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The Town of Sakura

by Sugaru Miaki

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1

What made him willing to meet with that woman in person was that he hadn't been able to sense an ounce of goodwill or affection in her message. So blunt that he couldn't imagine how someone who works as a chat operator could have written it, it was lacking in any etiquette at all. It was almost the sort of thing you'd use in a teaching exercise as an example of what not to do. The gist of it was that she was feeling stuck with work lately and wanted some advice - but seeing this, that was no wonder, Ogami thought.

For the average person, receiving an email like this would probably put them in a bad mood. But for Ogami, things were different. He would only open up for one kind of person: someone there was no chance he'd be fond of, with likewise no chance that they'd be fond of him. In that way, the sender of this email was an ideal fit. Only when dealing with a person who had no expectation of a favorable relationship from the beginning could he ease his nerves.

Of course, he wouldn't completely let his guard down. Depending on how you look at it, people who give a first impression like hers could be considered the most dangerous. Even the smallest thing can turn a negative first impression into a positive one. And a trust that's overwritten a prior negative impression is much sturdier than any positive first impression could be. Truly excellent scammers should probably lead with a negative impression, Ogami theorized.

Once he went to meet the woman face-to-face and they started conversing, he found no need for such worries. The young woman, who gave the name Miwa, seemed to him not to have a deceptive bone in her body. From her choice of words to the way they were timed, she seemed like the type to just say anything she was thinking as soon as she thought it. In short, she wasn't all suited for her current occupation.

Thought she had perfectly fine looks, she wasn't the type that would captivate Ogami's heart, and she didn't appear especially charmed by Ogami on first meeting him either. Thanks to this, he was able to let loose and talk with another person in a way he hadn't in a long time.

They sat on two sides of a table in the back of a café. Taking a light-pink smartphone from Miwa, Ogami looked over some messages sent between Miwa and another user.

Her messages were actually much better than he'd expected. Contrary to the email she'd sent Ogami, she had been writing entirely adequate messages. She kept to all the rules outlined in the manual, and demonstrated some creativity with each message rather than falling into a predictable pattern.

Just being able to do this is pretty impressive, Ogami thought. Do I need to give any advice here? He'd been approached by colleagues for similar consultations in the past, but most of them just proved to be lazy people who hadn't even read the manual once, convinced that all they had to do was pretend to be interested in the other person. Compared to them, this woman certainly wasn't taking the job of a Sakura lightly, at least. That, he could appreciate.

Ogami handed the smartphone back to Miwa.

"I don't think you've got any real problem."

Miwa looked between the smartphone and Ogami's face. Her expression told how unsatisfied she was with that response.

"If there's no problem, then why is it my results are on such a decline?", she said with displeasure. "I just can't keep up a long conversation with users lately. I think I must be outing myself as a Sakura at some point or another. In fact, I've been told several times "you're a Sakura, aren't you?" So of course there's a problem. And yet, I can't figure out what it is."

"Sure, I've been told that too. Some people just get suspicious of everything, seeing Sakura in every shadow."

"Yes, but there are also people who can do it as skillfully as you, Mr. Ogami. I want to know what makes that difference."

Ogami folded his arms and leaned back in his chair, thinking back on the messages he'd just read.

"I think maybe your messages are a bit too excess-free, Ms. Miwa," Ogami replied. "You follow the manual closely, you take care not to fall into a pattern, you give responses that properly take their messages into account. It's skillfully done. There's nothing to get hung up on. So they receive you well at first. But once the conversation has gone long enough, that lack of hang-ups starts to become a hang-up."

Miwa thought about that for a while, but eventually looked to Ogami's face, seeking further explanation.

"There's too little noise. Conversations usually don't go that well. Everybody knows that from experience. You both feel like you're being misunderstood a little, but you accept some compromise and keep pushing forward. That's just how it works. There's none of that in your messages. So maybe that's giving a bit of a mechanical impression."

"But take right now for instance - aren't we talking to each other without any misunderstandings?", Miwa argued.

"That's because we're having what's ultimately a professional discussion. Two users on a matchmaking app aren't gonna be discussing their work concerns."

"Well... I suppose that's true."

"The point is," Ogami continued, "having hang-ups like that makes it feel more like you're talking with a flesh-and-blood person."

"So you're telling me to say more useless things?"

"What I'm saying is, be someone who doesn't do as expected to just the right degree," Ogami corrected.

"And what degree is that?"

"You can only learn how to gauge that for yourself. Personally, even I can't say I understand it perfectly."

Miwa rested her chin on the table and let out a little sigh.

"I'm no good at making recipes that just say "to taste.""

"In some cases, it might even be more honest to express that."

With that, Ogami took a sip of his until then untouched coffee.

Miwa looked at him with a dissatisfied expression, but then, as if struck by an idea, said "Mr. Ogami, you're more earnest than I expected."

Ogami didn't give her a reply. He silently put his cup on its saucer, and glanced toward some customers at the next table over. It was a pair of women who seemed to be making plans for a trip, apparently paying no mind to the conversation over here.

"There, I tried saying something useless," Miwa said, laughing to herself. "I've certainly learned something from you today. However, I imagine it's not a skill I can just pick up in a day. Could you maybe have some simple techniques that can produce results in a shorter time? Like, one little trick that'll keep you from being seen through as a Sakura..."

"Can't say there aren't any," Ogami replied, turning back to Miwa. "For instance, suspecting them before they suspect you - that one's simple yet effective. If a user's uneasy that a Sakura might be deceiving them, get them on the side of clearing their own suspicion instead of suspecting. It's like a criminal suggesting a search for the criminal. You can get into their mental blind spot."

"I see..."

Miwa nodded with a renewed sense of admiration. Then she picked up the smartphone on the table and started inputting something with both hands. It seemed she was eager to put Ogami's advice into practice.

He watched her do it without making it a full-on gaze, but when she was about to look up, he quickly averted his eyes toward a sugar container on the corner of the table.

"By the way," Miwa asked, "how exactly should I try to convey my suspicion? If I say outright "I bet you're a Sakura, aren't you?", it might put them in a bad mood."

"There's a bunch of ways. Hard to just sum it up. But I bet a lot of the users you get are anxious men prone to suspicion, right? You should observe any guys like that. The trends should become apparent quick."

Miwa then peered intently at Ogami's face. She remained silent for an unnaturally long time.

"What's the matter?", Ogami questioned.

"I'm observing an anxious-looking man."

"Me?"

"Indeed," Miwa affirmed with a smile. "What about me are you so afraid of?"

After leaving Miwa, Ogami drove back to his apartment. He made some coffee and sat at his desk, then got started on his work for the day. He didn't put on music, so as not to be put in a particular mood. He kept his work room as neutral an environment as possible.

The term "chat operator" might make it sound all fancy, but in essence, his job was to catfish on matchmaking apps. He'd go onto the app wearing the skin of a fictional person, show users a dream, and scam them out of their money - that was all the job entailed.

The app Ogami was currently on was a lesser-known one. The userbase was mainly people in their twenties to thirties, and it targeted people seriously looking for marriage partners. It didn't have many users compared to the bigger apps, but that spoke to its high review standards - anyone who was obviously a scammer or with some kind of business was promptly removed, making it an excellent pick for those in the know.

Ogami's primary role was, in a manning of speaking, to draw the short straws. He'd target users who nobody else was willing to date, leaving them just enough scraps to keep them from deleting their accounts in despair.

It was no easy task to patch up the self-respect of users who had developed an inferiority from being consistently ignored. Yet without anyone even teaching him, Ogami was a master at it from the jump.

It was only natural, considering it was what he was always doing for himself.

He finished up work around 11. Returning to the living room, he sat himself on the sofa and poured a glass of whiskey. Alcohol was indispensable after talking with large numbers of people. Without it, their voices (not that he'd actually heard their voices) would be ringing in his head all night, and he'd never get any sleep.

Closing his eyes, he tilted the glass, and drove the voices of people starved for love out of his head.

As he stared absentmindedly at the ceiling after emptying the glass, his smartphone suddenly went off. Miwa's face was what first came to mind, yet the number on screen was unfamiliar to him. It didn't seem to be a work-related call, but Ogami didn't have a single acquaintance who would call him for personal reasons. No doubt they had the wrong number.

He answered the phone without thinking on it too deeply. Hoping that the voice on the call would cancel out the ones in his head.

"Is this Masaki Ogami?", a man's voice asked. It was an unremarkable voice that he might've forgotten by the next moment.

Briefly, Ogami hesitated to respond. When you live using so many pseudonyms, you start to resist revealing your real name, even if there's no good reason for it.

After acknowledging that he was indeed Masaki Ogami, the voice abruptly informed him:

"Sumika Takasago has killed herself."

Sumika Takasago has killed herself. Ogami repeated the words in his head. As if to confirm that it was real, he tightly gripped the phone in his hand, then stood up from the sofa for no particular reason. Leaving the living room, he stopped in the hall and leaned against the wall.

"I'm sorry, but who would this be?", Ogami finally asked.

"I just thought that you should know," the man said, ignoring Ogami's question. "That's all. Even if I told you my name, I think you probably don't remember me. Well, goodbye."

Before Ogami could voice another question, the call had ended.

The hallway was freezing, but that chilliness seemed somehow irrelevant to him.

He returned to the living room and sat back on the sofa. After looking at the phone screen again for no particular reason, he placed it on the table.

Hearing the name Sumika Takasago after so many years didn't instantly make memories of her cross his mind. There was no feeling of nostalgia, nor the accompanying feeling of suffering.

No, it was just natural. Because for these past few years, she had always been sitting in the center of his mind. Until just moments ago, it had been an issue in the present tense.

For now, should I just be glad that the issue has come to an end?, Ogami wondered. Though it's unfortunate I wasn't able to resolve it myself, if you really think it about it, there was no conceivable solution as long as she still lived. Perhaps Sumika Takasago's suicide was the best settlement I could hope for.

There was no guarantee that what the man on the phone said was true, but it was hard to imagine it was a lie. There was no point to a lie like that, and even if he were to tell him false information out of some malice, he'd have put together a story with more detail. You couldn't expect much of a result from just the words "Sumika Takasago has killed herself."

He then started trying to recall voices that matched the man on the phone. But sure enough, he was having a hard time of it. Still, if it was someone who knew Ogami and Sumika's relationship, it seemed unmistakable that it was a classmate from middle school. And given what he'd said, probably one with little enough connection to him that he wouldn't remember even after hearing his name.

He felt it would be pointless thinking about it any more than that.

Even after getting into bed and falling asleep, Sumika didn't appear in his dreams or anything.

The notion of his life's biggest obstacle having been removed just wasn't feeling real.

Two days passed, then three, and his mood not only didn't clear up, it became muddier. Unable to concentrate on work, he made a number of stupid mistakes. His sleep became lighter, and he drank more.

On the fourth day, he couldn't muster the energy to do anything, spending a whole day making a round trip to the convenience store.

The morning of the fifth day, the words of Miwa, the woman he met at the café, suddenly came back to him.

What about me are you so afraid of?

The woman's face and voice, which he already couldn't remember, were filled in by those of Sumika Takasago.

I still can't feel at ease, Ogami finally realized. No way can a single phone call put me at ease. If I don't go back to that town and confirm Sumika's death for certain, she'll keep being a menace upon my life forever.

The Sumika that's in me still won't die.

He pulled out his suitcase and quickly packed up, went down to the parking lot, and got in his car. When he started the engine and the navigation system asked his destination, he spat out the name of the town where he was born.

In much the same way a criminal returns to the scene of the crime, Ogami set his sights on that town again after four years.

Moving to Tokyo after high school and bouncing all over the map since then, seeing so many varied places as a result, Ogami had come to realize what a colorless town it had really been. It had no rich nature, nor dazzling streets, nor a culture with much history; he spent his childhood in a dull, transparent town. As if it had been diligently pruned of any element that could be charming, as if it were a strangely-shaped blot that rejected any mental association, as if it were created with the very goal of being overlooked and forgotten - it was a town with a tragically commonplace name.

Yet he would always refer to the town of his birth by another name, imbued with hatred:

The Town of Sakura.

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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.

[+]

3

Ogami's middle school held their culture festivals in the summer rather than the fall. It made for a hectic schedule: doing rehearsals for the culture festival alongside preparing for finals, going straight into the festival after finals without a break, and then having the summer festival soon after that. He didn't know what possessed them to adopt such a messy schedule. Maybe it was out of consideration for third-years preparing for entrance exams.

The classes were changed up when they became second-years. There was a possibility that he'd be separated from Sumika, but he felt he was prepared for that eventuality. On their last day communing to school in March, she told him "Even if we end up in different classes, let's still walk to school together like this."

And yet on the first day of the new term, looking at the class roster posted at the entrance, he sighed with relief seeing both their names in the same box.

The one thing he didn't like about his new class was Kujirai being there. The man who had driven Ogami into isolation. While you could also say he created the impetus for him becoming close with Sumika, it could only been viewed that way in hindsight. Rather than being fearful of what he might actually do, Ogami was more annoyed about having a symbol of that painful month always in sight.

April passed in the blink of an eye, and after the Golden Week break, preparations for the culture festival began. Ogami's class decided to put on a play. It was mostly just decided arbitrarily by their homeroom teacher, but no one showed any opposition. It really doesn't make much difference what you do at a middle school culture festival.

To put on a play, you need lead parts, supporting parts, bit parts, and stagehands. Ogami figured he would naturally be a stagehand. His other classmates seemed to think the same. With no one in their class who desired to stand out and take center stage, nor any responsible honor students, duties were decided starting from the backstage roles. By the time Ogami understood that this meant they were scrambling for the uninteresting roles, the only option that remained was to play a leading role.

Sumika had followed a similar path. Apparently she'd seen Ogami absentmindedly watching and not participating as they fought over backstage tasks and thought "well then, I'll do that too."

"I was sure you were just standing ready to jump on one of the lead roles," Sumika said with a laugh.

Even just the thought of standing in front of others and acting annoyed Ogami, but thinking how Sumika would share that suffering with him lightened his spirits some.

Though he had been made to take part in plays before in kindergarten and elementary school, they were always bit parts where he just had to say one or two meaningless lines and leave the stage. He couldn't imagine he could do any proper acting, but surely nobody was expecting much from a middle school play. As long as he didn't forget his lines and just stand there, he'd manage in the end, he thought.

And yet, there was someone expecting superb performances from a middle school play, surprisingly close at hand.

Kujirai was irritated from as early as script rehearsals. He glared at his classmates as they read their lines, and let out an obvious sigh every time there was a break. Every time a teacher gave an instruction, he looked at them with a frown. He had a temper that was unimaginable compared to the usual good-mannered Kujirai. And it was clear to everyone that it wasn't the play itself, but the quality of the performances that he was irritated by.

As far as Kujirai's own acting, much as it pained them, you couldn't so much as form a complaint. He spoke with a clear voice suited for performing, and was able to express what needed expressing without over-exaggerated intonation or gesturing. At the same time, he didn't seem to be standing above the other hammy performers either, naturally blending in with the scene. It was a bit magical. Ogami'd always thought he was a man who could do anything well, but when it came to theater, he was clearly on another level.

His irritation was also effectively expressed through that acting skill, further intimidating the amateur actors with each passing day. Among them, Ogami alone doggedly hung on out of antagonism for Kujirai. He couldn't stand the idea of giving Kujirai a justifiable reason to look down on him. By imagining how Kujirai would play his role, and comparing Kujirai's unimaginable talent with his own, Ogami was able to refine his acting. The actual fastest way to improvement would have probably been to ask Kujirai to show him how it's done, but his pride wouldn't allow for that.

The other exception was Sumika. Though not on Kujirai's level, in no time at all after beginning rehearsals, she was demonstrating stand-out acting ability. Even if comparing her to Kujirai was unfavorable, thanks to her personality matching the role, she was able to master her part perhaps even quicker than Kujirai.

After school following their fourth rehearsal, due to class duties or something along those lines, Ogami and Kujirai had an opportunity to be alone with each other. Then, for the first time since the Kozaki incident, Kujirai spoke to Ogami.

"Y'know, it seems like the only ones with functioning brains in this class are me, you, and Sumika," Kujirai remarked in a tired voice. "The rest of them don't know a single thing about acting."

"No point in getting mad at amateur actors, is there?", Ogami replied - feeling a quiet relief that he wasn't included in "the rest of them."

"No such thing as an amateur actor," Kujirai declared decisively. "And yet as soon as they get up on stage, they suddenly forget everything they know."

You know, he's got something of a point there, Ogami thought. No one's "new" to acting. To some extent, people are always having to perform around others. And yet if you're outright told to "perform," you suddenly aren't able to. Like how if you turn your attention to your breathing, which you're always doing without a thought, you suddenly can't remember how to breathe naturally.

"By the way," Kujirai added, "you're just a little better than the others, not actually good."

"Well, thanks."

"Sumika is good."

"I can tell that."

"Which makes you the only one with room for growth."

It was hard for him to tell if he was being complimented or insulted, but he figured it was probably a compliment. For how irritated Kujirai was, he could honestly accept that remark as complimentary.

Kujirai asked if he had time later, and after being told Ogami had no particular plans, suggested he "come over to my house for a bit." Ogami said he wouldn't mind. It wasn't like he had forgotten his grudge from just earlier that year, but his curiosity won out. It seemed this man had a hidden side he didn't show in the classroom. Maybe he'd get to catch a glimpse of it.

Kujirai's house was on the edge of a residential district close to the school. The house looked like a boring and bland gray box, with a garage sticking out as if it were a little box put next to a big one. Kujirai took Ogami over to the garage. Raising the heavy shutter up to around his waist, he then bent down and ducked under. After confirming that Ogami was inside, he roughly pushed the shutter down with his foot.

It was pitch black inside the garage, which may have been why it felt much larger than it seemed from outside. Though there was a faint smell of concrete in the air, the place didn't feel unclean. Kujirai took familiar steps through the darkness. Eventually he flicked on the light, and Ogami's eyes narrowed at the sudden brightness.

It was a nice and tidy space. The first thing Ogami noticed was a black leather sofa in the center. On the right wall was a steel rack being used as a bookshelf, and on the left wall hung a large screen, with a projector hanging from the ceiling pointed at it.

Kujirai pointed at the sofa and said "sit there and wait," then opened the door in the back to go to the main part of the house. Ogami said in the sofa as told, staring at the blank projection screen for a few seconds. Then he stood up, went behind the sofa, and stood in front of the steel rack. Books made up at most one third of the contents, while the rest seemed to be video discs.

Ogami's eyes stopped on the label of a CD case on the bottom shelf. It was a movie that Ogami himself also owned. An old one. It was being sold for next to nothing at a thrift store after being given discount after discount. He was fond of the title: a boring, commonplace title that wouldn't make movie-lovers or movie-haters alike feel like reaching for it.

Ogami used that CD case of his as a secret hiding spot. It was thin, so he couldn't fit anything much in there, and indeed, nothing much was in there. A letter from a girl he used to be friends with, a New Year's card; stuff like that was the most it could hold.

Ogami reached for the case, having an amusing idea. Perhaps Kujirai - although it may have belonged to Kujirai's father - was using the same CD case as some kind of hiding spot. If he was lucky, maybe he'd even get some insight into Kujirai's weaknesses.

Not actually expecting much, he opened the case.

There were photos inside.

Maybe I could actually get on with this guy pretty well, Ogami thought with wonder.

The photos were all taken when Kujirai was young, suggesting that his parents hadn't hidden them. A parent would have no reason to hide photos of their son in a place no one would look. They should have shown them proudly.

Naturally, the photos didn't seem to carry any kind of secret that would capture Ogami's interest. Most likely Kujirai just felt kind of embarrassed about having old photos of himself.

After looking through all the photos, Ogami went to put the case back where it was. But something was tugging on his mind. He couldn't help but feel like he'd witnessed something with a deep relation to himself. He opened the case again and, careful not to leave fingerprints, inspected the photos again.

At the third photo, his hands froze.

It was Kujirai at around 10 years old. No, maybe a little before that. Judging from the clothes and the general atmosphere, it might have been taken at something like a piano recital or concert. To his left, a woman who seemed like his teacher gave a soft smile, and to his right stood a smiling girl around the same age as Kujirai.

A girl who looked a lot like Sumika Takasago.

No, never mind "looked like" - wasn't this Sumika Takasago herself?

Hearing a creaky floor beyond the door, Ogami quickly put back the photos and stuck the case back in its spot. Then he jammed his hands in his pockets and pretended to be looking at the top shelf of the rack. But there was no need for his haste. Kujirai kicked the door, telling Ogami from the other side "open it for me."

Upon opening the door, he saw Kujirai holding a cola bottle in one hand and a frying pan filled with popcorn in the other. The popcorn was still radiating heat, and smelled of cooked butter. Kujirai set it down on the sofa table, then went to grab a disc and put it in the projector. After dimming the lights with a remote, he sat down at one end of the sofa. Ogami sat himself at the opposite end.

Projected on the screen was, of course, a movie, an old film whose title Ogami was just barely able to remember. The quality was pretty rough, but it wasn't black and white. It started with a scene of two men dressed in thick clothes talking under a bridge.

There was initially enough space between Ogami and Kujirai for a cat to curl up in, but as the movie progressed, it gradually shrank. A consequence of the popcorn being put at the center of the table. Ogami felt it was a little lacking in salt, but even so, it was the best popcorn he'd ever eaten. He also appreciated how unlike a movie theater, you didn't have to worry about the crunching sounds you made as you ate.

By the time the movie, less than two hours in length, ended, the pile of popcorn had disappeared.

During the end credits, Kujirai aired a question. "What'd you think?"

"Some more salt would..."

"I mean the movie. The actors' performance."

He had no particular impressions worth calling impressions. He didn't know very much about films, and was too focused on the plot to pay any attention to the acting.

"There was nothing really egregious," Ogami answered. He intended it as a roundabout way of saying "I didn't feel anything," but Kujirai was pleased with that answer, nodding in admiration.

"That's the fundamental thing," Kujirai agreed. "You can't even let them think "they're good at this.""

If you're making the audience think "they're good," your acting is already being perceived as acting. That must have been what Kujirai was trying to say.

It was a notion consistent with his own acting.

"The popcorn was tasty," Ogami remarked as he gazed at the now black screen.

"I know," Kujirai said with disinterest.

Every day from then until the day of the culture festival, Ogami watched movies with Kujirai in the garage. They were diverse in genre, some old and some recent, some short and some long. Some were terrifyingly simple stories, while others were packed with enough details to make your head hurt, and some you couldn't make sense of at all.

He didn't imagine watching them would improve his own acting, nor did he think it was necessary to get serious about a culture festival play in the first place. Yet drawn by the unusual sensation of watching movies in a dark garage as well as the taste of the popcorn, Ogami went as far as to neglect finals to continue paying visits to the garage.

He hadn't forgotten his resentment of Kujirai. But Kujirai's invitation could be taken as an offering to reconcile, and he felt it was no use holding a grudge over things that were in the past.

Some conversation or another led Kujirai to abruptly divulge that his father had passed away. "He died all of a sudden while relaxing on a day off. Right on this sofa we're sitting on."

Ogami frowned, and Kujirai laughed that it was a joke. But following that conversation, the darkness of the garage started to feel like it had the same kind of stillness as a graveyard.

Although it wasn't such a bad sensation.

A week after Ogami started going to Kujirai's garage, Sumika suddenly spoke up while they were walking to school.

"Ogami, you seem friendly with Kujirai lately."

"Really?" Ogami played dumb.

"Really. You're always going home together."

Now that she mentioned it, ever since they started preparing for the culture festival, he hadn't once accompanied Sumika on the way home from school. Part of it was that he was being assigned other small tasks on top of the play rehearsals, so the times they were going home didn't line up. But sure enough, the primary reason was Kujirai.

He had yet to tell Sumika about his visits to the garage. Even he was still trying to determine how to associate with Kujirai, so he wasn't sure how to go about explaining it.

"I guess it's more fun for boys to hang out together, huh?", Sumika said in a sulking tone.

It seemed she didn't find the situation very agreeable. Was it bad that he was being friendly with Kujirai, or was it bad to be getting close to someone without Sumika's knowledge? In any event, it was the first time she'd openly stated some dissatisfaction to him.

To defend himself, Ogami openly explained the situation. At first, Sumika listened to his story with suspicion, but gradually began to show an interest in what they were doing in Kujirai's garage.

"I wonder if you'd let me join in, too?"

Of course, there was no way he could decline.

After school that day, Ogami brought Sumika along to the garage. Kujirai was unfazed when he saw Sumika, simply saying "Huh, you came too, Sumika?", then squeezing himself against the edge of the sofa to make room for a third person.

From then on, the films became something for the three of them to watch together.

What did this situation mean?

That question was adjacent to the question of what Kujirai's photos meant. Supposing the girl in the photo was Sumika, and there was a significance to Kujirai keeping it in a hidden spot, this situation could be extremely dangerous for Ogami. On the other hand, Kujirai couldn't ask for anything better.

At first, Ogami watched Kujirai's every action to determine whether he might become a rival for Sumika's affection. Needless to say, by this point Ogami had long since fallen for her, and was plenty aware of those feelings of his. Part of it was that she was kind to him when he was suffering, yes. But when Ogami truly fell in love came after moving up a grade, when the two being together became natural.

There came a moment when Ogami had a revelation, as if sent from the heavens. Me meeting this girl is a once in a lifetime event. There probably won't be anything else in my life to come that can make me as happy as this. Decades later, I'll look back and think "I never was able to get anything better than that" - that's the kind of encounter this is.

And Kujirai was a superhuman the likes of which he had never seen before. Until seeing him, he thought all people had their advantages and shortcomings, that no one was generally blessed with everything. But since befriending Kujirai, he had to re-evaluate that idea. This man has nearly everything. Compared to Kujirai, do I have even a single thing that's more charming than him?

At a glance, Kujirai didn't appear to be treating Sumika any differently for being a girl. But figuring it would be a piece of cake for a skilled actor such as him to conceal his affections, Ogami couldn't let his guard down.

Even putting the photo aside, there was no mistaking that the two had an old acquaintance. It wasn't necessarily intimate, but he felt a particular familiarity around the edges of their words. Like siblings who didn't get along particularly well nor poorly, or else a couple who had broken up amicably.

He also considered just coming out and asking about the photo. He'd just have to ask directly: "why are you hiding a photo of Sumika?" Knowing Kujirai, he'd probably answer honestly. That would make his feelings clear, thought Ogami.

But if he honestly admitted having feelings for Sumika, what would I do then? Would erasing my immediate doubts end up shortening the lifespan of my happiness?

But by the time the culture festival was near at hand and the play was almost fully prepared, such worries had vanished from Ogami's mind. Kujirai didn't seem to be an enemy. In fact, seeming to infer the complicated relationship between Ogami and Sumika, he showed restraint, even going so far as to keep some distance from her. Kujirai was probably consistently doing that from the start, but his consideration had been so casual that Ogami didn't notice.

So there was surely no deep meaning to that photo after all. Maybe the girl in the photo was Sumika, but her being in it didn't hold any great meaning, it's just that she happened to be there. Or perhaps Kujirai had special feelings for her at the time, but it held no meaning to Kujirai now; maybe he just couldn't let go of a photo that was once a treasure of his.

Ogami was relieved on two fronts. One, that he wouldn't have to recklessly challenge an opponent he knew he could never contend with. And two, that it wouldn't throw a wrench into the budding friendship between the two of them. Ogami had come to feel a natural fondness for this Kujirai. The time he spent with him was becoming his second-favorite in the world. It was an entirely different kind of "special" from the kind Sumika provided.

As he spoke more with Kujirai, Ogami's words became more fragmentary. If I use the minimum amount of words, this guy should understand what I'm trying to say without misunderstandings, he thought, and in practice, he did indeed convey himself without misunderstandings. Then Kujirai's words became fragmentary to go along with it, to the point that there were occasions in which Sumika was unable to keep up with the speed of their conversations.

This guy's equipped with the same circuits as me, Ogami thought. He might have much higher specs, yet we're built from the same base. So if you put in the same input, you get the same output. So maybe even the fact we used a CD case for the same movie as a hiding spot wasn't such a coincidence.

The play came and went without incident. When both the actors and the audience are amateurs, there's no such thing as success or failure. Even so, approaching it like another rehearsal where you're just trying to avoid forgetting your lines from nervousness, Ogami ended it feeling like it truly was no different from the rehearsals.

The culture festival reached the end of its schedule, and Ogami walked with a sense of reluctance down the hall, where echoes of the festival lingered. As he changed his shoes at the entryway, Kujirai spoke from beside him, lit by the westering sun.

"It's a comedy today."

"An old one?", Ogami asked without looking up.

"Relatively new."

"When you say "relatively new," that means about 30 years old," he heard Sumika remark with a laugh behind them.

Even once there was no longer a need to study acting, Ogami and Sumika continued to visit Kujirai's garage. Yet bit by bit, the movie part became unnecessary, and the three started gathering to idly spend time more often. They even grouped together at school, and on days off, they sometimes went on day trips together.

During summer vacation, the garage became as hot as a sauna. Some days it would be so much that they were sweating even with the fan on, in which case they'd leave the garage and walk around town seeking ways to cool off. Just like how they sat on the sofa, Sumika was always in the middle of the lineup, inserted in between Ogami and Kujirai. It wasn't like someone decided it should be so, yet that lineup was what felt most right.

That's why even after so much time had passed, whenever Ogami recalled Sumika from those days, he'd get a glance of Kujirai's face over her shoulder. He too was someone Ogami had a grudge against, but compared to his grudge against Sumika, it was quite a bit weaker. Kujirai had been showing Ogami a number of hints from the beginning. In that sense, you could say he was a lot more fair than Sumika.

Though he found it too awkward to ever say as much to the two of them, Ogami felt that the only term that could describe the relationship between the three of them was "best friends." The trio of Ogami, Sumika, and Kujirai demonstrated the perfect relationship for a group mixing boys and girls; you couldn't ask for something better. Built on a careful balance you wouldn't get with three boys or three girls, it was something of a miraculous relationship. Looking around, he could see not a single group of people that maintained the appropriate distances the way they did.

By no means had he given up on his love of Sumika. Yet Ogami prioritized the preservation of their three-person relationship over romance, striving to not see Sumika differently as a girl. It required extraordinary effort, but it just went to show how valuable the time they spent as a trio was to him.

He was well aware such an unnatural relationship wouldn't last long. Eventually, an end would come to their friendship. The most perfect times will always leave you at some point. But Ogami had made up his mind: at least I won't do anything to hasten that day's coming.

He heard the rumor about Handcuff love-divination on a sunny morning in November the following year. The town was filled with an aroma signaling winter's arrival, and whenever the wind blew, you could hear the sound of dry fallen leaves rustling somewhere. It was on the way to school, so of course Sumika was there next to Ogami. Which meant Sumika heard the same rumor as the same time.

At that moment, Ogami and Sumika were waiting for the gate to rise at the railroad crossing. Behind them were two others also waiting. It was a pair of girls, having a rambling chat as girls their age are wont to do. Ogami had been tuning them out as background noise, but certain words suddenly caught his attention.

"Hey, have you heard? There's this thing where you can tell you likes you using your Bracelet."

Even after the gate went up and they started walking again, Ogami listened in on the two chatting behind them. Sumika, perhaps also interested in the conversation, was unusually quiet as she walked beside him. Their gossip soon ended, and they went back to talking about ordinary topics.

The gist of the rumor was this. There existed an app that could capture and analyze the data transmitted by Handcuffs, and using that, you could tell who had affections for you.

The "Health" part of the National Health Care System wasn't just referring to physical health. It also accounted for mental health, meaning the info collected by the Handcuff's extensive sensors didn't stop at simply biological data. For instance, it even included things like the wearer's relationships. Among the problems a person might have, some can only be resolved with the help of their personal network - that was the stated reasoning, setting aside whether it was true.

While the extent of the data being collected was publicized, it was not clear just how much the System could read from that information. But people were saying that for instance, by simply analyzing physiological responses, you might easily be able to predict things like personal feelings if you so desired - that the System might quietly be building a massive web of relationships based on likes and dislikes.

Of course, even supposing that were true, you'd likely have to analyze the server directly - surely analyzing transmissions from Handcuffs wouldn't allow you to go as far as determining who had affections for you. It was just a harmless rumor surrounding Handcuffs, one you could just laugh off and be done with.

So it should have been.

But days later, Ogami still couldn't forget about that rumor. No, it's an understatement to say he couldn't forget. Handcuff love-divination had been constantly sitting in the center of his thoughts.

If that rumor is true, I could ascertain Sumika's feelings without her even suspecting a thing. Not only that, I could even confirm what Kujirai thinks about her.

Since the first time Sumika visited the garage, Kujirai had kept a consistent attitude. He kept a line between him and Sumika as if out of consideration for Ogami, and carefully avoided being alone with Sumika without Ogami there.

And yet, Ogami thought. There was the matter of the photograph. At one time I'd decided that there was no deep meaning to that photo, but was that judgement accurate? Kujirai's showing consideration for me now, but could I say for certain that he always would?

What if Kujirai, too, is just keeping a lid on his feelings out of fear he'll ruin our three-person relationship?

If I can learn their relationship through this Handcuff love-divination thing, then I can come to some kind of personal settlement. If Sumika likes me back, there's nothing better than that, and if she likes Kujirai instead, I'd much prefer learning it this way to hearing it from Sumika's mouth. I'll quietly have my heart broken without her knowing, and be able to mentally prepare before their relationship develops. I'd no longer have to worry about facing the worst kind of surprise attack.

Or maybe she didn't have a romantic interest in anyone. In that case, we could maintain the same relationship as usual.

He got as far as typing keywords into a search engine box. But he was barely able to stop himself there. This kind of approach wasn't fair. Maybe Kujirai or Sumika are feeling similar anxieties to me. For me alone to use this method to get relief, as if stealing a glance at their hearts, would be equivalent to betraying their friendship.

After much struggle, Ogami managed to reject the allure of Handcuff divination. And he felt just a little proud of himself for arriving at such a decision.

That said, if Kujirai had been sufficiently informed at this point, it's dubious whether he would arrive at a similar conclusion. Ogami, at the time he heard the rumor, still had something safe to fall back on. Even supposing Kujirai had feelings for Sumika, Ogami had the quiet conceit that she would likely choose him.

Even when the three acted together, there would be times when she had to pick one of the two. And at those times, Sumika would always prioritize Ogami. It was never the case that Sumika and Kujirai would go home from school together, whereas she did so with Ogami near-daily. There were times when Sumika would briefly touch Ogami physically, but he never saw her touch Kujirai.

Above all, Sumika and Kujirai becoming friends at all was largely just the way things went. Meanwhile, she clearly befriended Ogami out of her own volition. Even looking at only the objective facts, he felt that he had more advantages.

Naturally, however much friendliness Sumika felt for him, whether it was love was something else entirely. You could even take the perspective that she treated him so lightheartedly because he wasn't a target of affection. Yet you could also say she was having trouble taking the next step because he was a target of affection.

Kujirai is a fascinating man, Ogami thought. Even I think that as a guy, so I can only imagine how he looks to a girl. Some people have charms that are only liked by their own gender or only by others, but Kujirai wasn't like that. Not just likable as a man, he was likable as a human. If it were between me and Kujirai, it'd only be natural to pick Kujirai.

Even so, perhaps Sumika, and only Sumika, was judging people on a basis different from your average girl. The fact that the faux pas which isolated me is what led to her interest in me was the number one proof of that.

Sumika's feelings toward me are unlike the feelings she has for anyone else - even if they aren't love - so shouldn't I at least be confident in the fact that I'm special to her?

Those hopeful predictions of Ogami's, in truth, did hit close to reality. With the only problem lying in what "special" entailed.

It happened on a Sunday two weeks later, as Christmas approached.

That day was a rare occasion: the three of them were each on their own because they had their own things to attend to. Kujirai said he was going skiing with his family, and Sumika said she would be attending a school event for her little sister. Ogami was supposed to visit his grandmother's house, but circumstances changed in the morning, and the plans were postponed.

He hadn't been alone on a Sunday in a long while. After cleaning his room and lightly browsing social media, he felt restless and left the house. It was 1 in the afternoon, yet it was as dark as evening, with snow seeming likely to come down any moment.

After walking aimlessly for a while, Ogami stopped in front of a building. It was an old two-story apartment building built from wood, sitting in the corner of the residential district looking like an outcast compared to the surrounding buildings. The once white exterior had blackened beyond saving, and the rusted front steps looked as if holes might soon open up in them. He could sense no one's presence through any of the six windows, and there was not a single car in the presumed parking spots in front.

Ogami had always felt charmed by that gloomy apartment building, which seemed to have no charm as a residence. It's not like he yearned for frugal living, but he had the sense that such a lifestyle filled with deficiency suited someone like him.

Maybe the time he spent in Kujirai's garage had planted that perspective in him. That, too, was difficult to call a comfortable place. It was terrible in the summertime, but even worse in winter. It got cold enough that you might have no problems converting it into a freezer. At its chilliest last year, they wore blankets over their coats, huddled around the heater, and kept drinking hot tea from a heated kettle.

They could have simply moved into the main part of the house, but the three also found they enjoyed the difficulties of the garage. All three of them had learned from school life, like it or not, that sharing in suffering deepens bonds of friendship faster than anything.

Standing outside the apartment, Ogami imagined himself living there. At first, he placed Sumika next to his imaginary self. He tried to paint a picture of the two of them living an inconvenient yet sufficient life in a cramped tatami-floor room. But something felt wrong about that. This sort of life didn't fit Sumika. He wanted her to be living a peaceful life somewhere more clean.

Next, he imagined living a life of poverty with Kujirai. This felt entirely correct. They ate bland meals every morning with a low table between them, having frivolous conversation as they headed to their respective workplaces. They saved up to buy a cheap used car, and toiled to fix it themselves every time it broke down. On the weekend, they drove the car to visit Sumika. Celebrating some kind of anniversary, they got drunk until morning, and spent the whole next day lying down on the tatami floor.

An anniversary. Come to think of it, I haven't gotten Christmas presents for Sumika or Kujirai yet, Ogami recalled. Last Christmas, Sumika suddenly gave him a present, so he hurriedly ran off with Kujirai to a variety store in a neighboring town. To avoid that happening again this year, he thought he should get something prepared soon.

He thought of a present for Kujirai right away. He and Kujirai's tastes matched. He could just assume that anything which would make him happy to get, Kujirai would be happy to get.

Yet he struggled to think of a gift appropriate for Sumika. She had no clear hobbies or tastes to speak of. Not that she didn't have anything fun in her life, but it was almost like life itself was her hobby.

Indeed, last Christmas he'd asked her directly what sort of thing she'd want, but her answer was "I don't know either."

"Oh, but I'm happy with anything if it's from you, Ogami," she hastily appended. "Whether it's a pencil, an hourglass, anything."

"Talk about selfless," Ogami said, somewhat amazed. "Come to think of it, I've never really seen you wanting anything."

"That's not true. I'll absolutely give my all to get something if I really want it, like anyone else."

"Such as?"

"It's not possible to name something "such as" the thing you really want."

"You just can't think of anything, can you?"

"Not yet, no," she admitted. "If you're so insistent, what do you want the most, Ogami?"

He didn't remember how he answered that question. But most likely, he told some terribly boring lie. That was for the best, he thought. Because if he'd spoken his real feelings, he'd surely get a similarly boring answer.

Riding the bus to the next town over, he perused the same store he went to last year. After thinking it over for about 30 minutes, he decided to buy a Bracelet stand. It was a conical wooden stand, and pricey for a mere stand, but it seemed good quality. For Kujirai, he bought a leather keychain shaped like a shoehorn. This too matched Ogami's tastes so much he was loath to give it as a gift, meaning there was no question Kujirai would like it too. While ringing them up, the clerk explained that both were handmade, one-of-a-kind items.

He had the stand and keychain wrapped for him, then left the shop. As he rode the bus holding the paper bag, he started to become uneasy about his choices. Kujirai aside, would Sumika be happy to receive this?

He got off the bus partway and walked toward Kujirai's house. He likely had already bought a present for Sumika, or at least had an idea. If he could casually ask what he chose, that would be a good reference.

Kujirai was supposed to be skiing with his family, which was the whole reason the three were spending time apart that day, but Ogami only remembered that after ringing his doorbell.

He waited by the door for about 30 seconds, but of course got no reply. He gave up and stepped away, setting his sights on the garage. He didn't think Kujirai would be there, but thought it might be a good way to kill time. Kujirai had given him permission to enter the garage freely even when he wasn't there.

As he neared the garage, he noticed the shutter was open about 20 inches. Maybe someone forgot to shut it, or perhaps Kujirai was also at home because of a change in plans. Just after he thought that, he heard a voice that sounded like Sumika's through the gap in the shutter. It seemed it wasn't just Kujirai - Sumika was also in there.

Sumika was also in there?

He instantly came to a halt. Looking around to make sure no one was looking, he hid himself beside the garage. The sound was muffled, so he couldn't make out their conversation, but it seemed he was correct that Kujirai and Sumika were there.

As he held his breath to listen in, even though it wasn't like he'd been running, his heart pounded rapidly. Worrying that his heartbeat could be felt through the wall, Ogami kept his back slightly away from the garage.

"Why didn't... from the start..." Ogami was barely able to make out some of Sumika's words.

The mood didn't seem cheerful. Both voices had a tinge of tension to them. It was almost like they were rehearsing for a play, but while that might have checked out a year ago, there was no reason for them to be doing that now.

Neither Kujirai nor Sumika were supposed to be here in the first place. Just one of the two would be one thing, but it was hard to imagine that both of them had a change of plans. Even if this just happened by coincidence, hadn't Kujirai always avoided being alone with Sumika without Ogami there?

Ogami's confusion only deepened further when a moment later, he heard the sound of Sumika crying.

There was no question they were having some important discussion. And it likely had to be something they could only talk about without Ogami.

What in the world were they talking about?

The first thing Ogami imagined was that Sumika had admitted her affection for Kujirai and been rejected. And she was doing this when Ogami wasn't around because she had picked up on his feelings. Kujirai turning her down, too, would be because he was aware of those feelings.

If this guess was right, it was the worst possible development for Ogami. And even if he was just overthinking it, it was clear the two were sharing some kind of secret. It could even be something entirely unrelated to romance. And yet, there was no changing that Sumika had chosen Kujirai to show her tears to.

