Three months have passed… and I still don't know if I truly came back, or if I've just changed enough to seem like someone else.
I sit now in this small room… the light is dim, and the window slightly open. The night air moves slowly, carrying with it something that resembles loneliness. In front of me is a notebook, and a pen that hasn't moved for half an hour, resting on a blank page. I tried to write, tried to begin with a sentence… but words betray me, just as memory did, just as I betrayed myself.
I can remember only fragments now… blurred faces, broken voices, the heartbeat in an emergency room… and a child dying in my arms. My son. Hiro.
What I recall isn't enough to make sense of it all, but it's enough to hurt. A strange kind of pain… not like a wound, not like regret. More like a hollow inside me that can't be filled, even when I breathe.
I work now in a small clinic. It's not a place for heroics, or saving lives… but it's enough to make me feel like I still have something. When I place the stethoscope on a patient's chest, I feel like I'm borrowing a piece of my old identity. But the truth is, I'm no longer that doctor. Nor that father. Not even the man Yuko once trusted.
I went to her house. Once… then again. The third time, I heard footsteps behind the door. I stood there, silent. I felt her waiting for me to say something… but she waited in silence, just like I did. What could I possibly say? I'm sorry I didn't protect our son? I'm sorry you see his death in my eyes? I'm sorry I'm still breathing?
I don't know if she hates me, or if she's just punishing herself through me. But what I do know is that her trust in me is gone… and maybe she's right.
The police say Kento has disappeared. No trace. But sometimes I feel like he's still here… behind the corners of the city, in the reflection of windows, in an unexplained movement of shadow. And sometimes, I suspect he did what he did… and disappeared the way I did—but in a darker way. I don't hate him, despite everything… but I don't excuse him either. He chose vengeance when life demanded patience. And I chose collapse.
I sometimes ask myself: who am I now? A man without a son… without a wife… with memories full of holes like an old, torn coat. I walk as if I don't live… I breathe as if I'm preparing to suffocate.
At night, before sleep, I go over the questions with no answers: how did I get to that warehouse? Why did Kento tie me up there? Why didn't he kill me quickly? Did he want to save me for last? And why, when I woke up, did I feel like I didn't deserve to be free? The questions still hang with no clear answer.
All I know is that I still wake up every morning, trying to keep going. And continuing, these days, feels like a new kind of courage. Or maybe… a different form of running away.
But I won't run forever. I'll find that missing piece… or at least, I'll try to understand why it went missing.
And maybe… in the end, that's what it means to be alive: to keep searching in the darkness, even when you know the light may never return.
Eventually, I surrendered to sleep… or so I think. I don't remember the dream, and I'm not sure I really slept—but I woke up. And that's what matters.
Dawn was soft, as if it didn't want to disturb the city. The sky was gray, the air a little cold. I wished the night had lasted longer, just to avoid the day to come.
But I've learned that days don't wait, even if you're not ready.
I dressed slowly, then left the apartment without eating, heading to the clinic. The streets were quiet, as they always are in the early morning. People were still dreaming, or perhaps… trying to forget.
The clinic is small. Just one room, and a waiting area filled with old furniture. The smells were familiar: disinfectant, paper, bandages.
I walked in. Hung my coat on the rack, and sat behind the desk. The stethoscope hung around my neck, like a reminder of who I was… and still am.
Patients began arriving: a man with a headache. A woman treating an old wound.
Then… I heard light footsteps outside the clinic. They stopped at the door. Then… silence.
I didn't move right away. Maybe I imagined it. Or maybe… I was afraid to see a face I didn't want to see.
But I opened the door.
She was standing there.
Yuko.
She wasn't looking at me. She was staring at the ground, as if counting her steps before taking one.
Then she slowly raised her gaze, and stood in front of me. She didn't smile. She didn't shout. She just looked at me, as if making sure I was still real.
> "I found you."
She said it calmly. She was cold, but not angry. She looked like me.
I didn't fully understand why she came. Was it to say goodbye? To demand an answer? Or was she, like me, starting to ask herself the same questions?
I asked her to come in. She refused. She stood at the door, as if not ready to cross the threshold.
I looked into her eyes… they explained everything.
A sad look… or maybe pity. As if she was trying to find in my face what was left of the man she once knew.
Then she whispered, softly:
> "Do you really not remember what happened?"
She tried to stay strong, but tears betrayed her. I saw her crumble silently. Small drops began to fall from her eyes—hesitant at first… then free.
She looked at me again, with a look mixed with pity, sadness, and anger long held in.
She said:
> "Please… don't try to remember the past." "Just… live now. At least let one of us try to live." "Let one of us forget… that red past."
Her words hung in the air, as if they couldn't find a place to settle.
"The red past"…
I didn't fully understand what she meant.
But I felt it.
As if something inside my chest knew the way without a map.
I looked at her with difficulty, and said:
"Yuko… even if I tried to forget, it won't change what happened."
She blinked, as if the answer struck a fragile place in her.
> "Forgetting only buries things. It doesn't heal them."
She paused, then continued in a voice closer to a whisper:
> "But we don't have to dig up graves just to live."
She looked at me for a long time… It was a sad look, a look of pity—yes—but it wasn't cruel. We both fell silent.
The street was empty, and the wind began to move gently. Dry leaves passed between us, like a reminder that the world waits for no one.
Then I asked her, my voice cracked:
"Is there any way back?"
She looked at me for a long time… Her eyes trembled, then she cried harder. As if she wanted to begin a new page, but something held her back.
I wanted to ask more, But she raised her hand, as if asking me to stop.
Then she quietly turned around. Her steps were slow, but certain.
She walked away.
And disappeared.
And the door remained open… As if something inside me was still standing there, on the threshold. But I realized something: I had lost Yuko completely.