— Chapter 4: Monday, January 5th, Morning —
Makoto awoke to the sound of her cell phone ringing, coupled with a pounding headache. Dazed, she reached for the phone and swiped absently at the screen until it was quiet. Bringing it to her ear, she hoped she hadn't accidentally hung up on the caller. Shakily, she croaked out a weak "Hello?"
"Makoto? Is that you? Were you sleeping? You're late for work."
It took her a second, but she finally thought she recognized the voice. "Sato? Sorry—Sakai-san? Is that you?"
"Yeah, it's me. I was just at your cube looking for you. When I couldn't find you anywhere, I thought I'd give you a call. You're not home sick today, are you? You okay?"
Horrified, Makoto bolted upright in bed, though it made her brain throb inside her skull to do it. She could barely see anything—every beat of her heart sent flashes of white into her eyes. "Yeah, I'm fine," she lied, pulling her legs out from under her blankets. "Sorry, I was just out late… investigating that case."
"Oh?" he said, intrigued. "Find out anything good?"
"I have a description of a potential suspect."
"A suspect? Well hey, that's something! Nice work, Niijima-san. Wanna talk about it later? I'd be happy to look over your notes with you."
Makoto held her phone to her ear with her shoulder as she rummaged around in her dresser for a fresh blouse to change into. "Uh, sure, thanks Sakai-san. That's nice of you to offer."
"Call me Sato, please."
"Sato, of course." She started unfastening the buttons on the blouse she'd inadvertently slept in.
"Well," he said, a hint of embarrassment coloring his tone, "I can tell you're busy. I'll try to catch up with you at some point after you get in, Niijima-san. Take care."
"Thank you Sa—Sato," she said, barely catching herself before saying 'Sakai' instead of 'Sato'. "I'll see you later." And with that, she let the phone fall from her shoulder onto the bed as she hopped and shimmied into her navy blue suit pants. Catching herself in the mirror, she knew she looked like a wreck: Her hair hadn't been done, the bra she'd slept in was slipping off in unusual ways, and she'd buttoned her new blouse incorrectly. Sighing, she gave herself a moment to mentally reset before taking another crack at her appearance.
Once she'd popped a couple Tylenol and gotten her outfit in order, she settled for brushing her hair and applying some scented lotion to make herself smell like she'd actually showered. Plucking her phone up off the bed, her dashboard lit up, and the last message Ren had sent her last night became visible. Stopping in her tracks, she paused to read it:
Whatever happens, I want you to remember three things:
1. You're the smartest person in the entire department
2. The hardest, most necessary victories can take the longest to win
3. Whoever it is that's missing doesn't know it yet, but he's one of the luckiest people in the world to have someone like you out trying to find him
Straightening her spine, Makoto Niijima steeled herself and opened the front door, ready to show the world what she could do.
— — —
Back at the Academy, Ren sat, slouching, in his usual seat in the lecture hall for his elective course in Correctional Theory. If he wasn't such a creature of habit, he'd have taken a seat much further toward the back—he was having a hard time focusing. He spun his pencil around anxiously in his hand, and took virtually no notes. The only thing on the page was today's date.
It wasn't until everyone else around him started getting up that Ren realized the lesson was over. He looked down at his empty page and scrawled the words "Read the chapter!" across the length of it. He hadn't heard a single word. Shutting his notebook and stuffing it in his bag, he got up from his seat and heaved a great sigh.
"Bored today, Amamiya?" asked his professor, Kambei Shimada, before Ren could fully exit the row of seats.
Ren looked away, embarrassed to have been caught looking disinterested. "No, sir, I'm terribly sorry. I'm just incredibly distracted today. It wasn't the lesson, I promise."
"Was it something that happened over Christmas?" asked his professor, trying to be supportive. Ren was one of his best students, and it was unlike him to space out during a lecture.
