Chapter 93: Erased
With the news he just received, Arata went rushing out of the store. Due to the shock from what he just heard, Erina was able to avoid being detected by him. Though she hardly had much in her to do anything else either.
"What do you mean he thinks it's that day?" Misei questioned her, after she had called everyone together.
"He asked to buy something here." She explained. "But the storekeeper said he already bought it six months ago."
"I see." Misao thought over the information she had gathered over the course of today. There was only one conclusion she could come up with. "I know it might seem cliche, but do you think he has Amnesia?"
Amnesia? They all thought, it would explain his actions. Except, now there was an even bigger problem that arose if that was the case. What caused him to lose his memories, and why did it bring him back to that day of all dates.
That question lingered in everyone minds. Thought perhaps, none more than Arata himself. Now it was the next day. He was sitting in class, scrapping his mind for answers. When he had returned home, he asked his mother about the date. In order to make sure that the store owner wasn't pulling a trick on him.
Unfortunately for what he was hoping, she ended up agreeing with that man. So that really meant that he didn't remember a single thing he did in the last six months. But how?
"Kashimura?" A voice brought him back to reality. Lunch had begun, and now there was a strange woman standing in front of his desk. "You probably don't remember me, but I'm this school's nurse, Koume Mino." She told him.
"Hmm? I'm sorry, but is there a problem?" He asked her, curious why she would want to take interest in him.
"I heard about a medical problem in relation to you, so I'd like to check up on it." A medical problem? Hopefully it was about this memory loss and not something that he forgot about. So Arata followed her to the office, which was fine with him. Except there was one question he wondered. How did this woman find out.
As it would turn out, the answer was clear the moment he stepped into the room. That would be the fact that it was filled with a lot of uninvited visitors.
"It doesn't appear that you've suffer any trauma to your head." She flashed a light into his eye to check the reaction. "When I was informed that you had amnesia, it made me very concerned, especially with your other recent medical emergencies. The fact that he had other problems was not pleasant to hear for Arata.
"I guess that's a good thing." He commented. "Um, aren't medical examinations usually… Private?" He pointed over to the group of people that were interested in this. Which was a lot of them. Yogi and the group, the library committee, even the gardening club was here. At least he ran into the first two, but Arata had no clue why that club was interested in him.
"Well, I'm not doing anything too personal." She answered. "But aren't they your friends?" Apparently he had a relationship with all these people, but that's a lot of people. Arata was certain he kept to himself. "Oh no, wait. Maybe that doesn't matter." Now the nurse was freaking out over breaking protocol.
"Arata, you gotta snap out of it!" The bright auburn haired girl hopped onto him. Simultaneously shaking and hugging him. Why is everyone so on-hands with him too? Instinctively, he shoved her away from him. He took a defensive stance away in case anyone else decided to attack him.
"Please, don't do that." Koume informed her, the rest of the gardening club restrained her. Much to Matsu's chagrin. "It's already a shock for him, to hear about losing his memory. We also don't know the cause to it, so please. Avoid physically shaking him up."
"Okay…" The girl had a downtrodden expression from hearing that.
"I'm going to need to contact your parents, so that you can see a doctor for a second opinion." The nurse turned her attention back to her patient. "So expect to see me after school."
"That's fine." Arata got up from the examination bed. "I guess I'll just go now."
"That's it?" Erina spoke up, before Arata was able to make his exit. "But, what about-"
"The fact that you're apparently my friends?" He finished for her. "I'm sorry, but I don't really see how that's the case." In his mind, there was no way he could just up and be friendly with all of them. A lot of them, he had no background knowledge of. At least with Yogi's group, they were all in the same class was first-years.
"But, Arata…" Yogi was at a lost for words. The thought of losing a friend like this was painful.
"Stop it." Arata was getting irritated with this persistent begging. He had gotten used to thinking of ways to avoid Yogi, but this was getting to be too much for his taste. "Look, I don't know why you all think so fondly of me. But I know that there's no way I got that close to any of you in just six months." He spoke with gritted teeth, then stormed out of the room.
"Arata…" They stood in shock, this anger was new to most of them.
"I should've stopped you all." Koume was the one to break this silence. "You need to understand where he's coming from." After all, he had just learned that six months of his life was taken away. Now he was in a strange situation, with strangers telling him that they were friends.
That's already confusing to most people. However, for someone like Arata. Whom at the last point he could remember, was him being a loner. This came as a huge shock.
So that was all they could do with him. This Arata didn't want to spend any time with them, so how could they force him to do so. Not that it made the bad taste in their mouths any more bearable.
The three groups split up. They all had their own separate ways to go to and they were only there for one reason anyway.
"This stinks." Ichiri complained once the committee began their meeting. "Are we just supposed to pretend that everything we've been through didn't happen?"
"It's a shame to think that might be the case." Said Hifumi. "But he's now the Arata of old, instead of the one we've gotten to know."
"Actually, that's another thing." Ichiri had only been at this school starting as a second year, which was also only six months ago. "He wasn't friends with anyone back then?"
��He's what we all figured was a loner." Yurime explained. Despite not wanting to be well-known at the school. Arata actually had quite the reputation that everyone talked about. "That's why I thought it was strange when he started to hang with Aono and the others. Well, you know the rest after that."
Since his major interactions only ever occurred during this time period. It was a shame for all of them to think that it ended up being meaningless. However, Yurime had a part of her that wondered if it was truly a bad thing for her.
Elsewhere, the gardening club was also gathering their thoughts over this event.
"He really doesn't remember me?" Matsu had plopped her face down at the table. This was the worst news she could think of hearing.
"If it makes you feel better, he didn't remember you the first time." Hanaka told her, giving the girl a pat on the head.
"Yeah, I'm sure this'll all pass in no time." Karino proudly proclaimed.
"But what if it doesn't?" Yumeho was more pessimistic...
Of course, the main group had their own problems with him now being the way he was. Things were a lot more quiet with him gone now.
"Ahhh, what are we supposed to do?" Yogi asked in frustration. He didn't know what to do, or even what they could do about this situation in the first place. "We can't honestly not try to help him."
"The best thing we can do is to wait until he sees his doctor." Misei tried her best to maintain calm in this bizarre scenario. "Perhaps they'll find the cause and fix him."
"And what if they don't?" Yuriko asked. That was a question no one wanted to seriously entertain. Yet at the same time, it couldn't be ignored.
Right now, the Arata they all knew was gone. Replaced with the one they once knew, a long time ago. It was as if he was deleted, and system restored back to a previous version.
"Perhaps there might be something we can do." Misao thought of something...
Of all people that were conflicted with this. Arata had to be the one affected by it the most. Now, sitting alone behind the school, with no one to bother him. The only things keeping his attention were his own thoughts.
"Sheesh." He muttered to himself. To think that so much was lost to him, with no way of knowing if it would ever come back. He hoped that his doctor's visit would cure him, but nothing was ever guaranteed. There wasn't even a known cause for this.
Not to mention, that all these people claiming to be his friends. It was bad enough for him to think that the last six months was him acting like a completely different person than the one he knew he was. Not to mention, there was also another point in this, that his mind couldn't leave about these people.
"How did so many cute girls want to be my friend?!" He yelled in frustration, scratching up his head.
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