There was no changing that Ogami had been cut out.

Eventually, he heard the shutter open. At about the same time, a door closed inside the garage. It seemed Kujirai had gone into the house, and Sumika had left the garage.

Ogami continued to stand there next to the garage for a long while. Once the sun set and the streetlights came on, he finally came to his senses, and fled back home.

The next morning, Ogami dragged his sleep-deprived body out of the house. He took 42 steps, turned left, counted 56 steps, and saw Sumika's smile in front of him. "Good morning, Ogami," she said, bounding down from the porch. She bumped into Ogami from the momentum, and laughed playfully.

A faint hope crossed Ogami's mind: Maybe this whole thing is a misunderstanding. But when he looked at Sumika's face up close, there were unmistakable traces of tears. As if she had been crying all night.

He hoped for some kind of explanation soon, but even by next week, the two of them had not referenced what happened on Sunday. For Kujirai, it didn't help that it was exam season, so they didn't have many opportunities to talk. But Sumika had plenty of opportunities to tell the truth if she felt like it. She'd always detailed the most trivial news to Ogami; it was inconceivable she won't touch on an incident that made her cry. However he looked at it, she had to be hiding it from him.

He couldn't be worried about appearances anymore. He had to know what had happened between them, no matter how. Exams ended, and winter break was approaching. He decided he needed to clear everything up soon, while he could still meet Sumika every day.

That was how the rumor of Handcuff divination grabbed Ogami's heart once more, and guided him to the Town of Sakura.

On December 20th, a heavy snow warning was issued to the town. The snowstorm lasting half a day had colored the whole town white, but Ogami, busy researching at home, didn't even know that.

At some point, he'd fallen asleep at his desk. When he woke up, the app was already installed on his computer, and a page showing how to use it was displayed on the monitor. He couldn't clearly remember how he arrived at that page.

But it seemed certain that this was the app for Handcuff love-divination. His sleepy mind couldn't follow all the technical terms, but he at least understood the part about analyzing Handcuff transmissions.

The clock showed it was 12 PM. Probably because he'd fallen asleep with the heater on, his throat was terribly dry.

It appeared the app was named "BlossomBuddy."

Contrary to the name, the gray icon depicted a desolate, bare tree.

But this was no time to be looking into the origin of the app's name. Following the complex instructions on the page, he set up his computer to accommodate the app's functionality, synced it with his Handcuff, and got it started on analyzing the data.

By the time he got back from taking a shower, the analysis had finished. Not even bothering to dry his hair, he sat at the desk to check the results. At a glance, they showed more or less the same thing as the medical reports the System sent him every month. There was nothing to be gained from just being shown this again.

He scrolled down the page, feeling despair creeping in, when a line in the analysis with emphasized red text jumped out at him. Red text. That meant something high-risk.

Hurriedly scrolling back up, he checked what it was.

And there it said: "suicide risk."

There had been, of course, no such diagnosis in any of the medical reports the System had sent before.

BlossomBuddy was a tool for killing flowers. A way to root out Sakura, in other words.

Among the evaluations the System made based on collected Handcuff data, there were numerous things the wearer themselves would not be informed of. An emblematic one of these was "suicide risk."

A person who had been diagnosed as having a high suicide risk would be supported in various ways without their knowledge. They would generally try to put together a solution that involved connecting high-risk individuals with suitable facilities, organizations, or services, but there were no small number of cases for which this wasn't enough. The proposed way of filling this hole was the prompter system.

A prompter wasn't a professional like a counselor. The System would select the most suitable person from the high-risk person's surroundings and appoint them as a prompter. Broadly speaking, it was their duty to approach the high-risk individual as a good friend, and prevent their suicide.

Prompters would be given the appropriate training before being sent to the high-risk individual. Depending on the severity of the risk, multiple prompters might be sent. Their duty would last until the risk dropped to a safe value. Furthermore, it recently became forbidden by law for prompters to reveal themselves as prompters.

The name "prompter" came from the term used in opera and theater. Like prompters dressed in black who, out of the audience's sight, support actors who forget lyrics or lines, they were asked to be figures who supported troubled people from behind the scenes. (There were probably clearer choices for the name, but an English word unfamiliar to most Japanese people probably served them better. If you were sent something as blunt as "You've been appointed as Suicide Prevention Staff," anyone would surely recoil.)

On the whole, the prompter system worked effectively, and actually helped lower the suicide rate, so society generally accepted it favorably. As a result of frequent heartwarming stories in the media related to prompters, having the experience was seen as conferring a certain kind of societal status.

But on the other hand, the prompter system was creating a new kind of sickness. A sickness of suspicion, referred to as Sakura Delusion.

People began to think: What if all the people around me are prompters assigned by the System, putting on an act of being friendly with me? They're kind to me on the surface, but what if deep down they're just committing to a duty they were given, and I'm actually shunned by everyone?

What if they weren't so much prompters supporting the play that is my life from the shadows, but rather, reluctant seat-fillers? A paid audience of sakura, with all the transience that implies?

Kozaki's words from long ago suddenly arose in Ogami's mind.

You know, Ogami, I was thinking for sure you were a Sakura.

Popularly known as BlossomBuddy, the app's official name was "Blossom Killer." It was developed for people suffering from Sakura Delusion. If using BlossomBuddy showed you had a low suicide risk, the odds that you had Sakura assigned to you were extremely low. You'd no longer have to worry about Sakura Delusion steering you astray.

Meanwhile, if you were judged to have a high suicide risk, there was a high chance that you already had Sakura assigned to you.

Here we had a young man. He had no awareness of any suicidal tendencies, but checked against the System's standards, he was a prime candidate for someone who might kill himself. He had extremely few associates, with only two who he might call best friends - and if you left them out, it would be fair to say he had no proper interaction with anyone. Even his relationship with his family couldn't be called favorable.

Now, if there were already multiple Sakura assigned to him, who might they be?

There was no need to even think about it.

Maybe I'm not as strong a person as I thought.

That winter in my first year when I was isolated in the classroom, I was in a dangerous place mentally. I didn't realize it myself, but my body was putting out enough signals for me to be viewed as having a high risk of suicide. The System received that from my Handcuff, and decided to assign me a prompter - that theory began forming in Ogami's mind.

Normally, even if the target of support was a middle schooler, a middle schooler wouldn't be selected as the prompter. Not only communicating well with someone at high risk of suicide, but completely concealing that you're a prompter, is a heavy burden to put on a child in their early teens. Even for a mature adult, there were only so many who could sufficiently carry out the job.

And yet, as it would happen, there was an excellent candidate in Ogami's vicinity who could smoothly carry out the duty of a prompter. In fact, there were two. Sumika Takasago, and Shogo Kujirai.

First, Sumika took on the duty. She filled the role of suicide prevention staff perfectly, and saved Ogami from imminent crisis. But the System judged that her actions alone were insufficient, and after a gap of a few months, assigned Kujirai as a second prompter. He was expected to support Ogami from a different angle than Sumika, and he too executed this perfectly. But even then, Ogami's suicide risk wasn't improved enough to declare it safe, so they were still wearing the mask of "Ogami's good friends" to this day.

Behind those masks, perhaps they were looking at him with eyes full of hatred, for he was keeping them bound to their duty as prompters.

Ogami tried to shake off those thoughts, realizing "isn't this textbook Sakura Delusion?" It happened all the time. A healthy person can be driven mad by someone else's persecution complex. Just by being temporarily exposed to the poison of delusion, soon everything starts to look foolish. Even the app's analysis wasn't necessarily accurate. If it were this easy to read the transmission data, you'd surely have free reign to steal the data from other people's Handcuffs too. There was a significant possibility that the app was a fake, making you go through steps which sounded right and then just showing you a diagnosis that sounded right.

But the more he thought about it, the more his theory that Sumika and Kujirai were prompters seemed to have veracity. I had completely gotten used to it now, and accepted it as natural, but thinking back, hadn't I obtained happiness far beyond my position? Why was I, a man with no redeeming qualities, able to acquire such wonderful friends without any effort at all?

I'd thought of Sumika as an angel who saved me from my predicament. But an angel is a messenger of the heavens, so in the same way tracing back an angel's intentions leads you to the will of the heavens, perhaps it wasn't her own will, but the will of the System?

Was I just a foolish jester, feeling genuinely proud to receive applause from a paid crowd?

On Christmas day, they'd planned to have a bit of a party in Kujirai's garage. But the meeting time passed by, and Ogami still hadn't left home, lying down in his bed. His parents didn't seem to think this was especially unusual. It was exam season, so that sort of thing can happen - that may have been the most thought they gave it.

He didn't know if they would honestly reveal themselves or not. But once he showed some suspicion, it would force some sort of response from them. It was impossible to keep acting as a "good friend" while having suspicion of being a Sakura cast upon you.

He'd spent the last few days setting the stage. By now, the two had no doubt picked up on Ogami's suspicion. All that remained was to clearly point the finger. You guys are my Sakura, aren't you?

He could do it right this moment if he wanted. He could just make a call. And if they didn't pick up the phone, he could just go directly to their houses. He had tried to do just that several times, but always faltered just beforehand. Ogami endlessly lay in bed, gazing at the ceiling. He felt simultaneously like the accused awaiting judgement, as well as the judge announcing it. It would bring him relief to get it over with quickly, but he couldn't even bring himself to move his fingertips.

Past 6 PM on December 26th, Sumika visited Ogami's house. The moment he heard the doorbell, he knew it was her ringing it. He'd been convinced that she would come see him around this time. Past the open door, Sumika would be wearing her usual deep blue coat, her usual rouge-colored scarf, and her usual carefree smile, saying his name like she usually did.

Because that's what Ogami wanted her to do.

The front door opened, and there was the scene just as he had pictured it.

"Ogami."

Ogami looked at her face wordlessly. He tried to see through into the depths of her eyes. But he couldn't identify any differences from the usual in her expression or attitude. When he thought about how he'd stood them up, that overly-natural smile instead felt unnatural to him. It seemed to be snowing hard outside, as the shoulders of her coat were stained with snow.

She didn't bring up the party. "Let's go for a walk," she proposed innocently. "I've always liked walking around at night at the end of the year. Doesn't it have that feeling like the whole town's become one?"

Ogami gave a brief nod. A situation where they could be alone was most desirable for settling the issue with her. Doing it at the front door would just distract him. He put on his duffle coat from the coat hanger and boots, then went outside.

It wasn't windy, but that meant the snow was piled thick and damp. It came up high enough for his ankles to sink in, and the sound of shovels digging through the snow echoed in the darkness. Down the main street, he heard a snow plow driving around. You couldn't call this suitable weather for a walk. Ogami put up the hood on his coat and stuffed his hands in his pockets.

He didn't know what expectations Sumika had in coming to see him. Was she still intending to sidestep Sakura suspicion, or was she going to reveal herself here? He could bring things to a head himself by simply questioning her, but for the time being, he decided to observe her actions.

Stepping onto the main street, there was no one around. The occasional car that showed up slowed down as much as it could, windshield wipers working busily.

When Sumika almost tripped due to a difference in elevation obscured by the snow, and Ogami grabbed her hand, he felt momentary relief before immediately regretting it. She said "thank you" with some slight embarrassment, and while her voice sounded entirely natural, even that now only sounded like a line being performed to Ogami. He quickly let go of her hand, and put his hands back in his pockets.

Walking the path along the railroad track, Ogami had a thought. I'm at a crucial junction in my life. The pain awaiting me might be enough to change me as a person, down to my very core. Despite this, I'm unusually calm. He had a dry perspective, as if he were looking down on this present from decades in the future.

Or else, maybe that pain is too much for me to accept right now. I might not be able to gauge its true size unless I spend an unimaginably long time chewing on it. Pain like that had to be processed in parts, so maybe my mind is already preparing to minimize the pain that's going to befall me now.

At some point, Sumika got a fair bit ahead of him. She stopped and turned around, then when Ogami caught up, started walking again.

"I called again and again yesterday. Did you notice?", she asked.

"I noticed," Ogami replied.

"Were you busy?"

He couldn't answer that question. Sumika wore the same smile she always did when visiting his house, but looking at it up close, the smile seemed somehow strained.

He wondered if this was how her smile had always been.

After seeing she wasn't getting an answer, she changed to a more direct question.

"Are you avoiding me, maybe?"

Ogami silently nodded.

"Why?"

As she asked repeated questions, he could sense impatience in Sumika's tone.

"Wouldn't you be the one who knows that best?", Ogami said.

Sumika stayed silent for a while, but didn't stop walking. He didn't know where she was headed, but at the moment, they seemed to be following the route to school. It's not like they had a destination, did they? They were just subconsciously walking a path they were used to taking.

Eventually, she opened her mouth.

And she said, in an indifferent voice that sounded like someone else's:

"I guess so."

Those words were enough.

The girl who had been his best friend took off her mask and reverted to being an actor.

The railroad crossing came into view. The place where Ogami first heard about Handcuff love-divination. If those two talking about it hadn't been stopped by the gate coming down, if he hadn't heard their gossip, Ogami might have been treating this day like any other.

As if awoken by the sound of their footsteps, the warning bell rang, and the gate began to lower.

When the train drew near, Ogami had a sudden thought. If I jumped onto the tracks right now, what kind of face would she make? Of course, he wasn't seriously thinking of doing it. Yet a sane person wouldn't arrive at that kind of idea, either. Maybe Blossom Killer's diagnosis wasn't necessarily off the mark.

Thinking back, maybe he'd always been charmed by things that had the scent of death. Even as a kid, he liked places like hospitals and retirement homes. He felt oddly calm seeing flowers offered at the sites of accidents, and when he saw news about suicides, he always had to check up on the details.

Even when Kozaki killed himself, his first thought might not have been "way to go," but something closer to "you sly dog."

The train roared past the crossing gate. In his imagination, he saw himself becoming chunks of meat that scattered across the fresh snow. The train went off into the distance at incredible speed, disappearing beyond the trees in no time.

The gate and the warning lights went back to sleep, and silence filled the air.

One person's footsteps gently broke the silence.

After she'd reached the other side of the crossing, Ogami spoke.

"You never really liked me at all, did you?"

Sumika stopped and turned around, and started to say something, but her mouth froze like an actor who'd forgotten their lines.

...That's not true at all. Sure, at first I didn't like you very much. A letter came telling me to be a Sakura, and so I reluctantly got close to you. But soon, I realized I felt unusually comfortable playing the role of your friend. By the time the first month had passed, I hardly even needed to act. But whenever we cut loose a bit, I had to tell myself that this was just a performance. Even without an impetus like this, I'm sure we would have ended up with a relationship like this eventually... I knew I needed to tell you I was a Sakura someday, Ogami. But if I could, I wanted to wait until I was naturally removed as a Sakura. Though in the end, that only made you suspicious. But I want you to believe me. I like you, Ogami.

Those were the kinds of words Ogami was hoping to hear.

But the Sumika who followed backstage directions to simply give him the words he hoped for was here no longer.

That had been nothing more than a role.

With a sober smile, she said:

"Yeah. I didn't like you at all."

That was their final conversation.

Even after Sumika walked away, Ogami stood at the railroad crossing as if waiting for something. Maybe that thing was a girl coming back to give him a hug and words of apology, or maybe it was a merciless hunk of metal which would come and smash his real, non-imaginary self into pieces. Maybe it was a deus ex machina that would descend from the sky and solve everything, or maybe it was modest applause from some external being who had been watching this little tragedy.

He didn't know how long he waited. The edges of his vision glowed red, and the warning bell started to sound again. He saw the train's small headlights off in the distance. He knew he had no desire to jump in front of it. Ogami turned away from the crossing and began quietly walking.

After the train passed by, he turned around just once. The bell was still ringing, as if reluctant to go. Snow covered the branches of the dead trees along the road, and the blinking warning lights beyond them dyed the snow a light red.

To Ogami's bleary eyes, they looked like out-of-season sakura trees.

*

And thus, the town where he was born was transformed into the Town of Sakura.

*

Saying farewell to Kujirai was much simpler compared to Sumika. Ogami visited Kujirai's house at a later date, and matter-of-factly asked him if he was his prompter.

Kujirai readily admitted it.

"I'm relieved, honestly," he said with a refreshing smile. "I was getting irritated with you lately. I was planning to give you the talk soon, but I'm glad you picked up on it first. Now that it's come to this, I should be getting replaced by someone else."

Because he'd gotten pretty much the reaction he expected, Ogami was able to accept the truth rather easily. By having him admit it so boldly instead of awkwardly trying to talk out of it, he could close off his heart much more quickly.

The talk about going skiing and a little sister's school event must have both been lies so the two could create an opportunity to meet in secret. That day Ogami went to buy presents for the two, Kujirai covertly called Sumika to have a discussion as fellow Sakura. Feeling the limits of keeping things up with Ogami, he revealed his intention to expose himself.

Sumika panicked when she heard this. Because if he did that, there was no question she'd be exposed as a Sakura too. Whether out of innate kindness or simply common decency, she felt it was her duty to see her role as a Sakura through to the end. So she tearfully pleaded with Kujirai to change his mind. Kujirai reluctantly gave in, and decided to keep up the act a little longer. But Ogami happened to witness that exchange, and so despite all her efforts, he realized the two of them were Sakura.

That was more or less the truth of things, wasn't it?

Maybe Kujirai showing Ogami all those movies was a silent cry of "see through my act already, and free me from this position."

It was a quiet winter break. The new year came, and three days of it passed. Feeling his parents would be suspicious if he was moping all the time, Ogami started pretending to go out and visit Sumika or Kujirai daily. Avoiding routes where he might encounter anyone he knew, he killed time in places he could be alone. It's not that he didn't want to worry his parents. He just didn't want to show weakness to anyone. He couldn't stand for having any more Sakura.

It hadn't even been two weeks since his best friends were exposed, but Ogami was already solidifying the direction of his life to come.

Don't get involved with anyone. Don't let anyone sympathize with you.

And don't have fondness for anyone.

The break ended, and his last three months of middle school began. All three of the trio treated each other as people who didn't exist. As graduation neared, the class unified, with increasingly many students who felt reluctant to leave and hung around the classroom after school. Amid that, the total breakdown of the trio's relationship must have stuck out all the more.

However, there also wasn't anyone who decided to ask Ogami about it. Maybe the fact that the other two were Ogami's Sakura was common knowledge, and he was the only one who didn't know. That idea made his cheeks heat up, and made him want to run out of the school. Even so, the self-conscious fear that such a reaction would delight them the most kept Ogami chained to school.

It was something that had already happened. Which meant that the most he could do was pretend he wasn't hurt. He became a loner, but he could simply go "well, this isn't actually so bad." Until he'd eventually have everyone thinking "that guy didn't really need Sakura to begin with."

What gave him some meager comfort was that the relationship between Kujirai and Sumika was also severed. They must have just pretended to be friendly with each other as Sakura supporting the same person. Had they turned out to become a couple after the removal of Ogami, who impeded that relationship, he might have never been able to recover.

Ogami became an even more closed-off person than before, hardly speaking to anyone up to graduation. Even after going to college, he avoided associations to the utmost, rejecting people when they showed even the smallest shred of interest or sympathy. He came to distrust people the more they were kind or favorable to him, opening up only to those who were harsh or antagonistic. It was like choosing to only water trees if they were dead.

During high school, he worked part-time jobs to slowly save up money, and left home to start living alone at the same time he graduated. By then, he felt he was able to clearly understand the events that happened to him. Sumika and Kujirai had just faithfully carried out the jobs they were given. It wasn't those two who deceived me, nor the System's design that led them to deceive me, which deserved the most blame. That would be none other than myself, for being so weak as to need the support of Sakura.

Even with that understanding, Ogami wasn't able to fully quell his anger. He knew they had just done the jobs they were given. He knew that. But did that mean they had to deceive him so brilliantly? There was no need to so thoroughly charm someone you were going to forsake eventually, was there?

He managed to turn that anger, something of an unjustified resentment, into a positive. The only resource he had left was a desire for revenge, and by burning it, he survived seven years past middle school graduation. He perceived Sumika and Kujirai, the System who created Sakura, and the society who let them get away with it as enemies. Depending on your perspective, life can be easier when there's a villain. It fogs up the problems around you and gathers everything into a single focal point.

Someday I'll get my revenge on Sumika and Kujirai, Ogami thought vaguely. But he couldn't even guess when or where it might happen. All he could say for sure was, it wouldn't be a matter of simply making them suffer as much as possible - the pain they felt had to be the same kind that Ogami tasted.

[+]

4

Ogami had visited Sumika's house countless times during the two years they interacted, but thinking about it, he hadn't been let inside the house even a single time. Similarly, Sumika never went into Ogami's house. Even on days off when Kujirai wasn't present, neither one invited the other to their house, always using spaces like the community center or the rest area at the supermarket.

For Sumika's part, she probably wanted to avoid her performance as a Sakura spilling into her private spaces. Ogami also had no thoughts of wanting to actively introduce his parents to acquaintances, and didn't want adults to overly suspect his relationship with Sumika. So he actually found a relationship that kept their houses off-limits to be desirable.

Still, he did know that Sumika had a sister a few years younger than her. When he went to pick up Sumika in the morning on weekdays, frequently he would bump into a girl who looked exactly as if Sumika's growth had been rolled back a couple of years. When she saw Ogami, she always gave him a bluntly displeased look. Maybe she felt like he was taking her big sister away, or maybe she saw through the twisted relationship between them.

Sumika had often said that her sister had a similar name to her, so her father was always getting their names mixed up even after all these years.

"I mean, why give sisters such similar names? It's bad enough as it is that we look the same."

So when Sumika, who should have been dead, showed up in front of Ogami wearing a familiar-looking uniform, his sense of reason quickly told him that she wasn't some sort of ghost. Upon closer inspection, while she did resemble Sumika, he spotted slight differences in the details of her face.

Even then, it took some time for him to regain presence of mind. During that time, she looked up at him with the exact same displeased face as back then.

Approaching it with a calm mind, you could certainly argue this was a convenient situation. He had come to check with Sumika's parents, but if her little sister was here, she would be easier to talk with. She was close to him in age, and there was less that could get in the way.

Trying to remember the little sister's name, Ogami tried rearranging the syllables of "Sumika" in his head. On his third try, he arrived at a combination that seemed like the correct one.

"Kasumi... wasn't it?"

Her expression clearly conveyed that her wariness had gone up a level.

"Who would you be?"

It was a stiff and tense voice, but something about the shape of it felt just like Sumika's.

"I'm a friend of your sister," Ogami answered. Then he corrected himself: "Ex-friend."

"Ex-friend," Kasumi repeated. "Well then, that means you're of no relevance now."

With that, she turned and walked away as if to say there was nothing more to talk about. Ogami went after her. When he tried to stand next to her, she increased her pace.

"Do you have some business?", Kasumi asked with resignation, seeing that Ogami would keep tagging along.

"I want to talk to you about your sister."

"She died half a year ago. It was suicide. Is that all?"

"Don't you have anything to explain there?"

Kasumi came to a stop and glared at Ogami.

"I know who my sister associated with better than anyone. And someone like you..."

After saying that, she suddenly started to stare at Ogami's face as if realizing something.

"You remember?", Ogami prompted.

Kasumi timidly asked: "Ogami?"

"Right. I'm Masaki Ogami, who came to pick up your sister all the time back when you were in elementary school."

Instantly, her attitude did a complete 180.

"You should have said that up front!" She walked over to Ogami and took a look at him from various angles, a smile on her face. "Wow, how did I not realize?"

That reaction disturbed Ogami somewhat. Because even if Kasumi remembered Ogami, he expected the reaction to that name coming up wouldn't have been a positive one. Had seven years of time shaved away the antagonism from her memory, or was he mistaken from the start to think she disliked him?

"I forgot something at school, and was just on my way to go get it," Kasumi said, pointing at her uniform. "Do you mind if we walk and talk?"

Ogami said he was fine with that.

She seemed to be headed for the train station. She was evidently attending the same high school Sumika had - the one Ogami would have gone to as well, had nothing happened. He remembered the look of the uniform, with its mainly gray color scheme.

"Ogami, you feel so much grown-up compared to back then," Kasumi remarked with admiration.

"That's because I grew up," Ogami replied. "You've gotten pretty big yourself. What year are you in?"

"I'm a third-year. I'm graduating soon."

"I see," said Ogami. He didn't have any impressions beyond that. He had no strong memories of high school whatsoever. He could barely even remember what he was doing around this time in his third year.

"I guess there's no point talking about me," Kasumi noted tactfully. "You said you wanted to talk about my sister. How much do you know?"

"Hardly anything. I got a call from an old acquaintance, who told me only the fact that Sumika had taken her own life. Didn't seem to feel like telling me a single thing more."

"That's... rather strange," Kasumi replied, her head tilting to the side. Her shoulder-length hair shook gently along with that motion. "Aside from relatives, only a small handful of people should know about her death. How could word have gotten out?"

"I guess that's just how these things go," Ogami supposed. His tone of voice dropped as he continued. "Incidentally, I know these kinds of question might be uncomfortable, but..."

"Please don't worry about it," Kasumi interrupted. "It's already happened; I don't think anything of it."

"Then I'll get straight to the point. Do you have any inkling of why your sister... did what she did?"

"I'd be lying if I said I didn't," Kasumi answered after thinking it over for a while. "She'd always been mentally unstable in ways, but around spring last year, she apparently became terribly aggressive, causing trouble for those around her. Though she didn't display that sort of behavior to me."

Always mentally unstable in ways. Becoming aggressive, causing others trouble. It sounded like they were talking about a completely different person from the Sumika that Ogami knew. But people will change after seven years. Ogami himself was a far cry from the person he had been then.

This was a good start. Yet doubts remained.

Soon, the two arrived at the train station. There was no one around in the building, so small that it felt more like a storage room. There weren't even station workers. According to the time table, it was still about 10 minutes until the next train. Sitting on a plastic bench faded in color, the two continued their conversation.

Ogami indicated his Handcuff to her. "So this thing didn't do its job, then?"

"Yes. I hate to say it, but it wasn't any use at all. Bracelets strictly only analyze and give detailed reports about suicide risk; it's not as if they'll directly prevent a suicide. Of course, you could also say what "didn't do its job" was us, her family and friends who should have supported her..." After saying this much, she realized the thorniness of her remarks and hastily appended, "Oh, no, I don't mean you, Ogami. You've been far away for a while, right?"

"Yeah, far away. Last time I met her was seven years ago."

Kasumi seemed relieved hearing that. Actually, maybe she'd be happier if he told her they hadn't really been friends to begin with. But the circumstances around that were much too complicated to explain here and now.

"Then you knew my sister at the best time. Please, keep her that way in your memory."

Ogami nodded. Though in reality, he wanted to forget even that if he could.

"You said earlier it was half a year ago."

"Yes. At the end of August last year."

"Did she leave anything like a suicide note?"

"As far as I know, there wasn't anything of the sort. Maybe it was a spontaneous suicide, with no time to afford for a note. So even we aren't aware of any clear motive. Still, she was confused enough as it was, and maybe that caused even her friends to desert her. So maybe she got fed up with everything, herself included."

Ogami felt a sudden urge to ask what method of suicide Sumika had chosen. But thinking about it, it made no real difference whether she had jumped, hung herself, or what. Sumika's body was already gone from this world.

He had learned plenty of what he needed to know. Sumika Takasago was dead with no room for doubt, and he could see nothing unnatural about her death. An emotionally frail woman had driven herself to death - end of story.

"Thanks for talking with me," Ogami said gratefully.

"It's no problem. I'm glad to answer a request from you, Ogami."

An automatic message played announcing the train's arrival, and Kasumi stood up from the bench. Ogami followed her up to the platform, then saw her off from there.

Just before boarding the train, Kasumi turned around and said, "Ogami."

"I was happy to meet you after so long. Well then, I hope to see you again sometime."

Before Ogami could say anything back, the door shut, and she waved from behind the glass window.

Once the train left, Ogami walked to the edge of the platform and lit a cigarette. Vivid images popped up one after another in his mind, undesired as they may have been. If me and Sumika's relationship had gone on just a little longer, we would've surely walked to the train station together, just like I did with Kasumi today, and taken the same train to high school. And in exchange for that slight extension, I would've experienced a far greater pain than the one I experienced seven years ago.

With Sumika gone, he'd thought the Town of Sakura was safe now. Kujirai had surely left town long ago. He wasn't the type to have an attachment to his hometown, and this place was far too small for a guy on his scale.

Besides, Ogami didn't feel as threatened by Kujirai as he was by Sumika. Even if he encountered him again by some chance, he felt confident that it wouldn't disturb him as badly as it would to encounter Sumika. Ultimately, maybe Kujirai just wasn't as important to him as her.

So he had felt relieved. But meeting Kasumi Takasago had attacked Ogami's weak points even more directly than meeting Sumika herself would. Supposing Ogami met Sumika while she was still alive, the real Sumika would at least deny the "what if" Sumika he subconsciously painted in his mind. But Kasumi Takasago was that "what if," in the flesh. A higher-purity Sumika Takasago than the real thing, you could say.

He dropped his cigarette to the ground and put it out with his foot. Nothing productive would come of soaking in his devastation here. Now that he'd gotten reliable information from a relative of Sumika's, there was no more reason to stay in this town.

Returning to the parking lot, he went right into the nearby supermarket, bought a sandwich and mineral water, and had a light meal in the rest area. He realized he hadn't eaten a thing since this morning, but didn't feel that hungry considering. The sandwich had a perfectly fine flavor and bite to it, yet it felt like he was eating it with someone else's mouth. It's like I've gone back to three years ago, Ogami thought. Back when I was first struggling to live away from my hometown, this is how everything tasted in my mouth.

Once done eating, he left the supermarket and got in the car. Reclining the seat, he closed his eyes and let out a deep breath.

Sumika is dead. I don't have anything to fear now, do I?

The image of Kasumi waving at him behind the train window arose behind his eyelids.

Ogami. I was happy to meet you after so long. Well then, I hope to see you again sometime.

Instantly, he could feel his heart stirring - and becoming fragile.

It would seem she'd broken through all the defenses I'd built up over these long years in a single instant.

But there's no need to be afraid of her. I'll leave the Town of Sakura, never to come back, and my relations with her will end here.

I should get back to the apartment quickly and resume my work, he thought. These days, it's me who's in the business of deceiving people; I'm a predator who feeds on the pure. It's not a commendable job, but I can do it better than anyone. And while I might not be rich per se, it earns me a decent income, and I live leisurely without having to break a sweat.

When I get home, I'll take a shower, have a little more whiskey than usual, sleep soundly, and tackle work with a renewed vigor starting tomorrow. Setting his heart on this, Ogami stepped on the gas pedal, and left the Town of Sakura behind.

By the time he got back to the apartment, dawn was beginning to break. Dragging along his exhausted body, he ducked through the entrance door, stuffed a piled-up bundle of mail from his mailbox under one arm, and headed back to his room.

As he sunk his body into the living room sofa drinking whiskey, and the soft morning sun began to shine in, he noticed an envelope with an unfamiliar color among the mail he'd tossed onto the floor. It was a large, light-pink envelope that brought to mind washi paper, and "Important" was written in red on the front.

Right now, there couldn't exist anything more important to me than Sumika's death. Despite thinking this, he had a look at it anyway. Inside the envelope was a booklet and a few documents.

The heading on the first document read: "Notification of Prompter Selection."

We are writing to inform you that after strict examination, you have been selected as a prompter.

In the center of the notice was a thick black rectangle, and Ogami's vision was drawn toward it.

Inside that rectangle was the name "Kasumi Takasago."

*

The following week, Ogami stood once more in the Town of Sakura to which he'd expected to never return. This time, he had no need to park at the supermarket. The day before, he'd taken care of the paperwork to move into that old wooden apartment building on the edge of town.

For at least the next few months, he would be living in that apartment. Spring wouldn't come to the town for another two months, so the harsh cold would continue until the end of March. Considering that, he probably should have chosen someplace better to live, but when he made the decision to return, he prioritized getting a room in that apartment above all else. No other options came to mind.

Staying at his parents' house for a while was also a possibility, but he desired a solitary place where he wouldn't be distracted to serve as his base of operations. Living with his parents would mean being constantly exposed to people who knew his old weaknesses, and that would be a major impediment to acting out the role of a brand new person as Kasumi's prompter. There was also the issue of his old house being too physically close to Kasumi's. When building favorable relationships with others, excessive closeness can often do more harm than good. In that respect, the old apartment was in good position relative to her house.

After carrying a suitcase full of clothes and daily necessities into his room and checking that there were no problems with the electricity or water, he went to the home improvement store and assembled the bare minimum of furniture. After carrying in a futon, a refrigerator, an oil heater, and a fold-up table, that alone had filled up his living space.

Oh well, Ogami thought. Compared to the first room he rented after high school, at least this one had the major benefit of having a shower. That place felt more accurate to refer to as a prison cell than a residence.

After preparing everything for his life in the Town of Sakura, Ogami went on a walk to the train station. It was around the time Kasumi would get home from school. He'd intended to wait in the station building, but the train seemingly arrived sooner than expected, and he spotted Kasumi before the station even came into view. When he raised up his hand, Kasumi noticed him right away and ran over.

Kasumi slipped in front of Ogami and started to fall, but Ogami grabbed her arm firmly. Despite the heavy coat she was wearing, her body felt worryingly light.

"Thank you very much," Kasumi said with an embarrassed laugh.

Ogami found himself subconsciously searching her voice, expressions, and actions for signs of putting on a performance. Despite knowing there was not a single reason for her to be acting.

"It's been a week," Kasumi remarked in a lively voice. "I wondered if you'd already left."

"Circumstances changed. I decided I'd stay in this town a while. So I wanted to come greet you."

"I see. You know, I kind of had that feeling."

"You had a feeling?"

"Yes. And I also thought, it'd be nice if I was right."

"Why did you think I'd stay in town?"

"Err..." She hesitated a little. "Um, could it be you want to look into my sister a little more?"

For a moment, Ogami was at a loss for how to reply. He figured she would ask about the reason for his stay, and he'd talk his way through it. But if she was going to provide that for him, no way would he pass it up.

"Yeah. I actually -"

But before he could speak, Kasumi cut him off in a low voice.

"You also felt something was off about my sister's suicide, didn't you?"

Endeavoring not to let his surprise show on his face, Ogami questioned her back. "What are your thoughts?"

"Well..." After a short silence, she began to speak, choosing her words carefully. "It's true my sister was an emotionally unstable person, but she was also conscious of that fact. It was sort of like she could force a resolution to the problems that arose from her frail heart by way of her intelligence. She'd give herself counseling, in a way. And that really did work for her for a long time. For both good and ill, she tended to keep things inside, so even if she had a problem she couldn't handle by herself, she wouldn't lash out at others, but take the time to confront it. I respected that about her. Yet a few months before her death, she started attacking those around her, seeming like a totally different person. Isn't it only natural for me to think that there was something abnormal that happened to her?" After saying this all at once, she concluded, attentive to Ogami's reaction: "Wasn't it thoughts like that which brought you back here, Ogami?"

"I can't say anything for sure just yet," Ogami replied. "It's just, I want to ask all sorts of people about your sister. You, of course, but also people she was friends with. I know it might be pointless, but it's seeming like I can't be satisfied unless I do that. So I want your assistance."

"As long as it's no trouble for you," Ogami tacked on at the end. But he knew from the start that she would accept. That's what him being chosen as a Sakura meant. What Sumika and Kujirai had been to Ogami, now Ogami was to Kasumi.

"Oh, no, no trouble at all!" Kasumi hastily shook her head. "Just tell me if there's anything I can do. And to tell the truth, there's lots I want to ask you as well. So whatever your reasons, I'm glad you're staying in town."

"Thanks," Ogami said. A bit later, he'd realize that his tone was somewhat similar to Sumika and Kujirai's.

Seems like I'm adopting to the role of a Sakura already.

He had spent all seven years since his middle school graduation trying to get away from Sakura. By spurning all affection and good will and not showing anyone weakness, he thoroughly removed any gaps for a prompter to wedge themselves in. He protected himself by suspecting that anyone being kind to him, without exception, was a prompter. He did research into how the System detected suicide risk, and sought out ways to put on the guise of a healthy mind. (He even considered living without a Handcuff, but figured that might just further draw the System's attention.)

However, he hadn't even dreamed that he would one day become a prompter himself. The shock brought by that light-pink envelope had been equal to, if not greater than, that of Sumika's death.

Even Ogami himself didn't know why a person like him had been chosen to be Kasumi's Sakura. She had only the slightest familiarity with him; he should have been nobody beyond "her sister's friend." Surely there were plenty of candidates who were closer with her. And yet why had he been chosen?

Ogami theorized that perhaps the nature of her problems was such that they were harder to deal with the closer you were. Some problems are like that, certainly. So maybe she had issues that were hard to talk about except with someone who just barely rose above "I don't know them." If a mandatory requirement for Kasumi Takasago's Sakura was a lack of intimacy, all he could say was, ah, I can see how I'm suited.

Another possibility: maybe she has a misunderstanding about who I am. Maybe Sumika pretended to be fond of me even in private to maintain the consistency of her Sakura act, and young Kasumi took that at face value, marking me into her heart as a sort of big brother figure alongside her sister.

If you tried to force an explanation, there are also kinds you could make sound plausible. But in reality, things probably weren't that simple. The computations the System's advanced intellect performs to select Sakura likely can't be understood by a human brain. Even if you got it to explain everything neatly from step one, you'd probably just be at a loss.

The same thing could be said of the processes that judged Kasumi to be at high risk of suicide. It's fair to think her sister's suicide was an influence, but the System doesn't necessarily think the same way humans do.

The one and only thing Ogami knew right now was that he had been chosen as Kasumi Takasago's Sakura.

What did that mean to him?

For instance, via this role, he could rescue a girl akin to "another Sumika" from the threat of suicide. Or instead, he could gain the trust of a girl akin to "another Sumika" to then betray it, making her experience the same pain he had.

A pseudo-revenge. Needless to say, there'd be no meaning to it. Kasumi wasn't Sumika. Getting revenge on her wouldn't prove anything. Not only that, it would mean putting himself on the same level as the people he had detested the most.

Yet a woman spoke, a faceless voice. What are you so afraid of?

The only way I can conquer that fear is by using Kasumi Takasago. Ogami was convinced of this. Although she was sinless, by carrying out this ritual, time could finally resume for me after it stopped that winter seven years ago.

It'll be simple. I'm a skilled Sakura who's deceived countless people before becoming Kasumi's. I've dealt with plenty of young women, even. Going from text-only communication to meeting face-to-face would change the flavor a bit, but my target is a girl not even age 20, and as a bonus, I've got the System's approval. Even if I'm not able to work miracles like Sumika and Kujirai, I'm confident I can do much better than your average Sakura.

I'll get revenge, with Kasumi Takasago standing in for Sumika. That must be what I've come back to this town to do, Ogami thought.

He didn't care one bit what happened to her after that.

On the way back, Kasumi asked Ogami if he'd like to look at her sister's room.

"You won't have to worry about bumping into my parents. I'm by myself tonight."

"Are they on a trip or something?", Ogami asked.

"No. Since my sister died, both my mother and father have been doing a lot of volunteer work. For suicide prevention, you see. You know, talking with people about their troubles over the phone. Apparently a lot of people who need support like that call late at night. So the real work begins after everyone's gone to sleep."

How ironic is that, Ogami thought to himself. As a result of them nobly volunteering to prevent more tragedies like the one that befell their daughter, they were going to overlook the danger their other daughter was in.

Then again, perhaps it wasn't unreasonable. As far as he could tell just having a normal chat with her, Kasumi didn't seem at all like someone who would kill herself.

"You must get lonely always being left by yourself."

"It is lonely. That's why I'm bringing you home."

Ogami was able to crack a natural smile at her joke. He felt a bit like he was overworking his underused face muscles, but he'd get used to it soon. Because he'd had that sort of smile around Sumika all the time back then.

As they neared Kasumi's house, Ogami nonchalantly glanced around. If any neighbors noticed his return and brought it up to his parents, it would be troublesome. But there was no sign of anyone nearby. Aside from their footsteps crunching into the snow, he didn't even hear any noises worth mentioning as noises.

Kasumi opened the door and turned on the lights inside. The entryway was more cramped than not, yet had a nice clean atmosphere; Ogami had seen this far into the house many times in the past.

But once he removed his shoes and took a step down the hallway, that was unknown territory. Sumika had never invited him beyond this point back then.

Immediately after climbing the dark stairs, there was a room, which Kasumi guided him into. He knew that it was Sumika's former room without having to be told. Because she had sometimes called to Ogami while poking her head out of that room's window.

It was a room you could believe a mature girl lived in, with a unified palette of calm colors. Everything was orderly, as if it had all been cleaned just last night. Atop a rug colored a deep blue in the center was a small table and a floor chair, where Ogami was made to sit. After turning on the heater, Kasumi said she would make him coffee and left the room.

For a while, Ogami looked up at the blue-gray pendant light hanging from the ceiling, having nothing else to do. He heard a dog elsewhere in the housing district give a quick bark twice, but even that was quickly swallowed up by silence. The heater began emitting warm air, and the room was filled with a nostalgic scent, a mix of winter air and oil.

I'm in a place that was once holy ground to me, Ogami mused. But that reality didn't elicit any form of interest from him. If the girl who had made these grounds holy were there, well, of course that would change things. But she had long since left this room, and now her sister was carrying on with a different life. Sumika's presence was now little more than a lingering scent.

Soon, Kasumi returned. Putting mugs of coffee on the table, she sat cross-legged across from Ogami. Asking if he needed sugar or milk, Ogami replied that he did not. She didn't put anything in her coffee either, and took just a sip before putting it back on the table.

Ogami broke the ice. "Did your sister live on her own after graduating high school?"

"Yes, though her college was close enough to commute from here. Our parents half-forced her to start living on her own, knowing her tendency to seclude herself. She came back here every weekend without fail, and even I often visited her at her apartment, so it didn't especially feel like she was living alone."

Kasumi then told him the name of the college Sumika was going to. It was just about the best one you could attend that was within commuting distance of the Town of Sakura.

"Of course, living independently didn't do much to improve my sister's introverted nature. Perhaps you could even say it worsened, without her having to mind her family being around. But she gained more opportunities to interact with others when she took up acting around autumn of her first year, and acquired some level of interest in the outside world."

"Acting?", Ogami repeated back to her on impulse.