"No. Well, not exactly… It's just… I saw my girlfriend over the holiday…"
"Say no more," said Shimada, laying a sympathetic hand on Ren's shoulder. "I take it you had a fight—you don't need to share the gory details. Not many women understand the time commitment that this life demands. Trust me, I've been married a couple times, and—"
"—Oh, it's not that, sir," said Ren, cutting in before his professor could get too personal. "She's a graduate of this academy—she understands it just fine—it's just that she's back in Tokyo, and I'm here. I'm this close to graduating," he said, holding up pinched fingers, "and I just wish I could fast-forward to the end so I could get back there and be with her."
"O-oh…" stammered Professor Shimada, turning a shade pinker. "Okay then. I guess I don't really have any words of wisdom to impart upon you then. I suppose I should just hurry up and finish teaching you everything that's going to be on the final, so you can take it and get out of here," he said with a chuckle.
Ren laughed politely, nodding. "Yeah, if only I could do that for all my classes! Anyway, thank you Professor. I appreciate your concern. I'll have better focus next week, I'm sure."
"I'm sure you will, Amamiya-san. Have a good day." Professor Shimada gave Ren a reassuring pat on the back and headed out of the lecture hall, leaving Ren behind.
Ren lifted his wrist to check his watch: 10:09am. He had nearly three hours before his next class—plenty of time to read the chapter that accompanied the lesson he'd just completely tuned out. It was a lucky thing that all of his professors this term taught everything right out of the textbook, so he could just read those more carefully when his class notes failed him.
And then it hit him. Alone in the lecture hall, he stood stock still, his mind a churning cauldron of machinations, conjuring up a plan. He'd had an epiphany, and he wouldn't be able to think about anything else until he'd fully considered it. Stepping with conviction, he strode up the aisle toward the exit, climbed on his bike, and furiously pedaled his way back home.
— — — Monday, January 5th, Late Afternoon — — —
Emiko loved her life. Ever since she moved to Tokyo and began her education in medicine at the University of Tokyo, everything just seemed to click. Though she missed Naomi, she felt good about the direction of her education. Even the big city, despite its reputation for fast-paced craziness, flowed with her rather than against her.
Even from Utsunomiya, Makoto and Ren had eased her transition to Tokyo by connecting her with their friend network, which is how she had met Ryuji. His home in Yongen-Jaya was all the way across Tokyo from where the university was, but he seemed to have less going on than Makoto and Ren's other friends, so he made himself available pretty much from the start. Then, after a year that seemed to fly by, Makoto was back in Tokyo, and it was like they'd never been apart at all.
Having switched from post-mortem work to medicine for the living, Emiko was a bit behind in her schooling compared to where she would have been had she stayed at the Academy. Though it meant more years of paying for her education, her parents were happy about the change in career. For a proper young lady, medicine was a much more socially acceptable field of work than conducting autopsies.
Regarding her personal life, they remained hopeful that a rich doctor would woo her away from the bleached blond goofball she'd hooked up with. They were confident her relationship with Ryuji would run its course without their direct intervention, so they weren't too pushy, but Emiko could feel their consistent disapproval. It was true that Ryuji wasn't what she'd pictured for herself, but he was good to her, and she couldn't imagine being in Tokyo without him.
With the new year came new med school duties, and the beginning of her time as a physician's assistant—today was orientation day at the university hospital. Secretly, she worried about whether she could balance her increased responsibilities on top of her studies, and still manage being someone's girlfriend.
Not that she had any time to worry today. Occupied with endless tours and hand-wringing as she met doctor after doctor—after technician, after nurse, after different kind of technician—the day moved like a blur, all while nursing a hangover from the night before. By the time she was headed off to meet her new mentor physician at day's end, her head was swimming and her body was aching.
She pulled her phone out of her pocket to check the time: 4:24pm. Imagining she must look like hell, Emiko took a small detour to the restroom on her way to her mentor's office. Stopping in front of a mirror along the wall of sinks, Emiko noted the tired look on her face and the bags under her eyes. "Not your hottest day ever, Tanaka-chan," she said to herself, turning on the faucet.
