[Serina Mikage POV]
──Someone is calling my name.
It was a voice I had never forgotten. Yet, it was one I never wanted to remember.
When I looked back, a middle school hallway stretched endlessly into the distance. Outside the window, a dim winter sky spread wide, and the evening sun spilling across the floor burned as red as an alarm beacon.
I looked down at my sleeves.
I was wearing my middle school uniform, yet the length of my limbs was no different from how I was now.
Before I realized it, the hallway windows had turned into mirrors.
Reflected in them was my middle school self, then me in my current uniform. Every time I blinked, the length of the hair falling over my shoulders and the contours of my face swapped places.
Only my body remained unbrokenly linked.
My body had begun taking on a woman's shape earlier than the other girls my age.
When I grew taller and my silhouette began to change, the ones who noticed before I did were the boys around me.
Even now as a high schooler, that hasn't changed.
I couldn't pretend not to notice that my looks drew stares, nor that my figure was undeniably feminine even through a uniform.
The me inside the mirror was merely standing there.
And yet, voices echoing from the depths of the hallway casually drew lines across my body.
"Her legs are so pale. And crazy long."
"Damn, that's hot."
"She definitely has a boyfriend."
"She claims she hates guys, but isn't she just being picky?"
Voices from middle school blended with voices I had heard in the high school hallways.
Laughter from goodness knows when echoed exclusively within the mirrors.
When I tried to avert my eyes, the mirrors multiplied. Whether I looked aside or looked down, someone was watching the me reflected in another surface.
People had called me pretty before.
I had even been pressured to respond, told I ought to be happy because they were complimenting me.
However, neither my face nor my body existed just for someone else to talk about however they pleased.
I tried to say that, but no voice came from my lips.
"Mikage."
Once again, my name was called.
It was a voice I had known since elementary school.
We had walked home together after school, and we had laughed together in the same group. When other boys teased me about my appearance, he had even told me it was stupid and not to pay them any mind.
Even if he was a boy, he was different.
A voice from the time when I believed that reached me from beyond the mirror.
"Could you hold this side for me?"
It was the gymnasium after school.
We had been asked to return a box of gym pinnies to the equipment storage room, carrying it between the two of us by either end. In front of the storage room, an unstacked gymnastics mat was spread across the floor.
Beyond the box was a face familiar since childhood.
It wasn't that I had forgotten. His eyes, his mouth, even the habit he had when he laughed—I remembered them all, even now.
Just a few steps from the storage room, the sound of rubber scuffing the floor came from right beside me.
"Look out—"
Along with the shout, his weight tilted toward me.
The box fell from my hands. The lid came off, scattering the pinnies across the floor.
Before I could brace my feet, pulled off-balance by him, I fell backward onto the mat.
He collapsed right beside me, and in that instant, his hand brushed against my flank through my uniform and slid slightly.
Without understanding what had just happened, my body froze. Even though he got up immediately, I remained lying on the mat, unable to properly catch my breath.
"Sorry. My foot slipped."
Pushing himself up, he held out a hand to me.
An apologetic expression was painted over that familiar face.
"Are you hurt?"
"...I'm fine."
My own voice sounded flatter than I expected.
Deep in my chest, an inexplicable unease lingered.
Even so, I thought it was wrong of me to doubt an old friend.
On the way back to the classroom after parting with him, I stopped on the staircase landing just outside the gym.
No one was visible on the floor below. Only the laughing voices of several boys leaked out from a cracked door.
"Did you actually do it?"
"I pretended to trip, and she completely bought it."
It was a familiar voice.
The very voice I had been listening to right beside me moments ago.
"Getting to touch that body... I'm so jealous."
"Was it really that amazing seeing it up close?"
"...Even more than I thought."
The one who gave that final answer was the boy I had known for years.
Laughter overlapped.
"Well, she wouldn't have her guard up around you. You guys have been close forever."
