Tuesday arrived with soft footsteps.
The sky hadn't changed. Still gray. The kind of weather that blurred the edges of everything, like the world had been drawn in charcoal.
Shoya hadn't told anyone about the text. Or the strange conversation with Naomi. He hadn't even written about it in his sketchbook.
He couldn't.
Because part of him wasn't sure what really happened.
---
In class, the windows were fogged at the corners. The teacher's voice came in and out like background noise. Shoya didn't hear most of it.
Naomi wasn't there.
His gaze drifted to the empty seat near the window. The one no one ever sat in, though technically it wasn't assigned to anyone. He remembered Asuna once saying it was bad luck.
He looked away.
---
At lunch, Taka waved him over .
This time, Shoya sat with them without a word. He pushed his food around on the tray, barely eating. His mind kept returning to yesterday. Her voice. The way she said her name like it had weight.
Naomi Tsukihime.
The name didn't ring bells with Ken or Taka when he mentioned it.
Which made it feel even stranger.
"Maybe she's from another department," Taka said, sipping miso soup. "Some of the music kids take elective classes in our building."
"But then how come no one knows her?" Shoya asked.
Ken shrugged. "We barely talk with other students, even now especially you doesn't know half of our classmates."
Shoya: " yeah maybe you are right, i barely know what we have done these past years in university"
Taka leaned back. "Maybe she doesn't want to be known. Some people just... exist on the edge. Like you."
.
.
That afternoon, he skipped his final lecture. Just walked. No goal in mind. Just followed his steps until they took him... back.
To the sculpture garden.
It wasn't empty.
She was there again.
Same place. Same sculpture. Same silence between them.
This time, Naomi didn't look up when he approached. She simply shifted slightly, just enough to make space on the stone ledge beside her.
He sat.
Neither of them spoke for a long while.
.
The wind moved the leaves overhead. The fountain gurgled somewhere behind the hedges. The sound of the city barely reached here. This spot—this little corner of the campus—felt detached. Suspended.
Finally, Naomi said, " i see you began to like this place!"
Shoya: "didn't know it was this calm and peaceful"
Naomi: "You looked at that drawing for a long time."
Shoya nodded. "It looked like you."
She traced her finger along the edge of the stone, eyes still forward.
"It's strange," she said. "I don't remember ever being drawn."
"Do you remember being here?"
She smiled faintly. "I'm always here."
He glanced at her. "That's not what I meant."
Another pause.
Then, softly—so soft he wasn't sure she meant for him to hear it—she said,
> "Sometimes I think I was supposed to disappear, too."
Shoya: " huh!? You said something?
"No it's nothing " she replied.
Naomi looked up at the clouds.
But she didn't explain.
He studied her face. Noticed again how her presence felt different. Grounded and absent all at once.
Her lips parted slightly. Then she gave a tiny smile.
"You're strange," she said.
"You're one to talk."
They both smiled, just barely.
As the sky finally broke and raindrops began to fall, Naomi stood, brushing her skirt.
"I should go."
Shoya nodded, rising too. They didn't say goodbye this time. She simply walked away under the drifting light rain, her silhouette slowly swallowed by the trees.
He stood there a while longer.
And when he turned to leave, he suddenly wanted to go back to that basement again, so he walked step by step towards the basement where he entered this time eyes with focus trying to catch everything with detail.
Then he noticed a something beneath an ink bottle.
A folded paper.
He hesitated. Then picked it up.
It was old. Faded. Water-smudged.
A torn page from a sketchbook. A pencil drawing, delicate and hurried.
A girl, sitting on this very stone.
But it wasn't Naomi.
The hair was different. So was the pose. More closed off. Sadder.
In the corner of the page, a name was scribbled lightly.
Kaori.
It caught his attention and folded it again and put it inside his sketchbook, then he walked to go back to his dorm…
---
To be continued in Chapter 5...