---

---

"Also, you mentioned earlier 'every last one of them' regarding my family. Was there some problem with my brother or my father?"
I decided to capitalize on that slip of the tongue I'd been saving and pressed him. Notably, I excluded my mother.
The old man's clamped lips shifted slightly, releasing the breath he'd been holding.
"My father is one thing, of course, but my brother? Had he caused enough trouble to get you involved? ... Or perhaps, there was some kind of incident involving my sister?"
I pointed this out with exaggerated politeness, as if implying there was more to it. In reality, the implication was inflated entirely by falsehoods. A complete bluff.
However, it seemed I was at least partially correct that there *had* been some conflict between the siblings that I knew nothing about. Why? Because the old man remained silent, failing to utter a simple "Don't know him" regarding my brother.
"'If you truly care about my sister, then talking is your only option, isn't it? We still have plenty of time, after all," I declared, without even checking the time.
My sister's teeth dug between my thumbnail and the flesh beneath, biting down. The memory of having my nail ripped off, and Mayu's scream, echoed inside the cage of the past.

"I'm just driven by a thirst for knowledge; I only want to understand. I won't tell anyone, and I have no intention of making things worse. I promise."
I made a concession, mixing in a modest lie. That seemed to finally make the old man resign himself to it, and he opened his mouth.
"It'd be good if you felt some guilt too, you who've just been coasting through life."
*Hmm. Have I been coasting, I wonder?*
Apparently, this old man looks down on me, seeing my sister as someone who's known endless hardship, while her brother—me—is just some guy who's had an easy, humdrum life, amusing himself day after day. Even though he knows I was involved in *that incident*, to him, it's ultimately just secondhand information from newspapers and news reports, lacking any real feel.
*Haha. Well, if that's how he sees it, fine by me.* I carried on picking the pith off the mikan, unconcerned.
"That girl... she was being bullied by your idiot brother."
The old man spoke, his voice pained. His nostrils flared.
"Ahhh... Oh, is that right?"
I finished peeling the pith. Plucking off a single mikan segment, I offered it into the kotatsu, and this time, just as expected, she bit. I thought back to us in the past, feeding bread crumbs to the freely swimming carp in the pond near the reservoir.
Though later, my sister ended up catching one and turning it into ingredients for fish balls for a hot pot... still, it's a hard memory to forget.
"What's with that attitude?"
The old man's blood pressure shot up as he fumed. His arms were positioned as if he might, any second now, attempt the audacious feat of flipping the kotatsu—something requiring far more brute strength than flipping a mere tea table. If he succeeded, my sister would surely shrivel up from the cold. Burning with my sense of duty as an older brother, I decided to admonish him.

