The First Face Captured
Even after the sound of running water in the bathroom had ceased, the living room remained quiet for a while.
Midday air drifted in through the open window, and the edge of the curtain stirred faintly. The Saintess stood before the bathroom door, wrapping her wet hair in a towel. Though she had just finished washing, a faint flush still lingered on her cheeks.
The Hero was by the living-room window, straightening the curtain.
At the bathroom doorway the Saintess only gripped the towel ends more tightly. Droplets fell from the tips of her wet hair and soaked into the towel.
The corner of the Hero’s mouth softened quietly.
The Saintess lowered her head and clutched the towel ends with both hands even more firmly.
“Ria.”
“Yes.”
“Want to rest a bit, then go out and get a phone?”
Her hands stopped.
“Right now?”
“Yeah. Your ID came today, so we should be able to open a line under your name.”
The Saintess hugged the towel around her damp hair more tightly.
“A phone… under my name.”
Still holding the towel ends, she turned the words over again. The ID card she had checked several times that morning was now tucked in the inner pocket of her outing bag.
“You’ll be the one carrying it around.”
She stayed still for a moment, then nodded.
“I want to go.”
The Hero smiled.
“Right away?”
“Yes. Just as soon as I dry my hair.”
She fretted at the towel ends a little longer, then finally gave a small smile.
Moisture still dripped from her wet hair, and the heat of a moment ago still colored her flushed cheeks.
The Hero brought out the hair dryer.
His hand moved toward it, then stopped.
The Saintess took the handle herself and let the warm air flow through her hair.
Once it was mostly dry, she opened her bag and checked the ID.
The small card was still there.
She did not hold it long.
She slipped it into the inner pocket of her outing bag and pushed the zipper all the way closed with her fingertips.
When she had changed into outdoor clothes and stood at the front door, she pressed the bag once more.
The Hero asked,
“Got everything?”
“Yes. The ID, too.”
“Good.”
When the front door opened, the spring air outside came in.
The Saintess smoothed her newly dried hair once with her fingertips and walked out beside the Hero.
The phone store was full of glass and light.
Small devices stood in rows on the display tables—black, white, soft pink, pale sky blue. Every screen was asleep, their smooth surfaces gleaming under the lights.
The Hero picked one up and set it in the Saintess’s hand.
“How’s this size?”
She received the phone with both hands. It was lighter than she expected, yet she tensed her grip for fear of dropping it.
“It’s a little slippery.”
“A case will fix that.”
“We choose a case, too?”
“Yeah. You can pick the color.”
Her fingertips drifted slowly over the cases—clear ones, ones with tiny flower patterns, pastel silicone, even ones with wrist straps.
After long hesitation she chose a soft sky-blue case.
“I like this one.”
“Sky blue?”
“Yes. It’s a quiet color… and it feels like mine.”
The Hero looked at the sky-blue case in her hands.
“It’s close to the color of your eyes, too.”
She drew the case close to her chest. She did not answer, but the corners of her mouth lifted a little.
The activation process took longer than expected. While the clerk explained, the Hero selected only the necessary parts and relayed them to the Saintess. She took the ID from her bag, confirmed the name, and signed several times.
Riane.
Each time her own name remained on the paper, she moved her fingertips more carefully.
A short while later the new phone powered on. An unfamiliar screen brightened, and several guide messages passed in turn. The Hero opened the keyboard for her.
“Just put your name here.”
“May I do it myself?”
“Of course.”
She raised her fingertips carefully.
Ri. A. Ne.
The letters appeared one by one on the screen.
The name on the ID was already written.
This name came from the Saintess’s own fingertips.
Even after pressing the last character, she could not quite lift her hand from the screen.
“My name appeared on the screen, too.”
“Yeah.”
“It feels closer than the card.”
The Hero took the phone and finished the remaining settings, then opened the contacts app.
“I’ll put my number in first.”
She nodded.
He paused in front of the name field.
“What should I save it as?”
She did not hesitate even a little.
“Hero.”
“Just like that?”
“Yes.”
He could not hold back a laugh.
“Got it.”
At the very top of the contact list the name “Hero” appeared. In a list that still held no one else, only that single name floated.
In front of that name, the Saintess’s fingertips stopped.
“If I press it, it reaches you, right?”
“Yeah. Calls and messages both.”
“May I try it now?”
“To me?”
“Yes.”
She took her own phone. She set her fingertips on the keyboard and pressed the characters one by one, slowly.
Hero.
