The envelope arrived on a Tuesday.
Plain white. No return address. Kobayashi's handwriting on the front: For Ren. Open immediately. Ren stood in the kitchen of their Nakano apartment, the envelope in his hands, his coffee growing cold on the counter behind him. Hikari was still in the shower. The water ran through the thin walls, a steady drumming that matched the rhythm of his heart.
He opened the envelope.
Inside was a single sheet of paper — not a letter, but a notice from the Tokyo District Court. The motion to unseal the medical records of Akiko Akiyama has been granted. The records will be made available to the petitioner's legal counsel on March 15th at 10:00 AM.
March 15th. Ten days from now.
Ren read the notice three times. His hands were steady. His heart was not.
The shower stopped. A moment later, Hikari emerged from the bathroom, a towel wrapped around her hair, steam curling around her shoulders.
"What's that?" she asked.
"The records. They're being unsealed."
Hikari's eyes widened. She crossed the room and read the notice over his shoulder. Her hand found his, fingers intertwining.
"Ten days," she said.
"Ten days."
"Are you ready?"
Ren looked at the calendar on the wall — a free one from the local supermarket, with pictures of Mount Fuji and cherry blossoms. March 15th was circled in red. He had circled it weeks ago, before the motion was even filed.
"I've been ready for three years," he said. "A few more days won't matter."
But even as he said it, he knew it wasn't true. Every day mattered. Every hour. Every minute that his father walked free was a minute too many.
---
Kobayashi called at noon.
"There's something else," she said. "Something I didn't want to tell you over the phone."
Ren's stomach tightened. "What is it?"
"Your father isn't just fighting the unsealing. He's preparing a counter-suit. Against you. For defamation."
"For telling the truth?"
"For making public statements that damaged his reputation. He's claiming that you've been manipulated by Hikari — that she's the one who fed you the stories about your mother."
Ren's grip tightened on the phone. "That's absurd."
"It's also legally plausible. You're a minor. Hikari is a minor. The court could argue that you're both too young to understand the consequences of your actions."
"What do we do?"
"We prepare. We gather evidence. We find witnesses who can testify that your mother's claims were true. And we hope that the judge — the new judge, whoever that ends up being — is on our side."
New judge. Right. Because Judge Matsumoto had been reassigned after the Kenji trial. Some said it was a promotion. Others said it was a warning — that he had ruled too boldly, too quickly, and the powers behind the bench wanted him somewhere less visible.
Ren didn't believe in coincidences.
"Who's the new judge?" he asked.
"A woman named Sakurai. She's young — forty-two — with a reputation for being tough on crime but soft on family cases. She's unpredictable."
"Unpredictable isn't good."
"Unpredictable isn't bad either. It means she follows the evidence, not the party line."
Ren ended the call and sat on the couch. Hikari was in the kitchen, making lunch — rice balls, simple and warm. She didn't ask what Kobayashi had said. She just brought him a plate and sat beside him.
"Eat," she said.
"I'm not hungry."
"Eat anyway."
He ate. The rice was warm, the seaweed was salty, and Hikari's shoulder was pressed against his. The world was still spinning. The sun was still shining. And somewhere in Tokyo, his father was planning his next move.
---
That afternoon, Ren visited the hospital where his mother had died.
He hadn't planned to. It wasn't on his list of errands. But he found himself standing outside the white building, the cherry trees bare and waiting for spring, the same antiseptic smell drifting through the automatic doors.
Nakayama Haruka, his mother's nurse, was waiting in the lobby.
"I thought you might come," she said.
"You told me you had more information. About the doctors. About who helped my father."
Haruka led him to a small break room — plastic chairs, a vending machine, a table covered in medical journals. She sat down heavily, her hands folded in her lap.
"Three doctors," she said. "Two nurses. One administrator. They all knew what your father was doing. They all helped him."
"Names."
"I can give you names. But I don't know if they'll talk. They have families. Careers. Pensions. They won't risk everything for a dead woman."
Ren sat across from her. "My mother isn't the only dead woman. There were others. Patients whose treatments were changed. Patients whose families were told it was 'for the best.'"
Haruka's eyes widened. "How do you know that?"
"Because I've been doing my own research. Your log — the one you gave me — it mentioned other names. Other rooms. Other families who lost someone they loved."
"You found them?"
"I found four. Four families who agreed to talk. Four families who didn't know their loved ones had been murdered until I called them."
Haruka stared at him. "You're not just fighting for your mother."
"No. I'm fighting for all of them."
She was silent for a long moment. Then she pulled out a piece of paper and wrote down three names.
"The doctors," she said. "Start with them. They know everything."
Ren took the paper. "Thank you."
"Don't thank me. Just make sure they pay."
---
He walked out of the hospital into the gray afternoon light.
The wind was cold, biting through his jacket. He stood on the steps, looking at the cherry trees, imagining them in bloom — pink and white and fragile, beautiful for a week and then gone.
His mother had loved cherry blossoms. She had taken him to the park every spring, even when she was sick, even when walking tired her out. She would sit on a bench while he ran through the falling petals, laughing, pretending he was catching snow.
You're so fast, Ren. You'll go far. Farther than me.
He had gone far. But not far enough.
His phone buzzed. A message from Hikari.
Mrs. Tanaka called. My mother wants to see me.
Ren's blood went cold. Hikari's mother — the woman who had checked into a psychiatric clinic after her husband's arrest, the woman who had believed Kenji over her own daughter.
"When?" he typed back.
Tomorrow. At the clinic. She says she's ready to talk.
Do you want me to come?
A pause. Then: Yes. Please.
Ren put the phone away and walked to the station. The train was crowded, the rush hour already beginning. He stood in the corner, pressed against the door, watching the city blur past.
Hikari's mother. The woman who had abandoned her. The woman who had chosen Kenji.
Tomorrow, they would see her.
And nothing would ever be the same.
---
That night, Ren held Hikari on the couch.
She wasn't crying — she had stopped crying weeks ago — but she was quiet, her face pressed against his chest, her hands curled into fists.
"What if she doesn't believe me?" Hikari whispered.
"Then we leave. And we never see her again."
"What if she wants me to come back? To live with her?"
"Do you want to?"
Hikari was silent for a long moment. "I don't know. She's my mother. But she's also the woman who called me a liar. Who chose Kenji over me."
"People can change."
"Can they?"
Ren thought about his own father — cold, calculating, unrepentant. He had never changed. He had only grown more skilled at hiding who he really was.
"Some people," he said. "Not all."
Hikari looked up at him. Her eyes were red, but her voice was steady.
"Will you come with me? Tomorrow?"
"I'll be right beside you."
"Promise?"
"Promise."
She kissed him — soft and slow, her lips warm against his. Then she closed her eyes and rested her head on his chest.
Ren stared at the ceiling, his hand in her hair, his heart heavy.
Tomorrow, they would face Hikari's mother.
Tomorrow, the past would come knocking.
And Ren would be ready.