*Just kidding, though. My throat is dry.*
"It's all in the past now, anyway."
*Just kidding, just kidding, just kidding.*
The old man looked like he was about to pop a blood vessel. My sister demanded the next segment, gnawing *gaji-gaji* on my thumb.
I plucked off another segment to fill her order, and she sucked it in, finger and all, and began to chew. The cool juice acted as a counterpoint to the furnace of my sister's mouth, playing the role of a cold spring.
"You were right there beside her, and you didn't notice a single thing, did ya?"
"No, not at all."
*Not one single thing. Who knew my brother and sister had such a* deep *relationship? I was completely out of the loop, wasn't I?*
The old man seemed exasperated with me. Pitied, looked down upon completely. Thanks to that, his anger faded.
"Your brother couldn't accept Iruka, or the girl either. Probably 'cause he was raised by a kid who hadn't even been weaned herself. He used to torment the girl maliciously, where no one could see. Judging by how she won't talk about the specifics, she must have gone through something pretty awful."
The old man spoke bitterly, as if it had happened to him personally, hinting at his intention to condemn me.
*Is that so?* I tried asking the person herself, mediated by the mikan. Her reply was to slobber on my finger.
"Means he properly inherited your father's blood, I guess. Just what kind of family are you people? That's why I was against Iruka living in that house."
Being grumbled at like this left me at a loss for words. *Which is why I said, it's all in the past.*
"Hm? What about you?"
The old man stared intently at me. When our eyes met, mine started to feel dry.
"People often say I look like the kid next door."
I dodged the question with a stale joke. I'm currently out of stock on witty retorts, so I wish he'd ask again some other day. *Owowowow, don't try to brush your teeth with my finger!*
The old man's sigh was little more than an exhalation. *I wanted to request something with a bit more chest-rumbling depth.*
"And so, well," the old man's explanation became even more halting.
"That girl... she started bullying her brother back. Apparently, she used stuff like dog meat, and tore up his books. Mind you, she deserved some payback, I suppose."
"'That's quite effective,' I noted." *Especially the latter. An act tantamount to carving flesh from his very being with a stone spear.*
The old man faltered, his words halting. *Had King Enma plucked out his tongue for telling a lie, perhaps?*
The old man parted his lips. *I was starting to get the picture, and various things were welling up inside me, but... Ahhh. Ah-ooo-ahhh...*
"But..."
"Uahhh..."
"Ahhh..."
*Deep breaths, deep breaths. Draw it out.*
"And so..."
"Just say it already, did she kill my brother?"
"What stupid thing are you saying? That was suicide."
"So the cause that drove him to suicide lies with my sister, then."
"Wrong. The one who commits suicide is the one in the wrong."
*He declared it so definitively. There's no right or wrong when it comes to dying, I thought. But I suppose there must be, if that's what people say.*
"Ahhh..."
[ ... ]
"...Ah, is that so."

*I see. The reason my brother killed himself involved my sister, and the reason my sister disappeared involved my brother. Heh. Oh, she's not adding 'Just kidding, though' this time.*
And just like that, as if vomiting, a memory spewed forth.
Following in its wake, a memory resurfaced: it was my *father* who killed my mother.
The backyard. The place where I'd later be shoved down by my sister's mother. There stood my father, stained red, and my mother, like meat sauce.
I was the sole witness. Told to keep quiet, right in the middle of my 'field trip' learning about the value of life from my mother's corpse, I simply nodded. For the sake of self-preservation, I took steps to ensure I wouldn't remember. I worked hard at it.
I regulated myself by taking care not to expend emotions unnecessarily.
That's why, when I was a kid, no matter how much my sister kicked me, I could remain completely unfazed.
Getting kicked hurt, yeah, it hurt, but I'd become unable to connect that to... anything else. Ah, I'm remembering again.
I didn't shed a single tear at my brother's funeral, nor before my sister's... curtain call.
My eyes were bone-dry, just like they are now.
Then, on the day my father gripped that metal bat, fear acted as a trigger, and finally, everything started coming back.
"And so, it seems she didn't want Iruka, her mother, to find out about that. Terrified that living together, her attitude would give her away, she fled to my house. And she probably didn't want to stay in that rotten house forever either."