There her fingertips stopped.
“May I send it?”
“Yeah.”
She pressed the send button.
At once the Hero’s phone gave a short chime. Startled by the sound, she widened her eyes; he showed her the screen.
The first message she had ever sent was displayed.
Hero.
Confirming those four characters, she smiled quietly.
“It really went.”
“It came.”
He sent a reply.
This time her phone chimed softly.
Ria.
The moment she saw the reply she lightly pressed the letters on the screen with her fingertip. They did not disappear; they remained right there inside the screen.
“Later, when I go to school, you can send messages like this.”
the Hero said.
School.
Her finger stopped at the edge of the screen.
The days she would soon spend alone rose in her mind.
She held the phone a little more firmly.
“I’ll send them then, too.”
“Yeah. Send them.”
Inside the small conversation window, the single name she had sent and the short affectionate nickname he had returned sat side by side.
When they left the store, the spring breeze lightly stirred her hair.
They did not head straight home. The Hero suggested resting a little at a nearby café, and she nodded, still holding the new phone in both hands.
Seated by the café window, they watched people pass beyond the glass. She set the phone on the table, then picked it up again. With the case on, it was less slippery than before. The soft sky blue looked gentle in her palm.
He took out his own phone and opened the messaging app.
“See? The message you just sent is still here.”
She leaned toward him. On the screen her first message floated small. Above it was his profile picture.
A riverside landscape.
Sky and water, a bridge in the distance. The photo was pretty. But there was no person in it. No face of the Hero, no hand, no shadow.
She stopped her fingertip before the profile picture and asked,
“Why aren’t you in this one, Hero?”
“Hm?”
“In the photo.”
Only after checking his own profile did he seem to understand what she meant.
“Ah. I just took it a while back.”
“You don’t have a photo of yourself?”
“Didn’t really have one worth putting up.”
She did not answer.
Outside the glass, people passed by. Some laughed with friends; some held up phones and photographed their own faces. Her hand closed around the edge of her phone.
A photo of only river and sky.
Pretty, yet quiet—and quiet enough that something felt empty.
Her own profile picture was still empty as well. Only the name remained inside the small screen.
She lifted her head.
“Then let’s take one now.”
He looked at her.
“A photo?”
“Yes. A photo of us.”
He was silent a moment. Her face colored a little at that silence, yet she did not set the phone down.
“It’ll go on your phone, too, won’t it?”
“That’s true.”
“Then… I want to take a pretty one.”
Once the words left her mouth she grew even more embarrassed. But the hand holding the phone stayed as it was. Sunlight from outside reflected off the glass and spilled across the table.
He smiled first.
“Then we’d better practice.”
The first photo was a failure.
The moment the screen switched to selfie mode she startled and held the phone too close. Only her eyes and forehead filled the frame in huge close-up. The Hero was outside it entirely.
Click.
When the first photo appeared she hurriedly covered the phone.
“This isn’t it.”
He tried to hold back a laugh and failed.
“Sorry.”
“You laughed.”
“Because it was cute.”
“It’s not a cute problem. You aren’t in it.”
“That’s a big problem, yeah.”
She nodded seriously.
The second photo did manage to include both of them. But they were too far apart. She sat at the edge of her chair; he leaned slightly the other way. The two people in the photo looked less like a couple posing together and more like strangers who had happened to enter the same frame.
She checked the distance in the picture and said carefully,
“May I sit a little closer?”
“Yeah.”
He pulled his chair sideways. Their shoulders touched.
Her lashes lowered once, then rose. She pretended to look at the screen, yet a small smile hung at the corner of her mouth. He said nothing. Instead he lightly supported the back of her hand so the phone she held would not tilt too far.
In the third photo she closed her eyes.
“Again.”
In the fourth the Hero smiled awkwardly.
She checked the picture and this time laughed first.
“You’re not good at photos either, Hero.”
“Guess so. I need practice too.”
“Let’s practice together.”
When they took the fifth, she gave his arm a light tug. He leaned in obediently. Her silver hair brushed his shoulder. The distance between the two people on the screen grew a little closer.
Click.
“How’s this?”
he asked.
Both of them were properly in the frame. Yet thinking of it as the photo that would go on his profile, she could not press save.
She wanted to leave a face that was a little closer.
“Just once more.”
“As many times as you want.”
She raised the hand holding the phone a little higher. And this time, before facing the camera, she turned slightly toward him.
“Don’t be startled.”
“By what?”
