Sayuri stops beside a shelf of plain crackers and adds a box.
“One pudding did not require all this,” Aina says.
“We are past one pudding.”
“That sounds less like an explanation than a declaration.”
Sayuri adds a bottle of water and continues toward the refrigerated fresh-food case.
Aina peers into the basket.
“Are you preparing for a typhoon?”
“You slept through lunch.”
“That was one meal.”
“And breakfast?”
Aina takes slightly too long to answer.
“Half a piece of toast.”
Sayuri stops.
“Half.”
“It was a large half.”
“That is not how halves work.”
“Then it was a mathematically significant portion.”
“It was insufficient.”
Sayuri opens the refrigerated case and selects a container of cut melon.
Cold air passes over their wrists.
For one heartbeat, the blue-and-red lines of their Tokui High uniforms blur in the dark glass.
Snow-darkened sleeves replace them, and a pale hand closes around another wrist beneath a colorless winter sky.
The refrigerator hum sharpens.
Their ordinary reflections return.
Sayuri closes the door and places the melon in the basket.
Aina studies her face.
“Did you see something?”
Sayuri keeps her attention on the basket.
Pudding.
Porridge.
Pacari Sweat.
Crackers.
Water.
Melon.
Everything present and accounted for.
“Only our reflection,” she says.
It is not quite a lie, but Aina’s silence suggests she knows it is not the whole truth.
The refrigerator glass darkens once more.
Snow covered a quiet railway platform beneath an iron-gray sky.
A crimson-haired girl stood in a pale wool coat buttoned to her chin.
Loose strands had escaped beneath her knitted hat, stirring across her cold-reddened cheeks whenever the wind rose.
Beside her, a chestnut-haired girl wore a heavy, dark school uniform beneath a wool overcoat.
Her hair was secured neatly at the nape, and her amber eyes remained composed despite the cold.
She held a small glass jar between both hands, pressing her thumbs against its warm lid while pretending the winter air had not numbed her fingers.
“You waited in line for this?” the crimson-haired girl asked, disbelief warmed by affection.
“You said you wanted it.”
“I mentioned it once.”
“Three times, Mayumi,” the chestnut-haired girl corrected.
“Twice on Tuesday.
Once on the train.”
Behind them, an emerald-eyed boy with medium-brown hair staggered beneath three trunks and two duffel bags.
Snow clung to his hair and shoulders as he struggled to keep the luggage balanced.
Paper name tags fluttered from four handles.
The fifth piece—a narrow black duffel wedged beneath his arm—bore no name.
“No one respects my arms!
I am a human pack mule!
Kyoko, tell Mayumi to carry her own trunk!”
A dark-haired boy emerged from the ticket booth and adjusted his coat against the wind.
Train tickets rested inside one gloved hand, and his guarded eyes surveyed the commotion with practiced resignation.
“Takashi, help me before my arms detach!”
“You insisted you could manage it, Akira.”
“That statement was made before the third trunk.”
Mayumi’s laughter rang across the platform.
At the sound, a rare smile softened Takashi’s guarded face.
Kyoko lowered her eyes to the warm jar, hiding the quiet satisfaction in them, while Akira continued protesting beneath the luggage.
For that brief moment, surrounded by snow and bitter wind, all of them were warm.
The refrigerator hum returns.
Fluorescent light replaces the iron-gray sky.
Smooth glass stands where the railway platform had been.
The basket handle presses into Sayuri’s fingers; she has not moved.
Aina’s fingertips rest against the cold refrigerator door.
The store chime fades beneath the remembered crunch of snow.
Aina turns toward her.
This time, the question in her eyes is not whether Sayuri saw something.
It is whether they saw the same thing.
“Snow,” Aina says carefully.
Sayuri does not answer at once.
“Tell me the rest.”
“A railway platform.
Four people waiting for a train.” Aina begins arranging the details aloud, testing each one independently.
“One of them carried our tickets.
Another was complaining about the luggage.”
