Chapter Text
“One day, you’re going to surpass your mother and me, and you’re going to win the admiration of the people around you. But now’s not that time. Stay humble and keep your silence. Always be modest. Just quietly observe and don’t hurt others with what you discover.”
Two years ago, Ranpo’s father gave him this advice before his unexpected death. It was a message just as cryptic to the boy now as it was on that cool spring evening two years ago. In times of silence or boredom, Ranpo found himself flipping these words over and over in his mind in the same manner he fidgeted with his sweater sleeves or pencils in class. Perhaps he shouldn’t have done this–the nuns and his teachers were always quick to scold him for fidgeting during mass or in class.
But the words loomed over Ranpo, like a cloud that never parted. When would that time come? How could the truth possibly hurt others? Besides, Ranpo wasn’t “discovering” anything new to the teachers or nuns, right? If Ranpo, a seven-year-old, knew with a single look that his first-grade teacher was stealing money from the school, surely the principal and other teachers knew? And if they didn’t know, didn’t Ranpo have a right to inform them?
Besides, right now Ranpo’s recent discoveries weren’t exactly helping him make sense of the world right now. Sure, Ranpo had immediately figured out which classmate stole his gummy worms at lunch and had already gotten a corrupt priest fired from the school. But what good was that doing when so little of the world made sense to him? Ranpo’s intellect excelled at understanding human behavior, sure, but it didn’t equip him with an understanding of Catholicism. Ranpo’s introduction to Catholicism began immediately upon being adopted by the nuns. He was taken in during the summer, meaning he had a good two months before starting at Saint Ibaraki’s. During this time, Ranpo spent a puzzling hour on Sundays on an uncomfortable wooden bench, listening to words he didn't understand. The man on the altar said that these little pieces of bread and cup of wine were becoming a man's body and blood--how was that possible?
Ranpo tugged at Sister Catherine's long dress one morning during mass. He whispered, "Sister Catherine? How does that bread become that guy's body?
Sister Catherine smiled and whispered back, "You'll understand in time Ranpo. You'll learn all about it next year with Mrs. Smith, okay?"
The next year rolled around, and Ranpo was entering second grade at Saint Ibaraki’s with Mrs. Smith. Curious to learn more about this "bread-becoming-body" thing, Ranpo stayed on his best behavior for the first month of the year. Once more clinging to his father's words in an effort to comfort himself, he stayed quiet. For a whole, long month, Ranpo even held his tongue about Mrs. Smith's affair with another teacher. Sure enough, one day in October, she sat Ranpo's class down in the storytime corner for a special religion lesson.
“Boys and girls, you’re now at a very special age. You are going to begin preparing to receive the Body of Christ!”
All of Ranpo’s classmates looked thrilled, but Ranpo sat there, intently studying Mrs. Smith. That phrase--"Body of Christ"--was the same one thrown around during mass. But it seemed no one could ever tell him what it meant. Was now the time Sister Catherine was referring to last year? Would he now understand?
The excitement of his classmates immediately dampers when they see Ranpo shoot his hand up into the air. Even after a mere year, his classmates had caught on to Ranpo’s seemingly infinite supply of questions.
“Mrs. Smith, what does that mean?” Ranpo calls out.
Mrs. Smith, not yet familiar with Ranpo this early in the school year, happily replies, “Slow down there Ranpo! We’re going to be learning all about that for the next few months.”
The next few months devolved into a series of weekly arguments between Ranpo and Mrs. Smith. And Ranpo knew he was disappointing his father—this certainly wasn’t “keeping quiet.” But it’s not like he was hurting anybody, right? After all, the friction between him and his teacher was not the result of his intellect—it was that other, indescribable part of Ranpo’s brain causing it. Unfortunately for Ranpo, his parents had not given him any vague, cryptic advice on this facet of himself. Thus far, Ranpo had clung to his father’s puzzling words like a comforting old blanket. But with each religion lesson at school, it felt like this blanket was being ripped off of him. Ranpo was cold, confused, and growing increasingly frustrated with the world around him.
