‘There’s something weird about being invited to a wedding and showing up in a white dress.’
‘What the hell? S’long as you’re invited, you’re a guest, and guests can wear what they like.’
Her boyfriend Katsuya’s counterargument wasn’t much of one and they were just going around in circles.
‘Fine, sure, the guests are part of the event on the wedding day, but there’s no question that the bride is the star of the show. The bride and groom are supposedly the hosts and the guests are there to celebrate them. Everybody knows that white is the bride’s colour so people with any common sense don’t wear white.’
‘Who says what’s common sense?’
‘Common sense is just stuff you know, it’s not like there’s anyone who decides it.’ Misa let out a sigh. ‘Come on, you wouldn’t show up to a wedding dressed like that, would you?’
Katsuya’s look that day was baggy, hip-hop streetwear.
‘What, now you’re complaining about the way I dress?’
‘No, that’s not what I meant! Just that there’s an appropriate time and place for everything.’
‘If you’re a girl, you have to be careful what you wear, even if it’s only a white shawl. You don’t want to upset the bride, of course, and nor do you want everyone else to think you’re clueless.’
Katsuya snickered through his nose. ‘Girls waste their time on so much bullshit. You’re a perfect example.’
They’d been dating for about a year so she was familiar with his cursing, but every so often he’d spew out some inexcusable criticism or abuse that went too far. And whenever this happened, it wasn’t in Misa’s nature to remain silent.
Though it was only afterward that she remembered how much aggro it created.
‘So you think you know more about weddings than I do? You mentioned you recently went to an older friend’s wedding, right? Are you sure you RSVP’ed properly?’
‘Course I did – all you do is just send that thing back.’
‘So how did you fix the return address on the front of the response card?’
Katsuya’s complexion changed – a quirk of his that happened when someone pointed out something he didn’t know.
‘Don’t tell me you just sent it back as is?’
Misa was still annoyed about Katsuya’s rude comment and so now her tone turned mean as she grilled him. Katsuya still didn’t respond, and his silence made it clear that was exactly what he had done.
‘It’s impolite to return the response card addressed to you with the honorific “sama” still intact, so you cross it out with two diagonal lines, to be humble, and write “from” before your own name. Then you cross out the “from” in front of the sender’s name and change their title to “sama” – that’s just good manners.’
Katsuya sulked in silence.
‘On the other side, you can’t just circle “will attend” and fill in your name and address. Again, you have to cross out the honorific and make sure you also cross out “will not attend”.’
She chose not to mention the additional courtesy of writing in ‘accepts with pleasure’ or some other nicety – that’d be far too much to expect of Katsuya. It had been her intention to stop there, but she couldn’t help herself. Part of it was payback for his nasty comment, part of it was just her being bossy.
‘… of course you also have to make sure you cross out the honorifics where you fill in your name and address—’
Katsuya interrupted her lecture by suddenly kicking the train door that he was leaning against. Misa flinched. Katsuya’s eyes were glassy. She looked around anxiously and, indeed, the sound had drawn stares from everyone in the car.
A young girl seated opposite was looking over with eyes wide. So was the woman beside her who appeared to be her grandmother.
Katsuya, no doubt aware of the other passengers’ attention, kicked the door again, harder this time.
‘You think you’re such hot shit because you know all that, huh?’
At least they weren’t someplace private, like at Katsuya’s apartment, where he lived alone …
Someplace where he’d hit her.
‘S-sorry. It’s not that I think I know everything, it’s just … it’s social etiquette so I thought it’d be good for you to know about it too—’
‘You makin’ fun of me?! You think you’re hot shit because you know all this etiquette crap, so you can lecture me?!’
He kicked the door a third time.
The little girl started to whimper. Not because she thought it was directed at her, but because the sound of the door being kicked so roughly and the abuse being hurled so brazenly in public were scary for a child.
Just as Misa was thinking this, Katsuya clicked his tongue and muttered, more quietly this time, ‘Shut up, you little brat!’