"Yes, I'm sure anyone who knows my sister would be surprised," Kasumi said with a slight smile. "It seemed to me that ever since she started going to college, she had more time than she knew what to do with. I suggested that she try joining a club or something, but she didn't appear to show interest in any activities. I imagine you're aware, Ogami, but she was a somewhat dull person, with no hobbies to speak of. But I felt that there had to be at least one thing she liked, and she simply wasn't aware what it was. So, hoping to find a way of motivating her, I asked if there was anything she'd particularly enjoyed doing in the past. And she told me an anecdote from middle school. She spoke nostalgically about doing a play for the culture festival, and happening to end up with an important role, and it being rather fun for her."

This came as a surprise to Ogami. He clearly remembered Kujirai having a passion for acting, but he'd seen Sumika as carrying out her role more disinterestedly.

"I promptly suggested she try joining an acting club in that case. But she shook her head, saying with disappointment that said club didn't seem like it would agree with her. Apparently, she had already gone and observed the acting club at her college. So I invited her to look for active acting troupes nearby. Though of course, at that point my goal was just to get her out of her shell, so I wasn't actually thinking she should join an acting troupe."

"Which is to say, Sumika was the eager one?"

"That's correct. As we gathered information about acting troupes, she began showing surprising reactions. She zealously watched videos that troupes had put online, and openly spoke her thoughts about what seemed appealing or worrying about each troupe. She truly hadn't shown that much open interest in something in a very long time. And in the end, she auditioned for a troupe known for their high level of talent, and got accepted in one try."

After breathlessly saying all this, Kasumi drank some coffee to moisten her throat.

"Your sister," said Ogami, "was always skilled at acting."

"That's right," Kasumi said, beaming as if she herself had been complimented. Of course, she didn't pick up on the sarcasm behind Ogami's words. "Even after joining the troupe, she seemed to largely prefer behind-the-scenes work, yet her talents were highly regarded even by long-time members. She didn't like to go out in front of people by nature, so up to the end, she never pushed for a starring role."

"But she got on well with those around her?"

"Yes. As she continued working with the troupe, she slowly regained some extroversion. Of course, that was limited to dealing with people in the troupe, but it was major progress for her. Our parents were openly delighted. Although personally speaking, I felt a bit of sadness as well. Since I'd practically had my sister to myself until then."

"You were always friendly with your sister, huh."

"Even if perhaps it was a one-sided attachment," she remarked with a lonesome tone. "My very suggestion to join an acting troupe came from my desire to bring back the best of my sister. But the result was that she became distanced from me bit by bit."

"As if the troupe was taking your sister away, right?"

"But it was me who recommended it, after all, so I just reaped what I sowed. That said, if it had just stopped at that, I could've looked at it as a happily-ending story of sisters becoming independent."

Kasumi took a pause there.

"The problem was that the relationships between my sister and the troupe members advanced faster, and became deeper and more complex, than I could have ever imagined. Eventually, she found herself in a vortex of serious trouble. No, not just in a vortex..."

Kasumi fell silent, staring at her hands as if lost in thought.

"I can't exactly speak about the rest myself. Or maybe more accurately, there wouldn't be much point if it came out of my mouth. Suffice to say, there were messes within the troupe. But as of now, it's unclear whether they were related to my sister's death. The end."

It was an oddly half-baked ending. Ogami felt as if the very heart of what she'd been telling him was within that abridged section. But he wanted to avoid damaging her impression of him by forcing her to talk about something she didn't want to. On top of that, he didn't actually have that big an interest.

"Thank you. I'll ask your sister's other acquaintances about the rest."

"I think that would be best," Kasumi agreed, sounding relieved. "I'll contact the troupe leader tomorrow. That would probably get you the most information about their internal affairs. I'll also try speaking with the troupe members who were close with my sister."

"That's a big help. Would it be okay if I got your contact info, too?"

"Mine? Yes, gladly."

Kasumi held out the Handcuff on her wrist toward Ogami. Ogami did the same, and with a light touch, they exchanged contact information.

After coming down the stairs and returning to the entryway, Kasumi spoke.

"Your house is just nearby, right? I'll escort you there."

Ogami shook his head. "Actually, because of some slight circumstances, my parents don't even know I've come back. I'm renting a nearby apartment for now."

He then verbally explained where the apartment was. That apartment had apparently left an impression on Kasumi as well, as she understood immediately from his simple description. She didn't inquire at all into the so-called "slight circumstances."

"And you're staying there alone?"

"Of course."

"Then is it all right if I come visit sometime?"

"It's a cramped, cold, and empty room, but if you don't mind that, you're welcome to."

"I'm glad," said Kasumi. "I have quite some time on my hands until graduation. It's boring to sit around the house, and I don't like school much either. Since I can't go visit my sister in her apartment anymore, I was thinking it might be nice to have a refuge to take its place."

"You know, it might be an excellent place for a refuge."

"I look forward to it. I'll contact you once I get in touch with the troupe leader."

Ogami thanked her again and left Kasumi's house. Until the moment the door shut, she was giving a little wave with her hand near her shoulder.

After passing the gate, Ogami turned around and looked up toward the window of Kasumi's room. The curtains were closed, but he saw a faint light leaking out.

The plan's going almost too well, Ogami thought. It feels like I've gotten way closer to Kasumi in just these scant few hours. We were alike in the sense of having an unparalleled attachment to Sumika, so if I could make good use of that commonality, I might be able to easily win her trust. Just by pretending to seek the truth behind Sumika's suicide, not even doing anything special, I'd secured a connection with Kasumi. At this rate, maybe I'd achieve my goal and be back to life as usual in a month.

Talk about an easy-to-handle target.

I'll bet that's how she saw me back then, too.

[+]

5

The factors that cause Sakura Delusion to sprout are various. Some, like Ogami, succumb to suspicion because of the involvement of actual prompters, while others are possessed by the delusion from the day they learn the prompter system exists. Some end up that way due to special circumstances, and some mistake people who were just drawn in by their charms as Sakura. In any event, always fearing the threat of lurking Sakura much like Ogami, they live isolated lives that keep others as a distance.

A few years ago, Ogami had binge-read writings from sufferers of the delusion. He thought maybe they would contain clues to help resolve his own problems. But he could learn nothing at all from them. Those who were successful in shaking free of Sakura Delusion either had a light case to begin with, or became taken by some other delusion.

As he continued reading their writings, he noticed a common dilemma that those with Sakura Delusion faced. To put it simply: just because a person is afraid of other people doesn't mean they no longer need others.

Rather, the majority could be said to have an above-average need for others. If you looked at groups created by sufferers of Sakura Delusion, like "Victims of the Prompter System" or "Blossom-Killers Anonymous," that was immediately obvious. In places like that, they would become shockingly social. They became desperate to fill the gap left by the social opportunities they missed, and would continue to miss. Here is where they chose to spend the affection and kindness they had nothing else to do with.

A strong solidarity between patients with light symptoms could even progress into a friendly or romantic relationship. Yet unfortunately, these wouldn't last long. People who have been alone for a long time can't help but have unreasonable expectations of other people. And upon actually getting a friend or lover, they're faced with intense disappointment. The thing I'd been dreaming about all this time - was this all it was?

On the other hand, severe cases are such bundles of distrust that they'll even see Sakura among gatherings of Sakura Delusion sufferers. Are these people surrounding me not actually victims of Sakura, but themselves Sakura who are pretending to have it to encourage me? Maybe such doubly-blooming deceptions, Sakura with the goal of resolving Sakura Delusion, have already been placed around without me knowing. And so on. In short, regardless of the severity of your symptoms, the curse inflicted by Sakura always hangs over you.

That being said, it surprisingly didn't always mean that these people had turned to despair. They were able to manage their isolation well through alternate methods. Isolation wasn't something exclusive to Sakura Delusion, after all. It had been with them since long prior.

So then, what about the Sakura? After the people chosen as prompters by the System are freed from their role, are they able to return to a normal life as if nothing had happened?

To tell the truth, some do experience prolonged after-effects of their own from their distorted relationships. At least a few, exhausted by having to care for someone at a high risk of suicide, become biased toward people at risk of suicide in general. Some even purposefully keep their distance from others in hopes of never being chosen as a Sakura again.

But taken as a whole, most ex-Sakura see the experience positively. Some even hope to become someone else's Sakura. Naturally, you don't typically get tons of people near you with a high risk of suicide, so the chances they'll be selected as Sakura again are near-zero. So to fulfill their unsatisfied desires, they devote themselves to positions that are as close to being a Sakura as they can get. Paths like volunteering for human services, becoming a counselor, or working with a suicide prevention hotline.

You could imagine that they were chosen as Sakura because they had such qualities to begin with, but you could also take a different perspective. Namely, that in the course of continuing to perform as Sakura, they could then only live in a Sakura-like way. They always had to be the ones giving, the ones helping, the ones taking things on, or they wouldn't be satisfied. Their pride could no longer bear being the one receiving, or being helped, or having things taken on for them.

That in itself wasn't always a bad thing. It caused them no harm, at least, and even they would see themselves as satisfied. But in any event, it might be good to keep in mind that some have their lives driven mad on the Sakura side, too. And that, had there not been someone at risk of suicide, they wouldn't have had to become a Sakura, either.

The days went by with Ogami just waiting in the old apartment for Kasumi to contact him. To ensure he could take action immediately once he had an appointment with this "troupe leader," Ogami wouldn't take a single step outside of the Town of Sakura. It was a boring town, but he'd built up a tolerance to its boredom from growing up there.

He also had the option of fabricating reasons to go visit Kasumi so he could deepen their friendship. But he felt their reunion was still all too recent, and that making a rapid approach at this stage would have the opposite effect. He'd learned from his experience on matchmaking apps that such impatience could be fatal. For the time being, doing nothing seemed like the best move.

The level of comfort in the old apartment was awful, fully in line with his expectations. He bought a small oil heater, but no matter how high he raised the temperature setting, it only heated up the room right up to the cusp of "warm." It's just like Kujirai's garage, Ogami thought. Even the warmth the heater provided wasn't sufficient there.

It snowed in town every other day. It was a charmless snow fitting for February, piling up on everything from guard rails to power lines. The apartment roof was covered in a thick snow mixed with ice, and many thick, pointed icicles hung down from the edges. Ogami remarked upon how impressive it was that the roof didn't collapse every time he went in or out.

When he felt like it, he would clear the snow outside the apartment using a snow-shovel from the communal area. It was made of aluminum, with a red handle that could stand out even amid snow. People in the neighborhood would put shoveled snow onto a snow scoop and carry it off. So it seemed there was a snow "dump" of sorts somewhere, but even if he'd known where it was, he lacked the tools to bring it there. So he piled up the snow in the corner of the site, creating a mountain of snow that could make a fine igloo.

There were other residents besides Ogami at the apartment, of course, but they were docile, as if hibernating for the winter. They lived quiet lives, aiming not to make household noises or encounter the other residents. If he sat still in his room at night, he could sometimes hear a creaky floor through the wall, and that finally gave him the sense that it wasn't just him in these apartments.

There was no room for a washing machine in the room, so when he ran out of changes of clothes, he went to a small laundromat in the neighborhood. Listening to the washing machines spin in the middle of the night felt like being among the workings of an old clock tower, and it calmed his heart. Not like he'd even been inside a clock tower, of course, so it was no more than his imagination.

Early in the morning that day, he left the apartment to head for a Mental Health and Welfare Center in the prefecture. Though known for being in an inconvenient location, it was less than a 30-minute drive from Ogami's apartment.

The building had a coloration that brought to mind a dull, cloudy winter sky. It was a tidy facility that indeed seemed to align with words like "mental health" and "welfare." But stepping inside, he found it much more aged than the impression the exterior had given. Even if every inch was kept clean, the entire building had an air of being worn down.

There was still time before the prompter training began. Ogami went outside and sat on a bench to eat a sandwich from the convenience store. He sat there for about ten minutes, yet didn't see a single person enter or leave the building in that time. Perhaps he would be receiving training all on his own.

But when he entered the training room five minutes before the starting time, he found about a dozen men and women sitting there. The majority were young, with the oldest man seeming like he was 30 at best. There was even a high school boy in uniform, but indeed, no middle schoolers that he could see. Cases like Sumika and Kujirai must have been rare after all, Ogami thought as he sat in his assigned seat. And he waited for the teacher to arrive.

Ever since he began working as a Sakura on matchmaking apps, he had realized over and over just how outstanding Sumika and Kujirai had been as Sakura. As he improved, he saw that his way of speaking (albeit just through text messages) and choice of words were becoming more and more similar to those two. By their early teens, they had already picked up the art of precisely hitting people's tender parts, the weak spots they were unable to reinforce. Not only that, but skillful acting chops that kept lies from seeming like lies.

Part of him felt like he could hardly be blamed for not seeing through Sumika's act. When the girl he'd secretly yearned for gently spoke to him while he was being ostracized in the classroom, of course he wouldn't be able to keep his cool.

But Kujirai was different. Compared to Sumika coming in with the advantage of Ogami liking her, Kujirai was saddled with many handicaps. Despite having once earned Ogami's resentment, he overcame that to gain his trust.

Still, maybe happenstance played a big part there, Ogami considered. Sure, Kujirai had been entirely consciously performing as a friend that would get on well with me. No mistaking that. But you couldn't purposefully aim to do something like using the same movie's CD case as a hiding spot.

Likely there had been things that genuinely overlapped between us. But whether Kujirai would have developed a real friendship with me if he weren't my Sakura is an entirely different question. Our common points, most likely, would just be things about ourselves that we hated to see in others.

The training was split into a morning and afternoon section, with the morning part being nothing but watching a video about prompter training. The video had nothing special to say, just a lot of things you'd already know with a bit of research into prompters. The general attitude to take when dealing with high-risk people. Common mistakes. Handling examples.

The other trainees, too, watched the video earnestly for the first hour, but eventually started losing focus and glancing around, with some even falling asleep. That's how boring it was. You couldn't imagine that someone who needed to be explicitly taught these fundamentals to put them into practice would be chosen as a prompter in the first place. But they must have felt they had to cover their bases.

There was a two-and-a-half-hour break between the morning and afternoon sessions. After eating at the cafeteria, Ogami headed for the smoking area outside. It felt unusual that there was a smoking area at a facility like this, but maybe it being this kind of facility meant there would be people who needed to smoke. After finishing his cigarette, he sat on a nearby bench and mindlessly felt the breeze.

As there weren't any places to kill time close to the facility, he just continued to smoke there. Two and a half hours seemed a bit too long for a break. Maybe the other trainees were using this time to mingle with each other. Or maybe they were enthusiastically going back over the video, reflecting upon the weight of the mission they had been assigned.

If that was the expectation they'd planned this break with, then I was completely flying in the face of that hope. I felt bad, yet the responsibility surely didn't lay with me, but with the System who's chosen the likes of me as a prompter.

For the afternoon portion, they were made to practice. With the lesson from the morning in mind, they would actually talk with people at high risk of suicide. Of course, it wasn't being done with real human beings. It was a mock exercise using a simulator. The high-risk individual on the monitor would have a talk with you, and the appropriateness of your response was judged. Of course, it's not like there was a penalty for repeated inappropriate responses.

"Rather, approach it with a sense of getting out all your mistakes while you can," the training staff said. "Because failures here can always be taken back."

Over the following two hours, Ogami met with nine high-risk individuals. He was judged to have given an "inappropriate response" for five of them. If that implied a failure to prevent their suicide, it meant he had managed to kill five people in two hours. Talk about efficiency.

Ogami felt he had given safe responses for all nine. At the very least, he didn't do anything that went against what they'd been taught in the morning. They'd probably set the difficulty to be unreasonably high. The purpose of the training was to impress upon you the difficulty of preventing suicide, so maybe they made it such that even a professional counselor wouldn't be able to save them all. Either that, or the simulator was more advanced than Ogami expected, and it saw through to his innermost lack of desire to stop their suicides.

Taking off his headphones after finishing up the ninth meeting, he realized he was now alone in the practice room. The silence pierced his ears the way cold pierces your skin when taking off a heavy coat. It seemed the other trainees had already finished and moved elsewhere.

Ogami still had a tenth person to go.

Putting the headphones back on, he resumed the simulation on the device.

The last one was a boy. He was around 14 years old, and had a gloomy expression.

The boy didn't make eye contact with Ogami, seeming dead-set on not opening his mouth. Maybe the idea was that he hadn't come to talk of his own will, but rather someone else brought him here.

He figured he should be the one to speak, but for some reason, he couldn't get a word out.

The test of endurance lasted nearly five minutes. The boy was the one who cracked first.

"I think there's been some kind of mistake," said the boy. "I'm not thinking about dying or anything, and I'm having fun every day..."

That's what I thought too, Ogami said.

But maybe, just maybe, you're standing on the edge of a cliff without even realizing it.

Maybe everything you see before you is a sham, and the world might turn on its head tomorrow.

You ought to prepare yourself for that eventuality.

The boy stared into Ogami's eyes silently for a long time.

Eventually, the boy vanished from the screen, and the message "inappropriate response" was displayed.

Past noon the following day, he got a call from Kasumi.

"I finally got in contact with the troupe leader. Sorry it's sudden, but are you available this evening?"

"I'm always available," Ogami answered.

"Good. Then I'll let the leader know," Kasumi said. "I'm sorry it took so long. It seems there's lots of work to be done with the dissolution of the troupe."

"Dissolution?"

"Oh, that's right, I never mentioned. They're breaking up. The troupe my sister was in."

Ogami thought for a bit, then asked: "Is that somehow connected to your sister?"

"That's part of it. It's just... I think it'd be faster to ask the troupe leader for the details in person."

"I see." Ogami judged that he shouldn't pursue that any further. "So, what should I do now?"

"I'll have you head for their rehearsal hall. It's less than an hour from your apartment."

Kasumi explained the route to the rehearsal hall. When you grew up in the same town, things like this could be talked out quickly.

"They renovated an old warehouse for it. There aren't any other buildings nearby, so you should be able to spot it easily."

Ogami made out some faint voices in the background of the call. They all sounded young and lively.

"Are you calling from school?"

"Yes. It's my lunch break," Kasumi said in a hushed tone. "It feels strange to be talking to someone unrelated to school while I'm at school."

"I was having similar thoughts. Like I'm up to something nefarious."

"Yes, nefarious," she repeated, then giggled to herself.

"By the way, what's the troupe leader's name?"

There was silence for a while. Ogami heard a sound that seemed to be the first bell.

"I'm sorry, I've forgotten. My sister always just said "troupe leader," you see."

"Ah, that's fine."

"Oh, but I remember your name, Ogami. It's Ogami, right?"

"Good on you for remembering."

"That's a sign of our friendship."

"Huh."

"Also, I'm terribly sorry, but I can't accompany you this time."

"Still busy with school?"

"No, it's nothing like that. But given of the nature of the conversation, isn't it better that a relative of hers not be there?"

It was a good point. If a relative of a suicide victim were there, they'd probably only be able to bring up harmless topics.

"So I'll have you go by yourself this time. Please call me when you're done talking. I don't mind even if it's late at night."

"Sure."

"It's going to be chilly again tonight, so please keep warm. Well, goodbye."

With that, she hung up.

The clock had only just hit 2 PM. What preparations should he be making in this span of time? Should he get his questions in order, or look more into the troupe? Though of course, even if he skimped on preparations and wasn't able to get anything major out of this, it was no issue. He didn't have that much interest in the truth of Sumika's death. He was just using her death for the sake of building a good fake relationship with Kasumi.

Ultimately, he just spaced out until the appointed time. Remembering how Kasumi said she'd come visit sometime soon, he went and cleaned up, but even that took fewer than ten minutes.

I have to say though, thought Ogami, does she have no sense of wariness? Does she understand what it means to visit the room of a man living on his own? Thinking about it, her letting me into her room at night while her parents weren't around was also pretty dubious. Does she trust a friend of her sister just that much, or is she making light of me? Or else, is visiting a man's house a common occurrence for her?

At any rate, it was beyond Ogami's understanding as a man whose life had no notion of friendship.

The warehouse being used as a rehearsal hall was next to railroad tracks at the end of a path through a field. The entrance door was on the side of the building, with the front having a lowered rusty shutter. Its structure brought to mind equipment storage for a fire brigade, a common sight in rural areas. Maybe that's what it had actually been once.

An old pickup truck was parked in front of the warehouse. There were many footprints going back and forth between the truck and the warehouse. Loaded onto the back was a cluttered pile of things like folding chairs, pipes, and plywood.

Ogami leaned against the truck bed and lit a cigarette. Across the train tracks were a sprawling number of conifers covered in snow. A horn sounded in the distance, and after some time, a train passed behind the warehouse. Once it left, the sense of stillness became stronger yet. It wasn't like there was no sound at all, but it felt like the snow was covering up not only the terrain, but the noise as well.

After finishing a cigarette, Ogami walked alongside the footprints toward the warehouse. Just then, the door opened, and a man came out carrying a cardboard box and holding open the door with his leg. Perhaps having been working in darkness, the man narrowed his eyes for a bit as if dazed by the light. Seeing no sign of anyone else around, Ogami judged that he must have been the "troupe leader."

When Ogami greeted him and gave his name, the leader nodded with understanding.

"Come inside. I'll leave this here."

Ogami shook the snow off his boots in front of the door, then went inside the warehouse. It was dark, and his eyes took a few seconds to adjust. The light coming through the window illuminated the concrete floor in a blurry rectangular area. The only things left inside were cardboard boxes, so he could find nothing that indicated it having been a rehearsal hall. He tried to imagine Sumika working on rehearsals for a play here, but found himself struggling.

The leader came back quickly. He brought two folding chairs from the truck and sat them across from each other. The two chairs sitting in the center of a basically empty warehouse was something of a curious sight.

"Sorry it's so cold. Disposed of the heater yesterday."

The leader was tall and slender, with hair dyed a bright color, but Ogami didn't sense any of the aggressiveness one might expect from such an appearance. He was probably somewhere around 30. The cracked sheepskin jacket he wore over his sweatshirt had a musty leather smell that reached Ogami even at a distance.

"The work's been going kinda slow," the leader explained, gesturing with his chin at the boxes scattered around the warehouse. "Sorry, but hold on just a li'l longer. I'll be done soon."

"I can help," Ogami offered. He had nothing else to do.

"Oh yeah? I'd appreciate it."

The leader smiled, as if that had been his aim from the start.

The two worked together to clean up the cardboard boxes. Ogami carried them out to the truck, and the leader loaded them onto the truck bed. Quickly warming up from the work, Ogami took off his jacket. These sorts of day-laborer jobs had been his primary work before he started as a chat operator, so he was accustomed.

Moving his body didn't feel so bad. He didn't have to think about anything but what was in front of him.

"Those guys always say they're busy and won't even come help." The leader sometimes stopped to grumble about the troupe members. "I've had'ta find time between work to do this too, y'know. Had to clean up pretty much this whole place myself. Driving a beat-up old truck to and fro down snowy roads. What're they so busy with, anyway? They had nothin' to do before, meeting here and making a ruckus. But then the second it's decided we're dissolving the troupe, they suddenly act like they're serious adults with busy jobs. Even the founding members. Heartless, I tell ya. Though yeah, I guess it might be hard to face each other now..."

In spite of his rough tone, he didn't appear to be genuinely angry. Maybe that anger was a thing of the past for him, and he was just dragging it back out to fill space.

By the time everything on the bed was tied in place with rope and they took a break from the cleanup, it had become completely dark outside. You could see the moon through the clouds that night - a rare treat.

The leader boiled water using a portable stove and a little kettle, then made some instant coffee. The two drank it while sitting on the edge of the truck bed. Seeing the leader light a cigarette, Ogami removed his Handcuff and took out one of his own. He struck the flint in his lighter, and the bright spark in the center of his vision briefly dazed him.

"Now then, it was about Sumika, right?" The leader placed the paper coffee cup on the side of the truck bed and rubbed his hands together for warmth. "I got the gist from her sister. Looking into the truth behind her suicide?"

"It's nothing as major as that. I just wanted to ask you about it."

"What was your relationship with that woman?"

"Just a friend," Ogami answered, tapping his cigarette to drop some ash to the ground. "No, I guess a plain old friend wouldn't have come this far. I'll just say we had a bit of a complex relationship."

The leader nodded. "I'm not sure Sumika had anyone who was "just a friend," honestly. If there was anybody who could avoid having special feelings about that woman, they'd have to be a saint or something."

"Meaning you had special feelings toward Sumika, too?"

"She ruined my troupe. 'Course I've got thoughts."

"Sumika ruined the troupe?"

"Most of the members'll back me up on that opinion."

Come to think of it, Kasumi had alluded to trouble within the troupe.

Eventually, she found herself in a vortex of serious trouble. No, not just in a vortex...

Could that mean she had been the very cause of said vortex?

"I want to know more about that, too," Ogami insisted.

"I wouldn't mind telling you," the leader began, "but if you still have any fondness for Sumika Takasago, I recommend you leave without listening to another word. 'Cause I'm sure it'll leave you with a bad taste."

"I can accept that."

"Guess you would," the leader said, breathing out smoke.

"You want the roundabout version, or the short version?"

"I might as well hear the roundabout one."

"Good," he said. "I'm lousy at summarizing stories."

*

One of the troupe leader's classmates in high school was a person who wanted to die. His name was Kayaba. If Kayaba hadn't been in his class, and hadn't wanted to die, the troupe leader wouldn't have become a troupe leader, likely taking a different path in life.

Of course, now that the troupe had dissolved, his title was more accurately "ex-troupe leader." And as of now, he hadn't found a title to replace that. Even if he was able to become something else, it would take time to paint over that awareness of himself. For a time, it had carried a far more important weight than the name his parents gave him, even.

Maybe I'll be dragging along the title "ex-troupe leader" for the rest of my life, he sometimes thought. It was a name signifying his meager glory days, and the remnants of his dreams.

The troupe leader received a light-pink envelope in spring his second year of high school. After becoming Kayaba's Sakura, that relationship continued until graduating high school. He didn't know what happened to Kayaba after that. Maybe he was being supported by some new Sakura, maybe he had long since killed himself. It was even possible he himself had wound up as a Sakura.

It had never become clear why Kayaba wanted to die. It wasn't even a sure thing that he actually did want to die. As far as the leader could ascertain, there was nothing in Kayaba's life that meant he had to despair. He looked like an average high school boy in every respect, and even if he wasn't especially fortunate, neither did he seem especially misfortunate.

If there was any cause for alarm, it was that a relative of Kayaba's had killed themselves a few years prior. Even as someone with no knowledge of whether suicide risk had anything to do with genetics, nor familiarity with mental issues, the troupe leader could easily imagine how the act of suicide might be contagious. When someone close to you does something, it instantly becomes an easier "option" to consider for yourself. That is, "if someone tied to me by blood can do it, I see no reason why I couldn't."

The leader wasn't the kind of person who found his own value in helping others. But it was in his nature that if he was going to do something, he had to do it well, so he carried out his duty as a Sakura diligently. He disguised himself skillfully enough that Kayaba thought of him as an unparalleled best friend, and as he polished his acting methods day after day, he even found a game-like enjoyment in it.

In practice, many of the people the System selects as prompters are of this type. Altruism and a spirit of self-sacrifice aren't considered for evaluation (though of course a person with violent tendencies won't be chosen); rather, priority is given to people with high adaptability and stable emotions. Without that sort of tenacity, there would be a risk of them being afflicted by suicidal thoughts themselves.

As he played the role of a second self as a Sakura, the leader learned the depths of what it meant to act. Until then, he hadn't really thought of theater as much more than an extension of kids playing make-believe. But when he pursued this "game" earnestly, it occurred to him that, in a way, all people's lives are being tested. How attentively you've been observing yourself, other people, and the world, and whether you've put serious thought into them, will reliably show in your acting. This game - there's really nothing else like it.

That said, he hadn't imagined by that point that he would genuinely get involved in the world of theater. He was able to find enjoyment in his duty as a Sakura if he looked for it, but it didn't change the fact it was a burden on him. He had plenty of other charming friends, yet he was bound to a boring person who seemed to offer no interest at all. What could he call it but exhausting?

Kayaba had the sorts of average faults an average person does, and there were numerous times the troupe leader got fed up and irritated with him. But even when he was, he had to pretend to be an understanding person and maintain appearances. Gradually, a feeling of hatred for Kayaba grew inside him.

But just before his good graces for Kayaba ran out, the System took action. Judging that the troupe leader alone would be insufficient to keep Kayaba from suicide, a second and third prompter were sent to Kayaba.

At first, he didn't realize this had happened. To the leader, it just looked as if Kayaba had made new friends entirely naturally. He had two of them: Kakimoto was a short guy good with words who was the life of the party, and Usuzumi was a big guy who seemed to take charge of keeping the class in order.

The two quickly hit it off with the troupe leader by way of Kayaba, and the four would often act as one from then on. It thus became rare for the leader and Kayaba to just be by themselves, lessening the burden of being his Sakura. He could count on the other two to keep Kayaba in a good mood, allowing him to stand on the sidelines, nodding along and smiling vaguely.

But ever since that group was established, the troupe leader would sometimes feel that something was off in a way that defied description. This sense of dissonance grew slowly but surely, like unseen sediment in the water. Something's odd about this group. Of course, part of it is that I'm in it as a Sakura, but even subtracting that, there were still unnatural aspects.

Kakimoto and Usuzumi's appearance had been a godsend for the troupe leader, so he'd closed his eyes to questions like what appealed to them about Kayaba, or why they suddenly decided to hang out with Kayaba after the class's relationships had solidified. But after a month had passed, he found himself having to confront those doubts again. For what possible reason did they approach Kayaba?

As he carefully observed the group, the cause of the dissonance slowly became clear. In many cases, it took the form of a bizarre synchronicity. Curious coincidences, namely the three of them sans Kayaba saying almost the same thing as the same time, were happening once every few days. Furthermore, this only happened when the troupe leader was pressed to say something to Kayaba "as his Sakura." To put that more clearly, they synced up only when he went to say words of encouragement or flattery he wasn't really thinking.

As an experiment, he completely abandoned his duty as a Sakura for a few days, leaving Kayaba to the other two, and there were no problems at all. The two of them neatly filled the hole he left.

These guys are way too convenient for me, the troupe leader thought. It's like there are three of me to act as Sakura now, and they'll work in my place.

No, hold on - could that be it exactly?

Were they actually new Sakura, dispatched to help me out?

However, the leader didn't try to directly air his suspicion to the two of them. Even supposing Kakimoto and Usuzumi were Sakura, making that clear to each other would introduce flaws into their performances, he thought. They'd lose the tension of working alone as a Sakura, getting careless and assuming that the others would cover for any mistakes.

Having three actors also triples the risk of the performance being seen through. That was the troupe leader's thinking. Kakimoto and Usuzumi probably had the same idea. Until the day of their high school graduation, the three feigned ignorance and performed as Kayaba's Sakura.

The day after graduation, the leader received another one of those light-pink envelopes, and he was freed from his duty as a prompter. Maybe Kayaba's suicide risk had decreased to a safe level, or maybe the role would be passed on to someone more suitable to match the change in environment. The four members of the group went on to different colleges, and it seemed their relationship would end there.

After graduating, the troupe leader felt liberated. Now I won't have to watch over somebody who wants to die anymore, and I can just get along with people I wanna get along with. That thought alone made his heart feel light.

At first, he viewed his two years as a Sakura as pure exhaustion. But after returning to normal human connections unrelated to Sakura, he had second thoughts. His experience as a Sakura had done wonders for his acting, observation, and above all, his endurance. As a result, by treating his new college environment as a stage, he was able to conduct himself skillfully enough that even he was shocked.

Compared to having to keep pretending to be understanding with Kayaba, this game was simple enough to make him yawn. With just a quick conversation, the troupe leader was able to read what a person subconsciously sought in others, and he learned how to act as their ideal just as quickly. Like a creature that changes color to blend in with its environment, he was creating new selves on the spot.

It wasn't just him who was performing on a daily basis, of course. Everyone did something similar, with the key difference being to what degree. But to him, other people's acting looked astoundingly stiff and clumsy. He hadn't realized back in high school with Kayaba taking his attention, but it looked to him like they didn't even know the basic rules of the game.

Maybe this ability I'm wielding like it's ordinary is actually something really special? It didn't take too long for the troupe leader to start thinking that way. In fact, the moment he was selected as Kayaba's Sakura, the System was acknowledging that he had talent as an actor.

That discovery excited him. Until then, he'd never thought of himself as having talents surpassing anyone else's in any way. He was generally fine, but anything he did was only half-baked, and with no particular weaknesses, he couldn't boast about anything either.

It would be a waste to let this ability rot, the leader thought. And it's not just me. The abilities of those two, who performed as Sakura just as well if not better than me back then, should be put to some use, too.

He called the two of them. And he asked, "I didn't dare bring it up at the time, but you were both Kayaba's Sakura like me, right?" Both Kakimoto and Usuzumi readily admitted it. They had also picked up on the troupe leader being a Sakura, and were themselves realizing the value of their talents after being relieved of their duty.

From then on, the three developed friendly relations without Kayaba. Two months after their reunion, they launched an acting troupe. All three were practically amateurs at theater, but they couldn't think of any other means of utilizing their talents.

The troupe, though started by fumbling around, steadily grew in part thanks to the trio's social talents. Motivation was high, and they were blessed with good luck. They soon became known online, and people even came from outside the prefecture to join. In the end, there were fifteen members including the original trio, but they had all made it through strict auditions to find the best of the best, so for a troupe led by an amateur, they were a superb bunch.

Sumika Takasago was the fifteenth, and last, member of the troupe.

First speaking with Sumika when she came to the rehearsal hall for an audition, then immediately passing her after seeing her performance, the troupe leader was bewildered by both her towering talent and her incongruous lack of presence. Anyone in this field would put stickers saying "look at me" all over their body, but she had none. No matter how immense a talent they had, he couldn't imagine that sort of desire-less person could manage in such a self-asserting place as an acting troupe.

He had no confidence in whether his decision to pass Sumika was correct. That said, it seemed like introducing a foreign substance like her could be a good way to stimulate the other members. He could just watch how it went for a while, and leave later decisions for later.

As he expected, Sumika had a hard time fitting into the troupe. She wasn't necessarily shy, but it seemed like deepening her relations with others was quite low on her list of priorities. The other members didn't treat her with concern nor cruelty, taking a neutral stance of "be here if you want to be, leave if you want to leave." The leader felt fine with that, too. He didn't know what other troupes did, but he thought troupe members becoming too stuck to each other should be avoided if possible. It's best if they're just barely connected by the thin thread that is the stage. Leaving a slight discomfort among the troupe helped maintain a nice tension.

But while the troupe leader wasn't looking, Sumika had suddenly become accepted by the other members. His impression was that rather than her approaching them, they had started to understand the charms she concealed within her. Male members regarded her like "She may fade into the background, but she's actually got a pretty face, and lots of talent," while female members thought "It's hard to tell what she's thinking, but she works hard in practice, and often takes notice of details."

A year, then two years passed, and Sumika had become an irreplaceable part of the troupe. Her presence made the entire troupe turn smoothly. She was just lubricant, not a threat to the job of the gears - this perception, too, was one of the reasons she was accepted. She also had talent and put in plenty of effort, but had shed some essential quality as an actor, making her a lovable junior member.

To sum it up, every single one of them thoroughly misunderstood Sumika. That's what the leader realized, much later. They would all admit it now, no doubt. That she was the best actor in the troupe, the best deceiver, and the most brimming with ambition.

And by the time he realized that, it was too late to do anything.

It happened two and a half years after Sumika joined the troupe.

There had been no advance signs. That day, nearly half the members abruptly skipped rehearsal. He tried calling them, but no one picked up. It was the end of April, and they were preparing for a show next month, so no one should have been skipping rehearsals with no notice at a time like this. He asked the other members if they had any ideas, but they just shook their heads.

The six members who had disappeared were all men. Considering the almost even split of men and women in the troupe, that hardly seemed like a simple coincidence.

Could this be some kind of mutiny?, the leader considered at first. Maybe the six who weren't here were planning to start a new troupe of their own. Most of them were long-time members, including Kakimoto and Usuzumi who had launched it with him. He didn't want to consider it, but he couldn't think of any other reasonable explanation. It wasn't like all of them would've come down with some contagious disease.

Something serious was happening, that was for sure. The leader canceled rehearsal and went around visiting the six's homes and workplaces, questioning them about what was going on. His bad feeling had been accurate. All six wanted to leave the troupe - however, for a completely different reason than he'd imagined.

To get right to the conclusion, the six who wanted to quit the troupe were all Sumika's lovers.

Not in the sense that Sumika had been waffling between different lovers in such a short time, of course. Without anyone in the troupe being the wiser, she had been dating the six of them simultaneously for more than half a year. And they weren't merely going out; she had completely charmed them.

It's not like they were pure, naive, and ignorant. All six were accustomed to being betrayed and deceived, with enough resilience to recover from breaking up from a years-long relationship in half a day tops. They wouldn't survive as troupe members otherwise.

But what Sumika had wrought upon them was different from mere heartbreak. Sumika had led them to believe it would be a lifelong love. It was fair to say she'd repainted their very concept of love.

Talking with the six of them, the leader was horribly confused. Because it was like they were each talking about an entirely different woman. He wondered again and again whether this Sumika Takasago was indeed the same person as the Sumika Takasago he knew.

There was only one explanation that made sense. That Sumika had gone and perfectly played six different roles as the "girl of their destiny," matching each of the six members' types. No matter how excellent her acting chops were, he couldn't see her as someone who would do such an outrageous thing, yet there was no room for any other explanation.

That left just one question: motive. Why did she have to do such a thing? What possible reason could there be to stir chaos and destroy the troupe that accepted her from the inside?

There would be no way of knowing that without asking Sumika herself. But the leader was now busy dealing with a troupe that could no longer maintain itself, and would have no chance of meeting her for a while - no, perhaps that was only an excuse. He knew Sumika's address and contact info, so he could create an opportunity anytime if he wanted.

The leader was afraid of Sumika - that was the truth. Maybe she was still concealing something even now. What if the troupe's destruction was only the beginning, and she was watching how things played out to decide when to drop a second bomb? What if agitating her somehow caused the already-fatal wound to open further?

Now that Sumika had left this world, he was freed from such fears, but had lost all means of determining her motive. The troupe was a mish-mash aside from the initial three, so they were a weakly-involved bunch who had little association once they stepped away from the troupe. So while a grudge against individuals would be one thing, it was hard to imagine Sumika held a grudge against the troupe itself.

As much as he racked his brain, he couldn't come up with a satisfactory answer. She probably had some grand motive far beyond us, he imagined vaguely. Or no, maybe she simply wanted to try using her incomparable talents in the real world instead of on stage. If that were the case, I could understand at least a little.

In any case, the incident forced the dissolution of the troupe. To call it a breakup caused by romantic trouble was too trite. He had instated rules to prevent those kinds of problems in advance, but they proved to be useless in the end. In fact, it could be said those rules only delayed the surfacing of the problem.

But at least in that regard, the leader didn't feel much regret. No matter how many counter-measures he prepared, it would have arrived at the same conclusion regardless. The moment he caught the attention of that femme fatale Sumika Takasago, his troupe was already done for. Though he lost a thing that he'd built up over long years, perhaps he could chalk it up to simple bad luck, that he wasn't chosen as a target of her seduction.

*

That marked the end of the troupe leader's story.

There was a long silence. The leader took a tissue out of his pocket and blew his nose, then started making fresh coffee. While they waited for the water to boil, the two of them gazed at the pale blue flame on the portable stove. And they smoked cigarette after cigarette.

"Do you hate Sumika?", Ogami asked casually. After asking it, he realized it was a pointless question. There was no chance he didn't.

"'Course I do. Hated her enough to kill her, at first."

The leader put coffee grounds into a paper cup filled with hot water and stirred them, then handed the first cup to Ogami. He thanked him, and put the hot coffee to his chilled lips.

"Everything I'd worked so hard to build was destroyed without me really even knowing why. If there were some way to hurt that woman without leaving evidence, I'd say I would've done it without hesitation. 'Course, then she went and kicked the bucket without my involvement."

After the leader finished making his own coffee, he pondered about how to continue for a while.

"Yeah, at the time, I hated her to death. But at this point, I'm more impressed than anything. That woman deceived a bunch of guys who'd put years of work into acting with her stellar performance alone. No offense to the ones she tricked, but I feel like I got to see a good show in the end."

"Surprisingly positive of you," Ogami remarked.

"Yeah. And I'm not just impressed. I'm grateful, too. As I watched the troupe break apart, I realized that deep down, I was relieved. Seems like my motivation for acting had left long ago. The moment I realized I didn't have to keep the troupe going anymore, I felt refreshed like never before in my life. Like I'd suddenly grown wings."

"Your position as troupe leader had become a burden?"

"That's part of it. But more than that..."

All of a sudden, he smiled.

"When I first heard about the commotion Sumika'd caused, I was hit by an intense jealousy even I couldn't make sense of. Not toward the six guys she was deceiving, but toward Sumika. I think half my murderous desire toward her wasn't for destroying the troupe, but because of that jealousy. And when I realized what that jealousy was about, I lost my passion for acting completely."

The troupe leader summed up the circumstances of the dissolution like so:

"It's like this. It's not that I wanted to perform; I wanted to become 100% perfect to someone, like I'd been back in high school. When I was acting as a good friend to Kayaba, by way of him having 100% trust in me, I could approve of myself 100%, too. I was always someone who needed a roundabout approach like that to appreciate myself. And that woman managed to do it to six guys at the same time. You gotta admit defeat there."

[+]

6

By the time Ogami was back in the Town of Sakura, it was 8 PM. When he called Kasumi, she answered on the second dial tone. She whispered that her parents were home tonight, so they should rendezvous outside. The designated meeting spot was the supermarket rest area.

When Ogami arrived, he didn't see Kasumi there. He stood in front of a vending machine, and after some slight indecision, pressed the button for tea. He'd had plenty of coffee already today. Sitting on a pipe chair repaired with packing tape, he took a sip of the hot tea and instantly felt revived from the warmth.

After that, Ogami took another look around the area. Above some shelves carrying microwave ovens and electric kettles was a familiar poster, part of a campaign for suicide prevention. An illustration of a woman crossing her arms by her chest with a gentle smile was accompanied by the slogan "Don't keep it in, talk it out."

