For the next few days, Tsushima Kagami stayed flat on a hospital bed.
It was a private room, the window facing south, and the sunlight came spilling in right on schedule every morning.
Tsushima Kagami stared up at that patch of sky, and something came back to him.
As the anesthesia from the surgery worked its way out of his system, the muddled blur of his memory finally sharpened into focus.
From the moment he'd been stabbed at the amusement park that day, the pain had been violent enough to nearly drop him on the spot.
Right at the blurred edge of consciousness, just as his brain's protective reflex was about to kick in and let him black out, let him stop enduring it, he saw Shimizu Nayotake's face swim into view.
She'd fumbled a bottle out of her pocket, the energy potion he'd left with her way back when, wrenched off the cap, and poured the whole thing down his throat.
The pain didn't go anywhere. His mind, on the other hand, snapped wide awake.
Awake enough that he'd felt every single tearing throb from the wound with perfect clarity.
He could have passed out. Instead he ground his teeth and rode the pain the entire way to the hospital.
He suffered through one examination after another until they finally settled on a surgical plan.
Only when they wheeled him into the operating room and the anesthetic went into his vein did he finally cut out like someone had pulled the plug.
Thinking back on it now, Nayotake really was a living demon.
When he woke up, it was already the next day.
Mrs. Yukinoshita told him about it afterward.
The doctor said that when they removed the blade, they'd found it had stopped half a centimeter short of his internal organs.
And two millimeters short of severing a branch artery.
She'd even laughed while she said it, marveling at what a charmed life he led.
Then she'd switched to a tone that was half worry and half scolding, pointing out how many times he'd been hospitalized in under a year.
Complaining that he had a body built for hospital stays.
All Tsushima Kagami could do was laugh weakly, because he had nothing to argue with.
He'd also asked how the news coverage of the amusement park incident had gone afterward.
There had been plenty of people there that day, after all. Most of them far away, sure.
But someone might have recognized him.
Mrs. Yukinoshita told him about that too.
The Metropolitan Police Department had taken the initiative to bury the whole thing.
A minor was involved, and at the end of the day the incident reflected badly on the police themselves.
A stabbing in a crowded public venue like an amusement park, and after the culprit was subdued he broke free and went after the boy who'd stepped in to help.
If that got out, it would be an enormous headache for the department's public image.
So they'd leaned on the press themselves and forbidden the release of any related information.
On top of that, Shinchosha had reached out to the media as well.
All the major outlets had enjoyed a pretty comfortable working relationship with him lately, too.
So in the end, none of the big names ran the details.
It helped that the visitors had all been watching from a distance. The few who'd had cameras came away with blurry, low-resolution shots where no face was recognizable, nothing usable as news material.
A handful of gossip rags printed something anyway, but nobody took them seriously.
Only then did Tsushima Kagami let himself relax completely.
The very next day, Mrs. Yukinoshita hurried straight back to Chiba, travel-worn as ever.
After that, Tsushima Kagami's days settled into an almost unvarying rhythm.
In the morning a nurse woke him to take his temperature and blood pressure, change his dressings, and then breakfast.
After breakfast he lay in bed and stared into space. Lunch at noon. More staring in the afternoon, with the occasional flip through the manga Yukinoshita Shizuku brought him.
Dinner in the evening, then back to studying the ceiling or the window until drowsiness took him.
Besides that, one bottle of energy potion a day.
Every time he drank one, Tsushima Kagami could feel the wound knitting itself back together faster.
Even the doctor doing his rounds couldn't get over it, saying his recovery rate was frankly unbelievable.
At this pace, the stitches could come out and he could be discharged in about two weeks.
Visitors came in a steady stream the whole time.
Yukinoshita Shizuku came nearly every day, sometimes alone after school, sometimes with others in tow.
Shimizu Nayotake went without saying. She came even more often than Yukinoshita Shizuku, sometimes showing up at the crack of dawn.
She'd sit at the bedside without a word, quietly peeling an apple, and hand it over when it was done. If he didn't eat it, she ate it herself.
Tsukuyomi Komoe, Douraku Utage and Hayase Kinue came by regularly with home-cooked food to upgrade his meals.
Yamada Kenta and Hazuki Hotaru had dropped off get-well gifts the day he woke up and hadn't come back since.
Tsushima Kagami still remembered the awkward, complicated look on Yamada Kenta's face that day.
Honestly, hardly anyone could have withstood the atmospheric pressure in that room.
