Of Greetings and Goodbyes

Of course, what I was about to do bordered on idiotic, but at this point, no one—not even me—could be surprised by the level of idiocy I can handle in situations like this.
Or rather, no one would be surprised by the level of idiocy I can manage after a situation like the one that just happened.

Why did I choose the bridge and not the cemetery?
Different situations; different settings.
I wasn’t looking to vent. Nor was I seeking absolution for the things I hadn’t done, which were significantly more than the things I had.

I hadn’t forgotten Lyse, but as I said before, she’s a weight I’ll carry.
Everyone has a weight they bear, I think, so I’m not alone in this.
In fact… no one is.

There were no shadows dancing around the bridge, no eyes watching from beyond the human plane.
Just an abandoned bridge.
A round wooden table, a bit old and worn but covered with an overly ostentatious tablecloth.

A table.
Two chairs—one for her, one for me.
Two cups of tea: 'hello' and 'goodbye.'

“Eiji…” she said, gesturing for me to sit.

“Sereres…” I replied, taking a seat.

If I had to say something about this moment, I’d say the chair was pretty comfortable.

“Pardon?” Her hand, reaching for her cup, paused. She looked at me and blinked once.

“Sereres.”

“What’s that?”

“Your name.”

“I don’t have a name, Eiji.”

“Everyone has one. Those who don’t, should. So I gave you one.”

She sipped her tea, as if contemplating something. “Why that name?”

“Because it’s a palindrome.”

“Like Aranara.”

“Exactly. Same, but different.”

“Still, I meant your choice, not the reasoning.”

“The first time I saw you was in the cemetery. It was raining, so I think that name sounds like rain hitting something.”

“Interesting choice…” Her eyes, captivating in their own way, were two black orbs that reflected nothing. “I’ll keep it, at least until someone gives me a better one.”

“As if that’s gonna happen…” I said, chuckling as I picked up my cup. Oolong tea, perfectly oxidized, slightly fruity.
No, it wasn’t poison or some weird potion—just well-made tea, which is almost as rare.
No one makes good tea these days; everyone seems too rushed to do it properly.

“Don’t you think someone could sit down for a drink with me and give me a new name, Eiji?”

“Honestly, no.”

“And in a million years?”

“Not even in a trillion years multiplied by itself.”

“You’re being awfully harsh, Eiji,” she replied with a subtle tease. “Why do you think that?”

“Hmm… fear, I guess. People fear death,” I said, extending my cup toward her.

“You’re right…” she added, refilling it.

“But they shouldn’t, don’t you think?” I asked, setting the cup down and leaning closer, careful not to rest my elbows on the table. You know, manners. “We see death—sorry, we see you, Sereres—as the culprit behind the end of all stories, but looking at it differently, you just close a chapter.”

Her bluish lips paused just before touching her cup. “You really believe that?”

“Completely. At least now.”

“Why do you believe that, Eiji?”

“You know the answer.”

“I’m omnipresent, Eiji, not omniscient.”

“Aranara said you were omniscient.”

“Ah… in her head, anyone who knows more than her is practically omniscient,” she said with a laugh empty of humor, anger, or any emotion, for that matter.

“In that case, I feel a bit omniscient.”

“What an idiotic comment.”

“Yeah, you’re totally right,” I replied, picking up my cup again. “The reason’s simple—if no one feared death, many would be tempted to seek it, to rush the story’s end, so to speak.”

“Like you.”

“Like thousands,” I corrected.

She stood slowly, adjusted her chair, wiped her lips with a napkin, and walked to the edge of the bridge, gesturing for me to follow.

“Let me be honest. I was prepared for this to be more than just a ‘chat.’ I thought you’d come loaded with rage and insults that, though I’ve heard thousands of times, I’m not in the mood to hear,” she said, resting her hands on the bridge’s railing, her eyes watching the small waves below or perhaps part of the town.

“For a moment, I considered it, yeah. But I don’t have a reason to, you know?”

“I gave Aranara a role more painful than you can imagine, Eiji.”

“I know. But I’m the one who made that pain tangible.”