Back when he was in middle school, there had been a blunt notice reading "Please refrain from using for more than 30 minutes" where that poster was. It was nowhere to be seen now. Maybe it had outlived its usefulness with the town's dwindling population.

After about five minutes, Kasumi appeared in her usual coat and sat down next to Ogami. Figured he should buy a drink for her too, he asked what she'd like, and she replied "I'll have the same thing as you, Ogami."

Kasumi took a sip of the tea he gave her, then put down the cup. Then, putting both elbows on the table, she stared at Ogami with her chin in her hands.

"Were you able to have a good talk with the troupe leader?"

"He kindly explained everything, even things I didn't ask about. I feel like I kind of get why you didn't want to give me the details yourself."

She nodded. "I worried that even if I told you things just as they were, it might sound like I was being overly bitter because we're relatives, or that I was still hiding something crucial. The troupe leader was able to see things relatively calmly, so I figured he would be best to ask first."

"I think you made the right call, too."

Ogami summarized what the leader had told him. Kasumi listened to it in silence. It seemed there was nothing that needed appending or correcting.

"Was your sister really just playing with those guys?", Ogami tried asking. "She didn't strike me as someone to do such a pointless thing."

Kasumi stared into her cup as she spoke. "I don't know the truth, either. But I do think she did it not on a whim or impulse, but with a firm intention. I have no proof, but you can call it a sister's intuition. And also, like the troupe leader said, I feel like her objective certainly wasn't to ruin the troupe or get revenge on a member."

"If not that, were there some circumstances that forced her to do it?"

Kasumi shook her head, suggesting she didn't know.

"The number one thing that doesn't sit right with me is..." She briefly paused, then continued. "Why, if my sister possessed such eminent acting talent as to be almost magical, she would purposefully paint herself as a villain. There should have been plenty of ways to make herself appear like a victim as well. And yet in reality, it seems she actively chose to reveal the secret. In so doing, she resigned herself to accepting the role of villain. That just gives a mismatched impression, doesn't it?"

Ogami nodded, and drank his tea instead of replying. That's exactly what he had been stuck on, too. If Sumika was mentally unstable, maybe that sufficed to explain it, but could someone walk a tightrope with six men for over half a year in such a state?

To drive away the heavy silence that came over the two of them, Kasumi spoke up in a cheery voice.

"Um, do you want to go for a walk?"

The town was already half-asleep. Houses with their lights on were sparse, and there was no noise worth qualifying as noise. There were no aromas of dinner nor soap; there was only a scent like clear water that was unique to snowy towns.

Every time he passed a bulletin board at a street corner, Ogami casually checked it. All of the boards had posters on them similar to the one he'd seen in the supermarket earlier, affixed with thumbtacks. In some cases, there were even posters about suicide hotlines on the fences and walls of people's houses, though most had faded completely from exposure to the sun. He'd heard that national suicide rates, which peaked about 20 years ago, had improved considerably with the spread of Handcuffs and introduction of the prompter system, but it didn't change it being a serious societal problem.

"Do you smoke, Ogami?", Kasumi suddenly asked.

"I do," Ogami replied simply. He recalled how he'd smoked quite a few while talking with the troupe leader. "Do I smell like it?"

"No. I just thought I smelled something like that for a moment," said Kasumi. Then she stared at Ogami's face. "Ogami, do you have a death wish?"

"What, because I smoke?"

"My middle school health teacher said so. That the only people who smoke these days either aren't thinking at all, or have a latent death wish. You don't strike me as someone who doesn't think at all, so I wondered if it was the latter."

"Who knows, maybe I'm not thinking at all."

"Is that so? Then good."

Ogami nodded vaguely, unsure how to respond to that.

"It's good to not think about anything," Kasumi said after a while. "I'm striving to be like that myself."

"Hope it goes well for you."

"When I'm walking at night like this, sometimes I find it's going quite well."

"And right now?"

"Right now, I'm thinking about how I hope you aren't bored."

"I'm not."

It was the truth. At least since coming to this town, he hadn't felt bored once.

"Now I'm thinking about whether you're just saying that to be diplomatic."

"It's useless to think things like that," Ogami said. "Besides, I like walking too. Probably for the same reasons as you."

Soon, they arrived at an elevated plaza. The two approached a bench placed in front of a wooden fence, and sat down after checking that the surface wasn't wet. And they gazed at the night town, not doing anything in particular.

Kasumi repeatedly reassured him "feel free to smoke," so Ogami moved a little further away and smoked just a single cigarette. Seeing him remove his Handcuff before lighting it, Kasumi remarked with wonder, "So it's true that smokers "jailbreak" before smoking."

The cigarette tasted worse than usual in the night air. Even Ogami didn't quite know why he was smoking these things. Maybe it was in fact a drawn-out suicide, or maybe he wasn't thinking like Kasumi said. Or maybe it was just a chronic case of "having nothing to do."

There were no large buildings in town to obstruct their vision, so they could see to the edges of town from the plaza. Amid the flat darkness that spread out from the unlit houses, there was a solitary light. Ogami supposed it was a hospital. The one he'd visited Kozaki in when he was staying there.

Come to think of it, Kozaki'd suspected I was a Sakura, Ogami suddenly recalled. To have one foot in Sakura Delusion as a grade schooler must be a pretty rare case, thinking about it. Maybe spending so much time in a hospital was fertile soil for delusions like that.

No, that's not right. Ogami thought it over more. What Kozaki had couldn't strictly be called Sakura Delusion. He likely did have Sakura assigned to him; he just misjudged Ogami as one, is all. No doubt there were some fakers among his "friends at the hospital" he'd mentioned. And they had failed to prevent Kozaki's suicide - that seemed like a safe assumption.

Even as early as then, Sakura were near at hand.

"Oh, I wasn't thinking anything just now," Kasumi reported as Ogami returned to the bench.

"Good to hear."

"Still, I'm going to have to think about what comes next soon."

"I was just thinking about discussing that," Ogami said. "Actually, I've already decided who I'm going to meet next."

"Ah, did the troupe leader tell you about someone?"

"Yeah. Though due to scheduling, we probably won't meet until next week."

"Who exactly is it?"

"Don't know her name. But she's a woman, and was apparently on good terms with your sister."

"Oh, Teacher? A good choice."

"Teacher?"

"Everyone called her that because she took initiative to teach newcomers, I'm told. She evidently helped my sister a lot, and meeting and speaking with her myself a few times, she seemed very kind. Though from what I hear, she left the troupe herself before it was officially set to be dissolved."

"Was that... prompted by your sister?"

"I don't know. But I think there's a good chance it was. Since she had been quite close with my sister until then."

"Seems worth talking with her."

"Indeed. Teacher might know a side of my sister that we don't. I hope we can learn something new."

The two got up from the bench and went back to the supermarket taking a different path than the one they'd come from.

While walking absentmindedly with Kasumi, Ogami realized he'd pass by Kujirai's house if they continued this way. It was hard to imagine he remained at his parents' house, but even so, his pace quickened as they reached it. Because of this, he almost missed seeing the "For Sale" sign.

It seemed the Kujirai family had already left this town. So it wasn't just Sumika; the other threat had also been removed without him realizing.

Ogami stood in front of that sign for a while.

"Was this an acquaintance's house?", Kasumi asked, standing beside him.

"Nah," Ogami said. "Just thinking how there are a lot more empty houses around."

Kasumi still seemed like she wanted to ask something, so Ogami brought up a different topic. "By the way, have you decided what you'll do after you graduate?"

"I'm going to the college my sister went to," Kasumi answered. "Even if there's no significance to it now. I wish I'd aimed for somewhere better. I had pretty good grades, you see."

"You wanted to support your sister from nearby?"

"Sure, something like that." She didn't seem very interested in the topic. "What are you doing these days, Ogami? Are you in college?"

"I'm bouncing between various jobs," Ogami replied, dodging the question. Certainly he couldn't say he worked as a Sakura on matchmaking apps. "Currently I'm working as somewhat of a counselor, but I'm not able to disclose much about it."

"Ah, confidentiality, I see."

"Right. It's confidential."

"You seem like you'd be well-suited to work like that. I get the feeling you really listen to what people say."

"What are you aiming to do?"

Kasumi hummed in thought. "Nothing in particular for now... but if I have to name something, I'd like to be a happy bride."

"That's a fine goal, too."

"Do you think I can do it?"

"Dunno. I don't really know much about brides - too complicated for me. Happiness, too."

"I don't know much either," Kasumi said with a smile. "It's a very difficult problem."

His meeting with the teacher was in a week. There wasn't much to be doing until then. He spent his time aimlessly at the old apartment, occasionally went shopping, and shoveled snow when it snowed, moving through the days like clockwork.

After the fourth day, he got a call from Kasumi. She was calling to confirm if it was okay to visit the apartment tomorrow. He had no reason to refuse, of course. Ogami told her she could come anytime she liked, so Kasumi said "Then I'll be visiting at 10 AM," and hung up.

There was a knock on his door at 10 that night. The knocking had a kind of weight to it that Kasumi's delicate hands couldn't possibly produce. It was unquestionably someone other than Kasumi, but he couldn't think of a single other person who'd visit his room. He hadn't told the troupe leader about this apartment, and it was far too late for a mail delivery. Was it a neighbor who mistook their room?

He held his breath to wait out the situation, and they knocked again. This time it was an even stronger knock, filled with conviction. The light from his room was probably visible from outside, so he couldn't pretend to be out. Ogami went up to the door, unlocked it, and opened it while bracing himself.

Standing there was a man who Ogami indeed had no acquaintance with. He was a tall man wearing a military parka over a suit. Judging from his eyes, he was probably about the same age as Ogami. Greasy forelocks and stubble covered a good deal, but even through these, Ogami could tell he had a good-looking face. He's like a movie actor done up to look like an outcast, Ogami thought. It was the kind of face where trying to dirty it just made its beauty stand out more.

In spite of the snowstorm starting up outside, there was hardly any snow on the man's jacket. Behind him was a large four-wheel-drive car that felt out of place with the old apartment's parking spots. It seemed that was what he came here in.

The man faced Ogami in silence for a while. It appeared as if he was just as taken aback as Ogami.

"Do you need something?", Ogami asked.

The man continued staring at Ogami as if he hadn't heard it. Ogami felt an impulse to just shut the door on him, but he couldn't imagine that would make the man simply give up and leave.

Finally, the man opened his mouth. "So that means... I suppose you must be Mr. Ogami?"

"That's me," Ogami affirmed. "And you are?"

"As I thought." The man nodded with self-satisfaction. "I heard from the troupe leader. That a man had recently started looking into the truth of Sumika's death."

With his use of the title "troupe leader," this man must have been a member of that troupe. But Ogami didn't recall telling the leader his address, and it didn't seem like even the man had come with the expectation of Ogami being here.

"I see, living here to await the fiend's return... An interesting idea," the man remarked with admiration. "I wouldn't have thought of it, at least, and even if I had, I certainly couldn't pull it off. Your feelings for Sumika seem genuine."

He wasn't following at all. What in the world was this man saying? "Await the fiend's return"?

"I think you've made some kind of mistake," Ogami told him, endeavoring to keep a polite tone. "I'm not living here to wait for anyone's return. I was just looking for a residence in the area ,and rented one here because there happened to be a room open."

Then the man fell silent again. He seemed like the type who would talk when it pleased him, and not talk when that pleased him.

"If that's true," the man said at length, "you're in possession of some absolutely incredible luck."

"What do you mean?"

"I'm your ally," the man said with a smile. "I've been running after the truth of Sumika's suspicious death ever since then. And if my guess is correct, this very room you're living in is the goal. Even if the goal tape has disappeared."

Ogami settled on "the detective" as a tentative name for the man. Sure, he probably would've given his name if asked, but he also didn't particularly care to know.

The room had no chairs or cushions for visitors. As Ogami puzzled over what to do, the detective said "I'm fine with here," leaning his back on the door. "I don't intend to stay here long."

Ogami nodded. If he didn't mind, that was fine.

"Instead of me talking, I think it'd be faster if I hear what you can tell me first," the detective said. "How much do you know about Sumika's death?"

"Nothing beyond what I've heard from Sumika's sister and the troupe leader."

"And what sort of story did you hear from the troupe leader?"

"That after tearing the troupe to shreds, she finished things off with a mysterious suicide."

The detective twisted his mouth into a smile and laughed with ridicule at that. "Guess it's not unreasonable he'd think of it that way. He was out of the loop about the essential parts the whole time. Though of course, that was a silver lining for him. Even though his troupe dissolved, he got away with a much lighter impact than what some of the members did."

From the detective's loathsome-sounding tone, Ogami supposed he was one of Sumika's ex-lovers. It was clear he had some form of attachment to Sumika, for good or ill.

"Well then, what are you thinking about her suicide?", Ogami asked.

"I'm convinced that her death wasn't suicide," the detective declared.

"Why?"

"Because there's no chance she would kill herself."

His face practically had "isn't that obvious?" written on it. This guy probably still hasn't escaped the spell Sumika cast on him, Ogami thought. Actually, perhaps her death had made the spell fully take hold on him.

"You don't seem to believe me," the detective remarked, as if reading Ogami's mind.

"Saying "it's not suicide because it shouldn't be suicide" is the same as saying nothing at all."

Then the detective laughed out loud, as if Ogami had told a clever joke.

"You've got a point. You're right," the detective conceded. "But you see, when you work in theater for a long time, you start to pick up on that kind of thing. The more serious you are when acting, the easier it is to see through. It's the same as how trying desperately to hide something makes it easier to spot. And she acted something out for us very seriously. Which is why I know her actions weren't her genuine feelings."

The detective adjusted the front of his military parka, as if only just starting to feel the cold.

"She had no intent of dying," he insisted, looking into Ogami's eyes. "At the very least, her death wasn't a simple suicide fully of her own volition. I guarantee it."

"So you're saying she was murdered?", Ogami inferred. Then he appended, with a hint of irony, "By one of the six guys she cheated on, for instance."

"It's a more likely possibility than suicide," the detective said calmly. "If they really hated Sumika that much, that is."

"And weren't you one of them?"

The detective smiled wordlessly.

"Well, I suppose it's hard asking you to believe me when we only just met. But it's true. Which is why I can tell that you're convinced Sumika was murdered, too. You have sufficient grounds to believe it was murder, don't you? I'd appreciate if you could fill me in."

Ogami didn't respond, instead asking: "By the way, who's this "fiend"? You said this room was your "goal.""

"The man who lived here before you moved in. One of the troupe members. If there's anyone who has important information about Sumika's death, it's him. It's pointless even asking any other related parties. Because ultimately, their knowledge ends at wondering "what kind of show was Sumika putting on?" But he fell off the map at about the same time Sumika died. So I've been periodically checking here to see if he'd come back."

"But since I was able to move in, he must have moved out some time ago."

"Yep, that's what it means. But I don't have any leads pointing to anywhere else he'd go. In that sense, this is our final stop for the time being."

"You're sure it's not just "a dead end"?"

"I try to keep an optimistic outlook," the detective said. "By the way, are you familiar with where and how Sumika met her end?"

"I'm not."

"Would you be willing to go there with me?"

In contrast to his soft demeanor, the detective was a rough driver. The tires would sometimes get caught in a deep rut in the snowy road, making the car shake violently. Yet paying it no mind, he just further pressed on the gas pedal. Ogami imagined this wasn't him getting worked up as they neared the site of Sumika's suicide, but just the way he normally drove.

Taking a side road in front of a bridge that went across a large river, they descended a gentle slope to a riverside park. There was no sign or anything at the entrance, and the road to the parking lot had fallen into disrepair, so it seemed to repel visitors in spite of being a park. It of course hadn't been cleared of snow either, so everything had been buried.

The detective parked beneath a solitary streetlight and turned off the engine. Aside from an echo in the back of Ogami's ears, it was so perfectly silent as to make you think you'd gotten something wrong. An excessive silence, like being left behind in a massive movie theater after closing. He felt like if he stayed still, his sense of sight and touch might also become strange.

"This is where her life ended," the detective said in a whisper.

"How?", Ogami asked. His voice sounded muffled, like he was talking with earplugs in.

"The car was parked like this, then sealed up with tape... you know, the old standby."

Ogami pictured the scene. As it progressed, he started to hallucinate that the air in the car was getting thinner.

He opened the door to exit the car. Stepping on the ground, his boots sank into snow up to the ankle. The wind was calm, but the damp cold air coming over the river stung his skin. He buttoned his duffle coat up to the neck, then crunching through the hard snow to cross the parking lot, headed to where he believed there'd be a walking path. The detective followed behind him. The darkness intensified the further they got from the streetlight, but when there was this much snow, it didn't make much difference whether you could see where you were walking or not.

After reaching a point where he could go no further, Ogami scooped up some snow to make a snowball, and chucked it up high in the direction of the river. It immediately went out of sight, sucked up by the darkness. A few seconds passed, but there was no sound of a splash. Maybe it hadn't reached the river, or maybe it hit a tree branch or something.

"Lonely place, right?", the detective said from behind.

"I wouldn't necessarily say that," Ogami said, turning around and rubbing his hands together for warmth. "Sure, it's pretty awful right now, but you can at least see something here in the spring."

The detective didn't reply for a while. Ogami couldn't read his expression in the darkness.

"That's right, you were a local here. Is this a famous place?"

"No. I just happened to know it."

"That's a funny coincidence," the detective said, not sounding amused at all. Of course it wasn't a coincidence, which he seemed to understand as well. "Though naturally, she died at the end of summer. Probably didn't get to see the "something" you're talking about."

"That's a shame," said Ogami.

*

During the spring break before their third year of middle school, the trio went to meet the cherry blossoms.

In the Town of Sakura, spring break was spring in name only, as in reality it was closer to a second winter break. You couldn't expect to see sakura blossoming at graduation, and even upon getting into April, you'd catch glimpses of snow for a while. You'd only get to put away your coat around the middle of April. That day, the trio were huddled around the heater dressed just the same as in the dead of winter.

It was Kujirai who proposed it. Leaning back in the sofa and paging through an old magazine, he unexpectedly said "Let's go meet the cherry blossoms."

Ogami and Sumika looked at each other, then back to Kujirai.

"You mean, head south to where the cherry blossom front is?", Ogami translated.

"How far have they reached at this point?", Sumika asked.

"Closer than I thought." Kujirai opened a map on his smartphone and pointed at the location of the front. "It's still too much to walk, but we can get there in two hours taking buses and trains."

The next afternoon, the trio left town to go meet the cherry blossoms. The sky was clear, and soft rays shone upon the ground. The gusty wind was still roughly as cold as in the middle of winter, but there was occasionally a faint sweet smell mixed in.

Ogami truthfully didn't care one bit about the sakura, but any excuse to go out as a trio was welcome. Even Kujirai surely didn't have the sort of interests that suggested a love of flowers, so it wouldn't have mattered if they were cherry blossoms, plum blossoms, peach blossoms, whatever.

To give away the outcome, they weren't able to meet the cherry blossoms. They got a bus transfer wrong, and headed in a direction that was completely off the mark. Part of it was being in unfamiliar territory, and part of it was not checking their location very well when they got engrossed in some discussion along the way. After laughing at their inattention, the three retraced their steps back to the Town of Sakura where no sakura bloomed.

A string of warm days continued the next week, and real spring came to the Town of Sakura earlier than usual. Waiting another week after that, the trio again went out for flower-viewing. While riding bicycles around town, they happened to come across that riverside park. Though surrounding trees made it impossible to tell from the outside, the plaza was enclosed by sakura in bloom, and a carpet of petals lay at their feet. The three gasped at the sight.

"If they're blooming this early, there's no need to go out and meet them," Sumika said, stretching happily in the shade of a tree.

"Because we went out to meet them, they tactfully hurried over to us," Kujirai theorized while lying in the grass. "We should be grateful."

They didn't see anyone but themselves who'd come to see the sakura. A wind a bit too lacking in modesty to call a "spring breeze" blew through the park, quickly scattering the petals of the sakura that had bloomed away from people's gaze.

The countless white petals fluttering on the wind looked less like a snowstorm, as was the common comparison, but a swarm of butterflies.

*

The detective's four-by-four arrived back at the apartment around midnight. When Ogami got out of the car to return to his room, the detective stopped him.

"If that guy comes back or anything, you should let me know."

He put his arm out the window and indicated his Handcuff. Ogami approached him and touched the Handcuffs to trade contact information.

"The last person Sumika went to meet before she died was the previous tenant of this room. He was always the kind to abruptly vanish and wander here and there, but he came back to this town just a few days before Sumika's suicide, and met with her in secret. Then after that, he disappeared completely. He must know something about Sumika's death."

"I'll contact you if he comes back."

"Appreciate it. And I'll report any developments on my end too," the detective said. Then he added, as if just remembering it: "The man's name is Shogo Kujirai. You should remember it just in case."

"Right," Ogami affirmed, feigning calm. "I'll be sure to remember it."

[+]

7

Once the detective's car had left, Ogami went back into his room and shut the door. The cramped space was as cold as outside if not colder, and even turning on the heater didn't seem to be warming things up at all. It was as if the room had invited in a unique chill while he was away.

He took a shower and got right into bed, but his body heat escaped in no time at all, and an unpleasant cold swirled around his extremities. Getting up, he went over to the kitchen, heated some water and gulped it down raw, and returned to bed. Even then, drowsiness just wouldn't come.

Kujirai had been living in this room until not long ago, Ogami thought, staring up at the pitch black ceiling. He had simply assumed that his parents' house being vacant meant he had left town, but that wasn't the case. Kujirai had rented this room to stay in town, and furthermore, belonged to the same troupe as Sumika.

Neither of these could be coincidences, of course. Staying in town, joining the troupe, it was obviously because of Sumika's presence. Was Sumika someone special to Kujirai after all?

No, hold on. Ogami stopped and reconsidered things. Much like how I'm now a Sakura for Kasumi, isn't it possible Kujirai became Sumika's Sakura? Kasumi mentioned her being in a dangerous state after graduating middle school. So it wouldn't be at all strange if Kujirai, being both close to Sumika and having shown extraordinary aptitude for the task already, was selected as a Sakura.

However, if that were it, then it would also mean Kujirai failed in his duty as a Sakura. Was that a conceivable outcome? Could it be that a man with that much talent as a Sakura was unable to prevent the suicide of Sumika, someone he may have even had feelings for?

He would have also had disadvantages. Kujirai and Sumika had once acted together as Sakura for Ogami. Serving as a Sakura for someone with experience being one is like trying to counsel someone with counseling experience; it would surely come with many difficulties. Knowing too much about each other could also become a hindrance to that task.

But even accounting for that, Ogami couldn't accept it. That was just how highly he regarded Kujirai's abilities. Whatever the circumstances, he was a man who once deceived me utterly.

There, Ogami was struck by another possibility. A theory that he may have come to right away, if only he hadn't known Kujirai as a person.

What if it was Kujirai who killed Sumika?

Maybe he was betrayed by Sumika, just like the six members she deceived - or maybe Kujirai himself went unharmed, but the incident greatly angered him - and so he plotted her murder?

However, this theory felt less convincing than the Sakura theory. The Kujirai who Ogami knew wasn't the sort of impulsive person who'd harm others in anger.

There was so much he didn't know. He came to feel that there was no use thinking about it further with the information he currently had.

Still, as far as the coincidence of him moving into this room as if he were taking Kujirai's place, Ogami did come to an explanation he could be satisfied with. It was the same situation as with the photo hiding spot. We're strangely aligned in those sorts of ways. That was all there was to it.

As the pale morning sun began to shine through the window, Ogami finally got to sleep. His alarm rang three hours later, rousing him from his short sleep. For a while he couldn't remember why he'd set an alarm, but then he remembered: today was the day Kasumi was coming over.

From the day he left his parents' house all the way until today, Ogami'd had only a single acquaintance come to visit his room. A visit from one of his coworkers four years ago, with no advance notice whatsoever, was the first and the last.

She was a college student about two or three years older than him with a plain appearance. She did good work, but was awfully unsociable, sticking out about as much as Ogami did in the workplace. They often bumped into each other in the smoking area behind the shop, but it was rare that they'd converse, making her an ideal person for Ogami to associate with.

One day, Ogami was feeling sick and had her take over his shift. She was as unsociable as ever when she answered the phone, but agreed to fill for him in just two replies. She hung up without a word of concern for his health, which was comforting to Ogami. He even found himself thinking, "if everyone was like her, life would be a little easier for me."

So when she came over to his place at night, he carelessly opened the door jumping to the conclusion that it had to be some work-related matter. The instant he saw the shopping bag hanging from her arm and her strained smile, he regretted opening it. "She's one capable Sakura," his mind judged immediately.

She showed surprising tenacity. As much as he tried to drive her out, she wouldn't withdraw. "I know the feeling of not wanting anyone to bother about you," she said in a pacifying manner. "But you're too inexperienced to be living that life, it's too dangerous. You need to learn to lean on others sometimes, or you'll never manage."

After a thirty-minute back-and-forth, Ogami managed to send her away. The whole mess had worsened his condition, and he spent several days lying in bed. He felt like he'd said something cruel to her as she left, but his fever and headache made him forget what. Once he did return to work, she treated him with the same attitude as before, yet Ogami sent in his resignation the next month and fled from that town.

He didn't know whether or not she was a Sakura. But thinking about it now, he felt she probably wasn't. Maybe she only decided to visit because of their meager fellowship as people who didn't fit into the workplace, and nothing more.

These days, Ogami probably would've used more careful judgement. For instance, he could have accepted her kindness on the surface, then naturally put distance between them. But his Sakura Delusion was particularly severe at that time, so he saw everyone who spoke to him as Sakura.

At any rate, he didn't need to fear making that same mistake with Kasumi. He could just think about deceiving, and not need to consider being deceived. It made for a truly simple and relaxing relationship. Like interacting with a dog or a cat.

Kasumi rung the apartment doorbell right at 10.

Entering Ogami's room, she gave a brief look around the room, then stared at Ogami's face interrogatively.

"Ogami, is this room usually like this?"

"Like what, exactly?"

"I mean the temperature."

"I do have the heater on. Are you cold?"

"Igloos are surprisingly warm. Did you know that?", she said. "Well, it's about as warm as that."

"I've never been in an igloo."

"You'll wreck your body living in a place like this. Ogami, you don't exactly seem strapped for cash, am I right?"

"I don't like to have too many things. Because who knows when I'll be leaving here."

"Even then, this is just too terrible. Let's go buy something to warm you up."

It wasn't a bad suggestion. Truthfully, Ogami was unable to think up any ideas for how to deepen your friendship with a girl after inviting her over.

Arriving at the home improvement store, the two spent some time looking around. They gazed pointlessly at aquariums and the emergency supplies section, had discussions over bargain bin items with unclear uses, and after buying insulation sheets and thick curtains, went back to the car.

"It's been a long time since I went out in a car," Kasumi remarked, rather delayed.

"Is it fun?"

"Very."

Ogami imagined that with her parents being busy with volunteer work, they couldn't give much attention to Kasumi.

"Is there anywhere you want to go?"

"Are you going to take me?"

"As long as it's not too far."

Kasumi thought it over with an uncommonly serious expression.

"Do you like botanical gardens, Ogami?"

"I visited one once a long time ago, and that's it," he answered. "Want to go over there?"

"Absolutely." Kasumi nodded firmly. "In winter, I come to miss the warmth of that place. Even if it's been quite a while for me, too."

Ogami drove toward the botanical garden. They did some light chatting on the way there, but internally, he was deeply shaken by her speaking the words "botanical garden."

*

As he remembered it, he'd gone together with Sumika to the botanical garden not long at all after they became close. It was before Kujirai was assigned as his Sakura.

Before spring break, the school had that relaxed atmosphere characteristic of the end of a term. While Ogami was getting ready to go home after his afternoon classes, Sumika came over and invited him to go with her to the botanical garden.

"Until the end of this month, apparently the garden's staying open late into the night. That means you can see the greenhouse in the dark with the lights down. Doesn't that sound fun?", Sumika said, as if proposing a sinister plot.

Ogami obviously accepted the invitation. He was interested in seeing a totally dark greenhouse, and above all, it was an invitation from Sumika. He couldn't refuse.

With it being night on a weekday, the botanical garden was deserted. They bought tickets at the front desk and received small flashlights, then headed for the greenhouse.

Ogami saw the greenhouse at the end of a narrow path displaying insectivorous plants with poisonous colors. The lights were off, like Sumika had said, and with the lights from the path reflecting off it, you couldn't see inside.

When the automatic door into the greenhouse didn't open, the two nearly crashed into it. After stopping and stomping their feet a bit, the door clattered open.

"I was worried it was closed," Ogami said with relief.

"Automatic doors just don't respond sometimes," Sumika said, looking behind her.

"I've never had that happen before."

"It happens for me constantly."

"Is it a matter of height?"

"There are lots of people shorter than me," Sumika insisted, sounding insulted. "I'm sure there are body types the mechanism has a harder time detecting or something, right?"

Ogami couldn't particularly remember how the greenhouse at night differed from during the day. His heart was full from the fact that he was spending a night together with Sumika, so the plants weren't what caught his eye. Still, one thing he did remember was the distant green light of the emergency exit being unpleasantly bright.

There was a narrow bridge along the path, and when crossing it, Sumika kept her body right against Ogami's. He could hardly see her as she blended into the darkness, but that only made her presence feel stronger.

To extend their time just a little more, Ogami stood in front of plants he had no particular interest in and lit every nook and cranny with the flashlight, and retraced his steps for no reason. Despite his efforts, they were approaching the entrance before he knew it, and the two were once more returned to light. Sumika, too, remarked with regret that she wished they could've taken their time and looked around more.

While looking at a diorama display on the second floor, an announcement of the garden's closing played, and the two hurried out of the building. They bought canned coffee from a vending machine by the entrance, and sat down to take a break. There were specks of snow outside, but the heat of the greenhouse remained inside their bodies, so the chill was comfortable on their skin. Sumika remarked that it was like summer and winter had traded places in an instant.

Then, the two had a discussion about suicide.

Maybe because of the unordinary darkness they'd been cutting through, death felt closer to them than usual. In such darkness that you couldn't see your own limbs if you turned the flashlight off, they felt a floating sensation like they were souls who had left their bodies behind.

He'd been thinking for a while that he should speak frankly with Sumika about Kozaki's suicide. And there was no more appropriate timing for it than now. So he resolutely asked Sumika:

"What did you think about Kozaki's suicide?"

She must have been startled. Because the high-risk individual who she was watching over as a prompter had suddenly brought up suicide.

Sumika looked up into space, holding her empty can, and thought about the question for a while.

"If it were me, I wouldn't try to die in winter," she said. "I think I'd choose spring."

"Why?"

"Because I think I could sleep better in spring."

That's a strange reason, Ogami laughed. It is a strange reason, Sumika laughed alongside him.

Then she asked him back: "What season would you choose, Ogami?"

"I might pick winter, same as Kozaki."

"Why's that?"

"It's a season where lots of stuff is dying, so my death would be easier to accept."

Sumika put a hand to her mouth and went "hmm."

"But Ogami, don't you think you'd be more likely to go "if everyone's going to die, maybe I'll dare to try living"?"

"Maybe," Ogami admitted. "I guess I won't really know until that time comes."

I'd like to keep not knowing, Sumika said. Ogami agreed with that.

*

That was Ogami's grounds for thinking that Sumika's death wasn't suicide. If she were to kill herself, she would choose spring.

It was just as easy to brush it off as a frivolous remark she'd made in middle school. And yet, he felt her joke reflected at least some small part of her real feelings. In the first place, her position as a Sakura meant she should have denied the act of suicide entirely. The fact she gave a response like that in spite of this meant that the question was one she couldn't just yield to.

Because I think I could sleep better in spring.

Sumika was a girl who slept often. During lunch breaks, she'd often invite Ogami for "afternoon naps," in which they'd sneak into an empty classroom to sleep. Furthermore, for some reason this was restricted to times when Kujirai wasn't around; Ogami surely wouldn't have slept soundly otherwise. While napping, he would wait for suitable times to lift his head and gaze at her in secret.

Thinking about it, maybe she was just too timid to talk to Ogami when alone with him, and thus designated that time for napping. Or perhaps she was putting on the appearance that her heart was open to him by sleeping defenselessly in front of him.

However, what was clear was that her sleep itself wasn't feigned. She was indeed asleep. Ogami could tell, as an budding expert at feigning sleep.

The botanical garden was still there, the same as it was back then.

After paying the entrance fee, Ogami and Kasumi set their sights on the greenhouse. With it being afternoon on a weekday - he'd completely lost his sense for days, but it was probably a weekday - the garden was empty. They only others they spotted were a group of two young girls in a section displaying local plants.

When he told the story of him visiting the garden with Sumika at night, Kasumi was delighted.

"Please, tell me more stories like that."

"I will, if I remember any others."

"Well, huh. So you can see some interesting stuff if you come at night," Kasumi said with chagrin. "Let's come here again someday. After midnight this time, when it's darkest."

"I have to imagine they'd be closed after midnight."

"When it's decently dark, then."

After going down the path of insectivorous plants and opening the door, the two were engulfed in a humid summer air. The first smell to hit them wasn't the leaves, nor the plants, nor the fruits, but the thick soil that had just been dug up. It was a smell Ogami often caught a whiff of as a child.

There were, sure enough, no other visitors in the greenhouse either. There seemed to be an artificial waterfall somewhere, making a continuous sound like white noise, but it was quiet aside from that. They didn't hear anyone talking, and there was no music playing.

Taking their time, much like when walking through there with Sumika, Ogami and Kasumi proceeded along the greenhouse paths. They carefully read the descriptions on the labels, and looked over each and every leaf. There were dozens of different plants in the greenhouse, but they all seemed dwarfed by the banana plants reaching to the ceiling and the palm trees.

Kasumi was finding it unusually enjoyable. She probably hadn't come to a place like this in quite a while. But that can't be all it is, Ogami thought. No doubt she's enjoying it because she's with me. I should have a little more confidence in that.

As they proceeded along, they saw a bridge over an artificial lake. It was a thin bridge with no handrails, so crossing it side by side would be tricky. When they reached the bridge, Ogami casually held Kasumi's shoulders. Her body stiffened for a moment, but she soon relaxed, and let his arms guide her.

When he looked at Kasumi's face after crossing, her cheeks had become faintly red. So she does have at least some affection for me, Ogami noted, his confidence growing. Maybe it's sufficient to just preserve this relationship now.

After leaving the greenhouse and walking for a while, they found a shop doubling as a café. The shelves had a mix of merchandise, including decorative plants, bottles of jam, and stuffed animals. They decided to take a break to have a light meal at the café.

"My graduation is half a month away," Kasumi mentioned as they ate. "They're having us practice for it, but doesn't practicing for graduation seem kind of foolish?"

"That's true, I could see it lessening the emotional impact," Ogami replied. "On the other hand, I get the school not wanting you to mess up."

"I don't see any particular reason to cry at graduation myself, but strictly speaking, I suppose I could cry about that fact."

"You aren't sad?"

"Not at all. That said, it's not like I feel refreshed either. How was it for you, Ogami?"

"My high school graduation?"

"Yes. Did you cry?"

"I remember the gym was awfully cold."

"That's all?"

"That's all."

"Sure enough, you're like me, Ogami." Kasumi's eyes narrowed in a smile.

"Personally, I'm surprised you're "with me" on that," Ogami responded. "You look like an honest sort to me."

"Looking honest to dishonest people means you're not an honest sort."

Ogami thought about it for a moment, then nodded. "Maybe you're right."

After finishing their meal, the two left the botanical garden.

In the car on the way back, Kasumi picked up where she left off.

"Speaking of graduation... This is truly a crude question, and I'm not asking with any ulterior motive, but..."

"Yeah?"

"Why did you stop meeting with my sister after you graduated middle school?"

He knew that question would be coming eventually. So naturally, he'd prepared an answer.

"There was a bit of a change in circumstances. I had a need to quickly learn how to live by myself, without depending on anyone. Before I knew it, we'd been estranged for quite a while, and I was unable to get an opportunity to restore our relationship. Thinking how she might have forgotten all about me and been getting on well with new friends, I couldn't work up the nerve to call."

"It sounds like you've had it rough too, Ogami." Kasumi nodded with a meek expression. "But I believe she always remembered you."

"I hope you're right."

"She didn't seem to associate with many people at all in high school, so she always came straight home and rarely even left the house on days off. I wonder if she might have been lonely after you two separated. She used to always be telling me about you, after all."

"In what way?"

"Well... I'll keep that a secret." Kasumi smiled nostalgically. "I should clarify, my sister feeling down after you left was only up until she joined the acting troupe. So I imagine her ending up the way she did had nothing to do with you."

Thanks, Ogami said.

What a shame, is what he really wanted to say.

If only my existence could have contributed to Sumika's suicide in some way.

When getting out of the car, Kasumi spoke up.

"I guess I made things kind of serious at the end there. Once things have settled, let's go to the botanical garden again together. At night this time."

Convinced that this wouldn't happen, Ogami nodded.

The appointed spot for his meeting with the teacher was a café at a train station. It was a major station, seven stops away from the Town of Sakura. Driving there seemed like it would be a hassle in many ways, so Ogami decided to take the train.

Sitting at an end seat in a car with plenty of empty ones, he gazed out the window for an entire hour until reaching his destination. He saw nothing especially remarkable. Forests grown along the tracks, fields buried under snow, and one old street after another passed by outside.

It was terribly crowded at the large station, so it took him some time to find the café in question. People bundled themselves in plain-colored coats, pacing quickly in the direction they wished to go in boots damp from snow. For the first time in a while, Ogami felt a sense of just how many people were living out their lives in the world. Living in a desolate town where he didn't interact much with anyone made the world feel like a tiny diorama. Or like a cramped stage, say.

Finally finding and entering the café, he saw "Teacher" already sitting down. He knew at a glance it was her because the troupe leader had told him in advance that she always wore dark black clothes.

Indeed, she was dressed as black as a crow. Her coat was black, but her skinny jeans were even blacker, making it look like a hole in space had opened near her legs. And despite being clad in that much black, the teacher somehow gave a casual impression. Taking a look around the whole café, she blended in more than she stood out. What a curious thing, Ogami thought. She must have learned the art of concealing herself amid the background, like a creature with camouflage.

Perhaps she was a superb black-clad prompter on stage, as well. Though of course, the need for prompters seemed to be rarer in modern performances.

The teacher carried the spaghetti in front of her into her mouth with a bored look. It wasn't that she had no appetite; rather, it was the way a person with no interest in the act of eating ate. As if she were saying "I'm only eating because you need to eat to live."

As Ogami greeted her and took a seat, the teacher spoke without looking up. "Sorry, but can you wait until I'm done eating?" She seemed to want to finish off her spaghetti as soon as humanly possible.

Ogami went to the counter, spent some time looking at the menu, then ordered a single coffee. The seats were nearly filled, with all the customers seeming pressed by something as they stuffed sandwiches in their mouths or typed on keyboards. The sounds of utensils touching and the calling voices of employees became one with the background music, creating a comfortable noise like rain.

By the time Ogami brought the coffee cup back to his seat, the teacher was wiping her mouth with a paper napkin and pushing her plate to the side.

"Now, I want to make sure of this first," she began. "Ogami, was it? What kind of acquaintance did you have with Sumika?"

"We were classmates in middle school. For a time, we were close friends."

"That's it?"

Ogami hesitated a bit before speaking again. "She was my prompter."

"Prompter," the teacher repeated. "You mean, supporting people who might kill themselves from the shadows - that kind of prompter?"

"That kind, yes. Though many people call them Sakura."

"I see." The teacher put her index finger to her chin and pondered what that meant. Then she asked Ogami: "Your Sakura, hmm. So, which type are you?"

"Meaning?"

"Are you honestly grateful to Sakura, or are you resentful?"

"Somewhere in the middle," Ogami lied. He had a gut feeling that this would leave a better impression on her than answering that he was grateful.

"I suppose that's about how it goes," the teacher nodded. "You've already heard the gist from the troupe leader, have you?"

"Yes. We thought you might know more details, since you were close with Sumika."

"I don't know anything major. Why, the leader might have more to offer than me. I left the troupe a moment too soon for its dissolution, so I missed the most important scene."

"Which means you were the first to notice Sumika's dangerousness. Isn't that right?"

There was a short silence. Then her expression suddenly relaxed.

"Yeah. That's exactly right. I noticed first, and I ran away. That might have still been too late, though. Really, I should have gotten away from that girl sooner."

"Could I ask what there was between you and Sumika?", Ogami inquired.

"I don't mind. Lately, I've finally been able to sort the matter of that girl out. I was just thinking I'd like to open up about it to someone. You appeared at just the right time, Ogami."

"That's fortunate."

"However, not to make it sound like a trade, but when I'm done with my story, there's something I want to ask you too. It's nothing major, though."

"I'll answer, as long as I'm able to."

"Good," she said with a smile. "Now, where to begin?"

The teacher reached for her glass and took a drink of water, then for a while just stared at the napkin holder, where in the past there would have been an ashtray.

Finally, she began to speak.

*

When Sumika joined the troupe, the teacher was the one who first offered a helping hand when she wasn't fitting in. She had always served the role of looking after new members, but this time, the nature of her motivation differed. She wasn't approaching her out of pure goodwill. In truth, it was a calculated move.

The teacher picked up on the depths of Sumika's talent sooner than anyone else in the troupe. It started from the root of "this girl doesn't give off the same scent as me." Which is to say, the scent of an ordinary person. It meant there was something special about her.

Historically, her hunches of this nature had been startlingly accurate. Almost all the people she'd perceived as special ended up finding success to some degree.

Sumika, having enough acting talent to win over their leader yet not knowing even the most basic fundamentals about theater, was like unprocessed ore. By approaching her while I can and taking on the position of her educator, I might be able to get involved in a kind of success I'd never be able to achieve myself - that was the teacher's scheme.

She had long given up on her own talents. She understood that there was no future for her in this cramped, dark, and dusty rehearsal hall. She always worked backstage in the troupe, supporting other members. Because she felt that by doing so, even if she didn't get to bask in the spotlight, she could at least feel the warmth from that light.

Currying favor with Sumika was simple. With Sumika feeling helpless without any members who'd be friendly, she just had to be nice to an extent that didn't come off as overbearing. Before long, Sumika came to adore the teacher. From there, the teacher didn't even have to take action, as Sumika actively came closer. She seemed to be the type who had trouble getting close, but once she did, she tried to see how deep a relationship she could build. Sumika was quite extreme in that regard, and just one month after getting to know each other, she was walking at the teacher's side like a friend she'd known for years.

