But Chie hadn’t come to her without a plan.
“I don’t know if we can pull it off, but I have an idea of how to avoid him for the time being.” A glimmer of hope appeared on Mitsuba’s face. “I feel like I could take much better pictures of you, Mitsuba.” Which was why Chie couldn’t let her get eaten by Tsukiyama.
Mitsuba probably didn’t even understand half of what Chie meant, but she seemed to have at least some idea. Standing up from the bench, she lowered her head. “If you would, please.”
Chie took Mitsuba to a high-end condominium not too far from the Ghoul detention center.
“This is incredible …” the girl said as she took in the sights of the extravagant interior design and dazzling decorations. The window offered a great look out at the nighttime cityscape.
“Let’s hide out here for now. Oh, and you should probably contact the people from your agency. Let them know you probably won’t be back for a while.”
“Oh. Yes, right …”
Chie sat down on the floor in a position she was quite used to, then got her computer out of her backpack and booted it up. She then got out some snacks, rolled up her sleeves, and opened her photo files.
“What are you doing, Miss Hori?”
“Mmm … just picking out some pictures.”
“Picking them out for what?”
“Figure I might be able to sell some.” It was too much to hope that she’d be able to win out over Tsukiyama on her lonesome. If she could sell some of her photos, she’d be able to purchase some assistance.
“Oh, by the way,” Chie said then, remembering the photo of Mitsuba’s family amidst trying to figure out the next stages of her plan, “what’s your family like, Mitsuba?” Knowing Tsukiyama, there was a chance he’d make contact with her family in order to get information. That wouldn’t be too bad by itself, but it would be a disaster if Chie blurted out that Tsukiyama’s particular sensibilities might get the better of him and cause him to eat her family as part of some taste-comparison test. “It just might be a little risky if Tsukiyama makes contact with them.”
Mitsuba’s eyes drooped at that. “You don’t need to worry about that,” she murmured. “My father remarried and is living overseas now. I get email from him sometimes, but that’s it, so he knows almost nothing about what’s going on with me.”
She set the family photo atop the table and clutched her knees. Tsukiyama could probably still get to someone overseas if he caught wind of things, but given his current obsession with Kaneki, Chie doubted he’d go through the effort. So Mistuba’s father was probably safe.
“What about the other two?” Chie asked, looking at the photo set on the table.
Mitsuba huddled herself up even tighter. “They’re … missing.”
Chie stopped her typing and looked up. “Both of them?
“Did they go missing together?”
“No, separately,” Mistuba said. “Sorry. I’m not really explaining it right, huh?” she added with a bitter laugh.
Chie shook her head. “It’s all right,” she said. “Would you mind telling me about them?”
For a while, Mitsuba was lost in thought, but then seemed to find the resolve to talk. “My sister ran away when she was in high school. My mother was worried sick over it, and a year later she went missing too.”
Mitsuba’s sister was about ten years older than her, and had longed to become an idol singer since she was little. Back at home, she was always dressing up in cute little outfits and singing with a toy microphone. Her mother and father would laugh and smile as they watched her, praising her singing.
As her sister grew up, however, her mother began to frown upon these antics. “You’re in high school now! How long are you going to cling to this silly dream of becoming an idol singer?”
“It’s not some silly dream! I’m serious about this!”
Mitsuba’s sister held off on taking her college entrance exams, and almost every day she and her mother had arguments about her future. Her sister said that she wanted to quit school and go into the entertainment industry, but her mother staunchly forbade it. Her father stayed out of it, pretending not to notice as the other two argued incessantly. Mitsuba had wanted to support her sister, but her mother’s threatening, oppressive demeanor forced her into silence.
The arguments came to a head when Mitsuba’s sister went and got herself business cards from an entertainment agency.
It had been a summer day, the air filled with the droning of cicadas. There was the usual angry shouting from Mitsuba’s mother and shrill cries from her sister. At some point, Mitsuba’s mother raised her hand and struck her daughter across the cheek.
“Mommy, stop it!” Mitsuba hurriedly interposed herself between them after seeing her sister fall to the floor. Her sister shoved her out of the way, however, and got back up, a hand pressed to where she’d been hit on the cheek.
“You used to encourage me so much when I was little! You’re such a bitch, mom!” her sister spat before gathering up her things and rushing out the front door, slamming it closed behind her.
“Sis …”
“Leave her!” Mitsuba’s mother snapped before she could chase after her sister, then stomped off to the kitchen, indignant. This wasn’t the first time her sister had stormed off, and so Mitsuba was sure she’d come back home before long. Previously, it had turned out that she’d actually just gone to her voice lessons.
But that time, when her sister left the house in tears after her mother hit her, was the last time Mitsuba ever saw her. She never came back.
After that, her mother and father began arguing daily. Her father would tell his wife it was her fault. Despite having gone for so long watching their fights and ignoring them, he still had the gall to blame her every day for their daughter never coming home.
Her mother would cry, tears falling onto the photo of her daughter she clutched in her hands day in and day out.
And then, a year after Mitsuba’s sister disappeared, her mother vanished as well, leaving only a note that read: “I’m sorry.”
“Ah, maybe that’s it,” Chie said, feeling like she’d hit upon the answer now that Mitsuba’s explanation was finished. “The sad look on your face, I mean.” She brought up the photo on her computer screen again.
“I thought that if I went into the entertainment industry, I might find my sister. Given how badly she’d wanted to become an idol singer, I was sure that’s where she’d be working. And if I got famous enough, maybe my mother would see me on TV. But now, I … I don’t really think either of them is alive anymore …”
“Hmm. I see,” Chie said, crossing her arms, rocking about restlessly as her eyes darted around. She then got out a pen and some paper and handed them to Mitsuba. “Write down the names of everyone in your family.”
“Huh?”
“I’m gonna do some searching.” Because just maybe, she might find the key to all this.
It was after three o’clock in the morning, and the exhausted Mitsuba lay on the floor. Chie worked at curating her photos while also running searches online, scanning through news reports. A run of burglaries. Hospital patients suffering injuries. Sports news. Financial data.
“Hmm?” As Chie was following this narrow thread of hers, one word unexpectedly jumped out at her. “Huh …”
She wanted to go and look into it right away, but she couldn’t well leave Mitsuba here. Instead, she called up a helpful friend of hers.
“Hey, Ikuma? There’s a little something I could use your help with …”