"You've got to be kidding me."
This was Hiroto Minami, fifteen years old, staring at the frozen blue screen of his laptop with the kind of exhausted disbelief that only comes after pulling an all-nighter and realizing the universe doesn't care.
The screen glowed softly in the early morning light, a pale, mocking reminder that everything he had worked on—his progress, his saved files, his carefully modded characters in Celestial Soul VII—might now be lost to the digital void. He poked a few keys, tried the age-old trick of ctrl+alt+del, and watched the spinning wheel of doom blink uselessly at him.
"You've got to be kidding me," he repeated, louder this time, as if sheer repetition might summon a tech support god to his side.
But no deity answered. Just the sound of cicadas outside, chirping like summer was some kind of joke.
He yanked out the power cord and carried the laptop downstairs like he was presenting a body at a crime scene.
His father was at the kitchen table again, this time eating toast with one hand and scrolling through something on his phone with the other. Multitasking in its purest, most unbothered adult form.
"It froze," Hiroto said, setting the laptop down.
His dad looked at it. Then at him. Then at the crumbs on his toast.
"What were you doing on it?"
"Nothing that breaks a computer," Hiroto said quickly. "Just gaming. Maybe a little modding."
His dad sighed and reached over to pick it up. "I'll take it to the shop after work."
"How long will it take?"
"Dunno. Few days? Maybe a week if it's bad."
Hiroto blinked. "A week?"
His father had already moved on, sipping coffee like he hadn't just delivered the worst news imaginable.
So that was how Hiroto's first day of summer vacation began: a broken laptop.
...
..
.
He wandered the living room like a ghost. Sat on the couch. Changed channels. Watched fifteen minutes of a documentary about deep-sea squids before remembering he didn't actually care. He stared at the ceiling fan for a solid half hour, tracking its rotation with the intensity of someone waiting for an epiphany. None came.
He opened the fridge four times in one hour. Took a bite of cold fried chicken. Put it back. Took another bite later. Eventually gave up and microwaved it, only to regret that, too.
He considered reading a book.
Then didn't.
He lay on the tatami floor of his room, counting the tiny imperfections in the ceiling plaster.
He watered the one plant he owned—a slightly wilted cactus named Spike—twice.
By 2 p.m., he was pacing.
By 3 p.m., he had gone through his entire closet trying on old cosplay outfits from past conventions, realized none of them fit right anymore, and stuffed them back in a box with vague resentment.
By 4 p.m., he lay face-down on the bed with one arm dangling off the side like some kind of tragic anime protagonist.
"I am going to die of boredom," he declared to no one.
He looked over at his desk. At the drawer.
The letter he wasn't supposed to have read. The one meant for someone else entirely. The one he had shoved in a drawer yesterday and promised to forget about.
It was still there, obviously.
Hiroto sat up. Walked to the desk. Pulled open the drawer and stared at it like it might bite him.
He picked it up.
Smelled faintly of flowers.
He glanced around his empty room.
It was funny, wasn't it? The idea of replying to a stranger. Especially a stranger who didn't even mean to write to you. There was something low-key thrilling about that. Like sending a message to someone on Telegram then you roast your heart out.
And right now, Hiroto was dying for a distraction.
So....
He pulled out some old lined stationery from the bottom drawer, where he kept random school supplies he never used. He uncapped a pen. Sat down.
And wrote:
__
> Dear Yumi,
I know this is going to sound weird, but I'm not Aka. I'm sorry. I think your letter got sent to the wrong address. My name is Hiroto Minami.
I almost threw your letter away, but I read it instead. I hope that's okay.
This is probably super awkward, and I get it if you just throw this away. But if you do read this… maybe write back? Even just to tell me to mind my own business. I won't be offended.
Hiroto
__
He read it over twice. Debated signing it with something cooler. Realized he didn't know how to be cool in letter form.
He folded it. Found an envelope. Paused.
Should he send it?
Absolutely not.
So obviously, yes.
He copied the return address from the original envelope, added a stamp from the kitchen drawer, and by evening, he was at the corner mailbox, standing there like he was about to confess to a crime.
He looked around.
No one in sight.
He dropped it in.
The thunk it made hitting the metal bottom felt final. Like some small decision had just been locked in place.
And then he went home.
And tried very hard not to think about what he'd just done.