That Rainy Season

I have known Hina since kindergarten.

How strange it is that someone who has been such an important part of your life since childhood can eventually become nothing more than a memory.

I used to be a quiet kid. Not exactly a genius or some kind of nerd, just an ordinary boy who preferred keeping to himself. Perhaps that was why the bullies targeted me.

It wasn’t because I was poor. My father was a high-ranking police officer, and my mother was a teacher. I had a loving family and a comfortable home. They were strict, but they loved me unconditionally and always made sure I had everything I needed.

Still, none of that mattered at school.

Every day, I was bullied for being quiet and refusing to fight back. It went on for almost a year.

Then came the new girl.

She had bobbed hair.

Her name was Hina.

I still remember the bright smile on her face when she walked confidently into our classroom and introduced herself. After looking around, she chose the seat beside me.

Perhaps it was simply the only one available.

She tried to talk to me, but I was too shy to respond properly. It was my first time talking to a girl my age, and I had no idea how to react.

The following day, when the other kids started bullying me again, I remember the way she stood up for me.

She was the first person who had ever done that.

Back then, she became my inspiration.

And I wanted to protect her, too.

That was how our friendship began.

I remember her sitting beside me during class, smiling as brightly as ever, from the morning sunlight streaming through the windows to the warm glow of the evening sunset.

I remember how she liked sharing her rice balls with me. Her mother made them, and they were the most delicious rice balls I had ever tasted.

I remember the way she swung her legs beneath the desk because they were too short to reach the floor.

I remember how she whispered to me whenever the teacher wasn’t looking, commenting on how serious the teacher’s face was. Then she would pull the silliest expressions, imitating our teacher until we both ended up in time-out.

I remember her handwriting.

Small, messy letters that somehow always took up more space than they were supposed to.

I remember the little drawings she made in the corners of her notebooks.

Flowers.

Clouds.

Little houses.

Sometimes, she drew people, too.

She always drew herself with a ridiculous smile.

Whenever I asked her why, she would say that people looked better when they smiled.

I believed her.

Back then, everything was simple.

We were children in a small village surrounded by mountains, and the world beyond it seemed impossibly large.

Our village wasn’t beautiful in the way people described beautiful places in books. The roads were uneven, the buildings were old, and during the rainy season, the streets turned into mud. When the hottest months arrived, the air seemed to settle heavily over everything.

But we loved it.

Hina loved it.

She knew every shortcut through the village, every hidden path, every tree easy enough to climb, and every place where the adults wouldn’t notice us playing after school.

There was an old wooden bridge near the edge of the village.

We used to sit there for hours.

Sometimes we talked.

Sometimes we didn’t.

There were days when we simply sat beside each other and watched the water pass beneath us.

I don’t remember what we talked about most of the time.

Probably nothing important.

It was a long time ago, after all.

Children rarely realize when they’re living through the memories they will one day miss.

We thought we had forever.

We didn’t know childhood had an ending.

We didn’t know people could grow apart.

We didn’t know some promises were made by children who had no idea how difficult they would be to keep.

We only knew that tomorrow would come.

And the day after that.

And the day after that.

Elementary school became middle school.

Middle school became high school.

Our uniforms changed.

Our voices changed.

Our faces changed.

We grew up.

Yet somehow, whenever I looked at Hina, I could still see the little girl from kindergarten.

The girl who used to run ahead of me, then turn around just to make sure I was following.

The girl who knocked on my door every morning and told me to hurry because we were going to be late.

The girl who got angry whenever I said something bad about myself.

Maybe she simply knew how to make me feel less insecure.

Hina was always cheerful and far too kind to others. I often wondered how someone could be so kind-hearted, so full of energy, and so effortlessly perfect in the eyes of a boy who had never really understood people.

We were different in so many ways.

Perhaps that was why we got along so well.

The years passed quietly.

There were arguments.

Stupid disagreements that felt important at the time.

Days when neither of us wanted to speak to the other.

But eventually, one of us would always come back.

Neither of us was very good at staying angry.

Then came our final year of high school.

For the first time, the future began to feel real.

People started talking about universities, jobs, moving away, and the lives they wanted after graduation.

I remember sitting beside Hina one afternoon after class, at the old bridge where we had spent so much of our childhood.

The sun was setting behind the mountains.

She asked me what I wanted to do with my life.

I told her I didn’t know.

She laughed.

She said she already knew what she wanted.

Naturally, I asked her what it was.

She wouldn’t tell me.

She simply smiled and said, “Maybe I’ll tell you someday.”

I still remember that.

I remember so many small things about her. Things that shouldn’t matter anymore, yet somehow remain in my mind as if no time has passed at all.

The sound of her laughter.

The way she said my name.

The way she tilted her head whenever she was confused.

The way she looked at the sky whenever she was thinking.

And the strange habit she had of saying goodbye twice.

Once when she left.

Then again after walking a few steps away, when she would turn around and wave at me.

I never understood why she did that.

I wish I had asked.

When she asked what I planned to do after graduation, I told her my parents expected me to become a police officer, just like my father. Back in the nineties, the profession was considered honorable, and many families expected their children to pursue it.

As their only child, I had grown up beneath my family’s expectations.

I felt I had little choice but to follow the path they had laid out for me.

After graduation, I left the village and moved to the city to study.

It was the first time I had lived somewhere that didn’t feel like home.

The streets were crowded.

The buildings seemed enormous.

People passed one another every day without knowing each other’s names.

At first, I hated it.

I missed the quiet.

I missed the mountains.

I missed the familiar roads.

And I missed Hina, my oldest friend.

We continued talking for a while. Sometimes she called me, and sometimes I called her. Occasionally, our conversations lasted for hours. On other days, we barely had anything to say.

But hearing her voice and knowing she was doing well was enough.

Then, little by little, life became busier.

Days became weeks.

Weeks became months.

And eventually, years.

After about a year, we stopped talking.

Not because we had argued, nor because either of us had deliberately decided to end our friendship. We simply grew occupied with our own lives until the distance between us became something we no longer knew how to cross.

She lived her life.

I lived mine.

As everyone eventually learns, life goes on.

The last time I checked on her, I found out that she had married Ken, our former student council president.

I wasn’t surprised. Hina had been popular in high school, after all. She was kind, friendly, and cheerful.

Who wouldn’t have liked her?

I was happy that my childhood friend had finally settled down with someone who seemed as suitable for her as Ken did.

They looked like the kind of couple who were born to meet, as though they were meant to spend the rest of their lives together.

I felt relieved, believing that Hina had found someone who would take good care of her.

Around that time, I met a woman at university.

Her name was Yoma.

She was gentle but strict, with a sweet nature that I grew fond of. She became my first girlfriend, and I loved how her smile reminded me of Hina’s.

They were both silly in their own ways.

I could never grow tired of women who made ridiculous faces without caring how they looked.

As the days went by, life continued as it should.

I married Yoma, my loving wife, and eventually became the father of our two children.

Seven years after high school, my life had changed considerably. I had a family, a career, and responsibilities of my own. I had learned to live with the distance between my childhood and the person I had become.

Or at least, I thought I had.

Now, here I am.

I have to attend the funeral of someone who once meant so much to me.

How could I forget her?

Seven years have passed since those days. It sounds like such a long time when spoken aloud.

And yet, standing here now, it feels as though everything happened yesterday.

The rain falls steadily, tapping against the black umbrella above my head. Prayers echo through the cemetery, their voices cutting through the sound of the rain. Around me, people cry quietly, their grief hanging in the damp air.

I barely look at them.

My attention remains fixed on the coffin.

On the flowers.

White lilies, her favorite.

And on the name written beside them.

Hina.

For a moment, I almost expect her to appear.

I almost expect her to laugh and tell everyone that this is some terrible misunderstanding. That she’s fine. That she’s only pretending, and that we should all stop crying and go home.

But she doesn’t appear.

The coffin remains closed.

The flowers remain still.

And the rain continues to fall.

I lower my head and look at her photograph. Memories wash over me like waves, carrying me back to a time when everything seemed so much easier.

Seven years ago, I was a boy who believed he could protect his friend.

Seven years ago, I believed there would always be another conversation.

Another summer.

Another walk through the village.

Another chance to hear her laugh.

Until we meet again.

I was wrong.

The priest says her name, and everyone falls silent.

Suddenly, I remember the little girl who stood up for me.

The girl who sat beside me in kindergarten.

The girl who shared her food with me.

The girl who laughed whenever I told her I would protect her.

A little girl who smiled at me anyway.

I close my eyes.

For one brief moment, I’m back in that classroom, beneath the warm afternoon sunlight, before everything became complicated.

Back when we were children.

Back when tomorrow felt endless.

Then I open my eyes.

Hina is still gone.

And I make the promise I made to her so many years ago.

This time, I won’t fail.

“She was murdered,” her mother says through her sobs.

The words sound unreal.

Someone murdered Hina.

My Hina.

I stand before her grave, staring at the fresh soil where her coffin has just been lowered. The rain has stopped, but the ground remains wet, and the air smells of damp earth and flowers.

My hand tightens around the flower I’m holding.

I want to know who did this.

Who dared to do something so cruel to her?

I want to find them, bring them before the law, and make sure they face the consequences of what they’ve done.

Hina doesn’t deserve this.

She spent her life smiling at people. She was kind to everyone. Even when we were children, whenever someone treated me badly, she was always the first person to stand beside me.

And now she’s gone.

Forever.

I step forward and place the flower gently on her grave.

For a moment, I simply stand there, looking at her face in the photograph.

That smile, as bright as ever.

Hina.

My cheerful Hina.

My voice is barely audible when I speak.

“I’ll find out who did this.”

I lower my head.

“I promise.”

People slowly begin leaving the cemetery. Her family, relatives, friends, former classmates, and villagers walk away with heavy faces.

Eventually, I’m alone.

I take out a cigarette and move beneath an old tree near the cemetery. My hands shake slightly as I light it.

I’m not even thinking about smoking.

My mind feels empty. Everything around me seems distant, as though I’m watching someone else’s life through a window.

The smoke disappears into the cold air.

Hina is dead.

Someone has killed her.

And I can’t stop thinking about the same question.

Why?

What had she done to deserve this?

Who could possibly hate her enough to do something like this?

I stay beneath the tree until the cigarette burns down, then finally make my way home.

The lights are still on when I open the door.

“Welcome home.”

Yoma is in the bathroom, washing my dirty coat.

“Honey, yesterday’s mission must have been pretty rough. There’s dirt all over your clothes.”

Her voice is warm and familiar, the same voice that has welcomed me home countless times before.

Yoma has always been a devoted wife. Sometimes I wonder how I got so lucky to meet someone like her.

Our children come running toward me.

“Dad!”

They wrap their arms around my legs, excited to see me.

Normally, I would smile, pick them up, ask about their day, and listen to everything they wanted to tell me.

But that night, I can’t bring myself to do any of it.

I simply stand there.

My body is home.

My mind is still at the cemetery.

Perhaps I’m still in shock.

“Honey?” Yoma asks softly.

I look at her.

“I’m tired.”

That’s all I can manage.

She studies my face for a moment, then nods.

“Okay. You should rest.”

I walk past them and close the bedroom door behind me. Sitting on the edge of the bed, I stare at the floor.

The room is quiet.

Then, somehow, I remember Hina again.

