Chapter 14: We got married right after finishing high school

Friday, 2 May, 20XX - Part 4

We drove until we found a parking lot next to a train station. It was the kind of station in the middle of the countryside, where the train came only a few times a day, with no JR staff checking tickets. Instead, there was a box with a sign asking passengers to drop their tickets in there.

We decided to take a rest here.

At first, we thought of parking at the next possible convenience store. But doing so risked attracting attention. Our red Kei car suddenly felt like a huge target on our backs. The police identified us based on the color of the car and the registration plate. For now, we wanted to stay as far away from other people as possible.

We’ll have to think of a way of disguising the car later.

Yui and I sat on a bench on the platform, facing the tracks and rice paddy fields that lay beyond that. The sweet scent of the countryside filled the air. Somewhere in the distance, we could hear a motorcycle roaring.

We looked like two students waiting for the train. Two students in the countryside, taking the train home.

As someone who grew up in the city, I wondered if this is what kids in the countryside felt like.

It felt a bit strange to have such mundane thoughts running through my head when we had just survived the most dangerous situation that could’ve happened to us.

“How did you do that?” I asked.

“Heh-heh~” Yui smirked. She was radiating smugness. She had pulled off her greatest scheme, yet. An act of deception not even I could fully figure out.

“What should I do?” she said. “A magician never reveals their trick.”

“…”

“Don’t look at me like that. I’ll explain everything, okay?”

The magician revealed her trick.

Yui saw me speaking to the police. At first, she thought that the police were looking for her. But when she saw the police officer taking my driver’s license and not paying any attention to her, that was when she figured out that they were looking for me.

At that point, she knew that we were in deep trouble. The police were looking for and had found me. They weren’t going to let us go.

So she decided to put on an act. She’d pretend to be my girlfriend and act lovey dovey to get the police officer to lower his guard. A man with a loving girlfriend by his side was less suspicious. It was the foundation for explaining everything away as a mere misunderstanding.

“Wait, girlfriend? You said we got married right after finishing high school.”

“Mh, after I wrapped my arm around yours, I thought it might be better if we were married.”

“Why the change?”

“The police officer had a ring on his finger. He was quite young too, for a police officer. So he must be newlywed.”

“I see…” By portraying us as a newlywed couple, she was trying to make the police officer feel empathy with us. He might also have had trouble with his in-laws and understood what the newlywed life was like, which increases the likelihood of him letting us go.

“Wait, but why did you say you were pregnant?”

“If he didn’t let us go, my plan was to say that my stomach hurts, and then he’d have to let us go to the hospital. I figured on the way to the hospital we could find a way to escape.”

Uwah…Yui had planned five steps ahead – and in such a short time too. What was going on in that head of hers?

But there was still one thing that I didn’t understand.

“How did you do the phone call?”

Yui’s mischievous grin fell. Her expression darkened. I thought this would be her crowning achievement. The grandest deception of them all. But she didn’t seem to be the least happy.

“You didn’t call my father, right?”

She tried to smile. “Of course, not. I don’t even know who your father is.”

“Then who did you call?”

Yui pursed her lips. She tucked her hair behind her ear. Her gaze filled with quiet loathing.

“My stepfather.”

“Y-You called your stepfather?”

“Mh…”

“I don’t understand.”

Yui explained. When she said that she had to return to the car to get her phone, that was obviously a lie, as she had her phone in her pocket already at that point.

She went back to the car to set up the fake phone call. But there was no time to put together a fake recording using clips from TV dramas or using apps that can imitate someone’s voice. She had to call a real person, but she had no friends at school who could help. And even if she did, their voices would’ve sounded too young.

That's why she called her stepfather.

A high risk, high reward play.

She told her stepfather that she was in trouble with some police officers and that she needed him to speak to the police to get her out of it. Of course he wasn’t going to help her.

So she told him that if he lets her get caught by the police, she will show the police all the wounds on her body, as well as pictures of the worst of the abuse. It will be enough to get him in a lot of trouble. She says she has cracked open the box she stole from her mother, and inside there is evidence of him not paying his income tax. Enough evidence to lock him away for years.

But even then, he still refused to help her. He said that he would beat her half-dead when the police took her home.

So she played her final card.

“If you don’t help me, I will tell mother that you cheated on her. I have pictures.” Those were the words she said to him.

“How do you know your stepfather cheated on your mother?” I asked.

“I don’t know. But he spends a lot of time outside. So he might’ve cheated on her.”

It wasn’t her making a last play, so much as it was a wild gamble.

But according to Yui, that was enough to make him change his mind.

“I was hoping that it would work, but I didn’t expect him to change his mind that quickly. He really didn’t want mother to find out that he cheated on her, even if it meant he’d lose all the money I took with me.”

How strange…

He cheated on her, spent a lot of time outside and beat her daughter – but he’d rather lose all of his money than the woman he is in a relationship with.

He was a scumbag. But maybe he does love Yui’s mother.

Yui continued. “I told him to speak to the police officer, say that he is your father, and that it is all a misunderstanding after his daughter-in-law explained everything.”

Yui looked at the ground, her eyes filled with shame.

“I’m sorry, Haruto.”

“Why are you apologizing?”

“To make the whole charade work, I had to tell him your name and the car’s registration plate number. My stepfather said that Iyama Haruto is his son, and that the red Kei car with that particular registration number belongs to him, and that he gave us permission to use it for our trip. The police officer might not have believed it if there were details missing. If your father had my phone number, why not just call us instead of calling the police? I was hoping the police officer wouldn’t notice how this phone call didn’t make sense.”

It took me a moment to realize the gravity of what Yui was saying.

At this moment, Yui’s stepfather knew that we were traveling together. He knew what my name was, the color of our car and the registration plate number.

It would only take a few hours for him to find out where I lived and the fact that we were classmates.

He will most likely make use of this information.

My father was looking for me, and so was Yui’s stepfather.

This whole time, we thought that we had to hide Yui.

But it was me who had the biggest target on his back.