Round the corner, it was not. But it eventually became Tuesday night and the anticipation almost wouldn't allow me to sleep. I started to think all the scenarios that could happen the next day. In one, we'd go into the courtroom, and Prosecutor Mitsurugi would see Ryu-chan and maybe wave or nod or do something to acknowledge his presence, and after the hearing was over, we'd meet up and they both would renew their friendship. That was the ideal scenario, the one I was rooting for. In another scenario, Prosecutor Mitsurugi would act like he didn't see Ryu-chan at all, but we'd meet him later anyway and clarify misunderstandings (for there must be something, a reason why Prosecutor Mitsurugi avoided all contact with Ryu-chan, I was sure of it), after which they would renew their friendship. That was also not a bad scenario. Then, still in a third scenario, he wouldn't acknowledge Ryu-chan in the courtroom and also wouldn't even listen to him afterwards. That was the worst scenario, but I was convinced this couldn't happen. Prosecutor Mitsurugi must remember Ryu-chan, even if they met over ten years ago. Even if he did not care for Ryu-chan as a friend any longer, he was a respectable adult, and would act like one. As such, he will listen to him, at least. That was my hope.
While I was thinking of how we would rebound in the worst case scenario, I fell asleep and before I knew it, it was already morning. I jumped off my futon, and started doing my morning routine with extra speed. I barely tasted whatever breakfast I cooked. I checked the mirror a dozen times before leaving, to make sure I would leave a good impression on Prosecutor Mitsurugi. I laughed at myself for being as nervous as I'd be if I were meeting Ryu-chan's parents, but that didn't help me relax whatsoever. I grabbed my umbrella and shut the door behind me.
I was fifteen minutes early to our agreed-upon meeting time, owing to me doing everything way too quickly, but surprisingly, Ryu-chan was already waiting for me in front of my building. He was carrying Chinami's umbrella and a paper bag. From the looks of it, the paper bag appeared to contain traditional Japanese sweets. His back was reclining against the wall, and he had a pensive expression, complete with his hand stroking his chin. When he saw me, he looked comically puzzled.
"Oh, h-hi," he greeted me with nervousness. "You're pretty early."
"So are you," I replied.
He smiled awkwardly like a child caught cheating. From the looks of it, I presumed he must've also had a sleepless night.
"I guess we can head out now. It's better to arrive early than late, right?" he said.
He transferred the umbrella to the hand that was holding the sweets, and extended his now empty hand to me. I grabbed it without hesitation and we started walking.
"To be honest, I'm slightly terrified," he said. "I brought traditional sweets, in case the mood become tense."
"Does he like traditional sweets?" I said with generous curiosity.
"I don't know. I haven't seen him since we were 10... but optimism never hurt anyone, right?" he said with a serious expression, which quickly softened. "If he doesn't, you can have them."
Optimism... wasn't my forte. But I could try it out.
The District Court was located a 45-minute trip by train from my apartment. When we arrived, we cleared security and looked for Courtroom No. 2. The room was basically empty. There were about three people our age, perhaps also law students like Ryu-chan that were sent to watch this trial, or maybe are just curious to learn. There were also four elderly people, and one woman with long brown hair, who didn't conform to either group. I got the impression that this was a minor case. I glanced at the defendant, who was not much older than Ryu-chan or me. She probably committed a small crime, so no one was interested in the hearing, I thought. However, this thought was shaken when four reporters entered the room and sat in the chairs reserved for them.
The defense attorney and prosecutor were already standing in their respective positions. That was the first time I saw Prosecutor Mitsurugi in the flesh. I had glanced at a news paper article with his picture on it once, but the full-color version of him was, well, quite wine red and regal. He was standing with his arms crossed and had his eyes closed. Whether it was because he was in deep thought, meditating or just catching a snooze, I could not tell.
Ryu-chan didn't say a word when we entered, or when we sat down across from the prosecutor's seat, behind the defense attorney's. However, I noticed that he was grasping the handle of the paper bag and Chinami's umbrella tightly.
When the Judge entered the room, the whole room stood up. We all bowed in unison and then sat back down.
"Are the Prosecution and Defense ready?" asked the Judge.
"The prosecution is ready, your honor," said Mitsurugi in a deep but clear voice.
