Childhood’s End

First in the Hearts,

It was too hot for an autumn day. I’d made sure everything in your room was to your liking. I set the thermostat to an acceptable temperature, made sure the flowers in your room weren’t wilting, cut your food as you liked it, and held back tears seeing the weakness in your body. Now I stood at the window, sun hurting my eyes, refusing to look back for all the tears it would bring. Being this high up in this silent room made it feel like we were the last people on Earth, even as the sounds of the city and the lives of its people trailed ever-on beneath me. The world was bathed orange in sunset’s glow, the few skyscrapers of Kochi crowding the great disc and morphing it into a halo. I let the warmth hit my face and arms, let it travel into the cold tips of my fingers, let it ease the swelling anxiety in my chest. The sterile haze of the hospital room felt unfitting, the clean smell of antiseptic scraping my nostrils and the low electric hum keeping my attention in here, in this coffin, instead of out there. Out there, the free world, the real world, the world in which you ran and I instructed, in which the days lasted a lifetime and were spent living to the full in castles in the sky. It was all so distant now, too distant, too far gone. Now the days were short and spent in reality. We were old. You were sick. No great and beautiful yellow sun could change that fact, no matter how homely it made the streets below feel.

“Do you remember that day…” I began, full well knowing you would. You remembered every day we spent together. 

“Do you remember that day we spent pretending to be armadillos?” Under the guise of training, I had us roll around the gymnasium making squeaking noises. I did it to cheer up Doto, who had recently taken a bad fall and had hurt her knee. It was the first time I’d ever heard Opera O laugh normally.

“Hehe… being all rolypoly made me super dizzy… but it was super fun.” I could hear the smile in your voice. I didn’t need to turn away from the amber cityscape to do so.

“You always help me remember the funnest things,” you giggled.

“Everything we did was fun,” I chuckled back, “even the losses.” I focused in on a line of cars passing down the main street below. They passed out of sight and were then cyclically replaced by a new line. The sun glinted off their windshields and hit my eyes.

“Exactly! Back then, I felt like I could run forever!” 

“Yeah… and I felt like this whole training thing was gonna last just as long.” Time is a cruel thing. It compounds and compounds on itself, and by the end of its running pace last week was eight years ago.

“It lasted long enough to make me happy,” you said, after quite some time. I turned to see you, old and fragile, propped up against the soothing down of the hospital bed. I walked over to your bedside and sat down. The sallow skin on your arms hung loose, and I stroked it gently, knowing I couldn’t nurse away the weakness in your bones or rattling in your chest. 

“I was happy, too,” I beamed at you, weariness in my smile.

“I know you want to be young again,” you told me as you lifted a shaking hand to my failing smile’s corners, “and I wish I was too. But we can’t be, even if that makes us sad.”

“I know. But to see you run again, one last time… nothing would make me happier as your…” I trailed off, and we both smiled at one another.

“If I get out of here, I’ll let you see me run. And this time, I’ll definitely, definitely get first place!” I laughed, sorrow and mirth passing through my lips.

“You’re always first in my heart, Urara. Win or lose.” 

“Hah… now you’re really making me want to run. But everything… everything is so tiring nowadays. Even now…” I saw her eyelids droop. Immediately, fear struck my chest like a lance.

“Wait!” I was struck with the feeling that if she closed her eyes now, she wouldn’t ever open them again. 

“Before…” My heart wrung itself inside out, “Before you… nap, I…” I searched for something, anything to say. To keep her awake. To keep her with me. But every parent has to let their child fly the nest, eventually. Everything I had ever wanted to say to her in life had already been said, and all that was left was reminiscence and the fuzzy warmth of nostalgia.

“I love you. Like a parent would a child.” 

“I know,” she smiled as if young again, and drifted away as my heart shattered in two.

And in the Minds,

“Huh? Where…?” I was standing on the top of a large hill. Above me stretched the eternal blue sky, cloudless and still. There was a great valley beneath me, filled with the most vivid green grass I had ever seen. And there, cresting the hill, were a group of people who had left some time ago but finally returned home. My legs instinctively carried me towards them, the rust and creaking that seemed to grab at my bones having floated off into the blue above, and I broke into a full sprint to meet them.

“Rice!” I jumped onto the leader of the pack and tumbled to the ground with her as everyone else parted to let our rolling bodies past.

“W-Wah! Hello, Urara…” She laughed nervously, slowly returning my bear hug. I looked around at everyone, fifteen in total. 

