Chapter 1 Part 2

After I finished breakfast, I returned to my room to enjoy this migraine-free day as much as I could. I quickly finished my homework, and was just about to start playing a game I hadn’t touched in quite some time—when the doorbell rang.

I immediately found it odd; after all, it’s not like mom had friends over often, and god forbid, I didn’t have any friends, either. I assumed it was some door-to-door salesman of some kind and returned to my game—despite hearing happy chatter down below—until I heard her calling me from downstairs.

“Hiro, come down here! Someone’s here to see you!”

Huh? Someone to see me?

I didn’t think too much about it. It was maybe the class representative or a teacher just checking if I hadn’t fallen in a ditch during my trudge through the rain yesterday and died or something.

I shrugged, feeling just a bit happy that someone remotely cared about my well-being, and made my way downstairs.

Guess I’ll just reassure them and return—

My thoughts stopped.

If the day had already started strangely, then this was the biggest shock of all.

Sitting on the living room’s sofa, the same living room my dad had spent 90% of his existence glued to for the past four months, was a girl I didn’t know.

Or rather, that wasn’t quite the right feeling. She wasn’t the class representative or any one of my classmates, of that I was sure. But she was vaguely familiar to me—that sort of vague recognition of someone you might have seen once in your life years ago. In any case, I couldn’t place a name or wherever I had seen her, so for all intents and purposes, she was a stranger.

But in the split second after my brain categorized her as a “vaguely familiar stranger”, I finally took notice of her appearance—and my heart skipped a beat. She had blonde, medium-length hair with a single braid in the front. She was petite, but even through her school uniform—the same the girls at my school wore—I could tell her body was quite curvy. And her face looked soft and cute, with delicate features like a doll’s and a wide, pleasant, contagious smile.

In other words, she was exactly my type.

I opened and closed my mouth like a fish out of water.

The girl, for her part, seemed to find this amusing, and began giggling to herself.

When my mom saw me rooted in place, she made a displeased frown. “What are you doing there, Hiro? Come in and greet Ai!”

“Ah— Sure.”

I entered my own living room like this was a stranger’s house, and gave this stranger a polite bow.

“I’m Hiro,” I said, trying to avoid her gaze.

“I know,” she said, still giggling. “I’m Ai. Nice to meet you!”

When I raise my head up, Ai was just there, her perfect smile brightening the whole room.

Where have I found myself in? A romantic comedy?

I didn’t know who this girl was or what she was doing here, but I could take a guess from how my mom greeted her, and how she was wearing my school uniform. She probably had just moved into the neighborhood and would be attending my school starting tomorrow—so she had gone around every house to introduce herself to her new neighbors, so she wouldn’t be parachuting into school without knowing anyone.

It made sense—but.

You’re telling me that a girl exactly fitting my tastes just happened to move into the neighborhood on the same day my dad decided to get his shit together and my migraines were gone?

It was just too perfect of a situation. Too many coincidences.

But what really sealed the deal for me was what my mom said next.

She laughed out loud, and added,

“Why are you two greeting each other like you’re strangers?”

My mind literally stopped for a moment.

What the hell did she just say?

I reiterate—I didn’t know this girl, apparently named Ai. She was, at best, someone I had passed by on the street months ago and noticed how cute she was—and then promptly filled her away in a corner of my mind.

We were strangers.

And yet—

“Oh, I was just going along with Hiro’s greeting,” Ai said, her voice sounding like a beautiful bell. “I found it strange, too.”

I looked at her. Really looked at her; stared, even—but she reacted with a smile and absolutely no sign of being as confused or uncomfortable as I was.

So I turned to my mom.

“Y-You’re joking, right? I don’t know this girl… Ai,” I said resolutely.

Hearing this, my mom’s smile faded. “What are you saying, Hiro? Don’t tell me you forgot about Ai. You used to be all over each other!”

You think I’d forget a girl this cute? I thought, but held my tongue.

Seeing my probably ridiculously confused face, my mom added, “I can’t believe I’m saying this! Geez. You two were the best of friends in elementary school… You really forgot about her?”

I looked at Ai again, trying to see if her cherubic face could unearth any memories from elementary school. Much like today, I wasn’t very popular back then either, but I was at least somewhat integrated with other kids, and even had some friends. But definitely no girls, and definitely none named Ai.

