The rhythm of our days became a strange, beautiful melody. Mornings on the bridge were the quiet, searching first verse. School and study groups were the steady, harmonious chorus. Our afternoons of sketching and quiet discovery were the soaring, emotional bridge of the song. And the parting at the bus stop was the gentle, bittersweet fade-out.
We learned to live inside this song, to find comfort in its repetition. I learned to cherish the daily miracle of her heart finding its way back to me. She learned to trust the process, to trust her own art, and to trust the unwavering boy who was waiting for her at the start of every day.
But I knew, and Sora knew, that there was a missing piece. Sina was a passenger on this journey. She was reacting, adapting, surviving. She hadn't yet taken the wheel.
That changed on the afternoon of Day 103.
We were sitting by the river, not far from our bridge. She had just finished a stunningly detailed sketch of the light filtering through the leaves of a weeping willow. It was the best work she had done yet. There was a confidence in the lines, a depth in the shading, that spoke to her growing sense of self.
"It's beautiful," I said, my voice full of genuine awe.
"Thanks," she said, a pleased blush on her cheeks. She closed the sketchbook, but instead of putting it away, she held it on her lap, tracing the worn leather cover with her finger. She had a look on her face I had come to recognize—the thoughtful, introspective expression she got before she was about to say something important.
"Kelin," she began, her voice hesitant. "This... our life... it's a good one. It's the best life I've ever known."
My heart swelled. "It's the best one I've known, too."
"But it's not quite a circle, is it?" she continued, her gaze fixed on the slow-moving water. "It's more like... a spiral. Every day we get a little bit closer to... something. But we always have to start back at the beginning of the loop." She finally looked at me, her amber eyes clear and serious. "I'm tired of starting over."
The raw honesty of her words hung in the air. This wasn't the confused, scared girl from weeks ago. This was the girl who had now lived—through her sketchbook and her heart's echo—over a hundred days of this strange love story. And she was demanding more. From herself.
"I don't just want to leave a sketch for the girl in the morning," she declared, her voice gaining a strength that made me sit up straighter. "I want to leave her a message. I want to give her... an instruction."
I waited, my heart pounding, having no idea where this was going.
She opened her sketchbook to a blank page at the very back. She uncapped her pen, her movements deliberate, almost ceremonial.
"Sora told me about your archives," she said quietly. "Your video diary."
The mention of the sealed-away ghosts sent a jolt through me. "Sina..."
"It's okay," she reassured me, not looking up from the page. "I'm not ready for them. Not yet. But the idea... it's a good one. A message from one day to the next." She began to write, her handwriting neat and firm.
After a moment, she turned the sketchbook around and showed me what she had written. It wasn't a drawing. It was a letter.
To the Me of Tomorrow,
His name is Kelin Ishida. He will be on the bridge. He's the one from all these drawings.
Your head will be a blank page. You will not remember him. You will be scared. That's okay.
But your heart will not be blank. You will feel it. A pull. A warmth. It's him. Don't question it. Trust that feeling more than you trust the silence in your mind.
Today, he told me that I'm brave. I didn't feel brave. But right now, at the end of this good day, I do. So I'm leaving you an order.
Walk up to him. Look him in the eye. And take his hand.
Do it. Be the brave one for me.
Sincerely,
The You of Yesterday
I read the words, and then I read them again. My vision blurred. It was the single most powerful, brave, and heart-shatteringly romantic thing I had ever seen.
She was fighting back. She wasn't just creating a map of where she had been; she was drawing a direct order on the map of where to go next. She was weaponizing her own words, her own bravery, against the amnesia. This was not a passive footprint. This was a deliberate step forward.
"Sina," I breathed, my voice thick with emotion. "This is..."
"Is it too much?" she asked, a flicker of insecurity in her eyes. "Will she... listen?"
"Yes," I said with a conviction that felt absolute. "She will. Because you wrote it."
The bus ride home, the evening, the entire night felt different. A fundamental shift had occurred. A fuse had been lit. We had moved from a phase of discovery into a phase of deliberate action.
The next morning, on the dawn of Day 104, I stood on the bridge, and my anxiety was gone, replaced by a thrumming, electric anticipation. I saw her approach in the distance, sketchbook clutched in her hands, her pace hesitant. I could see the familiar confusion on her face. I saw her stop, open the book to the last page, and read.
I saw her lips move as she silently read the words from her past self. She stood there for a full, agonizing minute, the note in one hand, her other hand clenched into a fist at her side. She looked up at me, at the strange boy her heart was screaming about and her head knew nothing of. I saw the fear in her eyes. The doubt.
But then, I saw her take a deep, steeling breath. I saw her jaw set in a line of determination. She closed the sketchbook.
And she started to walk towards me.
She didn't stop a few feet away. She walked right up to me, her eyes locked on mine. I could see the battle she was waging with herself, the sheer force of will it was taking to follow the order. Her hand was trembling.
And then, she did it. She reached out and, with a shaky, deliberate motion, took my hand in hers.
Her hand was cold, but the contact was electric. A current of pure, unadulterated triumph shot through me.
She held on tight, her knuckles white. She looked down at our joined hands, and then back up at me, a single tear of victory tracing a path down her cheek.
"Hello," she whispered, her voice a fragile, powerful testament to her own courage. "I was told to find you."