2
In the winter of his first year of middle school, one of his classmates killed himself. That was the beginning of everything.
His surname was Kozaki, but Ogami had forgotten what his first name was. Because there wasn't a single student in class who called him by that name. The homeroom teacher merely said during a morning assembly that Kozaki had passed, but by then, the class was well aware of his suicide. The following afternoon, there was an assembly for their grade, and the students were made to give a moment of silence - 30 seconds, maybe a minute - in a drab gymnasium with poor air conditioning.
He was despised. He ran the gamut of reasons to be hated by others. At least among his classmates, there was surely not one person who actually mourned Kozaki's death.
Ogami, too, while surprised to hear the news, didn't feel any particular sadness or pity. He just thought "way to go." At any rate, for a few days after the fact, Kozaki was the main character of the classroom. His absence dominated it. It was something that could have never happened while he still lived.
If this had been the death of a student who was liked well enough, that death would be a proper tragedy, and it would have settled in an appropriate place in people's hearts. But no one wept for Kozaki's death. That said, there also weren't any who rejoiced over his death. Though he was hated, it was only a faint hatred, making him a harmless presence if you ignored him.
In other words, it was a death there was nothing much you could say about.
It was unclear who suggested it. But it happened the fifth day after the news of Kozaki's death broke, in the morning. The question of "what they could do for him" was raised in class. An impromptu meeting was held, and around five suggestions quickly arose. The air in the classroom became unusually tense, and lively arguments were had, with a sense that the class was coming together over this.
That sense of unity felt horribly uncomfortable to Ogami.
Something wrong is happening, he thought.
Though he avoided taking part and stayed quiet, someone eventually asked his opinion, and he blurted out what he was really thinking.
"Well, hang on now, didn't you all hate the guy?"
He was aware it was an extreme statement. Even so, he was expecting deep down that at least a few honest folk would agree with him. He figured the remark would ease the tension in the air, and clear up the uncanny atmosphere a bit.
That wasn't what happened.
From that day forth, Ogami was isolated in the classroom.
In truth, his classmates must have felt guilty deep down - seeking an outlet to process that guilt - and that's why they had clung to that farce. That's what Ogami later realized. His own faux pas had ultimately come from the very same root of feeling guilty about Kozaki. While the others chose to reverse their position out of guilt, Ogami chose to stick to his position out of guilt; that was the only difference. All told, everyone had been shaken by Kozaki's suicide.
The one who decided that things would flow in this direction was a man named Shogo Kujirai. He was a central figure in the class; to put it bluntly, he was the exact opposite of Kozaki. Whatever he ended up doing, he usually took first place in it, with both teachers and students taking notice, and yet he was also a friendly man able to cleverly joke around.
In that precise moment when Ogami's remark made the classroom freeze, truthfully, things could have very well gone either way. There were even a few faces that seemed to read as "I was actually thinking that too." Some were gauging the expressions of those around them, trying to decide what attitude to take.
Their gazes naturally concentrated on center-of-the-class Kujirai, who, with his chin in his hands, gave Ogami an icy glare and said:
"Don't you know there are things that are okay to say and not okay to say?"
That was all it took to set the trend.
Ogami didn't know if the class actually went through with their "thing to do for Kozaki" after that. He supposed they probably didn't. Talking it out was itself therapeutic, so there was no need to put what they discussed into action. As a bonus, some idiot had bought them a receptacle for their guilt, so they had no complaints.
One person after another started to keep Ogami at a distance, until finally no one would approach him. It was his first experience with being isolated in class. He had faintly imagined how it would feel, but once actually put in that position, he found the ingredients for unimaginable suffering all over his time at school. He learned that what the education system hates the most isn't students who can't study, nor students who can't be athletic, nor students with bad behavior, but students who are isolated.
Luckily, it was January. If he could endure two more months, it would be spring break, and the classes would change for the new term. He just had to hold out until then.
Yet those two months were long. The clock hands felt like they were frozen. Like a slope gradually increasing in steepness, time became denser with each day, and he wondered if he would never reach spring break for all eternity.
That said, he only suffered while at school; when he got home, just 30 minutes listening to his favorite music would let him forget most things. He slowly got used to being alone, learning new ways to spend his lunch break, and awakened to the joys of living in a world all your own.
But even so, every time he saw Kujirai's face in class, he thought to himself: If by some happenstance I'd chosen the same path as Kozaki, he'd probably be casually talking about "what they could do for Ogami."
There had been one single occasion when Ogami got to talk with Kozaki one-on-one. It was when they were both in elementary school.
Back then, Kozaki was often absent. He was frail, frequently visiting, if not staying at, the hospital. With his recurring disappearance from the classroom, at first his classmates found interest in him as an eccentric figure. But as it went on longer, their interest waned, and they merely viewed him as someone too unreliable to be a friend. Rather than a classmate who tended to be absent, they treated him more like a kid who happened to come to school sometimes.
