"Numbers"

The environment plays a huge role in your thinking. The world takes on the color of your thoughts, and your thoughts take on the color of the world. It’s easy to have good times in the sunny fields of Kenji or Tsukamoto. But on a cloudy, humid day in a town like Hoshinomori - where I pass by roads leading to shuttered factories, or streams dammed up and made artificial by endless concrete for no apparent reason - it becomes a lot tougher.

Ume’s words ring around my head. We’re both suffering from the intoxicant known as nostalgia. Our best days were in high school. Our best feelings were in high school. If only my friend Suga and I could hang out on that school rooftop under a setting sun once more. Or see the Class Prez with her back against the outfield wall. I can’t let that feeling go away. I can’t let the candle go out. I have to believe in that optimism, that I can still feel the way I used to feel - like everything would be alright in the end. Because what else is there to believe in?

Hoshinomori isn’t doing me any favors, but after speaking with Ume, I feel like I have an obligation to at least see as much of it as I can. Because this is the environment some people have to live in. It’s there, so I’ll see it. The long way takes me past a small park utterly devoid of children. The seesaw looks down on its luck, the merry-go-round has seen better days, the slides would give someone tetanus, and the man sitting on the bench looks ancient.

I know that man. The old man from the Vietnamese fusion place and the Castle of Mabuchi waves to me from his perch on the bench, which is surrounded by a concrete walkway. I make my way over to say hello.

“Young Shunsuke,” he greets in that distant old voice of his.

“Hello…” I pause; come to think of it, he never told me his name. But when I ask him for it, he simply shakes his head and smiles.

“No need for my name. I’m just a wanderer. I can be Japan. I can be anyone.”

“...okay.”

“What brings you to Hoshinomori?”

“Seeing an Anime Museum.”

“...uh-huh.” He rubs a wrinkled hand across his chin. “What do you think of this town? If Mabuchi is the light side of Yoshiaki, then this must be the gray.”

“Gray?” I repeat. “Not the dark side?”

“Oh, no, no, no. I’ve traveled across Yoshiaki in my waning years. There are places far worse to see. Villages entirely empty. Factories crumbling into yellow grass. Shrines, abandoned and forgotten. When the last priest of a shrine passes, and all its worshippers have moved on, don’t you think the kami inside dies, too? The decline of Yoshiaki is not just a loss of individuals. It’s the loss of ideas. The loss of perceptions. The living turned to ruin and dust, nothing more than mist that fades into mountains. A firm loss of a belief we all once shared until it becomes just a passing line in a history book.”

He chuckles. “Sorry. Forgive an old man for rambling. But perhaps this is why I’m wandering. When I was a boy, Yoshiaki was vibrant. We felt like we were building something. Something endurable, something that would never fade away. Maybe I still think that way. I don’t want to see my beloved Yoshiaki die out.”

His words strike a deep chord in me. Ume, the old man, and myself - we’re all suffering from that same illness of the mind, one springing from the old golden days.

“You still think we’ll all be alright?” I ask him, because I need to hear his answer.

He nods. “I do.”

“How?” The word comes out more desperate than I anticipated. “How did you never lose that old feeling?”

“You must be strong,” he tells me. “You are responsible for your own happiness. You can’t let the old days disappear from your memory. You must remember them constantly. Don't let in the new. Embrace the endless yesterday.”

I nod vigorously, then think about it, because what he’s telling me is the exact opposite of what I’ve been telling Shizuko and Ume. Even Shizuko told Ume - it’s injecting something new into your life, seeing the little details, that’s what keeps the world vibrant and beautiful. It’s about the things around you and spicing it up once in a while. But the old man is telling me that it all comes from myself and myself alone. It’s not about newness - it’s about maintaining the strength to hang onto the old.

I can’t tell which option is better. It’s funny - it’s a lot easier to cheer up others than it is to cheer up yourself. Maybe because it’s easier to like other people than it is to like yourself, too.

“Shunsuke,” he says, his voice becoming amazingly clear and crisp. “Have you ever heard of the Shinkumekai?”

I tilt my head. “Can’t say I have. What’s that mean?”

“They’re a movement in Yoshiaki. It’s short for the Crimson Sparrow Society. They’ve named themselves after the bird that Governor Eguchi killed off. They’re the ones thinking about running a candidate against Daisuke this election. Because they haven’t forgotten about the old Yoshiaki, either.”

A shrill breeze runs through the park. I’m suddenly aware of how alone we are. “Hey, no offense, but you’re not some sort of missionary for them or anything, are you?”

The old man laughs. “Oh, sorry. Didn’t want to give that impression. I don’t know anything about them. I just wanted to connect with people who have faced the same questions you do now. I’d feel bad if you just ended up like an old wanderer like me. You must take action to preserve the old feeling.”

I tug at my shirt. “Right. Sorry for thinking that.”

The old man opens his ratty jacket, revealing a surprisingly clean book. “I’d like you to have this, Shunsuke. You weren’t the first person to write about Yoshiaki. Why, old Governor Eguchi did it himself around your age. I’ve been following the spots listed in his book, but I’ve run through them all by this point.”

Against my better judgment, I take the book. Usually, people don’t just give you things for free, but the old man seems like a kindred spirit. I glance down at the book; on its cover, smiling children on swing sets - perhaps not in this same park, but it certainly feels like it - glance up at me.

“Into the Heart of Yoshiaki,” I read aloud. I look back up at the old man. “Thank you.”

“Any time, my friend,” he says, nodding in farewell. But then he keeps his hand raised and awkwardly coughs. “But, uh…could I borrow like five hundred yen? Yes, yes, for you see, the man who walks in front of car gets tired, but the man who walks behind car gets exhausted…”