rope to the edge of the track and watched the practice from the sky.
The wind blew, and the scent of soil swirled around.

“...I wanted to go. On the school trip. I wanted to have a pillow fight, too.”

Her whispered voice reached no one and dissolved into the sky.

In the morning, sitting on the balcony railing, Ibuki looks up at the sky. She can no longer leave through the front door on her own. These days, she relies on a pulley system her mother built to “descend.”

“Well, I’m off.”

Her mother turns the handle below.
The rope is slowly reeled in, and Ibuki “commutes” to school from the sky.

On the way to school with Kazusa.
From a height of 1.3 meters, Ibuki looks down at Kazusa’s hair parting and says.

“We have to watch out for crow droppings.”
“On my head, too!”

The rope tied to the handle of the umbrella swayed like the bond between the two of them.

After school.

“Let’s skip school tomorrow,” Kazusa said, placing two movie tickets flat on the desk.

“It’s not really skipping. Let’s just say tomorrow is a day to go see the sky.”

Ibuki smiled.

"Yeah, I want to go. But... if I don't hear the chime, I can't settle down for the day. I like that feeling of everyone starting to move."

At those words, Kazusa also smiled softly.

"...Ibuki, you're really serious, aren't you? But I like that about you."

In the morning dining room, her mother said:

"...I think it's okay, you don't have to push yourself."

With her back turned to the kitchen, her mother said:

"There are so many things I want to buy for you. For all the time we missed... let me make up for it from now on."

Those were words that sounded like her mother's atonement.

Ibuki, staring at that back across the table, said slowly:

"Thank you. But I want to go to school. I feel like as long as I think I 'want to go,' I'm still 'here.'"

Then, on another day, as she was leaving, her homeroom teacher said:

"...Shimizu, you..."

While preparing to leave school, the teacher stopped while handing out handouts.

"I'm happy to see you smiling. But... you don't have to stay like that forever. You don't have to put on a brave face."

Ibuki lowered her eyes for a moment, then looked up.

"I'm not putting on a brave face. I really want to come to school every day, so I come. ...Because this is my 'ground.'"

The teacher searched for words for a while, then nodded.

"...I see. Then I'll be waiting 'here' too."

At night.
Floating quietly on her bed, Ibuki stared at the ceiling.
Beyond that was the sky, stretching on forever.

Even so—her heart remained in front of those shoe lockers.
The sound of footsteps in the morning, the bustle of midday, the chime after school.

Each and every sound kept Ibuki tethered to "this place."

……That is why she will go again tomorrow.
To her "ground" beneath this sky.

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