Although it was already eight o’clock at night, the exhilarating emotional high had yet to subside. I caught myself fidgeting nervously, unable to sit still or calm down. And so, worried I’d only get yelled at by Ayaka again if I started pacing around the house, I decided I might as well go for a walk instead. I told my parents I was heading out for a bit, then slipped on my shoes and went to get some fresh air.
It was cool and pleasant outside at this time of night, far from the sweltering humidity of this afternoon. There was a gentle, constant breeze blowing through the streets, and the sounds of summer insects tickled my eardrums. I started walking—first through my neighborhood, then down along the highway, before turning and walking all the way to the big river, and finally down along its elevated embankment.
I remembered when the river’s floodplain had been a prime spot for viewing fireflies when I was younger—though now it had been converted into a prime spot for unlawful dumping. Large pieces of furniture and discarded appliances littered the riverside, and there was nary a firefly to be seen. And yet, I had to admit, there was a bit of a modern artistry to the rusty bicycles, the broken brown-box TV sets, and weed-infested sofas—all left to rot and decay out here under the stars.
I looked up at the sky; it was a half-moon night, though bright enough that I could make out the contours of the darkened half as well. The stars were out, glimmering from behind a thin veil of fast-moving clouds. It was a nice night for a walk—and the cool breeze against my face was enough to make me naturally want to quicken my pace. Before I knew it, I found myself awfully far from home. I pulled out my cell phone to check the time and found that it was already well past nine o’clock.
It’s getting late, I thought. I’d better start heading home.
“…Hm?”
Right when I was about to turn back, I heard a strange noise coming from somewhere nearby. It sounded like someone hiccupping, almost—a series of quick, punctuated breaths with considerably longer periods of silence in between.
I stopped and took a look around. Just down the hill from the embankment, on the side heading back toward the highway, there was a small park. And in that park, I spied the silhouette of someone sitting on one of the benches. Their back was turned to me, and their head hung low, so I couldn’t see their face—though I could at least tell, thanks to a nearby streetlamp, that they were wearing a standard schoolgirl’s uniform. Probably a girl around my age, then.
By this point, I figured I had a solid idea as to what the sound was. She had to be going through a pretty rough time right now, or else why would she be out there crying alone on a bench in the dark? At the same time, this certainly didn’t seem like the sort of situation in which the help of a random passerby like myself was necessary, much less desired, and the last thing I wanted was to make her think I was some shady character offering help with ulterior motives. The best course of action, it seemed, was for me to ignore her and head back home… But for whatever reason, I couldn’t bring myself to.
Upon closer inspection, I saw that her sailor-style uniform looked to be the same as that of Tsubakioka Junior High—the school Ayaka was attending, and my own alma mater as well. This thought made me feel a strange sense of kinship with her, and although I knew it wasn’t my duty as an alumnus to watch over every student who came after me, I still found myself suddenly curious about what the problem was and wanting to help.
After a few more moments’ hesitation, I descended the embankment and made my way over toward the park. I circled around to the entrance and finally got a good look at the girl from the front—though she still had her face buried in her hands, so I couldn’t make out her expression. But one thing did immediately stick out to me: her brightly colored hair.
Perhaps it was just the light from the park’s streetlamp playing tricks on me, but it almost appeared to be the sort of naturally transparent, palish blonde that would typically imply non-Japanese descent. Assuming that was the case, then it could only be—
Nah. That doesn’t even make any sense, I thought, laughing to myself.
Cautiously, I moved a little bit closer. With each step, I closed the distance between myself and the bench, and I gradually got a better look at the girl—and eventually I noticed something odd about her attire. It was ill-fitting, as though she was wearing a uniform that was several sizes too small. The fabric looked to be stretched extremely tight around the shoulders, and the hem of the blouse was so short that you could see her midriff from the navel on down. And for whatever reason, she wasn’t wearing any shoes or even socks. It suggested that she’d walked all the way out here on her bare feet.
The closer I got, the more my heart pounded again, though this was not the pleasant, fluttering excitement I’d felt earlier. This was more uncomfortable—that sort of awkward, anxious feeling you get at first when faced with something wholly different from what you’ve known before. Something you can’t quite wrap your head around. And yet, I couldn’t just walk away now. I had to know for sure.
About two, maybe three meters away from the bench, the bottom of my shoe scraped loudly against the pavement—and the person sitting on the bench jerked their head up. As the familiar bob of ash-blond locks billowed outward from the momentum, then drifted back down, I knew that I could feign ignorance no longer. Because I did, undeniably, know exactly who this person was.
“…Ushio?”
After all, we were once best friends.
Ushio had been born with naturally silver-blond hair, which he got from his Russian mother—and it was so bright, it was almost translucent. As far as I knew, he was the only person in all of Tsubakioka with hair like that. His mother had passed away when we were in elementary school, and his little sister, Misao, inherited their father’s thick, black hair. Obviously, with the right combination of bleach and hair dye, I assumed anyone could artificially achieve Ushio’s hair color, so I didn’t want to jump to conclusions at first—but now that I’d seen his face, I could say without a shadow of a doubt that the person sitting in front of me was indeed my old friend Ushio.
Ushio looked at me like a deer in headlights: startled, but unable to move or make a sound. He just sat there trembling, his already-pale skin now looking white as a sheet. I could tell from the swollen redness around them that he had indeed been sobbing his eyes out. Now his ash-gray irises simply stared back at me, wavering in disbelief.