The operating table had been covered with black leather, but now it was splitting, and only part of it was left. Part of it had been cut away entirely, exposing the metal frame. The black stain covered everything, and the boy’s fingers ran softly across it. I could almost hear the faint sound of his fingers stroking the bloodstain. It gave me goose bumps, as if it was me he was touching.
“Like Hiroko just said, I was curious to see how you would react when you heard the tape.”
Staring at me, the boy tapped the operating table twice with one hand—quietly, wordlessly. His eyes made it clear what he wanted me to do.
My back against the wall, I slowly shook my head. If I moved toward him, I would die. I would be killed like my sister. But it was not fear that made me refuse.
Standing quietly next to the operating table, the light made him look like he was floating in the darkness. His profile was lit so brightly that he seemed almost divine. I felt less fear than awe, like of some higher being dealing out death that was meaningless, indiscriminate, and absurd.
You know how I sometimes said things to hurt you or to confuse you?
“Natsumi, come here,” the boy said.
He was telling me to climb onto the operating table. He was only three steps away.
If he moved quickly, he could easily grab me, could easily overpower me. But he didn’t move. He simply waited for me to come over to him.
My legs almost did as he wanted. Deep down inside me, I felt a strange certainty that I had to do as he asked. When I realized that, it startled me.
Why would I go to him of my own accord? I kept my back against the wall, staring at him, confused.
Logically, he explained, “Narsumi, you already know.”
“What?” I asked, puzzled.
“That I’m going to kill you. And you’ve already decided to let me.”
My sister’s trembling voice, her breath ragged, washed over us. The boy stared at me, barely even blinking, his gaze so penetrative it was like he was looking right into my head.
“You are attracted to death … and you came here all on your own.”
“That’s not true,” I insisted.
The boy narrowed his eyes. “I believe that death means ‘loss,’ ” he said quietly. “At the moment of death, all connections dying people have with the world around them are severed. Everything that bound them to those they loved, those they cared about, vanishes. They will never again see the sun, feel the wind, sense darkness or silence. Joy, grief, happiness, despair—they lose all connection to those things. Natsumi, I know exactly what you went through when you decided to come here.”
I had my head in my hands. The flashlight I’d been holding was rolling across the floor. I remembered my parents, Itsuki, my classmates, Akagi.
“It must have been hard to come here—but you made up your mind. You know how much your parents will grieve if you don’t come back home, yet you came anyway. You severed all connections, said your silent goodbyes, and came to hear a dead person’s voice.”
The boy’s words stabbed right into the place that shook me the most. A voiceless something escaped my lips, something between a scream and a groan. My hands on my head, I forced it back.
Natsumi, the reason I made things hard for you really was of no significance. It was about Akagi.
What I had done was abandon my parents, even though they were already damaged by the loss of their eldest daughter. Guilt raged through me like a wildfire.
“You had two days after I gave you the second tape. During that time, you said goodbye to everyone you met—and as you bid farewell to everyone and everything connected to your life, you moved steadily toward your death.”
Finally, I realized it: Everything I had done since I met the boy was a slow-motion suicide. When I’d left the house without telling my parents, I’d left behind my last chance to turn back. I had chosen to sever the heaviest chains binding me to this world … and to come here.
I never told you how I met Akagi, did I?
“I …”
I lowered my hands and looked around me. The cold concrete room was filled with empty darkness. There was nothing in it but the bloodstained operating table and the boy—a very lonely place.
My feet moved. My back left the wall, and I stepped toward the operating table.
I had abandoned everything in my life of my own free will. Nothing mattered but my sister’s voice. Could I even be considered alive, right at this moment? My flesh was still functioning, but I was halfway into the land of the dead already.
He came up to me on the street. I only found out we went to the same college later.
I was standing across the table from the boy now. He never once moved a muscle, merely prying all hesitation out of me with words alone.
The boy stared at me, so close to me now, looking down at me slightly, as he was taller.
“I first found out that you existed when Hiroko made this tape. Ever since, I’ve been wanting to meet you,” he whispered. “You really do look like her.”
My sister’s voice echoed through the room, vanishing into the silent building. “I know why you gave me the tape, why you had to bring me here,” I said.
He looked intrigued.
“You aren’t doing this for fun, are you? Not for cheap thrills. You said so yourself, in the restaurant. Everything other people say seems like it’s scripted—everything seems fake … and only death seems real.”
After we started going out, Akagi said that he’d often seen me in the bookstore, and that’s when he first got interested. I was always in a white wool jacket, standing in front of the historical fiction shelf, he said …
This boy had killed people. And he felt absolutely no guilt about it. I knew I shouldn’t feel any sympathy for him, but even so … I did feel a little sorry for him.
“You wanted to see if I would try to recover my relationship with her, even if that meant accepting death. Trying to understand that which you cannot.”
For a long moment, he stared at me without expression. There were no words, only my sister’s voice echoing through the room. There was no way for me to tell what he was feeling.
You see? Akagi saw you first.
At long last, he placed his hands on the operating table. “Sit here, Natsumi.”
Feeling no fear, I sat down on the table stained with my sister’s blood, my back to the boy. I could feel him standing behind me.
The table was cold, and the chill passed right through the fabric of my jeans. I was about to die, but I felt peaceful, like a calm sea.
My hands gripped the edges of the table, feeling my sister’s dried blood. I couldn’t move. Or I felt no desire to move, so it felt like I couldn’t move. Everything felt cold and stiff, down to my fingers.
The light was behind me. I could see our shadows on the wall in front of me. The boy’s shadow half covered my own, standing slightly to one side.
We always dressed the same, and people always told us we looked alike … Akagi had called out to me by accident, thinking I was you.
The boy’s shadow moved. He raised his arm, his shadow rising over mine.