Soon, Sumika started to imitate even the smallest things about the teacher's expressions and actions. What she wore, her tastes in books and music, the TV shows she kept up with, the sites she had bookmarked - anything that could be imitated, she did.

The teacher knew a number of girls like that. Girls who couldn't help but imitate everything about a specific friend. Before you knew it, they'd be using the same makeup and going to the same beauty parlor. She didn't understand the mentality behind it, but there was always at least someone like that wherever you went. (Oddly, she'd never seen this behavior from any men.)

If it had been anyone but Sumika, she might have felt a bit put off. But she didn't mind being imitated by Sumika one bit. In fact, she even saw it as something to be proud of. This superb lifeform is approving every facet of me. That thought makes me feel like I've gone up a step as a human being.

Thinking back, she had never even been close to talent in her life prior. That's just how it was as far back as she could remember. People with exceptional qualities depend on each other, while ordinary people build relationships separate from that. Even those who appeared at a glance to treat everyone equally were no exception.

She had witnessed that line being drawn in front of her countless times in the past. She was always on this side, not that one. Even in the troupe she was in now, there existed a clear boundary. Yet Sumika was the one person who would lean over from the other side of the line and smile at me over on this side - at least for now.

Out of a desire to not lose Sumika's respect, the teacher put in a grueling amount of effort in secret. She studied the fundamentals of theater from scratch, practiced by herself in a place separate from the troupe's rehearsal hall, and zealously went to see shows by famous troupes. She just kept on thinking about theater, even as she slept.

The troupe members recognized her positive changes as well, trusting her with important roles she never would have been trusted with before. Sumika was as delighted as if they were her own accomplishments.

If I'm with this girl, maybe I can bask in the spotlight too someday. That was what the teacher quietly thought in her heart.

That happy relationship of theirs lasted for about two years.

The teacher herself didn't remember where she read this story. Maybe it wasn't a book, but a play she watched.

There was once a man who was having some problems in his life. A person who was his exact double then appeared before him. The double initially appeared to treat the man favorably, and the man worked with him to resolve his problems. But the double was more skilled than the real thing, and slowly took his place. After being harshly jerked around by his double, those around him deemed the man a lunatic and sent him to a mental hospital.

She thinks it went something like that.

In autumn two years after Sumika joined the troupe, that was more or less what the teacher experienced.

One day, she was summoned by the troupe leader and shown a video. In it was Sumika. It appeared to be footage from a rehearsal, but the teacher hadn't seen it before. Sumika's performance was perfect, and it would be instantly compelling even to someone who didn't know what kind of play it was.

As for what she was performing: it was the role currently assigned to the teacher, in the play their troupe was currently working on.

"What do you think?", the troupe leader asked, beating around the bush.

"Sumika should play the role for sure," the teacher replied immediately. It was clear he was looking for an answer like that, and their leader was a deliberate person, so he must have shown this video to the other members already. In this troupe, might made right. Even if she made a complaint here, no one would take her side.

It wasn't as if she felt no regrets about having her role usurped, but the fact that it was Sumika softened the blow a bit. It was likely the result of her frantically chasing after me, rather than actually setting out to steal my role. I taught her the basics of theater, so in fact, I should be proud that my education was effective. That's what she told herself.

Yet from that day forth, all the positions the teacher had been holding in the troupe were taken over by Sumika one by one. And not only did Sumika take her positions, she carried out the work they demanded several times better than the teacher ever had. Once she'd seen that, there wasn't a single thing she could do.

Before she knew it, she had nowhere to put herself. Losing sight of her reason for being, she found it difficult to naturally be a part of the troupe's circle. Just like Sumika when she first joined.

This is bizarre - does no one see anything wrong about this situation? The teacher looked at those around her for help. But no one seemed to have doubts about Sumika and the teacher swapping places. The troupe members entirely accepted the change, as if they had been hypnotized to.

Gradually, the teacher's duties returned to being mainly backstage work. But while she had taken the initiative to do them before, now she couldn't work up any enthusiasm at all for it. This isn't my true work. There's a place more suitable for me. Why had I ever willingly accepted these duties in the past?

By the time winter arrived, their positions had completely inverted. Yet even at that point, Sumika was continuing her imitation of the teacher unabated. Her clothes, her makeup, her words, her actions, everything. But it had ceased to look like Sumika was imitating her. Rather, the teacher looked like she was clumsily trailing behind Sumika. If they wore the same clothes, Sumika would wear them better; if they put on the same makeup, Sumika's would look better. If they said the same thing, Sumika would be admired more; if they did the same thing, Sumika would get the better reception.

Soon, the teacher was tormented by a sense of inferiority no matter what she was doing. She'd subconsciously compare herself with Sumika. Sumika would do this better, Sumika wouldn't mess up like this, a voice would whisper in her ear. Everything but Sumika instantly lost color, and she was struck by an immense powerlessness.

Maybe all it would take is to simply say "Please stop imitating me." Maybe Sumika would readily back down and hand back my positions. Maybe she would stop imitating me, and go try to become someone else this time.

But even if things did go that way, would I be able to behave the same way I had before in this troupe? There was no chance. Even if no one else minded, I already know. My identity is just a mass of unremarkable elements that can be reproduced by someone else.

The teacher remembered that in middle school, she'd often made her friends laugh by doing impressions of teachers and classmates. When she did them in front of the person in question, it would usually upset them. The more accurate the impression was, the deeper their anger. They must feel like I'm exposing secrets in their blind spot, she thought at the time.

She wasn't necessarily mistaken about that. But it didn't end there. Now, having become the one being imitated, she finally understood. To be imitated is to have something stolen from you. An excellent imitation brings the subject's very essence out into broad daylight, and then spits on it. By showing how it's not anything as special as they think, just a pattern that can easily be generalized, all its meaning and significance is smashed to pieces. People faintly detected that in my imitation of them, and that's why they were genuinely upset.

After Sumika had taken everything from her, leaving her an empty husk, the teacher gradually stopped showing up at the hall. She couldn't bear the members' gazes that seemed to say "why is she here?" - even if they were only imagined, and it was just her beat-up self-esteem talking.

Soon the teacher left the troupe, and cut all contact with Sumika.

*

"That's the end of my story," the teacher said. "Not very exciting, was it?"

Those words finally brought Ogami back to reality. Taking a drink of his water in which the ice had melted, he was finally able to formulate a decent reply.

"No, that's exactly the sort of story I wanted to hear."

"It's strictly just my perspective on events, you know. Perhaps I was subconsciously twisting the reality. Or maybe it was all a fantasy borne from my biases, and Sumika was simply someone more skilled and well-liked than me."

"I wouldn't say that's it at all. I think Sumika did it entirely consciously. Though I can't say I have a clue as to her motives."

"Yes, that's the key," the teacher said as if affirming a student's answer. "What could have made Sumika carry out that sort of harassment?"

The teacher then gave Ogami some time to think.

"I take it you've already come to an answer of your own?", Ogami asked.

"Well, yes. But let me hear your thoughts first."

"I can't even guess. That's like asking me to imagine how a natural disaster feels."

"A natural disaster," she repeated, seeming fond of the expression. "That might be relatively close to my idea."

"Which is to say, there was no motive at all?"

"No. In my opinion, that girl was an alien."

"An alien?"

"Not that I've ever met an alien before. But suppose there were an intelligent lifeform who was different from us in every way - their culture, language, science, religion. If creatures like that met us Earthlings, what would they do first? Probably, they would try to imitate us. Parrot our words back to us, hold out their hand if we held out ours. Doing that, they'd start to understand "ah, this corresponds to that thing we have.""

At this point, Ogami noticed that she had started posing like a mirror image of him.

"Perhaps that girl was only able to communicate with others by using that approach," the teacher continued. "Yet because she possessed such extraordinary talent for it, maybe it ended up inviting trouble. That would explain the "six-timing" incident. The men of the troupe surely viewed Sumika Takasago as a girl who God had made just for them. Because she instantly saw through to their essence, and matched it exactly. It would be difficult not to fall in love. And when someone wanted her, maybe all she could do was want them back, in an entirely pure way. Because she didn't know any other response."

"You have the most favorable opinion out of everyone I've heard from," Ogami remarked.

"Of course I do. I mean, I still like her even now, and I don't doubt she liked me up to the end." The teacher stopped mirroring Ogami and slumped back in her seat. "That's how I'm choosing to think. It's not that she had any grudge or ill will toward me, she just didn't know any other way to express her affection."

The teacher finished her story there, picking up her plate and leaving her seat. Left by himself, Ogami processed what she'd told him in his own way.

Up to today, I've considered a lot of different possibilities about Sumika as a person. In spite of that, I'd never once questioned the premise that she was a Sakura. But coming this far, that premise which had seemed like the foundation of the whole thing was beginning to wobble.

Let's suppose Sumika was the kind of person the teacher imagined - someone who could only repeat another's words, whose nature was like a living echo. If I liked her, then she would like me too, and if I hated her, she would hate me too; there would be simplistic mechanics like that at work between us.

That snowy day, I had accused that her goodwill was a sham, and Sumika admitted it. But thinking back, I never once spoke the word "Sakura" then. I just asked, "You never really liked me at all, did you?"

Yet supposing the words I spoke to mean "I've seen through you, you're a Sakura" had been interpreted by her as "I've seen through you, your goodwill is hollow," our conversation then still made a similar amount of sense. No, more than that, it was even possible her reply was nothing more than an echo of my words. Maybe all it meant was "if you're going to hate me, I'll hate you too."

Up to that point, maybe she did have an affection for me, however twisted.

But what I couldn't forget in all this was Kujirai. In his case, I had his word. He had clearly admitted to being a prompter. At the time, I didn't doubt that I was an individual with a high risk of suicide who needed a Sakura assigned, so it was only natural to assume Sumika was a Sakura too.

And even supposing she wasn't a Sakura, it wasn't like that changed anything. There's no question that everything I'd believed back then had been a lie. Even if our relationship hadn't collapsed in our third year of middle school, we would have surely arrived at a similar place.

Kujirai. Come to think of it, I need to ask her about Kujirai too.

When the teacher came back from cleaning her plate, Ogami questioned her.

"I hear from one of the troupe members that a man named Kujirai might have been involved in Sumika's suicide. I'd like you to tell me anything you know about him."

"Kujirai, huh?", the teacher said, as if caught off guard. "Haven't heard that name in a while."

"What sort of relationship did he have with Sumika? As you saw it."

"Kujirai and Sumika?" The teacher cast her gaze down and thought. "Publicly, Sumika acted like she was awkward with men, and Kujirai didn't come to rehearsals much either, so I never even saw the two talking face to face. I don't think they had any particular connection beyond being in the same troupe. This is the first I'm hearing about him being involved in Sumika's death."

Ogami passed along the things he'd been told by the detective. That Kujirai had returned to town just before Sumika died, and the two had been meeting in secret.

"I don't think there's any deep meaning to it," she said dismissively. "In fact, maybe it's just process of elimination? By then, she was hated by the troupe. Maybe Kujirai, who kept some distance from it, was the only person left who she could freely talk with?"

"Maybe so."

That was certainly one way to look at it. Perhaps there wasn't a deep meaning to it, like she said.

"What do you think the two talked about?", Ogami asked.

"Who knows. You'd have to ask Kujirai directly to know that."

So that's where this is leading after all, Ogami sighed. Just as the detective said, there would no further progress without finding Kujirai.

That said, he had gotten plenty of intel to bring back as a souvenir for Kasumi. It would surely be enough to convince her that he was diligently investigating.

"Well, no more questions, then?" The teacher started to get out of her seat.

"Nothing from me," Ogami said. "But didn't you say you had a question for me?"

"Right, I nearly forgot." The teacher hurriedly sat back in her chair. "You got to know the troupe leader through Kasumi, right?"

"Yes."

"How is that girl doing lately?"

"She's calm. It seems she's recovered from Sumika's death to some extent."

"Huh?", the teacher gawked, seeming surprised. Then she changed her question. "What's your relationship with Kasumi?"

"We used to only just see each other sometimes. We reunited when I went to visit Sumika's house, and now she's helping me look into Sumika."

"That's all?"

"That's all," Ogami insisted. He had no obligation to reveal his duty as her Sakura.

"Hmmm."

"Is something wrong?"

"I was just imagining that you might be a new emotional support to take her sister's place - to put it plainly, a lover."

"A lover," Ogami repeated without emotion.

"You probably wouldn't know this, but that girl was really moping just a short while ago. She was always inseparable from her sister, you see. Right after Sumika died, I hear she shut herself at home and didn't even go to school. We passed each other in town just once during that time, and at first I didn't even realize it was her. I'd never seen someone so worn out in my life. I imagine she wasn't eating or sleeping well. Even the troupe members were worried she might follow in her sister's footsteps."

"I'm sure she recovered on her own," Ogami said. "I only got involved with her last month, and she was doing just as well then as she is now."

"Or maybe she's pretending to have recovered around you?", the teacher mused. "Well, at any rate, she seems fond of you. You might see her as secondary to Sumika, but take good care of little Kasumi for me."

"I understand she's deeply wounded by her sister's death, really. Even if she won't show me much weakness, I hope I can be of some help to her."

"Good response," the teacher said with a laugh. "Supposing you ended up as her prompter, I think I could rest easy."

Of course, that was her idea of a joke. So Ogami made sure to laugh too.

[+]

8

Afterward, Ogami went to visit several more people related to the troupe, with the troupe leader serving as his go-between. Two of them were men who Sumika had six-timed, but they provided no information beyond what he'd heard from the leader, teacher, and detective. Just as the detective said, it seemed the room Ogami was staying in was the final stop. The only other way forward would be to locate Kujirai.

But he had absolutely no intention of going that deep into it. His investigation into Sumika's suicide was nothing more than an excuse to deepen his relationship with Kasumi. And by the time he'd done a full sweep of everything, there seemed to be no need for an excuse anymore. Kasumi was visiting his apartment every few days without a particular reason, having frivolous chats with him, even napping in Ogami's bed.

On weekends or days where her parents came home late, he would take Kasumi on drives lasting about an hour and a half each way. They never decided on a destination; if there was a place they liked, they'd stop there and walk around. It was evidently the time spent with Ogami that she enjoyed, so it didn't seem to matter where they went.

Ever since grabbing her shoulders at the botanical garden, Kasumi looked at Ogami a little differently. She would gently touch Ogami's body if she found an opportunity, with Ogami setting up such opportunities for her. She took a nonchalant approach, but she was trying to confirm something through it. Her physical intimacy implicitly said that "it's fine if we're like this."

When Ogami responded with the same approach, she laughed happily.

I wonder how close I am to achieving my objective by now? Ogami considered it every time he parted from Kasumi. If I confessed to being a Sakura next time we met, how hurt would she be? How much trust does she currently put in me, and how much does she depend on me?

For someone who's not explicitly her boyfriend or anything of the sort, Kasumi looks as attached to me as one could possibly be. But has her trust reached the same level as what I once felt toward Sumika and Kujirai? We'd been interacting for not even a month yet, too short a time. Normally, this point would be when you might finally find yourself at the starting line. But it was clear that she sought a new emotional support after losing her dear sister, so it wouldn't be surprising if all her affection with no place to go was being diverted to me, since I'd dominated that position.

If his communication with Kasumi were being conducted over devices like at work, Ogami might have been easily able to see the workings of her heart. He might have been able to sense the subtle vibrations of her feelings just from short messages. Yet hearing her real voice and following her actions with his eyes overloaded his sensors with information, rendering them useless.

Ultimately, the problem was his lack of experience dealing with people directly without anything in between. Since graduating middle school, he endeavored to not like anyone and not be liked by anyone. He strove to become numb to the goodwill of others. He came to think that behind any smile lurked something that couldn't possibly smile. The reason he had no issues being a Sakura on matchmaking apps was because people's affection was directed at a fictional character he'd made up. Whereas when the affection went toward him directly, there was too much static, making it impossible to use normal judgement.

He even seriously considered not meeting with Kasumi for a while and interacting only by texting for a while. That would make the conditions identical to those at work. But it's likely too late for that, he thought. I already know Kasumi Takasago as a person. Even if we did have exchanges of nothing but text, I wouldn't be able to help imagining her expressions, voice, and gestures.

Ogami honed his senses to observe Kasumi, trying to find something that would indicate her true feelings. This caused him to get incredibly fatigued after meeting with her, and he got stuck spending hours thinking about the meaning of casual actions and statements. As if he were a person in love.

Compared to that, his relationship with the detective was comfortable.

Around the time the investigation into Sumika's suicide came to a pause, the detective appeared at Ogami's apartment again. They hadn't contacted each other once since then despite having exchanged contact details, so his visit came as a surprise, as Ogami had assumed things were already over with him.

The detective first asked about the progress of his investigation. And despite finding that Ogami hadn't made a single substantial step since they last met, he wasn't shocked or disappointed. It seemed he was fully expecting that to be the case from the start. And he even knew that, naturally, Kujirai hadn't come back to the apartment since then.

"I came to visit today for a different matter."

After saying this, the detective went back to his car and brought something out from the trunk. In one hand he held a Boston bag, and in the other he carried a large black tube. When the bag was opened, Ogami saw something familiar: a small projector. That told him the nature of the black tube, too. It must have been the screen for the projector.

The detective removed the clasp on the tube, unfurled the screen, and skillfully set it up on the curtain rail. Then he set up a tripod, affixed the projector to it, and made minute adjustments to point it at the screen. Once done preparing, he told Ogami to turn off the lights.

Projected on the screen was practice footage of the now-defunct troupe.

"Our troupe tried to keep recordings of everything," the detective explained. "And we didn't just record, we made time to watch it over, too. It's absolutely fundamental to review your own acting objectively, but it can be surprisingly easy to overlook things because they're so basic."

Of course, Sumika was in the video as well. She had grown a few years from the 15-year-old girl Ogami knew, and become that much more beautiful.

He supposed this footage was from a year or two ago. But the cheap projector's rough video quality and crunchy sound presented the scene like it was from a more distant past than it really was.

Ogami watched the video in a trance. Before he knew it, a movie's worth of time had passed. The two hadn't said a single word the whole time. Ogami had even forgotten the detective was next to him.

When the video ended, the detective turned off the projector and asked Ogami: "What did you think?"

The voice brought Ogami back to his senses. "What about it?", he asked in return.

"I just thought maybe an old friend of Sumika like you would notice different things from us."

"I can't imagine I would notice something from this footage alone that the people actually there didn't."

"In that case, I'll bring a different video next time."

With that, the detective stood up and left the room without waiting for Ogami to reply, leaving behind the projector and the screen.

Following this, he visited Ogami's apartment numerous times with new videos. Each one was about two to three hours in length, and they were restricted to those that featured Sumika.

No matter how many of these he was shown, he wasn't going to make any new discoveries. I don't really care about the truth of Sumika's death in the first place, Ogami thought to himself. But he didn't drive away the detective, and faithfully watched through the long videos every time.

He continued to watch videos featuring a dead woman, next to a man whose name he didn't even know.

It was a strangely fulfilling time.

The night of the detective's fourth visit, Ogami made popcorn for the two of them. Some of it had burned, and there were many kernels left, but the detective ate it like it was delicious.

"There's a trick to it," he said, licking salt from his fingers. "It's better if instead of cooking them all the way through, you pop 'em all at once in hot oil."

"I'll keep that in mind," Ogami replied. And the next time the detective came over, he was able to prepare some impeccable popcorn.

Ogami saw a resemblance between the detective and Kujirai not because they were in a room Kujirai had once lived in, nor because they were watching videos on a screen together, nor because he had a natural air about him that made him feel inferior as a man. Rather, when he was with the detective, Ogami felt him to be semi-transparent. Despite him being a tall man with a strong presence, Ogami's mind didn't register him as a foreign substance. It was likely the man's conviction that he would be respected whether he was understood or not which brought about that sensation.

It was a sensation he hadn't felt in a long time, not since parting ways with Kujirai.

If this man weren't bringing the shadow of Sumika along with him, maybe we could've become close friends, Ogami thought. But if Sumika hadn't died, we wouldn't have gotten to know each other, and even if we had still met under those circumstances, he'd likely have not a shred of interest in me. Ultimately, it was just another meaningless hypothesis.

Some of the videos the detective brought included Kujirai as well, of course. Ogami only knew Kujirai up to age 15, yet he recognized him at a glance when he showed up on screen. His cheeks had sunken, and he had a somewhat more rugged face, but his general appearance had hardly changed. In Kujirai's case, it probably wasn't right to say he hadn't grown, but rather that he had already achieved perfection at age 15. It gave the impression that his age had caught up to his body.

The last time Ogami directly saw the two perform was on stage at the culture festival, in the summer when he was 14. Compared to then, their acting had advanced to an incomparable level. That was clear even to his untrained eyes. Not only did they not appear lesser next to the other actors, it felt like the two of them stood quite a bit above the rest. I'd stand out like a sore thumb if I stood on stage with them now, Ogami thought. Of course, one of the two had already left this world, and the other's whereabouts were unknown, but still.

As he continued watching their rehearsals through the videos, Ogami eventually stopped following only Sumika, and came to appreciate the plays themselves. He got accustomed to the grammar of theater, which differed from that of films and TV shows, and found his own enjoyment in it. In essence, this is a form of expression that asks for an active attitude from its viewers. If you aren't actively sharing in their madness, you might as well be watching the stage from 100 meters away.

One night, while watching a video with the detective and grabbing popcorn as usual, the video suddenly stopped. Ogami wondered if the projector had broken, but the detective showed no response. Focusing his eyes, he realized that the actor had just wordlessly frozen in place, and time was indeed passing on screen at the same rate as reality.

The actor in question was Sumika. She stood dumbfounded in the center of the stage. Looking up at a point in the sky, she was completely and utterly still. Ogami knew from having repeatedly seen the play that this silence was not part of the script.

Until then, Sumika had never forgotten her lines and tripped over her words. Even if she did forget, she should have been fully capable of ad-libbing something.

As Ogami was beginning to wonder if something had happened off-camera, Sumika returned to her performance as if nothing had happened.

"What was that about?", Ogami asked the detective. "That wasn't like her."

"I don't know," the detective said. "I wasn't present for this. It's certainly a strange mistake to see from her. Or maybe something was going on that forced the play to stop."

"When is this footage from?"

"Around autumn two years ago."

That autumn would be around the time Sumika started to take the teacher's place. But it was difficult to determine the relationship between that and this footage.

The video ended, and the screen went back to the startup menu. The detective lit a cigarette, and Ogami followed suit. The smoke in the air was made whiter by the light of the projector. The ashtray on the folding table was filled with both their cigarette butts.

"What was it about Sumika that charmed you?", the detective asked Ogami.

Ogami waffled over how to answer for a while, but decided to be honest.

"She reached out to me when I was troubled. That was in my first year of middle school."

"Troubled in what way?"

"I was isolated in class for saying something I should've kept to myself. She was the only one who came to speak to me during that."

"I see," the detective said. Then he smiled slightly. "I can picture it."

"What was it about her that charmed you?", Ogami asked back.

"She told me I was cool."

"You must be used to hearing that."

"Yes, you're exactly right," he admitted. "But in her case, it wasn't just that."

Then he quoted Sumika's words, as if reading out a poem.

You're always so cool, all by yourself.

Shall I make you uncool?

After smoking his cigarette to its base and pushing it into the ashtray, he spoke again. "It's a trite line when I say it like that, but those were the exact words I'd been wanting to hear for a long time. Though of course, I didn't realize that until she actually told me them. And she performed those words incredibly effectively. Much like she did for you, I'm sure."

Ogami was surprised by his used of the word "performed." "So you recognize that Sumika's affectionate behavior was an act?"

The detective nodded. "By no means do I think she earnestly loved me, nor do I think she was fully innocent. I just believe her death wasn't a suicide. It's a fact that she was having relations with six men at once. I'm surely no more than one of the people she used."

He then turned toward the heater and rubbed his hands together over it.

"It might sound like nothing but crying sour grapes, but I saw through Sumika's act from the start. I understood from the moment we started hanging out that the girl I was seeing was just a mirror reflecting my ideal, and the real her was lurking far behind that mirror. But it didn't matter if it was a mirror or what. As long as it was comforting for me."

The projector automatically turned itself off, and the room went dark. Neither of them went to turn on the lights. The detective's shape became lost in the darkness, with only the heater's "on" light illuminating the area.

"When Sumika gave up being my ideal girl, I didn't see it as her showing her true colors. Maybe you could say it was her act moving to its next phase. All I thought was, so she's decided to perform as a girl who I hate next. That's why I didn't feel any particular sadness. In fact, maybe the strongest emotion I felt was doubt. What was she trying to accomplish with this series of acts she was putting on?"

He went silent then, awaiting Ogami's reply. But Ogami's mouth stayed closed.

And it wasn't because he couldn't support the detective's opinion.

"To Sumika, even the troupe's destruction was probably just part of a process," the detective mused. "I can't imagine what she was aiming for past that, but it surely wouldn't have been suicide, at least. She didn't care for absurdist theater. She liked her tragedies clear-cut and her comedies clear-cut. When a character died, she wanted there to be a necessity to it. That's why I think the seeming lack of consistency to her actions in life means her play was unintentionally cut short."

After he finished, the detective stood up and turned on the lights.

It felt like the faint presence of Sumika that had been drifting in the darkness was dispersed in that moment.

Ogami gave a short comment on the detective's thoughts. "There's a surprisingly rational line of logic to that theory."

He smiled cheerfully. "You might be the only one who thinks so. All the troupe members look at me like I'm crazy."

"Being rational and being crazy aren't necessarily contradictory," noted Ogami.

The evening they finished watching the final video with Sumika, Ogami made a serious error. While helping the detective pack up the projector, and asking him where to put the cords, he carelessly called him "Kujirai."

The detective wouldn't just let that slide. He stopped what he was doing and slowly turned to Ogami.

"So you were close enough with him for that name to naturally slip out," he said calmly. "Did you keep quiet about it because you didn't want undue suspicion?"

"That's part of it," Ogami admitted. "But it's not like I was trying to protect the guy. Me and Kujirai being friends was back in middle school, and there was nothing there that would relate to Sumika's death. So I thought it didn't really need revealing."

The detective spoke after a short silence. "I believe you."

The two left the room with the projector and loaded it into the black four-by-four.

"In your eyes, Ogami, what sort of man was Kujirai?"

"He's a little like you."

"Well now," the detective said with interest. "So did he seem like the kind of person who'd kill Sumika?"

"Not a chance," Ogami immediately replied. "Now if Sumika had asked him to kill her, that's another story."

"It seemed you trusted him a fair bit."

"It's different from trust. It's an objective fact. He simply wasn't that kind of person."

The detective nodded. "But you know, the type of person who could kill someone isn't the only type who kills people."

His car drove away, and after its tail lights were out of view, Ogami thought back on his own words from earlier.

If Sumika had asked him to kill her.

Were he to hypothesize Kujirai as the culprit, that felt entirely valid as a motive. Seeing a person he cared for since childhood slowly lose her sparkle must have been hard for Kujirai to bear. If Sumika herself had requested it of him, he might have carried it out without hesitation. Like picking a wilting flower, gently putting it between paper, and making it a pressed flower to preserve it.

When he felt too restless to sit around in his room, it was always Ogami's custom to get in the car. He'd think about what to do and his destination once he was inside. That impulse only ever struck him at night, so most places were already closed. Thus, his destinations tended to be a similar bunch of places.

Since coming back to the Town of Sakura, one of his common destinations was a bathhouse along the highway. It wasn't too close nor too far from the apartment, and most importantly, it was open until late at night. Whenever he went home after soaking in a spacious bath, he was able to sleep soundly that night.

He used the bathhouse again that night, and sat on a wicker chair in the lobby to cool off his warmed body. It was around 11 PM, the quietest period in which the night customers switched out for the midnight customers. Closing his eyes, he sensed the smell of the old building. A mix of wood, tatami mats, cigarette smoke, sweat, all sorts of things.

When the woman came into the building, Ogami was moments away from drifting to sleep. So he didn't even notice her coming straight toward him from the lockers.

"Excuse me," she said to Ogami.

Looking up, Ogami saw a refined-looking woman standing in front of him. She looked in her mid-thirties, had a medium build, and her dry hair was tied back simply in a bun. She looked irritated with something, but maybe that was just how she always looked.

The woman had spoken to Ogami, but seeming to have not considered anything past that, stood frozen in silence for a while. Then as if suddenly having an idea, she opened her handbag and dug around, then produced something to offer to him.

It was a light-pink envelope.

After a beat, Ogami's heart started racing.

He felt the ground shaking beneath his feet.

I made a mistake somewhere, he thought. I must have let my guard down. The System once again judged me to be a weakling who needed the support of a Sakura.

Of course, his story didn't make logical sense if you stopped to think about it; as Kasumi's Sakura, he wouldn't be assigned a Sakura of his own, and Sakura are never to reveal themselves in front of high-risk individuals. But having just woken up, his mind didn't make it that far.

If she hadn't quickly corrected his misunderstanding, Ogami might have fled in the next moment.

"I'm Kasumi Takasago's prompter," the woman said. "Like you, Mr. Ogami."

Ogami's slightly-hovering body settled back in the chair, and he let out a large sigh.

He could feel the cold sweat running down his sides.

The woman put the envelope away in her bag, and quietly sat down in the wicker chair next to Ogami's.

"Why do you think I'm one, too?", Ogami asked first.

"Because there's no chance I would be chosen as a prompter and you wouldn't," the woman said. "My apologies for tailing you. There'd be a risk of Ms. Kasumi seeing me elsewhere. Here, this is me."

The woman handed him a business card. It was a monochrome card with no frills, with just the word "Educator" and the name of the high school she worked at. Ogami put the card in his pocket without making particular note of the woman's name. He didn't even want to know the names of Sakura other than him.

"I've been Kasumi Takasago's homeroom teacher since last spring," she informed him, supplementing the info on the card. "I was selected as her prompter around September. Since then, I've been striving to prevent her from taking her own life. I recognize it's rude, but I came to check a few things with you."

This was the second "teacher" Ogami had met since returning to the Town of Sakura. Since this one seemed to be an actual teacher by occupation, he decided to refer to her as "the educator" for convenience, to differentiate her from the troupe's "teacher."

"Aren't you supposed to be forbidden from revealing yourself as a prompter?"

"That's correct. However, these are circumstances where those rules have to bend."

"Meaning?"

"Are you aware of how many prompters Kasumi has had before you?"

Ogami was briefly at a loss for words. "You mean it's not just us two?"

"That's right," the educator confirmed. "I'm not aware of the exact number, but even just counting those I've confirmed, there are three besides you. Including those I haven't confirmed, it's six."

"Six people," Ogami repeated out of surprise. That was a situation where you could rightly expect every person who's friendly with you to be a Sakura. "Is that even possible?"

"I've never heard of such a circumstance before either. Hers must be quite the special case."

Ogami thought it over for a bit, then spoke. "Supposing it's true she has six prompters, and her suicide risk is high enough to warrant it, doesn't it seem like we've passed the time for prompters?"

"Then would you forcibly drag Ms. Kasumi into involuntary hospitalization?", the educator said in a rigid tone. "On the surface, she looks entirely normal. We can't intervene to that degree based solely on the System's diagnosis."

"Do you suppose her parents know? That their daughter's been assigned a whole crowd of prompters."

"Who can say. It's such an unprecedented thing, after all."

The educator didn't appear to be lying. Nor did she look like the type to decide things based on assumptions. For now, he'd just have to accept her statements as the truth.

With Ogami's questions done, this time the educator started asking.

"Numerous prompters have failed to become good friends for Ms. Kasumi up to now. And I'm one of them. Mr. Ogami, you alone are succeeding at forming an ideal relationship with her. What sets you apart from the other prompters, I wonder?"

"I don't know. Maybe it's because I feel the least will to save her. She's attuned to that sort of forced behavior."

"I see..." The educator seemed a little disappointed by Ogami's answer. "What are you thinking regarding the cause of Ms. Kasumi's suicidal thoughts?"

"Just looking at it straightforwardly, it'd probably be her sister's death. She seemed to revere her like a god."

"That's true. But don't you think there's more to it than that?"

The quiet hour ended, and more guests started coming and going. They were largely people who came by themselves, and passed by Ogami and the educator without even a glance.

"It's true, the death of family is a sad thing," she said with sympathy in her voice. "I have experience with that myself. It's all the sadder when it's someone for whom you had a special adoration. However, all emotions come to a peak. Once that point is overcome, even intense feelings that seemed they would never tire will slowly weaken."

Ogami was about to object, but finding that maybe she was right now that she mentioned it, he shut his mouth. His grudge for Sumika still remained, running deep enough to make him plot a substitute revenge on Kasumi. But whether his emotions remained as intense as they were back then was something he couldn't say decisively and with confidence.

"She is young. She has strong problem-solving capabilities, and is skilled at controlling her emotions. In addition, by gaining an ideal friend in you, she seems to be gaining enthusiasm for life lately. At a glance, everything seems to be going well. Yet in spite of this, her prompters seem to be multiplying even now. Mr. Ogami, you are not her final prompter. Given this, I have to think there is a cause besides her sister's death."

"You don't think it's the System being faulty?"

"That was what I questioned first. That perhaps Ms. Kasumi possesses some factor that the System tends to misinterpret, and this was brought on by a mistaken diagnosis. From what I've researched, such a case can't be entirely ruled out. But in the event of repeated unnatural diagnoses, the System is supposed to quickly correct its standards."

"Then maybe it's just slow to make that correction."

"Indeed, I pray that's the case," the educator said. "This winter marks my last chance to be Ms. Kasumi's prompter. Once she graduates and leaves high school, I'll surely be removed from duty. We have only a weak connection. In the end, I was unable to do anything teacherly nor anything prompter-like for her. So I thought I should at least tell you what I knew, given that you're likely to continue accompanying her."

The educator bowed her head deeply and left. What a dutiful person, Ogami admired. I've never seen such a stand-up teacher. No, actually, maybe there were teachers I've met who were as finely-intentioned as her. Maybe some of my teachers' hearts ached seeing me lie low in the corner of class and not make any friends, wanting to do something for me somehow.

He'd gotten chilly, so he decided to go warm up his body again. Dipping into the bath up to his shoulders, he closed his eyes and let the heat slowly permeate to his core. And he thought back on his conversation with the educator.

What must it feel like to be surrounded by six Sakura? I wouldn't be able to bear it. Heck, it sounds like a living nightmare. Of course, Kasumi herself probably hadn't noticed that, but what would happen if I told her?

No, there's no need to tell her everything. In fact, it was more convenient to let her think I was her only Sakura. The shock of learning she had six would only soften the wounds from each individual betrayal. To increase the purity of being betrayed by everyone she trusted, I ought to claim I'm her only Sakura.

Just like Sumika back then, Kasumi seemed to show no resistance to letting Ogami watch her sleep. She'd say "My body feels sluggish today" or "I couldn't sleep well last night," and frequently use Ogami's room for napping. Seeing her fall asleep in no time after lying down on his futon, it seemed that her being sleep-deprived was no lie.

So he'd had plenty of chances. That day, Kasumi fell asleep while having a frivolous chat with Ogami. He laid her down on the futon, then picked up her smartphone on the low table. After double-checking that Kasumi was sound asleep, he touched the power button.

It was locked with a good old passcode. Not getting his hopes up too much, Ogami entered Sumika's birthday. He didn't like that he still remembered it even now, but it came to his aid in that moment. He unlocked the phone in one try, and a home screen appeared that looked untouched from the factory settings.

He felt anxious about how easily he'd broken through, wondering if it suggested there was some trap laid for him, but he couldn't be turning back at this point. He went into any app that seemed like it might contain private information and gave it a check. They were all abnormally clean for the phone of a girl her age, making him wonder if this was a secondary phone used for work. Come to think of it, Ogami realized he'd hardly ever seen her use her smartphone except to make calls.

Just as he was about to give up and put the phone to sleep, he remembered a place he hadn't looked. He'd neglected to check the photos. Despite being the first thing you ought to check if you wanted to learn private information, it was so basic that he'd overlooked it.

He opened the photo album.

And he gasped.

The screen was filled with photos of Sumika.

No matter how far back he scrolled, he could find nothing but photos of Sumika. And it was thorough. Not only was there no sign of Kasumi herself, there wasn't even any trace of her parents or people who looked like friends. He couldn't even find any photos of scenery or food.

That said, it wasn't like it was all that unexpected to Ogami. He was aware that Kasumi's attachment toward her sister was extreme, and had noticed her lack of interest in anything else. With Sumika leaving this world, it seemed that attachment had practically entered the realm of worship.

But as he was looking at one of the photos, a cold chill ran up Ogami's spine.

The date on the photo was around summer of last year. If Ogami remembered right, it was one week after Sumika died.

And even past the date on that photo, photos of Sumika had been taken daily, without fail.

It was a ghost album.

But when he enlarged the photo to examine the details, that notion quickly fell apart. Through makeup, hairstyle, and angle, it was cleverly made to appear like Sumika, but it was no more than Kasumi in disguise.

Why was she continuing to take such photos? To meet her sister, no doubt. By transforming into her sister to update the album, she could immerse herself in the illusion that Sumika was still alive.

He felt like he'd finally gotten to catch a glimpse of her pathology.

After Kasumi woke up and Ogami took her home, he returned to the apartment to eat dinner by himself. When he went to have a drink after eating, he found the bottle empty, so he walked to a nearby liquor store to buy some more. Yet it was long past the store's closing time, and there was nowhere else within walking distance where he could expect to buy some alcohol. Giving up, he headed back to the apartment.

While walking through the night, he casually glanced at a bulletin board on a street corner, and a suicide-prevention poster caught his eye. It was the same kind as the one he'd seen posted in the supermarket's rest area.

He initially walked right past the bulletin board, but rethinking it, he walked back and stood in front of it. There was a phone number on the poster, which Ogami memorized. Thanks to the use of a simple mnemonic, he didn't even need to write it down.

Even after getting back to the room, he hesitated to call for a while. He sipped on the tiny bit of whiskey left at the bottom of the bottle, and smoked a cigarette under the ventilation fan. Around the time he finished that, the light in his room suddenly went out. It seemed his lightbulb had reached the end of its lifespan. Luckily, a small light in the kitchen still survived. But the room becoming darker made the cold feel that much more severe.

Ogami took his smartphone, and dialed the number he had memorized earlier.

Of course, he wasn't calling to actually talk through suicidal feelings; he had a different objective in mind.

The call was picked up right away. This is the phone consultation center, a man's voice responded. It wasn't too high nor too low, not too distant and not too familiar, a voice that comforted the listener. A voice suited for recitation, skilled at reading not just lines, but other kinds of writing as well.

"What would you like to discuss today?", the counselor asked.

"I have a friend who seems like they might be considering suicide," Ogami said. After saying it, he realized it sounded exactly as if he were doing a consultation on behalf of someone who was resistant to calling a suicide hotline. Not that there was any real problem with him being misunderstood. "Is a case like this acceptable for consultation?"

"Of course," the counselor confirmed. From his tone of voice, Ogami could tell he was giving a deep affirmation. "In fact, from certain perspectives, it's more desirable than consulting with the person themselves. There's only so much we counselors can do, but there's much someone in a position like yours can do. You're able to give them that support."

"Is that right?"

"Indeed, so please, don't hesitate to discuss it."

"This friend - she's a girl - a relative of hers killed herself a little while ago. It seems like she still hasn't escaped that sadness even now, so while she seems cheerful at a glance, there are also sudden moments where she looks very precarious."

"Precarious in what way?"

"More than wanting to die, it's like she wants to assimilate with the dead... I'm not really sure how to put it."

"No, I understand that well," the counselor said with sympathy. Indeed, his voice carried genuine sympathy, not a professional "listening and sympathizing." At least, Ogami heard it that way. Maybe this counselor actually did understand. To prove it, he tried rephrasing Ogami's words. "It may be a slightly inappropriate expression, but... it's not that she's trying to end her life, but that she's longing for the grave."

"I see. It might be something close to that."

"Could you describe your friend some more?"

"She's rather young, but she's rational and sometimes takes the long view on things; for someone like that, I'd expect suicide to be the furthest thing from her mind. Yet, when it comes to said relative, she can do things that defy common sense."

"Has anyone other than yourself noticed the crisis your friend is in?"

Ogami recalled his conversation with the educator. "There are several. However, I'm the only one of them she's close with."

"I see," the counselor assented. "So that's what made you call. You made the right decision not to try and resolve it on your own."

After a thoughtful pause, the counselor continued.

"From what I've heard, I imagine your friend having someone like you nearby is, in itself, her greatest protection. You have the affection to want to do something for her, calmness to look at the situation objectively, and you're able to ask for help instead of overestimating your own abilities. You're an ideal individual."

"And yet, her condition seems to be worsening by the day."

"It's easy to imagine that without you there, she would have died already," the counselor said encouragingly. "Currently, you are the one most contributing to her survival, and you're fulfilling that duty to the utmost. My concern, rather, is that you may push yourself too much and break before she does. You seem like a deeply responsible sort, after all."

What a way with words this guy has, Ogami quietly admired. He might be able to easily coax someone who's been cornered into a situation that's given them tunnel vision.

"And also, suicidal thoughts can be contagious. Just as you have an influence on her, she has an influence on you. The more cordial you are to others, the more that influence can take hold. It's not uncommon to try to pull someone up, yet find yourself being pulled down with them."

"That's true. I'll be sure to be careful of that," Ogami said. "Although, you're mistaken about me being deeply responsible."

"That's how all truly responsible people think," the counselor said with a laugh.

"See, I'm her prompter."

He could sense the counselor's expression freezing over the phone.

"I don't have a serious will to save her. I'm accepting the duty out of curiosity for now, but who knows when I'll abandon it."

The counselor fell silent. This time, the silence didn't feel carefully calculated like before.

"I see," the counselor said at length. "It must have been hard not being able to open up about it to anyone else. These conversations are private, so please be at ease."

"Is that right? Well then, I'll be completely frank and speak without reservations," Ogami said. He could feel himself getting a dark enjoyment out of this conversation. "This girl in danger of suicide, her name is Kasumi Takasago."

Again, the call went silent. It was a heavy, tactile silence.