Her ridiculous smile.

Her messy handwriting.

The little girl who used to sit beside me in kindergarten.

The girl who once told me that people looked better when they smiled.

I cover my face with my hands.

How could someone take that smile away from her?

When we were children, I promised I would protect her. Back then, she laughed at me.

But I meant it.

And now, after all these years, I have failed.

The following morning, I wake up early.

I’ve already made my decision.

I’m going to take Hina’s case.

I tell my wife and children before leaving.

“Mhm, I understand, my love. Please be safe,” Yoma says. She always worries about me.

The children hug me, and I kiss each of them on the forehead.

“Daddy loves you both. Be good, okay?”

“We love you too, Daddy!”

They grin at me innocently, and I can’t help smiling at their little faces. I pat their heads before leaving, hoping they won’t exhaust my wife too much while I’m away.

I have returned to my hometown for a reason, and now I finally have one that matters.

I want answers.

I want justice for my oldest friend.

I put on my uniform, look at myself in the mirror, and leave the house.

The road outside looks almost exactly as I remember it.

The same mountains.

The same narrow roads.

The same old buildings.

The same village where Hina and I grew up together.

Only she isn’t here anymore.

I arrive at the station and collect the case file.

Her name is written across the front.

Hina.

I stare at it for a long moment before opening it.

It’s time to find out how she died.

And who was responsible.

After hours of driving around my hometown, the roads gradually become familiar. I pass the old mountain road, the small shops, and the houses I’ve known since childhood.

Then I see it.

The old wooden bridge.

I slow down.

For a moment, I consider driving straight past it.

Instead, I pull over and step outside.

I take out a cigarette and light it, watching the smoke drift into the evening air.

Hina and I used to sit there when we were children. She would swing her legs over the edge and talk about anything that came into her head. Sometimes, she made ridiculous faces just to make me laugh. Other times, she smiled at me for no reason at all.

That smile.

I can still remember it perfectly.

Even after all these years, I’ve never forgotten it.

I take another drag from my cigarette and close my eyes.

For a moment, I can almost hear her voice.

Almost.

Then I open my eyes.

The bridge is empty.

There is nobody beside me anymore.

I finish my cigarette and drive to my parents’ house.

My mother has already prepared dinner.

“You’re home,” she says warmly.

My father looks up from the table.

“Come and eat. Your mother just finished making dinner.”

I sit down with them, and we eat together quietly.

They ask about my work, and I answer only what they ask. Neither of them knows what’s going through my head.

I can’t tell them everything. I don’t want them to feel worse about Hina’s death. My parents are getting older, and they shouldn’t have to carry more stress than they already do.

I simply tell them I’ve returned to town to work on a few cases.

They ask about my wife and children, too.

I tell them everyone is doing well and that my eldest daughter will soon enter Grade One.

I love how grandparents always seem to brighten up when they hear news about their grandchildren. Even the smallest details make them beam with happiness.

After dinner, I go upstairs to my old room.

The room has barely changed.

Some of my old books are still on the shelves. Childhood photographs remain tucked inside a box near the desk.

My mother has kept everything almost exactly as it was when I left years ago.

The bond between a mother and her child really is something else.

She never liked having me live so far away, so she kept my room clean, as though I might walk through the door at any moment and return to the life I’d left behind.

I couldn’t ask for anything more.

I have loving parents, a wife, and two children.

How lucky I am to have them.

But before I get lost in my thoughts, I pull myself back to the present.

I have something else to do.

I came here to bring justice to my friend.

I sit at the desk and open the case file.

Hina’s name is printed across the front.

I stare at it for a long moment before turning to the first page.

The report is difficult to read.

Hina had disappeared that night and was later found dead.

It had been raining.

Her body bore bruises of different ages, along with disturbing bite marks around her neck and upper chest. There were wounds and scars across her small frame, too.

The investigators had described the injuries as unusual.

They didn’t seem consistent with an ordinary attack.

Whoever had done this had behaved strangely.

Almost obsessively.

Like a violent person who knew exactly what they wanted to do to her.

Could it have been a stalker?

Or simply someone who had attacked and killed her?

I read further.

Then I hear a noise.

Something scratches against the outside of the house, followed by what sounds like a failed attempt to climb. A moment later, there’s a soft thud.

I turn toward the window behind my desk.

It’s dark now.

Beyond the house, wide rice fields stretch toward the forest. A lone lamppost stands in the middle of the fields, its light flickering on and off.

The light reflects in the round mirror hanging near the edge of my window.

Some old superstition comes to mind.

For some reason, the reflection unsettles me.

For a second, it looks almost like the shadow of someone standing outside.

I get up and approach the window.

Then I look toward the forest.

A dark figure in what appears to be a white dress moves between the trees, disappearing deeper into the woods.

How strange.

Who would be wandering around this late, especially near the forest? The area is known for wild animals that sometimes threaten the villagers, particularly snakes.

Perhaps I’m simply seeing things in the reflection.

I look down.

A black cat is sitting beneath the window.

Ah.

So that’s what made the noise.

I glance at the wooden window frame and notice fresh scratches across it.

This cat really needs to learn some manners. If it keeps damaging my things, it should at least pay me back.

I shake my head and return to the desk.

I have work to do.

Justice for Hina.

I continue reading.

Another detail makes the case even more disturbing.

Her face had been deliberately injured in a way that left it resembling a horrible imitation of a smile.

I stop.

My hands tighten around the file.

A smile.

Of all things.

Why?

Why would someone do that to her?

What kind of sick person could look at Hina and decide to do something like that?

This is getting worse by the minute.

I can only keep wondering until I find the answer.

I force myself to continue.

The medical report states that Hina had been taking prescribed medication for depression. According to people who knew her, she’d been struggling emotionally in the months before her death.

Seven months earlier, she had lost her child during pregnancy.

Afterward, she had become increasingly withdrawn and emotionally exhausted.

Her marriage had also been falling apart.

Ken had developed a serious gambling problem.

Ken?

Our former student council president?

He was addicted to gambling?

Unbelievable.

According to the report, he had been spending money recklessly and frequently disappearing with other women.

I stare at the page, struggling to reconcile these details with the person I remember.

They had seemed happy together.

Then again, perhaps that’s the problem with appearances. We can look at someone for years without ever knowing what happens behind closed doors.

There had been arguments between them.

Sometimes serious ones.

According to the report, Hina and Ken had a major argument on the night she disappeared.

Witnesses said Ken had struck her during the confrontation.

Later, he had aggressively taken money from her, slapped her, and driven away, leaving her alone in the rain.

How could he hit his own wife?

I could never do the same to Yoma.

Her smile is too precious to me.

My poor Hina.

I continue reading.

Hina had walked home alone.

She never made it there.

The next section contains footage from a nearby street camera. I read the investigator’s description carefully before watching it.

Hina can be seen walking alone through the rain.

She eventually reaches a darker stretch of road, an area known locally for drug dealers and gangs.

She seems nervous.

Then someone appears behind her.

A figure dressed entirely in black.

The camera cannot make out the person’s face.

I pause the footage.

For a moment, I can’t bring myself to continue.

I already know something terrible is about to happen.

After taking a few minutes to collect myself, I press play.

The figure approaches Hina and appears to say something to her.

She turns around.

Even through the grainy footage, her fear is apparent. She tries to walk away, but the stranger follows her.

Then the person suddenly reaches out and grabs her arm.

Hina struggles.

Her mouth opens as if she’s trying to scream.

But the figure doesn’t panic.

That’s the strange part.

The person remains unnervingly calm.

A moment later, something is placed over Hina’s mouth.

It looks as though the attacker might have done something like this before.

Or perhaps everything had been planned carefully.

A serial killer?

A deranged stalker?

Or some thug who abducts women?

I continue watching.

Hina’s movements gradually weaken. The figure catches her before she falls, then drags her toward the darkest part of the street, beyond the camera’s reach.

The footage ends there.

Another camera catches something several minutes later.

A dark vehicle leaving the area.

No clear license plate.

No identifiable driver.

I lean back in my chair.

I’ve dealt with criminals before. I know how easily a small mistake can expose someone, but this footage gives me almost nothing to work with.

The screen goes dark.

The room falls silent.

I look down at Hina’s photograph attached to the file.

She’s smiling.

That same ridiculous smile.

The one I remember from beside the bridge.

I stare at the photograph.

Then I close the file.

A moment later, I open it again.

There has to be something I’m missing.

There has to be a reason.

A mistake.

A witness.

Anything.

I’m not going to let Hina become another forgotten name in an old case file.

Not her.

Especially not my best friend.

Not the girl who has been beside me since kindergarten.

I will find the person responsible.

No matter how long it takes.

The following morning, I begin with the people closest to Hina.

Five names stand out.

Five people who crossed paths with her before she died.

Five people who might know more than they’re willing to admit.

I call them in one by one to be questioned at the police station.

The first is Ken.

Her husband.

The last person known to have argued with her that night.

He looks exhausted. His eyes are red, although I can’t tell whether he’s been crying or simply hasn’t slept.

“You’re the last person who was with Hina that night,” I say.

“I know,” he replies carelessly, as though his wife’s death is nothing more than an inconvenience.

“You argued with her.”

He looks away.

“We had problems.”

“Did you hit her?”

He remains silent for several seconds.

Then he admits it.

“Yes.”

I watch him carefully.

His eyes keep drifting away from mine. He scratches the back of his ear and seems unable to settle his hands.

He says he regrets what happened.

He says he lost control.

He says he never imagined Hina would disappear afterward.

I make a note of his answers.

Something about him bothers me.

Maybe it’s the gambling.

Maybe it’s the other women.

Maybe it’s the way he talks about Hina as though she had become a problem in his life rather than the person he once promised to protect.

Or perhaps it’s the way he avoids eye contact while tapping his fingers impatiently against his side.

Yes, I notice these things.

I write his name down.

Ken.

Then I move on to the second suspect.

An old homeless man who was seen around the area where Hina disappeared.

Everyone in the village knows him. He sleeps beneath an old shelter near the road and wanders around at night, carrying an old knife he uses to peel fruit. Unfortunately, he also has a habit of pointing it at passersby and threatening them.

Even without Hina’s case, the man needs to be dealt with before someone gets hurt.

When I question him, he barely looks at me.

“Black bird,” he mutters.

“What?”

“Black bird comes when the moon is hiding.”

I stare at him.

He laughs quietly.

He doesn’t seem entirely present, and his words are difficult to follow.

Then he starts talking about things that have nothing to do with Hina.

People in the village call him crazy.

But even someone whose thoughts seem disorganized might have noticed something important. Worse, he could be involved himself. I can’t dismiss him simply because he behaves strangely.

I ask whether he saw Hina that night.

He stares at me for a long time.

Then he says, “I saw the shadow.”

My pen stops moving.

“What shadow?”

He smiles.

“The one that doesn’t belong to anyone.”

This old man certainly isn’t making the questioning easy.

I try to get more information from him, but he offers nothing useful. Still, I write his name down.

The homeless man.

The third suspect is a local drug dealer.

He has been arrested before for drug-related offences. There is also an old case involving the sexual assault and killing of a woman, although he was never convicted of it.

That history alone makes him worth investigating.

He acts confident when I question him.

“You think I killed that woman?” he asks.

“I think your history makes you worth looking into,” I reply, keeping my eyes on him and studying his behavior.

