The umbrella was gone.

My long umbrella that I left in the convenience store's umbrella stand had unexpectedly disappeared while I was doing the shopping. I only took my eyes off it for a couple of minutes.

The shopping was one tub of butter.

The part-time store employee said, in a business-like manner, that somebody probably took it because it started to rain, as he held out paper and a ball-point pen.

He said that it probably wouldn't be returned, but just in case, I should leave my name and telephone number.

I reverently filled out the form with my contact details, like a prayer.

It had been bought for me by my late grandfather.

The light blue floral pattern made it seem like being beneath a hydrangea bush, making me happy. It was already quite worn, but I loved that umbrella.

Salt-free butter or regular butter - if I hadn't hesitated over this would I have been in time?

Or would it have been better if I'd taken out some small coins, so I didn't have to get change?

As I thought these things, the tears started to flow, so I flew out of there after I finished writing the note.

The shop assistant offered to lend me a plastic umbrella, but it was wrong that it wasn't my umbrella. There was no way I could return home with some other umbrella in place of my umbrella, so I ran back, crying in the rain.

I didn't want to think about it being stolen from me.

I didn't want to believe that there were people in this world who could steal an umbrella on a rainy day.

If they thought about the owner returning home sopping wet from rain, there's no way they could so nonchalantly reach out and take it.

But despite that, how - .

How could Maria-sama overlook such an event, I just couldn't comprehend it.

I'd only gone to buy butter from the convenience store, I couldn't understand why the rain was falling like some kind of divine punishment.

After I returned home, soaked to the bone, my mother used the butter I'd bought to bake me a pound cake, to cheer me up. But it felt like it was a bit saltier than usual.

It wasn't because the butter was salty. It was because I was crying as I ate it.

To me, that umbrella was special.

An irreplaceable existence.