"She believes anything if I just apologize."
The sensation against my ribs vividly came back to life.
His foot hadn't slipped.
It hadn't been an accident, either.
The instant I realized that, all the sound around me seemed to vanish.
"Next time, let's do it somewhere more deserted. I'll pretend to trip again and pin her down."
The one who said that was also the boy I had known for years.
"Wouldn't she actually cry from that?"
"If she cries, I'll just say it was an accident. Even today, she said she was fine right after I touched her."
The one who gave that final reply was his voice as well.
Who laughed, and who said what—I still remembered it all.
Even the sensation of something shattering deep within my chest the moment I heard it was something I had never forgotten.
In reality, unable to speak to anyone on the spot, I went home.
After getting home, I told my mother everything. My parents consulted the school and the police, but after that, I never tried to ask what became of him.
I never wanted to see that face again.
Yet in the dream, the cracked door swung open with a creak all on its own.
Several boys should have walked out, but the only one who appeared was that single former friend.
For the first time here, that familiar face sank into a black shadow.
His uniform, too, shifted between middle school and high school.
Before I realized it, the staircase landing had melted back into the endless hallway.
"Mikage."
Calling my name with easy familiarity, he reached out a hand.
I took a step back.
"Don't come near me."
"Wait. That's not it, I swear."
"Don't touch me."
No further conversation continued.
"Even though you guys were friends for so long."
"It was just a joke, why is she getting so mad?"
"It's her fault for having a body that makes people stare, isn't it?"
"It's not like anything was even done to her."
"Her rejection is way too harsh. I feel bad for the guy."
Faceless voices surged from the hallway ceiling, the floor, and the depths of the mirrors lining the walls.
Some were words I had heard before that incident. Mingled in were voices I had heard much later in the school halls or at the train station.
The invasive stares, the casual objectification, the hostility directed at me the moment I said no—none of it ended with just that one day.
Even so, only the voice of the person I thought I could trust lingered closer than any other.
"You said you were fine a second ago, didn't you?"
Just before his fingers could graze my wrist, the hallway tilted sharply.
My body didn't fall.
Instead, a single door appeared between me and him.
When I slammed it shut on reflex, the reaching hand vanished to the other side.
Closing the second door caused the voices appraising my body to recede. Beyond the third, the laughter sank away.
With every added door, it became just a little easier to breathe.
Reject them before they approach.
Drive them away with sharp words, and avoid places where I would be alone with a man. Never enter a passage without an escape route.
If they thought I was a man-hater, that was fine by me.
If it meant no one would try to open the door, that was safer.
Until the flames began creeping in from underneath.
Red fire licked at the doors one by one, turning the walls that had protected me into a cage meant to trap me.
An emergency alarm began to blare.
The moment I inhaled the scalding air, smoke coated the back of my throat.
A sharp pain shot through my right leg as I tried to stand, and unable to support my weight even as I braced with my hands, my knees hit the floor.
This wasn't middle school.
The walls hazy with smoke, the exit signs glowing red—it had changed into the mall from that day.
From beyond the closed door, someone was calling me.
I couldn't see him.
Even so, hearing the voice raspy from smoke, I knew it was a man.
"Don't come near me..."
Only a hoarse breath escaped my lips.
If I opened this door, the same thing might happen again.
Approaching with a gentle face, he might twist my words of believing I was fine into permission to touch me.
However, the person beyond the door didn't try to turn the handle.
Even with the flames closing in, he didn't kick the door down, nor did he reach his arm through the gap to grab me.
All that reached me was a voice, broken by smoke, repeating over and over again.
"Rest assured."
That there was an escape route.
That he wouldn't leave me alone until we made it outside.
That if there was a need to touch me, he would always tell me beforehand.
He offered me words, one by one.
He didn't rush me, telling me to hurry up.
He didn't demand that I trust the person who had come to save me, either.
He waited on the other side until I touched the handle from within.