He looked our way and... frowned. It was more than a frown, actually. I felt like his eyes, full of contempt, could pierce through my soul. It wasn't Ryu-chan he was looking at, either: it was me.
"The defense is ready, your honor," said the attorney, a middle-aged man, replied.
The Judge nodded once and asked Prosecutor Mitsurugi to provide an opening statement*. He was looking at me intently, so he looked like he was caught off-guard when the Judge talked to him. However, he quickly composed himself and started to give the opening statement.
"The defendant murdered the victim, Kanna Shimura, aged 27, in an alleyway near Heibon High School," he said. "The prosecution will demonstrate and prove that the defendant, Waka Humei, aged 33, committed said crime."
Prosecutor Mitsurugi presented the weapon, a bloody knife, as evidence to the court. The knife had been throughly checked and had traces of cocaine and the defendant's finger prints on the handle. From there on, the courtroom started heating up.
The defendant was the first to testify. She explained that she was the mother of two children, one of whom went to Heibon High School. She said that her teenager son and her had had a bad fight over the weekend, and he had resorted to running away from home. She knew that he would likely stay in one of his friends' homes, but she wasn't sure whose or where. Therefore, she had visited the school everyday in order to either talk with her son or ask around to see if anyone had seen him or knew with whom he was staying. However, she had been unsuccessful all three times. On the way back home from the third attempt, she was kidnapped and apparently lost consciousness at some point, because when she next came through, she was sitting in an alleyway with the cadaver of a woman she had never seen before. Next to her was the bloody knife, which wasn't hers. That's when the police arrived, and she was taken to the station.
Prosecutor Mitsurugi then revealed that the victim was found to be in possession of cocaine, and multiple witnesses from the middle school report that she sold drug to multiple teens. Hence, he argued that the defendant had enough motive to kill the victim, since her son was in direct danger, especially after he ran away and she lost track of his whereabouts. His argument was further supported because as it turned out, the detectives found her son in possession of cocaine as well, even though he did not appear to have consumed it.
The defendant argued back that she had no idea her son had been a client of the suspected drug dealer, but the Judge concluded that the prosecution's claims on the defendant's motives were throughly substantiated. The defendant protested, but two officers came and returned her back to the defendant's chair.
Next, the prosecution called the first witness. This was a tall man who happened to pass by the alleyway and heard odd noises like a few people were struggling. He didn't enter the alleyway because it was dangerous, but observed two women fighting from afar. He saw the defendant pull out a knife, though he couldn't tell from where, and stabbed the victim in the stomach area. He then ran off to the closest phone booth and called an ambulance and the police.
Here, Prosecutor Mitsurugi revealed that, as the witness testified, the victim had passed away due to blood loss from her abdomen, and offered the autopsy report as evidence to the court.
When asked in the cross-examination why he didn't call the police when he first saw the fight, he testified that it was because he didn't think it would lead to something major like murder. He thought it was just a wife confronting her husband's lover or something of the sort, which happens often enough in their small neighborhood. He also added that when he came back from the phone booth, he found both the defendant and the victim lying on the ground, apparently unconscious, though he had not enough courage to check them out for sure.
The second witness was a tacos seller who worked near the high school, and sold tacos to the children during lunch hours and after school. She testified that she had seen the defendant visit the school on four occasions on the same week that the murder occurred. When the defense attorney asked her whether she could recall exactly what dates and rough ranges of time these visits happened, the witness said the following:
"I saw her on Monday after school, Tuesday lunch, Tuesday after school and Wednesday after school."
The defendant objected and said that the witness' testimony was in direct contradiction with the defendant's testimony, for the defendant said that she had only been to the school three times. Moreover, the attorney followed the argument by noting that the defendant worked in a flower shop outside the neighborhood, and had signed in on Tuesday morning and signed out Tuesday afternoon. Therefore, she could not have been seen at the high school at lunch hours on Tuesday.
I thought that was a solid argument, but Prosecutor Mitsurugi said "Objection!" with a loud voice right after.