He laughs.

“I didn’t kill Hina.”

“You knew her?”

My eyebrows draw together.

“Everyone knows everyone around here.”

He leans back in his chair, then gives me a smile that I don’t particularly like.

“You should look somewhere else, officer.”

I don’t like the way he says it.

It’s almost as though he knows something I don’t.

I write his name on the list anyway.

The drug dealer.

The fourth suspect is another local thug.

His record is worse.

He has previously been accused of assaulting women, and several reports describe his violent behavior.

He claims he has nothing to do with Hina’s death.

But when I ask where he was that night, his story changes twice.

First, he says he was at home.

Then he says he was drinking with friends.

Finally, he claims he can’t remember.

People like him make investigations difficult. They lie even when they have nothing to hide.

Or perhaps they lie because they have everything to hide.

He looks nervous. Sweat gathers on his face, and he keeps glancing away whenever I ask another question.

I tilt my head slightly, watching him.

What is this?

Changing his answer once might be understandable. Changing it repeatedly is another matter entirely.

Perhaps he’s hiding something.

Whether it’s connected to Hina or not, I can’t ignore it.

I write down his name.

The local thug.

Then there’s the fifth person.

Aiku.

Hina’s coworker.

He’s different from the others.

Clean clothes.

Perfect manners.

A calm voice.

The kind of man people trust easily.

But I’ve heard things about him.

Apparently, he has liked Hina for a long time. Some of their coworkers say he tried to convince her to leave Ken because he believed she deserved better.

He and Ken never got along.

Ken hated how close Aiku was to Hina.

A love triangle, perhaps.

I make a mental note of it.

Aiku, on the other hand, believed Ken was destroying Hina’s life.

But Aiku has problems of his own.

He has a reputation as a playboy, and there are rumors about how he treated some of his former girlfriends. One particularly disturbing allegation involves private material being shared without their permission.

Nothing has been proven against him, but his reputation is hardly reassuring.

On the surface, he appears to be a gentleman. Beneath that polished exterior, however, I can’t tell what kind of person he really is.

Human nature can be ugly.

Sometimes, the kindest people are pushed into the shadows while those who behave terribly continue to prosper.

I can’t afford to judge him based on rumors alone.

But I can’t ignore them, either.

When I ask him about Hina, his expression changes.

Only for a second.

“She was a good person,” he says, his eyes shifting briefly to the side.

“You liked her?” I ask, tightening my grip on my notes.

There’s something about his self-assured manner that irritates me, although I remind myself to remain professional.

He looks at me.

“Yeah.”

I think I detect a hint of mockery behind his faint smile, but I can’t be certain.

“Did you want her to leave Ken?”

Aiku taps his watch, his eyes wandering around the room.

“Ah, officer. I wanted her to be safe.”

His answer comes too quickly.

I watch him carefully.

“You and Ken didn’t get along?”

“No.”

“Why?”

“Because he didn’t treat her well. A pretty girl like Hina deserved better anyway.”

His voice remains calm.

He looks every bit the perfect gentleman.

“Pretty girl, huh?” I raise an eyebrow.

He seems suspiciously eager to redirect the conversation toward Ken’s behavior.

This man is strange.

Sometimes, the people who appear the most perfect have things hidden beneath the surface that nobody else can see.

I write his name down, too.

Aiku.

Five suspects.

Five different reasons to be suspicious.

Ken has a possible motive.

The homeless man was seen around the area.

The drug dealer has a violent history.

The local thug has been accused of attacking women.

And Aiku has feelings for Hina, along with a history that makes me question what he might be capable of.

Perhaps he wanted to get involved with her.

Perhaps he wanted something from her.

Perhaps he was simply a man who couldn’t accept being rejected.

I don’t know yet.

All I know is that everyone seems to have something to hide.

I sit alone in my office after the interviews, looking at the five names written in my notes.

The case is beginning to take shape.

Or at least, I think it is.

I rub my eyes.

For some reason, my head has been feeling strangely heavy lately. My thoughts don’t always seem as clear as they should be, and I can’t remember the last time I felt completely rested.

I glance at the small bottle inside my desk drawer.

I haven’t touched it in years.

More than three, perhaps.

I can’t remember exactly.

I close the drawer.

There are more important things to think about.

The killer was careful enough to avoid leaving clear fingerprints. The forensic team is still working on the DNA evidence collected from Hina, and I need to wait for their findings.

Hina.

Her death.

The person responsible.

I pick up her photograph again.

She’s smiling.

I find myself smiling back at it.

“I’ll find you,” I whisper.

Then I correct myself.

“I’ll find them.”

My voice is quiet.

Almost a whisper.

“I promise.”

The next morning, I return to the station earlier than usual.

I barely slept last night.

Every time I closed my eyes, I saw Hina’s photograph. That bright smile seemed to follow me wherever I went, even when I tried to distract myself with something else.

Perhaps it’s because I haven’t accepted that she’s gone.

Or perhaps there’s something about this case that I haven’t understood yet.

I sit at my desk and begin reviewing the evidence again.

The footage.

The witness statements.

The medical report.

The names of the five suspects.

I go through everything carefully, looking for a detail I might have overlooked. But the more I read, the less certain I become.

The footage shows someone taking Hina away, yet the person’s identity remains unknown. Nobody has come forward with useful information, and the witnesses who have been questioned so far offer little beyond rumors.

I lean back in my chair.

Something doesn’t add up.

The attacker seems to have known where Hina would be that night. They approached her with little hesitation, as though they had been waiting for her.

Was the encounter planned?

Did Hina know the person?

Or had she simply been unlucky enough to cross paths with the wrong stranger?

I rub my forehead.

“Think,” I mutter to myself. “Just think.”

My eyes return to the photograph attached to the report.

Hina is wearing a familiar expression, her lips curved into that same cheerful smile.

For some reason, I remember something she told me when we were younger.

People aren’t always what they seem.

I can’t recall exactly when she said it.

Perhaps it was during high school.

Perhaps it was much earlier.

I shake my head and turn back to the file.

I need to stop getting distracted by memories.

The first person I decide to investigate further is Ken.

His argument with Hina occurred shortly before her disappearance, and the reports suggest their relationship had become increasingly troubled. If he had been violent toward her before, then his behavior that night cannot simply be dismissed as an isolated incident.

Still, an argument doesn’t automatically make someone a murderer.

I need evidence.

I contact the officers who handled his initial questioning and ask whether they have obtained anything else from him. They tell me he has been cooperative, although his answers haven’t been entirely consistent.

That doesn’t surprise me.

I decide to visit him again.

When I arrive, Ken is sitting alone outside his house. He looks up when he sees me, then slowly stands.

“Officer.”

“Ken.”

He gestures toward a chair.

I decline.

“I have a few more questions.”

His expression tightens.

“Didn’t I already tell you everything?”

“You told me what happened during your argument with Hina. I want to know what happened afterward.”

He looks away.

“I went home.”

“Alone?”

“Yes.”

“Where did you go after leaving her?”

“I told you. I went home.”

His irritation is beginning to show.

I study his face.

“Did you see anyone on the road?”

“No.”

“Did anyone call you that night?”

He pauses.

Only briefly, but I notice.

“I don’t remember.”

“You don’t remember?”

“It was a while ago. I was angry. I wasn’t paying attention to anything.”

I write down his answer.

Then I look at him again.

“Did Hina ever tell you that she was afraid of someone?”

His expression changes.

For the first time since I arrived, he looks genuinely uncertain.

“What do you mean?”

“Did she ever mention receiving threats? Someone following her? Someone making her uncomfortable?”

Ken rubs his jaw.

“No.”

He answers too quickly.

I wait.

He sighs.

“Look, our marriage wasn’t perfect. I know that. We argued a lot, and I did things I shouldn’t have done. But I didn’t kill her.”

I say nothing.

“I loved her,” he adds.

The words sound rehearsed.

Perhaps I’m being unfair. Grief affects people differently, and guilt can make even innocent people behave strangely.

But I can’t ignore the facts.

“Then help me understand what happened to her.”

Ken lowers his head.

For a moment, neither of us speaks.

Finally, he says, “You should ask Aiku.”

I look up.

“Aiku?”

“They were close.”

“How close?”

He gives a bitter laugh.

“Closer than you think.”

I wait for him to explain, but he only shakes his head.

“Ask him yourself.”

I leave with more questions than answers.

Aiku.

His name has appeared in this investigation too many times to ignore.

According to several people, he and Hina spent a considerable amount of time together at work. He often offered to take her home, brought her lunch, and stayed with her when she appeared upset.

None of those things is suspicious on its own.

Friends help each other.

Coworkers become close.

People develop feelings without necessarily acting on them.

But Ken’s reaction makes me wonder whether there was more to their relationship than anyone has admitted.

I return to the station and request the available records of Hina’s communications before her death.

The process takes time.

While I wait, I question several of her coworkers.

Most describe Hina as quiet in the months before her death. She had always been cheerful, but something had changed after she lost her child.

Some say she seemed exhausted.

Others remember her staring into space during lunch breaks, as though her thoughts were somewhere far away.

One coworker mentions that Aiku often stayed beside her.

“He was worried about her,” she says.

“Worried how?”

“She wasn’t herself anymore. Sometimes she’d come to work looking as though she hadn’t slept. Aiku would ask if she was okay.”

“Did she tell him anything?”

The woman thinks for a moment.

“Not in front of us. They talked privately sometimes.”

“Did they argue?”

“Not that I saw.”

“Did Hina ever seem afraid of him?”

She looks surprised.

“No. Why would she be?”

I make a note of her answer.

There is nothing particularly incriminating about their relationship.

Yet I can’t stop thinking about Ken’s words.

Closer than you think.

By late afternoon, I finally receive the available records.

I sit down and begin reviewing them.

Most of the conversations are ordinary. Messages about work, schedules, and small things that don’t appear relevant to the investigation.

Then I notice a conversation between Hina and Aiku from several days before her death.

The messages are short.

Hina asks whether he can meet her after work.

Aiku agrees.

She thanks him.

He tells her not to worry.

I read the exchange again.

There’s nothing openly suspicious about it, but the conversation ends abruptly. Aiku sends another message later that evening, asking whether she has arrived home safely.

Hina doesn’t reply.

I scroll through the remaining records.

There are several more conversations like it.

Nothing that proves wrongdoing.

Nothing that explains her death.

But the frequency of their contact confirms that they were close.

I set the papers down and stare at the wall.

Could Aiku have been the last person to see her alive?

I don’t know.

The footage doesn’t show his face, and I have no evidence placing him at the scene.

I need to be careful.

An investigation isn’t a place for assumptions, no matter how strongly they tempt me.

I close the file and stand to stretch my legs.

That’s when I notice something on my desk.

A small piece of paper.

I don’t remember putting it there.

I pick it up.

There are only four words written on it.

Don’t trust the smile.

I stare at the handwriting.

It’s mine.

I recognize the way the letters lean slightly to the right, especially the final word.

But I don’t remember writing it.

I turn the paper over.

Nothing.

Perhaps I wrote it while reviewing the evidence and forgot.

I’ve been sleeping poorly, and the case has consumed most of my attention. It’s possible that I scribbled a reminder without thinking much about it.

Still, something about those words makes my stomach tighten.

Don’t trust the smile.

