Gotou Julia
“THANK YOU,” Julia told the boy as she handed his phone back. Then she looked over at Ai standing on the sidelines, and their eyes met. “Ai?” she called to him.
He nodded wordlessly, perhaps because the boy was still standing there.
“I want you to go find the girl.”
In response, he shot a quick glance at the boy, then back to Julia. “Okay. If you want, you could wait for me somewhere…”
“I won’t,” she replied flatly.
He nodded several times in contemplation. Each nod forced the air out of her chest until she could scarcely breathe, but she intended to endure it.
“In that case, you could contact me if something comes up…”
“I won’t.”
In a split-second, she both anticipated and braced herself for the pain that was sure to come. Even then, she never imagined it would hit so hard. Still, she knew she needed to tell him.
“I’m sorry, Ai, but you don’t need to wait for me. Or contact me.”
She knew he was the type of person who never questioned the sincerity of a friend. He wouldn’t suspect her of lying, and even if she was outright deceiving him, he wouldn’t cross that bridge until he came to it. As a result, her next words held more meaning than anything she had ever said to anyone else.
“This is where we say goodbye.”
All she did was take a step back—and yet, he immediately stepped forward to grab her by the arm, as if she was standing on the edge of a cliff. But she knew better now. There was no cliff. There was only the fog of ambiguity, within which not even she could predict where her next step might lead.
“Julia?”
At this point, Ai might have completely forgotten about the dumbfounded boy standing off to the side. His sights were entirely set on the dear friend in front of him, and his gaze was so direct that her resolve wavered as she began to question whether she was actually capable of leaving his kindness behind.
“What’s going—?”
“I was using you, Ai.” As his grip weakened, she took another step back, and his fingers slid down her arm. “I only got in touch with you so I could figure myself out. You’ve been so nice to me, but when I thought about how I could get fired, and all these years could go to waste, and it could mean the death of Gotou Julia, I realized it’s not you I want to be with. And you shouldn’t have to wait even a single night for someone like that.”
He listened to each and every word—accepted them, chewed them, swallowed them whole. As he held her gaze, his thin lips parted, as if some had caught in his throat.
“If not me, then who?”
“Everyone.”
“The girls in your group?”
Though she knew it wasn’t an appropriate time, Julia couldn’t help but laugh. “Of course not.”
“Okay then…” Without blinking, he took a deep breath, then exhaled. “Is this what your heart wants?”
“I don’t know. I’ve thought about it, but I suspect I’ve never actually known what my heart wants. And right now, I want to keep living in that ambiguity.”
His grip left her arm. For a moment, he stood there hanging his head. Then he raised a hand to his mouth.
“I…”
As she watched his face, waiting for the words to come, she clearly saw the change in him. The hand at his mouth slid down to his neck to scratch an itch, and then his lips curled into a sincere smile, and she knew his reaction was genuine.
“I wasn’t planning to just sit around, y’know. But if you’re asking me not to, then I won’t. I won’t think of you as a friend, and I won’t contact you. But…if we run into each other someday…let’s talk then.”
She knew she was a hypocrite—she understood that full well. And she should have known Ai wasn’t the type to lie. But in that moment, her heart was a two-tone gradient of praying he wasn’t and wishing he was. In the fog of ambiguity, there was no telling which was which.
“I’ll always be your fan.”
Nevertheless, it was only polite to accept his words as truth and respond with some manner of sincerity in kind, no matter how ambiguous.
“Thanks. If I get the chance to stand onstage again, I’ll give my coolest performance yet, so I hope you look forward to it.”
He nodded, but the look in his eyes was distant, as if he had already moved past the conversation—as if she was no longer standing right in front of him.
“Welp, guess I’d better go save the girl.”
With that, he turned to look at the boy rooted to the spot beside him. Right as Julia was wondering what he was about to do, however, he tossed out an unexpected question:
“Hey, sorry to ask—do you know where I can find Itobayashi Akane?”
“Huh? Why her?”
“Wait, you two know each other?” Julia cut in, alarmed. Neither of them nodded.
“I wouldn’t go that far,” the boy replied, frowning evasively.
“Doesn’t matter. Do you know what she’s up to?” Ai pressed.
“What? No. Why would I?”
“Okay then, maybe I’d better start with a phone call.”
Watching this exchange, Julia had an idea. It was incredibly selfish, and completely out of line with the professionalism she’d committed to thus far, but…in order to make peace with her future self, and all the people who loved her regardless, she felt it was something she needed to do.
“Hey, you. If you don’t have any plans, I have a favor to ask.”
The boy flinched hard when she addressed him, and she wondered which Gotou Julia he was seeing when he looked at her. She was still a bit scared to know.