He provided written evidence from another employee from the same shop, which read that the defendant sometimes asked her to sign her in in her stead. Given that their boss rarely checked the sign in and out records, and whenever she did, it was just to skim through them, the system was very much exploitable, and the two of them often took turns without their boss knowing. Next, he provided two pieces of video recorded evidence: one was from the security camera inside the flower shop, which only showed a man, confirmed to be the other employee, tending to the flowers, and the other was from the school's entrance security camera, which showed someone speaking to a couple of students at 12:15PM. The woman in the latter recording had long straight hair and a thin body frame like the defendant. Her face was not visible in the recording, but Prosecutor Mitsurugi supported his claim that this was the defendant by written evidence from the two students in the recording, who wrote that the woman had introduced herself as Humei, the mother of Ryo Humei. Both pieces of information coincided with the defendant's last name and her son's name.
The defendant tried to argue a case against this, but was quickly shot down again, and the second witness was allowed to continue her testimony.
She testified that the defendant had indeed met with a couple of high school students during Tuesday lunch, and briefly talked with them before leaving the school properties. Judging from how the students had shaken their necks sideways several times, she assumed that the defendant was asking them one or multiple questions, to which the answer was "no".
Prosecutor Mitsurugi interrupted the witness here and provided the rest of the written testimony from the high school students. Defendant Humei had asked them whether they had seen Ryo Humei, but they did not know him. Moreover, they wrote that she had also showed them a picture and asked them if they had ever seen this person, but they hadn't. Even though the prosecution could not provide the picture, since they did not find it after extensive search of the defendant's apartment or the crime scene, the descriptions that the high school students gave of the woman in the picture were strikingly similar to the victim's features.
"All of this point to an indisputable truth: the defendant's testimony is questionable, given that part of it was disproven by the evidence here provided," he closed his statement thus.
The defense requested that the witness testify about the other three times she saw the defendant at the high school. She said she stood at the entrance for one hour each day before leaving.
"She appeared to be waiting for someone," the witness said. "However, she always left alone."
This did not contradict the defendant's claim that she was looking for her son. The witness also had nothing more to offer to the best of her knowledge, so even though the defense asked several questions, including whether the defendant ever met up with someone down the street, no concrete answers could be obtained.
Unfortunately for the defendant, the prosecution had built an impeccable case against her, substantiated with heaps of evidence. The first witness testimony had provided evidence that she had committed the murder with the weapon, and the second testimony had suggested that her initial testimony was likely to be a fraud. Moreover, the there was nothing to prove that she had been unconscious during the murder, or that someone else had placed blame on her. In the end, the Judge declared the defendant guilty. She cried and protested all the way until she was taken out of the courtroom.
The idea that the defendant could be telling the truth and was actually given the wrong sentence was upsetting, but to me, the most upsetting part of this trial had been the stares I received from Prosecutor Mitsurugi on several occasions. I almost felt like I was the defendant sitting on my chair, and resting my entire life on the shoulders of an attorney that was no match against the prosecution. Even after the trial was over, and he was retrieving his papers and belongings from the prosecutor's bench, he still directed sharp gazes at me from time to time.
"Mitsurugi looked at you a whole lot," Ryu-chan commented when the trial was over. "Do you know each other?"
"No... I think this is the first time I've seen him personally," I said, probably with my confusion and fear written all over my face.
"Weird. Maybe he couldn't take his eyes off you because you're so pretty," he chuckled.
This is no time for jokes, Ryu-chan, I thought. Those glares definitely weren't from admiration.
"Let's go. We have to catch him before he leaves," he said and pulled my hand.
However, we were too late, apparently, and could not find the prosecutor anywhere. To be fair, there were a few places we weren't allowed to go into for security reasons, but anywhere we could go, we went and searched for him with no avail. Ryu-chan was very disappointed, but tried his best not to show it. He wasn't very good at hiding his raw emotions.
"Um, I'll go to the restroom before we leave," I told him and asked him to wait there in the entrance.
I hurried over to the bathroom, which I knew the location of since we saw it while we were looking for Prosecutor Mitsurugi. There were a couple of people lined up in front of me, but no one came in after me so I was left alone in the end.
When I exited the bathroom, Prosecutor Mitsurugi was standing there, and my heart nearly stopped. I moved back a couple of steps towards the bathroom, hoping against hope that he had not seen me yet.
"Hold it," he said, and I froze in my spot, just inside the bathroom.
He moved to the bathroom's entrance, where we could see each other face-to-face. I unfrosted and stood up right, trying to keep my nerves in check, probably without success. I didn't know what to do. I had not prepared for this scenario.