These feelings slowly began to come to a head as the date of Ranpo’s First Holy Communion ceremony loomed. With a month left to go, Mrs. Smith wove a hypnotizing scene to her class—one where the class would process into the church in suits of white and beautiful white gowns. Adorning their outfits would be white flowers, and perhaps little cross necklaces or rosaries. At this special mass, they would then receive the Body of Christ—the Body of Christ would not only be inside them, but they too would become a part of this Body.
Ranpo’s hand immediately shot up upon hearing this. “Mrs. Smith, that doesn’t make any sense. Those wafers you showed us are just pieces of bread that taste like cardboard.”
“Ranpo, don’t be rude!” Mrs. Smith scolded, then sighed to regain her composure. After nearly seven months of this, the poor woman was nearing her wit’s end. “Ranpo, honey, we talked about this. The priest says a special prayer that turns those communion wafers into the Body of Christ during Mass.”
Ranpo huffed and crossed his arms. “But that’s not possible! Besides, it still looks like a wafer—”
“That’s just how we see it, Ranpo.” The increasingly exasperated teacher cuts Ranpo off.
“How? Why? This is so stupid—”
Mrs. Smith’s face suddenly darkened, any attempt to appear calm and sweet gone. “Ranpo, don’t you dare call His Body ‘stupid!’”
Feeling less confident, Ranpo nonetheless continued, “It’s not ‘His Body,’ it’s a piece of bread —”
Suddenly, a loud slam echoes through the classroom. Mrs. Smith leans over her podium, hands flat on the book she just slammed down on it in frustration. “Ranpo Edogawa, principal’s office! Now! ”
The class falls into a heavy silence. Every one of Ranpo’s classmates had turned to stare in shock at the interaction. It’s with all those eyes on him, and the perplexed stare of Mrs. Christie that Ranpo begins to realize how different he seems to be. There was his intellect, of course, but there seemed to be some other, indescribable part of his brain that no one, not even Ranpo, could explain. A part of his brain separate from the part that immediately knew that the “Santa” who came to visit their class in December was really the school priest dressed as Santa. No, this was a part of his brain that couldn’t understand certain things. This man named Jesus multiplied loaves of fish and bread? That’s not possible. This same man walked on water? Also not possible , yet no one else around him seemed to have an issue believing in this.
Escalated scenes like this one became a weekly occurrence for Ranpo. At home, the nuns tried their best to explain to Ranpo that these questions had no answers–that he was simply to accept them as mysteries of his faith. Asking Mrs. Smith wouldn’t get him closer to the truth, prayer and the Holy Communion would. This did not convince Ranpo. No matter how much the boy prayed, no matter how hard he forced himself to pay attention during mass, nothing changed. A man still couldn’t walk on water. A man still couldn’t be three beings in one. A piece of bread still couldn’t become the physical body of a man who wasn’t even alive anymore. The nuns saw these impossible feats as comforting grand mysteries of their faith. In those feats, however, Ranpo saw confusion and illogic that made him viscerally uncomfortable.
The day of the First Holy Communion ceremony was upon him. Ranpo was already having a bad day, and it wasn’t even nine o’clock yet. The nuns couldn’t afford a new suit for the occasion, so Ranpo was borrowing a spare one from the school. It was a size too small and faintly smelled like the musty old storage room from whence it came. The top button of this torture device was digging into Ranpo’s throat, choking him. Every time he breathed, that awful smell burned his nostrils. Ranpo made his discomfort no secret to the nuns, but this discomfort was only met with more scolding.
“Ranpo Edogawa, that is enough ! Your suit does not smell that bad and is only half a size small! If Christ died on the cross for you, surely you can handle a small discomfort for a few hours so that you can receive His Body!” Sister Catherine scolded Ranpo over breakfast that morning.