“Three trunks and two duffel bags,” Sayuri says.
Aina’s focus sharpens.
“You saw the exact number?”
“Yes.”
“And the jar?”
“You wanted it.”
“I—Mayumi wanted it,” Aina corrects, unsettled by how naturally the first answer came.
“Kyoko said she had mentioned it three times.”
“Twice on Tuesday,” Sayuri murmurs.
“Once on the train.”
Their eyes meet.
Fragments are no longer new to either of them.
Sharing one at the same instant is.
“That eliminates coincidence,” Aina says.
“It does not explain what happened.”
“No, but it establishes that the memory wasn’t mine alone.” Aina looks toward the dark reflection in the refrigerator glass.
“We retained the same dialogue, the same names, and the same number of bags.”
“Do not begin calculating here.”
“I already have.”
“Of course you have.”
Aina’s expression softens, though her mind remains fixed on the problem.
“Takashi had the tickets.”
“And Akira carried the luggage.”
“Badly.”
“He was carrying five bags.”
“He wanted everyone to appreciate the sacrifice.”
“Did you recognize him?” Aina asks.
“The one carrying the luggage?”
Aina nods.
“Akira.”
Sayuri tries to recall his face apart from the snow and shifting bags.
“I don’t know anyone who looks like him.”
“Neither do I.” Aina glances toward the store entrance.
“Takashi looked like Ryosuke.
But the brown-haired boy…”
She leaves the thought unfinished.
Sayuri has no name to offer beyond the one they heard.
Aina’s brow tightens.
“Only four had name tags.”
Sayuri searches the fragment rather than the refrigerator glass.
The detail returns reluctantly: four pale tags shifting in the wind and one black handle without anything tied to it.
“The fifth may have fallen off,” she says.
“It may have.”
Aina accepts the explanation, but not with the certainty she gives the number of bags.
The remembered warmth returns—not as another vision, but as an ache neither girl can place.
Aina lowers her voice.
“We were happy.”
“Yes.”
“What happened afterward?”
The question opens onto the missing edge of the fragment.
No image follows it.
No platform, no train, no clear destination—only an absence waiting to be mistaken for an answer.
Sayuri turns away from the refrigerator glass.
“We don’t know.”
Aina studies her.
“And we are not inventing the missing part,” Sayuri adds.
Aina accepts the correction with visible reluctance.
“Not tonight.”
“Not tonight.”
Her gaze drops to the custard pudding already resting in the basket.
“Then let’s keep the part with pudding.”
“It may not have been pudding.”
“It was a sweet custard in a glass jar.”
“That is an assumption.”
“A highly probable one.”
“It was also overpriced.”
“You still bought it.”
“You mentioned it three times.”
“Only because you ignored me.”
The old exchange fits their present voices too easily.
For once, neither girl tries to explain why.
At the register, Sayuri pays before Aina can reach her wallet.
Outside, she transfers the pudding and crackers into the lighter bag and keeps the bottles for herself.
“I can carry those,” Aina says.
“No.”
“My arms work.”
“Your entire body is under review.”
Aina gives her a sidelong look.
“By whom?”
“Me.”
“That seems biased.”
“It is efficient.”
A student wheels a bicycle past the storefront.
Aina steps backward to make room, but her heel catches the raised edge of the pavement.
Sayuri reaches for her without thinking.
The pull brings Aina forward instead of upright.
Her shoulder meets Sayuri’s chest.
Sayuri lowers her head just as Aina looks up, and their lips brush.
Neither steps away.
Sayuri’s practiced balance abandons her.
The plastic bag handles cut into her fingers, but she cannot make herself loosen them.
Aina’s hand remains against the front of her blazer, caught between pushing away and holding on.
A bicycle brake squeaks beside them.
The student stands several paces away, staring at what they have accidentally caused.
“I’m sorry!” they blurt.
“I didn’t mean to make you kiss!”
The realization seems to horrify the student even more.
He bows so quickly that the bicycle tilts with him.
