Chapter 4: Orimoto Suzuka Falls

It seems the girl called Orimoto Suzuka can only be perceived by me. ...Probably.

Her seat has disappeared from the classroom, and whenever Orimoto touches someone, they show strange expressions.

If this is bullying, the scale is far too large.

「...Why can I see her?」

I muttered to no one in particular.

I let slip a murmur and ponder.

Orimoto and I are complete strangers.

At most we're classmates with a tenuous connection... if I had to say something, I witnessed her confession crash-and-burn scene. That's about it, we're practically strangers.

Complete strangers through and through.

The reason why only I can currently perceive Orimoto Suzuka was completely beyond me.

The phenomenon affecting Orimoto just keeps getting worse in a downward spiral. Ever since that day when she exploded emotionally on the blackboard, the situation has remained completely at a standstill.

「Still, there's nothing I can do about it. …Well, whatever happens will happen.」

Saturday, I had left the house for shopping my parents asked me to do. This morning brought heavy rain, and even now in the cleared afternoon, puddles can be spotted scattered across the asphalt. Walking while avoiding them, I inevitably find myself thinking about Orimoto again.

(...But she's becoming quite pitiful.)

Even I, who's just been dragged into this mysterious event, can't help but feel sorry for Orimoto.

Rejected by the boy she likes, ignored by everyone, trudging forward in solitude. The cause remains unknown, but she was definitely a tragic heroine.

「...That girl.」

Heroine isn't an exaggeration.

Orimoto Suzuka is a beautiful girl who deserves to be called a heroine. Her face, her background.

That's why—she naturally stands out wherever she is.

——On my way back from shopping, there she was.

By coincidence, purely by chance.

Orimoto Suzuka was walking with her usual dark expression, wandering aimlessly as she moved forward.

Her steps were narrow, and she carried a somewhat ephemeral air.

For some reason, she's wearing her school uniform even though it's Saturday.

Her shoes are loafers, making her look like she's been left behind on a weekday.

Orimoto walks. Walks. Bumps into someone.

The salaryman turns around once, tilts his head, then starts walking again.

「What did I bump into?」

He spits out those words.

「...Haha, right~. Nobody can see me anyway. ...This sucks.」

Even after getting bumped into, Orimoto doesn't mind, laughing self-deprecatingly from time to time, then looking like she's about to cry as she lowered her eyes and let out a breath.

「...Seriously, we're going the same direction.」

I groaned. We're heading the same way.

I could pass her, but if she happens to talk to me, that would be troublesome.

But constantly walking behind her might make her think I'm tailing her, which would also be problematic.

Standing around would be weird too.

More importantly, it looks like it's going to rain again.

Unfortunately, I don't have an umbrella, and wasteful expenses like buying one at a convenience store are out of the question.

After pondering for a while, I decided to observe Orimoto's movements from a distance behind her.

It wasn't just at school.

Orimoto wasn't being acknowledged by anyone. Even when she bumps into people, they either tilt their heads or complain to someone other than Orimoto.

Even though colliding with such a beautiful girl should make any man eager to strike up a relationship, Orimoto was still being ignored.

I can't make out Orimoto's purpose as she walks.

Before I knew it, my main objective had shifted from going home to secretly following her without being noticed.

It's curiosity, but I definitely had an intuition that I shouldn't ignore her like everyone else. Maybe that's just an excuse I want to give someone.

The first place she visited was a pet shop.

「So cute~!! There, there!」

Unexpected baby talk.

It's the volume of someone who doesn't think anyone's listening.

Orimoto's voice carries well even in the commotion. She was talking to a puppy in a gentle, cute voice.

「Papa~! There's a doggy here!」

「Oi oi, don't pull hard.」

But when a family appeared, she moved aside.

Rather, the family squeezed in to look at the puppy.

Orimoto sadly leaves that spot.

The puppy seemed more energetic running around in front of the family than it did with Orimoto. That was just hopeless, utterly hopeless.

「——Ah, this book!」

At the bookstore, she picked up a book that caught her interest.

A love story that's all the rage among women. A new release that just came out. Since I serve as a library committee member, I'm knowledgeable about such things.

When the clerk muttered "Huh? It's not there", Orimoto quietly put the book back in its original position.

Immediately, the clerk resumed arranging the display with a relieved expression.

I can't help but watch her every gesture.

(Where is she going next...)

After visiting several places, the time naturally becomes evening.

The evening glow illuminates her chestnut-colored hair. The weather forecast was wrong. The water on the asphalt has evaporated at some point, exposing the hard ground.