That convinced Ogami that he'd hit the nail on the head.

...Since my sister died, both my mother and father have been doing a lot of volunteer work. For suicide prevention, you see. You know, talking with people about their troubles over the phone. Apparently a lot of people who need support like that call late at night. So the real work begins after everyone's gone to sleep.

The counselor finally opened his mouth. "Did you hear from Kasumi that I was working as a counselor here?"

"That's right," Ogami said. "Though I didn't imagine I'd hit the jackpot in one try."

"You're working as Kasumi's prompter," Kasumi's father said to confirm, "and you called to tell me that?"

Despite having just been informed his daughter was at risk of suicide, he had already returned to his usual calm.

"Could it be you already knew?", Ogami asked.

"No, it's not like that," Kasumi's father quietly denied. "It's just, I thought it was probably something like that. It's an unfortunate thing."

He phrased it as if lamenting the misfortune of a friend he wasn't particularly close to.

"Is there perhaps something you know?"

"No, nothing like that. It's just..."

His voice suddenly cut off. Ogami thought he'd put down the receiver, but listening close, he still heard some faint noises.

"Is it all right if I call you again later?", Kasumi's father proposed, then continued in a lower voice: "It's difficult to talk about it here..."

Ogami pictured a place like a call center, with rows of operators. Even if they got more calls late at night, it surely wasn't like they were always on the phone. Maybe some unoccupied counselors were listening in on his conversation.

"Understood," Ogami said. "Later, then."

Sorry, said Kasumi's father, then hung up.

The return call came an hour later. First, he apologized for the delay. I'm in a place without anyone else around now, so we can talk freely, he said.

"Where are you calling from?", Ogami asked out of curiosity. It surely wasn't from home, at least.

"A phone booth," Kasumi's father replied. "It's on an street so empty, it's almost bizarre that they set up a phone booth here. Whenever I passed by, I'd wondered who on Earth would call from a place like this, but I never expected to be using it myself."

"Are you always doing consultation this late every night?"

"Not as often as that. Only for about half the week. Chatbots never take a day off, so a good one can respond to people anytime. Even so, there are many people who want a real conversation partner for discussions of this nature, so we have to answer the call, so to speak."

"That kind of volunteer work is generally unpaid, isn't it?"

"That's correct. It's a very difficult problem," he said gravely. "But speaking to my personal experience, I feel I get sufficient value out of it. Not that I took this job expecting something in return by any means, but I've learned many things from my exchanges with the people who call."

"Like what, for example?"

"Well, for instance..." He paused to take a breath. "That in the end, we can only save those with no desire to kill themselves."

Ogami first chose to take those words literally.

"But aren't people with suicidal thoughts the only ones who call?"

"That's surely how they recognize themselves," he said with a roundabout turn of phrase. "Of course, this has nothing to do with off-base claims like "the kinds of people who say they have suicidal urges don't actually kill themselves." What I mean to say is, many people who call are mistaking something similar as suicidal urges. Our role is to gently correct that misunderstanding in such a way that they don't even notice."

"And what if it's not a misunderstanding?"

"Then there is almost nothing we can do. Beyond offer words of pity like "you've done well to make it this far," I suppose."

"And it's not a misunderstanding in Kasumi's case," Ogami inferred. "Is that how it is?"

Kasumi's father neither confirmed nor denied it. So Ogami slightly altered the question.

"What about with Sumika? When did she start showing signs like that?"

"With Sumika, hmm..." He spoke bit by bit, as if retracing his memories. "I'm still uncertain when she started having such thoughts. It's possible the System detected it early and assigned her a prompter, but unless that person comes forth personally, we have no way of confirming that. We - my wife and I - only noticed something wrong with Sumika about a month before she took her life."

Sumika's suicide was half a year ago, in August. So this would have been around July.

"I believe it was drizzling that night, as the rainy season was on its way out. All of a sudden, we were contacted by the college Sumika went to. They were calling to confirm if the signatures on the withdrawal form Sumika had given them were indeed from her parents. Naturally, this was completely out of the blue to us. I hurried to contact Sumika, but my wife stopped me. She said that directly questioning her would be pointless; after all, she was going as far as to forge our signatures to drop out of college, and didn't even try discussing it with us first. So we should calmly wait and see for now. And indeed, she was right. Sumika was always an obedient girl, but once she decided on something, she wouldn't give it up. Us trying to convince her would only ensure she'd never be convinced."

"Even so, I decided I would try going to see Sumika. I came up with a few reasonable excuses, and went by myself to visit her apartment. I intended to not bring up the withdrawal form, nor even ask "how college was going" with feigned ignorance, but just have a light chat with her for a few minutes. I didn't let her know in advance I'd be visiting. I hadn't really contacted her about prior visits to her apartment, so I thought suddenly doing it this time would only invite suspicion."

He took a breath there in a way that resembled a sigh.

"Sumika wasn't at home. And yet, the door was unlocked. At first I thought she might have been pretending not to be there, but when I entered the room calling her name, I found it completely empty. Not just in the sense that the room's owner wasn't there. There was nothing there; not a bed, a table, drawers, a bookshelf, a refrigerator, a microwave, a washing machine. There was only a futon laid out in the corner of the room. It hadn't been in that state when I visited before, of course. It had been an entirely typical room for a young girl to be living in."

Ogami was reminded of Sumika's room - the one that now belonged to Kasumi.

"It looked to me like the cleaned-out room of a person who had resolved to die. By then, Sumika had caused an incident with the acting troupe she belonged to, forcing it to dissolve - are you familiar with that?"

"Yes, I heard from Kasumi."

"Thinking about it now, that was probably just another part of the "cleaning" she did. She was trying to cut ties with everything she belonged to and become unfettered. The fact she so thoroughly destroyed the troupe, paradoxically, may have been because she felt such a strong bond with them that anything less couldn't sever it."

"I see," Ogami remarked. This felt like the simplest and most logical theory he'd heard so far.

"Seeing that this was happening, I couldn't take a leisurely view. My wife and I did everything we could to prevent Sumika's suicide. We asked many people for assistance in not letting her isolate herself. But she kept escaping from place to place as if she'd already planned against all of it, solemnly continuing her process of cleaning. And at last, she'd abandoned everything but her family blood ties."

"Ultimately, we were left no other choice but to forcibly bring Sumika back home and keep her under 24-hour surveillance. We paid even more caution to her than when she was a baby, dedicating our lives to preserving hers. I don't recall letting up for a single moment. And yet in spite of it all, we couldn't prevent her suicide. We realized she had vanished, and the next time we saw her, her life had been lost. When she seriously set out to do something, no one could stop her."

He went silent there. As if expecting agreement from Ogami. Or perhaps wanting some words of sympathy. But Ogami said nothing. He wasn't even quite sure how to take the man's story.

"Kasumi resembles Sumika quite a bit," her father said after some time. "And I feel a similar air about Kasumi now as I did from Sumika back then. In fact, I might call it the very same. If it's come to this, there's nothing more that we can do. Only watch over her so that she can spend her last days carefree."

"So you're bravely giving up on Kasumi, and dedicating yourself to saving the other lives you can save?"

"If you prefer to put it in such an ironic way, then yes, that's how it is."

Like daughter, like father, Ogami thought.

"Do you suppose Kasumi's suicidal urges were caused by Sumika's death?", Ogami asked.

"What are your thoughts?", Kasumi's father asked back.

"I just can't bring myself to think it's only that. Although I couldn't tell you why I feel that way."

To that, he let out a small breath. It didn't sound entirely unlike a voiceless laugh.

"I think your instinct is probably correct," he said. "But to speak honestly, my wife and I don't want to know about it."

"You don't want to know?"

"Forgive the vagueness, but... apparently, just before Sumika took her own life, she seemingly did something horrifying. It's possible Kasumi had some part in it as well. And yet, now that it's too late for them both, we don't feel any desire to uncover the truth of that."

"Sounds pretty irresponsible to me."

"Indeed. It is irresponsible. And you'll fail to fulfill your responsibility as a prompter too, won't you?"

Ogami couldn't say anything back after being told that. Because he never had any desire to fulfill that responsibility to begin with.

"Please don't trouble yourself over not being able to save Kasumi. She's been dead from the start. You've been holding onto a dead girl's hand."

With that, Kasumi's father hung up.

A dead girl's hand, huh, Ogami thought after lying down in bed.

That hand was far warmer than mine.

[+]

9

On March 1st, the day of Kasumi's high school graduation, it was lightly snowing all morning. At Kasumi's request, Ogami was going to pick her up from school at 1 PM. She asked him to take her on a little drive afterward. Her parents were apparently too busy volunteering as usual, and wouldn't be at the ceremony. They must have seen no point in attending the graduation of their already-dead daughter.

After crawling out of bed just before noon and eating a combined breakfast and lunch, he put on his duffle coat and left the apartment. Along the way, he bought coffee at the convenience store, then parked his car at a park a short distance from Kasumi's high school. The snow was intermittently stopping and starting back up, but either way, the sun was hidden behind thick clouds. It looked like it would be a gloomy day, not very befitting of a graduation.

He waited for Kasumi while sipping coffee and leisurely smoking. After finishing his cigarette, he reclined the seat, lay down using his hands as a pillow, and closed his eyes. The voices of children playing in the park were carried to the car on the wind. He could just barely hear their shrill screams, perhaps from a game of tag.

Why do children scream so much?, Ogami wondered. There's probably lots of reasons, but maybe the primary one is that it's simply fun to scream. Maybe vibrating your throat to emit a sound that shakes the air is just too much fun not to do. So there's no meaning to the actual words being screamed.

Thinking about it, that didn't change much even as an adult. The majority of people's conversations are meaningless. They're like animal cries that can represent a handful of emotions. And fundamentally, that's all a conversation has to be. If people aimed to only speak things that had meaning, everyone would eventually just go silent.

I suppose I'm thinking about things like this because I've had a lot more meaningless conversations with others - that is, Kasumi - in the past month, something I hadn't done for a long time outside of work. Conversations whose content had no real meaning, whose only purpose was to mutually affirm friendship.

But that's going to end today. I'm going to reveal my true nature to her. I'll coldly tell her that my kindness toward her this past month was no more than my duty as a Sakura, and that I had actually found it only a burden.

I'll push her down the same hole I was once pushed into.

There was no room for doubt that Kasumi was a person at serious risk of suicide. Dealing a blow to her now, as she stood at the edge of a cliff, might be the last push needed. In fact, it was almost certain. I wouldn't be directly getting my hands dirty, and likely no one would blame me, but I would know that it was murder.

If she died, I would have to carry that sin for the rest of my life.

Is it worth going that far for this revenge?

It is, Ogami answered himself after some thought. Inflicting that great of a wound on someone is the only way I can strike back at this world. I have to prove that I'm not someone who just suffers wounds, but can also inflict them. Until I fulfilled that, I would be forever looked down upon as a weakling who can't put up any resistance.

With his decision solidified, his head felt clear, and energy flowed through him. He felt like he was about to truly become free. He hadn't even felt this refreshed at his own high school graduation.

Ogami sat up in the seat, and waited patiently for Kasumi to arrive.

Before long, he saw her entering the park. She had her usual uniform on under a coat, but she wore a corsage on her chest, and carried a tube containing her diploma under her arm. Once she made eye contact with Ogami, she waved and jogged over.

As Kasumi sat in the passenger seat, Ogami remarked: "That's nice."

She didn't seem to understand what he was referring to at first, but noticing Ogami's gaze focused on her corsage, she laughed with embarrassment.

"Want to try it on, Ogami?"

"What am I gonna do wearing that around?"

It's fine, it's fine, she said, taking off the corsage and putting it on Ogami's chest. It seemed to use a clip, making it easy to remove.

It was a corsage of artificial cherry blossoms.

Around graduation season, sakura didn't really bloom in the Town of Sakura. The earliest you could see them in full bloom was mid-April. So they weren't really a symbol of goodbyes or new encounters, instead leaving a stronger impression as something you went to see with new friends to deepen your relationship.

A corsage of cherry blossoms, in a town where they wouldn't bloom for a while yet, felt like a consolation to bring about at least a little bit of that spring feeling.

"You sure you don't want to be with your friends?", Ogami asked. "Don't friends do lots of stuff together after graduation?"

"I didn't have any friends I was that close with," Kasumi said. "They were a bunch of people I could figure I'd never meet again after graduation. So it's more fun being with you, Ogami."

"Well, thanks," Ogami said, starting up the engine.

Exiting from the park onto the main street, there were still graduates wearing their corsages around. Likely not wanting to make eye contact, Kasumi put her head right up against the headrest and looked straight forward. Soon afterward, as the graduates went out of sight, she unbuttoned her coat and let out a big sigh of relief.

After driving around for nearly two hours with no destination, they entered a shopping mall at Kasumi's suggestion. It was an old mall, with not a single store suited for young people, and they noticed some spots left empty, hidden by partitions. There was a gathering of elderly people at the benches by the escalator, which was the only lively spot in the whole place.

Entering a ticket-operated cafeteria on the top floor, the two had soba noodles together. The whole west wall of the cafeteria was a giant window, and because Kasumi had chosen a window seat, the evening sun was blinding.

After eating, they took the elevator to the roof. By then, the sun was starting to set. The rooftop was used as a plaza, but they saw no else one there.

After having a cigarette at the smoking area in the corner, Ogami walked along the edge of the roof with Kasumi. Unfamiliar sights from an unfamiliar town stretched out below them. It looked so mundane, it could be replaced by another town while you weren't looking and you wouldn't notice.

"I think the feeling of graduating is finally starting to sink in," Kasumi murmured.

"Congrats," Ogami said.

"Thinking back, they weren't very decent years of high school." After saying that, she looked toward Ogami and laughed. "But I'm really glad you were there for the last month of it. I might not have made it through this winter if I were by myself."

"I've been helped a lot thanks to you, too. And it's been fun," Ogami remarked. It wasn't exactly a complete lie. If he hadn't encountered Kasumi after returning to the Town of Sakura, he probably would have been at a loss for what to do. She gave him a clear objective, and that kept him from ever being bored this past month.

Kasumi was quiet on the drive home, occasionally holding her mouth to stifle a yawn. Ogami said she should sleep if she was sleepy, so Kasumi replied "I'll do that" and closed her eyes.

Ogami slowed the car down and drove gently so as not to disturb her sleep. It was best for her to rest up while she could, so that she would have a clear head once they reached the essential scene.

Even upon arriving in the Town of Sakura, Kasumi didn't wake up. Bits of snow had started to fall slightly before entering town. It was a modest snow; even if it continued all night, it was dubious if it would reach even a centimeter.

While waiting for a stoplight, he glanced casually back at Kasumi sleeping. Then, as if sensing that, she opened her eyes, caught Ogami's glance before it could flee, and smiled.

"How long did I sleep for?"

"Thirty minutes or so," Ogami answered. "We're almost at your house."

"Oh, sure enough. Feels like kind of a waste..."

Despite it only just turning 7 PM, the town was totally silent. The sort of silence you'd expect around 3 AM. Ogami drove slowly down the roads, considerably narrowed due to the snow pushed to the side by snow plows.

Soon, their destination came into sight. He could discern the yellow and black warning colors even from a distance.

Right as he was about to stop the car in front of the railroad crossing, the warning bell started up, and the gate began to lower.

What an ironic coincidence, Ogami thought.

And that coincidence was demanding that Ogami do it here and now.

"Hey," Ogami said. "You know about prompters?"

Kasumi seemed to immediately discern the change in Ogami's tone. He could sense the sudden tension in her limbs.

"What are you talking about?", she asked back with unnecessary cheerfulness.

"Prompters. Some people call them Sakura."

"I know that, but..."

"When the System finds someone who might kill themselves, it chooses a Sakura from people close by. Sakura bear the duty of acting as a good friend to them, to prevent their suicide. Forbidden from revealing themselves, they're expected to act like they're doing it of their own volition."

Kasumi glanced at Ogami to judge his expression. "Ogami, are you angry about something?"

"I'm your Sakura," he said.

Even after the train roared past the railroad crossing, Kasumi was still silent.

When the gate went up, Ogami drove the car forward, and parked on the side of the road past the crossing.

The bits of snow were swallowed by darkness the instant the headlights turned off.

The videos the detective brought had featured hardly any clues toward understanding Sumika's inner thoughts. The camera had only captured Sumika Takasago as an actor. With each change of role, she became like a different person, sometimes giving the feeling that even her physique and age changed to match the role. These transformations were enough to make you doubt if she even had a true self, an authentic self.

As an actor, Sumika excelled at ad-libbing. During rehearsals, she often spoke lines that weren't in the script. You would know as much if you knew the script, but if you didn't, they would have scanned as perfectly natural. They didn't affect the big picture, and also didn't confuse the other actors.

But strangely enough, when you heard the original lines after seeing her ad-libs, it felt like it was the original that was wrong. You came to view it not as if they were ad-libs, but that only she had been handed the real script, which she was just acting out as-is.

In reality, she probably didn't think of it as ad-libbing. Maybe she read the script diligently, and in attuning her senses to the mood of the show, intuitively realized "no, this isn't it." This line is somehow obstructing the natural flow of things. And so she caught hold of a more natural, more appropriate line, which she then spoke.

What happened to Ogami here, past the railroad crossing, was something similar to that. The script he had prepared in advance had only lines meant to hurt Kasumi written in it. It was a script he'd spent much time polishing, but when he went to act it out, someone in his head spoke. No, this isn't it. Those aren't the words that would come naturally. That's a tortured, dead line produced by artifice. There's surely something else you ought to say here.

Of course, it's not like he could arrive at the correct answer instantly like Sumika. It took some time. So first, he decided to walk things back a bit. If he traced it from the beginning, maybe it would become clear where he was getting stuck.

"When we first met, that wasn't the case yet," Ogami began. "When I reunited with you in late January, I wasn't your Sakura yet. I'd been informed of Sumika's suicide, and returned to town to determine if it was true or not. As soon as you confirmed it, my business was done, and I left town. That was supposed to be the end of it. But when I got back to my apartment after that, a light-pink envelope had arrived. It was a notice that I had been selected as a prompter, and you were named as the individual at high risk of suicide. So I returned to town, rented an apartment, and interacted with you once more."

Ogami paused there and gauged Kasumi's reaction. Her hands sat on her lap, and she gazed at the darkness outside with pursed lips. But there was no tension or unease on her face. He could imagine that from the first word of his confession, she'd anticipated everything up to the conclusion, and was quietly confronting her sadness alone.

Ogami continued. "The whole time, I was wondering why someone like me was chosen as a Sakura. There should have been plenty of more suitable candidates, I thought. But it would seem I'm not your only Sakura. You have multiple others assigned to you. According to what one of them told me, it's somewhere around six. And I'm one who came in rather late. It must be they ran out of viable Sakura choices, forcing them to pick someone like me who might as well be an outsider."

He took a cigarette from his pocket and lit it without opening the windows. After taking a puff, he thought to himself: this too is part of the act. A prop to fill space in the conversation, while silently indicating that you've given up on caring about the person in front of you.

"The other thing I found bizarre was the very fact that you were wanting to kill yourself. At a glance, you didn't look at all like someone who would do a thing like that. I even thought the System had made a faulty diagnosis at first. Or maybe there was something about you that could be easily misinterpreted. But recently, after sneaking a peek at the photos you've been taking, my thinking changed. I may not know a clear reason, but you are in fact trying to die. And of course, I can tell it's something to do with your ties to Sumika. Because your world revolved around her."

After reaching this point, Ogami suddenly became conscious of the corsage on his chest. He unclipped it, and after some indecision, placed it on the dashboard. The fabricated flowers had a life and glossiness to them as if they had just bloomed, glowing faintly in the darkness.

In the way an ad-lib calls for an ad-lib to follow it, he continued naturally with words not in the script.

"But to tell the truth, I don't care what the reason is. All that's important is that you have a powerful desire to die, incomparable to your average suicidal person."

Behind the car, the railroad crossing's warning bell began to ring again.

The flashing lights dyed the deep blue darkness a faint red.

"We can cooperate with each other," Ogami said. "And if you want to know why, it's because I'm fed up with living, too."

*

Three nights later, Kasumi came to the apartment. Seeing Ogami's face, she didn't put on her prior friendly smile, simply bowing her head with a "Pardon me." Then she went into the bathroom with her shoulder bag, quickly changed, and came out. It was a dubious outfit for the season, a gray camisole and shorts a slightly darker gray. On top of that, both were soaking wet, with water dripping from them.

"I'll go out first," Kasumi said without even meeting eyes with him. Then she unlocked the window and stepped out onto the veranda. Ogami spent a while smoking a cigarette, looking at the drops of water she'd left on the floor. Once he finished it, he took off the sweatshirt he'd been wearing, leaving just a T-shirt, and headed to the bathroom.

The shower water was still on a cold setting, and he felt like he was suffocating the moment it touched his skin. Even so, he grit his teeth and got his whole body wet. Then, dripping water onto the floor, he quickly moved to turn off the lights, exit onto the veranda, and close the window.

There were two chairs out there, side by side. Kasumi sat in one, her thin shoulders already starting to shiver. Ogami sat down in the other. He grabbed a bottle of whiskey placed on the air conditioning unit, opened it up, and took a straight swig. His throat instantly heated up like it was burning.

"Can I have that too?", Kasumi asked.

Ogami handed her the bottle. She opened the cap with shaky hands and lightly poured it into her mouth. Calmly gulping it down, she quietly said "I see, so this is how it tastes. I can't fathom the minds of people who would drink this willingly."

Even so, alcohol was an indispensable prop. According to Kasumi's research, drinking greatly increased your risk of hypothermia. Getting your clothes wet was also effective, and fatigue, hunger, and lack of sleep boosted it even more. With all the conditions in place, it was possible to freeze to death even on a calm spring night.

Of course, the veranda couldn't be called a suitable place for freezing to death. The handrails served as a wall protecting from the wind, and only a single window separated them from an ideal place to take refuge. This was just a dry run. They wanted to know in advance how much suffering it would actually involve, or to reword that, how much resolve they would need to have.

It's foolish to be putting in more practice for freezing to death than for graduation, Ogami thought. But the stage and date had already been decided, so for now, all they could do was rehearse.

Ogami had invited Kasumi to a double suicide, and she accepted the invitation. The next morning, Ogami's world had changed completely. The thin frost on the window, the long icicles hanging from the roof, the piled snow in the parking area, the oppressive leaden sky - that morning, all of it had a picturesque tinge, as if being viewed through an old film.

He felt as light as if he were released from a job he'd worked for a decade. So light, in fact, that it made him uneasy. He found himself looking for reasons to suffer, thinking "I shouldn't be able to feel this at ease, I must be overlooking something important." Soon he realized he couldn't find any such reason, and he felt both relief and a touch of dissatisfaction. It was that kind of lightness.

Kasumi had proposed three conditions.

Rather than do it right now, I want to wait until the spring equinox.

If we die, we should do it in the same place as my sister.

If possible, we should freeze to death.

When Ogami asked why it couldn't be right away, Kasumi replied "because it would stand out."

"Apparently, many students who kill themselves do it at the end of spring break. I want to slip in with them if I can. Spring break only just started, didn't it?"

He felt it was pointless for a person who was about to die to be concerned about things like that, but the spring equinox did seem just right as a dividing point.

"Or are you feeling pressed for time, Ogami?"

"No, there's no real rush. I'll match with you."

Kasumi nodded silently. Then she asked after a short pause:

"You said you weren't interested in why I wanted to die, Ogami, but I'm interested in why you do."

"The same as you," Ogami answered simply. "My ties to Sumika."

"Is that the truth?", Kasumi asked dubiously. "I mean, wouldn't it be odd that you were chosen as my Sakura if you yourself had suicidal desires? Shouldn't you be having a Sakura assigned to you?"

"I did have one, long ago. That experience trained me such that I could deceive the System."

"Is that something you can do with mere training?"

"It's not like Handcuffs are looking into your very mind. As long as you know the standards for its diagnoses, you can counteract it."

"Then would it also be possible for a healthy person to pretend to be considering suicide?"

"There's plenty of people in the world making such an effort. But I've never heard of any who succeeded. It seems they won't be treated as suicidal without some pretty clear evidence. Innocent until proven guilty, so to speak."

Kasumi's eyes turned to her Handcuff, which she removed and placed next to the corsage. Then she turned to Ogami with a smile that looked weary. "So in trying to stop my suicide, the System instead set up a double suicide."

"That's what happened, yeah."

"If you're going out of your way to invite me, are you afraid to die alone, Ogami?"

"I am," Ogami said. "And you?"

"If I weren't afraid, I wouldn't have waited until six Sakura were assigned to me," Kasumi said with a laugh.

Kasumi was right to choose freezing as the method, Ogami thought after their first rehearsal. It was indeed painful. The wet clothes stole away your body heat in a blink, changing from simply feeling cold to a discomfort closer to pain. As your consciousness became hazy, you started to think of nonsensical things. On the back of his eyelids, he saw a jumble of fragmented memories even more disjointed than a dream.

But it didn't have the sense of death. It felt like strictly an extension of everyday suffering. The intoxication may have also helped there. And maybe another part was having been born in a snowy place, and being used to the cold. It had this feel to it like you could go all the way without even realizing you were stepping toward a fatal situation.

When they returned to the room, the two took off their freezing clothes before anything else. They took turns taking a hot shower, sat in front of the heater, and bathed in the warm air for a while. Once they'd recovered enough to sufficiently move their bodies, they had some premade stew and drank hot cocoa. But even then, they were having a hard time removing the chill that had reached their core. Putting something warm in your mouth only warmed the area around your stomach, and warm air only heated up your skin. Their feeling in parts of their limbs had dulled, a symptom that didn't heal even by next morning. Several languid days passed, like after getting a high fever, and they frequently felt sleepy.

"Why did you choose freezing to death?", Ogami asked a few days later.

"Why indeed?", Kasumi repeated. "I'm not really sure myself. Maybe because I was born in a cold town, I wanted to make use of it at the end."

It was strange logic, but he felt like he understood what she was getting at. Just being born in a place with lots of snow is a kind of punishment. You can get some benefit from it on rare occasion, but there are far more negatives overall.

Yet if they could make that their ally in the very end, maybe they could believe there was some small meaning to being born in this place.

Even if the very idea of it "having meaning" was meaningless.

After he'd put it into words once, his thoughts had hardened before he knew it. From an impromptu line that came about in his talk with Kasumi, he finally came to understand why he had returned to this town, and why he accepted being Kasumi's Sakura.

In short, I was unable to abandon my hope, he thought. In returning to the Town of Sakura and following the trail of Sumika, a part of me had been hoping that some comforting truth would arise.

What if her being a Sakura had actually been a total lie, and she had some deep reason for having to keep me away? Or what if it was true she'd been a Sakura, but while performing as one, she found her feigned affection becoming real? What if she only realized her affection after we completely cut ties, and up to the moment of her death, she was dragging that past behind her?

What if she had kept thinking about me the way I'd kept thinking about her?

What if her death was caused by that regret?

What if, had I simply offered reconciliation, she would have gladly accepted it?

Maybe I'd been hoping for a sweet regret such as that.

But learning about her hidden face from members of the troupe and her own father, that faint hope was completely extinguished. The conclusion revealed when all those different perspectives were combining into one was this: Sumika was no more than a mirror who reflected other people's ideals. There was no other way to explain the logic behind her actions. She was the ultimate people-pleaser, and in a sense, like a kind of hollow doll. Even what Ogami thought was affection had just been a reflection of his own.

Then again, if it was just despair over that, he surely wouldn't have gone as far as considering death. He probably would have gone on to live an even more hopeless life than before, but suicide should have been at least a few steps further off.

What was it that pushed me over the edge?

Maybe it was Kasumi's influence after all, Ogami thought. I was poisoned by her, and became captivated by death - perhaps that's ultimately all there was to it.

It's hard to be sure what the truth is. Perhaps the effect came before the cause - rather than dying because I have a reason, I had been searching for a reason to die. It's conceivable that returning to my hometown after so long just has me temporarily depressed. But if you were to ask the System, you would probably get an awfully complex motivation, not explainable by one simple reason. That was surely it: on the whole, I want to die.

Kasumi became addicted to their freezing-to-death rehearsals. Every few days she'd come to Ogami's apartment, take a shower in her clothes, and go sit in the cold wind on the veranda. Ogami accompanied her each time. And in those moments where they had to return to the room or there'd be no coming back, and not the moment they went back to the warm room itself, he found that he was enveloped in a bliss that was hard to describe. Most likely, it was a sense of harmony that arrived when his mental closeness to death aligned with his physical closeness to death. Ogami imagined Kasumi kept repeating these rehearsals, too, because she was enchanted by this feeling.

While at the start of each session his attention was drawn to the shivering, lightly-dressed Kasumi, once his body heat started to drop below the heat in the air, his senses gradually turned inward, and everything else became a vague "external," allowing him to relish a feeling of truly being alone. When he retreated into his inner consciousness, all these things from the past came to mind one after another. It wasn't exactly his life flashing before his eyes, but it was as if his brain were re-evaluating if this life was worth living or not.

When he thought back on it all, it was 22 years with hardly anything happy or enjoyable. Opening the lid on his fatal middle school memories only revealed complete nothingness. The life of a ghost, who can neither touch or be touched by anyone. No, maybe there had been just a little bit of good in there. But it wasn't enough to stick in his memory. Indeed, other people were mirrors - so as a person without mirrors in his life, he couldn't recognize his self, and accordingly, was unable to remember any events surrounding that self.

Still, while patiently dredging through the depths of his memory, his fingertips touched a faint warmth. It wasn't a very significant memory. In fact, it was so shabby that it only felt more miserable to hold it up as a good memory.

About half a year after he started doing work on matchmaking apps, his work as a Sakura was once praised by the company president. When passing each other by, he said something like "you do some pretty good work, huh?", slapping him on the shoulder. That was it. That was literally all there was to it.

The president was a man so listless you couldn't imagine he was the president of a scamming business, and he lacked any dignity or style, yet he was reasonably admired by the staff for his effective cunning. He wasn't the sort of person who did flattery, so Ogami was able to honestly accept praise from him.

Even looking back on it now, it truly was a meager event. But as much as he searched himself, that was about the only heartwarming memory. All his other memories were covered in frost.

I guess it's no surprise I'd freeze to death, thought Ogami.

During their third practice run, it snowed. It was fine snow that fell in bits and pieces, looking like dust on a projector. It was a windless night, so the snow didn't get onto the veranda, but Kasumi stood up on her bare feet and leaned over the handrail, opening her palm to try and grab the small snowflakes.

"Ogami, did you know?", Kasumi said as she looked up to the sky. "Double suicides are generally only done by family or lovers."

Ogami figured it was something total strangers could do too, but it was a pain to move his mouth stiffened by the cold, so he just said "Hm."

"It's something family or lovers do," Kasumi repeated. "Maybe it'd be more natural if we matched that, too."

Kasumi picked up her folding chair, stuck it next to Ogami's, and sat down. Her bare, thin shoulder touched Ogami's arm, but he couldn't afford to feel anything. He just thought, her shoulder's cold.

"Ogami, you liked my sister, didn't you. Then since I'm so much like her, you must like me at least half as much, right?"

"Well, sure," Ogami said.

"Huh, is that right?"

"Sure," Ogami repeated.

"Hmm." Kasumi pondered while cracking her numbed knuckles. "I was just imagining you'd reject me. I guess it's worth speaking your mind."

"But we can't become lovers."

"Why not?"

"I like the idea of dying with a stranger."

Kasumi looked at Ogami's face emotionlessly for a while, then soon smiled weakly.

"You have some strange tastes, don't you."

She let out a small sigh. The breath coming from her frozen body didn't even turn white.

[+]

10

The day after their fourth rehearsal, Ogami woke up past noon. He made coffee, heated up a stew from yesterday, and mechanically put them in his mouth. His body was sluggish all over. The sun went down while he lay down in front of the heater, and it was evening before he knew it. Every time they did a rehearsal, time seemed to accelerate. No, maybe it was more accurate to say his consciousness was slowing down. Either way, it was the same thing to Ogami. Time passing by quickly was desirable. Particularly now that he didn't have to worry about any practical life problems.

After 5 PM, he finally sat up, put on clothes, and got in the car for no reason. The navigation system asked his destination, but of course he had none. He couldn't even muster the will to go to the bathhouse. He considered going back to the room, but he wanted to make up for his squandered sleepiness somehow. In the end, he decided to drive around without thinking about anything.

As he focused on driving, he slowly started to wake up. At the same time, he didn't think a single extraneous thought. This must be why humanity loves cars so, Ogami mused. Their use as transportation is secondary. People get in cars because they don't want to think about anything. There's no need to even go over the speed limit; by putting yourself at speeds the human body wasn't made to account for, you can shove everything into a box of "that's neither here nor there."

After driving to the next town over, Ogami parked in front of a train station and walked for a while. He was starting to get hungry, so he searched for a restaurant, but couldn't find anything of the sort.

As he was about to give up and head back, a familiar store appeared before him. It was a brick building painted bright white, and only the door with a hanging "OPEN" sign was painted a refined color, hard to pin down as blue, green, or gray. In a town lined with sleepy houses, that refined shop stuck out like a sore thumb.

Ogami pushed open the door and entered the variety store. The wooden-floored shop was well-heated, filled with a scent of lamp oil and wood. Sitting on top of a heater surrounded by an iron fence, a large kettle was letting out steam. While the merchandise on the wooden shelves had been changed out, the rest of the shop had hardly changed at all from his middle school memory of it. Even the air and the creaking of the floor was the same as back then.

When he first came here eight years ago, Kujirai was with him. That time the two of them were looking everywhere for a place to buy a Christmas present for Sumika, an acquaintance had told them about a well-regarded store in a neighboring town.

Ogami didn't want the miscellanea they sold at this point, but it was a comfortable space, so he went around browsing the shelves. A collection of beautifully unnecessary things, even to someone who wasn't able to die, were put on display in a way that made full use of the space.

He didn't see any employees. Aside from Ogami, there was just a single customer, a young man. He wore a black down jacket, and had been standing in front of a shelf in the corner ever since Ogami entered the shop. He looked as if he might be seriously thinking about a gift for someone, though he also looked like he might simply be waiting for an employee to come back.

Come to think of it, where did I put those presents I bought for Sumika and Kujirai back then?, Ogami suddenly wondered. He definitely hadn't actually delivered them. After witnessing their secret meeting in the garage, his head was so full of thoughts he completely forgot about the presents. He believed he disposed of everything in his room when he left home after graduating high school, yet he didn't remember seeing the paper bag the presents were in.

When in the world did it disappear?

As he walked around thinking about that, he'd done a full lap of the store before he knew it. He took even more time gazing at the merchandise on the second lap. After finishing a third, he bought a notebook he had no particular use for and left the store. It was small enough to fit right in his jeans pocket, and used leather with a smooth texture for the cover. He wasn't sure whether the clerk at the register was the same as seven years ago. He'd completely forgotten their face.

There was an ashtray beside the store, so he decided to have a smoke there. As he lit the cigarette and did his first inhale, the door opened, and the man in the down jacket came out. Seeing that he was empty handed, it seemed he hadn't bought anything after all. Ogami quickly lost interest in the man and looked back down at the ashtray.

On his second inhale, he felt on the verge of remembering something. Something very important. It wasn't about where the paper bag with the presents went. It had to do with a more recent event, and it was unmistakably that man just now who stimulated the memory.

What could it be related to? Kasumi, Sakura, the acting troupe, the leader, the teacher, the detective, the educator... it wasn't any of those. It was a little bit older than that. Maybe even before coming to this town -

Sumika Takasago has killed herself.

The instant he connected that voice with the man in the down jacket, the memories came back to him all at once.

The inexplicable phone call just to inform him of Sumika's suicide. Now, he finally realized who that voice was.

Ogami hastily pushed his cigarette into the ashtray, and hurried in the direction the man went. He hadn't gone too far, so he caught up quickly. He was just about to get in a minicar parked on the side of the road. When Ogami called the man's name, he turned around. His expression of confusion, as he looked at Ogami's face, changed to one of pure astonishment.

Souma was a classmate from middle school. That was the only thing Ogami was able to remember about him. Despite having spent two years in the same classroom, he'd left as much of an impression in Ogami's mind as a person he only met once or twice. That was how little connection he had to this classmate. If they hadn't coincidentally met like this, he might have never in his life had an opportunity to remember him.

The two arrived at the restaurant they'd agreed to meet at right around the same time. After sitting in their seats and quickly ordering, Souma went "now then," faced Ogami, and laid out a few of those inoffensive phrases most people use when reuniting after some years. Ogami, too, gave inoffensive replies to them.

"What'd you buy?", Souma asked, indicating Ogami's paper bag.

"A notebook I've got no use for," Ogami answered. "What did you come looking for?"

"Nothing," Souma said with an embarrassed laugh. "I'm a college student with too much time on his hands. What are you up to, Ogami?"

"Managing to make ends meet working no-good jobs."

"That's an admirable thing."

There was silence for a while. Souma was the one who'd invited him for a meal, so Ogami continued eating in silence. Probably because he hadn't walked a long distance in a while, he was unusually hungry.

Eventually, Souma nervously broke the ice.

"Sorry about the strange phone call."

"No, I'm grateful," Ogami replied. Then he felt surprised that those words had come out of his mouth. Maybe resolving to leave this world had given him more peace of mind.

Souma smiled with relief. "Did you decide to come home because of my call, then?"

"Yeah. Haven't been back here since I finished high school."

"But you've been staying in town for a while now, right?"

"How do you know?"

"I passed by you on the street once. Though you didn't notice me then."

"I didn't know," said Ogami. "So then, why did you go out of your way to call me?"

Souma went silent again. Ogami noticed he hadn't been touching his meal at all. He kept putting his water glass to his mouth, but it hadn't even been half-emptied.

A waiter came over and took Ogami's cleaned plate. The restaurant was filled with evening customers and horribly noisy.

Souma spoke while looking at a family of four sitting next to them. "Hey, what did you think of Sumika back then?"

"Just how it looked."

"You liked her, huh?"

"Yeah. I was thinking about her 24/7."

"Well, so was I. You probably saw Kujirai as your only rival, not even noticing anyone else, but truthfully, most of the guys in that class were in love with Sumika. There was a long, long line behind you two. Did you notice?"

"No," Ogami said. It really was the first he'd heard of it. "But even if that was the case, it's not too surprising."

"That's why I thought you'd be someone I could share this joy with."

Joy, Ogami repeated in his head. In other words, had he hoped for Sumika's death?

"Maybe it's bad of me to use the word "joy" for it. It's not like I held a personal grudge or anything," Souma denied as if reading Ogami's mind. "But - and forgive me if I'm mistaken - as far as I know, even you, who was the closest to Sumika, couldn't become her lover. Isn't that right?"

"That's right," Ogami affirmed, not understanding what Souma was getting at.

"And then Sumika died," Souma said. "In other words, she finally couldn't belong to anyone. That warped joy was the first thing I felt when I learned of her death. And thinking you might be able to share in it, I called you."

"Pretty short call then, considering."

"I felt satisfied just telling you what I had to tell you," Souma said with a laugh. "But you know, that joy was shaken big-time when I passed you on the street the other day. Do you know why?"

Ogami shook his head, since he didn't.

"You were walking with a girl who looked just like Sumika. The moment I saw that, I was brought back to the classroom in middle school. Sumika smiling beside you, and me looking greedily from the corner. Ahh, I thought, so Sumika will always choose to be by Ogami's side."

"Sumika is dead," Ogami stated clearly. "That was her little sister, Kasumi."

"I know. I'm just saying that's the feeling I got." With that, Souma finally touched his meal. "I feel like I've been put at ease getting to talk with you directly. Sorry for dumping my pain and my relief on you."

"It's fine, everyone does it."

Souma ate about half of his cooled meal, put down his chopsticks, and said "I'd better get going soon." After paying the bill and leaving, Ogami found the night air unusually warm. Maybe because he hadn't had a proper meal in so long.

"This would normally be where people exchange contact info," Souma stopped and said, "but do you want to do that?"

"Nah," Ogami answered honestly.

"Good. Me neither," Souma said. "To tell the truth, there isn't a single classmate from middle school I still keep up with now. All the best people left town, so only the worst people like me are left. So I naturally stopped associating with any of them. But I think that's for the best. Just not having people who know my shameful past around gives me such immense relief. I don't dislike you, but I'd like to end it here if I can."

"Same here. I haven't contacted any old acquaintances even once," Ogami said. "Of course, I practically didn't have any friends from middle school on, but still."

"Weren't Sumika and Kujirai your friends?"

Ogami chose not to deny that. "Yeah. I had just those two."

"I think it's plenty to have two whole people you can still clearly say were friends after seven years. I don't have even one."

"And also," Ogami continued, "I never told anyone but those two my phone number."

Souma opened his mouth to say something, but stopped to think and remained silent.

"Just as you informed me, Sumika died half a year ago. That leaves only one person besides my family who knows my number. Souma, how did you learn my phone number?"

Souma didn't show any reaction for a while, as if he didn't even hear Ogami's voice.

But eventually, he smiled with resignation.

"You're right. I learned it from Kujirai."

"Where is he now?"

"I don't know. It's not like we had a personal relationship. About a year ago... no, ten months ago at most, he suddenly visited my house and handed me a note with your number on it."

"At that point -"

"Yes, at that point Sumika was still alive," Souma affirmed. "But Kujirai told me. If something happens to Sumika, let Ogami know. It was a sudden, one-sided request, so of course I could have refused. I didn't, because of the feeling I explained to you earlier. That wasn't a lie."

Ogami thought for a bit, then spoke. "Was Kujirai expecting Sumika to die?"

"Who knows. He worded it as "if something happens to her," so I'm not sure if he knew she would die. But he seemed convinced something would happen soon."

Ogami could detect no hint of a lie in Souma's words.

"I completely forgot I even made a promise like that. That's why I was so late to contact you."

"Did he leave you any other instructions besides that?"

"Nothing. Just to tell you the facts."

"What possible objective could he have in asking that of you?"

"I dunno. But you know, I didn't sense any malice in Kujirai's attitude then. Maybe he wanted to share a certain feeling with you, much like I did. At the same time, maybe he didn't want to share it with you directly."

Souma turned his back to Ogami and got in his car. He turned on the engine and drove off without even pausing. Ogami went back to his own car and lit a cigarette, gazing absentmindedly at the smoke filling the car.