“I didn’t see anything!”
He seizes the handlebars and hurries away, one pedal striking the pavement as the bicycle wobbles after him.
Sayuri retreats first.
“Sorry.”
Pink reaches Aina’s ears.
Her gaze drops to Sayuri’s rigid hands, then rises to the pulse beating at the base of her throat.
“I tripped,” Aina says softly.
“I pulled too hard.”
“Then we can divide the blame.”
“That is not necessary.”
Sayuri searches for something measurable.
“When did you get so tall?”
Aina’s eyebrows rise.
“What?”
“You were always shorter than me.” Sayuri squares the bags at her sides, trying to recover some part of her composure.
“Now you have an entire inch.”
Aina smooths the front of her blazer.
Her hand is not entirely steady either.
Then she steps half an inch closer, a knowing smile forming.
“It happened while you weren’t looking.” Aina tilts her head.
“You apologize whenever something frightens you.”
Sayuri lifts her eyes from the pavement and fixes her with a stern look.
“I was not frightened.”
Aina laughs softly.
“Good.
Because I’d hate to think tripping over a curb is what finally catches Sayuri off guard.”
The convenience-store doors chime behind them.
“Let’s eat outside,” Ryosuke says as he emerges from the store.
He angles the long bow case through the doorway before settling it against his shoulder and nodding toward the low brick wall beside the parking area.
The newly transferred Saki follows him into the cold, carrying a warm canned tea and a wrapped pork bun.
Ryosuke opens his coffee as they approach the wall, but he slows when he notices the two girls standing near the storefront.
For one suspended moment, no one speaks.
Aina looks at the boy beside Ryosuke.
Medium-brown hair.
Emerald eyes.
She touches Sayuri’s sleeve.
Sayuri has already noticed.
Her gaze moves from his face to Aina’s, then back again.
Neither knows what to call him.
Ryosuke’s gaze passes from Sayuri’s lingering flush to Aina’s equally unsettled expression.
Whatever conclusion he reaches remains hidden behind his usual composure.
He turns slightly toward Saki.
“This is Shimizu Saki.
He transferred into Class 2-B this morning.” Then he gestures toward the girls.
“These are my kyudo clubmates, Suzuki Sayuri and Tanaka Aina.”
Saki offers them a respectful bow.
“Suzuki-san.
Tanaka-san.”
Sayuri straightens.
“Another transfer student?”
Saki looks toward Ryosuke.
“Another?”
“My new roommate moved into the suite today,” she explains.
“I haven’t met her yet, so I don’t know her name or which class she joined.”
Two transfer students arriving on the same Friday in the middle of February.
The timing lodges in Sayuri’s thoughts, though the boy standing before her clearly cannot be the female roommate described in the housing notice.
Saki looks between the girls.
His emerald eyes pause on Aina, and something almost like recognition touches his expression before he covers it with an easy smile.
“You can call me Saki,” he says.
“Shimizu sounds a little formal outside class.”
Sayuri accepts the invitation with a single nod.
“Sayuri.”
“And I’m Aina.” She offers him a small, welcoming smile.
“It’s nice to meet you, Saki-kun.”
“Likewise.”
Aina studies his medium-brown hair and emerald eyes.
“Akira,” she whispers.
The name from the railway platform.
Saki straightens.
His fingers shift around the tea can as though searching for the handle of luggage no longer in his grasp.
Ryosuke notices.
“Saki?”
“It’s nothing.” Saki turns back to Aina, but uncertainty remains beneath his smile.
“Have we met?”
“Not yet,” she says.
Silence gathers beneath the bright store sign.
Ryosuke looks directly at Aina.
“Why did you call him Akira?”
Aina glances at Sayuri before answering.
“The name came with something we saw.”
Sayuri moves closer to her, wary of how much they are revealing in front of someone they have only just met.
Ryosuke understands anyway.
His coffee remains halfway to his mouth.
“Another fragment?”
Aina’s expression gives him his answer.