Hooking my fingers around the heated metal, I pushed down with all my strength.
The door opened a fraction.
Beyond the smoke stood a tall silhouette.
Even then, that person didn't approach immediately.
When I raised my head, he extended a single hand, as if asking for permission to touch.
Over that hand overlapped the hand my former friend had offered.
It had been a hand meant to trick me into believing it was an accident.
Perhaps the hand of the person before my eyes was truly no different.
With fear refusing to fade, I stared at his fingertips.
That person didn't move until I made my choice.
He wouldn't blame me if I didn't take his hand. Even if I couldn't trust him, he wouldn't play the victim with a hurt expression to make me feel guilty.
He simply gave me time to choose.
I reached out my hand on my own.
The instant our fingertips brushed, the closed doors swung open all at once.
However, what lay ahead was not the exit.
A corridor where sparks danced and the white curtains of an infirmary overlapped in dizzying layers.
The silhouette that had held my hand turned his back and knelt down before me.
Told that he would carry me, my body stiffened.
Even then, that person didn't rush me.
Until I nodded of my own accord and wrapped my arms around his shoulders, he waited without looking back.
I rested my weight against his back.
With every step we took through the smoke, ragged, pained breaths came right beside my ear.
Strength was gradually draining from the arms supporting me. Even so, every time he stopped, he told me it was fine and pushed forward again.
Something crumbled down from the ceiling.
He twisted his body, and carried on his back, I swayed away from the falling debris. The vision that had already been blurry was momentarily plunged into darkness.
I heard him gasp sharply right next to my ear.
As if shielding his right shoulder, the silhouette's body tilted.
"Please... put me down... You're... hurt, aren't you?"
"I'm not."
"You are... It smells... like burning..."
"That's just something that fell on the floor."
"There's no way... that's true..."
It was an obvious lie.
Even so, it was a lie told solely to keep me from being afraid.
"Just... leave me... Leave me behind."
"No."
"At this rate, you'll... die too."
"I told you I wouldn't leave you behind."
"But..."
"Rest assured."
"It just... hurts a tiny bit. I won't let go, so rest assured."
Though both were lies, it was entirely different from the words of someone feigning an accident to protect himself.
The white curtains swayed violently amidst the smoke.
"Big Brother, your right shoulder hurts, doesn't it?"
I heard Koharu's voice.
Beyond the silhouette carrying me, an infirmary bed drifted into view. Koharu, her dark brown hair falling forward, was looking down atop the sheets.
"Did you run all the way from the gates to the infirmary?"
"I just hurried a little."
The voice that answered wasn't raspy from smoke.
It was the voice I had heard yesterday from beyond the door.
After that brief reply, Koharu fell silent. Strength tightened her fingers against the blanket, and her head sank even lower.
"It's because I collapsed, isn't it?"
A trembling voice finally fell from her lips.
"Because I messaged you, you ended up pushing yourself too, Big Brother."
"That's not true."
He answered almost the exact instant Koharu finished speaking.
There wasn't a second of hesitation.
When that single phrase echoed through the infirmary, even my own voice that I had whispered into that person's back amidst the fire was revived.
"I'm sorry..."
"It's... all my... fault."
It would have been only natural if he abandoned me.
If he hadn't tried to save me, he wouldn't have been hurt either.
"That's not true."
Yesterday's voice was directed at me this time.
When he spoke the rest, that same voice grew raspy with smoke.
"I went back on my own. It's not like you asked me to."
The boy in the infirmary and the boy amidst the fire looked back at me at the same time.
The pitch of their voices differed.
Before and after inhaling smoke, there was no way they would sound identical.
Even so, the way they refused to make their own injuries the other person's fault overlapped perfectly.
My former friend had exploited my trust and blamed me for suspecting him.
The boy before my eyes was trying to strip that pain away from Koharu, who was blaming herself.
It had been the exact same during the fire.
