What am I doing here?
What am I expecting?
How did I even end up here?
These and thousands of other questions are swirling through my mind as I stare at the only door on the top floor of this five or six-story building in the middle of Tokyo.
Somehow Emi had found her. I don’t know how, and I didn’t really care to ask at the time, but she did. Had they kept in contact after she left? And if so, why would Emi have waited this long to tell me she knew where she was?
Does she even want to see me? No, she must. Emi told her I would be coming over, and she never objected to it. Then again, she never was one to object to things she doesn’t want. I, of all people, should know that.
None of that matters. Waiting for me on the other side of this door is a girl I haven’t seen in nearly four years. The girl who left me standing in the rain on that day in the city near Yamaku. The girl who I tried for months and months to forget about, but who could never seem to leave my mind.
According to Emi, she seemed ‘out of it’ over the phone. Is she okay? What if she’s trying to destroy herself again? The last time she did that, she lost me. I can’t even think of what would happen if she did it again.
There. There’s your motivation. You’re worried about her. Now knock on the door, you idiot.
Part of me wants to just run back down the stairs, out the door, and forget all about her. But I know I can’t do that. I’ve been trying for years.
My heart is pounding rapidly in my chest and, as if compelled by some otherworldly force, my arm raises itself up to the door, and I knock sharply.
No answer.
God, I can almost feel the fight-or-flight response working itself out in my head. I knock again, this time a bit more forcefully.
Still nothing.
I think flight is winning.
Nervously I try turning the knob, and to my surprise the door creaks open.
“Hello?” I call into the room. Again, there’s no response, so I nervously push the door open the rest of the way and step inside, shutting it behind me.
The atelier is not entirely unlike her old one. Paint cans labeled with various colors and hues cover the floor, and easels with unfinished works are displayed haphazardly around the room. A couch and coffee table are set up near one corner of the room, with a skylight above them letting in a ray of sunshine. Across from the door is a hallway leading to some other rooms. I guess she lives here full-time.
“Is anyone here?”
I get no answer, so I start making my way around the room. The half-finished paintings she has set up seem…different than I remember her work. There is an odd lifelessness to them that I never saw in something like the mural she did for the festival at Yamaku. A country landscape, a city at night, a man sitting in a chair, birds flying o-
Wait.
I turn back and look at the unfinished drawing of a man hunched over in a chair, his hands hanging between his legs. Something about it seems…familiar to me, but I can’t place it…
Suddenly, with a pang of guilt I realize it. The drawing is nearly identical to the one she did of me back at school. I immediately recognize the messy brown hair, and that grim look that she always saw in my face. When did she paint this? Has she not forgotten about me the way she said she would?
“Do you like that one?”
The noise nearly makes me jump, and I turn around to find Rin Tezuka standing in the entrance of the hallway.
I can’t help but notice how much she’s changed. Her auburn hair, while still having that unkempt look that I liked so much, is definitely longer, reaching a little past her shoulders. There are dark circles under her eyes, and she seems thinner and paler than I remember. She’s wearing a dark green turtleneck and a pair of loose jeans with the bottoms rolled up, both covered with specks of dried paint. How she manages to get dressed without Emi, I can’t imagine.
For a moment I stand there dumbfounded, just taking in the sight of her.
“Rin…”
I can’t think of anything to say. Damn it, I knew this would happen.
“Rin, I-“
Before I can form a coherent sentence, she covers the distance between us and pushes her body against mine, wrapping me in about as much of a hug as she can give. I stand there awkwardly for a moment, my arms splayed out at my sides, before moving them around her back and returning the embrace. She rests her head against my chest, and the scent of her hair tickles my nose.
“I tried my hardest to forget you, you know,” she says into my shirt. “But I guess I’m not as good at forgetting as I thought I was.”
We stay like this for a while, just enjoying the feeling of each other. Eventually she lowers her arms and I let go of her. There are a million questions I want to ask her, but before I can open my mouth she interrupts me again, this time with a question of her own.
“Why did you come here?”
I think for a moment and then respond, “Emi was worried about you. And the truth is…so was I. I just wanted to see you again, to talk to you.”
She looks up at me. “Do you want to sit down?” she asks. “I feel like I can think better if I’m sitting.”
I nod and she leads me over to the couch in the corner of the room. I sit down on one end of it and she takes the other.
“So…” I ponder what I’m going to say, and then continue. “I guess we never really forgot about each other after all.”
She looks up at me, giving me that blank stare that I remember oh-so well. “After I…left,” she explains, “I went to an art university here in Tokyo. I dropped out after a couple years and got back in contact with Sae. She set me up with this place and is showing my works at an exhibition hall somewhere. But ever since I left Yamaku, I…I…” She struggles with the words, before unleashing them in a torrent of emotion.