....... *And here I'd been convinced that everything stemmed from eight years ago.*
*Doesn't this make it seem like things have been messed up since way back?*
*But, if that's the case. Where... where did it all begin?*
*Just where did* I *start going wrong?*
*The quickest answer is, 'From the moment you were born!' though.*
"She spent all her time shut up in her room, but I thought that was for the best, so we lived together... Things should have just stayed that way, but recently she started going out at night, and that's how she got found by *them*. Why'd she have to go and do something pointless like that?"
*Because Mayu and I met. Hmm, maybe that's not entirely a lie.*
*Ever since Maa-chan got her hands on Mii-kun, the number of terrible incidents has only increased.*
"Hey," someone called out, so I switched over to my second head.
"What is it?"
"Don't 'what is it' me! What's with that composed look on your face! Don't you get how much that girl suffered because you just stood there looking stupid and didn't help her?!"
"Suffered...?" *The labor and hardship of driving someone to suicide?*
*Ah, I see. So* this *is what she meant by 'you didn't help me.'*
*And* that's *the motive for wanting to kill me... Surprisingly, I don't mind things being straightforward.*
"What's with that face? Looking all calm, it's creepy."
*Calm... Ah, yeah. I guess I am calm.*
*But people are supposed to solve their own problems, right? So expecting me to do something is misguided. Isn't that just not how humans should be?*
*Besides, it wasn't* me *who died. I can't make a big fuss over someone else's business.*
"Look, I'm done talking. But what are you going to do now that you've heard? Do you want to destroy that girl's life that badly? You never did anything before, but now you plan to take the lead in messing things up?"
*"Mmph!"*
"I don't intend to do anything like that," I replied. "Because 'We're best buds, you know.'"
I lifted the kotatsu futon, and my sister shot out as if she couldn't wait, immediately invading my space. She wiped the sweat from her forehead onto the back of my neck, then settled onto my lap. Quite a change in attitude from before.
*Wonder if she had some change of heart.*
"Anii-chan."
"Hm?"
"Today, you're like you used to be."
My sister pointed this out without even tilting her head, her eyes fixed straight on our grandfather.
The old man, lost in his impression of a gasping goldfish, didn't meet his granddaughter's intense gaze.
I gazed down at my fingertips. They were covered in my sister's saliva, but only the mikan juice felt dirty. The thread tied around my pinky had been thoroughly sucked on too, leaving it limp and heavy with moisture.
*The past... A time when the thing I idealized was right there beside me, yet I never realized it.*
*Alright, shall we renew our old friendship?*
"Want some mikan?" I asked.
"Yeah," my sister nodded.
The old man simply pressed the corners of his eyes. *Hope you feel better soon.*

***

On the way back from the sister's house. I questioned my sister walking beside me.
"You were planning to kill me two days ago, right? What made you decide to do it?"
The world was a combination of clear skies and a gravel road, laced with the smell of dirt.
"That woman, what's her deal? Does she always carry a knife?"
My sister didn't answer, asking a completely different question instead. As she did, she kicked a small stone ahead like a through pass.
"I'll tell you for the third time, she's the daughter of a millionaire."
*If the vast majority would pick the innkeeper's childhood friend, I'm the type who likes to pretend to be in the minority. Just kidding, though.* I kicked the stone rolling ahead of me back and forth.
"So, being a rich girl is why she can't ride a bike and falls over that much?"
My sister's pithy, scorn-filled comment. Apparently, she'd been spying on us since the bike practice, waiting for her chance. *Both now and last time... is my little sister actually stalking her Anii-chan? She must have too much time on her hands.*
"Let me tell you one thing."
My sister pretended to be absorbed in kicking stones, offering no reply. She had a strangely fatigued look on her face.
"If you plan on killing me, approach me when I'm alone. Leave Mayu out of it."
*In fact, if you're serious, do it right here. I can't fight back right now.*
My little sister kicked the stone hard, sending it flying into a nearby field. Then, she glared at me. Still, no words came.
"So, how far do you plan on following me?"
"As far as you can go."
*Save the cool lines for someone else.*
"Hey, Anii-chan..."
"Hm?"
"Did you kill Mom?"
She asked the question in a calm, descending tone. Kicking a new stone, I denied it. "Nope."
"Because I have no reason to kill her."
*I couldn't do something so presumptuous.*
My sister showed no particular reaction and looked away from me.
*Right... now it was my turn. I hadn't gone to that house* just *to listen to the old man grumble and curse.*
"Hey, Sis..."
"What?"
"Hey, Sis..."
"What?"
"Recently, have you done anything... besides to animals?"
A subtle distortion flickered in my sister's eyes. The usual snort followed.
"Well, *I* don't have a hobby of going up the mountain to *harvest plants*, if that's what you mean."
*What a twisted way of talking. Especially since she didn't exactly grow up following my example.*
"My phrasing was bad. Have you ever killed a person?"
"What's that supposed to mean? Holding a grudge? Weren't you listening to what he said earlier?"
Looking for another suitable stone, I asked again. But my sister glared at me hard enough to shoot lasers from her eyes, so I stopped and stared back. *I mean, I can probably manage to emit* some *kind of brain waves myself, you know.*
"No. I mean, have you *directly* killed someone? Stabbed, strangled, bludgeoned, assassinated, poisoned, whatever."
My sister let her slightly softened gaze wander for a few moments, then replied, "Not yet."
*Mmm, including the 'yet,' that fits my prediction. My sister's a terrible liar, so her word is reliable.*
As we walked, talking and searching for stones, the gravel road came to an end. Asphalt, a drugstore, and the occasional car began to appear and disappear from view.
"Ah, one more thing." Since my sister still hadn't turned back, I asked her another question as we crossed the road.
"That thing in the fridge the other day, what was it?"
"Small intestine."
"From what?"
"Human. Want some?" she replied in a flat tone.
"And if I asked you to share?"
*'Like hell I would,' she'd probably say.*
In the end, as I passed through the automatic doors of my apartment building, my sister turned and headed back the way we'd come. *What was that all about? Doesn't really matter, though.*