He'd been sitting on pins and needles himself for days.
And today, at last, Tsushima Kagami was cleared to get out of bed and walk.
The first time he stood, his legs went soft under him, and he had to grip the bed rail for a good while before he adjusted.
The wound still ached dully, but compared to a few days ago it was worlds better.
Even the nurses who changed his dressings kept marveling at how fast he was healing.
Tsushima Kagami walked to the window, pushed it open, and looked out at the early cherry blossoms.
All at once he wanted to paint.
So he asked Yukinoshita Shizuku for his art supplies.
A box of watercolors, a few brushes, a palette, and a stack of watercolor paper.
Yukinoshita Shizuku didn't ask a single question. She went straight home and brought back the set he always used.
She laid everything out for him in neat rows.
Tsushima Kagami spent the entire day painting the view outside that window.
The other girls all came by after school every day.
Sometimes in pairs, sometimes one at a time.
But whoever it was, the first thing they did after coming through the door was glance at what Tsushima Kagami was doing.
Then turn to Yukinoshita Shizuku and ask with their eyes.
How is he today?
Every time, Yukinoshita Shizuku only shook her head, a worry in her eyes that she couldn't put into words.
"Ever since he woke up," she said to them one day.
"He's always staring out that window."
"Then he started sitting by it and painting. All day, every day."
"He barely talks anymore."
The moment the words left her mouth, the air outside the hospital room seemed to freeze.
Sayuri was standing in the doorway with the get-well gift she'd just bought still in her hands, and she went rigid.
Her lips moved like she wanted to say something, but nothing came out. She only lowered her eyes, lashes trembling faintly.
Shizuka Hiratsuka leaned against the wall with her arms folded, her face giving nothing away.
But anyone who looked closely at her eyes would have seen them unfocused, fixed on something no one else could see.
Seika Ijichi sat in the visitor's chair to the side, head down, staring at the toes of her shoes.
It was a long while before she spoke, and when she did, her voice was low.
"Was it… that day, at the amusement park…"
She didn't finish. She didn't have to. Everyone there understood.
That day at the amusement park, they'd forced him to face all of it.
Forced him to look straight at the things he'd spent so long running from.
And then…
Kosaka Akane stood by the window with her back to everyone, as though she were admiring the scenery.
But if anyone had walked around to her front, they'd have found her eyes rimmed red, her teeth clamped down hard on her lower lip, fighting with everything she had to keep the tears in.
Machida Sonoko sat beside Kosaka Akane, hands clasped in her lap, fingers twisting around each other.
There was a faint smile on her face, but it looked glued on. One gust of wind and it would fall right off.
Every one of them was thinking the same thing.
Was this my fault?
If we hadn't pushed him that day, he wouldn't have gone off to the amusement park alone, would he?
Wouldn't have run into that lunatic?
Wouldn't have been stabbed?
Wouldn't have ended up like this?
The guilt was a bundle of fine needles, one driven into each of their hearts.
After they left the hospital that day, they sat down together and talked for a very, very long time.
Today, as usual, Tsushima Kagami finished having his dressings changed and settled in to eat the special nutritional bento Hayase Kinue had made.
He chatted with her, Tsukuyomi Komoe and Douraku Utage while he ate.
Then the door to the room swung open.
For the first time ever, Yukinoshita Shizuku and the rest had all come to visit at once.
The room had never been this crowded.
Sayuri sat at the bedside peeling an apple.
Shizuka Hiratsuka leaned by the window flipping through a magazine.
Seika Ijichi organized the gifts they'd brought.
Kosaka Akane and Machida Sonoko squeezed into a single visitor's chair, murmuring to each other.
Hiroi Kikuri and PA-ko stood in the doorway talking.
Yukinoshita Shizuku cleared away the empty bento boxes.
Shimizu Nayotake sat in the corner.
Hayase Kinue and her two companions took in the roomful of people.
Then they looked at Tsushima Kagami, and all three said with smiles that they had somewhere to be.
And out they went.
Leaving Tsushima Kagami alone with nine girls.
Looking at the strange mood filling the room, Tsushima Kagami knew the day had finally come when he couldn't put this off any longer.
The truth was, all that painting and all that silence over the past few days had been him turning it over and over, trying to work out how on earth to say this to them.
He knew they were worried about him.
He knew exactly what was going through each of their heads.
The girls' guilt, their self-blame, the sense of sin he'd created and that none of them should ever have had to carry.
