Hayashi chuckled. “No, I meant you. Maybe you’ll get a girlfriend soon.”
Shinji shrugged, taking out a sandwich and passing it to Hayashi. “That would not work out.” He walked with Hayashi to the front of the restaurant, far away from where the officers and forensics still swept for evidence and settled at a tall, standing table.
“Why not?” Hayashi asked while unpacking the sandwich. “You’re young, you’re good-looking. What wouldn’t work out?”
Hayashi’s sudden compliment made Shinji’s cheeks flush. He berated himself for feeling like this; it was just a simple compliment, nothing more. But it came from his superior officer whom he admired and who was also a very attractive man.
Hayashi had taken off his coat, and leaned with an elbow up on the standing table, the suit jacket hugging the muscles of his arm tightly. His white shirt stretched on his well-defined chest. Shinji’s gaze lowered to Hayashi slacks, then he moved it quickly back up to Hayashi’s face, which didn’t exactly help because that damn fine stubble was distracting.
Going with his gut feeling that Hayashi appreciated boldness and honesty, Shinji decided to lay it as it was. “I like men, sir. Only men.”
Their eyes met and Shinji expected many things. Disgust. Wariness. Alarm. Maybe Hayashi backing off. But neither happened. Hayashi’s brow arched a bit and he nodded making a small “hmm” sound.Interesting reaction. Definitely not repulsion. Or maybe he’s just good at hiding it.
“Well then, yeah, it wouldn’t work out,” Hayashi concluded, finishing his sandwich.
Shinji realized he’d barely eaten his own, having been too preoccupied with ogling his superior officer. Inappropriate thoughts kept invading his mind and Shinji admonished himself.
Get a hold of yourself. He’s your boss.
Pulling out his pack of Mevius, Hayashi lit a cigarette. “Have you noticed the weird weather lately?” He asked out of nowhere. “Some strange wind blew yesterday and today.”
Shinji frowned, confused by the peculiar topic. “No… I haven’t. It’s not windy tonight, sir.”
“Exactly,” Hayashi replied.
Huh?
“I don’t follow,” Shinji said.
“I saw this white wind earlier,” Hayashi went on, “just twirling about. Could be an arctic wind hitting the country early.”
“Right…” Shinji muttered.
He was starting to think maybe the fatigue had gotten to Hayashi when a thought occurred to him. White wind. No one called wind by color. And the direction Hayashi was leading the conversation was odd.
Did he see my reiryoku?
No, that wasn’t possible. Non-supernaturals couldn’t see the spiritual energy or any ghosts or anything related to the supernatural world. There were, of course, exceptions of very powerful supernatural humans whosereiryokuwas so strong anyone could see it. Places rich in spiritual energy also made it possible for non-supernaturals to see thereiryoku—Mount Osore was one such place. They could feel low temperatures caused by spirits, sometimes even the ghostly mist and old ghosts whose bodies were no longer immaterial were visible to anybody.
But this wasn’t any of those cases and Shinji’s spiritual energy was at its minimum strength. So… was it just the fatigue talking or had Hayashi seen his whitereiryokusomehow?
Shinji had thought about what it’d be like with a superior officer who couldn’t see ghosts. In Hiroshima he was free to pursue spirits, to question them, to basically do almost whatever he wanted at a crime scene under the protective umbrella of Sakai Haruna since she saw spirits too. He nearly slipped a few times and she had to cover up for him.
If Hayashi knew, would he think Shinji crazy? If he found out Shinji was a Shinigami would he fear him?
“You’re spacing out,” Hayashi said, bringing Shinji back from his thoughts. “Finish your sandwich and let’s get back to work. I want this done by eleven.”
“Yes, sir.”
~ * ~
Shinji hurried to his apartment after Hayashi kindly dropped him off. Yamato was still where Shinji had left him, his translucent white body emitting ghostly mist and engulfing the apartment into a freezing fog.
After bringing Yamato up to date with the case, Shinji was glad to hear that Yamato remembered his home address or at least some address he thought was his own. Shinji jotted it down fast on the same piece of paper, folded it and placed it in his pocket notepad. His research on missing persons reports had been cut short by the second murder, so having an actual address now was going to make it easier to find Yamato in some database. Once done, all he needed was a good excuse for Hayashi about how he miraculously found out their unidentified victim’s name and address.
Shinji showed Yamato the picture of Ozawa. “Do you recognize her?”
“She died like me,” Yamato said. “But I don’t recognize her. It’s possible I forgot her, isn’t it?”