So, is this supposed to be suicide? If it is, the position of the alice is strange. If a yukkuri wanted to jump off a bridge they would go down by leaning forward or jumping forward but this alice looks like it's just floating there.
HankySpank said: I can tell you just from the picture it most likely involves Alice realizing she couldn't amount to anything, thus threw herself off a bridge
Good guess. I just finished skimming this anko this earlier.
Alice was unhappy being a pet yukkuri, and swapped places with a stray Alice at the first opportunity. She had a romanticized view of wild yukkuri life, and wanted to taste freedom. She has dreams to become someone important, was confident that as a pet yukkuri she will have superior status and knowhow compared to the strays.
Unfortunately, reality showed her otherwise. Raised as a pet yukkuri all her life, she was ill-equipped for life outdoors, and was rejected by the herd of wild yukkuri. Worse off, she could no longer go back to the life she had before. Rejected by other yukkuri and unable to live as a wild yukkuri, with the last of her strength she threw herself off the bridge in despair. Finally she did become something of use -- as food for the fishes in the water under the bridge.
To quote the last lines of the anko:
"A bird should not be caged. But she is only a bun, not a bird."
Also, it's too bad yukkuri don't wear shoes or Alice could've done that 'leaving your shoes at the doorstep' shtick they do in japanese TV dramas.
Anyway, thanks for the summary Skrib.
I actually made a mistake since I was recalling the story from memory. Looking through the anko again, the second part should be "But she is just a bun, and could never fly in the sky".
So the moral of the story is, put the buns in the cage since they aren't like birds nothing good will come from their freedom. . .i don't like that moral! D:
JusticeItEasy said: So the moral of the story is, put the buns in the cage since they aren't like birds nothing good will come from their freedom. . .i don't like that moral! D:
Yeah, this anko used way too many figures of speech, I'm not really sure I've got everything right. The summary I typed down is the gist of it, from what I could understand.
The bird cage motif is repeated throughout the fic as Alice compared herself with a caged bird while living as a pet. To fly in the sky is to be free...
Her last words were "It's like flying with the birds..."