Even Ogami didn't have any particular thoughts about Kozaki not having a proper school life. But Ogami's mother was different. He couldn't remember the details, but one time he brought up Kozaki in front of her. Perhaps feeling rather sorry for him, she strongly encouraged her son to go visit Kozaki in the hospital. He refused at first, but reluctantly went along with it after some kind of trade was offered.
His mother drove him to the hospital, and he went up to the room alone. It was a small hospital. Ogami himself had been cared for there a few times, so he had no difficulties getting around. He rode the elevator up and followed the signs to Kozaki's room. It felt strange to him to be walking around a hospital even when he wasn't sick. He remembered a feeling of excitement as if he'd snuck in through a back entrance, which overpowered his guilty feelings toward the patients.
In the hospital room, Kozaki had a somehow calmer air about him than usual, looking two or three years more mature than he did in class. Maybe it was because of his worn-out hospital gown, or how accustomed to hospitalization he seemed.
Despite them being classmates, there was hardly anything the two had in common to discuss. When Ogami asked what kind of sickness he was even in the hospital for, Kozaki feebly laughed that he didn't know.
"They put me in the hospital before I get sick, have me take medicine, and that cures it. So I don't even know what the sickness was." With that, he held up the stainless steel bracelet on his thin wrist. "This Handcuff's pretty versatile."
Of course, it wasn't only Kozaki who was wearing that bracelet. Ogami wore one too, as did his parents. So did his teachers and classmates, without exception. It was no simple bracelet, but a small device connected to the National Health Care System - which most people these days simply called the System - and the fact that it was constantly collecting biological data from its wearer was also common knowledge.
He didn't know when things got this way. At least as far back as Ogami could remember, all citizens were obligated to wear these bracelet-shaped devices. Wearing them was such a matter of course, he never even felt it got in the way.
Wearing the device meant being under a certain kind of surveillance, but only the elderly showed resistance to this. The majority of people simply wore it. Weighing health against privacy had just the outcome you would expect. Choosing to live without a bracelet wouldn't break any laws, but you would no doubt be branded as "someone with annoying beliefs" in the eyes of others. Although quietly removing your bracelet when doing something guilty involving your health was a thing everyone did.
The bracelets went by a variety of names. While some used the acronym or an abbreviation of the official name, others called it by the name of its inventor, some simply called it the "Bracelet," some oddly only referred to it as "that" or "this" - and some called them "Handcuffs," by association from the mechanism for getting them on and off.
Kozaki was one of those who used the term Handcuff. No one Ogami knew referred to the bracelets that way, so the word rang fresh in his ears. From that day on, Ogami decided to consistently use the Handcuff name as well. In that sense, you could say Kozaki still lived on inside Ogami.
To the frail Kozaki, his Handcuff should have been an indispensable lifeline. But on the other hand, it was also a symbol of the various causes that kept him chained to a hospital room. If he were genuinely grateful to the device, one would imagine he wouldn't be calling it a "handcuff."
It wouldn't be surprising if Kozaki's life of going back and forth between school and the hospital twisted his personality. But from time to time, Ogami had this thought: Even after Kozaki turned into someone so widely hated in middle school, had I met him in a hospital room, I might not have been able to see him as such an awful person. Ultimately, maybe he was just hopelessly unable to mesh with the classroom, and if he had just been kept in the hospital and never discharged, his good qualities could have bloomed.
Once the topic of his sickness was done with, Ogami next asked about hospital life. It was an insensitive question, thinking back, but he saw it as easier to answer than asking Kozaki about his school life.
"It's fun," Kozaki replied, almost proudly. "I've got more friends here, even. Though hospital food isn't tasty."
"You aren't bored?"
"Classes are way more boring. I don't care for moving my body, either."
"Are you keeping up with schoolwork?"
"Not at all. But given all this, I'm sure the teacher will give me a pass." Then he asked Ogami something out of the blue. "Why come visit me in the hospital all of a sudden?"
Ogami gave an honest reply, that his mother had encouraged him to.
Kozaki didn't seem disappointed by that, just saying "Huh."
"You know, Ogami, I was thinking for sure you were a Sakura."
"Sakura?", Ogami repeated back.
But Kozaki didn't seem to feel like providing an explanation.
A while later, he mumbled as if to himself.
"I think you might be fond of this sort of life too, Ogami."
"I wonder," he said somewhat dismissively.
It was like being told "you're like me too," and he didn't like that.
The next time he would recall those words wouldn't be until half a year after graduating high school. Working all day long in silence in a dim and dusty warehouse, and spending the rest of his time holed up in his apartment, lying in bed with the curtains closed. He had practically no appetite, just sending things akin to gruel down his throat.