“How much?”
The question is quiet, but Aina’s shoulders still draw inward.
“Don’t interrogate her,” Sayuri says.
“I asked one question.”
“It was enough.”
Ryosuke lowers the can, his gaze moving from Aina’s pale face to the shopping bags in Sayuri’s hands.
“When did you last eat?”
“He always replaces difficult questions with practical ones,” Aina murmurs.
“Because practical questions matter.”
“Lunch,” Sayuri answers for her.
“She slept through it.”
“Then she hasn’t eaten since breakfast.”
Aina raises one finger.
“Half a large piece of toast.”
Ryosuke looks at her.
“That is still half.”
An unreasonable spark of vindication warms Sayuri’s chest.
Saki surveys the three of them.
“I’m missing a great deal of context, but I’m beginning to suspect no one bought enough pudding to explain it.”
“So are we.” Sayuri turns back to Ryosuke.
“You said you remember all of them.
Tell us what that means.”
His expression closes by a fraction.
“Not outside a convenience store.”
“Aina is seeing them whether you explain or not.”
“And she is exhausted.”
“Which is why half-answers are worse.”
The words sharpen between them.
Ryosuke accepts the accusation without reacting.
After a moment, he gestures toward the low brick wall.
“Sit down.”
Aina complies before she can argue, and Sayuri sits beside her.
Ryosuke props the bow case securely against the wall within reach before taking the other end.
Saki remains standing a moment longer, then sits beside him.
Traffic moves through the intersection.
The store doors open and close behind them, and a child argues with his father about a fried snack.
The ordinary noise keeps the impossible conversation from consuming the evening.
Ryosuke waits until Aina drinks from the Pacari Sweat.
“I remember sixteen lives.”
The aluminum tea can gives softly beneath Saki’s fingers.
Sayuri keeps her expression composed.
“All of them?”
“I thought I did.” Ryosuke looks toward Saki.
“Since he arrived, new fragments have surfaced.
Things I had never remembered before.”
Saki leans forward.
“Why don’t I remember the way you do?”
“You may eventually.”
“That is both vague and deeply reassuring.”
“It wasn’t intended to reassure you.” Ryosuke turns the warm coffee can between his palms.
“The harder you reach for one fragment, the more likely you are to pull others with it.
Different places.
Different names.
Sometimes several lives at once.”
The final words emerge with a strain his even voice cannot entirely conceal.
Saki sobers.
“That happened to you.”
“Yes.”
“How bad was it?”
Ryosuke studies his distorted reflection in the curved metal.
“Bad enough that I don’t want any of you repeating it.”
For once, Sayuri does not mistake his restraint for refusal.
“The pieces never arrive in order,” he continues.
“Places and names overlap.
Sometimes one life interrupts another.
But the same four souls keep returning—and whatever follows us returns with them.”
Aina’s rallies despite her exhaustion.
“The clothing and railway design at the station differed from the room connected to Ren.
That suggests separate periods, but it does not establish dates or which came first.”
She pulls out her phone and opens a blank note.
“I need to record every name, material, weather condition, and architectural detail before our recollections alter them.
Then I can compare sources and test the most obvious explanation before we trust it.”
Saki looks at her.
“You developed all of that tonight?”
“It is a working model, not an answer.”
The distinction appears to steady her.
Sayuri watches Aina begin a list—Mayumi, Kyoko, Takashi, Akira—giving each name its own line.
The problem still frightens her, but now it has details she can arrange and claims she can challenge.
Sayuri can no longer dismiss the pattern either.
The people at the station wore their faces and answered to unfamiliar names.
Whatever the fragments are, they belong to more than one of them.
Aina rests the cold Pacari Sweat bottle against her cheek.
“Did we die in that life too?”
Ryosuke becomes very still.
Saki turns toward her.
Sayuri reaches across the brick and covers Aina’s unsteady hand.
Aina’s fingers stop beneath hers.
The question reaches into the missing part of the journey—and finds an answer.