Whose smile?

Ken’s?

Aiku’s?

The stranger in the footage?

I crumple the paper, then stop before throwing it away.

After a moment, I smooth it out again and place it inside the case file.

I don’t know why.

I simply feel that I shouldn’t discard it.

When I leave the station that evening, the sky is already dark.

Rain begins falling before I reach my car.

I stand beneath the entrance for a moment, watching the water gather along the road.

The smell of wet earth brings back memories of the village.

The bridge.

The trees.

Hina laughing as she ran ahead of me.

I close my eyes.

For an instant, I hear footsteps behind me.

Slow.

Measured.

I turn around.

Nobody is there.

Only the empty corridor and the rain beyond the entrance.

I let out a quiet breath and rub my face.

I’m exhausted.

That’s all.

I get into the car and drive home.

When I arrive, Yoma is sitting in the living room with our children. She looks up and smiles when I enter.

“You’re late.”

“Sorry. The case is taking longer than expected.”

She studies me.

“You look tired.”

“I am.”

She gets up and walks over to me, gently touching my arm.

“Are you eating properly?”

I give her a small smile.

“Of course.”

It’s a lie, but I don’t want her worrying about me.

She seems unconvinced.

“You know you can tell me if something is bothering you, right?”

I look at her.

For a moment, I consider telling her about the note.

About the strange figure near the forest.

About the feeling that something is wrong, something I can’t quite explain.

But I don’t.

Instead, I pull her into a brief embrace.

“I know.”

She rests her hand against my back.

“Just don’t forget to take care of yourself, okay?”

“I won’t.”

The words leave my mouth automatically.

I wonder how many promises people make without knowing whether they can keep them.

Later that night, after the children have gone to bed, I return to the guest room and open the case file again.

The note is still there.

Don’t trust the smile.

I read it several times.

Then I place it beside Hina’s photograph.

For a moment, the two seem strangely connected.

Her smile.

The warning.

I stare at the photograph until my eyes begin to hurt.

Then I close the file.

I need sleep.

Tomorrow, I’ll speak to Aiku again.

I’ll find out what he knows.

I’ll find out why Ken was so eager to send me in his direction.

And I’ll find out who took Hina away that night.

Because somewhere in this village, someone knows what happened.

Someone knows why she died.

And whoever that person is, I intend to find them.

The next morning, I return to the station with a clear intention.

Today, I’m going to speak to Aiku again.

I need to understand his relationship with Hina, and I need to know why Ken seemed so eager to point me toward him.

Before leaving, I check the case file one more time.

The photograph.

The witness statements.

The footage.

The note.

Don’t trust the smile.

I stare at those words for a few seconds before putting the paper away.

I don’t know why I wrote them.

I don’t even remember when I did.

But I can’t shake the feeling that they mean something.

When I arrive at Aiku’s workplace, the receptionist informs me that he’s out. She says he left earlier that morning and hasn’t returned.

I ask whether she knows where he went.

She hesitates before answering.

“He said he had something to take care of.”

“Did he say where?”

“No, officer. I’m sorry.”

I thank her and leave.

Outside, I stand beside my car, considering my next move.

I could wait for him to return.

I could call him.

Or I could visit his house.

I decide to try calling first.

The phone rings several times.

No answer.

I try again.

Still nothing.

I lower the phone and stare at the screen.

Aiku has every right to be busy. Not answering a call doesn’t make him guilty of anything.

Still, I don’t like the timing.

I put the phone away and return to the station.

By midday, I’ve received an update from the forensic team.

Some of the evidence collected from the scene has been examined, but nothing has yet provided a definitive identification of the attacker. The results are inconclusive, and further investigation is necessary.

I read the report twice.

Nothing.

Again, nothing.

I press my fingers against my forehead.

For a case involving so many suspicious details, there is remarkably little that I can prove.

I need something concrete.

A witness who saw the attacker clearly.

A piece of evidence that connects a suspect to the scene.

A mistake that the person responsible failed to conceal.

Anything that can move this investigation forward.

I return to my desk and spread the photographs across it.

Hina’s last known location.

The dark road.

The vehicle leaving the area.

The place where her body was eventually found.

I examine each photograph carefully.

Then I notice something in the background of one of them.

A sign.

It’s partially obscured, but I recognize the shape and lettering.

I lean closer.

The sign belongs to a small shop near the road where Hina disappeared.

I remember passing it when I was younger. The shop has been there for years, even though its paint has faded and the sign is barely legible.

If the shop was open that night, perhaps someone there saw something.

I check the case notes.

No detailed interview with the shopkeeper is recorded.

I immediately reach for my phone.

This time, I have somewhere to start.

The shop is still there when I arrive.

It’s smaller than I remember, squeezed between an old house and a narrow road leading toward the forest. The faded sign swings slightly in the wind, and the windows are covered with a thin layer of dust.

I park the car and step inside.

A small bell rings above the door.

An elderly woman looks up from behind the counter.

“Welcome. What do you need?”

I introduce myself and show her my identification.

“I’m investigating Hina’s murder. She disappeared near this area on the night she died. I’d like to ask you a few questions.”

Her expression changes.

“Hina?”

“You knew her?”

“Of course. Everyone around here knew that girl.”

She looks down at the counter and rubs her hands together.

“Such a terrible thing. She was so young.”

I ask whether she remembers seeing Hina that night.

The woman thinks for a while before shaking her head.

“I don’t remember seeing her directly. It was raining very heavily, and I closed the shop earlier than usual.”

“Did you notice anyone suspicious?”

She hesitates.

I wait.

“There was a car,” she finally says. “A dark one. I remember hearing it pass, but I didn’t see who was inside.”

“Do you remember what time?”

“Not exactly. It must have been late.”

“Did you hear anything unusual?”

The woman glances toward the window.

“Some shouting, perhaps. I thought it was people arguing. But with the rain, it was difficult to tell.”

My pen moves across the page.

“Could you hear what they were saying?”

She shakes her head.

“No. I couldn’t make out the words.”

I ask whether she has any security cameras.

She points toward a small camera mounted near the entrance.

“It’s old. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn’t.”

I look up at it.

“Would you mind letting me check the recordings?”

She agrees.

The footage is grainy and difficult to see. Most of the screen is occupied by the road, with rain streaking across the image whenever a vehicle passes.

We watch it together.

Cars.

Motorcycles.

People hurrying beneath umbrellas.

Nothing particularly unusual.

Then, shortly before the shop closes, a dark vehicle appears on the road.

I lean forward.

The car slows briefly before continuing.

The license plate is unreadable.

“Is that the one?” I ask.

The woman squints at the screen.

“I think so. It looks similar.”

I rewind the footage and watch again.

The vehicle passes the shop, disappears beyond the edge of the frame, and never returns.

It’s not enough to identify the driver.

Still, it’s another detail worth investigating.

I thank the woman and leave with a copy of the relevant footage.

Outside, the sky has turned grey.

The air feels heavy, and the first drops of rain begin falling before I reach the car.

I pause beside the driver’s door.

For a moment, I have the strangest feeling that someone is watching me.

I turn toward the houses across the road.

An old man stands beneath the eaves of a building, looking in my direction.

When our eyes meet, he turns away.

I stare at him for a few seconds.

Then someone passes between us.

When the road becomes visible again, the old man is gone.

I sigh and get into the car.

This case is beginning to affect my sleep, my concentration, and perhaps my judgment.

I need to remain calm.

I need to focus on what I can prove.

Nothing else matters.

Back at the station, I review the footage with the other officers. We compare the vehicle with the available descriptions from witnesses and check whether the timing matches the known movements of the suspects.

Unfortunately, the recording provides no clear identification.

The vehicle could belong to any number of people in the village.

Still, I ask the team to look into it.

Then I turn my attention back to Aiku.

This time, he answers my call.

“Hello, officer.”

“Where are you?”

There is a brief silence.

“At home. Why?”

“I’d like to speak with you again.”

“About Hina?”

“Yes.”

He exhales quietly.

“All right. When?”

“Now, if possible.”

Another pause.

“Fine.”

I drive to his house.

When he opens the door, he looks as composed as he did during our first interview. He invites me inside and offers me a drink.

I decline.

“Did you leave town this morning?” I ask.

He looks at me.

“Yes.”

“Where did you go?”

“To see someone.”

“Who?”

He smiles faintly.

“Does that have anything to do with Hina?”

“That depends on your answer.”

For a moment, neither of us speaks.

Then he gives a small laugh.

“You’re very suspicious of everyone, aren’t you?”

“I’m investigating a murder.”

“Of course.”

His tone is polite, but something about it irritates me.

I take out my notebook.

“Did you meet Hina on the night she disappeared?”

“No.”

“Did you speak to her?”

“Not that night.”

“You’re certain?”

He looks directly at me.

“Yes.”

I study his face, waiting for some indication that he’s lying.

Nothing obvious appears.

He seems calm.

Too calm, perhaps, although I remind myself that appearances alone prove nothing.

I ask about his relationship with Hina.

He leans back in his chair.

“We were friends.”

“Only friends?”

His expression changes slightly.

“Why are you asking me that?”

“Because several people have told me you were close.”

“We worked together. Of course we were close.”

“Ken disagrees.”

At the mention of Ken’s name, Aiku’s smile disappears.

“Ken has no right to say anything about her.”

“Why?”

“Because he treated her terribly.”

His voice is sharper now.

I watch him carefully.

“Did you ever tell Hina to leave him?”

Aiku looks away.

“Yes.”

“Why?”

“Because she deserved better.”

“Did she agree with you?”

He doesn’t answer immediately.

Then he shakes his head.

“She said it wasn’t that simple.”

I write down his response.

“Did you ever argue with her?”

“Of course we argued. Everyone argues sometimes.”

“What about?”

He rubs his forehead.

“Her marriage. Her husband. The way she kept forgiving him.”

He looks toward the window.

“I told her she didn’t have to keep putting up with it.”

“And what did she say?”

Aiku is silent for a moment.

“She said she still hoped things would get better.”

Something in his expression shifts as he speaks.

For the first time, he no longer looks like the confident man who welcomed me into his house.

He looks tired.

Perhaps even hurt.

I can’t tell whether the expression is genuine.

“Did you love her?” I ask.

His eyes return to mine.

“Would that make me a murderer?”

“No. But it might give you a reason to lie.”

He stares at me for several seconds.

Then he laughs quietly, without any amusement.

“You police officers really do have a way with words.”

I wait.

Finally, he answers.

“Yes. I loved her.”

The room seems to grow quieter.

“But she didn’t love me that way,” he continues. “I knew that. I accepted it.”

I study his face.

“Did you?”

He looks at me sharply.

“What is that supposed to mean?”

“It means I need to understand your relationship with her.”

Aiku stands and walks toward the window.

For a while, he says nothing.

Then he speaks without turning around.

“Hina was the kind of person who made you feel as though you mattered. Even when she was miserable, she’d ask whether you were okay. She’d remember small things you’d told her months earlier. She’d listen when everyone else had stopped caring.”

He pauses.

“People like that are rare.”

I remain silent.

“And when someone like her gets hurt, you want to help. You want to make things better. Sometimes you start thinking that if you were the person beside her, everything would be different.”

He turns to face me.

“But wanting something doesn’t mean you’re entitled to it.”

His words surprise me.

For a moment, I see something honest in his expression.

