Descent

Miho was almost to the stairwell by the time I caught up with her.

“Miho.”

She didn’t stop. She stepped briskly down the first set of stairs to come to the large landing facing the street.

“Miho!”

“What?”

Miho said it with feigned nonchalance. There really was something getting at her, but what? She hadn’t been nearly this disturbed a few minutes ago.

“...Nice weather we’re having.”

For some reason, I couldn’t say it.

“We’re in the middle of a heat-wave.”

True. It was very late in the day, now. We had agreed to meet after school to help Ayasa figure things out. The heat from Saturday had returned with a vengeance. Even though it wasn’t yet summer, it felt like it had been for a while.

“Is that it? Is that why you followed me out here?”
Miho sounded- and looked- annoyed. She tugged at the short sleeve of her polo jersey shirt, straightening it out.

“Uh… no. That’s not all of it.”

Miho just glared at me.

“Miho…is something wrong?”

“No. Nothing’s wrong.”

It didn’t sound like a lie, but Hiroki had noticed it, and now I couldn’t help but notice. Miho was trying to gloss over this.

“Are you sure?”

Miho clenched the hand that was still trying to straighten her shirt.

“Yes. I’m sure.”

She made off to keep going down the next flight of stairs. I moved in front to block her.

“Are you…jealous of Higashiyama?”

Miho snapped.

“Oh, that’s what you think, huh?”

I stumbled back, unready for her to strike with this kind of ferocity. I had to grab the railing to avoid falling down the rest of the stairs.

“That’s what this is about, huh? You. You. You.”

“Miho, wha-”

“I’m sick of it. No. I’m not jealous of Higashiyama. I’m scared for her.”

Miho got up in my face. The death glare she had given earlier was nothing compared to this. Her brown eyes seemed to light up with fire from the reflection of the sunset.

“Scared because of you.”

“Me?”

“You.”

Huh? This was all wrong. What did Miho have against me? I thought things were going better than usual for us.

“I’m not going to-”

“It’s not a matter of what you’re going to do. What you’ve already done to her is bad enough.”

“Rescuing her was bad? Helping her was bad?”

“That’s not what I’m talking about, Touma.”

Miho’s voice was wavering. It was still full of rage, but now something else was welling up.

“Higashiyama is alone. We can only do so much for her. Helping her was the right thing to do. But-”

Miho laid her palm on my chest. It wasn’t gentle, but it wasn’t quite a strike, either. She was leaning past me so I couldn’t see her face- only her shaggy ponytail, bobbing in front of my field of vision.

“Miho. I don’t want-”

“See. That’s it. That’s what I’m talking about.”

“Huh?”

“You don’t want. You want.”

“I want what Ayasa wants.”

I had forgotten to call her Higashiyama. Miho didn’t seem to care.

“What does she want?”

I didn’t have an answer to that. Miho leaned back. I still couldn’t see her face that well, but I could tell her eyes were- ever so slightly- dripping with tears.

“That’s what your world is like, Touma. I’ve been there.”

“I don’t understand.”

“I was sick of it.”

“Of what?”

“Of the way you do things.”

“Like what? Bringing Higashiyama here?”

“Yes.The way you do everything.”

Miho stepped back, wiping her eyes with her palm. It didn’t look like that would work- it was sticky with sweat.

“I had to do something. I couldn’t help-”

“You can’t help it? You say that too much.”

“Huh?

“Are you going to stay like that for the rest of your life? Are you going to justify every little thing you do with some cheap phrase like ‘I couldn’t help it’ or ‘I had no choice’? Are you going to keep playing dumb and pretending you’re some impassive observer to this whole thing, that you don’t have any responsibility in all of it?”

“I really didn’t have a choice this time. They would have shot me if I had stayed.”

“And Higashiyama? You didn’t have a choice but to drag her along with you?”

I had. And I had chosen to grab her hand, knowing full well where I was going.

“I already apologized to her. It was a misunderstanding.”

“Did you?”

The anger in Miho’s voice had faded into a low growl. It was being overwhelmed.

“Yeah.”

“Did you really?”

Huh? I thought I had.

“Yes.”

“Liar.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“What you’re doing right now- they aren’t the actions of a contrite person.”

“I’m trying to help Higashiyama. Isn’t that enough?”

“I don’t think what you’re doing is helping her.”

I was getting angry now, too. What did Miho mean? Why speak so cryptically? Ayasa would have come out and said what she was concerned about by now. Miho’s constant dodging was just making us swelter in the heat longer and longer.

“What? What am I doing?”

Miho’s head slumped, dejected. She started down the last flight of stairs.

