Oniisan… Ohitori Desu Ka? -

She nodded, as if that was the right answer. Then she let go of my hand, picked up her knapsack, and started down the steps. At the second landing, she stopped and looked back.

“Oniisan,” she said again, softer this time. “Do you think it’s possible to miss someone who’s still alive?” oniisan… ohitori desu ka?

I was twenty-two then, or maybe twenty-three. The kind of age where “alone” still sounded like a choice you made, not one that was made for you. I’d come up the mountain to escape a thesis I wasn’t writing, a city that buzzed like a trapped wasp in my chest, and a voicemail from my mother that I’d listened to four times and still not answered. She nodded, as if that was the right answer

“You see that? My grandmother used to say that’s when the kamisama change shifts. The day gods go to sleep, and the night gods wake up. And for one minute, nobody’s watching. That’s when you can say anything you’ve been too scared to say.” “Oniisan,” she said again, softer this time