While living that life, his conversation with Kozaki suddenly arose in the back of his mind, and he thought, aha.
Maybe I was, in fact, like him.
"Hey Ogami," she said to him, as if it were just natural.
It was the middle of February. That afternoon, heavy snow fell on the town.
The students in class had their attention drawn to the windows one after another, until finally even the teacher stopped to look that way. He walked over to a window, gazed outside, and remarked "Now this is something," halfway between admiration and annoyance.
The lesson quickly resumed, and thanks to the momentary break, most of the students had regained their interest in it. But Ogami was the one person who continued to stare at the window after that. It had been just about a month since the Kozaki incident. A month that felt like two or three, but it was a major turning point nevertheless.
After homeroom, which the teacher had prolonged on a whim, came to a close, and as Ogami was grabbing his bag to leave before anyone else, the girl in the seat next to him said "Hey Ogami," as if to stop him.
"It seems like you're always by yourself lately. What's the matter?"
It was clear she knew the answer to that from the start. There was no way she couldn't know. That moment Ogami's isolation was established, all members of the class were present, so of course she had been there as well.
"As if you don't know," Ogami replied without even looking at her.
Then she gave a troubled laugh, and readily admitted it.
"Yeah, I actually do know."
By this point, Ogami was already feeling painful glances on him from around the classroom. A few positioned close enough to hear the conversation stared at the two of them wondering what this was about, and even those who at a glance seemed unconcerned were, if you paid attention, stopping what they were doing to listen in.
That was just how much of an abnormality it was for her to speak to Ogami.
Sumika Takasago was the flower of the classroom. She was more mature and withdrawn than not, but people naturally gathered around her. Surely it helped that she had glossy long hair and a face just cute enough to not stand out, but perhaps it wasn't only that. She felt almost defenseless, somehow, having a certain perilousness to her like she might get hurt by something if you left her alone, and that seemed to effectively stimulate the goodness in people's hearts.
Sumika questioned Ogami without paying any mind to her classmates' gaze.
"Our houses are really close to each other. Did you know that?"
He knew. He'd been dimly aware of it since elementary school, but after ending up in the same class as her in middle school, Ogami made a daily game of whether could time his commute to and from school to match hers. If he could see her from behind, that was a win. Though lately he'd been extremely late coming to school, so he was on a losing streak.
Ogami pretended not to know, of course. "Huh," he said, and stood up from his seat.
Sumika promptly stood up as well, and suggested:
"Let's go home together!"
There was no question people around the classroom heard that. But Ogami had already fled the room by then. So to this day, he didn't know what sort of ripples her bizarre behavior sent through the class.
The hallway was filled with students. Weaving between people standing around talking and people squatting to dig through their lockers, Ogami hurried forward.
He could sense Sumika was following him at a light run.
Is this some kind of punishment game?, he first considered. Was she an assassin sent by my classmates, since I had become so numb as to not make a peep no matter what punishment they inflicted? Was this for their sick amusement, as they watched from the shadows to sneer at me if I dared delight at being offered a fake helping hand?
He didn't want to think a seemingly harmless girl like Sumika was involved in something so malicious. Nor his other classmates, even - yes, they would ignore those they didn't like, but he couldn't see them actively taunting him like that.
In which case, the next thing to consider was sympathy. Or else feeling a sense of responsibility. It was possible she personally roused herself with the idea that "I have to help him to avoid a second Kozaki." But that also seemed unnatural based on Sumika's personality. He'd never once seen her approach someone with such intentions this entire year. A girl quietly satisfied all by herself - that was Sumika in a nutshell.
The most dangerous thing about a situation like this is hope, thought Ogami. He simply had to keep imagining the worst case. Whether the bridge was made of straw, spider's silk, or stone, he had to keep tugging on and hitting it to be assured of its sturdiness.
Even after stepping out of the entryway, Sumika didn't leave Ogami's side. He heard the keychain on her bag jingling about two steps behind him the whole time. As he passed by the track team warming up in the corner of the parking lot, a few familiar faces among them glanced toward Ogami, then to Sumika walking behind him, then once again to Ogami. So it was, indeed, a situation that looked odd even to bystanders.
As soon as he made it past the front gate, he felt at ease. From here on, he was outside the school's sphere of influence. Even he, at the bottom rung of the classroom, was on the same level as everyone else when outside the school.
He turned around, and Sumika was still there.
"You're a fast walker," she said breathlessly, unwrapping her rouge-colored scarf and putting it in her bag.
Once they'd come this far, where no acquaintances were watching, Ogami expected that there would be some kind of explanation. Was it a punishment game, or sympathy? Or just maybe, she too felt put off by the Kozaki incident like me, and felt that my classmates' treatment of me was unfair?
Or else, she'd had an interest in me from the start, and perceived my current isolation to be a prime opportunity?
Surely not.