***

Same day, 7:00 PM.
We were already under the covers, breathing as if sound asleep. *He is lying*, I even fabricated a third-person viewpoint to chastise myself for the deception.
Mayu was using my pillow quite literally as a *dakimakura*, fast asleep. Her sleeping face wasn't exactly angelic. Her usual expressions were stripped away, revealing her poor complexion without concealment. *Couldn't she manage to maintain a smile while sleeping, like she always demands* I *do? As if I'd ever make such a rude complaint.*
*Because she's Maa-chan. That kind of thing, absolutely not.*
Gazing upon her honorable sleeping face, I set the parameters for my actions starting tomorrow.
My main concern was the bicycle practice. Since the timing depends on when Mayu wakes up, there were bound to be days we'd end up practicing at night.
Which meant I had to eliminate the danger beforehand.
*'It's just like always.'*
*Just putting in a little extra effort for Maa-chan's safety.*
*Tomorrow, I'll call and confirm... Get ready... and let her kill me.*
"I love you, Maa-chan! Super love you!"
*So, I'm fine. Starting tomorrow, I'll be Mii-kun again, full-throttle. Giving up my paid time off. Right, time for sleep.*

***

Late at night, I lie that I've woken up.
*What is a lie, anyway?*
I lie that my eyes weren't even closed to begin with.
I sit up. *That's not a lie. It's not a lie! It's okay to not lie* to myself *once in a while, isn't it?!*
*I'm busy with insomnia!*
My chest doesn't hurt. Neither does my brain, nor my eyes, nor the back of my nose, nor the buzzing in my fingertips—nothing hurts anywhere.
The only things that hurt are my back, ears, mouth, lungs, heart, blood—scratched raw by my own fingernails.
Unlike with Maa-chan, there's no one to stop me, so I can do as I please.
*"Espec-ial-ly, not the eye-balls."*
*"Espec-ial-ly, not the eye-balls."*
Terrified by the light, I pulled the covers over my head. *But since I couldn't sleep anyway, it didn't lessen anything at all.*
Sakashita Koibi. My teacher. She wasn't dull-witted, she wasn't unattractive, and she wasn't someone who didn't matter to me.
On various occasions, she'd spoken about my heart. 'Your heart hasn't withered and died,' she'd say. 'It's just sleeping.' Her view was completely different from Biwashima's—she was someone who affirmed my humanity.
Back then, in my rebellious phase, I rejected her words, and now, that youthful arrogance comes back to me like bitter bile.
*Ah, I want to see her. I want... I want to see Sensei.*
*I want her to teach me how to wake up my heart. Just tell me, come on, hurry.*
*But it's no good. She's not my teacher anymore.*
*I have to try hard on my own, affirm my own existence by myself.*
*Everyone says you have to do things for yourself, don't they?!*
*So then, what's the point of other people? Why do we need them?*
I dug my fingers into my eye sockets. *These eyes are wrong. These pupils, these useless tear ducts—*
*I looked away when my father killed my mother; I didn't notice my brother bullying my sister; I didn't notice my sister bullying him back and driving him to suicide; it never occurred to me that my sister wasn't actually dead; my father was a criminal; my sister's mother saved my life, yet I earned her daughter's resentment; I deceive people and live my life telling lies—and through it all, I feel no shock, no anger, no regret, no rejection. I can't offer my sister a single 'I'm sorry,' feel no pangs of apology scratching at my heart, stingily hold back any tears, don't grieve that I couldn't help her—*
*Here stands a sinner who doesn't grieve, not even on the surface.*
*Even though I've had my license revoked.*
*I still go on playing human with a calm face, operating without a license.*
*All the lies I tell stem from that crime.*