“Wow! So many! Why is everyone here?” From a distance, it must have looked quite a sight. Sixteen of us, all gathered on the top of this hill, a cherry blossom billowing ceaselessly into the wind. I still didn’t know where we were, but it was peaceful and sunny, so I didn’t really care.

“Why else do sixteen umamusume gather together?!” El pushed her way to the front of the pack, beaming with her fist clenched, “To race to the finish line!”

“Race?! Right now?” I almost jumped up out of excitement, which would probably have led to me bumping into Rice’s head in the process, “I haven’t raced in so long… But if you say so!”

“Sheesh. Contain yourself, El,” Sei put a hand on her shoulder and pulled her back, “Racing can wait for just a bit longer. For now, I just think we should all chill a bit.”

“You’re always saying we should chill! It’s been forever since we raced Urara! Come oooo~n!” El jumped up and down in frustration, carrying a smattering of laughter across the breeze and down the hill. Whilst the others intervened to calm her down, a familiar face came over to me.

“Urara,” Spe-chan got down on one knee and looked me in the eyes, “it’s always fun here. Here, the cherry trees always give off pink petals that flutter forever into the sky. We all see our friends every day, and nobody is ever sad. Every day we all race each other until we can’t anymore, and then we fill our bellies with the yummiest food you’ve ever tasted.”

“Wow…” I couldn’t stop my eyes from glittering, “That sounds really, really fun!”

“But…” Grass joined Spe on one knee, “It’s really been missing someone. Someone who can make everyone smile, just by being there. Do you know who I’m talking about, Urara?”

“Um…” I tried to hide the fact I had no idea.

“They’re talking about you…” Rice whispered into my ear, giggling.

“Me?! Woah! No way!” I stood up in surprise.

“Heheh…” Spe blushed slightly, “She’s right. We’ve all really, really missed you. Every day can be bright and sunny, every meal could be the best you’ve ever tasted, every memory can be the sweetest one ever, but when someone you love isn’t there nothing ever feels right. But you’re here now!”

“I’m… here…” I looked around for you, but you were nowhere to be seen. This happened sometimes. But I could always find you again, near the finish line of a race. Cheering me on. Over and over. Spe was right, this place wouldn’t feel complete without someone you love being there. So I supposed that I should bring you here too by running to that finish line, to the place you always waited for me.

So some time later we set off down the hill. A full starting gate. Sixteen of us in exaltation, donning racing silks and all as we remembered each other – young, happy, warm and blushing, in the days that would never end. I wanted so badly to reach that finish line before anyone else and see you there. So I ran full bore down the hill, not caring if I wiped out and looked dumb in front of all of my friends. Because they’d still love me, no matter how stupid I made myself look. No matter how much of a loser I was. There, right there, legs sprinting down that verdant green from one hill to another under that sky, that blue sky, that eternal blue sky, there was deep sorrow in my heart. The feeling of leaving something behind for good. It was like the day after the Kinen. I was having so much fun. So, so much fun. I looked to my left and saw Ope, Top Road, Hishiama and the President. They were not focused on the stretch ahead. Nobody was. They were focused on me. Every single one of my friends looked at me running on ahead of them. And as the joy in my heart grew deep enough to burst it, so did that sorrow. Tears beat at the corners of my eyes. The wind was only partly why. It was so confusing, so, so confusing, but unlike that day, back then, it did not cause my step to falter. Instead, I felt my legs blaze hard beneath me, pushing me forward. I could feel it, ahead of me. The sensation of winning. A sensation I knew would come one day, beyond tears.

I neared the top of the hill. I could feel a stampede of feet behind me, knowing that everyone was going all out this one final time. And yet, the view from the front was mine. The almost infinite stretch of verdant grass, the cool blue of the sky and the cold, stinging breeze. Was this what winning felt like? I turned back to look, to see you right there at the finish line, but you were nowhere to be found in this place. I wanted so badly to see the look on your face as I crossed over the threshold, as I crested the hill and won. But you weren’t there. I knew then that even if I won, it wouldn’t feel like winning. Because you weren’t there. It would still be fun, I thought, as I slowed my pace and Grass overtook me, it would always be fun. But it wouldn’t be winning. I crossed the finish line in second place. One final loss. Something swelled in my chest, a deep-wrought, thorny fire mixed with bursting exhaustion. I stood there, at the peak, and yelled out.

Rest Now, Forever

“G-Goal…!” Your lips barely parted to whisper out that final goodbye.