The sound of her loafers reached my ears. Stairs, stairs. My cheeks twitched.

An unpleasant premonition throbbed painfully in my mind.

「——Oi, oi oi!」

I was stunned. I gasp.

She was walking upward. Shock leaks from my mouth. The location was what it was.

No way. That's not happening.

Orimoto quietly continues climbing those stairs one step at a time, but steadily. Her hand resting on the footbridge railing. I agonized repeatedly over what I should do.

I can objectively agree that she's being driven to desperation. From my perspective, she was definitely empty.

Looking back at the past, I have no memory of the girl called Orimoto Suzuka being so continuously depressed.

While she was content to be a member of Sera's harem, she had always remained the cheerful center of the class, the Orimoto standing there bears no resemblance to that girl.

She's not a different person, but if she were introduced as one, I might have to reluctantly agree.

「What should I do? No, it's not decided that's what she's doing yet. ...But maybe I should stop her.」

I don't know. I don't know, but as someone who continues walking the loner's path, I can't fully understand the feelings of celebrities or the psychology of popular people, but when a person has hit rock bottom, there's something I can somewhat understand.

That might be boasting, but in any case, it's dangerous.

Suicide? Would Orimoto choose that?

It seems extreme as a choice to make from just a few days of being ignored. But maybe she has a surprisingly sensitive personality that's easily influenced.

If I'm going to stop her, I need to talk to her.

I can't pull off the clever trick of preventing suicide while pretending it's a coincidence. But if I call out to her, it means getting involved with someone who's been cut off from existence.

What would that mean... it would probably get quite troublesome.

Help her and that's the end.

It won't be that simple.

「...Ahh, damn. Can't be helped...!」

If the melancholy Orimoto jumped from the footbridge, I probably wouldn't be able to process how to face that fact afterward.

Moreover, if her traces of having lived remain erased even after her death, the person who knows the truth might end up being just me.

A vicious cycle of being manipulated by implanted guilt that no one else can understand.

The time to speak has arrived.

That's all there is to it, and today was that day.

I searched for an excuse to convince myself.

Whatever happens will happen, was that me talking to her? What should I do, what should I do?

「Should the first words be "Oi"? Rather than being high-handed, would "excuse me" or something be better?」

Following behind as I rushed up the footbridge, Orimoto was leaning against the railing, shielding herself from the setting sun with her hand. The crimson profile is dazzling and hard to make out, but she's definitely standing there.

Chestnut-colored hair. Slender limbs.

Her face reigns several levels above cheap words like "celebrity", and she hardly looks like just a high school student. When I tried to open my mouth, a lump of air got stuck in my throat. Orimoto just narrowed her eyes quietly, gazing silently at the city.

There's a flow of people. A student passes by me.

An elderly man passes behind Orimoto.

In a place with definite liveliness and commotion, only she, or perhaps even I, was in silence.

I don't know what I should talk about; overwhelmed by the atmosphere, the words just won't come out.

「...I wonder why. How did it turn out like this? Yeah, what happened to me?」

It was flat narration.

There's no emotion seeping into it.

It contradicts the tone of voice she had just recently when she was expressing her emotions so vividly.

It's not particularly a statement directed at me, and I have no obligation to think about it, but I don't know what happened to her.

Rather, if there were someone who had the answer, this wouldn't have happened already.

The silver lining was that she didn't seem to be in the mood for suicide. I had rushed after her in a panic, but it wasn't an immediate——situation.

However, having come this far, turning back would be questionable. Climbing a footbridge only to neither cross nor descend would be undeniably strange behavior.

She hasn't noticed me yet, but eventually she will. Since Orimoto was faithfully coming to school every morning, she'll probably continue the same way next week. It's just a matter of sooner or later.

(…Oi oi, at this rate you might collide.)

Suddenly, a large man stepped onto the footbridge crossing. He was a rough-looking guy who walked with his shoulders.

I shouldn't judge by appearances, but his roughness was obvious at first glance. The man advances with a brazen attitude, paying no attention to his surroundings.

Wrinkles between his eyebrows. His lips pursed, he was the type no one would want to get involved with.

When he bumps into an elderly person halfway through, he only glares threateningly. There's not a fragment of an apology.

「——Tch, you're in the way, idiot.」

When the man approached Orimoto, he spoke in a rough tone. His hoarse, crushed voice is intimidating.

