The tennis ball hung suspended against the searing summer sky, a tiny sun caught between two worlds. Twelve-year-old Aoi Minami squinted through the glare, her fingers tightening around the racket's grip—slick with sweat, trembling with exhaustion. The air smelled of hot asphalt and freshly cut grass, the kind of scent that clung to memories. Across the court, Mirai bounced on her toes, her sunflower-yellow scrunchie coming loose, dark pigtails swinging with every movement.
"One more point, Aoi!" Mirai called, grinning so wide her eyes crinkled shut. "We've got this!"
Aoi wiped her forearm across her damp forehead. They'd been playing for hours, the championship match stretching into golden afternoon light. The stands were packed—parents, coaches, kids from rival schools—but in this moment, it was just the two of them. Just like always.
The serve came fast, a bullet of white. Aoi's muscles moved before her mind could catch up. She pivoted, swung—
Thwack.
The sound was perfect. The ball rocketed back, a comet streaking across the blue. Mirai whooped, already lunging to return it.
Then—
—a screech of tires, rubber burning against pavement.
—rain, sudden and cold, pelting Aoi's face as she knelt on the sidewalk, her knees scraped raw.
—the sterile white of a hospital ceiling, buzzing fluorescent lights, her mother's voice fraying at the edges. "Aoi, look at me. Look at me."
—silence. Not the quiet of an empty room, but the kind that swallowed sound whole. The kind where Mirai's laughter should have been, where her "Nice shot, partner!" should have echoed, but didn't.
The doctors said it was quick. The police said it wasn't her fault. The other kids whispered anyway.
Aoi packed her racket away the next day. The grip still smelled like sunscreen and sweat. She buried it at the back of her closet, beneath old sweaters and forgotten homework, and tried to forget the way the strings had hummed in her hands.
She almost succeeded.
Until he showed up.