Or perhaps I simply want to believe him.

I close my notebook.

“Did you see her during the week before her death?”

“Yes.”

“Where?”

“At work.”

“Anywhere else?”

“No.”

“Did she tell you she was afraid of someone?”

Aiku’s face becomes still.

It’s a small change, but I notice it.

“What makes you ask that?”

“Did she?”

He looks away.

“I don’t know.”

“You don’t know, or you don’t want to tell me?”

His jaw tightens.

“She was going through a difficult time. Sometimes she seemed frightened, but she never told me why.”

“Frightened of whom?”

“I don’t know.”

He says it again.

This time, his voice is quieter.

I study him, trying to decide whether he is hiding something.

Before I can ask another question, he speaks.

“Officer, there’s something you should understand about Hina.”

I wait.

“She was kinder to people than they deserved.”

He looks down at his hands.

“Sometimes, I think that was what made her vulnerable.”

I don’t respond.

Because for a moment, I remember the little girl who stood up for me when nobody else would.

The girl who smiled at strangers.

The girl who believed people were better than they really were.

I remember the promise I made to protect her.

And I wonder how many other people made promises they never intended to keep.

When I leave Aiku’s house, I have no confession, no clear motive, and no evidence that he was involved in Hina’s death.

But I do have something new.

Aiku admits he loved her.

He admits he wanted her to leave Ken.

And he admits that she sometimes seemed frightened before she died.

I write these details down in my notebook.

Then I look at the road ahead.

Rain begins falling again.

For some reason, I can’t stop thinking about the figure I saw near the forest.

The white dress.

The dark trees.

The way the shape disappeared so quickly that I couldn’t be certain it had been there at all.

I tighten my grip on the steering wheel.

I need to stop thinking about it.

There are people to question.

Evidence to examine.

A murder to solve.

And somewhere, hidden among the lies and half-truths, is the answer.

I just have to find it.

Even if I have to tear apart every memory I have of this village to do so.

Two men.

Two possible killers.

And one dead woman who could no longer tell me what had happened.

I stared at their names until the letters began to blur. The rain tapped against the window, soft and steady, reminding me of that terrible night. I rubbed my eyes and returned to the evidence, trying to separate what I knew from what I merely suspected.

Ken had hit Hina. He had left her alone on the roadside. He had a reason to hate whoever she had been meeting, and perhaps he had discovered something about her relationship with Aiku.

But Aiku had lied about something, too.

I could feel it.

I just didn’t know what.

I leaned back and closed my eyes for a moment. The room smelled faintly of old paper and cigarette smoke. Somewhere outside, a vehicle passed through the wet road, its tires hissing against the pavement.

Then I remembered Hina’s face in my dream.

Please… make him stop.

Who was she talking about?

Ken?

Aiku?

Or someone else entirely?

I opened my eyes and wrote the question down.

WHO WAS HINA AFRAID OF?

The words looked strangely familiar, as though I had written them before.

I checked the pages beneath my notebook. Nothing.

I checked the case file.

Nothing.

Perhaps I was simply exhausted.

I rubbed my forehead and returned to the photographs. The abandoned storage building appeared in several of them, its windows dark and its walls weathered by years of rain. Hina had been found there, alone, after someone had taken her away from the life she knew.

I wondered what her final thoughts had been.

Had she called for help?

Had she believed someone would come?

Had she thought of me?

The last question made me uncomfortable. I pushed the photograph aside and forced myself to focus on the evidence.

There was still work to do.

I would not solve anything by sitting in a dark room and talking to myself.

“I’m investigating Hina’s death,” I replied.

Ken let out a short laugh.

“You think you’re investigating?”

His voice sounded strange. There was no anger in it, not the kind I expected from a man who had once been known for his temper. Instead, he looked at me with an expression that made the back of my neck feel cold.

“You’ve been asking too many questions,” he repeated. “You keep digging into things that should have been left alone.”

“She was murdered, Ken. What do you expect me to do? Forget about her?”

He stared at me.

For a moment, neither of us spoke. Rainwater trickled from the edge of the awning above us, falling between our shoes and splashing against the pavement.

Then he looked away.

“You always were like this,” he muttered.

“Like what?”

“Like she was your responsibility.”

I frowned.

“She was my friend.”

“Your friend.” He repeated the words as though they tasted bitter. “Of course.”

Something about his expression bothered me. I had expected him to become defensive when I questioned him about Hina. I had expected excuses, perhaps even another argument. But this quiet contempt was different.

“What are you trying to say?” I asked.

Ken looked back at me.

“Ask yourself why you care so much.”

My jaw tightened.

“Because she was killed.”

“That’s what you tell yourself.”

Before I could respond, he stepped away. I caught his arm, but he pulled free immediately.

“Ken. We’re not finished.”

“We were never finished,” he said.

Then he walked into the rain.

I stood beneath the awning, watching his figure disappear down the road. I wanted to follow him, to demand that he explain what he meant, but something stopped me.

Perhaps it was the way he had looked at me.

For one brief moment, I had felt as though he knew something I didn’t.

Or something I had forgotten.

I shook my head.

Ridiculous.

Ken was a suspect. Nothing more. His words were meant to unsettle me, and I would not allow him to distract me from the investigation.

I returned to the station and opened the case file again.

Hina’s photograph lay on top.

I stared at her smile.

Then I noticed something written in the margin of one of my notes.

He knows what happened at the bridge.

I read it twice.

The handwriting was mine.

I was certain of that.

But I had no memory of writing those words.

I searched through the pages beneath it, looking for any earlier reference to the bridge. There was nothing. No witness statement, no recorded conversation, no reason for me to have written such a specific sentence.

I checked the date on the page.

It had been written the previous night.

I sat still for a long time.

Then I took out my pen and circled the sentence.

If Ken knew something about the bridge, I needed to find out what it was.

But first, I had to understand why I had written it down.

And why, when I read those words again, I could almost hear Hina laughing beside the old wooden railing.

The sound was faint.

Familiar.

And gone before I could be sure I had heard it at all.

I decided to leave the station before the thought could consume the rest of my evening.

The rain had grown heavier. It fell across the village in silver threads, blurring the streetlights and turning the narrow roads into dark mirrors. I drove without turning on the radio, listening to the rhythmic sweep of the windshield wipers.

The bridge.

I hadn’t thought about it in years, not properly. It was an old wooden bridge near the edge of the village, where the river narrowed between the trees. Hina and I used to spend hours there when we were children. We would sit with our legs dangling over the side, talking about things we barely understood and making promises we were too young to keep.

I remembered one of them particularly well.

If either of us ever got lost, the other would come looking.

It had sounded so simple back then.

I parked near the path and stepped out into the rain. The air smelled of wet earth and leaves. Beyond the trees, the river moved beneath the darkness, its surface broken by the falling rain.

The bridge looked smaller than I remembered.

Some of its wooden boards had been replaced. The railing was weathered, and patches of moss had spread across the posts. I walked slowly, listening to the wood creak beneath my shoes.

I stopped near the middle.

For a moment, I could almost see us there again.

Hina sitting beside me, swinging her legs and turning toward me whenever she had something ridiculous to say. Her hair blowing across her face. Her laughter carrying over the river.

Then I remembered the note.

He knows what happened at the bridge.

I looked around.

There was nobody on the path. No footsteps behind me, no movement among the trees. Only the rain and the river, continuing as they had long before either of us had been born.

I checked my phone. No new messages.

Perhaps Ken had mentioned the bridge years ago. Perhaps I had heard something during the investigation and forgotten it. There were dozens of ordinary explanations, and I preferred any of them to the alternative.

Still, I couldn’t shake the feeling that I had come here for a reason.

I walked toward the far end of the bridge.

That was when I noticed something caught between two wooden boards near the railing.

A small, pale object.

I crouched and carefully pulled it free.

It was a pearl.

I stared at it in my palm.

For several seconds, I couldn’t move.

Hina had worn pearl earrings on the day she died. One had been recovered from Aiku’s car. The other had never been found, at least according to the report I had read.

I turned the pearl between my fingers, examining it beneath the dim light.

It could have belonged to anyone. The bridge was old, and people still visited it occasionally. There was no reason to assume it was Hina’s.

Yet my hands had begun to tremble.

I took out my phone and photographed the object where I had found it before wrapping it carefully in a clean tissue.

Then I stood up and looked across the river.

For one fleeting instant, I thought I saw someone on the opposite bank.

A woman in a pale dress.

Her head was turned toward me.

I blinked.

The figure was gone.

I remained there long after the rain had soaked through my coat, staring at the empty bank and telling myself that shadows could resemble people when the light was poor.

Finally, I returned to my car.

Before starting the engine, I looked at the pearl again.

There was something I needed to check at the station.

If the missing earring belonged to Hina, it might be the first real lead I had found in days.

And if it didn’t…

I wasn’t sure why I felt so afraid of that possibility.

I returned to the station shortly before midnight.

The building was almost empty. A few officers remained in the main office, their voices low as they finished their reports. I greeted them briefly and went straight to my desk, keeping the small pearl carefully wrapped inside my coat pocket.

I needed to compare it with the evidence photographs and confirm whether it could have come from Hina’s missing earring.

That was all.

I wasn’t going to let a coincidence turn into another obsession.

I placed the pearl beside the photograph of the earring recovered from Aiku’s car. The pictures were grainy, but the shape appeared similar. I couldn’t establish anything from the photographs alone, so I sealed the object in an evidence bag and wrote down where I had found it.

The old bridge.

I paused over the words.

If the pearl did belong to Hina, how had it ended up there?

Had she visited the bridge on the day she died? Had she dropped it weeks or even months earlier? Or had somebody placed it there after the investigation began?

There were too many possibilities, and none of them gave me a clear answer.

I reached for the telephone to contact the forensic team, then stopped when I noticed the time.

It was late. I could submit the evidence properly in the morning.

I put the bag inside the locked drawer and began gathering my papers.

That was when I heard a quiet knock.

I looked up.

An officer stood at the entrance to my office, holding a thin folder.

“Sorry to bother you, sir. This was left at the front desk. The person who delivered it didn’t leave a name.”

I frowned.

“Who brought it?”

“He was already gone when we checked.”

I took the folder from him.

There was no address on the front. No stamp, no official marking. Only my name, written neatly in black ink.

I thanked the officer and waited until he had left before opening it.

Inside was a single photograph.

Hina stood beside Aiku beneath the trees near the river. They were close enough that their shoulders almost touched. Aiku was looking at her, while Hina appeared to be saying something that had made her smile.

They looked comfortable together.

Not like strangers.

Not even like two people who had only recently become friends.

I turned the photograph over.

A short sentence had been written on the back.

You don’t know her as well as you think you do.

I read it once.

Then again.

My fingers tightened around the edges of the photograph.

Whoever had sent it knew about the investigation. They knew I was looking into Aiku, and they wanted me to question what I believed I knew about Hina.

Perhaps it was a warning.

Perhaps it was a threat.

Or perhaps someone was trying to lead me toward a conclusion that wasn’t true.

I examined the photograph carefully. There was no date, no location, nothing that could tell me when it had been taken. I couldn’t even be certain it had been taken recently.

Yet I couldn’t stop looking at their faces.

Aiku seemed to be listening to Hina with an attention I hadn’t seen in the photographs from his interviews. And Hina, who had always been friendly with almost everyone, looked different here.