“Imagine someone slicing your brain in two with a knife that lost its edge long ago. Imagine it happening every minute of every day, for all eternity,” she said, turning her face slightly to meet my eyes. “Even then, I don’t deserve a tirade of insults, Eiji?”

“Even then.”

“Why?”

“Because it’s not something you did just to cause her pain… just like I didn’t. Listen, it’s just that you and Aranara are… kinda dumb.”

“Dumb?” She laughed a little as she asked, a perfectly pitched laugh that sounded like a few notes from a song never played.

“Yup… Aranara exists because you don’t understand how humans work, and in turn, her pain is our fault, not yours,” I said, lightly tapping the bridge’s railing. The metallic clink was the only sound, besides our voices, breaking the night’s silence.
“Life isn’t easy, though no one ever tells you that. Life has more pain than joy, more defeats than victories—that’s true for everyone, to varying degrees. Some, like me, can’t handle the pain and decide it’s better to ‘close the book’ than ‘see how it ends.’ Our pain vanishes with us, often ignored. That’s why you gave Aranara that role, isn’t it?”

“…”

“I remember what she told me a while back—she remembers the names of every single person who took their own life.”

“…”

“What you did was an act of twisted empathy. I can’t blame you for not understanding us, but I can blame you for making her carry the weight of what we, as humans, should.”

“I think this chat has gone on long enough, Eiji.”

“You think? When’s the next time you’ll get a conversation like this, or am I too dense?”

“Yes, I think so. It’ll probably be thousands of years, if it happens at all, and yes, you’re too dense.” Through her eloquence, her elegance, the firmness of her voice, I could see a desire—maybe she genuinely wanted me to spit venom at her.

“In that case, let’s get to the point…” I said, returning to the table.

I refilled the cups. The teapot seemed bottomless, which I was grateful for because, honestly, the tea was some of the best I’d ever had.
I chose to drink from her cup instead of mine.

“Time for ‘supply and demand,’ right, Eiji?” she asked, taking a seat, clearly noticing the cup switch.

“You make it sound like we’re corporate suits. That’s awful,” I said, faking a shiver as I sipped the tea.

“Since you did something as absurd as giving me a name—which, don’t take it as too likely, I might come to appreciate—I want to do something absurd too.”

“Tell me.”

“I can silence all that pain.”

“I’m listening. Go on.”

“But…”

“Of course there’s a ‘but.’”

“You’d forget her. Like Sayo and her family.”

“Pass.”

“Why? I’m offering to free her from the pain.”

“Yeah, but… Sereres… I’m just a selfish guy. I want you to ease her pain and I want to stay with her.”

“Selfish indeed.”

“Exaggeratedly selfish. So I won’t accept anything less.”

“What do you want, then?” she asked, staring at her cup without touching it.

“Let her be just another death. Don’t tie her to people like me. No, better yet… how about giving her a new title?” I asked, pointing to the other side of the bridge. “Make her the death of this town.”

“The death of this town?”

“Yeah, since she lives here, I want her to see for herself that not all deaths are painful farewells, that people don’t always scream in horror when they… well, see you. That some lives, though few, end fulfilled.”

“I didn’t expect that,” she said, her fingers softly tapping the table, like keeping a rhythm, almost like a clock.

“What do you offer in return?”

“Let’s see… we could have meetings like this at least once a month…”

“Eiji.” she said, as if mocking me.

“Okay, okay… weekly if you want. I’d like to hear your stories too,” I said, finishing the tea.

“Eiji,” she repeated, more seriously, probably with a hint of annoyance.

“And when I die… which I hope is many, many years from now… you can let go of my hand.”

“Let go of your hand?”

Worry? I don’t think so, but I won’t rule it out.
Curiosity? I think so, almost certain.
Whatever it was, I’d confirmed that, even on a microscopic level, I’d stirred something in her.

“Yeah. Don’t take me to the other side when I die. Let me vanish.”

“Eiji, we’re talking about nothingness itself.”

“I know.”

“You still want that?”

