This is the first door I will shut.
Because I was pushing so hard, removing my hands from the door is more akin to peeling them away. My legs are weak. The shallow pool is as still as glass. Birdsong fills the air. The man is standing a few paces away from me, staring at the closed door.
“Um… What just happened?” I ask.
“The Keystone should have been in place.”
“Huh?”
He finally turns away from the door and looks me in the eye.
“…Why did you come here? Why could you see the worm? Where did the Keystone go?”
“Uh, um…” His tone is insistent, but my answer is confused. “Worm? Keystone…? You mean like a rock? What are you talking about?”
He glares at me. Wait, is he blaming me for something? Why?
“What is going on?!” I snap, suddenly angry. He blinks in surprise, then sighs, carelessly pushing a long strand of hair out of his eye. The small miracle of elegance in that gesture makes me even madder. He ignores me and looks back at the door.
“…This place turned into a Gate. That’s where the worm comes through,” he mutters cryptically and starts to walk away. “Thank you for helping me. Now please forget everything you saw here and go home.”
As he strides off, I notice that the dark bloodstain on his left arm is spreading. It’s the wound he got protecting me.
“Wait!” I shout.
At this time of afternoon, Tamaki wouldn’t be home. With that in mind, I unlock the front door.
“Please go upstairs. I’ll get the first aid kit and be up in a minute,” I say to the man, who’s standing in the entryway. I head toward the living room.
“I appreciate the sentiment, but I—”
“If you hate hospitals that much, at least let me give you first aid,” I say firmly. He’s been stubbornly resisting treatment since we left the ruined hotel. He hates doctors? What is he, a five-year-old? My house’s familiar entryway looks ridiculously small with him standing in it. Behind me, I hear him reluctantly climbing the stairs.
A news helicopter is flying overhead, which is unusual. That’s how big the earthquake was. On my way home from the ruins, I saw crumbled stone walls and fallen roof tiles. My neighborhood, which is usually deathly quiet, was as crowded as a festival, with everyone cleaning up and congratulating one another on surviving.
Our living room is strewn with stuff. The books from the shelf are all over the floor, an etching has fallen off the wall, and our Japanese ash has tipped over in its pot, spilling dirt across the floor. In the corner where Tamaki hangs her nostalgic photos, some of the frames have fallen off the wall. Glancing at a picture of myself about to cry on my first day of kindergarten (and Tamaki, ten years younger, smiling beside me), I open a cabinet and search for the first aid box.
I climb the stairs, thinking my room must be a mess, but I’m surprised to find it fairly neat. The man must have tidied up while I was downstairs. He’s sitting in the middle of the clean room, asleep. He must have been exhausted. He’s pulled the kiddie chair out from the corner and is sitting on it. It’s a small wooden chair, old and painted yellow. From the tidied room to the children’s chair, I have the awkward feeling he’s seen some private, embarrassing side of me.
“All righty, let’s get that wound washed,” I say loudly, walking him up.
“At one twenty this afternoon, an earthquake occurred with a lower six seismic intensity rating, originating in southern Miyazaki Prefecture. There is no risk of an associated tsunami. As of the present time, no injuries have been reported…”
The man listens to that much of the report, then taps the screen of his phone to turn off the news. The laceration doesn’t seem to be as bad as the blood made it look. But just to be sure, I wash it carefully with water and place an antiseptic patch over it. Kneeling next to him, I take his left arm and begin wrapping a bandage around it. His muscles are pretty thick. The strange key he used to close the door hangs against his chest over a long overshirt. It’s made of metal the color of dead grass, inscribed with intricate designs. A gentle breeze blows in through the open window, ringing a chime hanging there.
“You’re good at that,” he says, watching me wrap the bandage.
“My mom was a nurse. Anyway, I have a lot of questions for you!”
“I bet you do,” he says, his perfect lips smiling slightly.
“Um… You said there was a worm, right? What did you mean?”
“The worm is a powerful force beneath the Japanese archipelago. When distortions accumulate, it erupts without intention or goal, thrashing around mindlessly and causing earthquakes.”
“Huh…?” I find this information hard to process. “But we got him, right?” I ask, since that’s the important point.
“We only confined it temporarily. If we don’t seal it in with the Keystone, it will come back out from somewhere else.”
“…You mean there’ll be another earthquake? You mentioned a Keystone earlier, didn’t you? Is that—?”
“It’s all right,” he says, gently putting an end to the conversation. “Preventing that is my job.”
“Your job?”
I’m done wrapping the bandage. I fix it in place with a piece of surgical tape. Now I have more questions than ever.
“Tell me,” I say, hardening my voice. “Who exactly are—?”
“Thank you for doing that,” he says softly before sitting up straight. He looks me in the eye and bows his head. “My name is Souta. Souta Munakata.”
“Oh! Um! Uh, my name is Suzume Iwato,” I sputter, surprised by his sudden self-introduction. He repeats my name, rolling it around in his mouth, then smiles softly.
“Meow!”
“Eek!”
I look up and see a small form on the windowsill. A kitten is perched on the railing of the bay window.
“What? Who’s this? You’re so skinny!”
Its little body, small enough to fit in my palm, is bony and gaunt. Only its yellow eyes are big. It’s all white, except for a ring of black fur around its left eye like someone punched it, leaving a bruise. Its ears are pressed back. It’s hard not to pity a face like that.
“Wait a second!” I say to Souta and the cat before running to the kitchen, dumping some dried sardines onto a dish, and bringing it up to my room with a bowl of water to set on the windowsill. The kitten sniffs the fish, cautiously licks it, then begins eating with gusto.
“You must have been starving…,” I murmur, gazing at its bony ribs. I haven’t seen it around here before. “Did you run away during the earthquake? Are you okay? Was it scary?”