Tokyo Nishi Public High School (5)

Ikeda: Before the system is destroyed, we need to build a stockpile.

Anno: That can wait until after the destruction. Our lives will change at that point. Yours will certainly be destroyed once, though there's no way of telling how many years from now that will be.

Ikeda: I felt I had been destroyed in my incoming year.

Nagamori: That's a different kind of destruction, I think.

Anno: It can wait until after the destruction.

Takagi: Yeah, after.

Nagamori: What matters is how the pieces shake out.

Anno: As long as you're not dead, you'll be OK.

Ikeda: Then I'm safe. People tell me I wouldn't die even if I were murdered.

Anno: I've known my share of girls, but it's always the ones who tell you they're absolutely all right, they're the ones you have to watch out for...

Ikeda: I've been through some things that have made me want to die plenty of times, but I've survived, which makes me feel as if there's no way I'm going to die. Many times I've really thought I was going to die, but I'm still here.

Nagamori: And if someone shouted "Bang!" in your ear, you'd probably shatter.

Ikeda: I've thought about dying any number of times, but I've survived, and I doubt there's much that could be worse than that.

Nagamori: I don't think so.

Ikeda: Are you saying that this could go in a bad direction too?

Nagamori: You've only lived a measly 17 years.

Ikeda: People tell me I'm too straight and narrow, but what about you, Inao?

Inao: I'm all over the place.

Ikeda: No way! What about Daichi? He's been known to go wild, in a sense.

Moori: Yeah, he has. He blows a gasket from time to time.

Q. What kind of adults would you like to be?

Anno: I'm not even sure what the definition of an adult is. What is there that makes you an adult?

Ikeda: I'd like to be the kind of adult that goes all out to do dumb things, like Ishii Tatsuya in the band Kome Kome Club.

Takagi: I'd be happy to be better than the rock band "Ningen Isu (Human Chair)".

Uehara: Are you happy with the work you're doing currently?

Anno: Yes, I am.

Takagi: Does it feel like it's a hobby?.

Anno: It feels like a hobby that keeps going on.

Uehara: And that's what makes it the best kind of success.

Nagamori: I'd be happy if I could make a career as a performer too.

Ikeda: And I'm working as hard as I can to be able to make a living with my drawings.

"I'd Like to Grow Older With Grace"

Moori: What about you, Daichi?

Ikeda: You seem like you'd be happy to stay just as you are, Takagi.

Takagi: People say that to me a lot.

Ikeda: No changes, no improvements.

Takagi: Kind of an eternal drifter.

Inao: I'd like to get older with grace.

Moori: And what kind of adult is it that gets older with grace?

Ikeda: The kind that goes all out for foolish things. The kind of adult that never forgets the silly things, or what most people would call "young at-heart".

Takagi: I want to go on just as I am.

Uehara: People change, you know.

Ikeda: But I think "as I am" is great. It means that you like the way you are now.

Uehara: I like me right now so much I can't believe it.

Takagi: You'd like to go on as you are, or would you change it?

Uehara: I've never consciously thought about it, but...

Ikeda: I want always to keep changing for the better.

Uehara: I don't want to forget this feeling I have right now.

Ikeda: It's a sure bet that you (Takagi) will end up homeless.

Anno: I think that's OK too.

Ikeda: It's not OK. You end up withering away, saying "It really should have turned out differently."

Anno: And if you end your life that way, that's fine too.

(Thus ends the Nishi High School segment. Next will be the Kanagawa Prefectural Ikuta High School arc.)

(From the July 9, 1998 edition of Mainichi Intermediate School News)