A man stood in front of it, unbothered by this aura, giving the building a wistful look.
“Five years, and this place still hasn’t sold. Figures.”
After dropping Akane off at his acquaintance’s gym, Akabayashi came to visit this abandoned store by himself. He wasn’t doing anything in particular—just staring at the place through his tinted glasses—when he heard a faint voice nearby.
“…Mr.…Akabayashi?”
“Hmm?” He spun around and saw a girl standing there. She looked shy and quiet and wore the Raira Academy uniform, along with a pair of glasses. She’d probably been watching him approach with trepidation before calling out, but the gangster broke into a grin.
“…Ohh! Is that you, Anri? You’re so much taller now. How long has it been…? Two years?”
“Yes, it’s nice to see you again… What brings you here?” Anri asked, bowing. She didn’t seem afraid of the man.
“Oh, I was just in the area. What’s with the uniform? Shouldn’t you be on break today?”
“I had to show up at school for the class representatives’ meeting… I was just getting home now.”
“Gotcha. Must be hard having to go to school during your vacation,” Akabayashi offered with a breezy smile.
“Umm…I really should thank you for what you did.”
“You know, you say that every time we meet, but you really don’t need to. I’m the one who owes a debt to…to your mother.”
“But…if you hadn’t helped me find a new apartment back then, who knows what might have happened to me…? I lost my father and mother and had to leave the house…”
She put on a rare, gentle smile, one of pure gratitude.
Anri Sonohara lost her parents years ago in an incident.
She wound up passed around among her relatives, a time of great upheaval—and ultimately, they sold off many of the remaining Sonohara-dou items to put together a fund that would pay for her living costs until she was an adult.
The person who helped deal with this inheritance fund was a man named Akabayashi, who came to pay his respects at her parents’ funeral. Later, when she decided to move out on her own and save her relatives the trouble, Akabayashi was there to help arrange an apartment for her. He claimed that he owed her parents a favor and helped her with a number of very important things, all for free. She felt nothing but gratitude toward him.
She bowed, over and over, so Akabayashi scratched his head uncomfortably and changed the topic.
“So, uh, is that the Raira uniform? You’re in high school already, then. Wait…second year?”
“Yes, that’s right…”
She bowed yet again, and Akabayashi scratched at his cheek this time.
Suddenly, he recalled things Mikiya had said in the car earlier in the day:
“I don’t know if it’s like a game to them or what, but even in this college club, the guys at the top are bad news. They believe they’re totally safe from trouble, even against the real thing like us… They had beef with another gang in the past, and the fellows in that group got attacked.
“You need to be careful. Don’t hang around with Akane too much. I’ll set it up so that someone else goes to the dojo tonight to get her.
“In any case, this is very abrupt stuff, so while I’ll spare some protection for Akane, I don’t have the extra leeway to guard you, too. You’ll have to fend for yourself.”
Something about what Mikiya said snagged in Akabayashi’s head. He said to Anri, “I’m curious—I have a question about school fads for you.”
“Y-yes…? Well…I’m really not that up on fads, either…”
“It’s fine. I’ll take whatever you can tell me,” he said and decided to bring up the name, figuring she wouldn’t know. “Anri, have you ever heard the name Dollars at school?”
Her breath briefly caught in her throat. He noticed the change and asked, “You know something, then?”
“N-no…just…that I’ve heard a friend talk about it… But I don’t know any details.”
“…”
It was painfully obvious that she was lying. Akabayashi wasn’t going to rake her over the coals for it, but he also wanted more information.
“Ah, I see,” he said and patted her on the shoulder with a smile. “They’re dangerous folks I hear, so steer clear of them. And if anything happens, you let me know at once.”
“Oh no… I couldn’t impose on you any further…”
“No, I insist. You know I got a lotta clout around here, right? So call on me for anything. You got a problem? Just call that number I gave you. On the other hand…since I’m so well-known, there are folks who don’t like me. So if you happen to see me around town and don’t have anything to ask, feel free to ignore me.”
“Uhh…”
Perhaps she didn’t realize what he did for a living; in which case, the girl probably thought he was acting rather strange. Akabayashi gave her his usual tilted grin and was about to say something to put her at ease—
When a third party interrupted him.
“Is that you, Sonohara?” said the voice. He spun around to see a young man.
“Oh…Yagiri,” said Anri. It was Seiji Yagiri, the boyfriend of her best friend, Mika Harima.
The newcomer glanced around the area. “Wait, so…does that mean you’re done with whatever you were doing with Mika?”
“Huh…?”
She was confused, and now, so was he.
Recognizing that the two were friends, Akabayashi turned his back and waved to her. “Well, I’ll just be going now. You take care of yourself, hear?”
“Oh…yes! Of course! Thank you!” she replied, still bobbing up and down, until Akabayashi left the vicinity of Sonohara-dou.
