The Book Chapter 2
Summary
The book then centers back onto Akari Hirai. Teruhiko Oogami talks about how if Akari goes to the police, his life will be over. He threatens to kill her parents if she ruins his life, and then will go and proceed to take his own life. Akari refuses to eat anything Teruhiko gives her, and mentions that if she dies, he’ll never get his 50 million yen back. After a day of being trapped in the alley, Teruhiko comes back and gives her a bag of supplies, including bottled water. Teruhiko says that to Akari’s eyes, the bag is just full of yen, but to Teruhiko, it’s a medal he gained after putting himself at extreme risk. Akari drinks Teruhiko’s bottled water, and shortly finds out that the water was laced with a type of poison, presumably acid.
As Takuma is getting ready for school, he notices a TV report on how several apartment buildings in Morioh were rated much below the national standard for earthquake safety, yet they were all given a “pass” grade by inspection agencies. Takuma’s life revolves around going to school, talking to some people regularly (on limited subjects), and spending time outside of school with Chiho. He realized that he could keep up appearances if he had at least one female friend, but keeps his other reasons of being around her hidden.
After he talks to his classmates a little bit, he spots Koichi Hirose talking to Josuke Higashikata and Okuyasu Nijimura. Using his ability to read lips, he fakes tying his shoes to key in on what they’re talking about. After a bit of “listening”, he knows that they are talking about the murder of Orikasa Hanae, and that they know about the scars on the arms. Takuma gets shoved by a delinquent, and falls on his chest. Crybaby’s Boy pen falls out of his chest pocket, and as Okuyasu approaches to investigate, he accidentally breaks the fountain pen into smithereens. Josuke picks up the pen, and then returns it back to Takuma fixed, without any signs of breakage. Takuma planned to leave the school after the whole incident, but he decides to go meet up with the aforementioned delinquent, finding him in an empty stairwell. It’s later revealed that he was most likely sent to the hospital with severe injuries from Takuma’s stand.
Later, Takuma uses his “recorder” ability to play back Josuke fixing the fountain pen. He remembers seeing a “third arm” come out of Josuke, like it was a part of his soul. After a while of thinking about it, he concludes that it was one of Josuke’s “mysterious powers”. From this, he is able to conclude that both Okuyasu and Koichi both have these mysterious powers. Takuma meets up with Chiho, and they leave the school.
Koichi finds himself in class thinking about Trinita, and other miscellaneous things. After a short period of time, the temperature of the classroom started to rise dramatically. Everyone in the room starts feeling the heat and tries to open the windows in order to let the heat escape, but they find out that all of the lock in the windows have been jammed with hair. Due to the extreme heat, everyone starts taking off their jackets. Koichi doesn’t notice anyone with red scratches on their arms, so he undoes Echoes’ ability that was causing the room to heat up. At the same time, Yukako Yamagishi undoes her stand, Love Deluxe, which was jamming all of the locks in the room. They both leave the classroom together once class ends. This search continues for a week longer, until they finally encounter him.
Takuma and Chiho both walk around town, eventually reaching Morioh Station. Josuke Higashikata comes up and asks Takuma for the time. Takuma has a wristwatch, yet tells Josuke to go take the time from the train station. However, the clock has been broken, presumably by Crazy Diamond. Josuke gets a look at Takuma’s wristwatch, but then tries to roll up his sleeve. After a bit of an awkward scuffle, Takuma’s wristwatch falls to the bottom of the Morioh Station fountain. After Josuke tells Takuma to roll up his sleeve to get the watch from the bottom of the fountain, the mood grows dangerously tense. Takuma eventually just dips his hand into the fountain without rolling up his sleeve, which immediately prompts Josuke to call Okuyasu over. However, there are around 30 other boys at the school, each with red marks on their forearms, so they have to rule out Takuma for the time being.
Chiho and Takuma walk away from Morioh Station, and Chiho fixates on a line that sounded very similar to when she was saved from a delinquent at 12 years old. Chiho went back home, and as she sat in her room, she realizes a lot of things about Takuma. For example, his fixation on the Orikasa Hanae case was very suspicious, but Chiho decides to not say anything about it, wanting to preserve their current relationship.
Akari Hanae marks the seventh day that she had been stuck in the alley. She tries to accustom herself to her situation, but struggles with nature working against her. Eventually, Oogami Teruhiko gives her a pen and notepad, allowing Akari to communicate with him. He says that as soon as Akari will reveal the location of his 50 million yen, he would let her out of the alleyway. Oogami also talks about how he told her parents that she had gone out of town on a trip. She thinks of using the notepad paper to call for help, but can’t find a way to get it out of the alleyway. Akari decides to not beg for her life, but get out with her freedom.
Takuma reflects on how he once got the flu. He has the memories of it consolidated into text, but would never look at that section of that book again. It was one of his “forbidden sections” where he stored all of his negative memories. Takuma then goes and calls Chiho over the phone, and they decide to meet up later. He decides to write a letter addressed to Josuke Higashikata, with a page from one of his forbidden sections enclosed. This stand ability only has a range of around 30 meters, but this was enough distance for him.
Since Takuma has a slight cold, Chiho decides to treat him to a nice Italian restaurant. This is Tonio Trussardi's restaurant, where there is a rumor that anyone who eats at this restaurant will have any ill symptoms removed from their body. This is due to his stand, Pearl Jam, which heals through food. As Chiho and Takuma enjoy their lunch, they both feel their bodies start to get a lot better. They continue to eat their lunch until it turns dark outside, and then they start to walk home.
As Chiho and Takuma walk home, they accidentally bump into a man talking on his cell phone. The man drops his cell phone, and gets enraged at Takuma for breaking it. After Takuma has the man “relive” one of his own punches, the man pulls out a knife. Takuma takes the knife, and makes several clean cuts, de-attaching several of the man’s fingers, all to Chiho’s witness. As they walk away, Chiho finally realizes that Takuma was the one who saved her from the delinquent 5 years ago, and finally stops trying to fool her. As Chiho embraces Takuma, he finally feels like he pushed one man into despair. Chiho’s father is revealed to be Oogami Teruhiko, who had changed his name and got married 17 years earlier.
Josuke and his mother, Tomoko Higashikata, are at their house, when the front door bell rings. As Tomoko goes outside, she isn’t met with anyone, but sees a letter at her feet, addressed to Josuke Higashikata. The envelope has no return address or stamp. Josuke is currently preoccupied with a video game, so he tells Tomoko to open the letter for him. After a weird silence, Josuke turns over to look at his mother, and finds an unconscious body with blood spewing out of gashes on her arms.
Akari Hirai reflects on a trip to Europe, where Teruhiko Oogami got cut by a disfigured arrowhead at a shop. Teruhiko got extremely sick, but eventually got better. She wakes back up in the alley, to Teruhiko throwing down more supplies to her. This cycle repeats until Akari reaches 50 lines on the wall, meaning it has been her 50th day in the alleyway. Akari then realizes that she has not used any of Teruhiko’s menstrual sanitary products.