The freshly-fallen snow hadn't been stepped in much yet, so Ogami walked back home making use of what sparse footprints there were. Sumika, wanting to walk at his side no matter what, took crunchy steps through the fresh snow, sometimes nearly slipping and falling over.
The pant cuffs of Ogami's uniform became stained, and melted snow began to drip into his socks.
Things must have been even worse inside Sumika's shoes, given the rough path she was walking on.
At the bottom of a long slope going through a residential district, there was a railroad crossing. Usually you would never get caught at it, but just as Ogami got there, the warning bell started to ring.
Sumika caught up, and it was there she finally opened her mouth.
"I mean, didn't they all hate the guy?"
There was no need for confirmation that she was quoting Ogami's remark.
"For instance, if by some chance I died," she began, facing Ogami, "would you expose everyone's lies the same way, Ogami?"
The train passed through. The warning bell continued ringing for a bit longer, and eventually stopped.
The gate raised, and the two started walking.
"Except everyone likes you, Takasago," Ogami bluntly told her.
Sumika slowly shook her head.
"That's actually not necessarily true."
Ogami couldn't understand her meaning at the time. He still didn't get it, even nearly a decade later. For the two years between then and graduation, he constantly kept an careful eye on people's relationships, yet he never once found anyone who hated Sumika.
To the very end, she never made any enemies - except for Ogami.
Maybe there was actually no meaning at all behind saying "it's not necessarily that everyone likes me"; rather, it was merely a way of catching his interest.
When they reached her house, Sumika came to a stop, looking reluctant.
"See you tomorrow," she said with a little wave.
He couldn't wave back, nor could he avert his eyes.
After wordlessly seeing her disappear behind the door, Ogami started walking again, reaching his house in about a minute.
Even once back in his room, he forgot to even take off his uniform and just spaced out in front of the heater.
What's happening to me?
From the next morning on, his "game" ceased to function as a game. Sumika was always there past the corner, and when she noticed Ogami's arrival, she raised her hand up and smiled innocently.
Every day had become a "win."
In their last month as first-years, the two were outsiders to the end. The other students just watched Ogami and Sumika have friendly conversations with bewilderment.
Maybe it was that very spectacle which seemed "wrong" to their eyes.
Though not one of them went so far as to point out "you guys were never that friendly before."
*
He didn't intend to stay in the Town of Sakura long. He didn't even feel like showing up at his parents' house. He parked in the lot of the supermarket in the central part of town and turned off the engine. Reclining in the seat, he smoked a cigarette, finished off a can of coffee, then got out of the car.
In the evenings, the town had a sharp smell to it particular to the northern prefectures, and combined with the gloominess of nightfall, it made Ogami feel the same sort of lonesomeness he had in childhood. He started walking through the snowless parking lot over to the sidewalk, and the moment his soles touched the thick snow, his body quickly recalled how you were supposed to walk through it.
He could have gone looking for an old acquaintance who might know something about the Sumika situation, but he decided he wouldn't be taking any detours. It would be quickest to go to Sumika's house and ask her parents directly. Simply confirming her death was priority number one. Waxing nostalgic about the streets of his hometown could wait.
Ogami stuffed his hands in the pockets of his duffle coat, and being careful not to slip on the snowy path, he made his way toward Sumika's house.
It was never a very populous town, but it seemed like the population had only further dwindled in the past four years. The sun had only just set, so you'd expect to see plenty of housewives coming home from shopping or students from school, yet he only encountered enough people to count on one hand. He spotted many unfamiliar empty houses and signs on vacant lots, while several buildings he knew had completely vanished.
The Town of Sakura was becoming a town of ghosts.
The way to walk through snow wasn't the only thing his body remembered. Though his mind should have been filled with thoughts of Sumika, Ogami found himself in front of his parents' house. It wasn't as if he'd passed Sumika's house by. After graduating middle school, he made it his custom to go the long way around to avoid coming near her house. Apparently, he had followed that route subconsciously.
The lights in the house weren't on, so it seemed his parents were still at work. Ogami was grateful for it. He'd intended to leave the town quickly, and wanted to leave as few traces as possible.
Turning away from his old home, he took the first step toward Sumika's house.
He could've done the rest with his eyes closed. He remembered how many steps it was to the corner, then how many steps it was to reach her house.
So he actually tried closing his eyes.
Count 42 steps, come to a stop, and turn left around the corner.
Then another 56 steps.
Turn left.
Open your eyes.
He'd expected some slight difference in the numbers due to physical growth, but as if he'd been subconsciously correcting for them, he was only barely misaligned from his destination. The gate to Sumika's house was right in front of him, with an actual-size ornament of a black cat, small orange lights lighting up the nameplate, a brick fence just as perfectly white as in his memory -
And then, he gasped.
Dressed in uniform, Sumika stood beside Ogami, peering at his face.