Yuzuki was taken by ambulance to a hospital in Warsaw.

In the ambulance were myself, a man and a woman who seemed to be involved in the management of the hospital.

While Yuzuki was being examined, I was absent-mindedly looking at the statue of Christ in the hospital. Then Ranko-san and Sosuke-san appeared. They must have followed the ambulance.

We exchanged puzzled glances and fell silent. We were at a loss for words.

Yuzuki came back to us. Someone had put a coat over her red dress. She was still crying hard.

“Yakumo-kun! Yakumo-kun…!”

I hugged her. I looked over my shoulder at her parents. They looked hurt, devastated, indescribable. Yuzuki completely ignored her parents and started walking alone toward the exit. While I was gone, things had gotten a lot worse than I imagined, it seemed.

Before I followed her outside, I decided to tell them. They deserved to know.

“She has the Chloride Blight…”

Ranko-san covered her mouth. Sousuke-san’s mouth dropped open.

I chased after Yuzuki.

 　　　２

She sat on the hotel bed and wept. It went on forever.

I sat next to her and patted her back.

We hadn’t exchanged a single word. Which word would suffice in a situation like this? She was in the middle of what could have been the greatest moments in her life and then… and then she was confirmed that she would turn to salt and die within a year or so. 

I was filled with disbelief. What kind of a wicked joke was this?

She cried until three in the morning, when she collapsed onto the bed, as though a puppet’s strings were cut.

Concerned, I quickly checked her pulse and breathing, but she was fine. I adjusted her posture so she wouldn’t have neck pain the next day and settled myself down on the sofa.

A little searching told me that her case had caused quite a stir on the internet. Her finger falling off was broadcast in real time, and too many people had witnessed it to cover up. “Chloride Blight” was translated and defined in many languages across the globe. The disease that was almost unknown exploded into the public’s consciousness in the matter of hours.

The official video archive of the performance had, of course, cut off that section. Unsurprisingly, someone had saved it in time and posted it on the internet.

What was so amusing about someone dying?!

I closed my phone and glanced at her finger. It was wrapped in cloth and left on the table. I pulled up the cloth a little. About two thirds had already turned to fine salt, making the remaining flesh even more grotesque. Horror stricken, I quickly rewrapped it in cloth.

I thought of Mom.

I fell into half-sleep, occasionally keeping watch of Yuzuki, hoping that she won’t commit suicide.

 　　　３

The next day, the results of the International Chopin Competition were announced. This was the moment that marks a pianist’s turning point, where one will be showered with accolades and go on to a glorious career…

We didn’t watch the results. She woke up the next morning and sat on the bed, not bothering to turn on the light. We sat together in the semi-darkness. It was not until much later that we learned that Yuzuki had won a special prize, receiving rave reviews from the jury and the audience.

Yuzuki was dead quiet. She was neither crying nor smiling. She blinked at regular intervals and occasionally glanced to her left.

We boarded an evening flight together to Italy. It was a two-hour direct flight. I couldn’t bear the silence, so I spoke to her several times. Yuzuki, however, only gave me vague and indifferent replies.

I called a cab from Milan Malpensa Airport to Yuzuki’s apartment. It was a beautiful white-walled building with a stylish green balustrade on the balcony. It was so spacious that it was hard to believe that she was living alone; there was even a room with a grand piano. 

Yuzuki took off her coat and went to the room. On top of the piano was the familiar Anpanman doll. She passed her eyes over it calmly, dropped her gaze to the piano keys and burst into tears.

She wept for three days and three nights.

I was at my wits’ end, but I managed to move on for Yuzuki’s sake. I shopped in confusion in a foreign city, cooked a dish using a recipe I found on the Internet, and brought it to the room where she was crying.

“Sorry, I don’t want to eat.

She did not eat for two whole days. Even after that much time, she was still crying tears of sorrow as thick as melted blue paint. I thought that soon he would turn the room into a sea of blue, sink the piano, drown her, and everything else.

Tremendous blossomed from the blank space where her finger was. Trying to make up for it, I ate all the leftover food, even Yuzuki’s, while feeling like throwing up.

On the morning of the third day, Yuzuki ate some sliced oranges. She had dark circles under her eyes. It was as if the color of sadness had soaked her eyes. Even then, she didn’t eat much.

“Thank you…Yakumo…kun…” Then she began to cry again.

Midnight– I woke up to the sound of a piano.

Yuzuki was tapping on the keyboard. In my sleep-deprived mind, I thought of an African elephant. The mother had died and was lying on the ground, slowly left behind by the herd’s march. The child elephant, perhaps unable to comprehend its mother’s death, probes the body with its trunk, kicking the corpse as if to say “Wake up already.”