Relaxed.

Trusting.

I wondered what they had been talking about.

Then another question came to mind.

Why had she never told me about it?

I placed the photograph beside the case file and stared at it until the room seemed to grow quieter around me.

Outside, the rain continued to fall.

And somewhere in the back of my mind, a memory stirred, faint and incomplete, like a voice coming from the other side of a closed door.

I could almost remember Hina telling me something.

Something important.

But whenever I tried to grasp the words, they slipped away.

I shut the folder.

Tomorrow, I would find out who had delivered it.

And I would ask Aiku’s remaining contacts what they knew about the relationship between him and Hina.

There was still a great deal I didn’t understand.

For now, I had to accept that the girl I had known since kindergarten might have kept parts of her life from me.

The thought should have been ordinary.

People changed. They made new friends. They kept secrets.

But as I looked at the photograph one last time, I found myself wondering whether the secret had been meant to protect Hina from someone.

Or protect someone from the truth about her.

The next morning, I arrived at the station earlier than usual.

I had barely slept. Every time I closed my eyes, I saw the photograph of Hina and Aiku. Their faces kept returning to me, along with that sentence written on the back.

You don’t know her as well as you think you do.

I hated how easily those words had gotten under my skin.

I had known Hina for most of my life. I knew her habits, her favorite places, the way she laughed when something genuinely amused her. I remembered the little things about her that other people might have forgotten.

But knowing someone since childhood didn’t mean knowing everything about them.

I understood that.

At least, I thought I did.

I placed the photograph inside a clear sleeve and brought it to the officer who had been assisting with the case.

“Do you recognize either of these people?”

He examined it for a moment.

“That’s Aiku, isn’t it?”

“Yes. Do you know where the picture was taken?”

He shook his head. “No, sir. But they seem close.”

I took the photograph back.

“That’s what I’m trying to find out.”

I asked him to check whether the photograph had come with any identifying information, but there was nothing. No envelope, no return address, and no useful fingerprints that we could immediately connect to anyone.

Whoever had delivered it had left me with more questions than answers.

I returned to my office and called Aiku’s number.

It rang several times before going to voicemail.

I tried again.

Nothing.

I sat back in my chair, staring at his name on the screen. Aiku had already given his statement, and I had questioned him more than once. He had insisted that Hina had come to him because she needed someone to listen. He had said their conversations were private, but that there had been nothing wrong about them.

At the time, I hadn’t believed him.

Now, I wasn’t sure whether my suspicions came from the evidence or from something far less reasonable.

Jealousy, perhaps.

The word came to me so suddenly that I almost laughed.

Jealousy?

Of Aiku?

Why would I be jealous?

Hina was my childhood friend. I had my own family, my own responsibilities. Whatever relationship she had with Aiku was none of my business unless it had something to do with her death.

That was the truth.

It had to be.

I stood and walked to the window. The sky was dark with rain clouds, and the streets below were slick with water. People hurried past with umbrellas, their faces hidden from one another.

For a moment, I thought I saw a woman standing across the road.

She wore a pale dress.

Her hair fell over her shoulders, and her head was tilted slightly, as though she were watching the station.

My breath caught.

Hina?

A vehicle passed between us.

When it was gone, the woman was no longer there.

I remained at the window for several seconds, searching the pavement. There were only strangers, wet roads, and the dull reflection of the buildings in the rain.

I rubbed my eyes.

I needed sleep. That was all.

My phone vibrated on the desk.

A message from an unknown number.

Stop looking into Aiku.

I read it twice, then checked the number. There was no name attached to it.

Before I could reply, another message appeared.

You won’t like what you find.

I stared at the screen.

My first instinct was to call the number, but I stopped myself. If the sender wanted to frighten me, responding immediately would only encourage them. I saved the messages and requested that the number be checked.

Then I opened the case file again.

Aiku’s name sat among the others, surrounded by notes, statements, and unanswered questions. The photograph lay beside it, showing him standing close to Hina beneath the trees.

I looked at her face.

She was smiling.

For some reason, I couldn’t shake the feeling that I had seen that exact expression somewhere else, in a place I couldn’t remember.

I closed the file.

There was work to do, and I couldn’t afford to let anonymous messages or strange glimpses distract me from it.

Still, as I reached for my coat, I found myself checking the locked drawer where I had placed the pearl.

I don’t know why I did it.

Perhaps I wanted reassurance that it was still there.

Perhaps I was afraid it wouldn’t be.

The drawer opened with a quiet click. The evidence bag rested exactly where I had left it.

The pearl was still inside.

I shut the drawer and locked it again.

Then I returned to the photograph of Hina and Aiku, slipped it into my pocket, and headed out into the rain.

I needed answers from Aiku.

And this time, I wasn’t going to let him avoid my questions.

I found Aiku near the edge of the village, standing beneath the narrow roof of a closed shop.

He looked different from the last time I had seen him. His shirt was wrinkled, his hair damp from the rain, and dark circles rested beneath his eyes. When he noticed me approaching, he straightened immediately.

“Officer.”

“Aiku.”

His gaze moved to the photograph in my hand.

For a brief moment, his expression changed.

It was subtle, almost unnoticeable, but I saw it. His eyes widened slightly before he looked away.

“You recognize this?” I asked.

He didn’t answer immediately.

“Where did you get that?”

“Someone left it at the station.”

“Who?”

“That’s what I’d like to know.”

I watched him carefully. He looked at the photograph again, and something about his silence made me uneasy.

“Where was it taken?” I asked.

“Near the river, I think.”

“You think?”

“It was a while ago.”

“How long ago?”

Aiku rubbed his forehead. “I don’t remember the exact date.”

I waited.

He looked toward the road, where rainwater streamed along the edges of the pavement.

“Hina wanted to talk to me that day,” he finally said. “She’d been having a difficult time. We went somewhere quiet because she didn’t want people listening to our conversation.”

“What did she tell you?”

“That’s private.”

“She’s dead, Aiku.”

His jaw tightened.

“I know that.”

“Then you understand why I’m asking.”

He looked at me again. For a moment, I thought he might finally tell me something useful. Instead, he exhaled and shook his head.

“She was unhappy with Ken. Anyone who knew them could see that. But she didn’t want people talking about her marriage, so she asked me to keep it to myself.”

“And you agreed?”

“Yes.”

“Why?”

“Because she trusted me.”

The answer came too quickly, too naturally.

I glanced down at the photograph.

“Did she tell you she was afraid of someone?”

Aiku’s expression changed again.

This time, he didn’t hide it quickly enough.

“Why are you asking me that?”

“Just answer the question.”

He looked down at his hands.

“She was frightened sometimes,” he admitted. “But I don’t know whether it was because of Ken, or because of everything else happening in her life.”

“What else?”

“She’d say strange things. She’d ask whether I’d ever felt like someone was watching me, even when I was alone. Sometimes she’d stop talking in the middle of a sentence and look behind her.”

A cold feeling settled in my stomach.

“Did you ever see anyone following her?”

“No.”

“Did she mention a name?”

Aiku hesitated.

Then he shook his head.

“No.”

I studied him, trying to decide whether he was lying. His answers sounded reasonable, but there was something incomplete about them, as though he were carefully choosing which pieces of the truth I was allowed to hear.

“Did you argue with her?”

“Never like that.”

“Like what?”

“Like someone who wanted to hurt her.”

I said nothing.

Aiku swallowed.

“Look, I know what you think of me. You think I was involved with her behind Ken’s back. You think I had some reason to get rid of her.”

“Did you?”

“No.”

His voice was firm.

“I cared about Hina. That’s all.”

I had heard him say something similar before. Yet hearing it again only made the situation more complicated.

Because I couldn’t tell whether he was protecting Hina’s memory, protecting himself, or protecting someone else.

“Did she give you anything?” I asked. “A letter? A photograph? Anything she wanted you to keep?”

He frowned.

“No. Why?”

“I’m asking questions.”

“Then ask yourself something, Officer.”

His voice had grown quieter.

“Why would someone send you that photograph now? Why would they want you to see us together?”

I had no answer.

Aiku stepped away from the wall and pulled his collar up against the rain.

“Maybe whoever sent it wants you to suspect me. Maybe they know you’ll believe the worst because you already decided what kind of man I am.”

He started walking away.

“Aiku.”

He stopped, but didn’t turn around.

“If you remember anything else, tell me.”

For several seconds, he remained still.

Then he said, “There’s something I should have told you before.”

I waited.

“When Hina and I met that day, she asked me a question.”

“What question?”

Aiku turned his head slightly. I could see only part of his face.

“She asked whether I thought a person could become someone else without realizing it.”

I stared at him.

“What did you tell her?”

“I told her people change all the time.”

“And what did she say?”

He looked directly at me then.

“She said, ‘Not everyone notices when they do.’”

The rain tapped against the shop’s metal roof.

I wanted to ask him what she had meant. I wanted to know why she had asked that question, what she had been afraid of, and whether it had anything to do with her death.

But Aiku had already started walking again.

This time, I let him go.

I stood beneath the roof, listening to the rain and turning Hina’s words over in my mind.

A person could become someone else without realizing it.

I couldn’t explain why the sentence bothered me so much.

It felt familiar.

Not because Hina had said it before, but because some part of me seemed to know what came next.

I closed my eyes, trying to reach for the memory.

Nothing.

When I opened them, the road was empty.

Only rain remained, falling over the place where Aiku had been standing.

And for the first time since returning to the village, I wondered whether finding Hina’s killer would force me to uncover something about myself that I had spent years forgetting.

I returned to the station with more questions than I had left with.

Hina’s words kept repeating in my head.

Not everyone notices when they do.

I couldn’t understand why Aiku had waited until now to tell me about their conversation. If it had seemed important enough to remember, why hadn’t he mentioned it during our earlier interviews?

Unless he had forgotten.

Or unless he had been hiding it.

I sat at my desk and opened my notebook, intending to write down everything he had said. The moment I picked up my pen, however, I noticed something strange.

There was already a sentence on the page.

She knew before you did.

I stared at it.

The handwriting looked like mine.

I turned the page, searching for a date or any explanation of what I might have been writing about. There was nothing. The sentence sat alone in the middle of the paper, surrounded by empty space.

I tried to remember writing it.

I couldn’t.

Perhaps I had written it during one of the previous nights and simply forgotten. The past few days had been exhausting, and I had barely slept properly. It was an ordinary explanation.

A reasonable one.

I wrote the date beneath the sentence and added a note to review it later. Then I closed the notebook and returned to the case.

I had work to do.

The forensic team still hadn’t completed its analysis of the evidence collected from Hina’s body. The unidentified figure in the street-camera footage remained a mystery, and the dark vehicle had yet to be traced. Ken’s account of the night Hina disappeared also needed to be examined against the available witness statements.

There was enough to investigate without chasing every strange coincidence.

I started with Ken.

According to the report, he had argued with Hina on the night of her disappearance. Witnesses said he had struck her before leaving her alone in the rain. He claimed that he had driven away and hadn’t seen her again.

I read his statement several times.

His behavior had been cruel. His gambling problem and the trouble in his marriage gave him possible motives to hurt her. But none of that proved he had killed her.

I needed evidence, not assumptions.

I picked up the telephone and asked the local officers to arrange another interview with him.

