Seeing her head-on, from right up close, I found that she looked exactly the same as she had the night before last. And, I mean, duh, it was just two days ago. Even boys in puberty need at least a day or two more than that to change so much you wouldn’t recognize them. Of course she’d basically look the same.
Weirdly enough, though, I felt something as I looked her in the eye. She brought someone to mind, but I couldn’t put my finger on who. All that I knew was that they were someone really important to me—someone I hadn’t seen in a long, long time.
Ayase, meanwhile, was frozen in place, still reaching down for her chopstick case, her eyes locked onto mine. A chill ran down my spine as I worried that she might’ve remembered me, somehow, but it quickly became apparent that wasn’t the case. If she’d remembered me, she surely would’ve said my name or gotten mad about what I’d done to her a few nights back.
It wasn’t an “I remember you” sort of look—more of an “I swear I’ve met you somewhere before, but I can’t quite put my finger on it” one. Like how people look when they’re mid-déjà vu. I was simultaneously glad and disappointed that she didn’t know who I was. Really conflicted, all around.
She was still frozen in place, probably on account of the fact that I was staring a hole in her face. If just one of us broke eye contact, our weird little moment would end in an instant, and the flow of time would resume once more. For some reason I still can’t explain, though, neither of us did.
Of course, in reality, time never stopped flowing in the first place. The bell rang, signaling that we had five minutes to wrap up lunch and get to class. That snapped us back to reality.
“A-Ah...” stammered Ayase. “E-Excuse me!” She grabbed her chopstick case and jogged off. I, in contrast, stayed frozen.
She’d gone through the whole déjà vu process when she saw my face—I knew that for sure from her expression. There was also that time when I went to my old hometown—Shusen City—with Kiryu and remembered the nickname that the old me used to call her. It seemed reasonable to conclude that my power to erase memories didn’t completely wipe the slate clean.
But what about me? Why did I feel that incredibly powerful sense of nostalgia as I looked at her? I certainly couldn’t recall erasing any of my own memories about her. Even presuming I’d met her when I was a kid, the same was true of Kiryu, and I never felt anything of the sort when I looked at her. It didn’t feel like a plausible explanation.
I hadn’t forgotten anything. I hadn’t, and yet somehow, I was still on the verge of remembering someone. I just didn’t know who, and the more I thought about it, the more a painful, suffocating sensation built up within my chest. A gradually growing pressure, intense enough to make some warm, unidentifiable liquid build up in the corners of my eyes...
Even after the rest of the students returned to the courtyard, even after the bell rang again to signal the start of classes, I stayed parked on the bench, not moving a muscle.