The nightmare of my life began back around middle school.
My parents got divorced; my mom took me, and my dad took my older brother.
Once I got into high school, we lost all contact with my dad and brother. The child support stopped coming, and our household finances grew tighter and tighter.
Eventually, the strain took its toll, and my mom passed away.
Mom had no living relatives, so there was no one to take me in. But the thought of going into a group home terrified me, so I stayed in the tiny studio apartment I'd shared with her, scraping by on part-time jobs.
Then, unable to endure everything anymore, I tried to kill myself.
I couldn't even manage to die, though.
When I woke up in a hospital bed after failing my suicide attempt, all I could do was curse how sturdy my body was.
All I ended up with was a broken arm.
The doctor said something about possible brain damage, but I didn't really understand, and I just wanted to die anyway. I told them to leave me alone and bolted from the hospital.
Still, I didn't have the courage to try again.
I just secretly hoped the brain damage would kill me on its own.
That was when the real nightmare of my life truly began.
On my way home from work, while waiting for the train on the platform, I locked eyes with a strange man.
The moment our eyes met, he broke into a grin, rushed over to me, and—
"Tennodai Station, right?"
—he muttered in a low voice. That was my stop.
Terrified didn't even begin to describe it. Goosebumps broke out across my entire body, my head spun wildly, and a vicious headache set in.
I ran away at full speed and walked the entire way home that day.
For a while, I was too terrified to ride the train, so I decided to walk home every night.
After some time had passed doing that,
while walking home along the dark streets like usual, I heard a voice behind me.
"Heyyy! Heyyy, Chika Kanda! Wait uuup!"
it called out.
My full name.
I whipped around and froze in terror.
I saw that same man sprinting toward me, waving his hand.
"Heyyy! Heyyy!" he chanted, sounding like a machine reading from a script.
I ran faster than I ever thought physically possible.
Not wanting him to find out where I lived, I took a long detour and only went home after I had completely lost sight of him.
My head ached terribly.
Even though I'd wanted to die so badly—even though he might have killed me—it turned out that true terror wiped away even those thoughts.
Yet the nightmare only continued to escalate.
Walking in the dark became too scary, so I went back to taking the train, but he still chased me multiple times a week.
Gradually, he began cutting me off and waiting ahead of me.
At the station ticket gates.
Right outside the station exit.
Just around the street corners.
At the exit of the back alley I always sprinted through.
In front of the convenience store closest to my apartment.
He would always stand there in the dark, smiling at me.
"Don't you forget about me,"
he would say, and every single time, I ran for my life.
"Heyyy! Heyyy! Wait for me!" he would yell, chasing after me every time.
Before I knew it, the spots where he appeared were creeping closer and closer to my apartment. It was only a matter of time before he found out where I lived. Every time I thought about it, my mind flooded with terror, and I started obsessing over how to end my life all over again.
Then, starting from a certain day, he suddenly stopped showing up on the streets at night. I was foolishly optimistic, wondering if maybe he'd finally given up.
Until that day.
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That day, when I unlocked my front door, the man was inside.
He was standing right in the middle of my room.
He slowly turned toward me and flashed a grin.
The moment he opened his mouth to say something, I let out a pathetic scream that shocked even myself, turned on my heel, and bolted to call the police.
By the time the police and I returned to my room, however, the man was gone.
The police didn't take me seriously at all.
"Just keep your door locked, and call us if anything happens," was all they said.
The lock on a cheap, rundown 28,000-yen studio apartment was nowhere near reliable.
I didn't have the money to move.
I couldn't afford to change the locks, either.
In fact, I genuinely thought: if he can break into my room that easily, why doesn't he just kill me and get it over with?
The sheer terror and absurdity of it were driving me insane.
Whenever I encountered that man, the stress triggered an excruciating headache.
All I had ever done was try my hardest to survive.
Why is this happening to me? I asked myself over and over, cutting my wrists again and again.
I still couldn't bring myself to die.
Then, in the middle of the night that same day.
I had thought I would be too scared to sleep,
but between exhaustion from work and everything else, I collapsed and fell asleep without even laying out my futon.
A strange stench woke me up.
Like a sewer, or a foul public restroom... something like that.
Guess I really have to clean this place... I thought, groggily yet oddly alert, and sat up to get a drink of water. That was when
"it" entered my field of vision.
Right in the middle of the room, swaying from the ceiling—
was that man's hanging corpse.
Lifeless eyes, a slack tongue lolling out, dripping saliva.
At his feet lay a puddle of urine, feces, and unidentifiable bodily fluids.
And a single note left behind.
"Now you'll never forget me."
The moment I read it, the most agonizing headache of my life struck me,
and then...
And then.
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*
*
All my memories came rushing back.
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*
*
The person hanging from the ceiling was...
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*
My older brother, who I was separated from.
My only flesh and blood, who had always supported me through the hardest times.
【You Won't Forget Me: END】