Shortly after, Ranpo, Sister Catherine, and a few other nuns hopped on the train to Yokohama, where Saint Ibaraki’s school and church were located. That was where Ranpo was to receive…well, this was still a very hot debate between him and Mrs. Smith. Even the nuns began to find Ranpo’s lack of understanding and arguments less endearing and more troublesome.
Due to this, Ranpo found himself sitting in silence for much of the train ride. This was practically torture for a child who could gaze upon a stranger for a few seconds, and then rattle off their entire life story. Ranpo tried to take his mind off the woman sitting across from him, who was cheating on the husband she sat next to. He stopped himself from rattling off the entire plot of the book the nun next to him was reading—a plot so predictable to him that he didn’t understand how a full-grown adult could enjoy it.
The train ride agitated the already irritable state Ranpo was in. He didn’t say a word to Sister Catherine as she dropped him off at the classroom where the second-grade class was to meet. Ranpo sulked in a seat by the window, unsure as to why he was even here this early when mass didn’t even start for another hour.
After what felt like an eternity to Ranpo, and twenty minutes to everyone else, Mrs. Smith walked the class across a small parking lot and into the foyer of the Church. The children were quickly shushed by their teacher, who now went down the line adjusting her students’ outfits. She instructed the girls to make sure their many layers of skirts weren’t bunched up and straightened the bowties on the boys’ necks. Ranpo, being Ranpo, had already taken off his bowtie to undo that torturous top button that wouldn’t stop choking him.
Mrs. Smith sighed when she came to Ranpo in the line and said quietly, “Ranpo, honey, where’s your bowtie?”
“In my pocket,” Ranpo replied casually without quieting his voice to an acceptable Church level.
“Shh!” Mrs. Smith put a finger to her lips. “Ranpo, why don’t you button that top button and put your bowtie back on, okay? Do you need any help?”
Ranpo bluntly replied, still speaking at his normal volume, “It was choking me.”
“Ranpo, it’s only for an hour. You can take it off afterward.” Mrs. Smith gestured for Ranpo to hand over his bowtie. He pulled it out from his pants pocket, only for his little stash of gummy worms to fall out on the floor.
Mrs. Smith raises an eyebrow at this and snatches them from the ground, sternly saying to Ranpo in a hushed voice, “No snacks in Church. You know this, Ranpo.”
“Hey, give them back!” Ranpo shouts, causing the churchgoers beginning to congregate in the Church to look back at the foyer.
Needless to say, by the time Ranpo was processing into the main area of the Church alongside his classmates, he was not amused. In just three hours he had been choked out by his suit (that did in fact have a strong, bad smell, despite what the nuns, Mrs. Smith, and Ranpo’s classmates had told him), been scolded by Sister Catherine, dealt with an overstimulating train ride, and got his precious candy stolen by his teacher.
Ranpo was positively fuming in his seat during mass. The harsh wood of the pew against his back only added to the growing irritation Ranpo felt. After what felt like an eternity, it came time for the second-grade class to receive their first Communion. Mrs. Smith filed her class out of the pews and into a line, where they stood in wait as each child took their Communion wafer from the priest. Once the children were all in line, Mrs. Smith took her spot in front of the altar beside the priest, giving them quick instructions in case they forgot what to do.
Ranpo was in the middle of the line, where he was brooding over all of this. Why were all these people just going along with this? Why did everyone accept that pieces of cardboard, or “bread” were the physical body of Jesus? Why were he and his classmates all dressed up like little brides and grooms to go eat a piece of bread? How would they even become a part of the Body of Christ anyway? It’s not like you could just fuse bodies with him or something.
The words of his father interrupted these thoughts. His warnings to remain humble, keep quiet, and not hurt others were echoing around in Ranpo’s mind.
But how could Ranpo be quiet when it seemed everyone around him wholeheartedly believed something so impossible? What was it that these people weren’t getting? How was it that Ranpo, at the age of seven, found flaws in this logic that adults were blind to?