As she stood there waiting for the water to warm up just a bit, there was a flushing sound accompanied by another woman emerging from a stall behind her. The woman, a doctor by the look of her, sidled up to the sink next to Emiko and began washing her hands. Meeting their eyes in the mirror's reflection, Emiko flashed the woman a small smile before cupping her hands under the water and bringing them to her face.
"Long day, Tanaka-chan?" said the doctor, apparently having heard Emiko talking to herself a moment before.
Emiko blushed in mild embarrassment. "Ha, yes, sorry, it has been a long day. I'm about to meet my med school mentor, and I look and feel like garbage. I can't imagine a worse time for a first impression."
"Oh, I can imagine worse," said the doctor. "You could be hungover…"
At those words, Emiko's stomach dropped, trying to figure out if the doctor could tell she'd been drunk last night, or if the comment was just an unfortunate coincidence. She laughed anxiously and turned away from her, hurriedly dispensing a paper towel. Obscuring her face up to her eyes as she dried off, Emiko tried to recover her poise. "Y-yeah, you're right—being hungover would b-uuurrrp!"
Emiko's hands flew to her mouth and her eyes nearly popped out of her skull as she stared, mortified, back at the doctor, still eyeing her through the mirror's reflection. Oddly, the woman acted like she hadn't even noticed the loud belch that had cut Emiko's words short.
"Sorry, were you about to say something about being hungover?" asked the doctor, turning off the water and meeting Emiko at the paper towel dispenser with a wry smile.
Emiko was still rooted in place, her brain struggling to register the question. Once she had shaken herself out of her stupor, her instinct to abort took over. "PleaseexcusemeIhavetogo!" she blurted, fleeing from the bathroom and hurrying down the hall and around a corner, on her way to her mentor's office.
Finding the office with the correct name on it, she looked again at her watch: 4:29. She was right on time, and hoped intensely that her experience in the bathroom would be to first impressions what a failed dress rehearsal preceding a flawless opening night was to the theater. Taking a deep breath, she sat herself down in a chair opposite the office door and tried to focus on her accomplishments as a med student, willing her pulse to slow down.
In less than a minute, Emiko had herself feeling reasonably zen about what had just happened; completely mentally dissociated from the debacle in the bathroom. She was as steady as a surgeon's hands. Focusing on the solid office door in front of her, she waited patiently for it to open.
"Tanaka-chan?" said a familiar voice from just outside her field of vision.
Her blood ran cold in her veins, and she sat there, frozen. Emiko slowly turned her head to see the doctor from earlier staring down at her, looking entertained. Oh god, please no, it can't be her…
"Shall we step into my office?" said the doctor amiably. "I keep some ginger ale in a mini fridge under my desk, if you'd like some. It settles the stomach."
As though she were having an out-of-body experience, Emiko stood up and followed the doctor into her office, taking the seat facing the desk. Her mouth was dry, and her hands were clammy—she had never been more embarrassed in her entire life. No words would come.
"Here," said the doctor, popping open a can of Canada Dry ginger ale and handing it to her before taking a seat in her desk chair. Emiko accepted the can weakly and held it to her lips, drinking slowly as she delayed the inevitable. This woman was her mentor, and Emiko had introduced herself by tacitly admitting to being hungover and belching in her face before running away in embarrassment.
Her hands shaking, Emiko finally lowered the can into her lap and smacked her lips and tongue around inside her mouth. They still worked. "You… You're Doctor Takemi?"
"The very same," said the doctor, still wearing an amused look on her face, though it wasn't unkind. "And you must be Emiko Tanaka."
Emiko swallowed hard, determined to recover from this setback, but unable to conjure the words that would bring what had just happened into the memory hole any faster. She was stuck.
Tae Takemi watched the young woman's lips twitch as her brain tried to conjure up something coherent to say. "That was quite a first impression, yes, but you can relax. You weren't just assigned to me randomly. I don't normally oversee med students anymore, but we have a mutual friend, so I requested to be your mentor. I chose you."
That only barely helped. Emiko's lips had stopped wordlessly moving, but the shocked staring only worsened. Several seconds ticked by before Emiko could finally respond. "You… chose me? I don't understand. What friend?"