“Every day since I left I haven’t been able to forget about you or Emi or anything and I thought that if I dropped out of the university that would give me time to think about things but it only really made it worse since I think about things all the time, and for the past few years I feel like I haven’t been painting for myself, like I’ve been doing it for someone else, and a while ago I lost my inspiration and I couldn’t find it and all of my paintings ended up really bad and I thought that I should do something to get it back but whenever I tried to change myself I just ended up thinking about you and I feel like you were the only person who ever really listened to me or cared about my problems and-“
“Rin!”
The sharpness of the word shocks even myself. As I try to think of something to say, I wonder how often she thinks like this. How long she’s wanted to spill her guts like that but had no one to talk to.
“Rin, it’s alright,” I begin. “Ever since you left, I’ve felt like there’s been a hole in my chest, like when we first met you came through a door and forgot to close it on your way out. For the rest of school year I tried to forget about you, but every time I walked past the art room, or saw Emi, I was brutally reminded that you were gone. I even went to the worry tree a few times, but it just wasn’t the same without you. I truly thought I had lost you forever, and now, seeing you again and knowing you feel the same way…” I trail off, leaving the sentence unfinished. “Maybe I never will truly understand you, but that’s okay. And if you’re going to destroy yourself again, I want to be here for you. I never want to lose you again, because…I love you, Rin. And nothing will ever change that.”
I sigh, relieved to have let out all of my bottled up feelings. Rin looks up at me with her beautiful green eyes. They’re no bigger than anyone else’s, but they seem huge and mysterious to me.
“Hisao,” she says, looking straight into my eyes. “I’m sorry.” I start to protest, but she goes on. “I…I made the wrong decision on that day. I didn’t realize at the time how much it would hurt you…how much it would hurt both of us. I should’ve stayed at Yamaku. But instead I chose to let people have their way with me, to change me into something I’m not. And I couldn’t do it. I couldn’t change for someone else. I shouldn’t paint because others want me to. I should do it because I want to. And ever since I left, I haven’t felt that same want. I feel like the only reason I’ve been painting is because Sae needs a new picture in the gallery, or she wants something to show to one of her artist friends. But even though it was only for a short time, whenever you were around I didn’t need a reason to paint. I just did it. I think…I think you’re my inspiration, Hisao. I don’t feel like I need to destroy myself anymore.”
As she finishes, tears form in her eyes. I pull her close and she buries her head in my shoulder.
“Sometimes I feel like I should’ve gone after you that day,” I say, staring into space. “Maybe if I had, none of this would’ve happened. But that’s in the past. We can’t change any of it, and you shouldn’t feel sorry either. All that matters is what we do now. And maybe we can’t make it work, but even so, I need to try, because I love being around you. You’re beautiful and fascinating and I wouldn’t change anything about you.”
She looks up at me through her tear-stained eyes and, for the first time since the day that I found her high on codeine, she presses her lips against mine. The force with which she does this nearly knocks me over, but I steady myself and wrap my arms around her. For a moment I forget everything and focus all my attention on Rin. The taste of her lips on mine, the way her hair shines in the late afternoon sun coming in from the skylight overhead. In this fleeting instance she looks more beautiful than I had ever seen her.
We eventually pull apart and, realizing she can’t do it herself, I brush my hand across her cheek, wiping away her tears. She smiles at me for the first time since I came here, and my heart melts. I smile back at her. Suddenly she cocks her head, and studies me curiously.
“The grimness. It’s gone.”
“What?” I ask, not sure what she means.
“The grimness,” she says again. “In your face. It’s not there anymore. You look…happy.”
I think about this for a moment. “You know, this is probably the first time since…God, since my accident, that I’ve been genuinely happy.”
She smiles again. “I’m glad.” Then she swings her legs up onto the edge of the couch, lays her head on my thighs, and closes her eyes.
For a while neither of us says anything. It’s around this point that I realize there’s nothing I would rather be doing right now than being here, with Rin. Even if we aren’t saying anything, or doing anything, just the pleasure of each other’s company is enough. I feel like the hole in my chest has been filled, just by her presence.
I don’t know how long we stay like this; me lost in my own thoughts and her resting her head on my legs. It could’ve been minutes or hours. After at least enough time for the sun to have gone down, she opens her eyes.
“Hisao?” she asks. I look down at her and see that she’s staring past me to the skylight above.
“Yeah?” I turn my head upwards and stare through the skylight at the countless stars above us.
“Thanks for coming back.”