So I shrugged. Clearly, all the migraines had scrambled my brain more than I thought.

“Sorry. I really don’t remember you,” I said honestly. There was no point in lying to her at this point.

If I didn’t remember her, so be it.

“Oh, I see,” she said, a tinge of sadness in her voice. She immediately pivoted to a more cheerful tone, though. “But I guess that means we can start anew!”

“Y-Yeah, I guess… So, huh… did you move in to the neighborhood, is that it?”

“Yes! Just yesterday, actually. Your mom told me you were sick when I came by, so I came back today to meet you,” she said with a smile. “I’ll be transferring to your class tomorrow. I hope you can show me around the school!”

Just as I suspected.

“R-Right. I’ll be glad to,” I added.

“Well, I won’t hold you for any longer,” Ai said as she stood up.

“Oh, you’re going home already? I was hoping you two could catch up over lunch!” My mom said, clearly sad that this cute, polite girl was already going away.

“I appreciate the offer! But I don’t want to impose. And we can catch up on our way to school,” she said. “And I still have a lot of things to unpack. So I really must be going.”

“I see! Of course. Well, come by any time. I’m sure Hiro will be happy to have you over!”

“H-huh… sure. Yeah, of course.”

“Right!” Ai said with her usual bright smile. “Okay! I’ll be going now. See you tomorrow, Hiro!” She said with a wave, and then out the door she went.

I just stood there, the sound of the door shutting echoing in the otherwise empty living room.

What the heck just happened?

A girl from my past returning years later. If this wasn’t a romantic comedy setup, I’m not sure what was.

But something still nagged at me. Sure, she was vaguely familiar, but would I really have forgotten a seemingly close friend from my childhood?

I really doubted it.

So I had an idea.

“Hey mom,” I said. “Where do we store our old photo albums again?”

⬡⬢⬡⬢⬡

There she was.

In almost every photo taken of me with friends in elementary school, Ai was there.

Obviously, she was a kid, and had grown significantly since then. But her cute face and wide, bright smile were unmistakable. We were together in school events, on field trips, on birthdays, and even on a one-day trip to the beach with my parents.

But seeing these photos only made me even more confused. It took the entire day to even find them—my mom misremembered where she had placed these 10-year-old albums, and so I had to basically dismantle the entire cupboard looking for them. Fair to say my expectations were fairly high.

And well, I did find the photos in the end, but even seeing them, I just couldn’t remember Ai in any of those situations. Sure, in large groups, maybe she faded into the background, and maybe my mom and Ai had exaggerated our supposed childhood friendship.

But that beach outing was the real kicker. Because I did distinctively remember that day. I insisted on going to that beach to have a special ice cream they were having for just that weekend.

And Ai wasn’t there. I’m sure I went with my parents alone, only the three of us.

Even weirder, in none of the photos could Ai’s parents be seen. One would assume they would go together with their daughter, but they just were never in frame. When I asked my mom about it, she said Ai went with us alone because her parents had to work that day.

“You must still be tired from the migraine,” my mom said, seeing my confused reaction. “I’m sure you’ll remember Ai in time if you just rest a bit.”

As mom left the office, I just sat back on the floor, the evening sun streaking through the open blinds.

“Did I really forget about her…?” I said staring that those photos that froze in time a moment I couldn’t remember.

I closed my eyes and tried to recall my elementary school days, long buried somewhere deep in my mind. That was when something just clicked into place.

Suddenly, I could see Ai there—at class, during field trips, on my birthday, on that beach trip I had with my parents. I could recall scenes that weren’t depicted on any photos—like teaching Ai how to swim at the beach, or enjoying that fabled ice cream together.

But it was strange. It felt like I had two sets of memories—my original ones, and the ones where Ai was, like someone took the photo album of my mind and crudely glued a cutout of a little girl where there was nothing before.

Was I really recalling some repressed memories, or was my mind just hallucinating new oned?

I still felt a bit of apprehension at just accepting these scenes in my mind’s eye—but the physical evidence was unmistakable.

Ai and I had met before, and were apparently really close when we were children.

“Well, this is pointless,” I said as I closed the photo album.

Why was I even complaining about this? Things were finally going my way after months of torturous auto-piloting through life. My memories of Ai had likely been supplanted by years of light novel binging. A girl this cute had come into my life, so what was the point of doubting my faulty memory?

For the first time in a long time, I felt genuinely happy.