"Ren Amamiya," said Tae. "I've known him since he was in high school—used to let me experiment on him," she remarked, an almost sinister smile playing at her lips. "It's thanks to him that I was able to get some life-saving medicine out of R and D. He's a good kid, and I owe him a lot." She watched Emiko, studying her reaction.
"You know… Ren?"
Emiko had eased up ever so slightly. Tae smiled, pleased that Emiko's stiffness was beginning to melt—they could almost have an actual conversation. Tae leaned forward in her desk chair, lacing her fingers together as a hammock for her chin. "He tells me you saved his life."
At that, something in Emiko's stupor finally gave way, and her demeanor was instantly more relaxed. "He said that? No, he exaggerates," she said, waving a hand dismissively. "I mean, he was only barely shot… just once in the shoulder, and another in his lower leg. He was in a healthy state of shock when we found him—it wasn't as if he was about to bleed to death or anything, at least not for a while…"
"He told me you tackled an assailant who would have shot him in the head," said Tae.
"Oh, that," said Emiko. "I mean, I guess… Again, I hardly did anything. I just delayed the guy long enough for one of our other friends to club him in the head…"
Tae's mouth quirked in a subtle smile, trying not to chuckle at the young woman's awkward modesty. "Sounds like you may have saved his life more than once," she said.
Emiko shrugged heavily, mumbling, looking around the room as she tried to think of a way to deny the accolades Tae was trying to put on her.
"Is it hard to deflect well-earned praise, Tanaka-chan?"
Emiko relaxed back into her chair, fiddling with the soda can still perched in her lap. Looking up from the can, she met Tae's eyes and smiled weakly. "I only did what I thought needed doing. I was just the one who was there."
Pausing, Tae looked upon her protegé with genuine warmth and interest. "It takes mettle to keep a cool head when the stakes are high. Another person might have decided to leave Ren in his state of shock, or to run when the gun came out. You did neither. You have guts, Tanaka-chan—and that's why you're in my office today."
Emiko looked down at her hands, playing with the tab on the open soda can. She smiled to herself. The last five minutes had been a rollercoaster, but the ride was ending in an unexpectedly fortuitous place. Without even meaning to, her friends had come through for her again. This was going to be an interesting placement.
— — —
Back at her cubicle, Makoto considered the contents of her notebook: Kosuke Kobayashi had left work with his coworkers from Aspire Media at roughly 5:30pm on Saturday evening. They went to the Nightlife Bar and Grill in Harajuku to celebrate having landed a major client, Sunshine Commodities, a dealer in limited-run knickknacks sold exclusively on television. At the Nightlife, Kosuke met an attractive woman, and, according to the bartender, he left the bar with her at about eleven PM, inebriated. It had been about thirty-six hours since his disappearance, and he hadn't returned home. Statistically, by this point, he never would.
She had collected enough information that she could bring it back to Saki Kobayashi. She could tell her that her husband was last seen leaving the bar with another woman. Mrs. Kobayashi would surmise that he'd had an affair, and probably be devastated. Without more information, that was the most logical conclusion.
Makoto heard the precinct captain's orders on a loop inside her head. "Just go talk to her and get her to calm down, would you?" She gave a sad laugh—this news would definitely not calm the distraught wife. Makoto leaned back in her chair and sighed, rubbing her hands over her face as she melted into the plastic of the chair.
"Morning, Niijima-san, glad you made it in."
At those words, Makoto popped up and spun around, startled out of her moment of contemplation by the sound of Sato Sakai's warm voice. "Sato! Good morning, sorry."
"No, I'm sorry, Niijima-san—I seem to have a real knack for catching you when you're deep in thought!" he said, laughing amiably.
Yes, "deep in thought", that's it, she thought, embarrassed that for the second time today, he was catching her when she was mentally adrift. "No, it's alright, I was just looking over my notes for this missing person case, and not liking where it's taken me."
"Can I help?" asked Sato. "I'm between cases right now, so I have a minute, if you could use it."
"I don't know… I think I know what the evidence is saying, it just doesn't feel right," she said, frowning.
