The night in Tokyo was bustling with activity, especially around the shopping district in Ueno. The massive crystal chandeliers sparkled with dazzling light, illuminating the entire building as if it were daytime. From the ground floor of the mall, one could look up and see the bustling crowd spiraling upward on the escalators.
Dropping two people into such a massive flow of shoppers was like tossing two drops of water into the ocean—it didn't cause even the slightest ripple.
Of course, this was assuming Kitagawa Ryo's identity remained undiscovered.
Adjusting the wide-brimmed hat on his head and wearing a mask that left only his eyes visible, Kitagawa Ryo made sure his face was mostly concealed before turning to Hoshino Ai beside him:
"Let's go in."
Hoshino Ai nodded. Her level of fame wasn't anywhere near Kitagawa Ryo's, so she simply wore a baseball cap as usual. Even if someone caught a glimpse of her face, they'd only think she was a pretty girl.
To avoid unnecessary trouble, Toshirou Kindaichi had specifically arranged for an adult to accompany the two children, also responsible for paying and carrying bags.
The person Kindaichi had called to chaperone them was someone both Kitagawa Ryo and Hoshino Ai knew—Kabuto Katsuya, Kindaichi's junior from drama school and a former member of the LALALAI Theater during his university years.
However, after graduating, Kabuto hadn't chosen to become an actor. Instead, he leveraged his connections to become a producer in the industry. It was through him that Hoshino Ai had been introduced to the LALALAI Theater's acting training program during a fashion magazine photoshoot.
Having been in the industry for several years, Kabuto had shed the naivety of his graduation days and had become quite smooth in his dealings. This was one of the reasons Kindaichi had entrusted him with overseeing Kitagawa Ryo and Hoshino Ai's outing.
Kabuto maintained a slight distance, walking a step behind the two, his arms casually resting behind his head, looking every bit like a parent taking his kids shopping.
"Should we hold hands? It feels like there are a lot of people here."
Kitagawa Ryo glanced at the crowd inside the mall and blinked at Hoshino Ai, suggesting it himself.
"Sure."
Hoshino Ai didn't think much of it. She took two steps forward to walk side by side with Kitagawa Ryo and reached out her left hand, trying to naturally find his right hand. But when their hands actually touched, her mind went blank, unsure how to hold his hand or what posture to use.
B-Komachi had only debuted less than a year ago, and their popularity hadn't reached the point of holding fan meet-and-greets. Hoshino Ai tried to recall footage she'd seen of other idols shaking hands with fans at events—they smiled sincerely, gently holding fans' hands with both of theirs while expressing gratitude for their support.
No, no, that's not helpful at all.
Ryo isn't my fan, and I can't use both hands to hold his right now.
A flood of questions rushed into her mind.
If I only interlock the upper part of our fingers, would it be too loose and easily broken apart by the crowd?
If I interlace our fingers, would that be too intimate?
Considering Ryo's hand is noticeably smaller than mine, maybe I should just completely envelop his hand in my palm?
Kitagawa Ryo could sense that Hoshino Ai had a lot of thoughts about his right hand. Her fingertips occasionally brushed against his palm, as if she were caught in some internal dilemma. He decided to take the initiative and simply held her left hand.
It was just a simple handhold.
Their palms pressed together, fingertips resting on the back of each other's hands.
This wasn't the first time Hoshino Ai had held Kitagawa Ryo's hand, but unlike the dark movie theater, the bright lights of the mall made her inexplicably nervous. It felt like she was displaying her treasure in front of everyone, and she instinctively pulled her hand slightly toward herself.
But Kitagawa Ryo, completely unaware, had already taken a step into the mall. With one leading and the other following, their joined hands suddenly hung in the air, as if deliberately put on display.
"Huh? What's wrong?"
Kitagawa Ryo felt Hoshino Ai's hesitation and turned to look at her, puzzled.