She did not answer.
At the exact moment the shutter clicked, she pressed a very brief kiss to his cheek.
In the photo her eyes were closed; his face was truly surprised. The instant she checked it her face turned bright red.
“Th-this is…”
He looked at the picture quietly.
She moved her finger near the delete button, then stopped.
“It’s strange, isn’t it?”
“No.”
His voice lowered a little.
“I want to keep this one.”
With an even redder face she looked down at the phone.
In the photo her eyes were closed, her lips near his cheek.
Yet she did not want to erase it. After he said he wanted it, she wanted that even less.
She said carefully,
“This one… only you keep it, Hero.”
“Okay.”
“For the profile, let’s use a different one.”
“Got it.”
The last photo they took after leaving the café, on a nearby bench.
The outdoor light was softer. Street noise had receded a little, and tree shadows swayed across the bench. She sat beside him and raised the phone. This time her hand did not tremble the way it had at first.
He brought his face close. She leaned naturally against his shoulder.
On the screen the two of them were smiling side by side.
Click.
The moment the shutter sound ended, her thumb stopped near the save button.
This time neither of them spoke for a long while.
He waited quietly beside her. On the screen she was smiling a little shyly; he looked at ease next to her. No special pose, no big joke. Yet she enlarged the photo a little with her thumb, then returned it to normal size.
Their shoulders were touching.
The ends of her silver hair had spilled lightly over his clothes.
The smiling faces looked natural.
With her fingertip resting on the save button she said,
“This one.”
“Yeah.”
“Let’s use this.”
He nodded.
She saved the photo to her own phone first. Then she sent it to his as well. When the transfer finished, the same picture appeared on his screen.
He immediately opened the profile settings.
She watched his fingertips from the side.
The old photo shrank small.
Inside the square frame only sky and water and the distant bridge remained, tiny.
His finger selected the new photo.
Both their faces entered the center of the screen.
Just before he pressed the confirm button, his hand paused for the briefest moment. She watched that hand, then slowly looked up at him.
“Change it.”
Her voice was small, yet the ending did not trail off.
He looked at her.
“Yeah.”
He pressed the button.
The screen flickered once, and the profile picture changed.
Where there had been only river and sky, two people now stood.
On the screen that until a moment ago had held only landscape, both their faces had come in side by side.
Footsteps of passersby beside the bench continued as before; only the landscape inside the screen had become two faces.
Very slowly she reached out and touched the edge of his phone. Careful not to cover the screen, only her fingertips brushing lightly.
“Now you’re in your own photo, too, Hero.”
He laughed low.
“It’s not just me, though.”
“That’s why I like it.”
Only then did she open her own phone.
“I want the same one for mine, too.”
“Go ahead.”
He rested his hands on his knees and waited. While she pressed the screen alone, he simply watched the order quietly from the side. She mistapped a few times, but went back and chose again. Recalling the sequence he had just pressed, she followed it one step at a time.
At last the same photo entered her own profile as well.
The two phones lay side by side on the bench.
The same picture floated on both screens.
One was the Hero’s phone.
The other was her own.
Both held the same faces.
She turned the screen off once, then on again at once. The photo was still there. In the screen that had gone briefly dark and brightened again, she was still beside him.
He asked,
“Checking?”
She nodded.
“I was worried it might disappear.”
“It won’t.”
“I’m glad.”
She drew the phone close against her. The smooth feel of the new case met her palm.
The ID was inside the bag.
This photo she could turn on again and again in her hand.
Even on the way home she opened the phone several times.
Every time the screen brightened, the photo appeared.
She saw herself smiling side by side with the Hero.
He asked from beside her,
“You like it that much?”
With the screen still on she nodded.
“Yes.”
“How much?”
She thought a moment. Then she turned the screen a little toward him.
“A little more than cake.”
“That’s pretty big.”
“Yes. It’s pretty big.”
He laughed.
She laughed with him.
A little later she spoke first.
“When we get back, let’s eat cake.”
“While looking at the photo?”
She turned the phone screen on again. The same picture appeared once more.
“Yes. Together with the one we took today.”
Spring wind stirred the leaves along the roadside. She wrapped the phone in her hand again. There were still far more functions she did not know. Many things to press, many things to learn.
But inside the empty landscape that had once been his, both their faces now lived.
Holding the phone in her hand, she took the first step toward home.
When they returned she wanted to eat the remaining cake with him.
And sometimes, for no reason at all, she wanted to look at this photo again.
