After three more days of his time with Violet went by, Oscar finally stood on his heavy feet again. What he had gained inspiration for was a specific scene.
The story that Oscar was having Violet write was about the mysterious adventures of a lone girl. Having left home, said girl would come in contact with many people and events in several kinds of places while growing up.
The girl's motif was his late daughter.
At the end of it all, the girl would return to the home that she had departed from. Her father, who she had left behind, would be waiting for her there, unable to tell if it was truly her, for she had grown too much. The disheartened girl would beg him to remember, bringing up a promise they had exchanged in the past.
For her to show him someday that she could cross the lake close to their house by walking on the decayed leaves that fell onto the water.
"Humans cannot walk on water."
"I just want the image. In the story, I'll make her be assisted by a water spirit that she had earned divine protection from during her adventure."
"Even so… I am not fit for this. The girl from that story is vivacious, endearing and naïve. She is unlike everything I am."
The novelist and the Auto-Memories Doll were arguing back and forth. It was because Oscar had requested Violet to put on clothes similar to his main character's and play around by the lakeshore. He had gone as far as making her do cleaning, laundry and other kinds of housework, and on top of it all, asked for such a favor. He almost treated her as if she were a factotum.
Despite being a tactful professional woman, Violet had mused, "What a troublesome person…"
"Your hair color may be a bit different, but it's blond, just like my daughter's was. If you let it loose and put on a one-piece, surely…"
"Master, I am but a ghostwriter. An Auto-Memories Doll. I am not your wife or concubine. Nor can I become a replacement."
"I-I know that. I wouldn't have this kind of interest in a young girl like you… It's just… your appearance… If my daughter were alive, she'd definitely have turned out kind of like you… is what I think."
Violet's expressionlessness of obstinate refusal wavered at that.
"I did think your stubbornness was too strong, but then, your Young Lady has passed away?" She bit her lip lightly. Her face looked like she was in conflict with her own conscience.
There was one thing that Oscar had figured out about her during the past few days' span. It was that Violet would stick to the "righteous" side when torn between good and bad.
"As an Auto-Memories Doll… I wish to grant my client's desires… but I wonder if this one does not violate my work regulations…"
Although Oscar felt guilty as she muttered ponderings to herself, he gave one more push, "If you could build the image of the girl as a grown-up, coming back home and fulfilling her promise, it'll give me the will to write right away. For real. If it's compensation, I can give you anything. I can pay double your original price. This story is very important to me. By writing it, I want to make it into my life's milestone. Please."
"But… I am… not a dress-up doll…"
"Then I won't take photos or anything of the sort."
"You had intended to?"
"I'll sear it into my mind and write the story with it. Please."
Violet thought things over with a sullen face after that, but wound up losing to Oscar's persistence and complying in the end. She might be the type that was weak to being pressured.
Only for this time, Oscar abandoned his life of confinement and went out on his own to buy refined clothes and an umbrella for Violet. The outfit was a white all-lace blouse over a blue ribbon-belt switchback one-piece. As for the umbrella, he purchased a cyan and white-striped one with frills. As he handed the umbrella to her, Violet opened and closed it, opened and closed it, spinning it around with an aspect of piqued interest.
"Is the umbrella weird?"
"It is my first time seeing such an adorable umbrella."
"Aren't you wearing cute clothes yourself? Not your taste?"
"I wear what my company's president suggests me to. I myself do not visit fashion stores very often."
It was like a child dressing up as her mother told her.
――It could be that she's far younger than even she herself thinks.
Even someone as mature as her resembled a little girl like that, if just slightly.
While Violet had not yet changed her mind, once Oscar had finished shopping, he soon asked her to get dressed.
It was early in the afternoon, a bit cloudy outdoors. It did not seem as if it would pour down, but the atmosphere of rain was present. The chilly air that allowed one to feel autumn's arrival was still not cold enough to prick the skin.
