九

When I open my eyes again I find myself in a familiar place. Ashi-Toku station is a station with only two platforms, one each for trains going either way on its singular line.

In front of me, Keisuke is scaling the platform much earlier in the loop than last time, his younger self isn’t even here yet. He takes a seat on the bench with me. Unlike him, he makes sure to leave plenty of distance between us as he does so.

“What are you doing here?”

Is he asking me that? He didn’t look at me when he did, that’s something you normally do when asking questions. But there’s no one else around, so the only other person he could be asking is himself. Keisuke was never the type to do something like that. He loved thinking a lot but not questioning, he only ever thought of solutions for problems based on feelings he already had.

The high school girl swipes her train card over the scanner, once for herself and then a second time for her brother.

“Because you brought me here.”

I answer less because I’m sure the question was directed at me and moreso because I can’t bear to watch this event unfold in front of my eyes again.

Excitedly, the young boy points at a vending machine as his sister tries to drag him past it. She loses.

“I’m sorry about that,” Keisuke pauses, as if he’s choosing his words carefully, “but I meant why are you here?”

A cold can of cola drops to the retrieval hatch in exchange for a couple of 100 yen coins. The high school girl tells her brother to wait for a moment before opening it.

“You’re sorry? Then why do it? Why do things you’ll be sorry for? I wouldn’t have found my way here if you hadn’t led me someplace nearby,” I tell him.

“There is no reason. I don’t know why I did it.”

My mouth opens of its own accord, ready to hurl abuse back at Keisuke but my mind has frozen. He’s not lying, he was never good at that, only at withholding things. The realization that any hope of resolution is off the table is what causes my silence. I cannot attribute Keisuke’s actions to anything like malice or selfishness or even indifference. He has hurt me and does not know what he meant by doing so.

The two siblings set into place just behind the yellow safety line. One of them does not notice the other.

“I know what goes on out there you know,” Keisuke picks up that it is his turn to break the uncomfortable silence, “those ghosts on the other platform love whispering in my ears. The relief I felt when I heard that you’d survived the entry was unbelievable. Seeing you here feels like some kind of sick joke.”

“If you knew then why didn’t you stop it?”

“You think I can do anything about it?! If I was the type of person who could do anything, none of this would be happening.”

The boy who wants to be a footballer kicks the air as he imagines himself scoring a great goal. This drags the siblings onto the yellow safety line. The boy fails to notice, the high school girl fails to care.

“The first time I found myself here, I thought it was just a nightmare. It was, I managed to wake up from it then. But I found myself here a second-time months later. After a few weeks a third, a few more days a fourth. Then it was every night, that I found myself sitting where you are now.”

Far too late, the boy has realized something is wrong. He fights against his sister’s grip but she will never let him go. The siblings step across the yellow safety line.

Tears start leaking from Keisuke’s eyes one by one, slowly as if they too don’t want to see what’s about to happen.

“I tried stopping it. I tried to warn myself. I tried to pull Hori away from the platform. I tried to stop the train in any way I could. I tried to jump in front of it myself first. I tried-”

Keisuke suddenly hides his head in his hands.

The high school girl falls in front of the oncoming train, she does not stay behind the line. She is no immovable object, her body engulfs her brother’s as it is sent back the way it came. The siblings bounce on the tarmac, then they skid for two seconds, then they roll for a couple-dozen meters, then they bounce again and come to a stop. The brown sugary liquid incessantly tries to penetrate the pool of blood that threatens to drown the siblings. It can't.