“So who was that?” Seiji asked.
She smiled and said, “That was Mr. Akabayashi. He knew my mother…and he’s done a lot to help me.”
“What does he do?”
“Umm…I heard he delivers fresh crabs or runs a café or something… I think he does all kinds of stuff.”
“Huh… Seems like a strange guy…”
Seiji was still curious about Akabayashi, but then he came to his senses and returned to the topic on his mind.
“Oh, right. So are you saying you weren’t the person who called Mika earlier?”
“What…?”
Within seconds, Seiji Yagiri realized the truth and headed in a rush for a certain pharmaceutical company’s warehouse lot.
But that’s another story.
Six years ago
A shock ran through the skin around his right eye.
He could feel that much.
But whatever happened after that was a mystery.
A voice.
“I love you.”
A voice, an overwhelming voice that drowned out everything else, commanded his brain.
It was coming from around his eye, where he just felt the shock.
Oh, I see.
Understanding was instantaneous.
That katana hit my right eye…
And it was as if the eye itself was screaming in pain.
The voice raced from his eye through the rest of him, shredding his nerves, his bones, his muscle, his brain.
It was an unstoppable flood of words that threatened to wash his mind away. It was as if they had form, a solidity like lead that rocketed around inside his body.
For the first time in his life, he felt fear. He felt his mind and flesh being devoured from the inside out.
The voice speaking of “love” might erase him entirely. It might alter him, re-create him as something else.
The man who lived through nothing but violence now felt a bizarre, foreign fear.
However—amid his fear, he felt a different impulse rising within him.
This, too, was an overwhelming urge that he had never experienced before.
Hey… What the hell is this? Why now? What am I thinking?
But all the while, the voice grew, increasing
its pressure.
It grew to hold its own will, flooding his heart with words of love and
and
and
love
love
was all
ve, love, love, lo
ause of love.” “So mu
ust love people.” “Don’t be ridicu
“Don’t talk about who you love, that just
o, no, no! I love all, all, all of humanity equally
“Shut up for a second.”
What do I love? Don’t be ridiculous! It’s everything
love blood splatter.” “I love hard bone.” “It’s love.” “Nice
so I forgive you.” “So you can forgive me, too, okay” “I won’t
all of this.” “Ah!” “The slice of meat during the moment of ecstasy
I just love the soft and yet hard muscle that rips right apart!” “And there’s
that hard bone, so smooth and supple, weak yet sharp, tough and cracking!” “Love
trembling and soft and silky and squishy sticking and sticking and sticking tight together
as voices echo with cries of love, yes? I’m so jealous I wish I had words of love to speak but I
don’t so I want you to love me instead I want to be filled but yes oh yes but oh yes I’m so jealous even dying can be a form of love lust is a powerful form of love but no you can’t try to narrow love to a definition that’s blasphemy against the heart there is no definition of love all that you need are those simple words I love you I love you I love you I love you
“Shut up.”
I love…lo…? …ve? …love…love…love…love?
“I said, shut the fuck up, stupid eye!”
The echoing words of love inside of him abruptly stopped.
At the same time, there was a click, a snapping sound from around his right eye.
The first was merely a mental sound; the second was a physical process in his retina.
“…!”
It was actually the slasher who was most surprised by this change.
He had reached up to the eye that was just cut—and gouged it out with his own hand.
Then he crushed it in his palm and stood boldly before the slasher. The fear from moments ago was gone now, and in what light could be gleaned from the now-stabilizing streetlight overhead, his remaining eye glared fiercely.
An ordinary person might have yelped in the face of that glare. But the slasher chose to speak to him instead.
“…You’re really something.”
“…”
“I’ve never seen someone escape from this girl’s voice before. Saika was so shocked that she drew back inside of me. Maybe she’s feeling like she just got dumped,” the woman said, her voice soothing, perhaps even relieved.
It certainly didn’t sound like the voice of a mad, indiscriminate attacker. She walked closer to him. The countless blades were gone from her skin, leaving only the one katana in her hands, now its ordinary length.
“I’m happy… I thought no one would ever try to stop her…”
Large tears spilled from her glowing red eyes. The droplets caught that red light, making it look as though blood was dripping from her tear ducts.
“Are you going…to finish me at last?” she asked. It sounded like a request to die.
He shook his head. “No…sorry. I have no idea what you’re talking about.”
Then he started striding forward, no fear of her deadly sword. “But…I had something I wanted to tell you. I had to shut up that annoying noise first—that’s all.”
Already he was within the katana’s range. But she did not slice at him.
“What’s your name?”
“…”
“Actually, never mind. I don’t need your name.”
Then he was close enough to reach out and touch her. He came to a stop there.
And as the red-eyed woman watched in surprise and confusion, he spoke.
—Spoke the words brought by that other impulse within him, spoke his mind in a way he had never done before.