“Forget it. If you can’t see it yourself, you’re never going to listen to me.”

“I can’t understand you if you’re never going to get to the point, Miho.”

Miho didn’t answer right away. She stepped wordlessly down to the ground level, the only sounds coming from the crunch of her shoes on the chipped concrete.

“I just hope you realize it before you drag her too deep.”

“I’m trying to give her a new life!”

“A better one? Or…”

I didn’t answer. I couldn’t. Miho had left unsaid the second part of her question.

“Touma.”

Miho locked her eyes on me. It was only a few meters down the stairs, but she suddenly seemed many thousands of kilometers away.

“I think we should break up.”

Huh?

“I thought we already were.”

“Let’s make it official.”

“...Okay. Done.”

Miho turned around. Spying a pebble on the ground, she kicked it with full force- right into an expensive-looking black sedan of European manufacture in the parking lot. The pebble bounced off the side panel, leaving a visible scratch in the paint.

“...Shit.”

Miho stood there for a second, but then walked off as if nothing had happened. I didn’t move. Overhead, a couple of cargo jets made a slow, arcing turn over the city. The drone from their turbofans washed out everything- the humming of the air conditioners, the distant sirens of ambulances and police cruisers, and the sound of Miho’s footsteps as she disappeared past the parking lot and into the street.

“...Shit.”

Miho’s words were still stumbling around in my head when I got back to Hiroki’s- to Ayasa’s- apartment. The two were still sitting at the table in silence. Apparently, Hiroki had run out of questions that Ayasa was able to answer about her experience with Soviet hardware.

“Well?”

Hiroki asked this as if he had expected me to bring Miho back.

“She had to go home.”

“And you didn’t offer to go with her?”

“We broke up.”

“I know. That’s not news.”

Hiroki laid his head in his palm, the image of a world-weary philosopher.

“Nishizawa, you’ve got to treat her better. Even if she’s not your girlfriend any more.”

“She is your girlfriend, Nishizawa?”

Ayasa had perked up at this apparently-new piece of information.

“She was. Not since the start of high school, though.”

A slight frown appeared on Ayasa’s face.

“Oh.”

“Do you know which school you want to attend, Higashiyama?”

Hiroki tactfully changed the conversation topic.

“There is a choice?”

It was news to me, too. Hiroki pulled out one of the sheets Miho had left on the table.

“According to this, the program will try to place you in a public school in the area of your choice. So, no fancy prep schools, but it does look like you have some leeway.”

“Oh. I don’t know any of the schools around here.”

“You don’t have to take it, but being able to finish high school on a stipend is probably better than trying to survive for the rest of your life on part-time employment, even if the school isn’t the greatest.”

“Oh. That sounds better, yes. I think whatever is closest will work.”

“What about Akiba North?”
I butted in. Hiroki raised an eyebrow.

“Well, I guess that’s close. And we go there, so Higashiyama would have people to help her fit in. Still…”

“Is that your school, Nishizawa?”

Ayasa directed her questions to me.

“Yes. It’s some blocks north of here. It’s mid-range in academics. Not a great sports program, but that’s what you have to deal with in a city school.”

“It’s also in visual range of the Northern guard towers. Are you sure that’s a good idea, Nishizawa? There could be people there who recognize her.”

Hiroki had a point. If she ever took a class in the annex building, someone from her old school might see her. Was that dangerous?

“Do you think they’ll recognize her with a haircut and a blazer? We’re not that close. The annex building is barely close enough to pick out solid details of a person.”

Hiroki pondered this. Ayasa seemed intrigued.

“Nishizawa- your school is near the North?”

“Huh? Yeah, it’s actually right next to the border.”

A glint of recognition flashed across her eyes, but Ayasa didn’t follow up with any explanation. Not that I needed one- I already knew that her school was, too.

“Don’t worry. They can’t do anything except watch. You’ll be a completely different person, too.”

Ayasa cocked her head to the side, trying to figure this out.

“You’re going to get a new identity, right?”

“Oh, right. What you said earlier.”

“Might as well use it for everything. That way, nobody will be able to track you down.”

“Mmm.”

There was a long silence. Hiroki didn’t have anything to break the ice again.

“Nishizawa.”

Ayasa was ready to say something again.

“Yeah?”

“You said I could play the part.”

“The part?”

The conversation with Miho had displaced any memory of what we had talked about before she left. I was clueless as to where Ayasa was going with this.

“Yes. I have a question about it.”

“...Okay. Go ahead.”

“Do you think that she…”

Ayasa struggled to find words to finish.

“Do you think that Sayu Midorikawa would attend a school like Akiba North?”