Souma called me at Kujirai's instigation. Kujirai knew something would happen to Sumika. He felt a need to tell me, yet didn't want to tell me himself directly. Or maybe he wanted to, but couldn't.

Then did Kujirai kill Sumika after all? That would explain both him expecting Sumika's death and why he couldn't call me directly. It made sense. But judging him to be a killer just based on it "making sense" was really pushing it. You could have predicted Sumika would cause some major incident in the not too distant future even if you weren't Kujirai, and it's also conceivable that he simply didn't want to talk to me directly, like Souma said.

But all told, whether Kujirai killed Sumika or not doesn't matter to me right now. What's clear is that if Kujirai hadn't made this bizarre request of Souma, I wouldn't have come to this town, wouldn't have met Kasumi, wouldn't have seen Sumika's true colors, wouldn't have planned a double suicide, and wouldn't have arrived at this calm state of mind I'm in now.

Was there any other problem here?

The fifth rehearsal was their last. The spring equinox was just ahead of them.

Ogami and Kasumi went to the home improvement store and bought a portable shower that connected to a water tank. They tested it at the apartment, and it seemed to have no issues. "Make sure to charge it up," Kasumi instructed as she left. It feels like we're preparing for a vacation or something, Ogami thought.

Ogami had decided not to do anything special in the three days remaining before the main event. He couldn't think of a single thing he wanted to take care of while he was alive, and didn't have any interest in writing a suicide note or cleaning out his room. Paying mind to various affairs that would occur after his death felt meaningless. Kasumi seemed to feel similarly, saying she would spend the remaining time like a student on spring break should.

The final three days began. The first day had good weather, not a cloud in the sky. The temperature was ten to twenty degrees warmer than the day before, so Ogami went outside and started breaking down the snow piles. He scattered the snow in places where there was no foot traffic, and repeated the process every few hours as the snow melted. While taking a smoke break, one of the icicles hanging from the apartment roof fell and cracked with a tremendous sound. He became worried whether they could freeze to death in weather like this, but according to the forecast, there'd be several days of snow again starting tomorrow.

True to the forecast, it quickly cooled down again the next day with a snowstorm. That day, he went to the library to do research. He looked around for books about people doing double suicides, then went to the reading area to read them over thoroughly until closing time.

He found fewer than ten books that met his criteria. Maybe he just wasn't searching the right way, or maybe public libraries opted not to carry such risky books. He went outside every hour to have a smoke. Beside of the snowstorm, his fingertips were shaking by the time he'd finished two cigarettes. Ogami thought it a shame that today wasn't the day, but upon further consideration, figured it was best to avoid a situation too far removed from their usual practice. Wouldn't they be able to die most peacefully if it was simply "cold"?

Reading descriptions of people who performed double suicides, they all seemed to have been left with no option but suicide due to circumstances that could only be called tragic. In particular, most stories about family suicides were miserable tales. Compared to these, his motive felt terribly flimsy. Probably because it was. A girl who wasn't even his lover, but whom he once admired, had killed herself. A commonplace event. That same sort of thing was no doubt happening somewhere in the world at this very moment.

But it's not as if everyone dies for such fine motives that they're left behind in literature, Ogami thought a little bit later. There must be tons of people who die for worthless reasons. And the majority of such people die alone, remaining in no records nor in anyone's memories.

In that sense, maybe I'm fortunate. Because I gained a companion in Kasumi, I wouldn't have to die alone. If I hadn't been chosen as a Sakura, such a miracle would never have happened. You could say the System did a fantastic job with my mental health.

Soon the closing announcement played, and Ogami returned the books and left the library. Wiping off his car with a snow brush, he warmed up the engine and stepped on the gas. Many cars seemed to have been brought to a standstill by the storm, making for heavy traffic on roads that would normally be empty. Ogami sat at the back of the traffic jam, watching the chain of red tail lights while having a smoke. I can wait all day, he thought, calmly preparing himself. It was the first time a traffic jam this bad hadn't made him lose composure. When the flow of traffic resumed, he actually found himself a little disappointed.

He planned to spend the third day at the apartment doing nothing, but while lying down on the tatami floor and looking at the ceiling, the question that occurred to him at the variety store a few days ago resurfaced. Where had the paper bag with the presents for Sumika and Kujirai gone to? Maybe it was still at my parents' house somewhere? I thought I disposed of everything when I left, but maybe that was the one thing I overlooked?

Even if he wouldn't have to worry about such things once he was dead, he at least wanted to confirm the bag's location while he could. He wouldn't be able to stand it if he remembered where it was just before freezing to death.

If his parents were at home, he intended to give up on the matter, yet when he went to the house, he didn't see his father's car nor his mother's. He unlocked the door and went inside without making a sound, and listened carefully in the entryway for a while. His parents indeed seemed to be out, so he stepped quietly up to the second floor. The hallway felt considerably smaller than he remembered, but he didn't feel especially nostalgic. Coming to the end of the hall, he gently opened the door to his room, the one place he had once belonged.

The room seemed to be serving as a storeroom after Ogami left. Of course, nothing major had been brought in, so it wasn't too much trouble to search. And sure enough, he couldn't find the paper bag. It must have been disposed of at some point or another, and he just forgot about it.

Relieved, he left his old home behind. Even at this stage of being about to die, he didn't feel the tiniest desire to meet his parents one last time. He didn't even see a need to justify that to himself. They had both just been unlucky.

The fact he remained unshaken even when setting foot in his old house gave him confidence. Ogami walked the route of his former commute, heading for the middle school. He passed by Sumika's house, went down the small path between the fields, and walked along the tracks. Soon he reached the railroad crossing, but the gate showed no sign of lowering, and even after he crossed, it kept its silence.

Standing at the gate of his old school, he gazed at the building. No matter how long he stared, it didn't feel meaningfully different from looking at a school in an unfamiliar town. It seems there's nothing more that can threaten me, Ogami thought to himself. It's less that I have no lingering attachments, but rather, I wasn't even able to pick up any attachments. But I don't really mind that.

That was how the three days before the main event went by. He'd expected them to be a longer three days, but time neither lengthened nor contracted. Thanks to some whiskey, he was able to get to sleep his last evening before he could think about anything unnecessary.

When he awoke, his last morning was already nearly over. He prepared a slice of toast, fried an egg left in the fridge, and made instant coffee. So this unsatisfying meal will be my last breakfast, he thought as he ate.

After eating, he went out and shoveled the snow that had piled up two days ago. Back in his room, he took a shower, reheated the coffee, and drank it. Then he opened his suitcase to produce a paperback book, and lay down to start reading it. It was a book that dedicated more than 500 pages to the claim that "by design, humans aren't made to be happy." Ogami didn't have enough insight of his own to judge if this claim was right or not, but he felt comforted by the simple fact that a fine individual recognized by society was denying human life. Back when he was still living an unstable life, that book had comforted him greatly. As long as he shut his eyes to the fact the author was still in good health.

Kasumi knocked on the apartment door late at night. Ogami checked that he'd locked up, then left the room. He'd loaded the shower and water tank into the car in advance. They both carefully checked the battery and amount of water, then set out.

Neither of them said a word on the way. Not because of nervousness or unease. They believed there was nothing left to be said by now. Every time the tires went over a rut and shook the car, the water in the tank made a sloshing sound from the back seat.

It took less than twenty minutes to reach the riverside park. Compared to when he visited with the detective before, the fallen snow was a bit easier to deal with. Even so, the ground was still entirely white, so it was nearly impossible to gauge distance with the narrow field of vision provided by the headlights.

Arriving at the area he believed to be the parking lot, Ogami parked under the streetlight that served as a landmark. After turning off the engine, a heavy silence descended over the car.

If they proceeded as-is, their Handcuffs would alert the System to their lives being in danger, so the two removed their Handcuffs and placed them on the dashboard.

Kasumi opened the glove box and took out a small bottle of whiskey. As if in response, Ogami took a box of sleeping pills from his coat pocket. They were over-the-counter, so he couldn't expect a huge effect, but for peace of mind, he poured several times the recommended dose into the whiskey. They then took turns passing the bottle and drinking from it, gradually relaxing their brains. Once the bottle was empty, they got out of the car and opened the rear door, taking out the shower and tank and setting them up. Then together, they carried them into the park.

After arriving at a plaza a sufficient distance from the parking lot, Ogami set down the tank. He'd brought a flashlight, expecting it to be difficult to work in the dark, but thanks to the moonlight, it seemed that was unnecessary. It was unfortunate that it wasn't snowing, but Ogami knew from experience that the night chill was more intense when the sky was clear like this.

Kasumi took off her coat, leaving just a thin one-piece, and held out both hands toward Ogami.

"Now then, do it."

Ogami nodded and powered on the shower. For a few seconds there was just the sound of it working, then as if remembering what to do, the shower head started gushing water. When the water touched her skin, Kasumi laughed ticklishly. If it had been summer, and the park was covered in the greenery of trees instead of snow, maybe this would have looked like a charming scene.

Once Kasumi had gotten fully soaked, the two changed places. Ogami took off his duffle coat and had Kasumi spray him with water. The water didn't feel that cold; it was probably warmer than the air was. But the water absorbed by his clothes was at once chilled by the wind, and he rapidly started to lose body heat.

While looking for a good place to sit down, Kasumi suddenly grabbed Ogami's arm. Before he could think about what that meant, Kasumi pulled him to the ground. The two were lying down face-up on the snow. Kasumi was laughing with a stifling giggle. Either the alcohol combined with the abnormal situation had induced a high, or she was pretending to be high. Ogami tried to sit up once, but changed his mind and laid back down.

For a long while afterward, the two looked up at the moon absentmindedly. The moon had a near-oval shape, too ambiguous to tell if it was a half moon or full moon. There must have been a proper term for that shape. Thought it would do them no good to learn it now.

"Why do you think Sumika chose to die here?", Ogami muttered as if to himself.

"I thought you might have some idea about that, Ogami," Kasumi said.

"One time, I went with Sumika and another friend to see the cherry blossoms here."

"Then that's the reason."

"Maybe so," Ogami agreed. "Though maybe she only remembered it as an inconspicuous place, rather than a place she remembered fondly."

"No, I'm sure it was a place she remembered fondly. Her choosing this place must have been some kind of message to you, right?"

"I wonder."

"Talking's a good distraction. Let's talk more."

Ogami thought for a while, then asked, "What were you doing the past three days?"

"I was imagining my life if I didn't die."

"Did you feel any attachments crop up?"

"The fact that I'm here now is your answer."

"Now that you mention it, yeah."

Ogami subconsciously dug in his jeans pocket for some cigarettes, but they had been completely soaked by the water earlier, so he threw them out.

"To tell the truth, I didn't have a will to die," he heard Kasumi say.

"Then you can stop," Ogami told her.

"It's my sister," said Kasumi flatly. "That wasn't suicide."

Ogami reflexively looked toward her. But her face was half buried in the snow, so he couldn't tell her expression.

"When I found my sister's suicide note, I had the means of reliably finding out where she was," Kasumi continued. "But I pretended not to know, only telling our parents that I'd found her suicide note. And I didn't let them know right away, either; I delayed for nearly half a day, until it was completely too late for her. Do you know why I'd do something like that?"

"I do," Ogami said immediately. "You didn't want Sumika to disgrace herself any further, didn't you?"

Ogami hardly even felt shocked by Kasumi's confession. Maybe he'd realized it quite some time ago. At least in the event that someone else killed Sumika, that was the only plausible motive.

He felt just a tiny bit guilty for suspecting Kujirai.

Kasumi went on. "I think my sister didn't truly intend to die. It was a staged suicide, based on the premise that I would rescue her. Maybe she wanted to make others believe that she regretted her actions, or maybe she wanted to escape to somewhere like a hospital. At any rate, it was no more than a step in a plan. And she executed that plan putting 100% of her trust in me. But I let my sister die. Moments after I found her note, I had already begun thinking of how to fake the time of discovery. I thought, this is a chance that won't come again. Because I knew the sister I loved was already gone. Because I didn't want Sumika Takasago to be sullied any more."

Kasumi's voice was trembling, but by then, Ogami's body also wouldn't stop shaking. So he couldn't determine whether it was from the cold, or from the height of emotion.

"Now then, what will you do?", Kasumi asked, seeming to have pulled herself together. "Now that you've found the killer of Sumika Takasago."

"I won't do anything," Ogami answered. "Besides, I think you're underestimating Sumika. You know how she is; she would have caught on to how you saw her long before then. She must have been considering the possibility that you'd leave her to die from the very beginning. With that in mind, what if she thought it would be fine either way, whether she was saved or left to die? If she intended on being saved for certain, she would have surely chosen another method, and prepared a backup plan if not two. She wouldn't have walked that tightrope if the winds of chance could interfere. What I think is, Sumika was having difficulty taking that last step, just like we were until a while ago, and that's why she chose such a half-hearted method. Like taking a bullet out of the chamber to leave a chance of salvation, so that pulling the trigger would be easier. If Sumika was betting on tails from the start, then that means you answered her expectations wonderfully."

He thought he'd just say some words that sounded right to distract himself, but upon considering them further, he felt that theory might not be so off the mark.

He could tell from her breathing that she was taken aback.

"That's a wonderful way of thinking," Kasumi said. "It doesn't change the fact I left my sister to die, but even so..."

Ogami tried to give a reply, but his mind was already failing to string words together. The chill stiffened not only his limbs but his thoughts, and shivering got in the way of making precise motions. A heavy, uncomfortable numbness, different from cold or pain, was filling every corner of his body.

"This might not be as comfortable a way to die as I thought," Ogami said.

"Next time we do it, let's go with something else," Kasumi said with a laugh.

Once Kasumi's laughter stopped, silence filled the dark. They couldn't even hear the wind. There was just the pale night sky and the black shadows of the trees.

"I'm glad you were my Sakura, Ogami."

So Kasumi said, a long time afterward. No, maybe it had actually only been a few minutes.

Her voice felt strangely far away.

"Perhaps I was able to avoid dying until today because I knew you'd become my Sakura someday."

Ogami gave a short reply, but even he didn't know what he said. And the moment he finished saying it, an intense sluggishness overcame his mind and body.

[+]

11

What reawakened Ogami's senses wasn't a feeling of icy cold, but an intense pain throughout his whole body, especially in his extremities. At first his fingertips hurt, and then the moment he recognized it as pain, his whole body throbbed with pain as if anesthesia had worn off. He immediately tried to stand up, but his limbs wouldn't move like he wanted, so he lost balance and plunged head-first into the snow.

When he raised his head, he realized his body was covered by the duffle coat he thought he'd left in the car. But his mind was unable to arrive at what that meant. He tried to stand up again, but it wasn't going well; even so, he crawled toward the parking lot where the car was parked to escape the agony his body was in. His senses were muddled, but his body remembered that he could get relief if he went there.

Ogami's body was hardly advancing forward at all, like trying to run in a dream. It almost felt as if there were an invisible force slowly pulling him backward. There must be a hollow under the snow, something like an antlion pit trying to pull me in, he hazily thought. But past a certain point, the path suddenly became flat, and he advanced slowly but surely walking on his knees.

He arrived at the car and reached for the door. But it didn't open when he pulled the handle. He dug through his pockets with his numb hand. The key was nowhere to be found. His senses were growing distant, but when he pulled forcefully on the handle again, this time the door opened with a hard sound. It seemed it hadn't been locked, but had just frozen shut.

He climbed up into the driver's seat, and turned the still-inserted key with his shivering fingers to start the engine. He cranked the heater to the maximum and waited for the hot air, but all that came out of the vents was a chilly breeze slightly preferable to outside. Repeatedly stepping on the gas to idle the engine as if praying, the air slowly began to heat up.

Ogami held his hands in front of the vents and warmed his fingertips, then warmed his neck with his fingers. He repeated this over and over. Remembering he had a blanket in the car, he pulled it from the back seat and put it over his shoulders like a cape. His chills weren't letting up, and as the temperature in the car increased, the unfathomable pain in his body only became more intense. His limbs were heavy and cold, as if they had been switched out for something else while he was unconscious.

This whole chain of actions had been done practically subconsciously. At some point, the sky had started to lighten. He took a reserve pack of cigarettes from the glove box, struggled to take one out with his numb fingers, held it between his lips, and lit it with the lighter. That was his first conscious action. When the smell of the cigarette filled his nose, he finally came to his senses.

I've survived, Ogami thought. He accepted this not as a good thing or a bad thing, just as the reality. He couldn't muster emotions of any kind about that reality. Just like how when a baby is born, it doesn't judge the good and bad of that fact but simply cries, he kept absentmindedly shivering.

Then the next thing he thought was: Where did Kasumi go?

Once his wet clothes dried, and his body warmed enough to walk properly again, Ogami returned to the place he woke up, still wearing the blanket. He picked up the duffle coat, wiped the snow from it, and took a look around. There was no sign of Kasumi, but he saw small footprints from around where she'd been lying down. Following them, he found they met up with the trail left by his crawling. He didn't bother to follow the footprints further, but they seemed to lead back to the car. Come to think of it, he hadn't seen her coat in the car. Nor her Handcuff. Had Kasumi retrieved her coat and Handcuff, put the coat over Ogami, and walked out of the park?

The chills were coming back, so he returned to the car. Just as expected, there were footprints that appeared to be Kasumi's going from the car to the park entrance. But following these footprints wouldn't let him catch up to her. They surely would have come to an end around the exit of the park.

By now, hunger and throat dryness were being added on top of the chills and pain. Thinking Kasumi might come back to the car, Ogami stayed in the park for about two hours. Of course, she didn't come back.

She must have stopped just short of death, and decided to leave here by herself. That was what he had to conclude for now.

If so, that was an entirely reasonable judgement, Ogami thought.

He returned to the car and left the park. His movements were still stiff as usual, but for whatever reason, he was able to drive the same as always once he grabbed the wheel. What a well-built machine, Ogami thought with delayed admiration. It didn't seem very appropriate for an automobile to be the first thing he was impressed by after reviving from the brink of death, but in that moment, Ogami felt automobiles to be the far superior entity to humans. With machines having no wills of their own, they made no mistakes.

Just to be sure, he drove around within a radius of a few miles from the park, but saw no figures that looked like Kasumi. This time he gave up for real, and returned to the apartment.

Arriving at his room, he turned on the heater and warmed up some leftover stew. He heated up water and took numerous raw gulps of it. He took a scalding hot shower, changed clothes, lay down in a comfortable spot, and slept there for hours. He started to wake up at one point, but then quickly fell back asleep, then woke up from hunger a few hours later so he had a meal, then fell into another long sleep.

By the next time he woke up, the date had changed. After three sleeps, his consciousness had regained some clarity. He thought it over again with a clear head. Where had Kasumi gone? He thought about calling her, but if she were willing to respond to a call, she surely would have contacted him a while ago. Or else she would have visited the apartment directly.

Remembering the conversation they had before he lost consciousness, he pondered at what point she could've had a change of heart. Even after Ogami aired his theory that Sumika's death was indeed a suicide, having just been presented as "a staged suicide gone wrong," her intentions hadn't wavered. She'd said that there was no changing the fact she left her sister to die.

"Perhaps I was able to avoid dying until today because I knew you'd become my Sakura someday."

Those were Kasumi's final words he could hear before passing out. Even when she spoke those, it indeed seemed she was accepting death.

Then Ogami suddenly realized. Maybe it's not necessarily true that she chose to live.

Maybe she just chose to to die on her own.

Maybe by saving my life in the end, she meant to make amends for the regret of letting Sumika die.

He must have had that mindset to thank. Because when the detective came to his room and informed him of Kasumi's death, he was able to hear it calmly.

Her body was discovered early yesterday morning, hanging in the woods a little over a mile from the riverside park. By the time it was reported and an emergency team arrived, she had already breathed her last.

The detective arrived just as the streetlights were starting to come on. Hearing the knock, Ogami opened the door, and saw him standing there emotionlessly. And he concisely informed him of Kasumi's death.

Ogami's reply was simply "I see."

"You're not surprised," the detective remarked. "Did you perhaps know this would happen from the start?"

If he wanted to smooth things over, there were plenty of ways to do so. But right now, Ogami didn't care about revealing the truth and putting himself in a risky spot. So he told him everything just as it was. Him being Kasumi's Sakura. Multiple Sakura being assigned to her. Exposing himself as a Sakura to her, and proposing a double suicide. Her confession about the truth of Sumika's death while carrying it out. And Kasumi having disappeared when he woke up.

"If her death were a murder, you'd be the first suspect," the detective said with a stunned expression. "And yet, you probably won't even be questioned. Since her death was clearly suicide, without a speck of doubt."

"Why do you know that much about the details?"

"Thanks to an acquaintance. I can guarantee it's reliable information."

Ogami went to the kitchen and heated up water to make coffee for two. Taking his coffee, the detective took a sip and continued.

"With Kasumi's death and what you just told me, I'm finally seeing the full picture of Sumika's death. There are still questions remaining, but those should be resolved soon enough."

"The full picture? Wasn't what Kasumi said everything?"

"If it were, then why did Kasumi decide to let you leave with your life?", the detective asked aloud. Then he sat down on the tatami floor and looked up at Ogami. "Sumika, Kujirai. Please, tell me what sort of relationship you had with those two. Honestly this time."

Ogami hesitated a bit, but decided to tell him everything. Maybe this man would be able to derive a different understanding from my past than I had. Maybe he would be able to repaint what that past had meant.

"They used to be my best friends," Ogami said. "Yet, it was only me who thought that, as in reality they were Sakura assigned to me. I became friends with Sumika in winter my first year of middle school, then Kujirai in spring of my second year. That relationship continued until winter of my third year. But prompted by me happening to witness a secret meeting of theirs, I began to suspect they were Sakura. Questioning them directly made them both admit it, so our relationship ended there."

Ogami also brought up how after hearing the teacher's story, he was no longer sure if Sumika had really been a Sakura. There was a possibility that Sumika Takasago had been no more than a mirror, and simply reflected back Ogami's suspicion. Meanwhile, there was no room for doubt that Kujirai was a Sakura. He'd left him a sharp parting remark of "I was always irritated by you."

After finishing his story, Ogami observed the detective's reaction. He felt maybe his explanation had been rather lacking and unclear, but the detective didn't have any questions or seek any supplements. Stroking his chin with the joint of his index finger, he was deep in earnest thought.

After a considerable silence, the detective said "I guess that does it."

"With what you just told me, I finally understand the truth about Sumika. There was no need to look for Kujirai from the start. If I'd just stubbornly pressed you, that would have taken care of it."

"How do you mean?", Ogami said. Even he was surprised by how loudly he spoke it. "Just what kind of answer did my side of the story lead you to?"

The detective smiled ambiguously, and put his hand to the floor to stand up. "It'll become clear sooner or later. You've already acquired plenty of material."

"I don't want to know sooner or later, I want to know now."

The detective shook his head. "I'll refrain from telling you everything myself. This kind of truth is better reached by your own power. If someone else told you it first, then it would become an already-read truth, so to speak. No matter how perfect second-hand goods look, you can't fully put your heart into them. That's why I'd prefer that you unseal it with your own hands. A brand new, unopened truth."

"I've been thinking about it myself this whole time. Yet I don't understand a single thing about what Sumika was thinking. Could you at least tell me something?"

"Then I'll give you a relatively harmless truth. If my prediction is accurate, you could wait here forever and not meet Kujirai."

With that, the detective left the room and shut the door.

I should probably be saddened, Ogami thought to himself. Because a girl who had once offered to put her fate in with mine had left this world on her own. But once the detective left the room, Ogami found he was already beginning to adjust to Kasumi's death. Of course it was a shame he'd never get to meet her again, but he got a sense that he'd only slightly accelerated a predestined farewell. Maybe part of that was because of what her father proclaimed.

Please don't trouble yourself over not being able to save Kasumi. She's been dead from the start. You've been holding onto a dead girl's hand.

And somewhere in Ogami's heart, he perceived Sumika and Kasumi as paired entities. Thus, Kasumi's death felt like an inevitable phenomenon that was an extension of Sumika's death.

It even made sense to consider that his relationship with Kasumi going so well was because she was dead from the start. There's no room for social phobia with the dead.

He accepted Kasumi's death, but it didn't bring this to an end. It seemed as if the detective had unraveled all the mysteries earlier, whereas Ogami had not. He still didn't know the truth behind Sumika nor Kasumi's death. Despite the claim that it would become clear sooner or later, it probably wasn't like someone would come and bring him the answer if he just sat around and twiddled his thumbs. It was up to Ogami, so that time could end up coming days from now, or even years from now.

Ogami decided to stay in the Town of Sakura until he could solve that mystery. For a few days afterward, he was racking his brain whenever he wasn't sleeping. If the detective was able to put together the truth of Sumika's death from Ogami's short story, that meant Ogami had been given what was necessary to arrive at the truth from the start. And then there was the meaning of "you could wait here forever and not meet Kujirai." Just by hearing about Ogami's middle school days, the detective concluded that he couldn't meet Kujirai - at least not in this apartment. Ogami's past connected not only to the truth of Sumika's death, but even Kujirai's whereabouts.

Was there really an element like that in my story? Where?

Ogami kept walking around town, ruminating upon his talk with the detective and his last conversation with Kasumi. And he scribbled every little thing he remembered or thought of in the notebook he'd bought from the variety store.

Compared to when he first moved into the apartment, the coldness in town had calmed a fair bit. The sky was dull and cloudy as usual, but even when it snowed, it stopped before it could pile up. Most of the snow the plow had moved to the side of the road had melted, and the blurred boundary between sidewalk and road finally showed itself. The people living in town were wearing fewer layers, making them look more refreshed.

It wasn't such a bad season to be thinking about the dead.

The key probably wasn't going to be that Sumika was my Sakura. It was that I had convinced myself she was my Sakura. There was a big difference between the two. Let's first recognize that I had made a mistake in assuming she was a Sakura. Unless I work from that premise, I'm likely never going to arrive at the truth. Just like I'd failed to do for these past seven years.

Sumika Takasago wasn't my Sakura - in that case, how should I interpret the last conversation we had? If Kasumi was to be believed, Sumika choosing to die in that riverside park was some kind of message to me, and she'd continued thinking about me even after graduating middle school. If that's true, then what in the world made her say "I didn't like you at all"?

Perhaps it was out of consideration for me. Maybe she heard my question of "You never really liked me at all, did you?" as "Let me have a clean breakup with no bitterness." Maybe she was just complying with that request and nothing more.

But supposing that's true, how does that connect to her death?

Ogami's thoughts reached a dead end there. Like the detective said, at this point he should practically have the answer, yet he was subconsciously avoiding a certain way of thinking. So it might be more accurate to say he didn't come to a dead end, but had stopped walking himself.

One evening in early April, a snowstorm came to town. It was a violent one, as if it were trying to drive back the approaching spring.

The snow fell all night, then finally stopped the next morning. It became markedly more cold inside the apartment, so Ogami didn't leave bed for a while after waking. When he finally did crawl out of his futon, he heated some water and made coffee, then removed his Handcuff to go out on the veranda and smoke while shivering. He hadn't even put on sandals, so the soles of his feet felt like they were getting frostbite. He'd expected as much, since he heard the sound of the snow plow early in the morning, but snow pushed from the road had been piled like sandbags in front of the apartment.

He couldn't get his car out like this, so he went outside, found the snow-shovel buried in snow, and began clearing the snow in front of the apartment. Creating enough of a path for one car to get out would have been sufficient, but Ogami didn't stop until he had cleaned out all the snow in the area. He felt that moving around actively might help him think. But when he finished the work, he was left with nothing but a heavy fatigue.

As he stuck the shovel in a snow pile and went to return to his room, Ogami noticed someone looking down at him from the second floor. It was a man aged enough that you'd hear no objections to calling him an "old man." He wore a gray knitted cap and a long wool coat. When he made eye contact with Ogami, he didn't look away, and slowly walked down the outside steps. Ogami prepared himself for some kind of complaint, but once the old man came close enough for them to see each other's faces clearly, he mumbled out words of thanks for his work. It seemed he only wanted to thank him for clearing the snow.

After nodding with satisfaction at the snow piles Ogami had made, he made a beckoning gesture and went up the apartment stairs without a word. Though his intentions were unclear, he seemed to want Ogami to come with him.

The old man opened a door at the end of the second floor hall, turned around to confirm that Ogami was following, then went inside. He supposed the man was saying "come on in."

The room was a mess. A cylindrical oil heater sat in the center of the room, and lots of small things were scattered all around it. What most drew Ogami's attention were the piles of leaflets and newspapers. They were piled in a disorderly manner in the corners of the room, towering high. If there happened to be a fire here, the flames would probably spread in an instant. To make matters worse, the heater wasn't the only source of fire; there were used lighters on the floor here and there. The old man appeared to be a heavy smoker, as the whole room smelled of cigarettes. It was like the smoking area of an old Japanese inn.

The old man made tea in a kettle on the heater. It was average, unremarkable roasted green tea, but having it after working in the cold outside made it taste much more delicious. He'd been having nothing but coffee lately, so the simple flavor was kind on his tongue.

"How long you been living here?", the old man questioned. "Not that long, right?"

Ogami replied that he'd been here two months, though even he didn't remember exactly.

"The guy who was in your room before was a young man about your age too," the old man said as if recounting something from decades past. "Didn't notice for a while that you'd taken his place."

"That man was an acquaintance of mine," Ogami explained. "What was he like when he was staying here?"

"He shoveled snow," the old man said. "Every time there was heavy snow, he'd silently clean up the snow by himself. Think even that shovel you were using was his personal property. We talked once, but he was a shy fellow for his age."

The old man removed his Handcuff and took out a cigarette to light. Ogami was briefly taken by how smoothly he performed it, like only a person who's smoked for decades could.

"And he was away all the time," the old man said after flicking some ash. "He was a quiet guy anyway, so I didn't often notice if he was gone, but sometimes his car would be missing for days straight."

Ogami nodded. He couldn't expect much important information from him.

Once he was unable to remember anything else about Kujirai, the old man looked to the window and changed topics to the snow. The snow this year's been particularly bad, but there was an even worse year about three decades ago, he said. Fallen trees blocked roads everywhere, with the town becoming as isolated as an island for a week. There were power and water outages too, so with nothing else to do, he just drank with his friends constantly.

As the old man went to light another cigarette after coming to a pause in the story, Ogami thanked him for the tea and went to leave. Then the old man called after him.

"Hey. Why didn't I ever speak to you until today, do you think?"

Ogami shook his head to suggest he didn't know. He didn't even have a guess.

"'Cause I suspected you might be a Sakura," the old man said. "One of them actors who pretends to be a good neighbor to help pitiful old folk. When you live like this in a place like this, sometimes they'll send 'em your way. Not even realizing it's a hundred times more miserable than just leaving 'em be. So no matter who it is, I always watch 'em for a while. I carefully poke around to look for anything unnatural about their attitude, anything that seems forced. Seemed like you weren't checkin' on me - hell, you didn't even notice I existed. That's why I finally felt like talking to ya."

Ogami nodded wordlessly, and left the old man's room behind.

There was no chance the man would believe him if he said how painfully he understood that feeling. Rather, it would just further agitate his Sakura Delusion.

After returning to his room, Ogami imagined the life of that old man on the upper floor, living in isolation. It wasn't clear which came first; did Sakura Delusion make his life solitary, or did a solitary life invite Sakura Delusion? Either way, it was clear that if I kept on like this, I'd lead a similar life to that old man. The deeper your isolation, the higher the odds that Sakura will appear, furthering your delusion and thus your isolation.

If anything could save that old man - if anything could save us - what could possibly kick things off? If a person we could be 100% convinced wasn't a Sakura came out of nowhere and showered us with generous affection, could we be saved?

Most likely not. At that point, we'd just have to confront a new fear. We would be struck down by an obvious truth: people can put on acts and betray you even if they aren't Sakura.

Maybe what was keeping us locked in wasn't misdirected fear, but misdirected longing.

Ogami closed his eyes and recalled every individual thing he saw in the old man's room. The heavy oil heater, piles of newspapers and leaflets, tatami mats covered in stains, a tea table worn at the edges, a teacup stained from tea, a ceiling yellowed by long years of smoking. It was possible he was carrying out a protracted suicide in that room. Maybe the piles of newspapers and leaflets were meant as kindling for his own cremation.

Once he'd formed that picture, Ogami's focus suddenly turned toward his own room. Come to think of it, he'd never received leaflets of any sort since coming to this room. There were mailboxes for the apartments, but with them being in a hard-to-notice spot, he'd forgotten they existed until just now. Since he'd expected his stay in this apartment to be temporary, he hadn't forwarded his mail. So he probably hadn't received anything important there. That said, maybe the mailbox was overflowing with leaflets now.

He confirmed his mailbox number on the documents he received when moving in, and went to the communal mailboxes. He turned the dial and opened his up. There were only a few leaflets inside. Ogami bundled them up, closed the box, and headed back to his room.

Then something fell out of the bundle of leaflets, and landed in the snow.

Ogami bent down to pick it up.

It was a key. Judging from the size and shape, probably a car key.

And he knew from the moment he saw it that it had been left by Kujirai.

The key was attached to a keychain. It was a leather keychain shaped like a shoehorn, with a luster unique to leather that had been used for a long time.

It was the one Ogami had bought at the variety store seven years ago as a gift for Kujirai.

He finally knew where the paper bag went. That day he overheard the two conversing in the garage, he'd accidentally left the paper bag with the presents beside the garage. And Kujirai found it.

That was all well and good.

But the fact this keychain was here now meant that until just recently, he'd been using this gift from Ogami.

It didn't make any sense. Didn't Kujirai despise me?

He stood in front of the mailboxes for a while, holding the key in his hand.

At any rate, Kujirai wouldn't be coming back here. He must have left this key here because he already had no use for it.

There's no point in me having something like this.

Maybe I should just throw this away somewhere, Ogami thought.

And let that be the end, so I can forget all about it.

He decided to discard the key at the riverside park, where Sumika, Kasumi, and Ogami had all chosen to die. He felt it would be best for such fateful things to all be bundled together.

He parked in the parking lot, smoked a cigarette, and went outside. There was no sign of people in the park, as usual. Sticking his hands in the pockets of his duffle coat, Ogami walked through wet snow toward the river bank.

Bordered by snow, the river was dark, and flowed quietly. Ogami grasped the key in his pocket. As he was about to put his hand up and fling the key into the river, some snow piled on a tree branch above fell down in front of him. A heavy thump like a sandbag dropping echoed through the quiet park, and a spray of snow filled up his field of vision.

If he'd been just a few feet further ahead, he would have really felt the snow coming down on him. To check the safety of where he was standing, Ogami looked above him,

and there, he saw a sakura bud colored a faint red.

Thinking about it, this park had initially appeared before us in a way entirely unrelated to death.

Kujirai had been the one who suggested going to meet the cherry blossoms that day. We tried going south toward the cherry blossom front, so as to see them in full bloom sooner. Ultimately we took the wrong bus, and instead saw the blossoms in this park a few days later, but if not for that, we would have gone and met the cherry blossoms on that day, April 10th.

And as fate would have it, today was indeed April 10th.

He felt that Kujirai was waiting for him, at the boundary between buds and blossoms.

[+]

12

Ogami drove absentmindedly down the highway late at night, passing commercial vehicles and large trucks. He didn't put on music or the radio, focusing on driving. The monotonous sight of road lights spaced evenly apart sped past him as if flying by.

After traveling about half the distance, the navigation system suggested taking a break. He was conscious of his driving becoming sloppier, and getting in an accident now would be a total loss, so he went to a rest stop and parked the car. He bought canned coffee from a vending machine and headed to the smoking area. He searched around his hips for a cigarette, realized there wasn't a pocket where there usually was, then remembered how he'd gotten new clothes before getting on the highway. He'd hurried over to a department store just before it closed, and bought a new jacket, sweater, and shoes to wear.

It was strange. He had never bothered about his clothes when he was with Kasumi, yet the moment he decided to meet Kujirai, he suddenly started caring about his appearance. I can't show myself in front of Kujirai looking so shameful, he thought. I guess at this point, I'm afraid of disappointing him. Despite having cut ties with him long ago.

Even if I were going to meet Sumika, I probably wouldn't have worried much about clothes then either. Feeling that tension only for meeting Kujirai was probably because we were both men. The fact that we half-shared a set of values meant that we would pick up on more things than necessary.

Ogami put his hands in his pockets and lightly stretched the herringbone fabric, adjusting the jacket to his body. He didn't wear anything on top of the jacket, expecting it to get gradually warmer as he headed south, but right now, even after getting some distance from the Town of Sakura, his fingertips shivered, and the first puff of his cigarette had a whiteness that wasn't just the smoke. He couldn't call it great weather for going to see cherry blossoms, but regardless, they were already blooming in most parts of the country.

He discarded his cigarette butt and returned to the car, and woken up by the night air, thought about things again. What am I trying to do right now? Am I really correct in my prediction that Kujirai's at the cherry blossom front? I had no guarantee. In fact, you might as well call it total conjecture.

We're strangely aligned in those sorts of ways. That was my only basis.

He hurried to cover the remaining distance. When he opened the window, a cigarette in his mouth, he noticed the wind having a clearly different quality from before. It was somewhat soft, carrying a portent of spring's arrival.

He got off the highway at the GPS's suggestion, and after a few dozen minutes driving through downtown streets, he finally reached his destination. The bus stop stood in front of a massive bridge on the outskirts of town. Ogami went over to the side of the road and turned off the engine. The instant the headlights flicked off, the area was swallowed by darkness. He reached in his pocket to produce a flashlight, opened the door, and left the car. Now, he could clearly detect the scent he'd noticed when he opened the window earlier.

First, he did a stretch on the spot, loosening his stiff body after hours of driving. Retying the shoelaces of his unfamiliar leather shoes, then stomping the ground with his heel to judge its condition, he locked the car and walked to the bus stop. Sitting down on a crude plastic seat some random person had probably placed there, he lit a cigarette.

Well then, what to do now?

He pondered for a while with his cigarette, and concluded he should check to see if there were cherry blossoms in bloom in the area. He'd been driving down rural streets without much lighting, so he had been unable to afford to keep an eye out along the way.

He didn't see any such trees in the vicinity of the bus stop. Of course, Ogami wouldn't be able to recognize sakura trees if they didn't have blossoms on them, so he may have technically found one and just didn't realize it. At any rate, it was clear there were no sakura currently in bloom.

After taking one more look around the area, Ogami started walking into the dark, opposite the direction of the lights from town - following his gut feeling that this was what Kujirai would do.

With each step, the road became rougher, and the smell of greenery became thicker. After climbing a hill in search of a good vantage point, he spotted thin stairs coming from the side of the road between some thickets. They were old stairs made from logs, all of which were tilted to various angles. As if being guided, Ogami climbed up those stairs.

At the top of the long stairs stood a torii gate, indicating that it was the path to a shrine. It was a small shrine, as if it were built incidentally to something else. Ogami stopped in front of the torii to catch his breath. The paint on it had been stripped away by years of wind and rain, and the knotted rope connecting the two pillars was frayed, looking like it could break at any moment. At the top was writing that could have been the name of the shrine, but it had been worn away and become indecipherable.

Along the unpaved road past the gate, there were rows of the trees he had come here for.

Sakura.

Beneath the moonlight, their blossoms radiated a slight pale light. The flowers gently shaking in the night breeze made Ogami think of phosphorescent bugs on ocean waves. At this dark and desolate shrine, that pale light alone had a strange sense of vitality.

For a while, Ogami stood on the road and looked up at the sakura. Sometimes he was struck by a feeling like dizziness. It was like the flow of time itself was stretching and contracting to match the irregular movement of the branches. So he didn't know exactly how long he was standing there.

Truthfully, he'd noticed it from the start. Just after going through the torii gate, he caught a glimpse of something in the shadow of the shrine building. He was just unable to head over there right away for two reasons: disorientation from his half-wishful-thinking intuition having struck home, and a sense of reluctance that something significant was coming to an end.

Even so, he couldn't turn back after coming this far. Ogami traversed the road to the shrine and went around to the back. And he stood in front of a car in the corner of the premises, covered by fallen leaves. It was the same color and model as the one Ogami had driven here. Only the license plate number differed. It was no wonder the old man hadn't noticed one being replaced by the other for a while.

The key from the mailbox fit perfectly in the driver's-side door. When he turned it, the door unlocked with a grandiose sound. He opened it up and got in the car. After adjusting the seat's position and angle so he could relax in it, he let out a big sigh.

Of course, the car's owner was absent. The ashtray was filled with cigarette butts, but none of them felt like they were recent. Judging from the amount of fallen leaves on the car, it had been neglected here for a long time. A smell that was a mix of oil and rust filled the car.

It was hard to imagine Kujirai would leave his own car in a place like this. Even if some circumstance forced him to dispose of it, he wouldn't choose a method that left it to rot from exposure to the elements like this. He was that kind of guy. He could only imagine something happened to him after he got out of his car here.

Ogami gave the car a thorough search. He even checked under the seats and floor mats, but found not a single thing that would connect to Kujirai's whereabouts.

After exhausting all the places he could check, as he gave up and went to light a cigarette, he suddenly thought of something. Using his nails to lift up the handle pocket in the driver's side door, he easily removed the pocket part. And beneath it, he found a small cloth bag.

It was the exact same method Ogami used to hide coins in his own car.

Inside the bag was a notebook small enough to fit in your pocket.

After playing with the notebook in his hand for a while, Ogami pointed the flashlight at it, and pulled back the front cover.

*

I thought about writing a letter and sending it to you. But even I couldn't come to a decision about whether the truth I would've written in that letter was what I really wanted you to know. I even felt like it might be best to keep it all hidden to the end.

So I'm writing it in this journal, and hiding it in the car. It's more likely than not that no one will ever find and read it. More to the point, maybe the situation I'm fearing won't even happen. And even if it does, you might never learn that fact. And even if you do learn it, you might not even pay it any mind. And even if you do pay it mind, you might not bother to come back to town. And even if you do come back... in that way, there's a whole lot of "if"s you have to get past before you arrive at this car. Even if we did always align in weird ways, I'd say there's a 10% chance, tops. Because you might even make it all the way here, and just not figure out this hiding spot.

But it's better that way. When I think about how no one might ever read this, it makes me shockingly willing to be honest. If I knew for certain it'd be read, I'd subconsciously rewrite the story. I might depict myself as a victim. Or go the other direction, putting together an excessively self-punishing story. Even though really, I don't regret anything.