“Twenty minutes after we boarded the train—” Aina whispers.
Her focus slips away from the intersection.
The Pacari Sweat bottle tilts in her hand.
Sayuri catches it before it falls and closes her other hand around Aina’s wrist.
“Aina?”
No response.
Ryosuke sets his coffee beside him.
“She’s seeing another one.”
Saki puts down his tea and moves closer, catching the grocery bag as it begins to slide from the wall.
“What do we do?”
“Give her something to return to.” Ryosuke leans forward, keeping his voice level.
“Aina, you’re outside RAWSON.
We’re here.”
Aina does not appear to hear him.
Her fingers close around Sayuri’s hand.
Cold surges through the point of contact, and the intersection disappears for Sayuri as well.
Kamishiro Station had disappeared behind them.
Snowfall erased the mountains beyond the carriage windows.
Mayumi sat beside Kyoko with the empty glass jar wrapped in a handkerchief between them.
Across the aisle, Takashi checked the four paper tickets once more before tucking them inside his coat.
Akira had finally secured the three trunks and two duffel bags in the luggage area at the rear of the carriage.
He dropped into his seat, flexing his exhausted arms while Mayumi laughed at his complaints.
Until that moment, they believed they would arrive somewhere together.
Then a frozen switch failed beneath the train.
The passenger car tore from the tracks.
Lights shattered.
The luggage restraints tore free.
Glass swept through the darkness as the carriage rolled toward the ravine.
Kyoko reached across the chaos and covered Mayumi with her body.
Their hands found each other in the dark.
Then came the impact.
The intersection returns without warning.
Aina folds forward, one hand clutching the edge of the brick wall as though the ground is still turning beneath her.
Sayuri’s own balance pitches, but she braces Aina by the shoulders.
Ryosuke remains directly in front of them, while Saki stands close enough to catch either girl.
No one mistakes the girls’ silence for ordinary exhaustion.
“The train,” Aina manages.
“It left the tracks.”
“I saw it too,” Sayuri says.
Ryosuke’s face confirms the memory before he speaks.
“Yes.”
One word.
Nothing more.
Sayuri feels Aina’s frantic pulse beneath her fingers.
Whatever waited at the bottom of that ravine, she will keep Aina in the present tonight.
Around them, the intersection remains stubbornly unchanged.
A bus pulls away from the curb with a heavy hiss of air brakes, stirring the faded plastic flag near the store entrance in its warm exhaust.
Aina fixes on a crack in the pavement and uses Sayuri’s hand to orient herself.
“All sixteen?”
“No more questions tonight,” Ryosuke says quietly.
“He’s right,” Sayuri says.
Three faces turn toward her.
Sayuri directs her next warning at Ryosuke.
“Do not make that expression.”
“I didn’t.”
“You almost did.”
Aina tries to laugh, but panic cuts the sound short.
Sayuri turns fully toward her and places two fingers over the rapid pulse in her wrist.
“Stay here.” Her voice drops into the quiet register only Aina ever hears.
Aina leans closer, seeking her warmth.
“I am here.”
“Look at me.”
Aina’s focus begins to drift again.
Sayuri applies gentle pressure beneath her fingertips.
“Tell me what is here.”
Aina obeys.
Her first exhale falters.
“The blue sign.
Your bag.”
“Keep going.”
Aina looks around the group.
“Saki-kun’s tea.
Ryosuke’s coffee.
The pudding.”
“What can you feel?”
Aina presses the cold bottle against her palm.
“The condensation.
The rough wall beneath me.
My shoes.”
She turns her hand and catches Sayuri’s fingers.
Her final answer is scarcely louder than the traffic.
“You.”
Sayuri keeps her hand in place and slows her breathing until Aina follows.
Ryosuke’s posture eases when Aina’s breathing steadies.
Saki remains beside them with the grocery bag secured against his leg, his unopened joke abandoned.
For one minute, they are only four students with convenience-store drinks, melting snow trapped in their memories, and unfinished homework waiting at home.
