"Please continue, Tamura-san," Nagisa said as he got the control of his facial expression back and flashed the elderly woman a kind smile.
Tamura-san nodded. "As far as I have heard, the father of the Ryugazaki family was abusive, both to his wife and his two sons. One night, he took it too far and ended up killing his oldest son. He was about 8 years old or so," she said with a saddened tone.
Nagisa bit his lips as he started thinking about how common a surname Ryugazaki was. As far as he knew, it wasn't very common. There was still hope though. Osaka and Iwatobi were far from each other. Weren't they?
"Not many days after, possibly the following day, the mother gathered all her things and ran away. She didn't bring her remaining child. Nobody knows where she disappeared to, and her husband possibly didn't care. Her disappearance was discovered by her colleagues. She was found that same night when she crashed into another car, killing herself, and almost the entire family in the other car. There were two survivors of the other family, a young girl at about preschool age and a baby boy. You may have already figured that the boy was yourself. Both children were taken to the hospital, but the girl was too badly injured and died during surgery. Only the boy escaped unharmed,"
"Nagisa was unharmed?" Gou asked slightly surprised. In her opinion it should be next to impossible to escape such an accident without a single injury.
"Not one," Tamura-san said. "If you want to know, they found a considerable amount of alcohol in Ryugazaki-san's blood. It is highly possible she got herself drunk once she got to Tottori-shi,"
"What happened to the father and the youngest son?" Nagisa asked, suddenly not caring at all about his own family.
"Well, the authorities found out about this whole thing and removed the boy from his father immediately. The father was sent to jail while the boy was send to an orphanage in Tottori-ken," Tamura-san said. "I don't know where in the prefecture though," she said.
Nagisa nodded.
"May I ask, do you know if the Hazuki family lived in Tottori-shi?" Gou asked.
"No, they didn't. They were from Hiroshima if I'm not mistaken," Tamura said.
Gou and Nagisa exchanged looks. "If we want to know more about your family, we have to go to Hiroshima then," Gou said with a soft smile. "We can't stay in Osaka forever,"
Nagisa nodded again. "I wonder… was it really Rei-chan's family?" he asked.
"We don't know the boy's first name, nor his age, so I can't say. All we know is that he was younger than 8 years old," Gou responded with an irritated tone in her voice.
"The youngest Ryugazaki boy?" Tamura-san asked slightly confused. "Do you want to know that too?" she asked.
Nagisa nodded eagerly. "If you know, would you tell us, Tamura-san?" he asked.
Tamura-san nodded. "I am not sure, but I have read it before. I think he was about 4 years old and his name was… Rei?" she said the last in a slightly questioning way. "Do you know him?" she asked.
"We were at the same orphanage," Nagisa said. "Rei-chan has been like a big-brother to me as long as I can remember," he smiled at the thought of how their relationship used to be.
"Well," Gou said. She had started feeling uncomfortable. "We should get going to Hiroshima," she said.
"Hold on," Tamura-san said as she stood. "I'll make you some bentos,"
So Tamura-san made them lunch for their trip and saw them off as she left. She was smiling kindly at both teens all the way.
As Gou and Nagisa made it Osaka central station they both felt like they had learned something more from their visit to Osaka. They took a short time to look at the town for a short while. Gou eyed the post office which they had been at earlier that morning. An uneasy feeling was welling up inside her, but she didn't know what it was for. There was nothing different about the place from when she first saw it.
"Well, it was Hiroshima right?" Nagisa said. He was checking the tickets for the far journey.
"Yes," Gou said and turned her attention to the screen. "How much is it?"
"5000 yen," Nagisa said.
Gous eyes widened. "That's 10000 for the both of us!" she nearly yelled. "That's expensive!" She thought for a second. "Do we even have that much?"
Nagisa looked in his wallet. After traveling to Tottori-shi they had decided that only one of them should hold on to the money. It ended up being decided by rock-paper-scissors and Nagisa had won. Now he held the money.
"We have 3000 yen," he said.
Gou bit her lip. "That's not even enough for one of us to get there," she said. "What about back to Tokyo?" she asked.
"3000 for one person," Nagisa said.
"How far can the two of us get?" Gou asked and looked at the screens.
Nagisa studied it too and was first to find the answer. "We might be able to make it to Nagoya," he said hesitantly.
Gou sighed. "That's not very far," she said. She started thinking seriously about what they were going to do about this whole situation. They could get to Nagoya at best and that wasn't far enough. Maybe they could find Tamura-san and ask her to host them until they found out what to do, but considering they were strangers, it seemed a bit rude to ask that much. If only Gou hadn't decided for them to stay at that inn in Tottori-shi last night. Why had her comfort gotten the best of her right then?
She was snapped out of her thoughts when Nagisa walked to the ticket automat and prepared to buy a ticket. She followed him and looked over his shoulder as he picked the destination, Tokyo.
"Nagisa, what are you doing!" she exclaimed.
"Gou-chan, you're going home," Nagisa said.
Gou shook her head violently. Her ponytail was almost whipping her face over and over. "I refuse," she said. "I'm not going home without you," the last was almost a yell as she felt her eyes tearing up from the unthinkable thought.
Nagisa nodded. "You are," he said. "I promised you yesterday, I would make sure you came home as soon as possible," he said. "This is my fault," he said. "You have to get home safely and then I'll find a way to manage,"
Gou attempted to smile. "Stop being a fool and acting like a hero," she said. "I'm not going," she said.
"Your mother, Rin-chan and Haru-chan are all worried about you, so is Hana-chan and Momo-chan," Nagisa said. "I'll be fine here," he assured.
Gou sighed, allowing the tears to reappear in her eyes. "You really want me to go home, right?" she asked.
Nagisa nodded. "It's better if one of us go home than we are both lost and broke," he said.
Gou nodded and allowed Nagisa to finish buying the ticket. She wasn't even sure how to feel anymore. She hated the fact that she was going to leave Nagisa behind, but her classmate didn't give her any other choice than to go home and wait. They had been gone for three days now. He was right, everyone had got to be worried back there, not just her mother, her brothers and her friends, but also Makoto, Kisumi and maybe Rei too, if he even knew that Nagisa was missing.
"Go, Gou-chan," Nagisa said as he handed the ticket to her. Gou looked up and noticed the tears in Nagisa's eyes as well. This was also difficult for him. She understood. He spent their last money on getting her home and thereby he had nothing for himself.
"Take care, Nagisa," she said. "I… I'll speak to Makoto-san and let him know where you are,"
Nagisa nodded and then hugged Gou goodbye. They then parted ways. Gou went to catch the next train to Tokyo and Nagisa went out to who knows what. He didn't even turn around to watch Gou leave. Gou knew this, because she turned to watch him.