The rain stopped by morning, but the sky still looked bruised — pale gray clouds hanging low over the city like unspoken words. Ren woke late, the memory of last night still clinging to him.
He hadn't slept much. Every time he closed his eyes, he saw her again — the woman in the black coat, the way her voice cut through the quiet, the way her name lingered like a question he hadn't learned how to ask properly. Miyako.
He whispered it once, just to hear how it sounded in the empty room. It felt wrong to say it so easily. Too intimate, maybe. Too real.
By noon, he found himself standing again in front of that abandoned house. He told himself it was coincidence. That he was just passing by. But even he didn't believe it.
The door gave the same tired creak as he pushed it open. The air smelled of damp wood and dust — familiar now. The sunlight slanted through the cracks in the walls, laying thin strips of gold across the floor.
And there it was.
Her umbrella.
Left leaning against the beam by the window, exactly where she had placed it. A simple black one, its handle slightly chipped. He walked over and touched it, half expecting her to appear again, as if summoned by memory.
But the house was quiet.
Ren sat down where she had been sitting the night before. The wood was still faintly cool. He looked around the room — empty, peeling wallpaper, faint graffiti from kids who used to come here before him. He could almost imagine what the place might've looked like once: a small, clean house where someone lived and waited for the rain to end.
Maybe that's what this place was now — a kind of waiting room for lost people.
He waited until dusk.
He didn't know what he was waiting for exactly — her, probably. Or maybe the feeling of not being alone again. He pretended to sketch in his notebook, but every time he thought he heard footsteps outside, his head jerked up.
They weren't hers.
By evening, the light had turned soft and gold. The shadows grew long, stretching across the floorboards. He sighed and got up, brushing the dust from his jeans.
Just as he reached for the umbrella to take it with him — to keep it safe, maybe as an excuse — a voice came from the doorway.
"So you're still here."
Ren spun around.
Miyako stood at the entrance, hair slightly windblown, this time wearing a gray blouse and a skirt that still carried traces of rain at the hem. She looked surprised for a heartbeat, then amused.
"I thought I left that thing here," she said, nodding toward the umbrella. "Guess I was right."
"I was keeping it safe," Ren said quickly, then regretted how desperate it sounded.
She smiled a little. "How noble."
There was a pause — the comfortable kind. The rain hadn't started yet, but the air outside smelled like it might.
"Do you come here often?" he asked again, realizing too late it was the same question from before.
Miyako tilted her head. "You sound like someone trying to flirt."
Ren's ears burned. "That's not— I just… wanted to know."
"I told you," she said, stepping closer, "when it rains."
"Why this place?"
She looked around slowly. "Because it's quiet. The city's too loud. My apartment's too empty. Here…" She trailed off, as if she didn't want to finish the thought.
Ren waited.
"Here," she said at last, "no one asks anything of me."
The words hung in the air. He understood them in a way — he didn't know her story, but he could feel the weight behind it.
"So you come here to be alone," he murmured.
She looked at him then — really looked at him. "And you?"
Ren hesitated. "I come here to figure out why being alone feels easier than being with people."
That earned him a quiet laugh. It wasn't mocking, just soft — like she didn't expect such honesty from him.
"You're strange," she said.
He smiled, almost proudly. "People say that too."
Miyako took her umbrella and brushed the dust off its fabric. "Then maybe we're both strange."
The rain began again, faintly, tapping against the roof. She looked at the door, then back at him. "You should go home before it gets worse."
Ren nodded, though he didn't move. "Will you come again?"
She hesitated just a second too long. "Maybe," she said, turning toward the rain. "If it rains."
Then she was gone again — into the gray world beyond the doorway.
Ren stood there long after the sound of her footsteps faded. The air smelled like wet earth and something new he couldn't name.
He smiled, small and foolish.
He didn't realize yet that he would start watching the weather forecasts every morning from that day on.