Prosecutor Mitsurugi looked me from head to toe, then looked at my eyes with disapproval engraved in the wrinkles of his brow.
"H-h-hi, Pros-secutor Mitsurugi," I said with a dry mouth. "N-n-nice to me-et you."
Prosecutor Mitsurugi raised a brow at me. He looked as though he was going to say something, paused in silence and then finally spoke.
"Who are you?" he asked. His face somehow appeared more relaxed than before, but it might have been my wistful thinking.
"I'm Ch-Chinami, sir. Chinami Miyanagi," I said. "D-did you see Ryu-ch... Naruhodo-san in the courtroom? We were in the hearing. He said... He said you two are childhood f-friends. Nice w-w-work back there, by the way."
My brain was starting to short-circuit, and that was never a good sign.
"I did see him."
"He... he brought traditional s-sweets for you," I blurted out.
That's not even the most important thing I had to tell him, I scolded myself.
"Tell him that I appreciate the gesture, but will not receive them," he said with a refined, but arrogant, tone.
"I will tell him, I will," I said as I tried to squeeze myself out of the bathroom.
However, my path was cut short when Prosecutor Mitsurugi hit the wall with his hand and blocked me with his arm. I was frozen on the spot again, and slowly looked up to meet his stern gaze.
"What game are you playing, Chinami Miyanagi?" he asked.
"G-g-game? What game?"
"You acted like you didn't know me," he said. "That's a glaring contradiction, because you do know me. If you don't remember me by face, at least you must by name."
I was confused and my brain wasn't exactly helping by slowing down on this crucial moment.
"I was prosecutor on the Michiru Onamida (Terry Fawles) case, do you not remember?"
Michiru Onamida case? What was he talking about? I didn't know anyone named like that.
... Or did I? I suddenly had a realization: my sister had not told me all of the story**. No amount of Prosecutor Mitsurugi's piercing gazes could compare to the fear I felt right at that moment. I almost passed out, but the prosecutor saw my legs wavering and caught me before I completely lost balance.
"Miyanagi... I will not believe that you lost your memories," he said while holding me by my shoulders tightly. "That would be too convenient. However, if you insist on it, I will not rest until I find out what exactly you're planning this time around."
I was now shivering, and I was sure he could feel it since he was holding me. However, I couldn't tell him my real identity. That would mark the end or everything: Chinami's plot to retrieve the evidence of her crime, my relationship with Ryu-chan... If Prosecutor Mitsurugi found out that I was Chinami's sister and faking her identity, he would not hesitate to start an investigation, involving all of us in the process.
But what could I say to get his eyes off me?
"Tell me the truth," he said.
"I'm... I'm... Ryu-chan's girlfriend," I said. That was a truth, at least for now.
Prosecutor Mitsurugi batted his eyes, puzzled. He probably didn't expect me to say that as a response to his question. That moment of flinching gave me an opening to speak.
"Please I b-b-beg you. Don't tell him," I screeched, and while I talked I improvised an excuse that I wasn't sure he would buy. "I'm not Chinami. I'm... a law student, yes. Same year as him. I... lo-"
I paused there and said, in the faintest volume I could produce, that I loved him. It was crazy to me that I was saying something like that not to the target person but to a third party I barely knew. My shivering stopped but it was replaced with a burning sensation on my cheeks.
"You heard that? I'm not going t-t-to repeat myself," I shouted. "But he... he... loves Chinami-san, who... doesn't love him back. So she told me that since we h-h-have... similar... faces... I could p-pretend to be her. Actually, I look nothing like h-her, actually. This is... all power of m-make up. Isn't that crazy? Ha ha. She's a pharmacology student, s-so he wouldn't see us both... And... Naruhodo-san didn't notice the swi-switch. I know it's wor-wrong but please let me explain it to h-him... in due time..."
By the end I was shedding literal tears. They were rolling down my cheeks with so much speed, as though someone had opened a faucet in my eyes. I really was useless. That was such a terrible act and even more terrible excuse.
"Can you not cry, please. Do me that favor," said the prosecutor, unexpectedly flustered.
"How can I not cry, w-when now everything is over," I said, crying even more.