*Why doesn't my sister kill me, I wonder?*
*Maybe she's not my sister at all?*
*An imposter? Eh, she's a fake? Seriously? Man, what a letdown.*
*But thanks to that, I wasn't fooled! What a lucky guy I am!*
*I'm definitely gonna find happiness! Thanks, Ms. A-ko! Oh, quitting to get married? Hope you'll be happy! Oh dear, she seems to have left... via the window.*
*Window. The room's black window. Quitting by jumping? Gotta stop her!*
*No no no, gotta stop her, no! Huh? No no no no no... wait, that's the same phrase.*
*To commemorate, I'll open the window and inject some fresh air. Hey now, my brain did all the work figuring that out, but my lungs are getting the reward? Talk about favoritism.*
*My father scolded me about favoritism. My metal-bat-wielding father. Ahh, right... I gave up on being a baseball kid because I saw Dad hitting Mom with that bat... How nostalgic.*
*Wait a second, what the hell? Isn't everyone in my family completely messed up?*
*So, maybe I don't have to try so hard and struggle against it? Maybe it's okay to just keep things as they are, or even cut loose more? But then I'd stick out from the rest of the family, wouldn't I?*
*Let's value harmony.*
*So, it's fine just the way I am now. Indescribably fine, just as I am. Hopelessly fine, just as I am-ssu, fine as I am-ssu.*
*She's* angry. *Gets pouty right away when ignored and pulls out a knife. Just like Maa-chan. Hence this bump on my head. My second head. Wonder if I can pull it off? And then toss it onto the roof.*
*Gotta lighten the load more heading into summer, y'know.*
*Just pluck it off, like* thwip. *Hmmm... Would I die if it came off? Ouch, that hurts.*
*A great discovery! If the bump comes off, you die! It* is *a head, after all. Guess even a spare one is important.*
*Ahh, blood's rushing to my head. Hmm, or is it rushing away? Either way is fine. It's the essence that matters.*
*It's all such base stuff. But right now, I'm feeling high, so very high...*
*Besides, even someone like me has everyone. They're all bad people, though. Which means they're all in the right.*
*The kidnapped elementary school siblings. The detective who sees me as a toy. The psychiatrist who praises me to the skies. The classmate who fell for me. The classmate who rejects me without hesitation. ...And the rest have been cancelled.*
*Friendship? Affection? All these feelings... it's too much. Just call it the overall 'scene'.*
*Yes, Scene Power. Modern miracle, mysterious noise.*
*And thanks to all of you... I managed to stop myself just as I was leaning my stomach over the veranda railing.*
"... Uwah, hahahahaha!"
*Now's the time, cry! Go on, sprinkle '(Tears)' at the end of your sentences or something. ...Guess not.*
Sliding down, down along the wall. Falling back towards the room, fleeing the outside.
My back braced against the window, I trembled.
My exhaled breath is black. Nothing is reflected.
I clutch at my heart, my skin. *Grip, crush—*
*I know I'm asking for the impossible... I know. I'm sorry.*
*Even though this is what I wanted, what I finally obtained. Even though right now, I'm practically the ideal form...*
*Even though I'm not aware of where or what I lost to become like this.*
*Even though I killed my heart, yet became a creature with its own will...*
*What I'm wishing for, in the darkness, is.*
"Just once in a while, just once in a while, just once in a while..."
*Let it hurt.*
*Let my heart hurt.*

***

**Chapter 4: The Liar Boy Doesn't Laugh. However,**

It flows thick and viscous.
A liquid, still holding its warmth, streams down.
A little more, a little more... more... more...
Despite prayers and encouragement, the flow stops.
What? It's all out already?
To think it was this simple... I sighed, part exasperation, part relief.
Then, I look down.
There, it was simply... full.