Once Aina’s hands are steady, Sayuri opens the pudding.
Two cheap plastic spoons came tucked inside the shopping bag.
Aina holds them up as evidence.
“See?
It was always meant to be shared.”
“The clerk supplied two because you manipulated him with patient silence.”
“That still proves it was meant to be shared.”
Saki peels back the wrapper around his pork bun.
“Is this a normal argument?”
“Yes,” Ryosuke says.
“No,” Sayuri answers at the same time.
Aina claims the first spoonful with triumphant ease.
“That means yes.”
Conversation begins awkwardly, then finds its shape once no one tries to force it.
Saki tells them he practiced archery in Kyoto and brought his own bow, though he had intended only to observe Tokui High’s club that afternoon.
“How long have you practiced?” Aina asks.
Her spoon pauses above the pudding, her fatigue briefly overtaken by curiosity.
“Long enough to know how much I still have to correct.” Saki studies his hands.
Sayuri notices the deep callus at the base of his right thumb.
“You observed practice instead of joining.” Her tone becomes precise, the one she uses when examining form.
Saki meets her scrutiny.
“I didn’t want my first public humiliation rushed.
It deserves proper scheduling.”
“Good.”
The approval leaves Sayuri before she can reconsider it.
Saki’s eyebrows rise, and some of the uncertainty leaves his shoulders.
Aina points her spoon at Sayuri.
“That is high praise.”
“It was an observation.”
“She calls praise an observation whenever it escapes accidentally,” Aina explains to Saki.
Saki’s smile falters before he recovers it.
“I’ll remember that.”
Sayuri directs a sharp look at her friend.
“Do not encourage her.”
Beside them, Ryosuke takes a slow drink from his coffee and turns toward Saki.
“You should attend Monday.”
“I intend to.”
“Then you’ll need an evaluation,” Aina says.
She gestures between them with her spoon.
“Ryosuke leads the boys, Sayuri leads the girls, and I’m second behind her.”
“For now,” Sayuri says, looking toward Ryosuke.
Ryosuke glances sideways at her, challenge stirring in his dark eyes.
“You missed practice today.”
“One missed session does not change a ranking.”
“No.” He lowers the coffee can.
“It only gives me one peaceful evening without you trying to outshoot me.”
Heat touches Sayuri’s face before she can suppress it.
Aina’s playful expression softens.
She scoops up another bite of pudding and offers it to her.
Sayuri turns away.
“You can have it.”
“You waited in line for it.”
“That was someone else.”
“She had your exact terrible attitude.”
“Then she was probably right.”
Saki laughs, and Sayuri hears none of the burdened boy from the platform in it.
The sound belongs entirely to him.
By the time the last bite of pudding is gone, the sky has deepened from dusty gold to twilight violet.
Streetlights awaken along the road one by one.
Ryosuke stands first and brushes a speck of dust from his trousers.
He turns to Aina.
“She should go home.”
Aina looks up at him.
“I have a name.”
“Then Aina should go home.”
Saki’s eyebrows lift at Ryosuke’s easy use of her name, but Ryosuke continues before anyone can examine it.
“Write down each fragment after it ends,” he says.
“Never chase one or try to complete it.
I mean that.”
His expression turns severe.
“I tried once.
I lost most of a day and woke up unable to tell which room—or which life—I was in.” His fingers close around the coffee can.
“The migraines pass.
That confusion doesn’t.
Not quickly.”
He looks at Aina, and the warning becomes more personal.
“If the present starts slipping, call me.
I don’t care what time it is.”
Sayuri considers him.
“Call you?”
“Me.
Or each other.”
She looks toward Saki.
“What about him?”
Saki raises his tea.
“I would like to know why I remember luggage I never carried.
I would also prefer to keep my mind intact.
I hear it is useful for examinations.”
Ryosuke takes out his phone.
Beneath the fluorescent store sign, the four of them exchange contact numbers.
