“Miss Harano.”
Last week, a familiar voice stopped Mio in her tracks.
She wondered how she’d ever recognized it, given the crowd and noise. It was a familiar voice, unforgettable even. Mio had to chalk it up to her ears remembering the sound of it.
She was helping out at a pop-up shop for the spring festival at her college.
Mio was in an educational volunteer club, which was selling crepes today. She’d finished her shift at the register and switched places with an older sophomore. The stand was quite active, and it was just after Mio stepped away from the line of customers and walked to a nearby tent to remove her apron and hat that she heard him.
Mio looked up with a start and saw Kaname Shiraishi right in front of her.
She held her breath. The young woman’s eyes went so still they forgot to blink.
However, she wasn’t surprised. The timing was startling, but she’d long since lost the ability to be surprised when it came to him. The concept of surprise meant nothing to her anymore.
“Kana…me…”
Kaname Shiraishi.
The transfer student who came to her high school out of season.
Nearly two years had passed since she last saw him. The time they spent in the same class totaled less than a month.
Yet when Mio saw his face, the memories came roaring back in her ears—the sound of the wind rustling through the bamboo grove behind her family home accompanied the sight of Kaname’s face.
The senpai from her track team whom Mio had had a crush on, the delight of her first boyfriend, the girls she’d enjoyed chatting with. Saho and Hanaka. Hanaka, the one who’d disappeared.
I’m with Kanbara-senpai, a senior at school. Don’t worry about me.
The shock Mio had felt when she saw the message Hanaka had left behind. The pain.
The words Kaname had said to Itta Kanbara in front of the bamboo. The way her senpai’s face had become lacerated and bloodied in the blink of an eye. Itta Kanbara, grimacing with pain, running away…
“An unidentified male body was discovered in the mountains of Mie Prefecture yesterday. I think it’s Itta Kanbara,” Kaname had told her.
She’d said, “Take me with you.” If he meant to search for them, she wanted to be there. Mio was Hanaka’s friend.
Several beats later, Kaname had nodded firmly. “All right.”
The next month, Kaname Shiraishi vanished from Mio’s high school.
He hadn’t spoken with Mio during the weeks leading up to his disappearance, but the two had remained aware of each other’s presence. A while before he left for good, Kaname had given Mio a piece of advice.
“No matter where you go, take a piece of bamboo from the grove behind your house with you. Even a leaf will do.”
Mio had been taken aback.
“That bamboo is really, really good. It’s seeped into you,” Kaname had explained. He hadn’t exactly smiled, but it was the first time she had seen real emotion on his face, the sort she might expect to see when someone did grin. Mio had nodded, encouraged by that show of friendliness.
The next week, Kaname had left. He’d just stopped showing up to school. On the first day, Mio had thought he was sick, but when he didn’t show up the following day, or the one after, she went to Mr. Minamino to inquire about it.
“Shiraishi transferred again,” he explained, leaving Mio numb. She felt like he’d abandoned her. However, some deep part of her was convinced of the opposite.
Kaname would come back to get her.
Mio still kept a bamboo leaf in the bill compartment of her wallet. So when Kaname showed up out of nowhere at her college pop-up shop, she wasn’t particularly astonished.
In the almost-two-year interim, Mio had graduated from high school, left home in Chiba, and started attending a college in Kanazawa. And that’s where he’d appeared without warning. Somehow, Mio had suspected it might happen this way.
In the past, she’d thought Kaname’s abrupt movements and way of conversing were scary and creepy, but her opinion had since changed. In fact, she was delighted he’d kept his promise.
Kaname stared at her.
“I’m here for you. I found out where they are.”
“…You remembered.”
“Yeah.” That was all Kaname said before going silent. The two years hadn’t made him any better of a conversationalist.
He still had swollen, sleepy eyelids and scruffy hair.
Mio had never noticed until Kaname rescued her that he had long limbs and a nice figure. He was too thin and delicate, but that unbalanced quality gave him a certain kind of dangerous allure. In fact, it even looked like his facial features had grown more gentle and pleasing, including his sloping eyebrows.
“Did you find Hanaka?” Mio asked. Immediately, there was a firm pinch in her chest.
