Chapter 3: Days

I don’t recognize that ringtone , I think drowsily.

An alarm? But I’m still sleepy. And you know what, I’m going right back to sleep. Eyes still shut, I grope for the smartphone I know I put beside my futon.

Huh?

I reach farther. Grr, that alarm is so noisy. Where’d I put it?

Ow!”

My back hits the floor with an emphatic thud. Apparently, I’ve managed to fall out of bed. Ow, ow, ow, ow... Wait, what? Bed?

I finally open my eyes and sit up.

Huh?

The room is completely unfamiliar.

And I’min it.

Did I sleep over somewhere last night?

“...Where ami?”

The moment I murmur the words, I notice a strange heaviness in my throat. By reflex, I put a hand to it. The throat my fingers find is hard and angular. “Hmm?” My voice slips out again, and it’s really low. I look down at myself.

.....They're Gone

A T-shirt I’ve never seen before falls flat all the way to my stomach, and they’re not there.

My boobs are gone.

And right in the middle of my freakishly visible lower body, there’s... something. Something asserting its presence strongly enough to overwrite the feeling of wrongness precipitated by my missing boobs.

What is...this?

Slowly, I extend my hand, reaching for that area. All the blood in my body and all the skin over it is being pulled toward that one spot.

...Is this, um...? L-location-wise, it’s...

....................................

.....................

.......

I touch it.

And very nearly pass out.

Who is this guy?

I’m gazing at a strange face in the mirror of a strange bathroom.

His slightly showy hairstyle brushes his eyebrows, apparently aiming for a casual/calculated ratio of about 6:4. The eyebrows are stubborn-looking, but his eyes are on the wide side and make him seem like a bit of a pushover. His chapped lips seem completely unacquainted with the concept of moisturizer, and his neck looks stiff. His cheeks are lean, with clean lines, and for some reason, there’s a big bandage on one of them. When I touch it gingerly, there’s a dull throb.

—But. Even though it hurts, I don’t wake up. My throat is bone-dry. I twist the faucet, fill my hands with tap water, and drink. It’s unpleasantly warm and smells like chemicals, like pool water.

“Taki, are you up?”

Abruptly, a man’s voice calls from somewhere in the distance, and I give a little shriek of alarm. Taki?

“Breakfast was your job today, kid. Remember? You overslept.”

Nervously, I peek into what looks like a living room. As he speaks, a middle-aged man in a suit glances at me, then immediately returns his attention to the dishes.

“I-Tm sorry!”

I apologize out of habit.

“I’m heading out. There’s miso soup—go ahead and finish it off.”

“Um, yessir.”

“And go to school. Even if you’re late.”

On that note, the man briskly piles up the dishes, puts them in the small kitchen, passes by me as I stand petrified in the doorway, goes to the foyer, dons his shoes, opens the door, steps out, and shuts it behind him. It all happens so fast there’d have been barely enough time for a kite to call once.

“.. .What a weird dream,” I say out loud.

I take another look around the room. There are photos and design sketches of bridges and buildings and structures all over the walls. The floor is a careless mess of magazines and paper bags and cardboard boxes. Compared to the Miyamizu house, tidy as a venerable old Japanese inn (all thanks to Gran), this place seems wild and lawless. The room is really small—probably a condominium. If this is my dream, I have no idea where it came from, but I’m impressed by how real it seems. I guess I’ve got a pretty good imagination. Maybe I could be some kind of artist when I grow up.

Tweedle!

A text alert echoes from the depths of the hall with such impeccable timing that it seems like a comeback. Eep! I gasp, hastily dashing back to the room where the bed was. The smartphone’s on the floor beside the sheets, and there’s a short message on its screen.

Are you still home? Get over here, run! Tsukasa

Huh? What? What’s this? Who in the world is Tsukasa?!

At any rate, I guess I have to go to school. I scan the room. My eyes stop on a boy’s uniform hanging beside the window, and as I pick it up, I’m suddenly aware of another emergency.

Oh, for the love of...!

I need to pee.

Haaaaaah. I heave a sigh nearly strong enough to deflate my whole body.

What is wrong with guys’ bodies, anyway?!

I managed to do my business somehow, but I’m still shaking with anger. The harder I tried to pee, and the more I tried to aim it with my fingers, the more the thing changed shape and the harder it got to go. What’s up with that?! Are they stupid?! Are they idiots?! Or is this guy weird?! Arrrgh! I’d never even seen

one of those before! And excuse me, but I’m technically a shrine maiden!

After I change into the uniform, keeping my head bent from the awful shame and fighting back tears (I can’t actually fight them all back, and a few slip out), I open the condo’s door. Well, for now, I’ll just go, I think, and raise my head.

—And then.

My eyes are riveted.

The view before me leaves me breathless.

I’m standing on the outside corridor of a high-rise condo that’s probably on a hill.

Below lies a generous carpet of greenery, like a large park. The sky is a vivid cerulean blue, without the slightest blemish. On the border between the blue and green, ranks of buildings of all sizes line up neatly, like extra-intricate origami. Each and every one is stamped with minute, exquisite windows like the mesh of a net. Some of the windows reflect blue, others are tinted green, and still others simply glitter in the morning sun. I can see a red tower, tiny with distance, and a silver building whose rounded lines remind me vaguely of a whale, and a shining black building that looks as though it’s been cut from a block of obsidian. I’m sure these buildings and several of the others are famous—even I recognize some of them. Far away, little toy cars flow in neat, orderly lines.

It’s the scenery of the biggest city in Japan, and compared with what I’d imagined, it’s— Actually, come to think of it, I’ve never really tried to visualize what it would be like before, but it’s much, much more beautiful than it looks in the movies and on TV It hits me hard, right in the chest.

“Tokyo,” I murmur.

This world is far too dazzling. I inhale deeply and squint, as if looking at the sun.

“Hey, where’d you buy this?” “In Nishi-Azabu, on the way home from lessons.” “Guess who’s gonna be opening for their next big concert?” “Yo, wanna skip club today and go catch a movie?” “An agency employee is coming to the mixer tonight.”

Wh-what’s with these conversations? Are these people actually modern Japanese high schoolers? Maybe they’re just reading posts off some celebrity’s

Facebook page?

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