Ryosuke retrieves the bow case from the wall and settles its strap over his shoulder.
Then they leave RAWSON together.
Although the dorms lie back toward school, Ryosuke and Saki accompany the girls for several blocks.
Saki walks a few paces ahead, while Ryosuke remains beside them until the central intersection.
There, he takes in Sayuri’s convenience-store bag and the road she has chosen.
“You aren’t returning to your room tonight?” he asks.
“I’m walking Aina home.”
Sayuri offers no details about the note waiting on the dining table—or how she intends to manage the weekend without an overnight bag.
Aina rolls her eyes.
“I don’t need two escorts to my front gate.
She’s treating me like fragile glass.”
Sayuri transfers the shopping bag to her other hand and takes Aina’s free one.
“Your opinion has been noted.”
“And ignored.”
“Temporarily.”
Seeking an ally, Aina turns toward Ryosuke.
He considers her with infuriating calm.
“Rest, Aina,” he says quietly.
She throws up her free hand.
“You are both impossible.”
Several steps ahead, Saki looks back over his shoulder, a dry smile touching his lips.
“Should I pretend not to hear any of this?”
Before anyone can answer, he lifts one hand in farewell and follows the school road toward the dormitories.
At the crossing, Ryosuke turns to Sayuri.
“Sleep too, Sayuri.”
She falters at her given name.
Twice in two days means it was no accident.
Sayuri meets his gaze and straightens.
“I know.”
“That was not an agreement.”
“You sound like me.”
“Someone has to.”
His gaze drops to the hands linked between the girls.
For one unguarded moment, he looks lonelier than Sayuri has ever seen him.
Then his expression becomes formal again.
“Good night.”
Ryosuke shifts the bow case to his opposite shoulder and follows Saki along the tree-lined path toward school without looking back.
Once he is gone, the quiet of the residential street closes around them.
Aina’s shoulders lower beneath the weight of the day.
“I don’t want all of you dragged into this nightmare because of me,” she says.
Sayuri turns toward her.
“That is not your decision to make.”
The answer catches Aina unprepared.
Before she can retreat into another argument about protecting them, Sayuri steps closer.
“You aren’t dragging anyone anywhere,” she says.
“Whatever this is, it found all four of us.”
Her hand closes more securely around Aina’s.
Aina lowers her gaze.
“You always accuse me of making choices for everyone,” Sayuri continues.
“You are doing the same thing now.
Let us decide whether we stay.”
Aina looks at their joined hands, then at the light grocery bag hanging from Sayuri’s other wrist.
“All right,” she whispers.
They continue toward the quieter residential streets, walking close enough that their shoulders occasionally brush.
“No more chasing memories tonight?” Aina asks.
“No chasing them,” Sayuri confirms.
“What do we discuss instead?”
Sayuri gives the question more consideration than it deserves.
“Whether pudding can legally qualify as a full dinner.”
Aina laughs, the sound brighter now.
“It does if you share it with someone.”
“It does not.”
“Then the melon we bought.”
“The melon is reserved for tomorrow.”
Aina stops.
Their joined hands draw taut, bringing Sayuri to a halt one step later.
“Tomorrow?”
Sayuri looks back at her.
“Sayuri, how much of my weekend have you planned?”
“Enough of it.”
Aina examines her with growing suspicion.
“You aren’t going to tell me, are you?”
“No.”
“Why?”
“Because your opinion on the matter is temporarily irrelevant.”
Sayuri resumes walking, keeping Aina’s hand securely within hers.
Aina falls into step beside her and lets her shoulder bump lightly against Sayuri’s.
She does not move away afterward.
“You added ‘temporarily.’ That sounds like progress.”
“It was necessary for accuracy.”
Ahead, warm light glows from the windows of Aina’s neighborhood.
Evening meals scent the air, and a dog barks behind a garden wall until someone calls it inside.
Nothing on the street resembles the blood or wreckage of another lifetime.
Tonight, neither girl needs it to.