Hanaka—a girl Mio counted among her best friends. How many times had Mio thought about her in the past two years? On multiple occasions, she’d seen Hanaka’s mother at the train station and at school, handing out flyers about her daughter’s disappearance and asking everyone who passed for information. People said that Hanaka vanished of her own accord, but her mother tearfully stood in public and protested that Hanaka was not the type to run away without another word.
Mio realized at some point that she’d selected a distant college to escape her childhood town. When Mio and Saho had walked to the train station after classes, or waited for the bus near the school gate, they saw Hanaka’s mother handing out her flyers. She greeted them with empty eyes every time, saying something like, “You’ll be taking college entrance exams soon. That’s great,” and Mio felt her heart coming undone.
It was hard to believe so much time had passed since.
“I think I found her,” Kaname replied. He squinted the way nearsighted people often did. His eyes were just as inscrutable as they had been when he stared down Itta Kanbara.
“Are you still interested in coming?”
“Yes.”
Mio didn’t hesitate, undoing her apron while her mind raced. It was the school festival period. There were no classes for a while.
Her lips formed a smile. Kaname’s priorities seemed bizarre. He came all the way to see her in Kanazawa, yet if she claimed she wasn’t interested, he probably would’ve accepted it at face value. He made her a promise, so he came. Even though they’d spent so little time together in class, Kaname’s strange, unconventional way of thinking felt fond and familiar to Mio.
“Huh? You leaving, Harano?” someone asked while Mio folded up her apron and put away her hat. It was a senpai, a college third year, who had just gotten off his shift, too. He seemed mildly alarmed. Soon after Mio joined the club, she had gotten some unsubtle hints from him on several occasions. He never said anything directly, but he seemed to have a pushy, subconsciously possessive demeanor. Mio always managed to lightly brush him off. He started at the unfamiliar Kaname, clearly suspicious.
“Hey, who’s this guy? Oh, I get it,” he said, the displeasure in his eyes promptly turning to delight. “Is this your little brother? You said you have one, didn’t you? It’s Shizuku, yeah? You came to hang out?”
“No, he’s my boyfriend from high school,” Mio replied. She wondered why guys like this one always remembered her brother’s name and liked to use it in their pickup schemes.
As soon as she muttered the word boyfriend, her senpai—and, surprisingly, Kaname as well—looked shocked. Kaname’s eyes were as round as a startled cat’s. Mio had never seen him like that before.
Feeling a little odd, she continued, “He came to see me—sorry about that. My shift’s done for today, and I’m not coming to the festival tomorrow, so best of luck with everything else. Oh, and I’m taking one of these.”
Mio grabbed one of the crepes on display out in front of the sales stand. Club members were each permitted to have one for themselves. The crepe was stuffed with a chocolate-dipped banana and whipped cream, and she thrust it into Kaname’s hand.
“Here. I’m assuming you don’t mind chocolate and banana.”
“…I don’t.”
They walked off, leaving the stunned upperclassman behind. Kaname gave the crepe a tentative bite. Mio took note of that and remarked, “You eat stuff, Kaname?”
“Yes, I do eat food. Also, the whipped cream was about to spill off. I didn’t want to get it on my hands.”
Mio chuckled internally. The corners of her lips quirked up, which Kaname recognized.
“What?”
“Oh, just surprised that you talk about normal things.”
“I do.”
That he was responding to her comments told her that he had enough sense to know what a normal conversation was, so she kept going.
“Can I ask you something?”
“What?”
“Why are you still wearing that uniform?”
Mio wasn’t surprised at Kaname’s sudden appearance, but that still felt weird to her. They weren’t in high school anymore, but under his lightweight beige coat, Kaname still wore the same collared uniform he had when they first met. He’d transferred into her school and left before he got a new uniform, so he’d had that same high-collared shirt on the entire time he was in class.
“Oh…”
Kaname shook his head languidly. For an instant, Mio got the idea that Kaname had popped into existence two years later without any time passing for him—an eternally youthful presence. Mio didn’t think she’d be surprised if that turned out to be true.
He stated, “This is all I have.”
And then he smiled. At least, it felt like he did.
He has the emotions necessary to smile? Mio stared at him, stunned.
“You’ve gotten stronger, Miss Harano.”