"What's it saying?"
"It's saying that Kosuke Kobayashi, the missing person, didn't make it home because he went off and spent the night with another woman." She sighed in defeat. "Mrs. Kobayashi isn't going to be happy."
Sato gave a sympathetic frown. "It never feels good to deliver bad news, does it?" he said.
"No…" She considered what he was saying before scrunching up her nose. "But it's not just that," she said. "She was so certain that he would come home. Their one-year wedding anniversary is coming up. They were childhood sweethearts… That he would run off with some other woman, be it for forever or even just a night, just doesn't… feel right," she insisted.
"You don't think a happily married man could get drunk, sleep with someone else by mistake, then be too ashamed to want to come home and explain it to his wife? Or to lie to her about it?" he said.
The way he said it made it sound so cut and dried. So logical. She bit her lip, shaking her head slowly. "It makes sense," she said, "it just…"
Sato watched her trail off. "It juuust… doesn't feel right."
Makoto looked him in the eyes. "Yeah. It doesn't."
Sato leaned into the frame of her cubicle, thinking. "Would it make you feel better to check the city's CCTV footage? Have you tried that already?"
Makoto perked up at the idea, but deflated pretty immediately. "Well, think about what that could tell me," she said. "Either it tells me he really did shack up with someone else, or it tells me something worse, like maybe she robbed him and left him face down in an alley somewhere."
"Or maybe," he said, trying to sound more optimistic, "it will tell you she helped him into a cab and sent him on his way."
"Then why didn't he make it home?" asked Makoto, incredulous.
"Because the cabbie robbed him and left him in an alley," said Sato, pointing meaningfully at his temple. He was trying to be funny, but Makoto didn't laugh. "Sorry, I have poor comic delivery…" he said self-consciously, shifting his weight from one foot to the other. "Look, let's just check the footage. Whatever you learn from it, it will give you more confidence in what you'll have to do next."
After a beat, Makoto nodded, and turned back to her desk. "You're right," she said finally. "I'm going to do that right now." Flipping through the rolodex on her desk, Makoto pulled up the phone number for the security company the city had hired to monitor its CCTV cameras. She hit the speakerphone button on her desk phone and dialed the number. It started to ring.
A young man's voice answered the call. "Hello, Fujiyama Security, how may I direct your call?"
"Yes, hello, this is Makoto Niijima of the Tokyo Metropolitan Police Department. Please put me through to surveillance."
"One moment while I transfer you."
Sato stepped a little further into Makoto's cubicle and leaned against the desk. Together, he and Makoto listened to the clicks and rings as the call was transferred and subsequently picked back up again.
A polite but bored-sounding young woman answered the call. "This is Keiko with surveillance, how may I help you?"
"Hi, this is Makoto Niijima with the TMPD," said Makoto once more, "I'd like access to the CCTV footage surrounding the Nightlife Bar and Grill, please."
"Account number?" asked Keiko.
Makoto scanned around her desk for the correct post-it note. Finding it, she recited the appropriate numbers into the speakerphone.
"One moment, please." There was a pause while Keiko typed something into her computer. "Would that be the Nightlife Bar and Grill in Itabashi, Harajuku, or Adachi City?"
"Harajuku."
This answer was followed by the sound of more typing and another pause. "There are two cameras located near the Nightlife Bar and Grill in Harajuku—one mounted to an adjacent business just south of the Nightlife, pointing north toward the establishment's front entrance, and another trained on an alley out back. Do you have a preference, Officer?"
"Detective Niijima," said Sato, cutting in. He glanced down at her, apologizing for the interruption.
"Sorry, that was just… my partner, Detective Sakai," said Makoto, covering. "I don't have a preference—please provide footage from both cameras."
"Date and time?" Keiko asked.
"Let's go with… Saturday, January third, from ten o'clock PM to midnight," said Makoto, checking her notes.
"I'll prepare the files," said Keiko obediently. "You'll receive them by end of business hours tomorrow. Is email okay?"