He knew all of it.
So he decided that with everyone here today, he'd lay it out plainly.
Tsushima Kagami looked around at them and pushed himself slowly up off the bed.
Shimizu Nayotake hurried over and steadied him with an arm.
The moment he stood, every girl pretending to be busy shot a glance his way.
Then went right back to inventing chores to look occupied with.
Tsushima Kagami glanced at Shimizu Nayotake beside him.
Then at everyone else.
Finally he drew a deep breath.
"I—"
The first syllable was barely out before the room, full of rustling busywork a second ago, dropped into total silence.
Every head turned toward him at once.
The sheer force of it made Tsushima Kagami falter, but he pressed on.
"There's something I want to say."
The words had barely landed.
"Ah, we haven't eaten yet!" Hiroi Kikuri clapped her hands together and grabbed PA-ko by the sleeve.
"Come on, come on, let's go to the cafeteria."
PA-ko nodded like she'd read her mind, and the two of them left without a backward glance.
Tsushima Kagami. "…?"
Seika Ijichi stood up, picked up the lunchbox Hayase Kinue had left on the nightstand, and said with a perfectly blank face, "I'll go wash this."
Then she turned and walked out at a pace that looked an awful lot like fleeing.
Shizuka Hiratsuka snapped the magazine shut, straightened up, and said with a light, deliberately casual laugh, "I'll go ask the nurses if there's any medication for this afternoon."
And she strode out of the room.
Sayuri dropped the half-peeled apple onto the table and scrambled to her feet.
"I— I'll go wash your brushes!"
She snatched up the paint-caked brushes and bolted like something was chasing her.
Kosaka Akane and Machida Sonoko exchanged a look and rose together.
"We're going to… go for a walk."
"Right, a walk. Walking's good for you," Machida Sonoko agreed with a smile, though the smile looked strained from any angle.
The two of them filed out one after the other.
In under ten seconds, the room had emptied out completely.
Only Yukinoshita Shizuku and Shimizu Nayotake were left.
Tsushima Kagami stood frozen where he was, the corner of his mouth twitching.
Hang on… weren't you all here to visit me?
How did everyone just vanish?
He couldn't make sense of it, but he pulled himself together.
He walked over to Yukinoshita Shizuku.
Yukinoshita Shizuku was bent over the nightstand, gathering up the dishes.
Tsushima Kagami took a deep breath and started to speak.
"I—"
"That's enough. Don't say it." Yukinoshita Shizuku didn't even lift her head.
"I understand."
Tsushima Kagami blinked, then scratched his head.
He stared at her, thoroughly lost.
I haven't said a word yet. What exactly do you understand?
"Understand what?" Tsushima Kagami's brow furrowed.
"Because I sure don't."
Only then did Yukinoshita Shizuku raise her head and give him a look.
The corner of her mouth curved slightly into something that wasn't quite a smile.
Then she reached out and pushed him away, though her hand was gentle about it, almost coaxing.
"You're annoying."
"Stop bothering me while I'm clearing up."
Tsushima Kagami stumbled back a step, his head full of question marks.
He turned to Shimizu Nayotake, who hadn't said anything this whole time, bewilderment written all over his face.
"What does she understand?"
"Do you get it?"
Shimizu Nayotake smiled and nodded too.
"I understand."
Tsushima Kagami's brain shut down.
Understand WHAT?!
Tsushima Kagami was not a man who gave up easily.
He turned, walked out of the room, and followed the corridor to the washing station.
Seika Ijichi was standing at the sink with the tap running over the lunchbox.
The water rushed loudly, splashing onto her cuffs, and she didn't seem to notice.
"Seika…" Tsushima Kagami walked up and opened with that much.
Seika Ijichi shut off the tap, spun around, and clapped a hand straight over his mouth.
"Mmph mmph?!"
"I understand."
Seika Ijichi looked him dead in the eye, her tone far too serious for a joke.
Tsushima Kagami pried her hand off his mouth and gasped in a breath.
Utterly baffled.
"What is it that you understand this time?"
Seika Ijichi rolled her eyes at him, then turned sideways and shouldered him out of the way before switching the tap back on.
"Stop bothering me while I'm washing this."
Tsushima Kagami stood there for two full seconds.
Then he looked toward the other side of the room.
Sayuri was crouched in the corner in front of a bucket, diligently washing his brushes.
She dunked them one by one, rubbing the dried paint off the tips with her fingers.
The water quickly turned a murky grey-blue.
