“You can use that room as you wish,” the boy told me.
“O-Okay,” I responded.
Standing in front of the sliding door of the guest room, I gave a nod at the boy’s words.
We were back at the boy’s house. Or, more precisely, the house that belonged to his grandfather. It was the somewhat aged house into which I had collapsed from the pitch-black darkness after striking a deal with the listless god.
“Um… What about your family?” There was no sign of anyone else in the house but us.
“Well, it’s just me and grandpa,” he replied in a matter-of-fact tone. After telling me he would change, he started climbing the stairs. As I watched his retreating figure, I recalled our conversation just a few hours earlier.
“I’m willing to cooperate,” he had told me on the long staircase leading to the Death God’s Mansion. As he said that, he began descending the stairs briskly.
Taken aback by his unexpected words, I was at a loss for words and could not move. The boy then stopped in his tracks, looking back at me, standing there motionless.
“I’ll leave you behind,” he warned.
“Eh?”
“You’ve lost your memory, right? So, you don’t know your way home?” He resumed his descent down the stairs after voicing his thoughts indifferently.
Was this his way of telling me to follow him? I trailed behind him, maintaining a gap of about a meter.
We didn’t exchange a single word on our way home. However, each time I lagged behind, he slowed down his pace for me. Upon reaching the house, he opened the door and gestured for me to enter.
Sliding open the door to the guest room I’d been told I could use freely, I hunched over on the tatami mat. I hadn’t really thought things through with all that had happened. I wondered if entering the home of a boy I barely knew was okay.
His living with his grandfather meant the only ones in this house right now were the boy and me. When I became aware of that fact, my heartbeat quickened and my face heated up. At that moment, I flinched at the soft knock on the sliding door.
“Y-Yes?” I stammered.
The boy slid open the door in response. He had changed from his uniform into black loungewear.
“Can we talk for a bit?”
I nodded in response, and the boy sat in front of the table in the guest room. I sat opposite him, with the table between us, straightening my posture. Once he saw me seated, he began to speak.
“About what happens next, you said you need to ‘tie fates’ or ‘recover your memory’ to return to your original body, right?”
“Yes,” I replied, my expression tense. The boy made a slightly irritated face.
“I know we don’t know each other, but can we stop being formal? We seem to be about the same age.”
“O-Okay,” I replied somewhat awkwardly.
“By ‘recovering your memory,’ you mean understanding who you are?”
“Probably… But I don’t even remember my own name. I do kind of remember the roads around here, though.”
“So, you used to live around here, or you’ve been here before…” The boy stated it as a fact, but something about what he said puzzled me.
“Used to…? As in past?”
“I’ve never seen the uniform you’re wearing now.”
I glanced down at the black sailor-style school uniform I was wearing.
“I don’t think it’s from a school around here,” the boy added. His words didn’t quite click with me.
“I… this uniform…” I stammered.
I tried to convey this, but my voice naturally faded to a weak whisper.
“Huh?”
As I had anticipated, my words didn’t reach him. His face hardened as he asked me to repeat myself, causing me to shrink back.
“Look, you need to speak up. Why are you so timid? Am I that scary?”
His words made me retract further.
“I should mention that I’m actually the one who’s scared. You may not be fully aware of it, but you’re technically a ghost, right?”
His unexpected comment caught me off guard.
“You’re scared?”
He hadn’t shown any sign of it.
“To tell you the truth, quite a bit,” he admitted, seemingly uncomfortable. Oddly enough, his confession made me feel a bit more at ease.
“When I fell from the long staircase, I was wearing this uniform. So, I feel like I couldn’t have lived too far away.”
Upon hearing my words, the boy dropped his gaze, deep in thought.
“You said you fell from that long staircase, but I never heard any talk about an accident,” he mused. I wasn’t sure if my memories were correct. Could it be a misunderstanding on my part?
“For now, let’s check if there were any accidents nearby. I’ll go back to that staircase tomorrow,” he proposed.
I reflexively responded, “I’ll go too!”
“Sure, but…” He trailed off.
Seeing me lean forward eagerly, he stepped back, a shadow crossing his face.
“I don’t know whether you can be revived right away or if it will take time… but there’s one promise I want from you if I’m to help.”
“A promise?” I echoed.
“Promise me you’ll never touch me,” he declared, his tone severe. The atmosphere instantly grew tense. I felt as if I shouldn’t ask why he made such a request.
Instead of inquiring, I reached out with my right hand, extending it to the edge of the table. With a determined grip, I tried to hold onto it. But my hand merely slipped through the table.
Witnessing this, the boy’s eyes widened.
“I can’t touch anything, even if I try. Whenever I consciously try to make physical contact, my body slips through. I don’t feel hungry or cold either. And my memories… Being a spirit… really means having nothing.” I found myself growing sad as I explained.
“You said you don’t remember your name, right?”
When I nodded in confirmation, the boy fell silent for a moment before suggesting, “How about ‘Yuu’ then?”
“Yuu?” I asked, puzzled by his sudden suggestion.
“How about using ‘Yuu’ as your name? It will be inconvenient if you don’t have a name.”
“A name…”
“Yes, Yuu for ‘Yuurei,’ an ‘spirit’ in Japanese.”
His simplistic way of coming up with a name made me laugh a little.
“What?” he grumbled, glaring at my amused smile.
“Okay, and you are…?”
“I’m Hajime Soejima.”
I was still smiling. To that, Soejima-kun responded brusquely, as if to cover up his embarrassment.
“It’s just a temporary name until we find out your real one.”
I wondered what my real name was. Who was I?
Suddenly, an image popped into my mind. It was of me crying in front of a door before I lost consciousness.
“I want to disappear…”
What was that about? A small feeling of anxiety crept into my heart.
I couldn’t sleep that night. Although Soejima-kun prepared a futon for me, my body just passed through it, making it impossible to cover myself with the blanket. But I could walk upstairs and sit… I wonder how being a spirit works?
Looking outside from the window in the guest room, I could see a frail crescent moon floating in the night sky.
From the ceiling, I heard a faint creaking noise. I wondered if Soejima-kun, who should be in his room upstairs, was still awake.
Staying at the house of a boy I had just met, having him give me a name… It had all turned out rather strange. Well, the most bizarre part is probably that I’m a spirit.
“Yuu…” I whispered the temporary name he had given me. Strangely, saying it aloud seemed to make me feel slightly more optimistic.
In the night sky, the clouds slowly covered the crescent moon.
I wondered where the listless god could be . Is he somewhere watching me?
That night, I spent the entire time gazing at the crescent moon in the night sky.