Hey, can I tell you something?
It's about Nabe-kanmuri Park. In Nagasaki.
You know how beautiful the view is up there at night. The city lights spread out all the way down the hillside, and the harbour shimmers. Couples, tourists — everyone lines up at the observation deck to take photos. That's the kind of place it is. Which is exactly why, when I heard this story… I don't know. Something about it just felt wrong.
A friend told me this, so I can't swear it's true. But I wanted you to hear it anyway.
…Apparently, some years back, there was a stretch of time when women were being targeted near that park. Several incidents, one after another, and one of them was — bad. Worse than the others. I heard the body was found in the public restroom below the observation deck. That whoever had come up to see the night view had, at the end, walked into that restroom.
And that's when the stories started.
There was this boy — a local kid — who went up to Nabe-kanmuri on a dare with his friends. Past midnight. The observation deck was empty, a faint wind was blowing, and the lights of the city below looked almost unbearably beautiful. He was leaning against the railing, just taking it all in, when he felt it — a presence, right beside him.
You know that feeling. When someone steps close, the way the air shifts around them. He thought it must be one of his friends, and he turned to look.
There was a woman standing there.
Pale clothing, long black hair, both hands resting on the railing, staring down at the lights below. Even in that dim glow, he said, her outline was perfectly clear. It struck him as strange, but he told himself she was probably just a tourist, and he stayed where he was.
A few seconds passed. He looked again.
The woman had no feet.
She was simply there, suspended just above the ground on the other side of the railing. Motionless. Watching the city lights without so much as a tremor.
He said no scream came. His legs just started shaking, his mind went blank, and the next thing he knew he was running.
When he told his friends later, one of them said: "When you walked up to the deck, we were hanging back — but there was already someone standing next to you. From the start." They had all seen her. Not one of them had been able to call out.
…There's one more thing. The part that bothers me most.
On the way back, he had to pass the public restroom. He was so frightened he tried to sprint past it — but he heard something from inside. Not running water. Not the wind. Something smaller. Muffled.
A sound like something being struck.
From the inside.
Slow. Perfectly regular.
He said he hasn't been able to look at a night view since. That every time he sees those beautiful lights, he thinks of her — the woman with no feet, hands on the railing, gazing and gazing down at the city below.
…I wonder what she was looking at.
The lights of a town that just kept going, long after she was gone from it. I wonder what she felt, watching that.
I don't think I could bring myself to go and find out.