“…I’m in love with you.”
“…Huh?” she said, red eyes wide.
Those simple words represented his entire life being staked on a gamble.
He had built himself through the scars he’d inflicted on others. And now the words tumbled out of him as if he were trying to eject all those ugly red marks at once.
“For the first time in my life, I believed a woman was beautiful. I wanted to hug and squeeze one.”
“…”
“I don’t care if you’re human, or a monster, or even some kind of Buddhist goddess. All that matters is that I love you as a woman,” he said, his speech getting gradually faster as his self-control failed to hide his agitation. “Even I know that this is crazy to say, comin’ right after we just met, and you sliced my damn eyeball…but I ain’t pretending it’s based on logic. Please—marry me!”
The entire scene had only taken a few minutes. She was a monster. He just lost the sight of one of his eyes forever. Anyone would assume that his sanity had buckled under the extreme circumstances.
But the man’s brain was operating quite normally, successfully withstanding the pain and loss of that eyeball. It was much later that he realized that not only was it “love at first sight,” it was also “love at single sight.”
A person he’d only ever identified as a target to be hurt—a “weak, fragile” woman—had turned out to be a presence every bit his equal, completely capable of killing him.
The ghostliness of those glowing red eyes, the feminine figure, the flowing black hair melting into the darkness of night—all these things melded together in womanly beauty and enchanted his heart.
He’d never professed love before.
This innocence, his first ever feelings of romance, got under the cracks of his protective pride—his violence—and shot it someplace far, far away.
But that very first confession ended in failure.
“…Thank you. I’m very flattered that you said you love me, even like this,” she chuckled with a hint of sadness. “But I’m afraid I can’t return the feeling.”
She shook her head and spoke the only two words that could cut him deeper than her katana already had: “I’m married.”
“…!”
“I still love my husband and daughter. So I can’t reciprocate your sentiment.”
The sheer finality of that statement made his knees quake. Whether through sadness, anger, embarrassment, or the strange beauty of her rejection, he promptly slapped his cheeks with both hands. The blood drooling from his mutilated eye socket stained his hand even further. Intense pain shot through his face.
But he held fast without yelling, silencing the trembling in his knees through willpower alone.
“I see… That’s too bad. But…can I at least get your name?”
“…”
“Don’t worry. I’m not going to bother your husband or daughter.”
She seemed hesitant, but something in his gaze eventually convinced her. She summoned up some level of commitment and said, “That’s right… If you harm my daughter or husband, I will cut you down with everything I have.”
“Ha-ha… I’ll have earned it.”
“My name…is Sayaka Sonohara.”
The name jolted him.
Sonohara.
The name of the antiques dealer he was just about to go beat up.
“Well, well… I guess it’s fate. You just saved your hubby.”
“Huh?”
“Never mind. Talking to myself.” He smirked. Then he turned his back on the slasher and walked away from the scene. “My name’s Akabayashi. Let me know if you ever get tired of that husband of yours.”
“Believe me, I’m a worthy enough man to take care of both you and your daughter.”
Present day, Ikebukuro, taxi
“Yo, Akabayashi,” said a familiar voice over the phone.
“Is that you, Aozaki? You really do lo
ve calling me when I’m in a taxi, don’t you?”
“I don’t give a damn about your schedule or where you are.”
“So what’s the call about, then? If it’s about the young miss, things have calmed down a bit.”
“Nah. I just called to say my farewell,” said the low-pitched, jovial voice through the phone.
“Why’s that? You gonna kill me once and for all? Or are you staging a mutiny and leaving the Awakusu-kai?”
“Don’t be a moron. You know there’s nothing to be gained in that.”
“Of course not. If there’s one thing that’s real about you, it’s your devotion to Chairman Awakusu.”
“Just shut up and listen,” Aozaki snapped in irritation. “You’ve been living too free these days.”
“Those ghosts from five years ago have come back to destroy you.”
May 5, night, ruined building
Quite a ways away from the center of the city stood an unfinished building, its construction halted for some reason or another.
The first two floors were finished like any other building, but everything above that was stuck in skeletal form, the concrete bars standing open in the air and looming eerily over the night.
Men quietly surrounded the building.
“That him?”
“Yep, it’s him.”
The men in hoodies had bandannas wrapped around their faces. What little skin could be seen of their arms and necks featured fake tattoo stickers with similar patterns. They carried metal pipes, knives, two-by-fours studded with nails, and other crude weapons. These weren’t youngsters about to enjoy a spooky rite of passage at a haunted abandoned building—they were outfitted to bust those ghosts themselves.
“I can’t believe we’re gettin’ paid two hundred thousand just to wax that old man.”
“Even better, they said they’re also gonna give us the lion’s share of the shipment when we re-up.”
Durarara!!, Vol. 7 Page 10
