Chapter 3: The Things People Leave Behind
1239 Words
People stopped visiting after two weeks.
Grief had an expiration date for most adults.
At first, there were phone calls every morning. Condolences. Prepared meals. Soft voices.
Then gradually—
silence.
Ren noticed the exact moment people stopped speaking to him like a tragedy and started speaking to him like an inconvenience.
His aunt was the first.
“You can’t keep skipping meals.”
“I’m eating.”
“You’re getting thinner.”
“I’ve always been thin.”
“That attitude won’t help you survive.”
Survive.
Adults loved that word.
As if survival itself was meaningful.
Ren sat at the tiny dining table of his aunt’s apartment while cold miso soup rested untouched before him. The television muttered in the background about politics nobody cared about.
Across from him, Aunt Keiko rubbed her temples tiredly.
She wasn’t cruel.
That almost made things worse.
Cruel people were easier to hate.
“You’re returning to school Monday,” she said finally.
Ren stared at the soup.
“Okay.”
“No argument?”
“What’s the point?”
She looked surprised by the answer.
Most people expected emotional reactions from grieving teenagers. Anger. Breakdowns. Rebellion.
Ren simply felt tired.
Exhaustion had settled somewhere inside his bones and refused to leave.
At night he barely slept.
When he did, he dreamed in fragments: Rainwater. Footsteps. His mother’s voice. A smiling man standing beneath flickering lights.
Then morning arrived and the world continued pretending normal things still mattered.
Homework. Attendance. Laundry.
He hated mornings most.
Because for half a second after waking up, he forgot.
Then reality returned all at once.
Every time.
—
Sunday evening, he finally went back to the apartment.
Aunt Keiko insisted on accompanying him, but Ren refused.
“I just need to get some things.”
“You shouldn’t be alone there.”
“I already am.”
The words slipped out before he could stop them.
His aunt flinched slightly.
Guilt followed immediately.
Ren looked away.
“Sorry.”
She sighed quietly.
“You don’t need to apologize for being sad.”
Sad.
If only it were that simple.
The apartment building looked smaller now.
The rain had finally stopped after days of storms, leaving the streets washed pale beneath gray evening skies.
Ren climbed the stairs slowly.
Second floor.
Room 207.
Home.
His key hesitated in the lock.
For one irrational second, he imagined hearing his mother humming inside again.
Then the door opened to silence.
Cold silence.
Not peaceful silence.
Empty silence.
The apartment smelled faintly of detergent and old wood.
Ren stepped inside carefully.
Nothing had moved.
The half-read novel beside the couch remained exactly where his mother left it. A coffee mug still sat near the sink. Her cardigan hung beside the doorway.
He stared at it too long.
Then looked away quickly.
The human brain was cruel.
It preserved ordinary details with terrifying precision after death.
He could remember:
the sound of her slippers against the floor
the way she tucked hair behind her ear while cooking
how she always reheated tea twice because she forgot to drink it
Meanwhile her killer remained faceless in his memory except for cold eyes and a smile.
Ren moved through the apartment mechanically collecting clothes and schoolbooks into a bag.
Then he entered her room.
And stopped.
The bed remained unmade.
Police investigators had searched everything already, leaving subtle signs behind: opened drawers shifted boxes misaligned papers
Yet the room still felt undeniably hers.
Warm somehow.
A faded lavender scent lingered faintly in the air.
Ren sat slowly on the edge of the bed.
The mattress dipped softly beneath him.
And suddenly the exhaustion cracked.
His hands shook violently.
He pressed them against his knees.
Breathe.
Just breathe.
Instead, his eyes landed on something near the nightstand.
A notebook.
Small. Blue cover. Slightly worn.
His mother’s handwriting covered the front:
House Expenses
Ren almost ignored it.
Then something stopped him.
A strange instinct.
He opened the notebook slowly.
Most pages contained ordinary things: rent calculations grocery budgets utility bills
But near the back—
the handwriting changed.
Messier.
Rushed.
A single page.
He stared at the words.
If anything happens to me—
His breathing stopped.
The sentence ended there.
Nothing else followed.
No explanation. No names.
Just those four words.
Ren read them again.
And again.
His heartbeat grew louder.
Something happens to me.
Not “if I die.”
Not “if there’s an accident.”
Something.
Fear crept slowly into his chest.
His mother knew something.
Or suspected something.
Then another detail hit him.
The page beneath looked torn out.
Carefully removed.
Ren’s fingers tightened around the notebook.
Someone had taken something from it.
A sound behind him made him jerk violently.
The apartment door downstairs slammed shut.
Ren froze.
Footsteps echoed faintly from the stairwell.
Slow.
Heavy.
Coming upward.
His pulse exploded instantly.
The man in the rain.
For one horrible second, Ren genuinely believed the killer had returned.
The footsteps stopped outside Apartment 207.
Silence.
Then—
a knock.
Three times.
Exactly like before.
Ren’s blood turned ice cold.
Another knock came.
Calm. Patient.
Ren stood slowly from the bed.
Every instinct screamed at him not to move.
The knock came again.
Then a voice:
“Ren?”
Not the killer.
Detective Kuroda.
Relief hit so suddenly it almost hurt.
Ren opened the door cautiously.
The detective stood outside holding a paper bag and an exhausted expression.
“You weren’t answering your aunt’s calls,” Kuroda said.
Ren blinked. “You know my aunt?”
“She called the station worried.”
“Oh.”
The detective studied his face briefly.
“You alright?”
“No.”
Honest answer.
Kuroda nodded once like he appreciated the honesty.
“I brought food.”
Ren stared at the paper bag.
“Why?”
“Because grieving teenagers usually don’t buy groceries.”
“That sounds judgmental.”
“It’s observational.”
For the first time in days, the corner of Ren’s mouth twitched slightly.
The detective noticed but didn’t comment.
Smart.
Kuroda stepped inside after being invited.
His eyes scanned the apartment carefully—not suspiciously, just professionally.
Then his gaze landed on the notebook in Ren’s hand.
“You find something?”
Ren hesitated.
Then showed him the page.
The detective read it silently.
His expression hardened almost invisibly.
“Was this here before?”
“I don’t know.”
“That torn page matters.”
“You think someone took it?”
“I think your mother was frightened before she died.”
The words settled heavily between them.
Ren looked down.
“I thought maybe I imagined it.”
“What?”
“She’d been acting nervous lately.”
Kuroda was quiet for a moment.
Then:
“You should’ve told us earlier.”
“I didn’t think it mattered.”
The detective exhaled slowly.
“It matters now.”
He carefully took out his phone and photographed the notebook page.
Then he looked at Ren again.
“Did your mother ever mention names? Arguments? Someone bothering her?”
Ren almost answered no.
Then paused.
A memory surfaced slowly.
His mother near the window. Checking the locks twice. A muttered sentence half-overheard days earlier:
“He found me again.”
Ren’s stomach tightened.
“Kuroda…”
The detective immediately focused.
“Yes?”
“I think…” Ren swallowed hard. “I think she knew him.”
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