The next morning, he arrived earlier than usual. The sky was still dark, the stars faint and cold above.

  Yukari was already there.

  She told him about a boy who had fallen into the river years ago. How she had pulled him out, though she had barely been strong enough. How that moment had given her a reason to keep living.

  He realized, slowly, that the boy had been him.

  He didn’t know what to say.

  “You gave me a reason,” she said. “Now I’m giving you one.”

  When the sun rose, the river turned gold.

  Mizuno Kuusuke stood beside the Witch of the River.

  And for the first time in a long time, he wanted to see what tomorrow looked like.

  ※

  The next morning, Kuusuke woke without an arm.

  The apartment was dim, the curtains letting in just enough light to give shape to things.

  The clock on the wall ticked, each sound hollow in the stillness.

  For a while, he y in bed, staring at the ceiling, counting the faint cracks that spidered outward like pale veins. He thought about how easy it was to fall into routines. To live without ever really living.

  He got up. Pulled on his jacket. Left the apartment without eating.

  By the time he reached the river, the sky was a pale silver, like the inside of an old coin. Yukari was waiting on the stone where she always sat. As if she had always been there, and always would be.

  “Morning,” she said, without looking at him.

  He sat beside her, close enough to hear the quiet rhythm of her breathing.

  “You’re early,” she said.

  “I didn’t sleep much.”

  “You should sleep.”

  “I know.”

  He didn’t eborate. She didn’t ask.

  For a while, they just watched the river. The water moved slowly today, sluggish as if reluctant to leave. The surface was smooth, reflecting the sky like gss. Kuusuke felt that if he reached out, his hand would pass through the world entirely.

  Yukari held her camera on her p. She traced the rim of the lens with her fingertips, as if trying to memorize its shape.

  “Do you like it?” he asked.

  She nodded. “Cameras are honest. They show you what’s there, but they also show you how you feel about it.”

  “That doesn’t make sense.”

  “It will,” she said. “If you keep looking.”

  He wasn’t sure he believed that. But he wanted to.

  ※

  They started meeting every morning.

  At first, he thought it would be temporary. That he would grow tired of it. That she would grow tired of him. But days passed, then weeks, and the ritual became a habit.

  She showed him how to use the camera properly. How to focus. How to think about light. How to wait for the moment when something ordinary becomes something worth seeing.

  They took pictures of the river. Of the sky reflected in puddles on cracked concrete. Of birds that rested on broken power lines. Of cats that watched them from beneath rusted cars.

  “It doesn’t matter what you take pictures of,” Yukari said once, as they reviewed the photos on a small bench by the river. “What matters is whether you care about it.”

  Kuusuke nodded. He thought about that when he looked through the lens. Whether he cared.

  Sometimes he did.

  There were days when she was quieter than usual.

  She would sit by the water’s edge, her hands pressed ft against the stone, as if drawing strength from it. Her breaths were shallow then, her skin pale enough that he thought it might vanish altogether if he looked away.

  But she always smiled when she caught him watching.

  “Stop staring,” she said once. “You’ll miss something.”

  “I’m looking at you,” he said.

  “That’s not the same.”

  He didn’t understand. Not yet.

  ※

  Spring turned to early summer without him noticing.

  The grass by the river grew taller, brushing against his legs when he walked. The cicadas started to sing, their voices harsh and unrelenting. Kuusuke found himself sweating in his jacket, but he wore it anyway. Habit, maybe. Or superstition.

  Yukari started bringing a different camera. Digital, this time. She let him use the old one more often.

  “You’ll need your own soon,” she said.

  He shrugged. “I don’t have the money for that.”

  “You should save up.”

  “Maybe.”

  She smiled faintly. “You always say maybe.”

  “It’s safer.”

  “From what?”

  He didn’t answer. She didn’t press.

  ※

  On a humid morning in mid-June, Kuusuke brought her coffee.

  It was from a vending machine, still hot enough to burn his fingers through the can. He set it down beside her, unsure if she even liked coffee.

  She looked at it for a long moment, then picked it up, holding it between both hands as if it were something fragile.

  “Thank you,” she said.

  “You’re welcome.”

  They sat like that for a long time. She didn’t drink it. But she kept holding it until it went cold.

  Breaking the silence, he finally asked her the question that had lingered in his mind for days.

  “Why did you save me?”

  She didn’t pretend not to understand.

  She looked at the river for a long time, as if searching for something beneath the surface. Then she nodded.

  “I was there passing by,” she said. “So I pulled you out.”

  A slight look of confusion formed on his face. “That doesn’t really answer the question.”

  “You don’t remember it anyways.”

  “I remember falling,” he said. “I remember the cold. And hands pulling me up.”

  She smiled.

  He felt something shift inside him. Not relief. Not gratitude. Something heavier. As if a debt he didn’t know he owed had just been called in.

  She was quiet for a long time. Then, softly, she finally answered the question which lingered in the air.

  “I didn’t realize it at the time, but it's because saving you saved me.”

  He didn’t understand. But he didn’t ask her to expin.

  As they watched the sun rise over the water, he said quietly, “I’m gd you saved me.”

  She turned to him, her eyes bright with something unreadable. “I’m gd I did, too.”

  He took her hand.

  She let him.

  By the end of June, the river had changed again.

  The water ran faster. The stones were hidden beneath the current. The light on the surface was harsher now, the gentle gold of spring repced by the sharp silver of summer.

  Kuusuke stood at the edge of the water, Yukari beside him, and thought about how quickly things changed.

  And how some things, once lost, could never be found again.

  ※

  They made a project of it, eventually.

  Photographs of the river, and the pces where it led. Abandoned buildings, cracked sidewalks, empty lots where flowers grew through broken pavement. They called it The River Project.

  “It’s a stupid name,” she said.

  “It’s perfect,” he said.

  They hung photos on strings in her apartment. Bck and white, mostly. Some color. Images that blurred at the edges, as if they had been taken through water.

  He found he liked looking at them. At how they made ordinary pces look like memories.

  One evening, after a long day of walking and shooting, they sat on the bridge that crossed the river. Feet dangling over the edge. The sun was low, turning the water to liquid copper.

  “Why do you call yourself a witch?” he asked.

  She thought for a moment. “Because I’m cursed.”

  He ughed softly. “That’s dramatic.”

  “It’s true.”

  “What kind of curse?”

  She smiled, but it didn’t reach her eyes. “The kind that makes you stop changing.”

  He didn’t understand. Not then. Not completely.

  But eventually, he would.

  ※

  That night, he dreamed of the river again.

  But this time, Yukari was in the water. Reaching for him. Her hands pale and thin, her hair spreading like ink around her face.

  He woke before she could touch him.

  The apartment felt colder than it should have.