It was just holding hands. Kids shopping in the mall were all holding their parents' hands, and even occasionally breaking free to run a few steps ahead to press their faces against the windows of their favorite toy stores required a bit of courage.
At this time of day, the mall was filled with couples of all ages. Many girls clung to their boyfriends' arms like koalas, occasionally giggling softly in their ears or acting cute.
And the couples sitting on the benches in the rest area seemed to have forgotten they were in a public space, practically entwined like two snakes. Kitagawa Ryo even saw a high school girl sitting directly on her boyfriend's lap, their arms wrapped around each other's necks, kissing passionately as if no one else was around.
"It's nothing. It's just my first time in such a big mall."
Hoshino Ai calmly replied, catching up to him and asking:
"Do you come here often, Ryo?"
"Not really. Maybe once every two or three months."
"But it's usually just to buy snacks. This is the first time I've come here to buy clothes."
Kitagawa Ryo shook his head and explained.
"Huh? Why?"
Hoshino Ai asked curiously.
"Because I'm currently under two long-term endorsements for children's clothing brands."
Kitagawa Ryo pointed to the clothes he was wearing and explained somewhat helplessly:
"Whether it's for official events or casual wear, my wardrobe only has clothes from these two brands. It's basically a brand lock-in. If I'm caught wearing other brands' clothes in private, it could cause unnecessary drama."
"Including that orange-flavored toothpaste you're so fond of. After using it for a few years, even I couldn't stand the taste anymore. So, I use other brands in private, but I make sure to remove all the packaging and labels."
"…I didn't realize there were so many rules."
Hoshino Ai nodded thoughtfully. Unconsciously, she had already started to get used to the feeling of Kitagawa Ryo's hand in hers. When they first held hands, his hand felt cool and quiet, like a river pebble or a stone step on an autumn morning.
But after holding on for a while, their hands felt as if they had always been connected, hanging weightlessly between them, sharing each other's warmth. Their fingertips occasionally brushed against the back of each other's hands, like a fish's lips lightly grazing the swaying river grass.
"By the way, do you have any favorite types of clothes?"
Kitagawa Ryo asked as he looked around at the children's clothing stores on this floor. Hoshino Ai only had a few sets of clothes, all of them dull and gray.
"Dresses? Fancy outfits? Or something else?"
Hoshino Ai just shook her head blankly. She looked at the brightly dressed peers walking past her and suddenly felt like the scene before her was distorted.
"I've seen other women in life—what are they like? They step out of colorful little cars, walk past sweaty policemen busy maintaining order, and go to the TOHO Cinema to watch international film festival entries. Oh, their faces, so smooth and radiant, like gifts wrapped in cellophane!"
The lines from the character Lyalya in the script naturally surfaced in her mind.
"I… don't know."
In that moment, Hoshino Ai felt like everything around her—the golden crystal chandelier above, the dazzling storefronts, and the people chatting and laughing as they passed by—all blurred, as if it were an unreal dream.
But then, like an anchor connecting her to the world, Hoshino Ai felt Kitagawa Ryo's hand gently squeeze hers.
"Then let's try everything."
"You're a cute girl, so you'd look cute in anything."
Kitagawa Ryo said this as if it were the most natural thing in the world.
Watching Hoshino Ai enter the fitting room with the clothes, Kitagawa Ryo and Kabuto Katsuya both let out a sigh of relief and sat down on a bench outside the store.
The children's clothing store they had chosen happened to be across from a bookstore. On the promotional banner outside, Kitagawa Ryo immediately spotted the parenting book his adoptive parents had "authored," which he had signed copies of just a few days ago.
When he had first received the sample copy, Kitagawa Ryo had flipped through it himself. Admittedly, the ghostwriter the couple had hired was quite skilled, weaving together a whole book of nonsense by combining various classic theories from child psychology.
But some of the theoretical knowledge in it was actually quite practical.