When I said it was my fault, he never once tried to make me carry the burden of his wounds.
"I don't want you to be hospitalized again, Big Brother."
Koharu's weeping mingled with the crackle of flames.
"I hate waiting without knowing anything like last time."
The boy in the infirmary sat down on the chair and drew close to the bed.
Leaving his right arm down, he reached only his left hand toward Koharu. With that hand, without rushing his crying little sister, he gently stroked her dark brown hair.
"Rest assured."
Something deep in my chest trembled.
During the fire, he had given me those exact same words countless times.
"Rest assured."
The two voices overlapped, resounding as one.
It wasn't that I calmed down after processing the words.
The moment the voice reached me, my body knew instinctively that with this person, I would be safe.
It was nothing like when my former friend forced me to say, "I'm fine."
He didn't get angry even when Koharu said she couldn't take his word for it. Without trying to force belief through empty assurances, he promised to show the injury to their mother and contact the hospital if necessary.
"Promise?"
"Yeah. I promise."
The word "promise" dissolved into the smoke.
Exchanging our names once we got outside.
Getting crepes together, just the two of us.
He had told me he wouldn't forget.
Yet, the name I was supposed to learn that day had still never passed his lips.
Even when I tried to ask, my voice failed me.
The light of the infirmary receded, and the doors closed one by one.
From beyond them, only Koharu's voice carried through.
"I'm not asking you to apologize for going back to save someone."
──Going back to save someone.
He had gone back into the fire to save someone and suffered injuries severe enough to be hospitalized.
On his right shoulder, he still carried a wound he had to protect.
His height, too, matched the silhouette I remembered in the smoke.
There couldn't possibly be anyone else with so many overlapping pieces.
Beyond the nearly closed door, the silhouette dropped to his knees as if drained of strength.
His body tilted, guarding his right shoulder.
"Wait."
Even as I tried to chase after him, my injured right leg refused to move.
The voice that hadn't reached him that day broke through the smoke this time.
The silhouette raised his head just once more.
"Mi... kage... rest... assured."
Over that fading voice, the voice I heard yesterday overlapped.
"Mikage-san."
The person calling me wasn't two different people.
The boy who held onto my family name in the smoke, and the boy who spoke that same name with such care yesterday.
The two silhouettes I had tried so hard to keep separate merged into one.
──It's him.
Koharu's older brother was the one who had gone back into the flames to find me that day.
With that certainty, the fire and smoke evaporated.
In the pure white space, he stood alone.
Though his face was the one I had seen yesterday, everything from his right shoulder downward remained obscured by black smoke.
I tried to call out to him.
I could call him Aiba-kun.
However, the given name I was supposed to learn that day was something I still didn't know.
Without introducing himself, he quietly turned away.
"Wait."
This time, my legs moved.
I took a step closer.
Even though I was approaching a boy of my own free will, I felt no urge to run away.
It wasn't that I wanted to check the injury on his right shoulder.
I just wanted to feel with my own fingertips that he was really here.
I softly reached toward the left hand that had stroked Koharu's hair.
Just before I could touch it, the emergency alarm morphed into the rhythmic beeping of an alarm clock.
Morning light filtered through the gap in the curtains.
The emergency alarm wasn't ringing. It was only the clock by my pillow repeating its steady electronic pulse.
The hand I reached out to stop it grabbed empty air.
The left hand that had been right within reach was nowhere to be found.
Exhaling in several shaky breaths, I grounded myself in the reality of my own bedroom. There was no smell of smoke, nor did my throat ache. Only the dull ache lingering in my right leg confirmed that the fire itself had not been a dream.
Switching off the alarm, I buried my face in both hands.
The dream had scrambled the locations and order of my memories.
The mall doors lining a middle school hallway, the infirmary drifting into the smoke—they were nothing more than scenes stitched together by my sleeping mind.
Even so, what was placed inside those scenes hadn't been invented by a dream.