Tink. Tink. Incoherent sorrowful notes filled the room.

As my eyes became brighter and the sound of her crying came closer to my ears. I then noticed that the piano was laced with hatred. It was hatred as the reverse of love. She had devoted her life to piano, and had been rewarded with. And then everything crumbled, love to hatred. I felt her urge to smash the board every time she pulled up her hand, but as she brought her hand down, it slowed. How could she smash it? After all the hours spent praying, all the hours she drew her dream with it. The notes were her lament.

—Don’t leave me. Don’t leave me alone. The notes pleaded.

 　　　４

On the morning of the fourth day, I woke up to a pleasant aroma and found the plates lined up on the dining table.

I looked into the kitchen and saw her chopping her knife to the nostalgic rhythm. Thud-tok-tok-pok-pok-tok. She wore a green apron with her hair tied back in a ponytail. I could see the line of her glistening white neck. She added another plate to the table. 

I watched her work in a daze, half stunned.

“Good morning, Yakumo-kun.”

She smiled sweetly when I got up. The dark circles under her eyes were gone.

She gestured to the table, so I took seat. The table was adorned with delicious looking foods. Perfectly browned bread, consomme soup, caprese, bacon and eggs, orange juice… bright, bright colors that made you wonder where the blue of yesterday’s sadness had gone.

“Itadakimasu”

It was a simple breakfast. The taste was delectable. Yuzuki ate well.

She asked what I have been doing while she cried. 

“Nothing, besides trying to cook and failing,” I answered.

She guffawed, throwing her head back. She drank the orange juice and resumed her meal. After the meal was over, she cleared away the dishes. Kacha-kacha-clang-clack-kacha-kacha

 “Yakumo-kun, an aspiring novelist, don’t you have a novel to write?” With that, she chased me off to clack away at the keyboard, while she herself cleaned the room.

I thought I heard the sound of something being ground, and then a nice aroma came in, and the door opened with a clank, and she appeared.

“Good work.” she put down the coffee with a thump.

I took a sip. It was good coffee.

As I start typing away again, I receive a text message. It was from Furuta.

[Yakumo-kun, I haven’t heard from you lately]

My mind recounted my fast-paced life of late, I pushed it out of my mind. [I’m still writing, as usual] I typed.

[Maybe you might want to try writing a mediocre rom-com]

As usual, he offered no context whatsoever. I snort, typing back to him.

[What do you mean?]

[Empty your head. Write whatever you want. That might be just what you needed.]

[Stop with that ambiguous wording. What are you, a fortune teller? In the first place “what I want” is too vague. I can’t think of any]

[Huuh? But I can think of one though!]

[That is?]

[Boobs! I like boobs!!]

[TN: wtf]

Was this guy really in his thirties?

 　　　５

In the evening, we watched Cinema Paradiso together.

The next paragraphs will contain spoilers, so if you have not seen the movie, please watch it before reading. It was a masterpiece. Personally, I recommend the theatrical version over the full length.

The last scene. The main character watched a film of a love scene that was once deleted from a movie, and laughed and cried with nostalgia for the past. This beautiful scene brought tears to both of us. The movie ended and the credits rolled. The darkened room was illuminated by the blue-white light of the TV. We looked at each other in the half light.

The dark circles returned to her eyes. She covered them well with makeup.

She seemed to notice that I saw through the makeup. “You know, Tanaka Kiyoko-sensei was diagnosed with connective tissue disease when she was in her mid thirties. She couldn’t play the piano since then. Now I understand that frustration. The symptoms were also said to make her feel like being sliced by small knives all over. However, she continued to nurture various pupils and lived stoutly until the end… I’ve decided to follow her example. I’ll stop wasting my time crying and live the best out of my remaining life.”

Yuzuki surprised me again. Her strength was incredible. Even when she lost her piano, she decided to fill the horrible musicless silence with the vigor of her life.

As I remained silent, awed, she continued.

“Yakumo-kun… have you kissed before?”

My shoulders jumped. I looked at Yuzuki in surprise. She was staring at the menu screen, where the end roll had just finished playing. She must have asked that question because of the rainy kiss scene in the end.

“N-never.”

“Me too.”

Her response was curt, uncertain, and a little nervous.

“You want to?”

“Not really…but…”

“Then you don’t have to force yourself.”

Her left eyebrow twitched.

“Yeah.” The movie ended. “I’m going to bed. Good night.”

She stood up, went to the bathroom, brushed her teeth, and crawled into bed without taking a bath.