When Kiyoshi walked in, a red-faced man was crying at the far table, and a frail elderly woman was sitting opposite him. At the counter was a boy about elementary-school age and behind the counter was a man six feet tall, presumably a staff member.

The tall man did not greet Kiyoshi as he entered the café. He was too busy watching the couple at the far table. Only the young boy, who was slurping his orange juice through a straw, was staring at Kiyoshi.

Not being noticed when entering a café is nothing to make a fuss about. I’m sure he’ll notice me in a moment. Kiyoshi nodded to the boy in acknowledgement and took a seat at the table closest to the entrance.

As soon as he had sat down, the crying man was suddenly enveloped in a puff of vapor. And then he seemed to vanish, sucked up into the ceiling.

What?

As Kiyoshi stared with bulging eyes, a woman wearing a white dress appeared in the chair that the man had vanished from. These bizarre events seemed like something you might see in a magic show.

What happened just now?

As he watched in amazement, the elderly woman was talking to the woman in the white dress. From what he could pick up, she was saying, “Now, if there was only something I could do to make Kazu happy.”

The old woman was Kinuyo Mita and the man who had disappeared was Kinuyo’s son, Yukio. It was upon witnessing this incident that Kiyoshi came to realize that you really could return to the past in this café.

When he later learned from Kazu and Nagare about the annoying rules that applied when traveling back in time, he was astonished that anyone would want to make the journey. If it is not possible to change the present no matter how hard you try while in the past, then why bother? He became very interested in learning about the people who, even after knowing the rules, decided to go back.

“...It was rude of me, I know, but I decided to look into the people who have returned to the past here.”

Kiyoshi bowed his head at Nagare, still paused in the entrance to the kitchen, and Kazu, who was standing behind the counter.

“I found out from my investigation—” Kiyoshi brought out a small black notebook before continuing “—that over the last thirty years, forty-one people have sat in that chair and traveled back in time. They each had their own reasons for doing so, to meet a lover, a husband, a daughter, and so forth, but of those forty-one people, four returned to the past to meet someone who had died.

“There were two last year, one seven years ago, and then there was your mother twenty-two years ago...four people.”

Listening to Kiyoshi’s explanation, Nagare’s face seemed to turn blue.