𝐂𝐇𝐎𝐊𝐄 • Chishiya Shuntarō

XXIV: MEMORIES

No one had came to visit Hana in the hospital. She wasn't surprised. The nurse told her that she'd actually went away for a minute. One minute. It didn't feel like a minute.

Her injuries weren't too bad. She was actually one of the lucky ones. So many people had died. She listened to the names on the TV. Karube, Chota, Shibuki, Tatta. They all sounded familiar. She didn't know anyone with those names, yet she still somehow mourned their deaths.

She was given the freedom to walk around the hospital for a bit. She stopped at a wall which was covered in pictures. Photos of the doctors and staff, mainly.

She was looking for a photo with her nurse in it, but her eyes landed on someone else. A doctor with dyed grey hair. Shoulder length, tied back. She stopped one of the janitors as he was walking by.

"Excuse me," she said, "Who is that?"

"That's one of our doctors, Chishiya. He was in the explosion."

"Is he alive?"

"Think so. You know him?"

"I don't know."

The janitor gave her a weird look, before walking away. Hana stayed staring at the picture for a minute, trying to figure out where she'd seen his face before. Nothing came to her.

She continued walking through the hospital, seeing faces. Faces that she seemed to recognise, but she didn't know where from. Then, it came to her in the worst way possible.

She stood, watching as a girl in a pink shirt made her way over to her mother, who was sat in a wheelchair. She recognised her. She felt connected to her. Kuina. That was her name. Her name was Kuina. How did she know her name?

She walked away. Maybe she'd spoken to her before the explosion and forgot about the encounter. Yeah. That was a common thing, right? Amnesia. That's all it was. That was normal when you have trauma, physical and mental.

Then, she was hit with a curveball. She was heading back to her room, she couldn't take the confusion anymore, when she ran right into someone's chest. She looked up, seeing another familiar face. He had dark, messy hair. His name was Arisu. How did she know that? A million questions a minute ran through her head. What was going on?

Then, she looked at his face again, and it all came back to her. The games. The other world. Pick A Door, Tag, Witch Hunt, King of Spades. All of the games she'd completed with him. Chishiya, her boyfriend. But how did all of that happen if she was only gone for a minute?

"Hello?" Arisu said, breaking her out of her thoughts, "Are you okay?"

"Arisu! Please, tell me you remember!" Hana said.

"Hana? I thought I was the only one."

"So everyone else forgot?"

"Usagi did, and I've seen some of the others. They haven't said anything to me."

"So Chishiya doesn't remember me."

"I doubt it. I'm really sorry, Hana." Arisu pulled her into a hug. "Who knows? Maybe you can be something in this world, too. He's here, he must be. Everyone in that other world were people in the explosion, people who are here now."

"How can we be something when he doesn't even know who I am?"

"You start again. It'll be tough, but if you love him, you have to try."

"You're right. Thank you, Arisu."

After that, Arisu and Hana exchanged numbers. Arisu was her first friend in the other world, and he was no her first friend in this one.

Hana went back to her room after that. She needed sleep. All of her trauma had came back, only to fin out it wasn't real. She felt pathetic for feeling so traumatised by one dream, and even more pathetic for falling in love in it. What was weird was that her and Arisu had the exact same dream. Maybe it wasn't a dream, after all. She tried not to dwell on it. Whatever it was, be it a dream or a reality, it was over now.

After a nap, she woke up to footsteps walking into her room, looking up to see her brother, Daisuke. The brother who'd gotten beat because of a mistake that she made. He'd came all the way from the US?

"Daisuke?" She asked.

"I've missed you, little sis," Daisuke said.

"How long have you been here?"

"Well, I heard about your new house and wanted to visit you. I've been staying in a hotel since last week, a few days before the explosion. I've been putting off coming to see you for the past two days because I was scared you wouldn't wanna see me. I mean, I practically abandoned you."

"I get it, Daisuke. I do. You didn't wanna be reminded of our parents. I mean, I stayed with them and was sucking up to them up until now. If I was, Hiro or Momo, I wouldn't talk to me either. I'm just glad you decided to visit me. I was getting a little lonely."

"You doing any better?"

"I'm not in as much pain. I've been walking around a little, and I actually seem to be in better condition than most people."

"The nurse told me you threw up a peace sign before going into cardiac arrest."

"I did? Wow. I guess I'm chill like that. Hey, you weren't involved in the explosion, where you?"

"No. I heard it, but I bet everyone in Japan did. I wasn't hurt, though. When I got the call about you, I felt my heart drop."

"Do Hiro and Momo know?"

"Yeah. Hiro says he's sorry he can't make it."

"And Momo?"

"Well, she's Momo. Sorry, sis."

"It's fine, we never got along super well, anyway."

"Yeah. So, what's been going on with you?"

"I'm studying film production. Mom and dad aren't happy about it, they really thought I was gonna do some sort of sport."

"With all those sports they had you doing, I'm surprised, too."

"Please, I never wanna look at a gym again. I gotta say, though, the skills I picked up have came in handy."

"I bet."