While I waited, I opened the drawer beside my desk.

The evidence bag containing the pearl was still there.

I took it out and held it beneath the desk lamp. The small object caught the light, pale and smooth against the plastic.

For a moment, I imagined Hina wearing it.

I remembered how she used to tuck her hair behind her ear when she was nervous. I remembered her turning back after saying goodbye, smiling at me as though she had forgotten something important.

She had always done that twice.

Once when she left.

And once again after walking a few steps away.

I had never asked her why.

Now there were so many things I wanted to ask her that I would never get the chance.

I returned the pearl to the drawer.

Then I heard a phone ringing somewhere in the corridor.

It rang once.

Twice.

Three times.

I barely paid attention until the sound stopped abruptly.

A moment later, an officer appeared at my door.

“Sir, your wife called. She said you haven’t answered her messages.”

I glanced at my phone.

There were four missed calls from Yoma.

A strange feeling passed through me. I couldn’t remember when I had last spoken to her, although I was certain we had talked recently.

I called her back immediately.

She answered after the first ring.

“Finally,” she said. “I was starting to worry.”

“Sorry, love. I’ve been busy with the case.”

There was a pause.

“You said that yesterday.”

“I know.”

“And the day before.”

I rubbed my forehead.

“Yoma, I’m fine.”

“I didn’t say you weren’t.”

Her voice softened, but the concern remained.

“Have you been sleeping?”

“Enough.”

“Are you taking care of yourself?”

“Yes.”

Another pause.

Then she asked, very quietly, “Are you sure you’re remembering everything properly?”

My hand stopped moving.

“What do you mean?”

“I mean you’ve sounded tired lately. You keep forgetting things, and when I ask you about them, you act as though I’m imagining it.”

I looked toward the closed drawer.

For a second, I couldn’t remember why I had opened it earlier.

Then the memory returned. The pearl. Hina’s earring. The case.

“It’s the investigation,” I told her. “I’m under a lot of pressure.”

“I know. But please don’t push yourself too far.”

Her words were ordinary, loving, and familiar.

Still, I found myself wondering why both Aiku and Yoma had spoken to me as though there were something I couldn’t see.

“I’ll be careful,” I promised.

“Good. Call me tonight, okay? The children want to speak to you.”

“I will.”

We said goodbye, and I placed the phone on the desk.

For a while, I remained still.

Then I opened my notebook again.

The sentence was exactly where I had left it.

She knew before you did.

I read it slowly, trying to understand who she was.

Hina?

Yoma?

Someone else?

My pen hovered above the paper.

I wanted to cross the sentence out, to dismiss it as meaningless scribbling. Instead, I turned to a fresh page and began writing down the names of everyone connected to Hina’s case.

Ken.

Aiku.

The unidentified figure.

The driver of the dark vehicle.

And, after a long hesitation, my own name.

I stared at the final entry.

It was ridiculous. I was the investigating officer, not a suspect. I had no reason to include myself among the people I was looking into.

Yet something about leaving my name off the list had felt wrong.

I closed the notebook.

Outside, the rain began again, tapping softly against the windows.

I told myself I was tired.

I told myself the case was getting to me.

And I told myself that when I found Hina’s killer, every strange question would finally have an answer.

I believed it then.

I wanted to believe it.

But somewhere beneath those reassuring thoughts, a quieter question waited.

One I wasn’t ready to ask.

What if the person I was searching for had been beside me all along?

Ken arrived at the station just after noon.

He wore a dark shirt and carried an umbrella, which he left dripping beside the entrance. His expression was composed, but there was a tightness around his mouth that hadn’t been there during our previous interview.

He sat opposite me without waiting to be invited.

“You wanted to see me again?”

“Yes.”

I placed the photograph of Hina and Aiku on the desk.

Ken glanced at it.

For a moment, his face was unreadable. Then he gave a short, humorless laugh.

“So you found out about them.”

“About what?”

He looked at me as though the answer should have been obvious.

“Hina and Aiku.”

“You knew they were meeting?”

“Of course I knew.”

“Did you know they were close?”

His fingers tightened around the edge of the chair.

“Closer than they should have been.”

I studied him carefully.

“Did you ever confront Hina about it?”

“Several times.”

“What happened?”

“What do you think happened?” he snapped. “We argued. She denied everything, and I got angry.”

“Did you hurt her?”

His gaze sharpened.

“You already know I hit her that night.”

“I want to hear it from you.”

Ken leaned back and stared at the ceiling for a moment.

“Yes,” he said eventually. “I hit her. I was angry, and I lost control. I’m not proud of it.”

“Then you took money from her and left her in the rain.”

His jaw moved as though he were grinding his teeth.

“Yes.”

“And you never saw her again?”

“No.”

“Not even after you heard she was missing?”

“I went looking for her.”

“Where?”

“Home. The roads around the village. A few places where she sometimes went when she wanted to be alone.”

“Did you go to the abandoned storage building?”

“No.”

His answer came quickly.

Too quickly, perhaps, but speed alone meant nothing. I wrote it down.

“Did you know Aiku had been seeing her?”

Ken looked at the photograph again.

“I knew enough.”

“What does that mean?”

“It means I knew he was involved in her life. I didn’t know everything they talked about, and I didn’t care to hear the details.”

“You must have wondered whether they were having an affair.”

His expression hardened.

“I wondered whether my wife was lying to me. That’s different.”

I watched him for a moment before asking the question that had been troubling me.

“Did you kill Hina?”

The room fell silent.

Ken looked directly at me.

“No.”

There was anger in his voice, but also something else. Exhaustion, perhaps. Or resentment at having to answer the same question again.

“I treated her badly,” he continued. “I know that. I made mistakes, and I said things I shouldn’t have said. But I didn’t kill her.”

“Can you prove where you were after you left her?”

He looked down at the table.

“I don’t know. I drove around for a while.”

“Where?”

“I told you, I don’t remember every road I took.”

I wrote down his answer.

It was possible he was telling the truth.

It was also possible he was hiding something.

I had learned long ago that guilt and innocence did not always announce themselves in ways people expected. A man could look frightened because he had committed a crime, or because he was being accused of one. A man could appear calm because he had nothing to hide, or because he had spent a long time preparing what to say.

The difficulty was knowing which explanation applied.

“Did Hina ever tell you she was afraid of someone?” I asked.

Ken’s expression shifted.

“Yes.”

I stopped writing.

“Who?”

“I don’t know.”

“What did she say?”

He rubbed his palms together, looking uncomfortable.

“She said someone had been making her feel uneasy. She wouldn’t explain much. I thought she was talking about Aiku at first.”

“Why?”

“Because they were spending time together, and she kept refusing to tell me what they discussed.”

“Did she say Aiku was threatening her?”

“No. She said she wasn’t sure.”

“Wasn’t sure about what?”

Ken looked at me.

“Whether the person following her was real.”

For a moment, I forgot what I had been about to ask.

The room seemed unusually quiet.

“Explain that,” I said.

“She told me she sometimes felt watched. She’d turn around in the street and find nobody there. She’d hear footsteps behind her, but when she looked, the road would be empty.”

He paused.

“I thought she was exhausted. She’d been through a lot. I told her she should rest, but she got angry with me.”

“Did she mention a name?”

“No.”

“Did she tell you when this started?”

Ken shook his head.

“Not exactly.”

I wrote down his account, then looked up again.

“Why didn’t you mention this before?”

“Because I didn’t think it mattered.”

“You were her husband.”

“And I was a terrible one,” he said bitterly. “Is that what you want me to say?”

I didn’t answer.

He looked away.

“I know what I did to her. I don’t need you to remind me. But whatever happened to Hina, I didn’t do that.”

For the first time during the interview, I noticed that his hands were trembling.

He saw me looking and folded them beneath the table.

I couldn’t tell whether he was frightened by the memories or by the questions.

Perhaps both.

I ended the interview after recording his statement and asked him to remain available for further questioning.

As he stood, he glanced at the photograph one last time.

“You should ask Aiku what Hina was really afraid of,” he said.

“I already have.”

“Then ask him again.”

He picked up his umbrella and walked toward the door.

Before leaving, he turned back.

“And, Officer?”

“Yes?”

His expression was difficult to read.

“Sometimes the person who seems most certain about finding the truth is the one who refuses to recognize it.”

Then he left.

I remained at my desk, staring at the closed door.

I had come into the interview expecting to learn something about Ken’s movements on the night Hina disappeared. Instead, I had learned that Hina had been afraid of someone she couldn’t identify.

Or someone she hadn’t wanted to identify.

I opened my notebook and wrote down his exact words.

Whether the person following her was real.

Then I stopped.

My pen hovered over the page.

For one brief, unsettling moment, I remembered standing beneath the trees near the old bridge, listening to someone call my name.

A woman’s voice.

Soft.

Familiar.

I could almost hear the words.

But the memory vanished before I could understand it.

I stared at the notebook until the ink blurred slightly before my eyes.

Then I shut it, placed it inside the drawer, and locked it away.

I had a case to solve.

And I was beginning to fear that every answer would lead me somewhere I had no intention of going.

By the time I returned to my office, the rain had grown heavier.

I sat down and opened the case file again, searching for anything that might confirm Ken’s statement. If Hina had genuinely believed someone was following her, there should have been something. A complaint, a witness, perhaps even a conversation with Aiku that mentioned it.

But the file offered no clear answer.

I began with the statements collected from people who had known her. Most described Hina as cheerful and considerate, someone who rarely spoke badly of others. A few mentioned that she had become quieter in the months before her death, especially after losing her child.

Then there was Aiku.

He had described her as frightened.

Ken had described her as frightened.

And yet neither man could tell me whom she feared.

I leaned back and pressed my fingers against my forehead.

What had happened to her during those final months? Had someone threatened her? Had she noticed something that others had overlooked? Or had the pressure of her marriage and everything she had endured simply left her feeling unsafe?

I couldn’t assume any one explanation was correct.

I needed to find someone who had seen her shortly before she disappeared.

A name came to mind: the shopkeeper near the road where the street-camera footage had captured Hina walking alone. He had been questioned during the initial investigation, but his statement contained little more than a description of the weather and the people passing through the area.

I called the local station and asked whether he was still running the shop.

“He is, sir,” the officer replied. “Do you want someone to bring him in?”

“No. I’ll speak to him myself.”

I gathered the relevant photographs and left.

The rain had eased by the time I reached the shop, leaving the road covered in shallow puddles. The familiar smell of wet earth hung in the air. Somewhere nearby, a motorbike passed, its engine fading into the distance.

The shopkeeper recognized me immediately.

“Officer. You’re still looking into that case?”

“Yes. I need to ask you a few more questions about Hina.”

His expression grew serious.

“Of course.”

I showed him the photograph of Hina and Aiku.

“Have you seen these two together?”

He studied it carefully.

“I’ve seen the young man before,” he said. “He came through here sometimes.”

“With Hina?”

“Once or twice, perhaps. I can’t be certain.”

“Do you remember anything unusual about them?”

He took his time answering.

“They weren’t arguing, if that’s what you mean. They seemed to know each other well.”

I waited, allowing him to think.

“Was Hina ever alone here on the night she disappeared?”

The shopkeeper frowned.

“I remember seeing her that evening. It was raining quite heavily.”

“Was anyone with her?”

“No. She was walking by herself.”

