Fragments Of Past - Forgotten Promises

chapter 8 - lunch

I sat at the last bench, tucked away in the far-left corner by the window. The class was halfway through an English lesson, but it felt more like background noise than anything else. The teacher droned on, pointing at a chalkboard full of simple grammar exercises. My eyes drifted out the window, watching the sunlight filter through the trees, casting dancing shadows on the ground below. A gentle breeze rattled the windowpane, a welcome distraction from the monotony.

I absentmindedly spun my mechanical pencil between my fingers, feeling the cool plastic click softly as the lead retracted in and out. It was almost lunch break-thankfully. My stomach growled in anticipation, but my mind? It was a thousand miles away.

I'd already learned this stuff years ago. Every sentence structure, every vocabulary word-it was all etched into my brain from my old life. Back then, I'd been eager to learn, to pass tests, and to make my mom proud. But now, sitting here in a middle school classroom, it all seemed like general knowledge. I could do these exercises with my eyes closed. Heck, I could teach the class if I had to.

Shota and Ryoichi were chatting behind me, their voices muffled but easygoing, clearly enjoying themselves. Even Rina, seated a few rows ahead, kept glancing back with a playful smile as she whispered to her seatmate. It was nice to hear them laugh, to see them carefree-like they should be.

But my mind kept drifting to darker places, places I didn't want to go but couldn't ignore either.

Nakano Masaru.
The school's caretaker.

He was always such a gentle person. Quiet. Shy. Kept to himself. He'd sweep the halls, fix the leaky pipes, and sometimes stay late to make sure everything was locked up before leaving. No one really noticed him much, but he was always there in the background. Just a regular, unassuming guy.

But... if my memory was right-and these days, I wasn't sure about anything-I remembered how, after the summer festival, everything changed. There was an investigation. Police swarmed the school.

Interviews. Questions. They'd spoken to us-me, Shota even Ryoichi. We all gave our statements. The details were blurry, but one thing was clear: Nakano Masaru was charged with multiple murders.

It didn't make sense. Him, of all people. How could a guy like that- someone so mild, so harmless-have been responsible for such brutal crimes? The whole thing felt wrong, like trying to fit a square peg into a round hole. I remember thinking there had to be some mistake, that maybe the police had the wrong guy. But... I couldn't argue with the facts. He was arrested. Convicted. Life sentence. End of story.

It still didn't sit right with me, though. I didn't want to believe it. But, as the saying goes, you can't judge a book by its cover. Nakano became the perfect example of that.

I shifted in my seat, eyes flicking back to the chalkboard where the teacher was still talking about sentence clauses or whatever. My pencil spun lazily in my hand.

Could he have really done it? Or was it just a scapegoat situation? My memories were fuzzy, disjointed-like a puzzle with missing pieces. But the more I thought about it, the more I realized I had no choice but to find out the truth. If I could somehow stop whatever happened at the festival, maybe I could stop Masaru from ever being accused in the first place. Maybe the past wasn't as set in stone as it seemed.

Lunch break couldn't come fast enough. The more I played with these thoughts, the heavier they became, weighing me down like a lead blanket. The teacher's voice faded entirely into the background as my focus shifted to what really mattered-figuring out what went wrong and stopping it before it happened again.

The bell for lunch break finally rang, and the atmosphere in the classroom shifted instantly. The dull, quiet tension of the lessons gave way to laughter and the sound of chairs being dragged across the floor. Desks were quickly pushed together, forming little islands of groups scattered across the room. I slid my own desk to join the familiar huddle-me, Shota, Ryoichi, Rina, and Mika.