I sat on my bike and looked up at the sky. The stars in the ultramarine night were blotted out by the casinos’ gaudy neon light.
I really hate this town, I thought to myself.
It was still oppressively hot, so I put up my hair in a scrunchie. My mind was mush, like jam that had been simmered down to pulp.
My emotions were still bottled up and I didn’t feel like sitting, so I pedaled standing up as I cut through buildings that were under construction.
“Huff…huff…huff…”
I panted as I pedaled.
By the end of our conversation, I hadn’t been able to bring up the most important thing with Dr. Higano. But I couldn’t help it. My theory was just too absurd—even delusional—to share with anyone, even the doctor.
But I’d become obsessed with my delusional theory since I’d first thought of it.
I arrived at the Hard King Hotel. It had been modeled on a royal palace, and flashed with blue and orange lights. My old-fashioned bike didn’t match the decor, but I put it in the parking lot anyway. I felt pretty out of place myself as I walked in, following the seemingly never-ending red carpet, and finally made it inside the casino. The interior was nothing short of dazzling. A massive chandelier hung down from the high ceiling. But strangely, most of the customers looked pretty rough.
I faced the location we’d set up beforehand: the slots farthest to the left from the entrance. Electronic sounds cascaded in the air around the slots area, where everyone sat riveted in front of the simple matching games, their eyes reflecting the screens. No one paid me any attention.
I made my way over to a machine on the far left.
A beautiful woman was sitting there.
I didn’t know whether I was lucky or whether she had been saving the seat, but the machine to her right was open so I sat down.
Miraculously, she had agreed to meet me here. I called out her name, or more accurately, the only name I knew to call her by—“Otoha Tamachi.”
She looked over at me and smiled. “How are you, Yuri?”
Today “Otoha” had matched her outfit with the casino venue: she was wearing a formal, bright red dress slit up the leg, and stiletto pumps. Her makeup was different as well. Her lips were bright red, her gold eye shadow had glints of lamé, and her eyelashes were thick and prominent with mascara. She looked like a foreign celebrity; any trace of the demure princess from the day before yesterday was gone. You could’ve convinced me she was an entirely different person.
Nevertheless, the word that rose to the tip of my tongue didn’t change:
Beautiful.
“I wasn’t certain you’d actually meet with me,” I began.
“Haha. Relax, you don’t have to speak so formally.”
“Thank you, but I feel more comfortable this way.”
I didn’t think I could speak more casually to a woman whose true identity I didn’t know.
“I appreciate you taking time out of your schedule for me today. But what I’d like to talk about is so absurd I won’t be surprised if you laugh at me. My apologies in advance, but please hear me out.”
The woman looked at me inquisitively.
“I want to lay out a hypothesis I have. I’ll provide each and every piece of support that forms the basis for this crazy idea.”
The woman brushed her long hair aside and turned her whole body toward me.
I sighed deeply, gathered my breath, and then began to lay out my case:
Reina was extremely meticulous. She never let her boyfriend or her fiancé take pictures of her, and when her father sold the house, she threw out all her old photos, too.
After she had supposedly died, a coworker spotted Reina in her red BMW.
From high school onward, Reina used her beauty as a misdirection—despite her beauty, the way she looked was actually surprisingly forgettable.
Her apartment was almost impossibly absent of any personality.
Koichiro relied on psychoactive drugs after his wife’s death, yet he was still so disturbed that he became physically intimate with his daughter.
Koichiro was completely unaware of Reina’s boyfriend, Shota.
Reina’s fiancé, father, and boyfriend all had completely different impressions of her: ice sculpture, Snow White, and motherly.
Despite this, when Ken and Koichiro saw you, they both said you not only looked like Reina but gave off the same impression as her.
All of the Bumblebees, including Otoha Tamachi, went missing at the same time.
At right around the same time, Reina and Koichiro had been estranged for three years, when she was 18 to 21.
The woman laughed and shook her head. “I think I know what this crazy idea of yours is.”
“I have more support. Please listen.”
The face of the corpse couldn’t be identified because it had been cut off.
Reina and Koichiro aren’t biologically related, so not even a DNA test could prove whether the body was his daughter.
The dental records used to ID the body were from when she was 21, after all the Bumblebees went missing.
Shota was almost disturbingly devoted to Reina.
Shota drank the entire energy drink even after he realized it had cyanide in it.
Reina might’ve had others devoted to her. And while she was at Junseiwa Academy, the Bumblebees followed her around so closely it was unnatural.
I had dumped out everything I wanted to say. I realized my heart was throbbing heavily and pressed my hands against my chest. The cacophony around us completely faded from my hearing.
The woman was unfazed. She only looked at me with an unconcerned expression. It wasn’t possible to get a read on what she was feeling based on her facial expressions; Dr. Higano had said she was exceptionally skilled at lying.
“There’s a conversation I had with Reina while we were at Junseiwa Academy that I remember vividly,” I added.