俯瞰風景
It was the night of early August, and Akagawa showed up without any prior notice.
“Hey, I was passing by and thought I’d stop by.”
The sudden visitor greeted me with a friendly tone and walked in like he owned the place.
“I saw the accident before I came here. My jaw literally dropped.”
He tossed his shoes haphazardly aside, set the plastic bag in his hand on the counter with a heavy thud, and opened the fridge to pack everything inside.
“How was your day today, Shiki? Anything unusual?”
It was always the same. Akagawa asked me every time we met whether my day had been okay and then acted disappointed or relieved on the spot. Since he never skipped the ritual, I eventually grew used to it.
“You’re like my mom, you know.”
Yet the irritation never faded.
“Right, I met your mother. I stopped by the family home once. She’s been out of the hospital for over two months now and hasn’t contacted me even once. She worries a lot.”
“...I don’t like it. I can’t believe it’s really happening. Even though I feel no unease around you, I don’t think I could talk to a stranger like that?”
Time will fix it, Akagawa replied while tying the apron hanging on the wall around his waist. He looked like a perfect housewife.
In reality, he would suddenly appear, cook for me, and leave—insisting I eat every meal and packing bento boxes, only to never see the food again.
“Oh, you’re still here.”
That meant he was the one cooking and the one eating. Perhaps the real reason he visited my house was just to share meals.
“The rice in the rice cooker is still there. You haven’t eaten anything all day?”
“I’m a person too. I eat rice and live.”
“Then why do you only refuse to eat mine…?”
Akagawa pulled a small box off the wall and spread out the food. He grabbed chopsticks from the convenience store, started eating alone, and left the rest untouched.
The homeowner lay in bed while the visitor casually ate. What a strange fellow. Why does he keep coming?
“Here, Shiki. Have one karaage.”
I held out a piece of karaage. Since he wouldn’t give up until it was eaten, I had no choice but to accept it. The taste was awful. Akagawa had no talent for cooking.
“Tastes good?”
“Tastes bad.”
Maybe it was just my picky palate. From the Ryōgi family, I had only ever tasted the finest foods, so a convenience-store sandwich felt worlds away from real cuisine.
“Then I’ll have to practice harder next time.”
Yet he never gave up. That pure, foolish smile of his was truly an unbeatable man.
“Then I’ll be going, Shiki. Tomorrow is school, right? You need to fill your attendance to graduate.”
“I’ll think about it.”
Shiki buried his face in the pillow and waved his hand as he gave me the traditional farewell. Expecting anything kinder was unrealistic. Shiki was straightforward.
The street was deserted. Walking through an ordinary dark residential area should have made one anticipate the unusual. Yet I had already experienced enough oddities.
Since that day, Shiki had lost his memories. In the body that once housed two personalities, only one remained. The male personality, Shiki, had died alone that day, carrying the accident with him along with his memories and emotions.
The memories left in Shiki now felt like scenes from a movie. All the events, including those with me, were stored only as distant, detached moments. I had been there, yet it felt unreal.
That was why he could not approach his family. If a stranger suddenly grabbed him on the street and said “I am your father,” who could accept that?
Rejection was only natural. But for those who remembered Shiki, it would be a deep wound.
As for me, I did not flinch at such things. I did not believe anything shocking enough to surpass the impact of Shiki’s hospitalization would ever cross my future.
Occasionally, when I unconsciously mentioned something from the past, Shiki would look at me with a blank expression, as if he could not understand. I would feel guilty inside and the atmosphere would turn awkward.
…That kind of thing was never good.
I bought a canned drink from the vending machine. Bean-jelly soda? Who on earth invented such a thing?
“Shi~ki~?”
Akagawa had found out I skipped school and came to my house from the morning itself. Even before first period ended, he looked as puffed up as a pufferfish.
“Didn’t I tell you yesterday?”
“My head hurts today, so I couldn’t go.”
The excuse made Akagawa react with far more intensity than I expected.
“Head hurts? Then you should go to the hospital. You’re not seeing something strange again, are you? It must be hurting a lot…?”
“It’s a lie, it’s a lie. Calm down…!”
I tossed the pillow at him. When it hit his face, he fell silent for a moment.
This guy worried far too much. A sigh sank deep into the mattress.
“You’ve been restless lately. I don’t know why either. Sorry, Shiki.”
His genuinely apologetic expression did not sit well with me. Pretending to be shameless would have been easier. Who could scold such a face?
“It’s fine.”
“...Yeah. Thank you.”
Even though I could read his innermost thoughts with my ability without much effort.
“You’re an idiot.”
“I guess I am… Ah, this feels like a conversation I’ve missed.”
With Akagawa finally quiet, the room grew even quieter than before. He leaned against the wall, lost in his own thoughts. I turned away and lay back on the bed. The ceiling I saw every day brought only boredom.
“Suicide.”
“...Huh? Sorry, I didn’t catch that.”
“Is an accident even possible with suicide?”
The meaningless murmur made Akagawa flinch as if he had suddenly returned to his senses. He was clearly mulling something over.
“An accident… Suicide is a personal choice, but if we consider the environment that led to it, perhaps it can still be called an accident?”
“It’s just a difference in perspective. That’s vague. If it’s suicide, wouldn’t it be better to choose a way that harms no one?”
“...There must be reasons of their own.”
The tone sounded almost like someone who had experienced it firsthand, yet lonely. I pretended not to notice.
“Speaking of which, there’s something strange. A woman in Fujou Building. I saw her too.”
Akagawa took a bottle of water from the fridge, drank it, and handed me a fresh one.
“She was flying through the sky, exactly as Shiki described.”
Ah, I remembered. It had started as an ordinary rumor about three weeks ago. The office building had a high-end mansion called Fujou Building, and at night people said they saw human figures flying in its airspace. That it appeared to Akagawa as well as me suggested it was real.
Ever since the traffic accident two years ago, when I had lain in a coma, I began seeing things that “should not exist.” When I told Touko, she said I did not see them with my eyes but perceived them with my eyes. In other words, my brain and visual recognition had somehow leveled up. Yet I had no interest in such things.
I had not gone near that area for several days, but Akagawa, who apparently witnessed the suicides one after another, must have seen her by pure coincidence. Akagawa, like me, possessed a different kind of “eye.”
“Akagawa. Do you know why a person would fly through the sky?”
Akagawa answered immediately.
“To go to a new world.”
As if it were the most natural thing in the world, he spoke of the impossible without the slightest hesitation.