***

'A rule?'
'Yes, the one that says the culprit frequently appears at the scene of the crime.'
"And upon what... what manner of logic is such a rule constructed, I wonder?"
'I'm afraid I haven't studied it, so I wouldn't know the specifics. But it's a saying passed down through the ages, both East and West. If you don't have any other leads, it wouldn't hurt to use it as a guideline, would it?'
"Ah, I see. Yes, you aren't supposed to be sus-sus-suspicious right now, are you?"
'Exactly. I am deeply honored by your trust.'
"Well then, using your and Yagoto's opinions as ref-ref-reference, I shall go retrieve Yoshihito."
"Both opinions, huh... Me and Biwashima, I wonder which of us she trusts more."
"It's obvious-ob-obviously the one who tells me the culprit."
"Well, I suppose so. By the way, Ichimiya, is your suspension over?"
"The possibility that I am sus-sus-suspended... through what manner of process and result could that be derived, I wonder?"
'... *She really isn't bound by the logic of this world.*'
"Well then, farewell. Don't dally on your way home after school."
"May you remain in good health as well."
*And, goodbye.*

***

Even if I do manage to solve this case, few relationships are likely to improve.
Still, even if we end up losing more than winning, I feel it's something that has to be done.
Yes, we've done nothing *but* lose. It's supposed to be a contest, yet it feels like the winner was decided from the very beginning.
No matter how much we struggle, there's no chance of victory.
'You should be happy just to put up a good fight,' the winners laugh.
And so, the losing side is required to just smile subserviently and agree.
Even to remain on the losing side, there are conditions.

......... Actually, I was just talking about our record in the current 'Heart-Throb! Co-ed Baseball Tournament!!' Somehow, it morphed into sounding like some grand philosophy of life.
Third period was joint PE class with the kids next door, co-ed. The brilliant lesson plan involved having us form nine-person teams with no substitutes and just play casual pickup baseball—a meaningful way to ensure the PE teacher got a break.
However, the problem was that lazy laissez-faire approach of leaving team formation entirely up to student initiative.
The boys, crippled by the awkwardness of puberty, couldn't bring themselves to ask any girls, while the girls formed teams within their usual cliques. The result looked suspiciously like an all-girls school versus an all-boys school.
And somehow, I ended up enrolled in the 'all-girls school.' Not that I was cross-dressing or anything, which just made me stick out even more.
One of the meddlesome girls in class—the type who pokes at sensitive spots without hesitation, who you could fairly call insensitive (pity she wasn't the Class Rep)—dragged Mayu onto her team.
That much was only a minor issue. But when Maa-chan pulled me along too, making it clear I intended to join the girls' team, the other girls' reactions suddenly soured.
Playing ball with the relative of a criminal was apparently bad for their mental hygiene.
This happens all the time, so it wasn't exactly a scales-falling-from-my-eyes revelation.
Being innocently teased for being 'the kid whose brother killed himself,' or asked with wide-eyed innocence, 'Are you gonna jump off a building too?'—that was all part of the familiar landscape as well.
Mayu and I were registered on the girls' team roster in name only, and ended up 'volunteering' as substitutes in a corner of the field.
Kaneko had hesitantly invited me over, but one glare from Mayu sent him scurrying away.
It was a rescue attempt less reliable than a spider's thread. Though, even if Mayu hadn't been there, I probably would have refused anyway.
Mayu, sitting close beside me, made small talk like, "It's cold again today, huh?" We passed the time, occasionally watching the white ball arc through the air.
We kept our distance from the other girls, and they kept theirs from us. Even the girl who'd recruited Mayu seemed content with just having invited her in; she didn't interact with us any further.
*If I weren't here, maybe they would approach Mayu a little more.*
*Turns out, I guess I'm causing trouble for Mayu in my own way, too.*
*Just as someone pointed out once, I'm contributing to Misono Mayu's isolation.*