The "I'm fine" I gave my former friend.
The "Rest assured" whispered in the fire, and the "Rest assured" spoken yesterday.
The two instances of "That's not true" that shielded me and Koharu from blame.
The way he guarded his right shoulder, the way he waited patiently for the other person to calm down, the memory of having my family name called at the very end—every single bit of it had happened in reality.
It wasn't a conclusion manufactured by a dream.
I had merely accepted in my sleep the answer I had been too afraid to acknowledge while awake.
Koharu's brother and that person would never be separate in my mind again.
As that reality settled into my chest, before any relief or joy could take hold, Koharu's tears from yesterday flooded back into my thoughts.
To me, that fire was the day I met the person who saved my life.
To Koharu, it was the day she nearly lost the brother who had always been by her side.
I never wanted to lose sight of that difference.
I didn't want the joy of finding him to trample over Koharu's pain. For all the time I had spent thinking of him, Koharu had spent just as much time praying for her brother's recovery. I refused to turn his scars into a story that existed just for me.
It wasn't that my desire to apologize to him had vanished. Even so, he had stated clearly in the fire that he hadn't gone back just to be thanked or apologized to.
The gratitude I poured into that letter remained entirely unchanged.
The person who had only ever existed beyond a wall of smoke was now walking the halls of the very same school.
Rushing to the infirmary out of worry for Koharu, resting his left hand on his crying sister's head, and leaving an escape route open for me.
I want to hear his voice.
I want him to call my name again.
I want to know what he thinks about at school, and what he looks like when he laughs.
And... I want to reach out and touch him with my own hands.
The wish I had carried since before I even knew his face or name now had a clear shape, waiting at the tips of the fingers that had failed to reach his left hand in the dream.
Not to inspect his injury, nor to search for proof of that day. I just wanted to feel with my own touch that he was alive and standing right before my eyes.
Heat radiated from deep in my chest, flushing all the way to my cheeks.
Slipping out of bed, I opened the window, letting the crisp morning air wash over my damp forehead. Yet even that couldn't cool the warmth pooling inside me.
Yesterday, he called me by my family name.
However, he only introduced himself as "Koharu's older brother," never once speaking his own name.
I knew his family name was Aiba, the same as Koharu's. Even so, the name he promised to tell me that day had still never come from his own lips.
I could tell myself that in his panic over Koharu, introducing himself simply slipped his mind.
Yet, was it truly just that he forgot?
As I searched for the answer, the respectful distance he maintained between us came to mind.
If he revealed that he was my savior, buried under the crushing weight of obligation, I might lose sight of my own genuine feelings.
Perhaps he didn't want to rob me of the freedom to choose for myself.
On that day, too, he had waited until I nodded before daring to touch me.
If, even now, he was standing at that exact same distance, waiting until I was ready to close the gap myself...
Thinking that way might just be a convenient fantasy spun from my own wishes.
Even so, his silence didn't feel like rejection.
The fact remained that I still struggled around boys. It wasn't as though I had forgotten the past, nor had I suddenly become capable of trusting just anyone.
It was just that there was one single person I wanted to reach out to on my own.
Crossing paths in the smoke without even knowing we attended the same school, only to face him again in an infirmary free of flames, this time as Koharu's older brother.
The word "destiny" floated into my mind.
Just trying to dismiss it as an exaggeration made my ears burn with heat.
Maybe I was just giving a convenient, romantic name to a series of coincidences.
However, the question of whether he was that person could no longer be brushed off as mere coincidence.
I hadn't confirmed it directly with him. Even so, the answer was already set in stone within my heart.
I didn't want to bulldoze through his considerate silence with my own desires alone.
That was why, rather than trying to leap across the remaining distance all at once, I would take it one step at a time, drawing closer to Aiba-kun at school on my own terms.
And then, someday, I want to hear the name I couldn't learn that day spoken aloud in his very own voice.