INTERLUDE VI
IT WAS LIKE HEAVEN AND HELL both descended on me in the span of a single day.
Hell came first. When I discovered that my brother had stolen the entirety of my savings, I honestly thought my life was over. My whole world went dark; for the first time in my life, I knew the true meaning of desolation and despair. I couldn’t even find the willpower to cry. But then Kanae came along and rescued me.
To be honest, I still didn’t fully understand all the things he told me about this Rollback phenomenon, but that wasn’t the part that was important to me. What did matter to me was that he’d chosen me over my brother. That alone made me happier than I could ever convey in words. Thank you, Kanae. Thanks for hearing out my selfish wish. For making that promise with me. It really did mean the world to me.
How many years had it been since he last ran his fingers through my hair like this? Back then, he would only give me a playful tousle here and there, but his hands had grown large enough now that he could easily cradle my head. It felt so nice, I would have let him keep massaging the back of my head forever if he wanted to. In fact, I wished this whole entire moment could last forever. If heaven truly did exist, I imagined it probably felt like this. Complete and utter bliss.
A dark voice in the back of my mind told me that I would never forget the fact that I traded my brother’s life in exchange for this happiness. Probably not for as long as I lived.
ALL I COULD HEAR was the sound of Akari’s steady breathing. Meanwhile, I couldn’t sleep a wink for multiple reasons. For one, I was in an unfamiliar bed. For two, Akari was sleeping on my chest. But what kept me up more than anything was Akito’s death. It was like the image of his corpse was seared into the back of my eyelids. Every time I tried to close my eyes, I saw his body lying there in the empty lot, his skin white as a sheet, no trace of the boy who once took the mound at Koshien left inside those glassy eyeballs. This was the final resting place of the man who’d once given me the courage to stand up to bullies, the guy who’d led our puny island high school’s baseball team all the way to nationals, then broken his shoulder and lost everything. The same man who, in the final years of his short life, had stooped so low that he was beating and stealing money from his own sister.
I didn’t know whether we’d done the right thing or not anymore. I wondered if Akari already had second thoughts of her own or if she would regret it in the near future. Thanks to the Rollback phenomenon, I already had memories of everything that would happen over the next five days up to 6 p.m. on April 6th. As though I were following a trail of breadcrumbs, I traced my memories back in search of any indication that Akari came to regret this decision over the next few days.
Tuesday, we had our perfect little picnic in the abandoned park.
Wednesday, we broke into the school at night and shared a tender moment.
Thursday, I thought I was going insane until I spoke to her at Akito’s wake.
And Friday, she explained the Rollback to me beneath the cherry blossom tree.
Then I remembered something else. Something her future self told me on that day, before the first Rollback occurred:
“Kanae, I…I want you to save my brother.”
Did she really mean that, or was she only saying it to play along with the charade? I couldn’t say for sure, but I remembered her saying something else right after that: “I trust your judgment. So please…take care of past me, okay?” This was what made me think that Akari could be having second thoughts by that point, like maybe she felt like we’d made the wrong decision. It’d explain why she said the rest was up to me and that she would entrust everything to my judgment.
I had to honor that trust by doing what I alone felt was right.
I slowly sat myself up in bed, then looked down at my side, where Akari was still sleeping peacefully like a baby. Forgive me, Akari, I whispered as I silently slipped out from under the covers. When I stood up, I noticed the alarm clock at her bedside read 1 a.m. I turned and tiptoed toward the door, twisted the knob, then took one last look over my shoulder at Akari before stepping out of the bedroom. Slipping on my shoes in the entryway, I left the apartment, hurried down the stairs, and ran off toward the empty lot at a full sprint. Chances were high that Akito would already be there, face down on the ground.
“Forgive me, Akari… This is for your own good… I’m sorry!”
I apologized to her over and over as I ran through the streets. I knew I was yelling pointlessly into the ether, but I felt so bad for betraying her that I couldn’t help it. Forgive me, Akari. I just can’t do it. I can’t stand idly by and let a man die. Akito was a bad person, for sure, and I couldn’t see myself ever forgiving him for how he’d hurt his sister. I found him utterly detestable in his current state. That still didn’t mean he deserved to die. I couldn’t sit back and watch a man with his whole life ahead of him pass away and justify it with some huge mistakes he made.
I should never have let my determination to save him waver. Then I wouldn’t have had to break any promises. I was an absolute dumbass. A gutless, wishy-washy coward who always took the easy way out. Things would never have turned out this way if not for me and my stupid choices. I was sorry that I had to do this to her—but I needed to save Akito. I needed to believe there was a way we could still find a happy ending in all of this, one where nobody had to die.
I arrived at the empty lot and heaved my way through the tall grass in record time. It didn’t take long for me to spot his silhouette lying face down on the ground.
“Akito!”
His face was already bleached with a deathlike pallor, and I could tell that his fire was fading fast. I knelt down beside him and watched his chest. The movements were extremely faint, but he was still breathing. I dialed 119 and frantically explained the situation to the operator. The paramedics from the island’s fire department would arrive any minute, so all I had to do now was wait. My personal burden of responsibility now somewhat relieved, the exhaustion finally caught up with me, and I fell to my hands and knees on the ground. I tried to stay focused on breathing in, and then breathing out, spurts of cold night air that burned my throat. When my breathing stabilized at last, I glanced over at Akito again—only to find that his chest was no longer moving. Flustered, I put my hand up to his mouth. He’d stopped breathing altogether.
“You’ve gotta be kidding me!” I cried as I shook Akito’s body. “Hey, wake up! Don’t go dying on me now, goddammit!”
No response. I turned him over onto his back to administer CPR, or at least whatever movements I remembered from how they taught us to do it in gym class. I wasn’t sure if I did all the steps correctly or anything. I began compressing his chest in steady beats and prayed for the best.
“Come on! Live, damn it! Wake up and answer for what you’ve done! You can still turn your life around, I know you can! I swear, if you die right now, I’ll beat the crap out of you!”
I swore at him as I kept pumping his chest until the small ambulance arrived and two paramedics hopped out. One took over for me, while the other asked me a number of questions.
“Any relation to the victim?” he inquired.
“Yeah, we’re friends,” I lied, figuring it would make things a lot simpler. “Akito… Sorry, my friend here was out drinking until about two hours ago. He only stopped breathing a few minutes before you got here.”
The paramedic looked me over, taking a moment to consider this answer.
“Okay, got it,” he nodded. “We’d like to ask you a few more questions about what happened. Mind riding along with us?”
“Sure, no problem.”
I jumped in the ambulance after they loaded Akito up into it, and we sped off toward the harbor. The island medical clinic couldn’t treat him at this time of night, so we had to take the entire ambulance onto an emergency transport vessel and cross over to the mainland, which took about twenty minutes. From there, it was about another twenty-minute drive to the nearest hospital. Thankfully, they got him breathing again in transit using basic first-aid procedures. He hadn’t regained consciousness yet, but it looked like he was going to pull through.
Once we made it to the hospital, Akito was quickly rolled into the emergency room. I had to tell the hospital staff all the same stuff I’d barely finished telling the paramedics, but then my duties as a “friend” of the victim were complete. I sat down on one of the couches in the lobby and tipped my head up toward the ceiling. I’d managed to prevent Akito’s death, and that meant I’d changed both the past and the future for the better.
“Man, I’m beat…”