In Tokyo, summer of 2001, the air is thick with the scent of sweat and tension. A song by Lily Chou Chou fills my small room. I lie on the bed, staring at the ceiling, which is peeling from the humidity. The song "Glide" seeps into my ears, reminding me of everything. Everything I’ve lost, everything that’s slipped away in this life.

My name is Haru, and I’m a high school student, but I barely feel alive. School feels like a prison. Everyone bullies me. Each day is a battle for survival, a struggle to endure in this dark world. I feel trapped in this miserable neighborhood, where everyone suffers, and everyone fights.

At school, the gang controls everything. Ryuuji is the gang leader, and everyone fears him. I saw him for the first time sitting at the end of the hallway, lighting a cigarette and talking.

Ryuuji sat at the end of the corridor, his eyes locked on me as if he were challenging me without uttering a word. A shiver of fear ran through my body. The other kids were gathered around him, laughing at what seemed like a joke I couldn’t hear, but I knew I was the target. Even without hearing, I knew he was talking about me. The bullying had become a regular part of my life. There was always someone picking on me, whether with words that left invisible scars or silent punches that left no visible marks.

“Haru!” A sudden shout snapped me out of my thoughts. I turned to see my teacher, Mr. Tanaka, approaching quickly. He was a middle-aged man, always dressed in an old suit, and his face always looked tired. “You’re late again, come to my office after class.” I ignored it, as if I lived in a parallel world. I was always late, and there were always deeper reasons than just sleepiness or neglect.

When the class ended, I walked through the empty hallways and turned toward the school window. The sun was slowly setting, and the sky was a mix of pink and orange. This view of the sunset always reminded me of loneliness. Something about it made me think of the things I couldn’t escape, of the sadness that lived in me every day.

..."We live among people, but we live alone. We are trapped inside our minds, where words are just noise, and emotions are mere ghosts hovering."...

When I reached the teacher’s office, he was already there, sitting behind his desk. He didn’t look at me directly, but I could feel the weight, the heaviness of the words he was about to say. “Haru…” His voice was as tired as his face. “You know I can’t keep defending you. If you keep being late, and if you don’t start improving your grades, it’ll be out of my hands.”

I knew what was coming next. The same words I’d heard hundreds of times. “You’re smart, Haru, you have potential, but you’re not using it.” He spoke, but my mind was elsewhere. I was thinking about Ryuuji, and how my life had become hell because of him.

I left the office without a word, heading to the school’s back yard. The place was empty, the dim light of the setting sun casting a mysterious atmosphere over everything. I sat on one of the worn-out benches and pulled out my CD player. I pressed play, and Lily Chou Chou’s song began to play, taking me away from everything. Away from the pain, away from school, away from the bullying.

..."In the end, we search for voices to pull us out of the depths of darkness. But sometimes, even music isn’t enough."...

I listened to the song as I gazed at the sky. I felt like I was drowning in a sea of sadness I couldn’t swim in. Everything was getting worse. That day, when I returned home, I found my father in the living room, drinking and silently watching TV. My mother had left years ago, leaving us in this empty house. My father had been changing slowly since her departure, but he had become a completely different person. Each day that passed made him angrier, more distant from me.

I went up to my room, closed the door behind me, and threw my bag in the corner. I sat on the bed, turned off the lights, and let the darkness envelop me. It felt like I was disappearing into that darkness, like I wasn’t here. All I wanted was to disappear, to become part of nothingness.

The day passed slowly, and I barely slept that night. In the morning, I woke up to the sound of the phone ringing. It was a call from Yuka, my only friend. She said she wanted to meet me at Yoyogi Park and that she had something important to tell me. I wasn’t ready to leave the house, but I felt like I couldn’t refuse her request.

When I arrived at the park, Yuka was sitting under our usual big tree. She looked different today. She was quieter than usual, as if she was carrying a heavy secret weighing down her heart. I sat beside her in silence, unable to start the conversation. After a few moments, she looked at me and said in a soft voice, “Haru, there’s something you need to know...”

..."At times, life becomes harsher than we can bear. We hide in the darkness, seeking oblivion in melodies that take us far away. But the true escape is found only within our hearts. Wherever we go, the past follows us."...

Memories flow through my mind like an unbroken stream. I close my eyes, but the images remain. Summer, 1999. It was the first time I met "Ryuji." The heat was unbearable, seeping into the skin like needles trying to pierce the soul. That day, the sun was setting, but there was no sense of peace with its disappearance. On the contrary, there was a negative energy suffocating everything, as if the sky itself was drowning in sorrow.

I entered school late that day. Ryuji was standing at the end of the hallway, blowing smoke from his cigarette and laughing loudly with a group of boys. I didn’t know what was going on, but I felt something cold creep inside me. I didn’t know him well, but his reputation preceded him. "Ryuji" was known by everyone as the boy you shouldn't approach.

..."In a life like this, you may find yourself lost in the rush of small details. Faces, voices, words you hear that mean nothing. But they all come together in the end, forming a weight that crushes your soul."...

In that moment, I remembered how I used to waste time at home in front of the TV, watching the same boring shows, listening to songs that made me feel even more empty. "Lily Chou Chou" was the only light in that dark world. Her music was something I clung to because it was the only thing that understood me. Her songs pulled me away from reality. Away from the pain.

By the summer of 2000, things started to fall apart quickly. Everything went from bad to worse. "Ryuji" began to dominate the school, and no one could stand in his way. At that time, I felt utterly alone. No one understood me. I was always the quiet boy who didn’t talk much, and I preferred staying out of trouble.