"Yes, I have an address on file," said Makoto. She'd accessed CCTV footage many times in the past working narcotics and burglary cases over the last year and a half.
"And would that be… ' '?" asked Keiko.
"That's correct. Thank you," said Makoto.
"Will there be anything else, Detective?"
"No, thank you, that will be all."
"Okay, Detective. As always, we at Fujiyama Security are happy to support the TMPD's work to keep Tokyo safe, and we thank you for your service to this great city."
"Um, thanks, you too," said Makoto clumsily, but before she could even complete the last syllable, there was a click, and the call was ended.
"Well, there you go, Detective! Nothing more to do now until end of business tomorrow. What now?" asked Sato, looking chipper.
Makoto took a deep breath and blew it out slowly, thinking. Sato made it sound like that phone call had offered her a lifeline, but really, all it had done was delay the inevitable—at some point, she would have to tell Saki Kobayashi what she believed had happened to her husband, and she didn't look forward to making that call. As it was, Ms. Kobayashi probably deserved at least an update on how the case was progressing. "I guess I should probably call his wife and let her know we're waiting on a lead," she said, somewhat morosely. Then, in an even more dejected tone of voice, "After that, I guess I'll work on my PowerPoint…"
Sato made a face like he'd just smelled something foul. "Oh, god, Niijima, you're killing me with this. You're following a good lead on, well, not an interesting case, but at least a more interesting case than a purse snatching—isn't your adrenaline the least bit up?" he said, trying to imbue her with some sense of excitement.
Makoto felt bad for being so lame, but she really was dreading that phone call. Her mind meandered, and she found herself fantasizing out loud. "Wouldn't it be great if Saki Kobayashi called right now, and told me her husband had come home, all by himself?" she asked, being rhetorical. The low-level crimes she'd been investigating before now had all been about catching bad guys or recovering stolen property—seldom had she been tasked with delivering bad news. If her gut was right, and something bad had happened to Saki's husband, how would she deliver the news?
"They never do that," said Sato flatly, breaking her reverie. She looked at him. "Call to tell you that? Never. They only call when it's bad, or if they learn something else that will help you solve their problems—they never call to update you that 'Everything's all good now, thanks.' They just don't. Sorry."
Makoto evaluated him in earnest—she hadn't known Sato Sakai for very long, but she had the feeling that this was uncharacteristically dour for the man. He was just trying to help her—her naïvete must be just the littlest bit annoying. "Sato, I apologize for my ignorant comments—I was just thinking out loud. I want to thank you for all your help up to this point. I wouldn't have this case if it weren't for you, and your encouragement and support have helped me move it along. Thank you," she said, bowing forward in spite of being seated at her desk.
Sato carded his hand through his hair, trying to hide his embarrassment from her. "Hey, no worries, huh? If you want to thank me, come join me for dinner. You've been working all day without a break, I'll bet, and I just wrapped up a case. Come help me celebrate."
Makoto turned pink, afraid for a moment that Sato was getting the wrong idea. "Oh! No, I couldn't… I mean, I have a boyfriend, and I didn't mean…"
Sato waved her off. "Hey, hey, it's not like that—I'm your 'partner', right?" he said, chuckling. "This is a work dinner, okay?"
Makoto looked up at him, uncertain. He seemed genuine. He wasn't creepy or anything, and he was honestly the nicest person she had talked to at the TMPD in the whole of her career there so far. She liked the idea of having a friend at work, and didn't want to ruin things by assuming he was just being nice to her because he thought he had a shot with her. "O-Okay," she stuttered, "dinner sounds good, then."
"Great!" said Sato, snapping his fingers on both hands. "I know this awesome little walkup place down the street. Yakitori Alley, have you ever been there? You'll love it. Come on, grab your purse." Sato gestured to her to hurry out of her seat and follow him out of her cubicle. She did as he urged her to, plucking her purse from its hook and her coat from the back of her chair, and she followed him out of the office toward the exit doors.
She glanced at her phone to see if she'd missed any texts in the last few hours. She hadn't, so she tucked her phone in her pocket and kept walking.