Oscar had decided to go outside first and wait. He set up a wooden chair right next to the lake, smoking a pipe. As he had somewhat been considerate and not smoked ever since she had come by, the feeling of the smoke penetrating his stomach spread through. A few minutes of making ellipses of smoke float about the air in puffs ensued.
The front door of increasingly worse rattling opened with a creaking sound.
"I apologize for the wait."
He turned only his head at the gracious voice. "You…"
"…didn't make me wait much," was what he was going to say, but the words did not come out as his breath stopped for a second. He abruptly swallowed back a long sigh. Oscar was as dumfounded as the first time he had looked at Violet.
She was too charming with her hair untied – a beauty that robbed the time of anyone who looked at her. Her once braided hair spread leniently, drawing smooth curves. It was fairly lengthier than what he had imagined. And, above all else…
――If my daughter had grown up the way she was… would she…
Would she have showed him her figure looking prim after dressing up? As he wondered about it, something hot suddenly welled up in his chest.
"Master, how is the impression of myself wearing the clothes that you have given me?" Having appeared amidst the world of autumn colors, the girl of inhuman beauty took the hem of her skirt and tried swirling around on the spot. "With this, I merely have to model as though I were crossing the lake, right…? Eh, but Master, is this not a scene that you really want to write about? Rather than simply walking around with this outfit, even if just for a few seconds, it would be better if I did show myself running across the lake. Master, please leave it to me. I specialize in physical activities, so if just for a little, I can follow your expectations," Violet explained as expressionless and indifferently as ever, not paying any mind to Oscar, who was overcome with too many emotions and unable to reply with anything other than "aah" and "uuh".
The one standing there was a girl different from his daughter. Despite her possessing the same golden hair, there was no sweet glow in her eyes.
Violet leaned the closed umbrella against her shoulder while gripping it tightly with one hand. She took a broad distance from the lake, gazing at it as though carefully examining its surface.
Hues of autumn withered and fell down, and such decayed leaves were afloat on the water. The wind was unstable, blowing and stopping, blowing and stopping. Looking worried, Oscar watched over her as she licked one of her mechanical fingers with the tip of her tongue to confirm said wind's direction.
Grittily stepping onto the ground, she glanced at Oscar and smiled faintly. "Worry not. Everything… shall be as Master wishes."
After declaring so with a voice that had a sweet ring to it, Violet sprung into a wide step. Although the distance of her approach run was considerable, she flew past Oscar's eyes instantly. Such speed was like the wind itself.
Just a stride short of her feet entering the lake, the fast Auto-Memories Doll firmly kicked the earth. The impact was enough to hollow out the soil. Her tenacious leg strength made possible for her to jump a frightening height. The way she leaped made her look as though she was about to climb up the stairway to heaven.
Oscar's mouth was agape at the action so removed from those of ordinary people. From that moment on, he saw everything in slow motion.
At the critical point of the jump, Violet broadly raised the hand that was holding the umbrella and opened it at once. It was almost as though a flower had bloomed. The frilly umbrella swayed beautifully and, with the timing just as she had predicted, the wind swept her legs. Her skirt and umbrella bulged fluffily with air, her white petticoat sticking out in flaps. Right before her eyes, her knit-up boots gently stepped over the decayed leaves on the water surface.
That one instant. That one second. That one image.
The image was seared into Oscar's memory, as vivid as if he had taken a photo of it. A girl with a suspended umbrella and a fluttering skirt, treading onto the surface of a lake.
She was just like a sorceress.
The words of his daughter from the day when her heartbeats stopped came back to him.
"One day. I'll show it to you one day, okay? On that lake close to our house. During the time in autumn when the fallen leaves drift about the water surface. One day… I'll show it to you one day, Daddy."
There was a voice. The voice of that girl, which he had ended up forgetting, reverberated in his mind.
――You had no idea, had you? I'd wanted you to continue calling out to me, a hundred more times even.
