Chapter One:
11:14:36 a.m.
GOD, THIS SUCKS. Man, I wish I were dead.
Such were my thoughts as I moped my way down the boulevard, wondering why the hell I’d ever agreed to this in the first place. I should have just stayed in Tokyo. Up here in Hakodate, the only thing stretched thinner than the sharp autumn air was my patience. Though the sun was high, any time we rounded a corner and entered into the shadow of the city’s stunted skyline, the biting chill set in so suddenly that it felt like stepping into a walk-in freezer. It was a cold so keen I couldn’t believe it was only late October—yet I could feel the sweat trickling down my sides as my armpits refused to be outdone by the perpetual perspiration on my palms. But this was less a testament to my duffle coat’s heat retention than a symptom of my extreme social anxiety.
Just ahead of me, four boys walked shoulder to shoulder, taking up almost the entire sidewalk as they laughed and jostled each other. Beneath their various overcoats and down jackets, they wore the same high school uniform as I did. These were the students I’d been grouped up with for our class field trip—but you wouldn’t know that just by listening in, as I hadn’t said a single word to any of them in almost a full half hour now.
At first, I’d made a paltry effort to walk closer behind them and contribute to the conversation with passive one-word answers and nods of agreement. I knew I wasn’t actually engaging with them, though—just trying to pretend I was a part of the club. But after a while, I realized just how pathetically futile the whole exercise was, and I slowed my pace until I’d lengthened the distance between us from a single stride to about two meters. I should have known better than to think I could even perform the role of listener.
The four of them were already an established friend group—close enough that you’d often see them hanging out between classes and eating lunch together every day. There was no room for a guy like me to insert himself into their little clique. Not when I’d hardly ever spoken a word to any of them, let alone gone out and actually done something with them as a group until now. Anyone with eyes could see that I was the odd man out here—the one guy in the frame who clearly didn’t belong.
I knew I never should have come on this trip. I knew it all too well.
“Don’t you think so too, Mugino-kun?”
“Whuh?!”
I lifted my gaze from the sidewalk to see that one of the members of my group—a boy named Nagai—was looking back at me over his shoulder. Flustered by this sudden address, I scrambled to close the gap between me and the rest of the group.
“Er… M-my bad,” I said. “What were you guys talking about?”
“Ha ha. ‘My bad,’ he says. Chill out, man. We’re not gonna bite your head off,” Nagai said with a chuckle, and the other members of the group laughed along. I knew from his tone that this teasing was all in good fun, but it still made my face go beet red. “We were just saying how it feels like kind of a waste, coming to Hokkaido in the fall, y’know what I mean? Like, we won’t even get to see any snow this time of year. Would’ve been way cooler to come during the winter, don’t you agree?”
“I mean, I dunno… Maybe.”
“What, not a fan of cold weather or something?”
“N-no, it’s not that… Think I’m mostly indifferent to it.”
“Gotcha… Well, fair enough!”
Nagai flashed me a slightly awkward smile, apparently realizing that attempting to include me in the conversation had been a fruitless endeavor. I felt bad for letting his consideration go to waste. He was a pretty cool guy, all things considered.
It was Nagai who’d welcomed me into the group when I was the only one left unaccounted for and the teacher asked if anyone wouldn’t mind letting me join them for the class trip. He didn’t even so much as flinch at the idea, and there was no opposition from any of the other group members either. I really was lucky to have such good-natured classmates; it was a far cry from what I’d put up with in junior high. Though, in all honesty, there was also something about being treated so kindly and accepted so warmly that only made my self-imposed reclusiveness sting that much worse.
From up ahead, a man in a stuffy-looking business suit came walking down the sidewalk, so Nagai and his friends cleared a path. The closer we got to Hakodate Station, the more people we saw bustling about in their heavy jackets, scarves, and sweaters. For whatever reason, I’d assumed people from Hokkaido were conditioned to the cold, but most of the passersby were dressed much the same as we were.
“Yo, Nagai,” said one of the other boys in the group. “We should totally hit up the local Animate after we grab some lunch, don’tcha think?”
“Oh, come on, man,” said Nagai. “We come all the way out to Hokkaido, and all you wanna do is look at anime merch?”
“I mean, there’s gotta be at least some regional differences, right?”
“You think? I dunno… Actually, where even is the Animate here in Hakodate?”
“Just over on the opposite side of Goryokaku Park.”
“Okay, maybe we can swing by after we check out the fort, then,” Nagai mused, then turned back to me. “Anything you feel like checking out while we’re here, Mugino-kun?”
“Oh, uh… No, not really,” I said.
“Ah. Got it.”
He abandoned this attempt at communication far quicker than the last.
All of a sudden, I felt starkly ashamed of my inability to even reach out and accept the olive branch being offered to me. Maybe I should have just suggested some random tourist trap, even if I didn’t really want to go there. He’d gone out of his way to engage me in the conversation; I should have at least made an effort to be more talkative. Right now, I was nothing but dead weight dragging down the rest of the group.