The ocean doesn't forgive.
It hides what it takes, quietly, endlessly, until all that's left is the sound of the wind pretending nothing happened.
Ren's standing at the edge of Hoshimura Cliff again.
The place feels smaller now, but heavier.
He can see every detail, the crooked fence, the old warning sign, the hollow under the rocks where the waves curl and vanish.
He remembers standing here eight years ago.
He remembers the storm.
And now, finally, he remembers what he did.
---
He used to come here with Airi and Kai.
Kai, his older brother by two years, was the brave one. The kind who dared the ocean to try harder.
Airi, the dreamer, the one who believed paper planes could carry wishes.
That summer, they'd made a promise:
> "When we grow up, we'll fly one from here," Kai had said, "and wherever it lands, that's where our future starts."
Airi laughed, holding her tiny paper plane.
> "Then we'll write our names on them. So even if the wind forgets, it'll remember us."
Ren had nodded.
Back then, promises were simple.
And forever felt real.
---
Now, he kneels by the fence, the same spot, tracing the rusted metal with his fingers.
Aika stands behind him, silent. She doesn't ask questions anymore. She just listens.
> "It was my fault," Ren says. "The wind was too strong. I told Airi to wait, but she ran ahead. Her plane got caught in the current… She tried to grab it."
He stops. His throat tightens.
> "Kai jumped after her."
The memory crashes back, raw, unfiltered.
Airi's scream.
Kai's hand reaching out.
Ren's feet frozen in the mud.
The roar of the sea swallowing everything.
Two planes flew that day.
One made of paper.
One made of innocence.
---
When the rescue teams found Ren, he was half-conscious, half-drowned.
Kai was gone.
Airi, too.
No bodies, just the sketchbook floating near the rocks.
The doctor said he'd lost pieces of memory, trauma's way of protecting itself.
But now, he knows it wasn't protection.
It was punishment.
---
Aika opens her sketchbook again and flips to the very first page, one Ren's never seen before.
It's a drawing of three children under a wide sky, hands linked.
Below, written faintly in old, smudged pencil:
> "We'll meet again, even if the wind forgets."
Aika looks at him with tears gathering but never falling.
> "Kai saved her," she says. "The fishermen said they saw him push her toward the shallows before the wave took him."
Ren blinks, stunned.
> "Then, she..."
"She didn't make it either," Aika says softly. "The sea gave her back, but she never woke up."
Ren's knees buckle.
He grips the fence until his knuckles go white.
Every word hits like thunder inside his ribs.
> "So that's why… they erased it. My parents. Everyone."
"They thought you wouldn't survive knowing both of them were gone," Aika whispers. "They were right, for a while."
---
Silence stretches, long, fragile, sacred.
Only the waves dare to speak.
Ren finally looks up.
> "Airi's wish was to see the world, right?"
"Yeah."
"Then maybe she did. Through you. Through the sketches. Through the dreams."
Aika closes the sketchbook, holding it close.
> "Maybe through you, Ren."
He glances at her, the same eyes, same voice, same quiet strength.
And for the first time, instead of guilt, he feels something else.
Gratitude.
---
Before they leave, Ren pulls a crumpled paper from his pocket.
It's an old notebook page, torn and faded, the same one he'd found at home last night.
He folds it carefully into a plane.
> "For Kai," he says.
"And Airi."
Aika nods.
Together, they let it fly.
The wind catches it instantly, lifting it toward the horizon.
For a moment, it soars, higher, farther, before vanishing into the sunlight.
Ren watches until his eyes blur.
Then he whispers:
> "The promise is kept."
---
End of Chapter 4 – The Promise We Buried