Kitagawa Ryo propped his head up and looked at the banner that read, "Endorsed by Swiss child psychologist Jean Piaget and American child psychologist James Dobson! Essential knowledge about parenting you must know in your lifetime!" He recalled a quote he had seen on the book's title page.
"The mind does not originate from innate maturity or from acquired experience, but from action. Action is the source of knowledge and the medium of interaction between subject and object. The earliest actions are innate, unconditional reflexes. From birth, children respond to external stimuli with various unconditional reflexes, signaling their needs, interacting with their environment, and thus constructing their psyche, which is then expressed through action." —Jean Piaget
Over the past year of interacting with Hoshino Ai, Kitagawa Ryo had noticed some unique psychological and behavioral traits she harbored, including but not limited to an excessive fixation on so-called "love" and a suppressed tendency toward self-destruction.
And today, Kitagawa Ryo noticed something else.
Hoshino Ai seemed overly sensitive to external sounds.
Kitagawa Ryo had watched her live performances before. At first, he had simply thought she had a good sense of pitch, but as they spent more time together, it seemed there was more to it.
Earlier, while they were looking for a suitable store, a customer on the other side had accidentally dropped their glass, which shattered loudly on the floor. The staff had handled it quickly, cleaning up the glass and water within a minute.
While many people had been momentarily distracted by the sharp sound, Kitagawa Ryo, holding Hoshino Ai's left hand, could clearly feel her body tremble noticeably at that moment.
Even though they were quite far away, it was as if the sound had exploded right next to her ear.
Kitagawa Ryo remembered Toshirou Kindaichi mentioning that Hoshino Ai's background was different from his. Before being sent to the orphanage, she had been from a single-parent household. In other words, she had spent a significant portion of her childhood with her mother.
After her mother was imprisoned for theft, Hoshino Ai had been temporarily placed in the orphanage. But when her mother was released and subsequently disappeared, Hoshino Ai had remained in the orphanage until a year ago, when the president of Ichigo Pro, Saitou, had taken her in as a foster child.
What did her mother mean to Hoshino Ai?
Kitagawa Ryo wasn't sure, because in truth, he couldn't answer that question himself.
Neither in his past life nor in this one had he ever met his mother.
That was why, back in the hospital, he had been so fixated on other people's mothers—twenty-year-olds, forty-year-olds, sixty-year-olds, eighty-year-olds. It was as if by seeing enough of other people's mothers, he could piece together the vague image of his own.
He remembered rambling on about this topic with Sarina back then. Thinking about it now, it felt like it had just happened yesterday.
To this day, Kitagawa Ryo hadn't watched a single second of the exclusive behind-the-scenes footage of He Once Lived.
Memories are strange things. When one side is missing, it feels like all your past experiences have fallen into a black hole of time with them. Every word, every sentence, feels like a skeleton left behind by time, worthless.
But when those memories are exposed to the public, it feels like pristine snow being trampled by careless feet, like a treasured possession being hoisted up on a pole for everyone to comment on.
The dead are both the most respected and the least respected presence on the internet.
So, over the past few months, Kitagawa Ryo had avoided searching for anything related to Sarina.
Looking back now, part of the reason he had resolved to send the Kitagawa couple to prison might have been because of this.
From the moment they had brazenly said, "Your guardian and her guardian have both agreed," he had already made up his mind.
If he ever achieved that goal, he would visit Sarina's grave again.
"How do I look?"
Hoshino Ai pushed open the fitting room door, appearing before Kitagawa Ryo like Cinderella under a spell.
"Hmm, you look great."
Kitagawa Ryo smiled and replied.
Hoshino Ai and Tendouji Sarina had once been peers.
But not anymore.
One was thirteen, soon to be fourteen, fifteen, sixteen.
The other would forever be twelve.
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"Haha… you're mistaken."
"It's not Ryo."
Mechanically typing out this response, Kitagawa Ruby turned off her phone as if to escape reality and buried her head under the blankets.