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But something was wrong. There was blood on her hands.

I didn’t know how I got myself into the garden.

Mina was standing in the garden like a sleepwalker, unaware of my presence. She didn’t lift her head, just stared ahead. I had a crazy idea that she had come here unconsciously.

“Mina!” I called out, rushing forward in an attempt to reconnect with her. She was still wearing her school uniform, but I couldn’t see her backpack anywhere. I tried to see if she was injured; my sensors couldn’t find any cuts on her. Fortunately, it wasn’t her blood.

“Mina!” I grabbed her by the shoulders, shaking her to bring to her senses. “Mina!”

She startled as if waking from a dream, the dead look in her eyes disappearing. As she raised her head and met my gaze, her eyes filled instantly, tears began streaming down her cheeks. I waited. I didn’t take my eyes off her, afraid even to blink.

“Remi…” Mina moved her dry lips weakly.

Then she screamed.

She crouched down, couldn’t stand any longer, but I caught her before she fell. She was clutching the fabric of my jacket, her hands shaking like an old person’s.

“I-I-I…”

She struggled to speak, her chest heaving. I handed her a paper bag to breathe into, but her coughing only intensified. She screamed again, shouting with all her might, expelling the pain inside her. She tried to break free, but I wouldn’t let her go. It felt like I was holding a prisoner on an electric chair.

“I did it!”

She shouted, then pulled her hair down, but I held her wrists, preventing her hair from being torn out.

“I… I ran away. I left Eli b-b-behind. Her father… they…”

“What, Mina? What happened?” I raised my tone to be heard, to remind her I was still there to support her. Realizing her own screams were being drowned out by my voice, her eyes rolled back even further. She pushed me away hard.

“Leave me alone!”

My jaw clenched. I grabbed her arm and pulled her close.

“What the hell is going on, Mina?”

“Eli died!”

She screamed it like she wanted the whole world to hear. Her head fell back, her eyes finding the sky as the tears finally broke.

“Her father killed her. Fuck, they killed each other!”

My gaze darted from feature to feature across her face. She shook her head nonstop, as though she could blot out the images from her mind.

“I couldn’t do anything, anything! Anything! She told me to run, and I ran. I… I… I just ran! I ran! I’m a coward, I…”

Without letting her continue more, I pulled her into an embrace. She tried to push me again, but her weak arms were not strong enough.

“Le… Let go…”

I didn’t. Instead, I stroked her hair, brushing a lingering kiss against her temple. “Let’s go and see.”

A startled sob escaped her lips. “What?”

“Let’s go there and check, Mina. You didn’t run away from anything, you won’t run away. That’s not who you are.”

When she suddenly threw me to the ground, I felt a sense of deja vu. I looked up and caught the same darkness in her eyes again. The previous time, this feeling hadn’t been so clear, but at that moment, all I wanted was to kiss her. I wanted to consume that darkness.

“Who am I, Remi?”