Strange Memories With You, My Dear

Chapter 01.01

Unknowable Memories

Translated by KuroNeko
Edited by Omkar

I had a memory that I should not have had.

    I get a strange sensation of déjà vu while strolling around the city. In addition, images of children with names like “Tomoki” or “Minami” that I should not have known come to me, and I can occasionally see myself with them.

    But I’d never known someone with that name.

    There was no one with that name in my elementary school graduation album, and since I didn’t take part in any sports clubs or lessons, I would have had no way of getting to know my peers outside of elementary school.

    Not only do I experience a strong sense of déjà vu, but I also have many recurring dreams about the same stuff. It appears like a character from my “memory” is in the dream, but I can’t recall the details when I woke up, but in the dream, I was content and liked a girl named Yuuko. I always had a slight sensation of nostalgia after waking up from a dream, and occasionally I felt sad that I had woken up from the dream.

    These phenomena began about the time I started junior high school. I was curious, so I read a few books on “dreams.”

    I’d read theories about how dreams reflect our own aspirations and unconsciously suppressed emotions, and I wondered whether having fulfilling dreams was easing my dissatisfaction after a tough upbringing.

    I was escorted to an examination room after filling out a medical questionnaire, where I explained to an elderly doctor in a white coat that I occasionally experienced the same recurring dreams and felt a sensation of déjà vu regarding things I had never seen before. After hearing my experience, the doctor had a look at the questionnaire and then had me do some type of IQ and psychological test. I answered those questions in another room, and when the results came in, I was brought to the examination room. The doctor began asking questions after reviewing the questionnaire and test results.

   “Do you have difficulty sleeping at night?”

    “No.”

    “Do you frequently wake up in the middle of the night?”

    “No.”

    “Do you dread going to school or feel you don’t want to do anything?”

    “No.”

    “Do you ever lose or exceed your appetite?”

    “No.”

    After repeating these questions and answers, the doctor turned to the questionnaire with a puzzled expression, “Hmm….”

    “You’re doing well in school and in terms of your health, right? Do you have any aches or pains, or is there anything else bothering you?”

    “Not particularly.”

    The doctor scribbled in his report before asking, raising just his eyes from his hand, “Do you have any friends at school that you talk to a lot?” 

    “In a nutshell, I have a few good friends in my class and club.”

    After some thought, the doctor concluded, “It’s puberty,” and directed me to a counselling centre near the hospital.

    The doctor did not recommend medicine that day, but he told me to return soon if I felt anything abnormal or depressed.

    Later that day, I went to the counselling centre. It was a clean facility, and the room I was taken to featured a comfy chair, as well as orange juice, which the employees offered me. I sipped my orange juice and gave the friendly-looking counsellor, who eventually came with the same explanation I had given the psychotherapist.

    As I told her about my experience, the lady smiled and listened. Then she started asking things like, “Do you enjoy school?” or “How are things at home with your mother?”

    “It’s not always fun, but sometimes it’s fun in its own way. It’s fun to play soccer and talk with my classmates during lunch. My mother usually arrives home late from work, but when she arrives early, we eat dinner together.” I said. “Hmm’, the aunty gave up and asked, “Do you ever get lonely when you’re home alone?”

    When she asked me, I felt terribly childish, so I shook my head and said, “No, it’s not.” The lady then smiled pleasantly and murmured, “I see…”

    “By the way, do you frequently have problems remembering something in your everyday life, or do you forget things?”

    “No, I don’t think so. I’m not bad at remembering stuff. I almost forgot nothing.”

    She made notes while she listened to me, then glanced at them attentively before straightening up and spoke about the “memory.”

        Human memory, she claims, differs from what is recorded by devices such as photographs, hard drives, and semiconductor memory in that when we try to recall anything, it is not immediately replicated in its original form, but the image is reconstructed each time. It is changeable and vague, and it may be corrupted by the influence of others.

    “I know it may be difficult for you to say this right now, but if you have any issues with you, please talk to me about anything, even if it is something small,” Before I left the counselling centre that day, she said it to me.

    But I felt as though I’d arrived in the wrong place. It was interesting to hear about other people’s recollections, but I had a feeling that what was happening to me wasn’t the same. I couldn’t believe the “memory” was simply a reworked version of my initial recollection or an assumption. As a result, I stopped visiting hospitals and other services in that neighborhood.

    In reality, it wasn’t an issue that had to be solved right away because those recollections hadn’t had a detrimental influence on my life. It worried me, but not to the point where it interfered with my exam preparations. In that regard, the announcement of the new release of my favourite game was far more disruptive to my attention on my academics.

    As the doctor at the psychosomatic clinic murmured, “It’s puberty,” I deduced on my own that this was a puberty-related perplexity and chose not to be too concerned. According to a book I read, the hormones in the brain are out of balance throughout puberty, so I assumed that’s what it was.

    However, I experienced the same dream again shortly after leaving the hospital.

    After waking up from the dream, I suddenly realised in my hazy waking mind that I had answered the counsellor lady’s question incorrectly.

    “Do you ever get lonely when you’re home alone?”

    The counsellor lady’s questioning voice resonated in my foggy brain in the early morning dimness, like a blend of dream and reality.

    Whenever I awoke from the dream about the girl named Yuuko, I always felt a sense of loneliness, like if I had lost something, like a stinging pain in the back of my chest.

◇

 The sound of chalk tapping on the blackboard jolted me out of my sleep.

    …… I appeared to have dozed off. With my cheekbones in the air, I slept in a shallow, uncomfortable slumber. I felt slight ache in my knuckles and cheekbones, and I rubbed my palms together as if wiping my cheeks.

    Although it was just May, the classroom was exceedingly hot. The back of the neck of the girl in front of me, whose hair was wrapped in a single bun, was saturated with sweat and glued to her skin.

    A gentle breeze came in through the open window, stroking my sweaty skin as I exhaled deeply. After PE, it’s time for World History. The antiperspirant that the students had applied while changing left a slight odour in the classroom.

    The world history teacher was an elderly man named Okamoto, who was famous for writing so much on the board that it was said if he took the writing seriously, he would get tendinitis in a month. He always teaches at his own pace and pays minimal attention to students who are doing work or dozing off.

    The notebook in my hand is not the crumpled one I was holding just before I fell asleep.

    It was a little past three o’clock in the afternoon. The sunshine was becoming more vivid, and the normally white ground was turning orange.

    Following that, we had club activities until well beyond seven o’clock.

    Perhaps it was the languidness of the class, but even that time, which I was most looking forward to in my current school life, felt a little like a burden.