“Your arrogance truly knows no bounds, it seems. You make my skin crawl… You’re not even his real family,” Masako continued.
Himari wanted to refute this statement, but she was having a hard enough time just remembering to breathe. What is she doing here? Why does she know my name? And why would she say that?
“It’s because of your little sister act that Kanba refuses to come home to me.”
“Little sister act?” Himari repeated. She wasn’t putting on an “act” at all. But for some reason, uncertainty flared up in her chest, swiftly transforming into terror.
“Give Kanba back to me! You cannot build reality out of fiction!” Masako roared.
Himari flinched and took a few steps backward. “Leave. Now. Please.” She looked down at her feet and swallowed hard, her lips trembling. There stood a little black penguin looking smugly back at her, its eyes as narrow as its owner’s.
“San-chan!” she whimpered desperately. At this, Penguin No. 3 peeked out from Himari’s bedroom. The blood drained from its face as it looked at her. When their eyes met, it dashed over and hid itself behind Himari’s legs.
“Oh, have you forgotten? Very well then. Allow me to jog your memory.” Calmly, Masako pulled out her trusty slingshot gun and red golf-ball bullets. “These are custom-made Reminder Bullets! I’m going to make you remember who you really are!”
She aimed the gun at Himari, who reflexively squeezed her eyes shut.
“Don’t avert your eyes,” Masako told her in an eerily calm voice. “Who are you? Why are you here? What do you want?”
Himari slowly opened her eyes, avoiding Masako’s gaze. “I…”
Outside, rain began to fall from the muggy sky. The downpour swiftly grew heavier and heavier until the living room was overwhelmed with the sound and smell of rain.
What did I ever do to her? Himari wondered dazedly as she stared down the barrel of Masako’s gun. For a moment, the two polar opposites froze, taking in each other’s unwavering eyes.
Right as we were nearly home, carrying all the ingredients we’d need to make stew, it suddenly started pouring down rain. I handed the groceries to Kanba, then dashed all the way around to the backyard to retrieve the laundry hanging out to dry.
“We’re home, Himari! It’s raining!” I shouted, my arms laden with clean clothes, as I kicked off my loafers and stepped onto the porch. Then I opened the sliding glass door, stepped through the curtain, and entered the living room. I could see her standing there, looking tense. “You really need to keep the doors locked while we’re gone. What’s wrong?”
Then I followed her gaze to find Natsume Masako standing in front of the red sofa, pointing a gun at my sister.
“Aah! AAAAHH!”
“Of all the rotten timing… If we’d just been a little bit faster, we coulda made it home ahead of the rain,” Kanba grumbled as he walked in through the front door at that exact same moment. Then he noticed the situation happening in the living room and froze.
The other girl took one look at Kanba and hesitated…but quickly turned back to Himari. “Your forehead is toast!”
Then, before we could stop her, she aimed her gun at Himari and fired. With a shriek, Himari narrowly dodged the bright red bullet.
“What are you doing?!”
I tried to run to my sister, but tripped over Penguin No. 2 and fell to the floor in a multi-colored explosion of fabric. Panicked, Himari ran barefoot out into the backyard.
“Himari!”
“What are you doing here?!” Kanba demanded of Masako.
“I came to get what’s mine. My love! My past! My truth!”
He reached out to grab the arm that was holding the gun, but she smacked him away, jumped over me, and ran out into the rain after Himari.
“Hey! Wait!”
Hastily, I jumped to my feet and ran after her. The rain was beating down harder than ever, threatening to drown out my voice. When I arrived at the empty lot next door, I found Himari standing frozen in place, soaked to the skin, while Masako held her at gunpoint. Kanba ran past me toward them.
“Stop it, Masako!”
“Stay out of this! You know these Reminder Bullets aren’t the only weapon in my arsenal!”
He slowed to a stop; the words “Reminder Bullets” made the breath catch in his throat. With a name like that, one hit was surely enough to dredge up old memories. Masako was attempting to regain her truth by bringing it all to light.
“I want what was stolen from me.”
In spite of the pouring rain, her curls held firm. The slingshot gun made a clicking sound in her hand.
“Who are you?” Himari asked, her breath leaving her lips in a white fog, her voice shaky and hoarse.
“Who I am isn’t important. It’s finally time to crush you. You’re going to remember everything! There will be no escaping the truth!”
A red laser sight affixed itself to Himari’s forehead. Meanwhile, I was frozen in terror, unable to think of a way to stop her. Surely my brother and I would be able to take her on together…but I couldn’t quite get a read on her.
“Himari, duck!” I screamed as loud as I could manage.
In the same moment, Kanba shot off like a bullet and slammed into Natsume Masako in a full-body tackle. Together, they fell to the muddy, rain-soaked ground. As for her bullet, it grazed past Himari, who was crouched down with her face in her hands, and embedded itself in the concrete wall behind her. As the rain poured down, she looked up at me dazedly, and our eyes met.
“Himari?” I asked quietly.
But before she could speak, she closed her eyes and passed out.
“Himari!” I raced over to her and lifted her into my arms.
“Why?!” Masako screeched as she rose to her feet.
She loaded her gun with bullets of a different color, then aimed the gun at us. But her footing was unsteady, and her eyes were red…with tears. Kanba stood there in silence, shielding Himari and me.
“Get out of the way, please. Like I said before, I can and will shoot you, Kanba.”
Her voice was firm, but her cheeks were wet—from rain or tears, I could scarcely tell. Kanba remained silent.
“This is absurd. You know this little fake family can’t possibly last forever, right?” she asked, pointing the gun in his direction. But I was the one who answered her.
“Our family isn’t fake.”
“You do realize you might be the only one who feels that way?” she snorted, looking in my direction without moving a muscle.