「Hya, I'm sorry! W-Was that me...?! Ah, I guess not...」

For a moment I was surprised, thinking he had spoken to Orimoto, but that wasn't the case—the man seemed to be picking a fight with a different salaryman. The flustered salaryman meekly stepped aside——and collided with Orimoto.

「Ah.」

「Ah.」

My bewilderment overlapped with Orimoto's.

A collision that should never have happened. An event that shouldn't have occurred. But right now, it's an emergency situation.

Therefore, it's beyond the framework of normalcy.

Just a moment's carelessness. Or perhaps just a moment's shift in center of gravity.

In any case, Orimoto Suzuka's body lost its balance, was pulled by gravity, and with obedient compliance to the laws of physics, swayed unsteadily.

Then she tilts. Outside the railing.

That way is the ground. Yes. The ground. Asphalt. The worst possible choice as a landing spot for a fall from height. Only ground. No matter how many times I say it, there's nothing but ground there. It was an unforeseeable contact.

「——! Hold on!」

Shouting, the time until I rushed over was several seconds.

Called by name by me, Orimoto falls toward the other side of the railing with an indescribable expression, a mix of fear of falling, shock at being called, and question marks about the fact that it's me, a stranger, calling her. Those few seconds felt long, far too long.

「Make it in time, damn it!」

Don't ask the impossible of someone from the going-home club, I grumble at the current situation, but surprisingly my hand seems likely to reach.

Don't underestimate the going-home club.

From an outsider's perspective, a male student suddenly shouting and extending his arm.

Now I'm definitely exposed to curious stares.

「——Got you. Don't struggle!」

My shout was reflexive.

I thought the idea of your body moving before you think was just a cheesy manga thing——but to think it would happen to me.

「Wha, eh, eh?! What what what?!」

Orimoto blinks her eyes. Well, of course.

She was about to fall and got grabbed, and the one who grabbed her is a classmate who's practically a stranger.

At this point, it would be natural for her to be surprised, and if she weren't surprised, that would be scary in its own way.

「Just don't let go!」

My tone became like shouting, but it was my honest feeling.

I didn't have the luxury of putting on airs.

My outstretched right hand was firmly grasping Orimoto's thin arm. If I had been even one beat slower, she would have already been slammed into the ground and expressing her misery at full force.

Relief and at the same time, the responsibility that I have to pull her up.

I have no spare attention for the surroundings, much less time to think calmly. But I definitely heard a suspicious voice saying "What's up with that guy?"

Shut up. Shut up.

That can wait.

I don't care about the spectators.

If I let go of my hand, Orimoto will probably die, and this numbness is proof that I'm holding on, so hauling her up should definitely come first.

My shoulder made a cracking sound. I'm used to being a loner but not used to manual labor.

「I'll listen to complaints later! I'm pulling with all my strength! Put up with a few scrapes!」

「You can see me?!」

「If I couldn't see you, I wouldn't be talking to you like this or grabbing your arm! Besides, how do you have the composure to talk so much in a crisis?!」

「You're talking more than me though?!」

I had thought I was naturally taciturn, but apparently it's different in emergencies.

Like a faucet with a broken packing, meaningless words flow out torrentially.

I clenched my back teeth and focused on my lower limbs, as if resisting the gravity and energy trying to drag her over to the other side of the railing.

「You can really see me?! Nobody could see me, eh, but why? Why?!」

「Save that for later! You'll die!」

With a click of my tongue, I pulled her arm like hauling in a rope. I won't accept complaints even if it leaves marks. I'm doing my best in my own way.

「What's that guy doing?」

「Eh, isn't that creepy? Should I record this?」

Oi, stop that.

I'm shouting, having a conversation, extending my arm and breaking out in cold sweat, but please spare me from being recorded.

Also, people these days record everything too much. What the hell, most people have no interest in others, yet they pretend to be interested──!!

In the end of my internal ranting, smartphones pointed at me multiple times. Lenses impossible to dodge.

「Be grateful, you bastard! I'm the one who got dragged into this!」

If I were to call it a blessing in disguise.

Orimoto's upper body, thrown outside the railing, bends somewhat and is being drawn by gravity.

But I can still pull her up.

「Everyone was ignoring me! Do you think I'm the crazy one, or is everyone else crazy?!」

「How should I know?! Don't ask me!」

——And so.

Through that exchange, I successfully pulled Orimoto back, and Orimoto stared intently at the face of me, her rescuer.

A few seconds of consideration. Then she blinks.

「.........Ah, Kasugai-kun...?」