Chapter 37: Dream

Dream

I was dreaming.

It was a memory from when I still lived in my original body, back in high school.

A dream of the time I had just entered school and started dating a girl named Kaori—the dream of my most blissful days.

That day, I had been planning to take Kaori to the aquarium.

Though we weren’t crossing prefectural lines, access to our chosen aquarium wasn’t great. There was no train, and the only way to get there was by taking three connecting buses.

And since these were rural buses, running once an hour at best, the bus we took back then had a staggering three-hour gap between services.

Thanks to Kaori’s meticulous preparations, we managed to transfer between buses smoothly and arrived at the aquarium without issue. Together, we admired all kinds of sea creatures.

Turtles. Penguins. Dolphins. Garden eels.

But the one that truly caught Kaori’s eye was the axolotl.

Watching her get so excited over the little white creature, calling it cute again and again, felt different from the image of Kaori I had known. I found myself completely captivated by this fresh side of her.

That day, the aquarium was packed.

Visitors had come from both inside and outside the prefecture, and our tour through the exhibits ended up taking much longer than planned.

“We should probably head back soon.”

Kaori checked her wristwatch and reminded me that our return bus was fast approaching.

“It’s fine. It’s a holiday, so there should be more buses running from the aquarium to the station.”

I reassured her with my usual optimism.

But it wasn’t just the hassle of travel that made me reluctant to leave—I simply wanted to spend more time admiring my adorable girlfriend.

I couldn’t take my eyes off Kaori.

Yet, deep down, I had a faint understanding of something.

It was true that I was starting to be drawn to her, this girl I had just started dating.

But at that time, what attracted me to her was her face, her appearance, her figure… just those superficial qualities.

I hadn’t yet come to love her from the depths of my heart.

I briefly chastised myself for being so shallow, yet at the same time, I had an odd sense of certainty.

Someday, I would come to cherish her so much that I’d never want to lose her.

In the end, we left the aquarium about forty minutes later than planned. The bus was packed.

We laughed, wondering where all these people had come from in such a rural area, and I did my best to shield Kaori from the crowd as the bus swayed along the road.

The trip back was a nightmare of traffic jams.

Not only was our arrival home delayed, but the congestion stretched for kilometers.

By the time we reached our transfer point, the last bus of the day had already stopped running.

“I’m sorry.”

I apologized.

“Don’t apologize. Even if we’d stuck to the original plan, that traffic jam would have made us miss the bus anyway.”

Her gentle smile saved me.

We started walking in the direction of home, but of course, the distance was far beyond what we could cover on foot.

Eventually, we found a hotel that offered overnight stays without reservations and decided to spend the night there.

My heart pounded as I waited for Kaori to finish her shower.

Despite it being a holiday in the countryside, the hotel was fully booked… and in the end, we could only get one room with a double bed.

I told Kaori I’d sleep on the sofa.

But Kaori responded.

“You’ll catch a cold if you do that. No way.”

And with that, she completely threw me off balance.

The memories of what happened next are still crystal clear.

I was utterly captivated. By the warmth of her skin. By the sound of her voice. By the radiance of her smile.

Looking back, that was the turning point.

Up until then, my feelings for Kaori had been based on appearances alone. But that day changed everything.

Her kindness, her sincerity, her attentiveness…

…and the occasional mischievous glint in her eyes.

I fell for all of it.

Maybe it was for the best that we broke up when we did.

If we had stayed together, if I had fallen even deeper, losing her might have destroyed me. I know it sounds dramatic, even to myself.

But that’s how incredible she was.

…She truly was.

“Let’s meet again someday.”

Those were our final, genuine words to each other.

I never thought I’d see Kaori again.

And yet… I often found myself imagining the day we’d meet again, wondering what I’d say to her when we did.

The words I came up with were mundane, something casual to mask my embarrassment.

…In the end, I never got the chance to say those words. Instead, I ended up possessing her son and reuniting with her.

I had known the truth.

Given my current circumstances, it was painfully clear.

There was no longer any path for me to be with Kaori.

Not when I didn’t even know what had happened to my own body.

Living as her son, sharing a household with her…

There was no way I could ever hope to be with her again.

And yet, I had met her once more.

I had convinced myself we would never see each other again, had forced myself to give up…

But here we were.

The mere act of recalling her life story had left me physically drained.

“…Pathetic.”

Disgusted with my own weakness, I spat the words out to myself.

“Are you okay?”

A worried voice called out to me—it was Tachibana-san.

Before I knew it, I had woken from my dream and unconsciously voiced my thoughts aloud.

To someone else, hearing me mutter in my fevered state might have sounded like something entirely different.

“Sorry. It’s nothing.”

“…If you feel even a little off, tell me right away.”

Tachibana-san’s kindness stung a little.