“Well done.” Everything was blurry under the sweltering haze of tears. I couldn't see your hand. But I knew whatever it was your closed eyes had seen, whatever you were doing right now in your head, you had done your best. You always did. I felt your hand go rigid in mine.

“Really, truly, well done.”

It is the wish of every parent to outlive their child. I couldn’t do that. I failed. I lost. But you taught me that losing doesn’t have to hurt forever. I can bounce back. Fight on. Like you did. You’re gone now. You’re smiling and carefree even now, looking down over you, but you’re still gone. I think it’s going to feel like losing for a long time. Maybe forever. But it doesn’t have to. I know that, because you taught me as such. So, if I’m going to lose then I’ll do it as you did. So even as I strained to form it, even as it wavered as it curled, even as I couldn’t see anything in front of me through tears, I smiled back at you. Smiled down at my daughter, safe and asleep in bed. The only other wish of a parent, fulfilled.

Our Shining Star.

The race was over. As I lay sprawled out on the peak of the hill, heaving and panting, someone came over and looked down at me. 

“King…?” She was like I remembered her, adorned in those super-fancy racing silks, tiredness and tenderness in equal measure pooling in her eyes.

“But you weren’t part of the race…?” I asked. She laughed back, regally.

“Of course not! A first-class umamusume like me, running against you? I would’ve… would’ve…” The tiredness in her eyes sunk beneath them, “lost by a mile.” She extended a hand to me, pulling me upwards. As I fixed my eyes on the horizon, I saw that a deep red sun was about to sink deep below it. The sky billowed with orange and purple, and everyone who had raced me to the hill had already left.

“Phwah… That race was really hard!” I could feel my legs, still leaden, shaking.

“You did…” Her lip quivered, “Very well to lose it.”

“Hehe! Yep! But then… why do you look so sad, King?” The question hung in the evening air for a moment, before King grabbed me in the tightest hug I’d ever felt.

“W-Woah! Wha–?”

“Urara… Urara…!” The tears that had been held back fell freely, wetting my shoulder with their warmth. 

“It’s been so long, I…” She struggled to regain composure, never quite finding it. All she could do was stem the strength of her weeping enough to tell me, “Welcome back.”

“I’m home.” I returned her embrace as night fell across the valley.

“I didn’t think I’d still be so tired…” King was carrying me on her back, descending the hill as the colours of night swept over us. Even though there was nothing to light our way, the moon was full and the stars twinkled so brilliantly in the sky I knew there was never a chance of King getting lost on the way to wherever she was taking me.

“The stars are really pretty tonight, right King?” They blanketed the sky with their gleam, looking down on us with cosmic smiles.

“They were always pretty to you, Urara… Even on nights where they were dull and grey, or you could only see three or four of them from our dorm window, you’d always point outside and tell me how pretty they were,” King turned her attention to the black velvet above, “but you’re right about tonight’s sky… so, so right…” She sounded deeply wistful as she seemed to scan the sky for something.

“Look there, Urara,” she told me, pointing to a certain star that seemed to burn blindingly tonight, “do you see that star?”

“It’s super pretty…” I told her.

“You probably don’t realise it,” the wistfulness in her voice was replaced by something almost choked, “but that star is you.” As she told me this, something began to buzz inside my head.

“I’m… that star…?” I asked, my voice beginning to trail off. King stopped in her tracks.

“You are, Urara,” She patted my head as my cheek sank to rest on her shoulder, “so please… keep shining on. For all of us. Everywhere.” I could tell she was crying again.

“King, I… I’m really tired.” I told her, straining to keep my eyes awake.

“I know… I know… I’ll carry you to where you need to go, so just get some rest, okay?” 

“O-Okay!” She started again, “Um… will Trainer be there?”

“Yes… Trainer will be there,” No sooner had she started than she stopped again, and I could tell by the strain in her voice the tears were almost overwhelming her.

“A-And Spe? And Rice? Oh, and Ope?” I could barely murmur out these last few questions.

“Everyone who ever loved you will be there, Urara.”

“Is… that a lot of people?”

“...more than you could ever know.” King’s body trembled beneath me. I knew if I kept asking questions she would probably collapse, so I chose to let the wave of tiredness close my eyes.

“Hehe… yippee! Please wait for me, everyone…” I managed to hum out one last little prayer. Then I closed my eyes and let sleep take me, excited for when I could wake up and run with everyone again.