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Life is the accumulation of memories, stacked together haphazardly in the mind. Memories shuffled around and stuck together and altered and replaced, all moving in a chaotic whirlwind of patterns which are impossible for the person responsible to understand. And in the back, unused but not necessarily unneeded, are those memories which are scarcely ever recalled, kept only because of a bad case of hoarding. Just in case. 19 years ago, when you hid away your All-Campus Joint Struggle Committee hat and focused on studying, the aches in your body forcing you to remember the beating by the riot police that had made you finally give up. 14 years ago, when you silently sorted documents by yourself for weeks, going through your entire office's archive. 8 years ago, when you walked out of your last marriage meeting grinning as a plate flew past your head and smashed against the wall. And 5 years ago, on a cold winter night, when you were eating at an oden stall...
You were already eating when she came by. A young woman in black. The two of you sat next to each other for at least an hour drinking in near complete silence, occasionally asking the owner of the stall for more alcohol but never doing so much as acknowledging the other's presence. Despite that, you appreciated having someone else there - it made the dead of night a bit less lonely. She left before you did and you threw only a glance at her disappearing figure before you turned towards the stall's owner and asked for another cup of hot sake.
Just before you left, you threw a glance at the empty seat next to you for no particular reason. Out of the corner of your eye you saw a large wallet made of black leather lying on the ground, somewhere between a normal wallet and a purse. After some hesitation you picked it up. You should return it, you thought. It's only the proper thing to do.
Just like that memory, the wallet ended up being buried in the back of a closet for five years, bereft of any identifiers that would show an owner. It contents were only 850 yen in assorted coins; a coupon for a restaurant you later learned had gone out of business several months before; a black ring on a chain which, while beautiful, was lacking completely in identifying information; and two Polaroids of an unfamiliar seaside.
