Suddenly, my vision cleared, almost like I’d stepped across some invisible boundary.
The rain pounding at the windshield had stopped, and the wipers had shucked off the remaining film of water to reveal a bright blue sky. The sky had been full of dark clouds all morning, but they’d scattered right before my eyes, melting away like smoke. Nito and I were both taken aback by the abrupt change in weather.
Two days had passed since the Lantern Flower Festival. We’d used a lot of that time tidying everything away, packing up the food we’d been given, and then saying our farewells to everyone. When the time finally came to leave, we’d still been reluctant, so we’d ended up spending the rest of that day enjoying tea and talking.
Then, once we’d finally resolved ourselves to depart, the morning had opened with heavy rain. Fago and the others had all come to the temple to see us off, and we’d headed out through the downpour. Unable to see much through the sheets of rain, we’d just traveled in a slow, straight line from the village. It had suddenly stopped not long into the journey, though. The leaden clouds had vanished and daylight had come pouring in through the windshield, and now that the sky had cleared, we could finally see the road in front of us.
We were at a crossroads with a sign standing at the side of it. This was the place where I’d first met Charolles. I stopped at the side of the road and climbed out. The trike following us stopped as well. Charolles got out and walked over, shaking the water from her cape.
“That cleared up quick,” I commented.
“It did, thankfully.”
“Keisuke, can I put it here?” Nito asked, carrying the atlas and nodding toward the Kettle’s hood.
“Hold on. We don’t want it getting wet,” I said, pulling a tarp out of my backpack and using it to cover the hood.
She carefully placed the atlas down on top of the tarp, opening it. The three of us crowded around it and looked down at the open pages.
“Are you sure we can have this?” I asked. “You’ll need it if you’re carrying on with your job.”
Charolles shook her head.
“I’m not delivering things to someone in a certain location. Besides, I’ve lived my whole life relying on maps—getting lost for a while sounds like fun.”
“Oooh...” Nito murmured.
Please don’t be a bad influence on her, I thought in Charolles’s direction. Also, Nito, stop getting influenced so easily.
“Still, though, perhaps I’ll follow the route you two took here. That sounds like a good way to meet people, doesn’t it?”
“I think that’s a great idea!” Nito exclaimed, her head bobbing up and down in an energetic nod.
“Let them know we’re doing well too, if you would,” I added.
“You need to go to Barcia first, then! And to Vandyke. Also, um, um...” Nito’s ears were vibrating with joy as she flipped through the atlas. “Here it is! Charolles, there’s a witch here!”
“Oh, there is? I’d like to meet her, then.”
“But her real name is Olympia, and...”
Nito cheerfully regaled Charolles with tales of our journey before we’d come to the village, and Charolles just leaned in, nodding along with a smile as she listened. While they were occupied, I rifled through my bag to find the lantern charger. When Nito finally wound down, Charolles readjusted the cords holding her cape on.
We knew without saying anything that our farewell was approaching. There wasn’t any visual cue, just a sense of the inevitable welling within us as our reluctance to part tightened our chests. It was the same feeling as when we’d parted with Fago, Paula, Jill, and Monty that morning.
“This is used to recharge the phone,” I said to Charolles, holding out the lantern. “I’ll teach you how to use it.”
“I don’t need it,” she answered.
“You don’t need it...? But the battery will run out eventually.”
“It will last longer if I keep it in my bag when I’m not using it, right?”
“Well, that’s true,” I admitted reluctantly, pursing my lips.
She laughed at me.
“Besides, when it does run out, I’ll come to see you both again.”
“All right, I give,” I said, raising my hands in surrender.
There was nothing I could do against a line like that. In this world of goodbyes, that promise was a spark of warmth. Charolles and I both knew we might never see each other again, and yet Charolles had still promised that we would.
“We’ll see you again, Charolles...” Nito said, tears welling in her eyes.
“Of course. Let’s have another meal together some time,” Charolles replied.
“We will!”
Charolles gently patted Nito’s head and then turned to me. Partings weren’t something you ever got used to. I’d always thought there had to be a set of perfect words for saying goodbye, but that was no more than an illusion. Whatever words you prepared, and no matter how many, they would never carry all your feelings across to the other person. Therefore, all you really needed was one simple phrase.
“See you tomorrow, then,” I told her.
She gave a rueful laugh. I was sure she was going to call me weird again, but she didn’t.
“Indeed. See you tomorrow,” she said with a nod, heading back to her bike.
She didn’t turn back again, just drove away down the road we’d taken on our way into the village. She gradually became a blue speck in the distance, and then eventually I couldn’t even make out the color. Nito and I stood there for a while. I heard a sniffle and thought she might be crying, but when I turned to look—while she did have a reddened nose—the expression on her face was a smile.
People say life is made up of goodbyes. However important a memory is, it will one day vanish. I’d understood that for a long time. Yet we still conversed, spent our time with each other, and laughed together. The accumulated time we’d shared was not a sad thing.
We stood at a fork in the road, two paths stretching on without end to the left and right. We didn’t know what or who was waiting for us along those roads. What we did know was that we had our supplies on the Kettle and that we’d go as far as we could, searching for that which was precious to us as the cycle of meetings and partings repeated, collecting our memories in the sketchbook as we lived out our days in this ruined world with our wheeled box of hope. Someday we’d look back and see our tire tracks showing the path we’d traveled, and that path would be the tale of our journey.
“We should head off too, Keisuke. Where shall we go next?!”
“We’ll have fun wherever we go,” I answered.
We met each other’s gaze, then turned to look at the maps.
Fin.