"!" The two high school girls came back to their senses and realized they had been so absorbed in playing with the music box that they had nearly forgotten the important part. They hurriedly stopped talking and resumed listening to the client's account as if nothing had happened.
Haruna Yuki recalled the past and sighed silently. She stroked the music box, then looked at Jiang Xia. "Actually, I'd like to ask you to help me find someone."
"Oh, finding someone." Suzuki Sonoko nodded as she took notes. Looks like this time it's a mysterious missing-person case!
Haruna Yuki said, "The person I'm looking for is named 'Aki-Satoru.' I met him through a Pager three years ago—back then, I came to Tokyo from the countryside to attend art college. Since I couldn't find any common ground with the students around me, I never made any friends.
"I was far from my family and terribly lonely, so one day, on a whim, I made up a phone number and sent a message to it with my Pager."
At that, Haruna Yuki smiled. "I remember the message I sent was, 'Hello, my name is Haruna. Would you like to be friends with me?'
"I thought perhaps no one was using that number at all, or that the person on the other end would find it boring and toss the message aside... But unexpectedly, not long afterward, I actually received a reply.
"That person said his first love had also been named Haruna, that he was very happy to meet me, and honored to become my friend.
"That was how we began corresponding. We shared our feelings with each other, and whenever I ran into trouble, I would chat with him. He gave me a lot of useful advice—although we had never met, I