“Did she look frightened?”

He rubbed his chin.

“She kept looking behind her.”

My attention sharpened.

“Are you certain?”

“Not completely. It’s been a while, Officer. But I remember thinking she seemed distracted. She nearly walked past the shop without noticing me.”

“Did she speak to you?”

The shopkeeper considered the question.

“She asked whether the road ahead was still flooded. I told her it was passable if she stayed near the side.”

“And then?”

“She thanked me and left.”

“Did you see anyone following her?”

“No.”

“Any vehicles?”

“There were cars passing through. I couldn’t tell you which ones.”

I showed him the still image of the dark figure from the street-camera footage.

He stared at it for a long moment.

Then he shook his head.

“I can’t identify that person.”

I lowered the photograph.

It wasn’t much, but it was consistent with what Ken had told me. Hina had been looking behind her, and someone might have been following her. The shopkeeper hadn’t seen anyone, but that didn’t prove nobody was there.

Before leaving, I thanked him and asked him to contact the police if he remembered anything else.

I had almost reached my car when he called after me.

“Officer?”

I turned.

“There is one thing I didn’t mention before.”

I walked back toward him.

“What is it?”

He glanced down the road, toward the stretch of pavement that disappeared around a bend.

“After Hina left, I heard another person speaking.”

“Where?”

“Somewhere along the road. I couldn’t see who it was.”

“What did the person say?”

The shopkeeper hesitated.

“I couldn’t hear the whole conversation. Just a few words.”

“Which words?”

He looked uncomfortable, as though he wasn’t sure whether the memory was worth mentioning.

Then he answered.

“Something like, ‘You came back.’”

I felt a strange chill move through me.

“Did you recognize the voice?”

“No, sir.”

“Was it a man’s voice or a woman’s?”

He thought for a moment.

“A man’s, I believe.”

I thanked him again and returned to my car.

For several minutes, I sat without starting the engine.

You came back.

The words could have meant almost anything. Someone greeting an acquaintance. Someone surprised to see a familiar face. A conversation unrelated to Hina altogether.

There was no reason to attach a meaning to them yet.

Still, I wrote them down.

Then I looked at the time and realized how long I had been away from the station.

I started the engine.

As I pulled onto the road, I caught sight of a figure standing beneath a tree on the opposite side.

A woman in a pale dress.

She was facing away from me, her long hair darkened by the rain.

I slowed.

The woman turned her head slightly.

I couldn’t see her face, but something about the movement felt familiar enough to make my hands tighten around the steering wheel.

A vehicle approached from behind, its headlights filling my mirrors. I pulled forward to let it pass.

When I looked back toward the tree, the woman was gone.

I sat motionless for a moment, listening to the engine.

Then I forced myself to continue driving.

I had seen no clear face. I had heard no voice. I had no evidence that anyone had been standing there at all.

I could not put a shadow in a case file and call it a clue.

But I could record the time, the location, and what I thought I had seen.

So I did.

And beneath the entry, without knowing why, I wrote four additional words.

Ask what happened before.

I stepped inside.

The air was cold and damp. The smell of wet wood and rust filled my nose, and my shoes scraped against the dusty floor. The building looked exactly as it had in the photographs from the original investigation.

Broken windows.

Rotting beams.

Old ropes that had been collected as evidence.

I switched on my flashlight and moved farther inside.

“Hina?”

My voice sounded unfamiliar in the darkness.

There was no answer.

I walked toward the room where her body had been found. The officers had already examined every corner, but I wanted to see the place again for myself. Perhaps there was something they had overlooked. A mark on the floor, a footprint beneath the dust, anything that might help explain what had happened to her.

The light moved across the walls.

Then stopped.

For a moment, I thought I saw a figure standing at the far end of the room.

A woman with long, dark hair.

She stood with her back toward me, her pale dress hanging loosely around her legs.

I lowered the flashlight.

“Hina?”

The figure didn’t move.

I took a step forward.

The floor creaked beneath my foot.

When I raised the light again, the figure was gone.

I stood still, listening.

Nothing.

I told myself that shadows could look like people in a place like this. The building was full of broken beams and uneven surfaces, and the flashlight distorted everything it touched.

I knew that.

I had investigated enough crime scenes to understand how easily the mind could turn uncertainty into something familiar.

Still, my hand had begun to tremble.

I continued searching the room.

Near one of the walls, I found a patch of disturbed dust. It might have been left by the investigators, or by someone who had entered the building after them. I photographed it and marked its location in my notes.

Then I noticed something else.

A faint line in the dust, leading toward the doorway.

I crouched to examine it.

It wasn’t clear enough to identify as a footprint. It could have been the mark of a shoe, a dragged object, or nothing significant at all.

I took another photograph.

As I stood, my flashlight slipped from my hand and struck the floor.

The sudden noise echoed through the building.

I bent to pick it up.

And saw my hands.

There was dirt beneath my fingernails.

I stared at them.

For several seconds, I couldn’t remember noticing it before.

I rubbed my fingers together, trying to dislodge the dirt. Some of it fell away, leaving dark streaks across my skin.

Where had it come from?

I looked down at the floor. Dust covered the ground, and I had been walking through it since I arrived. There was nothing unusual about getting dirty in an abandoned building.

Nothing at all.

Yet I couldn’t shake the feeling that the dirt had been there before I entered.

I checked my watch.

It was later than I expected.

I had told myself I would spend only a few minutes examining the room, but I couldn’t remember how much time had passed since I arrived.

I switched off the flashlight and walked outside.

The rain had softened to a drizzle.

I sat inside my car and locked the doors before taking out my notebook. I wrote down everything I had observed, including the patch of disturbed dust and the possible mark on the floor.

Then I paused.

There was another sentence on the page.

You promised her.

I read it slowly.

The handwriting looked like mine.

I searched my memory for the moment I might have written it, but nothing came. I couldn’t even remember opening the notebook before I had entered the building.

I turned to the previous page.

The words One down. Two to go stared back at me.

My mouth went dry.

I shut the notebook and placed it on the passenger seat.

For a while, I sat in silence, listening to the rain tap against the roof.

I needed to go home.

I needed to sleep.

And tomorrow, I would ask someone to examine the photographs and the marks I had found. I would follow the evidence, no matter how strange the investigation became.

That was what I told myself as I started the engine.

But when I glanced into the rearview mirror, I thought I saw Hina sitting in the back seat.

Her head was tilted slightly.

Her expression was gentle, almost sad.

I turned around.

The seat was empty.

I faced forward again, gripping the steering wheel until my fingers ached.

Then, from somewhere behind me, I heard a soft voice.

“You said you would protect me.”

I spun around a second time.

Nothing.

Only the empty seats and the darkness beyond the windows.

I remained there for a long time, unable to convince myself that I had heard anything at all.

Eventually, I drove away.

I didn’t look back at the building.

I didn’t look in the rearview mirror again.

And I didn’t open my notebook until I reached home.

When I finally did, I found one more line written beneath the others.

You were there that night.

I stared at the sentence until the letters seemed to blur.

Then I closed the notebook.

Because for the first time, I wasn’t afraid of what I might discover about Hina’s death.

I was afraid of what I might remember.

I didn’t sleep that night.

Every time I closed my eyes, I saw the sentence written in my notebook.

You were there that night.

I tried to remember the evening Hina disappeared. I remembered the rain, the reports, the photographs, and the long hours spent questioning people who claimed to know her. I remembered arriving in the village and promising myself that I would find the person responsible.

But when I tried to picture where I had been on the night of her death, my memories became strangely indistinct.

I remembered being tired.

I remembered the rain.

I remembered waking up the following morning with a headache.

Beyond that, everything seemed to dissolve into fragments.

Perhaps I had simply forgotten the details. It had been a difficult period, and grief could make ordinary memories feel distant.

I repeated that explanation until the sun began to rise.

Then I took my notebook and drove to the station.

The first thing I did was request the original records of my movements on the night Hina disappeared. I wanted to know whether there was any reason to believe I had been near the abandoned storage building before her body was discovered.

I expected the records to settle my mind.

Instead, they left me with another question.

According to the duty log, I had left the station earlier than I remembered.

There was no detailed explanation of where I had gone. At the time, it hadn’t seemed important enough to record. Officers left the station for all sorts of reasons, and not every movement was documented.

I checked the time of my departure.

Then I checked the time Hina was last seen on the street-camera footage.

I sat back slowly.

The times didn’t prove anything. There was no confirmed sighting of me near her, and nothing established that I had gone to the storage building.

Still, I couldn’t ignore the gap.

I asked whether anyone remembered seeing me that evening.

One of the older officers thought for a while before answering.

“I remember you were here earlier,” he said. “You seemed distracted.”

“Distracted how?”

He shrugged.

“You kept checking the clock. I asked if something was wrong, but you said you were fine.”

“Did I tell you where I was going?”

“I don’t remember.”

I thanked him and returned to my office.

The conversation should have been insignificant.

Instead, it made me think of something Yoma had said on the telephone.

Are you sure you’re remembering everything properly?

I opened my notebook and wrote down the officer’s statement.

Then I stopped myself.

I didn’t want to add another mysterious sentence to the collection of things I couldn’t explain. I needed facts, not more fragments to obsess over.

I put the notebook away and continued working.

By late afternoon, I had reviewed the available records and requested additional information from the officers who had handled the original investigation. Nothing gave me a clear answer about my whereabouts that night.

I was beginning to think I had wasted an entire day when the telephone rang.

It was Yoma.

“Have you eaten?” she asked.

I glanced at the untouched food beside my desk.

“Not yet.”

She sighed.

“Of course you haven’t.”

“I’ll eat in a minute.”

“You always say that.”

I smiled faintly, but she didn’t laugh.

There was a pause before she spoke again.

“Can I ask you something?”

“Anything.”

“Have you been having those dreams again?”

My smile faded.

“What dreams?”

“The ones you used to have years ago. You’d wake up confused, and sometimes you wouldn’t remember what we’d talked about the night before.”

I stared at the desk.

“I don’t think so.”

“You don’t think so?”

“I’ve been tired, Yoma. That’s all.”

She was silent for a moment.

Then she asked, “Have you been going to that old building?”

My hand tightened around the telephone.

“How do you know about that?”

“I don’t know that you have. I’m asking.”

I looked toward the window.

Rain had begun to fall again, thin streaks sliding down the glass.

“Why would you ask me that?”

“Because you mentioned it before.”

“When?”

“I can’t remember exactly.”

Neither of us spoke.

Finally, she sighed.

“Please come home soon. I don’t like how you sound.”

“I’ll be fine.”

“You keep saying that, too.”

Her voice softened.

“I love you. I just want you to be all right.”

For a moment, I couldn’t find an answer.

Then I promised to call her the following day and ended the conversation.

I sat quietly, holding the telephone long after the line had gone dead.

Yoma knew about the building.

Or at least, she remembered me mentioning it.

I couldn’t recall telling her.

Perhaps I had. We had been married for years, and there were countless conversations I no longer remembered word for word. There was nothing extraordinary about forgetting one.

But the pattern was becoming difficult to ignore.

The missing memories.

The notes.

The dirt beneath my fingernails.

The strange certainty that I had been somewhere I couldn’t remember visiting.

I opened my desk drawer and took out the small bottle I had kept there for years.

I looked at it without touching the cap.

Then I put it back.