“Don’t you see it as a fair trade? I’m asking for a lot, so I have to offer the most I can.”

“You won’t see her again when you die, Eiji. In fact, there’ll be nothing when you die.”

“I know, Sereres. That makes me want to spend more time here,” I replied, showing her the empty cup. “Not exactly here, but with Aranara, with Sayo, and who knows? Maybe I’ll meet more people…” I said, setting the cup down before standing. “Maybe you and I can have tea more often. You seem like someone with interesting stories.”

“I can’t undo it once you leave this bridge, Eiji,” she said, not intending to stand, though her voice urged me to sit again.

“Sereres, have you seen Casablanca?” I asked, still walking—no, heading home.

“Eiji, I’m trying to make you rethink and understand there’s nothing waiting for you once you die.”

“Yeah, I heard you, but here and now, someone is waiting for me. So, have you seen the movie or not?”

“I had the fortune of meeting Humphrey Bogart, so in a way, yes, I know the movie.”

“Great, then you know… we’ll always have Paris.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?” she said, her eyes returning to the cup one last time.

“My cool line,” I replied.

I didn’t expect to continue the conversation, nor did I want to. I just wanted to go home.
I hoped Aranara was helping Sayo settle in, though I had a slight feeling they’d both be waiting for me to organize everything.

Sayo, because I was the one who made the offer, and Aranara because… well, she’s Aranara.

Not seeing her again… did that weigh more than the void itself?
Yes, the former, if I’m honest.
But something kept circling in my head as I walked home. Sereres’ gray coat didn’t seem as threatening as I remembered from the first time. She herself didn’t seem threatening—maybe because I didn’t push her to a limit, or maybe because she didn’t have one to push.
I prefer to think my cool line did something.

Maybe, in reality, that gray coat was something so simple it went over my head until now. It was simple, actually.
There’s no such thing as black or white, no absolutes. We live in a gray area we often fail to notice or usually interpret as bad because it’s not the color we want.

Before I knew it, I was at the front door, hesitating to go in.
No, nothing was out of place—it was exactly that which made me doubt whether to enter or spend the night in the garden.

The first thing I noticed was the kitchen in shambles. It didn’t take much to know who was responsible. On the table were three plates with something that looked literally like vomit.
Aranara was eating like it was nothing. Sayo, on the other hand, had her eyes fixed on the plate, like she was staring at a corpse.

“You could’ve waited for me, you know?” I said, slumping into a chair.

“Technically, it’s not a dinner if we’re not all together, so we’re not eating, and…” Sayo said before her eyes returned to the plate. It was clear this would give her nightmares. “I’m not eating this thing.”

“Hey, it doesn’t taste that bad!” Aranara protested, not even taking the fork out of her mouth.

“This is vomit, Aranara… you forgot to cook the egg… the rice is sticky… I wouldn’t give this to an animal.” Sayo stood and went to the fridge.

Apparently, they’d gone shopping while I was out. I wonder how that went, but… I have time to find out next time.

“Sayo, come on, don’t be harsh on her,” I said, taking her fork and trying what, in some other universe, might be tamago kake. Yes, it was awful, and swallowing it was, I think, the greatest feat of my life.

“Where’d you go, Eiji?” Aranara asked, eating like it was nothing. We really needed to keep her out of the kitchen for our own good.

“I told you, I forgot something…”

“That’s it?”

“That’s it.”

Aranara placed her hand on her chest. “Something feels lighter in here,” she said with a smile.

“Glad to hear that.”

“What did you do, Eiji?”

“Oh, the food’s getting cold.”

“Eiji, what did you do?” she repeated, leaning her face closer to mine.

“Just… gave Casablanca a sequel,” I said, laughing.

 There aren’t answers for everything, and I don’t have all the answers either.
You probably want to know some things… sorry, I’m not like that guy on TV who showed how magic tricks were done.
Sometimes, not knowing adds another kind of thrill.
You probably want to know why I switched the cups. Well, sorry, that’s not something I’ll just tell you.
But since you insist, let’s just say…

I don’t like goodbyes.