No, Ranpo wasn’t going to go along with this. Something was off. Something wasn’t okay, and Ranpo couldn’t quite put his finger on it. And until he could put his finger on it, Ranpo wasn’t going to pretend like this was normal.
He reached the front of the line. With the large crucifix looming above him from the altar, the forced smile of Mrs. Smith to his right, and the nuns sitting in the pews to his left, Ranpo just stood there. After a moment he simply bowed, then turned on his heel to walk away. Mrs. Smith quickly grabbed his shoulder and whispered in his ear, “Ranpo, honey, you need to take the Communion wafer.”
“No,” Ranpo whispered back, staring ahead of him. With a determined expression, Ranpo tried to take a step forward. When he still felt Mrs. Smith’s hand clutching his shoulder, Ranpo whipped around to face her. “No, I won’t do it !” Ranpo said, reaching his normal speaking volume. Everyone in the Church was looking. The Communion line had paused, even the priest himself staring at Ranpo in bewilderment.
Mrs. Smith’s forced smile falters as she tries to explain, “Ranpo, I know you don’t understand this yet, but you will one day. One day you will appreciate this. So just do it, okay?”
“NO!” Ranpo exclaims, shrugging off Mrs. Smith’s hand. Tears of a frustration that had been building inside him for months began to well up in his eyes. “I’m not going to do it! I don’t understand !”
“Ranpo—”
Hot, frustrated tears begin to roll down Ranpo’s cheeks as he shouts, “N-NO! Wh-Why is everybody just going along with this? I-It’s not his body, i-it’s just bread !”
Mrs. Smith tries to put a reassuring hand on his shoulder to comfort him, but Ranpo dodges it immediately. Instead, he rushes past the line of his classmates, through the foyer, and out into the sunny spring morning.
The fresh breeze ruffles through Ranpo’s hair, wafting the fragrance of the blooming church flowerbeds into his nose. For a moment, Ranpo feels alright. Nobody is around. The world is still apart from the breeze and the sound of windchimes from the neighbors across the street. For a moment, he’s back at his old school. The schoolyard where he played games at recess was right by flowerbeds that smelled just like this one. Soon after recess, he would always return to his family home in the countryside, spending cool summer nights with his parents outside, windchimes rustling in the breeze.
“That’s gone now,” Ranpo mutters under his breath, a new wave of tears forming in his puffy, red eyes.
He tears off to the empty school building, knowing it is still unlocked from earlier. Ranpo rushes down the empty hallway, practically tripping over his own shoes. Soon, he arrives at his destination; the top of the third-floor stairwell. This stairwell was seldom used, since it was located in an isolated hallway on the second and third floors and the only first-floor exits led to the library and schoolyard.
Here, Ranpo slid down the wall of a landing and began to let everything out. He brought his knees up to his chest and began to sob uncontrollably into them.
Nothing about this world made sense to Ranpo. Well, no—at times the opposite was true. At times he could read a person within seconds. He even helped the nuns vet through new faculty hires for the school, letting them know of any problematic applicants for their open teaching positions. Each time, the background check of the candidate proved Ranpo’s assessment to a startling degree of accuracy.
Yet at the same time, there were occasions like this. Occasions where it seemed the opposite was true—when everyone else around Ranpo seemed to know something he didn’t. It was a weird contradiction that little Ranpo, for all his intellect, couldn’t make sense of. Simultaneously, he felt like a genius yet an idiot.
For yet another time today, Ranpo remembered his father’s words. He once more turned them over and over in his mind like the bowtie he fidgeted with in his hands.
“One day, you’re going to surpass your mother and me, and you’re going to win the admiration of the people around you. But now’s not that time…don’t hurt others with what you discover.”
When was that day going to arrive? Because right now, all Ranpo seemed to do was mess things up for everybody—including himself.