Really, what I should've done was tell you everything years ago. I didn't, solely because I didn't want to hand Sumika over to you. (Writing it that way feels a bit dramatic and silly to me, but that's exactly how it was, so what can you do?)

But to be clear so there's no misunderstanding, just because I didn't want to hand Sumika over to you didn't mean I wanted to make her mine, either. Of course I thought how great it would be if things could be that way, but I also thought it was fine that it wasn't.

To tell you the circumstances without any misunderstandings, I'll probably have to explain the relationship between me and Sumika from the start. But I'm just no good at explaining stuff in an orderly fashion, so I'll put the most important answers first.

Was Sumika your Sakura?

Nope, she wasn't.

Was I your Sakura?

Nope, I wasn't.

As far as I could tell, you didn't have any Sakura around you back then.

And the next question you've probably got after that: Then why did Sumika leave you?

The answer's something like this. Sumika was convinced you were a Sakura, too.

Of course, it's not like it was like that from the start. Until you pushed Sumika away, she thought of you as a real friend.

No, she thought you were her only real friend.

Sure enough, just writing the conclusion won't help you understand anything, huh.

Where to begin?

Let's start from the violin lessons.

When I was six, I went to violin lessons in the next town over. It was an economical sort of class, with the instructor using her own house as a classroom to teach about 15 students for a cheap tuition. My parents didn't have any musical grounding at all, which might be why they wanted their only son to get an education.

The lessons were only at night on weekdays at the instructor's convenience. At the time, I had no interest in violin itself, but I liked the special feeling of having an early dinner after coming home from school, then getting in the car to go to another town. It was like getting a second shorter day added to the end of a day.

Both my parents worked, and couldn't drive me a lot of nights, so I often rode with other students in their cars. There was a kid at school who happened to go to the same violin classes, and I often took lessons with her already, so it was convenient.

That kid's name was Sumika Takasago, which is to say we knew each other since we were six. Though I doubt it looked that way to your eyes.

During our car rides together, Sumika's mother was good at mediating between us. My first impression of Sumika was that she talked in a mature way. What she talked about wasn't necessarily mature, but something about the way she put out her voice, or her sense of timing when giving minor responses, felt clearly different from other kids our age. Like she had her screws in tight, so to speak. And if necessary, she could loosen those screws too.

But when the instructor and her mother left their seats and Sumika was left alone with me, she instantly became like a different person. After lessons, Sumika's mother was always talking at length with the violin teacher. So she had us go back to the car first to wait for her, and when that happened, Sumika always acted as if I didn't exist.

I figured that she was putting on an act around her mother and the instructor, and actually hated or scorned me. Even if we were getting the same teaching, I clearly didn't learn as well as her, and that kept her lessons from making much progress too. She was probably so irritated deep down that she wanted nothing to do with me, I thought.

But when I was being ignored by Sumika, I strangely didn't feel that bad. In a dark car with the engine off, a girl my age wearing real fancy clothes ignoring me with a demure look - it kind of just seemed right, in its own way. I'm not self-deprecating myself here. In fact, now it feels like something I could call "picturesque." And just being included in that picture was comfortable enough for me.

Lots of pictures like that are etched into my memory. Composed as if I'm a third party looking on from outside the car, with a backdrop that varied based on the season, but the two of us inside invariably being the same. A girl in the right back seat looking out the window listlessly, and a boy in the left back seat glancing at that girl out of the corner of his eye.

You could say the relationship between me and Sumika never moved from that composition up to the very end.

Two years after I started going to violin lessons, they suddenly decided to stop doing them. I don't remember the reason. Maybe the instructor just got tired of it, since the whole thing had always sorta been a hobby for her. It was a shame to lose the opportunity to go out at night, but I was getting pretty tired of violin myself since I wasn't getting any better, so part of me was relieved.

After my final lesson, the instructor said she had something to talk about with Sumika and had me leave first. Since Sumika had a sense for music, I'd imagine it was something about recommending she still keep up with music afterward.

That was the first instance of me and Sumika's mother waiting in the car for Sumika. Unlike her daughter, I saw no reason why her attitude should change when it was just us, but she was oddly reticent that day. I imagined she was wondering what the instructor was talking with Sumika about, but that was wrong.

Sumika's mother suddenly turned around in the driver's seat to face me, and spoke with a strained look. "She doesn't have any friends she can call friends, so I hope you'll keep getting along with her." "Because you're the only one she seems to open her heart to, Shogo."

I was stunned - like, what was she saying? Sumika having no friends, that I could get. But she only opened her heart to me? However you looked at it, she was decisively shutting it, wasn't she? To say nothing of when we were alone, even when her mother was mediating a conversation between us, she didn't seem to be enjoying herself by any means. If that's "getting along," then I must be getting along with everybody in the world.

Regardless, I replied "understood." I'd never had a serious request made of me by an actual adult before, and I did owe her for driving me in her car for two years. I figured odds were it wouldn't go well, but I decided I'd try to do what I could.

Next year, me and Sumika ended up in the same class for the first time. Her mother was right: she didn't seem to have any friends worth calling friends. I was a kid who was more unsociable than not, but with Sumika, it wasn't even a matter of sociability. Even in class, she behaved like she was the only person in the world, same as when she was alone with me in the car. It wasn't like she denied others either, since she'd respond normally if you talked to her, and thank you if you did something kind, but she never attempted to communicate by herself without being made to by a considerable amount of necessity.

When I saw Sumika like that, I remember feeling relieved more than surprised. "So she wasn't just ignoring me specifically," y'know. Maybe her mother's claim that she only opened her heart to me wasn't necessarily untrue.

So I started trying to get close to Sumika by trial and error. What motivated me then wasn't a sense of duty nor goodwill, but curiosity. I thought friends were something you just made naturally, so that unnatural way of forming a relationship felt fresh. I thought back on how I'd come to befriend all my current friends, and considered what'd happen if I tried those out on Sumika. I knew she wouldn't become friends with me over any old thing, so I made careful preparations. I wanna say I even ignored classes, thinking only about Sumika.

I knew I couldn't be hasty. If you try to quickly close the distance with someone like Sumika, you'll raise alarm bells and make her go into her shell. So I moved as carefully as if I was walking a minefield. I didn't have much self-control at the time, like any kid my age, but when it came to Sumika, I was able to exhibit surprising patience. Well, though half of it might have been me losing my nerve.

We changed classes twice in the four years up to graduation, but me and Sumika were never separated. I wonder if the school was trying to ensure Sumika wouldn't be isolated. Not to say my relationship with Sumika was much more than "technically having interaction," but I was still doing a bit better than anybody else.

Over four years, I feel like the distance between us was lessened by about three centimeters. Whether you should take that as "only three centimeters or "a whole three centimeters" depends on your point of view. As usual, she wouldn't say anything unless you drew it out of her, but when pressed into mingling with classmates by some circumstance, she'd come to depend on me, strictly by process of elimination. That was all. But that alone was big progress in her case.

Even if everyone other than herself was a potato to her, I was the finest potato of them all.

That was enough for me. As long as no better potatoes showed up.

Just what I've written so far probably doesn't adequately communicate Sumika's idiosyncrasies. Truthfully, I think Sumika wasn't that peculiar of a person back then. She wouldn't become full-on strange until a little later.

That being said, it wasn't like there weren't signs as early as elementary school, either. I noticed them when watching as a third party as she talked to someone else.

There were other students besides me who attempted to get close with Sumika. About once every six months, some fearless individual would ardently approach Sumika to become her friend. Sumika did have an attractive force to her - but I guess that doesn't need explaining for you at this point.

I didn't try to force my way into such situations, instead just carefully watching Sumika to see if I could learn anything of use. I was curious what sort of reaction the forceful approach I'd been avoiding would elicit from her.

To cut to the chase, it did in fact have the opposite effect: the deeper the interest someone directed at her, the more Sumika seemed to lose interest in them. But that much I knew from the start. What I found odd was the movement of her eyes.

One day, I noticed that when forced into undesirable communication, Sumika wouldn't look at that person, but instead look toward unrelated people who happened to be present. Almost like the person talking to her was just a representative, and actually it was everyone present who was talking to her.

By now, you might know what that means. But I didn't know at the time. I thought nothing more of it than "she probably doesn't like being seen talking to people."

After advancing to middle school, Sumika's personality mellowed a fair bit. She made a few female friends, and blended into the classroom like a normal girl. Sure enough, when you get to around that age, you start running into more practical problems if you don't have friends. She probably found she couldn't be looking demure by herself anymore. I should've accepted it as a favorable change, but it was also a lonely one for me. Making new friends meant fewer chances for her to rely on me.

However, it was clear even as an onlooker than Sumika wasn't opening her heart to those makeshift friends. The walls around her remained as thick as ever; she just started having exchanges with those outside the walls. That put me at ease a bit.

With the change in situation, new tactics for talking to her became necessary. The role of a kind boy speaking to a lonely classmate wouldn't work anymore. Thus, I acted out a sort of sibling-like relationship, suggesting to others at every turn how me and Sumika had a connection since youth. Thanks in part to us not having many common acquaintances in our new class, the act was reasonably successful. I could hang around her all I wanted, and everyone would accept it as natural. I imagine Sumika was the one person bewildered, though.

Needless to say, by then I'd started perceiving Sumika in a romantic way. I adored every little thing that comprised her. I clearly comprehended that I wouldn't be given anything greater than this in my life to come.

To this day, I still think that instinct in itself was accurate. Even if I was wrong about everything else.

For you, the decisive turning point may have been that winter in the third year of middle school, but the first turning point for me came two years earlier, in the winter of our first year.

You remember the skating classes during winter break, I'm sure. The ones the three of us slacked off at as second-years. Well, when we were first-years, me and Sumika took them seriously.

While I pretended to be fooling around with a male friend, I was paying attention to Sumika the entire time. The bunch she usually hung out with all had lousy reflexes, hardly accomplishing anything on the rink before they retired to the bench and chatted up a storm. Sumika alone remained on the rink, sliding around silently.

While searching for an opportunity to talk to her, a boy from another class took a big tumble in front of Sumika. He'd probably been trying to pull off some fancy move. She nearly fell over herself trying to avoid it, but just barely kept her footing. But it seemed she sprained her leg in the process. Her face contorting in pain, she put a hand on the wall and exited the rink, dragging her leg along.

Not wanting to pass up this opportunity, I went after Sumika. Standing in front of her as she untied her skates on the bench, I asked where she'd hurt herself. Sumika bluntly replied that it was no big deal, she was just resting a little, but I sat down next to her anyway.

For ten minutes, we watched the skating rink together in silence. Before I knew it, the sun was setting, and the rink lights came on. The dry sound of skate blades cutting along the ice and the youthful laughter of our classmates sounded oddly distant. There was a whole crowd of people just over there, yet it felt like I was alone with Sumika again after so long. The silence had the same feel to it as the silence in the car back then.

Thinking about it, that was the first time Sumika opened her mouth first.

"You don't have to force yourself to be nice to me," Sumika said. With her eyes still fixed on the rink, sounding a little apologetic.

I recited a pre-prepared line: I'm not forcing myself, I just wanted to take a break too.

"That's not what I mean," Sumika said with irritation.

Then I decided to be honest. I'm not intending to be kind, I'm just doing it because I want to be next to you. But if you feel bothered by it, I'll stop that too.

She was silent for a while. Personally, I saw it as the best profession of my love I could've managed at the time. It came out of my mouth much more smoothly than I'd imagined. To the point that I only realized what it meant after saying it.

I felt like I'd anticipated every possible response. Whether she accepted or rejected my goodwill, and whatever way she chose to express it, I wouldn't be surprised.

"An exemplary answer," Sumika said with a dry laugh.

An exemplary answer?

Unable to understand the intent of her words, I felt her rapidly growing distant from me.

Perhaps the gutter between us was far deeper and wider than I'd imagined, I thought to myself.

From the other side of that gutter, she asked me, with eyes full of conviction:

"You're a prompter, aren't you?"

Even as a middle-schooler, I knew about the prompter system. And that said system was producing sufferers of Sakura Delusion. So that single line from her thawed everything out. The many mysteries that surrounded her were explained in an instant.

This girl had Sakura Delusion. And a very serious case of it.

She saw everyone other than herself as a Sakura.

She was convinced everyone was putting on an act in front of her.

She peered deep into my eyes. As if trying to determine the size of the ripples her question sent through me. And she saw clearly how great my unrest was. Taking that as a tacit affirmation, she lonesomely muttered "Sure enough."

Ever since that day, I've thought about it again and again: if I had immediately dispelled her suspicion then, would things have played out differently later? But that was a meaningless question.

"She doesn't have any friends she can call friends, so I hope you'll keep getting along with her."

Whatever my feelings were now, that was where it all started.

I absolutely was a Sakura, with the sole difference being who put me up to it. Unless I were a first-rate actor, there would be no hiding that guiltiness.

Before I could recover from my confusion, she retied her skates and returned to the rink. I couldn't go after her. There was something I had to think about first: my next strategy. A paradoxical approach that was, indeed, based upon the fact she suffered from serious Sakura Delusion.

Even after winter break ended, I didn't change how I interacted with Sumika. I didn't take any action at all to clear her suspicion that I was a Sakura. In fact, I actively did things that supported her suspicions.

Whenever someone showed signs of approaching Sumika, just like her mother had done, I made a request of them while Sumika wasn't around: "That girl doesn't have friends, so get along with her for me." Those who accepted the request were more friendly to Sumika than necessary, so detecting the scent of a Sakura, she forcefully shut the door on them.

In that way, I provided fertilizer for her Sakura Delusion.

Since I couldn't make Sumika mine, was I trying to create a situation where she couldn't belong to anyone? That was certainly one angle to it. In fact, that pretty much is where it started from. But it's hard to imagine a negative motivation like that is what let me persist for nearly a decade.

Did I have a grudge against Sumika for not becoming mine, and was I trying to dispel that grudge by trapping her in her shell? That's not it either. I hadn't been irritated with her. Not even once, to this very day.

Most likely, I think that upon learning about Sumika's Sakura Delusion, I fell in love with her - Sakura Delusion and all.

To preserve the Sakura Delusion that made up her core. That was more or less my aim.

However, in February, my scheme quickly started to collapse.

That's right. Sumika reached out to you.

Of course, it was the first time I'd seen her do such a thing to anyone but me.

For about a month after that, I kept a little distance from Sumika. Collecting data from afar, I tried to determine the nature of your relationship. But that was really only secondary; I think I was actually afraid to compare your attitude toward Sumika with my own. So I temporarily pretended like I'd lost interest in Sumika.

You know what happened from there. Using the play, I approached you and formed a friendly relationship. Of course, I did that so I could observe you up close. I had to do whatever it took to figure out what about you charmed her.

At a glance, you were a somewhat gloomy middle school boy you could find anywhere. It's not like you had any notable faults, but no particular merits either. Still, you must have had some secret I didn't know about. With some nature that was beyond us, or some method we couldn't imagine, you must have busted through the thick walls surrounding Sumika.

Yet the more I learned about you, the deeper the mystery grew. As closely as I observed, I couldn't find a single special thing about you - just like me.

Yes, you were like me. Of course I could name plenty of differences if I wanted. But at our root, we were similar enough to be long-lost brothers. Not on a surface level, like our personalities or tastes or whatever. We have the same core. So even if our routes differ, we always end up at the same place.

In the end, maybe it was nothing more than chance. Even your remark about Kozaki wasn't a decisive factor, nor was the classroom isolation that resulted from it. You don't have any decisive factor, on the outside or the inside.

But through the interplay of different factors, you just happened to pull at Sumika's heartstrings.

It placed you outside of her Sakura Delusion.

I think maybe that's the truth.

In other words, I just didn't have that luck.

From there, a year and a half passed in a blink. My instinct was telling me that if things kept on like this, you and I would be lifelong friends. That part was something to be welcomed. But us being lifelong friends meant I'd have front-row seats to your romance with Sumika. I would continue to have the thing I couldn't get thrust in my face, and yet wouldn't be able to hate you as I writhed in agony.

That said, if I ditched you, Sumika would unmistakably go with you. I'd half-given up, thinking, do I just have to sit here and twiddle my thumbs?

It was right around then when Sakura Delusion started to bud in your head.

Because I'd seen a case like Sumika's up close, I noticed it right away. Maybe her delusions were infecting you without you realizing. Or maybe me performing in front of you as an actor somehow kicked things off.

I decided I'd do the same thing I did to Sumika to you. I'd water your Sakura Delusion into a fine tree. You'd become like Sumika had been. A solitary tree in the wild, unable to believe anyone, unable to love anyone.

I weighed something like love and something like friendship on a scale, and the scale easily tipped toward the love-like something. My priorities had become clear.

Once your Sakura Delusion was sufficiently grown, I called Sumika to the garage. And I told her that I was a Sakura, as well as suggesting that you were too. As if it had just slipped out of my mouth after giving a serious confession.

The degree to which this shook Sumika was immeasurable. I had never seen her that out of sorts before. She said that was a lie, and tried to make me admit it. But I calmly threw one line after another at her to agitate her Sakura Delusion with pinpoint accuracy. Finally, she burst into tears like a child, and ran out of the garage.

I don't know how exactly the fateful moment came after that. But some day or another, it seemed Sumika had a decisive breakup with you.

I felt no guilt. I just thought everything had been returned to how it should be.

For now, I'm relieved to have written up to the important part.

I'll try to keep the rest brief.

Sumika and I went on to the same high school. She'd gone back into her shell like before. She stood emotionlessly on the train platform every morning, didn't speak to anyone - me included - and left before anyone else once class was over. She stayed at home on days off, not meeting anyone. She got skinnier by the day, and her eyes glazed over.

But there was something clearly different between elementary school Sumika and high school Sumika. Her eyes had always looked distantly, but before, it wasn't as if her gaze was looking at something. She was just averting her eyes from something nearby. But now, she was looking straight at something far in the distance.

One winter morning, Sumika was standing alone on the train platform like usual, and I looked at her from some ways away. As she stared into the middle distance, it looked as if she were waiting for something other than the train. She wasn't waiting for the snow to stop, nor for spring to arrive. It was like she was continuing to patiently wait for someone who wasn't showing at the appointed meeting spot.

Something struck me then. Maybe she's waiting for a Sakura to appear.

Of course, any person looked like a Sakura to her. But that was limited to people she interacted with on a regular basis. To turn that around, it meant she didn't see people with no relation to her as Sakura. Between those two ends, she probably recognized people she used to have a relation to as "ex-Sakura."

Normally, when an individual is at high risk of suicide, a Sakura is selected from the people close to them. But what if there isn't a single such person around? The System would still have to pick someone anyway, wouldn't it? Surely the standards for "close" just drop lower and lower, and it becomes about picking the least bad option.

For instance, a former best friend you cut ties with.

Essentially, I considered this: What if by driving herself into a corner and limiting her relationships to the extreme, Sumika was trying to narrow down the possible Sakura candidates to a single person?

What if she was thinking, "if Ogami can become my Sakura again, I can start it all over from scratch"?

Yes, by then, Sumika's plan had already begun.

After graduating high school, I went to the same college as Sumika. My parents had to sell the house and leave town to look after my grandparents, but I rented a cheap apartment to stay in town.

The one regret I had about leaving the house was that garage. Even after you and Sumika stopped coming, I spent a lot of time in that garage. I watched movies by myself, ate popcorn by myself, boiled in the heat by myself, shivered in the cold by myself. I never once invited any high school friends there. Maybe I felt like if I did invite someone, something similar would happen all over again.

Four or five days after saying goodbye to the garage and moving to the apartment, an unfamiliar envelope was delivered to me.

I had been selected by the System to officially become Sumika's Sakura.

I don't know whether God loves me or what, but at least the System was on my side. I thought, I've been given a valid reason to walk by her side.

If Sumika was in fact trying to call you back as a Sakura like I expected, I would unmistakably be the greatest obstacle to that happening. As long as I did my duty as a Sakura diligently, the odds of a second one being sent to her were low. If Sumika had really wanted to die, it would be a different story, but I'm sorry to say that she had hope. It was no more than a feigned desire for suicide. When she looked out into the distance, she was looking forward to a life with you.

In autumn that year, Sumika joined the acting troupe. Having a comprehensive grasp of her tendencies, I'd joined them in advance. There were auditions of a sort, but I got through them without difficulty. I was always skilled at acting, and my twisted relationship with Sumika and you had gotten me used to falsifying myself.

And yet sure enough, Sumika was the one with far more talent as an actor. All the world was a stage to her. From as early as she could remember - or perhaps since she learned about the concept of prompters - she recognized the people around her as actors, and watched their every move. And she carefully observed what behaviors of her own drew out what reactions. I was no match for someone like that.

Through her work in the troupe, Sumika was slowly recovering from the wound inflicted by leaving you. All the people in the troupe were putting on some sort of act at all times. And because they didn't even try to hide this fact, it must have given her Sakura Delusion relief. Maybe going to the side of deception lessened her fear of being deceived. Beginning to give up on getting you back, she was adapting to real life in her own way.

Though I took care to not let her Sakura Delusion wither completely, I was honestly delighted that she'd recovered enough to once again respond when I called to her. My ideal Sumika was the way she'd been in elementary school, and she attained a similar state once she started fitting into the troupe. I prayed that it could last as long as possible.

Even after I successfully pulled you apart from Sumika, I was always afraid. I was constantly having bad dreams that woke me up in the middle of the night. What if one of you arrived at the truth someday? If you knew it was all a trap I'd laid, you could have reconciled in the blink of an eye. Having lost each other for a time would make your affection even stronger, and this time there'd be no gap for me to wedge myself into.

But two, three years went by, and seeing no sign that your relationship would be repaired, my wariness gradually eased up. Sumika had kept wanting you all that time, but didn't realize that you (probably) kept wanting her too. Both convinced you were the one who had been abandoned, you constructed a life based around that misunderstanding.

I stopped hanging around Sumika 24/7, frequently going on long trips. Even I'm not sure why I started doing that. It's certainly not because I wanted to get away from Sumika, but that said, I wasn't running from myself either. Maybe I just realized I'd been stuck in the same place for too long, and it was a kickback from that.

Two years after joining the troupe, by the time even I'd nearly forgotten that I was the culprit behind you two separating, the gears suddenly meshed in Sumika's head. As if she'd been waiting a long time for my guard to lower.

At the time, Sumika was acting in a famous play. She wasn't the lead or anything, but it was a pretty significant role for someone who tended to work backstage. It was a common tragedy about a man and woman having a misunderstanding and both losing their lives, and she played the role of a short man who tries to make peace between the couple, but who neither will listen to.

While she was reciting the lines on stage, her voice suddenly came to a halt - of course, I wasn't present for this, so I'd only heard about it.

Sumika had never forgotten her lines even once before, so at first everyone thought it was an ad-lib. But the silence went on too long for that. She stood there frozen for ages. One of the members whispered the rest of the line to her, but it didn't reach her ears. She was completely inattentive, and didn't move a muscle.

That night, Sumika visited my apartment. And she begged me: please, tell me the truth. Were you and Ogami really my Sakura?

I relented quickly, telling her everything. After revealing the truth, I remember feeling pretty relieved. Like being the last guy in hide-and-seek who's finally found past evening.

Despite learning that I'd been deceiving her for years, she wasn't irritated. She didn't rejoice that you didn't hate her after all, nor lament the fact that she'd hurt you; she just looked at me with eyes of pity.

And so Sumika resumed her plan.

She thoroughly destroyed the relationships she'd built over the past few years. She worked to make all the troupe members forsake her, cut contact with people who had even a slight connection to her at college, quit her job without advance notice, and aimed to be despised by everyone but you.

Naturally, she turned against me as well. I'll spare you the details, but I was honestly impressed how malicious she could become if she put her mind to it. She know my weaknesses more accurately than I did, and attacked them mercilessly. The only reason I wasn't broken like the others was probably because I was broken from the start. Even Sumika didn't have the means to break what was already broken, it seems.

You might think it's strange. Why would Sumika adopt such a roundabout method? She didn't need to tear through Sakura candidates until you were chosen as one, she could just meet you and talk. If she just told you in person "that was all a misunderstanding, I've liked you this whole time," that would be that.

But it had become a kind of obsession to her. She was strongly convinced that unless you appeared before her as a genuine Sakura, there could be no true reconciliation. Indeed, even if she went and told you at this point, you wouldn't believe her that easily. For good or ill, that past had already become an important element of who you are. To deny it would also be to smash the ground beneath your feet.

She must have considered the angle of what it would take for her, trapped by Sakura Delusion like you, to be able to believe in someone else's words. And so she arrived at the idea of giving you the position of a Sakura. A situation where both of you were Sakura would be inconceivable. If you became her Sakura, then you would be able to trust Sumika completely.

And so she went on nipping every bud, until finally I was left. It seemed that as long as I remained as a Sakura, then you wouldn't be getting pulled as one.

Sumika's desperately trying to push me away. But sooner or later, she's sure to realize that's impossible. When she does, I think I can imagine what she might do, in her current madness. She'll probably take the simplest and most foolish option.

I imagine I'll be killed by Sumika. And I intend to assist her as much as I can. Because for the first time, I figure Sumika will be genuinely grateful to me.

I suppose I should apologize to you. But apologizing on the verge of death just feels kind of cowardly. So I think I'll accept your resentment. Even after I'm gone, feel free to hate me all you like.

If you'll let me say just one selfish thing, I really kinda liked the time I spent in the garage with you.

It's all I ever think about lately.

I wonder how nice it'd be if you were sitting next to me now.

[+]

13

What made him willing to meet with that woman again was that he'd detected a simple sense of gratitude in her message. He'd always avoided second contact with people related to past jobs, but when he tried giving her a call, it turned out she had also, like Ogami, quit doing work on matchmaking apps recently. She too seemed surprised to hear that Ogami had quit.

"What are you doing now?", Miwa asked.

"I'm doing nothing," Ogami answered. And he really wasn't.

"In that case, we can meet right away."

Miwa said she'd be waiting at the same café as their last meeting and hung up. Ogami put a light jacket over his T-shirt, got in the car, and headed for the café.

The rain that had gone on for days finally cleared up that morning. The trees along the road were dripping water from their leaves, and puddles on the pavement brightly reflected the sunlight. It was humid in the car, so Ogami opened the driver's-side window all the way. But he was still sweating, so he parked the car on the way and took off his jacket. Then he was finally comfortable.

Miwa had arrived at the café before Ogami. Meeting her again after months, Ogami felt her cheeks were a bit more plump than in his memory. Maybe it looked that way because she was smiling.

She greeted Ogami with a more favorable attitude than when they last met. Ogami returned the greeting.

"I called you to thank you directly," Miwa said, then quickly explained the circumstances that led to her quitting.

After receiving Ogami's advice, Miwa diligently put it into practice. She strove to observe "anxious-looking men," and trained to perceive the anxieties users were having. She traced men's thoughts, and earnestly imagined what sorts of words they were most wanting to hear right now.

And as she did that, she said she started to empathize with the users.

"An honest man showed up who just made me feel too apologetic to be deceiving," she recounted happily. "So despite being a Sakura, I got the urge to go to meet him in person..."

How things went from there needed no explanation. She quit her job and was thanking Ogami, so the rest was obvious.

"Congrats," Ogami commended. "Guess you being a Sakura will be a lifelong secret."

"No, I spilled the beans right away. I'm not skillful enough to keep someone's company and hide something like that."

"What was his reaction?"

"He said he didn't care."

"Glad he's a tolerant guy."

"I knew he was that kind of person. That's why I wanted to meet him."

Miwa continued to brag about her lover for a while afterward. Ogami listened and nodded along. He hadn't heard a voice directed at him in a while, so it almost felt like listening to music from a foreign country. A song sung in a very distant part of the world, yet it was by no means bad to listen to.

"Come to think of it, you also quit your job, Mr. Ogami."

"Yeah."

"Why'd you quit? It was your calling and all."

"Got tired of it."

"Hmm," she mused. "At any rate, I guess we're both going from being deceivers to being the deceived."

"Guess so. I'll be careful."

"So will I," she agreed, then thought of something. "That said, being deceived isn't all bad."

"Like in the case of your boyfriend?"

"Like that," Miwa said with a smile.

Miwa was right that being a Sakura on matchmaking apps had been Ogami's calling in a way. He could deeply understand the feelings of love-starved people and accurately select the words they wanted to hear - that was one of the reasons.

But it wasn't just that. Ogami had gotten a kind of healing from that work. Being able to artificially fill in a loneliness that wasn't looking for anyone in particular, and above all, realizing that there were many others besides him who were starved for love yet only able to obtain forgeries, eased his pain just the slightest amount.

The biggest reason he decided to quit was because he no longer required that healing.

Ogami turned his thoughts to all the people he'd deceived as a Sakura. There were many honest people, but just as many dishonest people. Some couldn't abandon their pride and put on a bluff, while others abandoned too much pride and became self-debasing. Some were half-mad from being starved for love, while others had gone past starvation, no longer able to even imagine what it was like to love or be loved.

Even so, they were still several steps ahead of me, Ogami thought. At least they were reaching out. They were trying to grab hold of something. Even that simple action took an unbelievable amount of courage for me. Indeed, my emotions have only just started to walk past where they were at age 15. Right now, I can't imagine how far I'll need to walk before I even see their backs.

But there's no rush, Ogami told himself. All I can do is take it at my own pace. Even if all I do is make it back onto the same course as them, I'll just have to be grateful for that.

He left the café and said goodbye to Miwa in the parking lot. While parting, she gave him a little wave with her hand around her shoulder. Like the one Sumika gave him every morning.

Her Handcuff sparkled in the sunlight along with he movement of her arm.

"Goodbye, Mr. Ogami. Take care."

I'll probably never meet her again, Ogami thought for no particular reason as he watched Miwa go. He felt that was as self-evident as the fact he'd never meet Kasumi, Sumika, or Kujirai again. She symbolized many of the things Ogami had been associated with before his Sakura curse was lifted, and so it felt like she had come at the end to say goodbye.

Being deceived isn't all bad.

While driving home, Ogami thought back on Miwa's words.

Was that really true?

Looking back on his own past, many of his problems had come from being deceived, or trying to avoid deception. And as for the people Ogami deceived for work, he might have temporarily shown them a dream, but in the end he just wasted their time and money. It leading to a positive result like Miwa's was surely an exception among exceptions.

And yet, supposing a world where people always spoke their true feelings without falsehood, Sumika would have never fallen to Sakura Delusion, and thus might not have had any special feelings for Ogami. Kujirai wouldn't have fallen in love with Sumika either, and wouldn't become friends with Ogami.

And all told, Ogami thought, those twisted friendships born of suspicion and scheming were, at the moment, the best ones in my life.

By the time he had dinner and got back to the apartment, it was 9 PM. The living room still had some leftover warmth from daytime. Ogami opened the window, turned off the lights, and went to the bathroom. He took a longer shower than usual on account of how much he'd sweat. After cleaning himself thoroughly with soap, he left the bathroom and dried off with a towel.

Changing into sleep wear and returning to the living room, the heat from the day had left, and the smell of a spring night filled the room instead. He went to the window to close it, but then decided to leave it be. Without turning on the light, Ogami sat on the sofa. The comfortable night wind shook the curtains as it blew into the room. Listening close, he could hear distant bugs in the trees.

Over at the kitchen, he poured some whiskey into a glass and put ice in it. As he headed out to the veranda with it in hand, something broke the silence. It was a ringtone. Ogami looked toward the smartphone on his desk. He thought it was Miwa, but it was a call from an unknown number.

The ringtone wasn't stopping. Ogami put down his glass, picked up the phone, and answered the call. An unfamiliar voice spoke an unfamiliar name. Waiting for them to finish speaking, Ogami informed them they had the wrong number and hung up. Then he laid the phone down on the desk, picked up his glass, put on sandals, and went out to the veranda.

Sitting in a folding chair, he drank the whiskey and looked out at the town. It wasn't much of a sight. Aside from the faint light coming from people's houses, the systematic lines of streetlights, and the cars on the road, the rest was just sprawling darkness. And yet compared to winter, the scenery had become considerably more friendly.

Of course, maybe the change of season isn't the only reason I feel that way, Ogami thought. Until just a while ago, no matter where I was, anywhere I went was a town of Sakura. There was surely a lurking threat of Sakura there, so I couldn't let my guard down for a second.

I recalled the name "Blossom Killer" for the first time in a long while.

To borrow that expression, my "sakura" had indeed been killed.

He took out a cigarette, put it in his mouth, and took off his Handcuff to place it on the cigarette pack. He took a deep inhale of smoke, then let it out bit by bit. Then he looked toward his Handcuff again. Even that, which had bound him for so long as a symbol of Sakura and the system that produced them, now just looked like a regular bracelet.

Ultimately, even this is just a part of the stage setting that makes up our world.

Because the problem always lies with us.

The smell of the cigarette mixed with the night air. Cigarettes tasted different in spring than in winter. It was actually etched deeper into his memory than the smell of the seasons themselves. The smell of a new season is always fresh, and no matter how many decades he lived, Ogami imagined spring would always bring him a surprise.

The time flew by before he knew it. Apparently he had nodded off. Real sleep would probably be coming soon. He had to get back to the room. He needed to sleep properly in his bed, and cultivate the courage to live another day.

But still, why is it so warm tonight?, Ogami thought with wonder. And before he could arrive at an answer, he fell into sleep as if it were swallowing him up.

*

The first action Ogami took after learning the truth of everything was to burn the notebook, the sole piece of evidence.

Once he'd finished reading through the notebook three times, he had no more need for the flashlight. He put the notebook in his pocket, opened the door, and left the car. In the deep blue known as night, a faint orange was starting to mix in. From the trees surrounding the premises, he heard birds chirping. With an animal's cry from one direction being answered by a cry from another, then yet another, the woods gradually became bustling.

He sat down on the hood of the car and put a cigarette in his mouth. Instantly, he was hit with an intense lethargy. It was like the accumulated fatigue of the past few months caught up with him all at once. He struggled to put energy into his limbs, and his head had a dull ache when he tried to move. He felt like he'd aged a decade in one night.

After lighting the cigarette, Ogami took the notebook out of his pocket and lit it aflame as well. The air was dry, so it burned quickly. Ogami watched intently as it turned to ash alongside the truth of that chain of events.

Sumika had wanted only Ogami up to the end. He didn't know how to accept that reality at this point. Indeed, it was because he had always wished for that to be the case that there were countless "but"s surrounding it. A deep conviction had taken root in Ogami's mind that his greatest wish specifically would never be heard.

However, it had been none other than Kujirai's confession. He had to believe it. I have to accept that head-on, Ogami thought. She wasn't just a mirror reflecting back my goodwill. The Sumika my eyes saw back then was simply the real Sumika. Even after we parted, she continued thinking of me for nearly seven years.

It felt like having an all-too-convenient dream. But in reality, maybe it was more fair to say he'd just woken from a nightmare.

Ogami thought about that nightmare once more. You never really liked me at all, did you? That day seven years ago, how had she felt hearing the words I hurled at her across the train tracks? When forsaken by the one person in this world she could trust, how much despair did she feel?

And despite having just been subjected to such a cruel thing, she wrung out the willpower to reply "Yeah. I didn't like you at all."

May Ogami at least be able to leave me cleanly, with no bitterness.

He wanted to go back to that moment if he could. He wanted to run across the tracks to her and embrace her in his arms. He wanted to tell her it was all just a misunderstanding. He wanted to say that he needed her just as much, if not moreso, than she needed him.

But it had already ended seven years ago. As much as he raised his voice, there was no way of conveying those feelings to their past selves.

Images of another present that could have been came to mind one after another. It was impossible to stop them. Compared to that present, this reality he was in now seemed to have no value at all.

Once his cigarette was mostly ash, Ogami hastily lit up a second cigarette. And he focused his mind on the taste of the smoke. If he didn't distract himself like that, it felt like something swelling up in his chest was going to burst.

To shake away the thoughts, Ogami looked up at the cherry blossoms overhead. Seeing them in the faint light of dawn, they looked to him like common white flowers. Indeed, they were merely flowers. They were appreciated only because they went so quickly; if they bloomed year-round, people would quickly tire of them.

I wonder what Kasumi would say seeing this, Ogami suddenly thought. She liked the botanical garden, so no doubt she would have liked cherry blossoms as much as anyone. She had hoped to go see the botanical garden at night with Ogami. In the end, that promise never came to fruition. She was unable to enjoy this year's cherry blossoms. Those cheap artificial ones must have been the last she saw.

But no doubt her resolve wouldn't have changed even if she'd gotten to see some real sakura. At some point or another, she would vanish from Ogami's sight, and fulfill her original objective with a firm will.

Now that the mysteries of Sumika and Kujirai had been revealed, Ogami could easily imagine the reason Kasumi decided to die alone, too.

"Perhaps I was able to avoid dying until today because I knew you'd become my Sakura someday."

Her last words. By coincidence, they also described Sumika's true objective while she was alive.

When she realized that, she must have also realized the true meaning of the terrible mistake she had made.

I was convinced my sister had changed for the worse, but what if that wasn't it at all?

What if she was just wearing an elaborate mask, and behind that mask was the very same sister I had loved?

What if once she achieved her goal of reuniting with Ogami, she was ready to immediately discard that mask and return to her old self?

And I took that chance away from my sister forever.

There was no path left for Kasumi to turn back to. So the last thing she did was push Ogami, the man which her sister would have done anything to get back, over to the side of the living.

Maybe she realized that if she didn't do that, she would be taking even Ogami from her sister.

Feel free to hate me all you like, Kujirai had said in the notebook. But oddly, I didn't feel any anger toward him. It wasn't because he had received enough punishment, nor because the last lines of the notebook had moved my heart.

It's just if I'd been asked to pick one or the other, I would've picked Sumika without hesitation.

That was all there was to it. We were both in disadvantageous roles, but compared to the fate he arrived at, maybe I had it a little better.

It's a little different from forgiveness. And it's not sympathy, either.

Maybe the closest word for it is "recognition."

Finally, he decided to go back inside the car one more time. When Ogami opened the door, he found it strange that he didn't see Kujirai. It felt as if he'd been talking with Kujirai there all night. But all there was inside the car was a faint smell of rust and oil.

Leaving the door open, he lay down in the driver's seat and watched the dawn fully turn into morning. When the sun shone brightly on the sakura, they regained their specialness. Yet Ogami closed his eyes, and gazed upon the scene behind his eyelids instead.

It was the first day of their third year of middle school. When he arrived at school, Sumika was looking at the class roster posted at the entrance, but suddenly hid her face and covered her eyes.

When Ogami asked what was wrong, Sumika shook her head silently, then said "hay fever" in a nasally voice.

"My face is really something right now, so you shouldn't look."

"What kind of pollen sets it off?"

"Cedars, cypresses, rice plants, wormwoods, and dandelions."

It was very clearly a lie, but Ogami just said "sounds rough" and left it at that.

At a later date, he talked about it while alone with Kujirai.

"It startled me since she suddenly started crying," Ogami said. "What was that about?"

"She must've been so happy to be in your class she cried, duh," Kujirai said like it was nothing. "I was real happy myself that the three of us didn't have to go our separate ways."

The frankness he spoke with made Ogami falter.

"Happy, sure, but enough to cry?"

"I was nervous enough to puke that morning. If I ended up separated from you guys, I was thinking of playing dumb, carrying over a desk, and attending your class."

"I'd kinda like to see that."

"What about you? What would you have done if you were separated from us?"

Ogami thought it over for a while. "I might've felt the futility of life and secluded myself."

"Now that I'd like to see," Kujirai said in a raised voice and laughed.

When Sumika appeared later, the two asked her the same question.

Sumika pondered it with a serious expression.

"In that case, I'd have to take Ogami or Kujirai's place each day."

"Dressing up in a boy's uniform?", Kujirai asked.

"Yes. We'd trade uniforms so you could do the same with me."

"With your talent for acting, Kujirai, that might actually work out," Ogami remarked.

"I really wouldn't think so," Kujirai said in an imitation of Sumika. The impression was accurate enough that even Sumika held her sides with laughter.

In that moment, we really were best friends, Ogami thought.

He felt something inside him break. A door he'd firmly closed so as to never open it again was torn open, and he felt the old feelings pushed within flooding out. It was a rush of emotion that felt like dizziness, and he grit his teeth to endure it. But the more he tried to resist, the more it picked up speed, with no limit in sight.

Why hadn't everyone told me the truth sooner?, he wanted to scream. If even one person had revealed the reality before it was too late, things might not have ended in such an awful way. There could have been a world where Sumika, Kujirai, and Kasumi were all just living as normal.

And the biggest fool of all had been me. If I'd had the courage to take another step to confirm Sumika's feelings, if I'd had the guts to confront Kujirai directly, this absolutely wouldn't have happened. Sumika probably would have believed me, and as much as I fought with Kujirai, we could've made up in the end. Even Kasumi could have been an entirely happy girl if she hadn't lost her beloved sister.

And so I was left alone. Maybe I should follow the three of them right away. If I do that, at least I won't be left out. I won't have to worry about or regret anything anymore.

But Ogami knew that in truth, he had no desire to die. Likely the Handcuff on his wrist knew that, too.

As much as he wallowed in sorrow, no Sakura would appear to console him.

A person who'd had two genuine best friends had no need for Sakura.

To stay here by myself, and continue to think of them. That must be the role I've been given.

That's what he felt.

Ogami started by remembering the day Sumika first spoke to him. Then he went day by day, digging up everything he could remember in order. And from each and every one, he went removing the label that marked them as "fake." Like picking the individual petals off a flower.

*

It was about time to return to town. Smoking one last cigarette, Ogami left it in the ashtray and got out of the car. He walked down the shrine road lined with sakura trees, taking each step firmly. The wind, still retaining a slight chill, blew through the premises, rustling the trees and scattering petals.

He went through the torii gate, down the log stairs, and back to his own car. When he sat in the driver's seat, it felt like an awfully nostalgic place considering he'd only been away from it for a night. He slightly adjusted the angle of the mirror, put on his seatbelt, grabbed the wheel, and waited in that position for his senses to get accustomed.

Taking a final deep breath, he turned the key to start the engine. The car shuddered, and the gauges lit up.

The navigation system activated, and asked him his destination like usual.

The Town of Sakura, Ogami replied without thinking.

"I couldn't find "The Town of Sakura,"" the navigation system said after a short pause.

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