But I couldn’t run away forever. One day, I met "Yuka." She was an eccentric girl, always sitting alone in class, talking very little, but there was something in her eyes that made me curious. There was a deep sadness. Perhaps she felt what I felt, but I didn’t have the courage to get close to her.

..."There are people who pass through your life unnoticed until a moment comes when they push you to the edge. Then, you realize they were always there, silently watching."...

Yuka was different. She wasn’t like the other girls. She seemed to carry the weight of the world on her shoulders, yet she was calm, as if she had made peace with that pain. I started talking to her after a while. At first, the conversations were short and insignificant. But over time, things changed. I started seeing her every day after school in Yoyogi Park. Those were the only moments I felt like I could breathe. But even in that park, strange things happened.

..."Sometimes, you're closer to your true self when you're with others. But at the same time, you realize you're more alone than you thought."...

On a hot summer day, Yuka and I sat under a large tree in the park. She was holding an old book in her hands, looking as if she was lost in another world. I asked her about the book, and she slowly replied, looking away, "It’s about loss… about people who disappear without a trace." I felt that those words meant more than she was saying. She was talking about herself without saying it directly. There was something dark in her past, but I didn’t know what it was.

The summer passed quickly, as if time refused to wait for us. At the end of August, I decided to listen to one of "Lily Chou Chou's" albums in full, and I wanted to share it with Yuka. When I told her, she seemed happy for the first time since I knew her. We sat by the river, listening to songs that seemed to tell our story.

..."In the end, we are just fleeting notes in the song of life. Some of us are heard, and some of us fade away with the wind."...

Days passed, and I started to see Yuka change. She seemed quieter, but she also began to disappear more often. One day, she didn’t show up for our usual meeting in the park. I waited for hours, but she never came. I started to worry. When I got home, I tried calling her, but there was no answer. Days went by, and I searched for her everywhere, but to no avail.

In the end, I learned from one of my classmates that she had been admitted to the hospital after a failed suicide attempt.

The sun gently filtered through the leaves in Yoyogi Park, casting soft shadows of loneliness across our faces. The air was thick with the scent of summer and the earthy aroma of wet soil after a light morning storm. Yuka sat there, nervously licking her lips, her hands tightly clasped together, and her eyes avoiding my direct gaze. Something heavy hung in the air, as though the words she was about to say would change everything.

“Haru…” she started slowly, taking deep breaths between her words. “You know we live in a world full of lies, don’t you?” I didn’t respond. I knew this was only the beginning of something bigger. She continued, “There’s something I’ve been keeping to myself for a while… but I can’t bear it anymore.”

She let out a heavy sigh, looking up at the sky for a moment, as if searching for courage or an answer from something greater than reality itself. It felt like time had stopped, as if everything around us turned into a slow-motion scene from a movie. Yuka had always been my only friend, the one person I could be with without wearing any masks. But now, with that look in her eyes, she felt like a stranger to me.

...“We lie because we fear the truth. We fear what others might uncover about us, and we fear facing ourselves.”...

Yuka snapped back to reality, her sharp gaze returning to me as she said, “Ryuji… Ryuji isn’t who you think he is.” She paused, letting the words linger in the air as if testing me. My heart started racing, as though my entire body was responding to a sense of danger. “Ryuji… he’s the one behind all the bad things that happened to you.”

I couldn’t believe what she was saying. “Ryuji?” I croaked. “But why? Why would he do that?” I didn’t have many friends, and I always knew there were people who looked down on me. But Ryuji? The person who walked beside me in the hallways as if we were equals? I couldn’t wrap my head around it.

“He’s not what he seems, Haru…” she said, fidgeting nervously with her hands. “Ryuji… he’s the leader of a gang. He’s involved in things you can’t even imagine. He’s been controlling everything all along. Even the people you thought were your friends… they were working for him. Everything was under his control.”

My lips trembled, and I couldn’t stop the tension that seeped into my heart. Everything I thought was real now seemed like a mirage, a bad dream. I looked at Yuka and asked in a shaky voice, “But… why didn’t you tell me before? Why now?”

...“We live in a world of intertwined lies, and the closer we get to the truth, the more painful it becomes.”...

“Because I was scared, Haru. I was scared of what might happen to you… or to me.” Her eyes welled up with tears, but she struggled to hold them back. “Ryuji… he’s not an ordinary person. He’s dangerous. Dangerous enough to hurt anyone who stands in his way.” Her words shook me inside, igniting a fear I had never felt before.

“What do I do now?” I asked, as if pleading with her to bring me back to a logical world where things were simple and understandable. But she didn’t answer. There was no answer to that question. I was trapped between the terrifying truth she had revealed and the harsh reality I had been living.

We spent the rest of the time in silence. The sounds of the park became our refuge, the white noise of the world around us trying to fill the heavy void between us. The birds sang light melodies while children ran between the trees, each of them seeming far removed from our reality. But for me, everything felt dark, as if I were slowly sinking into a swamp of sadness.

...“Once the truths begin to surface, you can’t go back. You can’t unlearn what you’ve discovered.”...

I walked home slowly, each step heavier than the last. I knew my life would never be the same. Ryuji was more than just a bully—he represented everything I despised about this world. Yet, something inside me still wanted to understand him, to know what made him become the way he was.

When I got home, my father was sitting in his usual spot, a bottle of alcohol in his hand as he watched the TV on low volume. I passed by him without saying a word, heading straight to my room. I sat on my bed, closed my eyes, and tried to remember what life was like before everything became complicated. But I couldn’t. Everything was shrouded in fog—blurred memories, tangled emotions.

That night, I couldn’t sleep. My thoughts kept circling around Ryuji, around Yuka, around everything. I opened my eyes and stared at the ceiling, the darkness enveloping everything around me, but my mind was wide awake. I knew I needed answers.