Tsushima Kagami had taken exactly one step.
"Don't come over here!"
Sayuri shouted it without turning around, as if she had eyes in the back of her head. There was a flustered urgency in her voice.
"I get it, I get all of it!"
Tsushima Kagami stopped in his tracks. "Confused" no longer covered the expression on his face.
It was closer to genuinely wondering whether something had gone wrong with the world.
"I don't get it," he said, and there was a distinct note of grievance in it.
"So what exactly is it that you get?"
Sayuri still didn't turn around, but the tips of her ears went visibly red.
She scrubbed at the bristles hard, her movements jerky, like she was using them to cover something up.
"I just get it, okay!"
Her voice climbed a notch.
"You're so annoying, go away already!"
"…"
Tsushima Kagami had no choice but to turn around and head back.
At the bend in the corridor, Shizuka Hiratsuka came walking toward him.
She had a medication list she'd just gotten from the nurses' station, head down, reading as she walked, and she nearly plowed into him.
"Koharu." Tsushima Kagami stopped her.
Shizuka Hiratsuka looked up and met his eyes.
And in the gaze of the usually liveliest person he knew, a flicker of panic went past.
"Kagami, what are you doing out of bed?"
"Shizuku and the others decided I was annoying and threw me out."
"Anyway, there's something I want to talk to you about."
The words were barely out.
Shizuka Hiratsuka shoved him aside.
"No need to say it, I understand."
I haven't said anything yet. What do you understand?
Tsushima Kagami stood there with his hand still outstretched, watching Shizuka Hiratsuka disappear down the hall.
It occurred to him that maybe these past few days had been a dream inside a dream inside a dream.
Why was every single one of them saying they understood?
That they got it.
That they comprehended.
Understood what, exactly?
I don't understand!
Wakannai yo!
Standing there in a daze, Tsushima Kagami spotted Hiroi Kikuri and PA-ko, who may or may not have come back from the cafeteria.
He was just about to pull rank as their senpai and ask whether the two of them knew something.
The instant they saw him from down the hall, they turned and ran.
Shouting as they went.
"We understand everything, so don't say anything else and don't ask us anything either!"
Tsushima Kagami stood in the middle of the corridor.
It struck him that he might be the single most clueless person alive.
Everyone was saying "I understand," "I get it," "I comprehend."
But understand what? Get what? Comprehend what?
He hadn't figured out one word of it.
That was when Kosaka Akane and Machida Sonoko came back in from outside.
Seeing Tsushima Kagami standing there staring into space, the two of them traded a puzzled look.
Then they walked over.
"Kagami, what are you doing standing here spacing out?"
Tsushima Kagami came back to himself and looked at his two senpai.
His expression turned serious.
"If I told you I had something to say to you, are you two going to hit me with an 'I understand' as well?"
"Ah, well."
Kosaka Akane and Machida Sonoko hadn't expected their escape route to be cut off so directly.
Neither of them looked the least bit rattled, though.
Machida Sonoko sighed and then said with a smile, "If Kagami really has something he wants to tell us,"
"then as your senpai, we'll listen properly."
For once he wasn't getting a nonsense answer before he'd even opened his mouth.
Tsushima Kagami's face brightened at last.
"Then I'm going to say it!"
He met Machida Sonoko's eyes and let out a breath.
Ready to lay out every filthy, contemptible, ugly thought he had.
"I—"
"We're willing to listen, but Kagami should understand something too."
"Once certain words are said out loud, things can never go back to the way they were."
Barely a syllable in, and Kosaka Akane had cut him off with a smile.
"What's that supposed to mean?" Tsushima Kagami frowned at her.
Kosaka Akane and Machida Sonoko glanced at each other, then smiled at him.
"Kagami's clever. You'll figure it out."
Watching Tsushima Kagami sink abruptly into thought, his eyes flickering between one realization and another, the two of them waited a while before continuing.
"So, does Kagami still have something he wants to tell us?"
Tsushima Kagami surfaced from his thoughts.
He felt like he'd caught the faint shape of something.
But he wasn't sure.
In the end he looked at the two of them.
And they looked back, smiling as they asked, "So, Kagami. Do you understand?"
"I think I do."
"But I don't know if what I understand is the same thing everyone else understands."
"Could you let me understand a little more?"
Kosaka Akane and Machida Sonoko each raised an index finger and pressed it to his lips before he could ask anything further.
"Don't get greedy now."
____
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