It takes Orihara Izaya being gone for everyone to realize he might have never really been there all along. There are just too many people in this city whose lives he has messed with. Too many kids he has once called out in the street or visited to return a fake copy of their student ID. Too many phone calls that influenced too many things. Too many bodies that hurled down from skyscrapers after he's walked them to the edge.
It's the stuff of urban legends and it doesn't make sense when you think about it.
People seem to remember him but they no longer believe what they remember was ever true.
There might have been some chat room or some website where the idea originated, they figure, and then suddenly everyone started seeing him everywhere and everything was his fault. He didn't have to be real for that. Actually, it would have been way more manageable if he wasn't.
"Maybe you just imagined him, Nee-chan." Kuon ventures a guess one day. "Just like you impersonate him now. Maybe it was just you all along and you saved us on your own."
Nozomi thinks about it for a moment. The next time he will suggest it, she will give it more thought, he's sure of that.
"Ryuugamine-senpai, have you ever met Orihara Izaya?" Kuon asks one day at school.
"Well…" Mikado hesitates. He's aware at this point Izaya has succeeded at what he himself had been trying to do. He's become the stuff of legends. It's really exciting. "Maybe I haven't, now that I think about it." He answers with a smile, playing along.
"And you, Kuronuma-senpai?"
Aoba looks at them as if they've both lost their minds.
"I'm dating his sisters."
"Are you sure?" Kuon looks at him critically. "Dating hot twin sisters may be just a figment of your imagination as well."