Prosecutor Mitsurugi let go of my shoulders and pushed his handkerchief onto my hands. I wiped my eyes with it, but I felt it would be disgusting if I wiped my nose too, so I didn't... until he insisted I did.
"Listen. My apologies," he said, bowing like a noble from a foreign country. "You really do look like Chinami, so I thought you were plotting something. Please stop crying."
I hid half my face with the handkerchief, because I didn't want him to see my expression suddenly look hopeful. This turn of events- who could've foretold it?
"There's no doubt within me that you're not Chinami," he continued. "In the little amount of time I dealt with her, she was always manipulative and calculating, and I never saw her lose her cool. That is, even when the evidence was starting to stack against her. No offense, but your behavior is vastly different. It is perhaps ironic that your testimony being thoroughly disorganized actually made me believe it more. After all, Chinami would have had an eloquent narrative ready for me. I think that is evidence enough for an interaction outside the courtroom."
"Sorry," I apologized instinctively.
"You don't have to apologize. It's actually better that you are not her," he said. "Even though she roams freely, I am convinced that... I can't say it, for in the end there was not enough evidence to prove her wrongdoing."
He snatched his handkerchief back, with my snot probably all over it. He did not even wince when he took it, and maintained that disinterested look on him as he folded the cloth and placed it back into his shirt pocket.
"And about Naruhodo. I hope your feelings are sincere. Do not hurt his feelings with the merciless game you're playing. You're betraying his trust, and that's mean."
I was quiet for a moment, trying to digest what he had just said. Did he just... express that he cares about Ryu-chan? However, my mouth produced a more urgent question.
"You're not going to tell him, are you? As I t-told you, I plan to tell the t-truth... soon."
"I have no reason to tell him. Whatever happens in his life is none of my business," he replied. "I just... don't agree with your methods. That is why I express disapproval of them, but I will do nothing more."
Had I interpreted his earlier words wrong? No... that was no possible, for, somehow, his back looked lonely when he started to walk away.
"Wait," I called him back unintentionally.
He stopped and turned, and I realized I had to say something.
"Erm, Ryu... Naruhodo-san. He's still here. What I said about the sweets, it's true. Y-you could still talk to him," I blabbered.
"Thank you for the offer, but I will not. If you're so kind, tell him to forget about me," he said, bowed, and this time he really was gone.
I crumbled to the floor once he was out of sight. I just felt so weak mentally, emotionally and physically, that I didn't know what to tell Ryu-chan now. I had probably taken way too long for a simple bathroom break. I went back in to check the status of my eyes' poofiness, and washed them with cold water to treat the inflammation at the cost of ruining my makeup. I could explain suddenly wanting to wash my face, but I couldn't explain poofy eyes due to crying.
When I came back to where Ryu-chan was waiting for me, I lied and said that there was an incredibly long waiting line to use the bathrooms. He didn't question me about that or my lack of makeup, though he did appear to notice that my face looked different.
"It's too bad we couldn't meet Mitsurugi," he said. "Too bad for him too. He'll be missing delicious sweets."
"Uh-huh," I agreed with little energy.
I never told Ryu-chan about my meeting with Prosecutor Mitsurugi. I couldn't relay the contents of our conversation, or the equally merciless message that the prosecutor had left me with. I could only hope that one day they would meet face to face, and get to talk heart-to-heart.
Those were my thoughts as we left the District Court behind.
*Now, I have to confess that I'm not a romance writer, but have at least given it a few shots at it before. However, one thing I'm definitely not is a writer of crime fiction. And here I've wrote a case I literally pulled out of my a** at 2AM, so there might be some holes in the case other than the ones that the prosecution is obviously omitting to get the defendant convicted for murder. Message me if 1) you find a glaring hole anywhere, and/or 2) you want to know how the case, as I envision it, really went down (since I don't plan to reveal the truth of it in the story).
**In the prologue, Chinami called Ayame several times, but she never told her the names of the river-plan collaborators or that she had stood as witness in the Onamida (Fawles) trial that resulted in the man's death.
- Characters -
Ryuichi Naruhodo = Phoenix Wright
Ayame Hazakurain = Iris
Masashi Yahari = Larry Butz
Reiji Mitsurugi = Miles Edgeworth
Chinami Miyanagi = Dahlia Hawthorne
Kikuzou Nonda = Doug Swallow