"I'll show it to you one day, okay?"
"Daddy," her lisping, sugary voice would say.
"I'll show it to you one day, Daddy."
――Your voice was more comfortable to listen to than any music.
"I'll show it to you one day."
――Aah, that's right. With that voice of yours, you'd innocently said that you'd try to entertain me, hadn't you? We'd made a promise. I'd forgotten. I'd forgotten about it. I couldn't bring myself to remember you for a long while, so I'm happy to see you. Even as an illusion, I'm glad I get to meet you. My adorable little lady. Mine, mine. My one and only treasure shared with that person. I knew that it definitely couldn't be fulfilled. Yet I still promised it. That promise, as well as your death, have rendered me useless, while at the same time keeping me alive until now. They've been extending my life up to this point. I've been living as a mess, looking for vestiges of you. I'd resented it. But this moment, the moment where someone who isn't you looked like you to me, was a chance meeting, a reunion, and an embrace for an instant. It might be that I'm still alive because I'd wanted to witness it. Since forever, I've been wanting to see you, whose name I can't even whisper out of sadness. I'd wanted to see your lovable self, all this time. The last family member I had left. Always, always. I'd wanted to see you all along. I loved you.
He was so happy that he wanted to laugh. "Fu… uh… uh…" Yet only sobs came out.
Tears flowed down as though to start bringing Oscar's frozen, standstill time to motion.
"Aah… geez…" He could hear a clock moving with a tic-tac. His formerly frigid heart was making thumping sounds. "I really, really…" He covered his face with his hands, but realized that the wrinkles on them had increased horribly.
Just for how long had his time been on a stop ever since those two had passed away?
"…wish that… you wouldn't… have died…" he murmured with a tearful voice, his face crumply distorted, "I'd wanted you to live, live, grow up, get big…"
――…and show me how beautiful you'd have become. I'd wanted to see you that way. After seeing you off like that, I wanted to have died before you. Before you. With you taking care of me. That's how I wanted to die. Not me taking care of you instead. Not like that.
"I want to see you…"
Teardrops overflowed from Oscar's eyes, traveled down his cheeks and trickled onto the ground. The sound of Violet sinking into the lake echoed through his tear-smeared world. The moment of gleam was gone, and his daughter's voice, which he had been able to recall, was soon forgotten again. The illusion of a smiling face, too, disappeared like soap bubbles.
Oscar rejected even further his line of sight, covered as it was with his hands, by shutting his eyelids. He denied the world where he had lost her.
――Ah, it'd be great if I died right now.
No matter for how long he wallowed, the two would not return.
――Heart, breathing, please stop. Ever since my wife and daughter died, it was as if I'd died too. Then be it now. Right now, at this very second. I want to be shot by a bullet and drop dead. It's just like how flowers can't continue breathing if their petals fall off.
However, even if he made that wish several hundreds of million times, nothing would change. Having already implored for it these several hundreds of million times, he was well aware of that.
――Let me die, let me die, let me die. If I have to be alone otherwise, then let me be dead with them.
Not a single thing had come true just from him praying. Nothing had, and yet…
"Master—"
…beyond the world he had secluded himself from, he could hear the voice of a thing which time was now flowing like his own. With ragged breaths, it made its way to him.
――I'm alive.
He was still living. Living and currently struggling to leave behind some sort of legacy of his departed loved ones.
There was no dream that would concretize just from someone praying for it, but with a darkness-engulfed field of vision, where sunlight could not reach, Oscar begged either way, "God, please…"
――If I'm not to die yet, at least may that girl be happy, even if just within a story. May that girl be pleased with it. And by my side. May she be by my side, forever. Even if only inside a tale. Even as an imaginary girl. May she be by my side.
He could not stand not wishing so. After all, his life would go on.
As Oscar cried in tatters, thoughtless of his years, Violet arrived in front of him, completely drenched after having crept out of the lake. Droplets dripped from her. The clothes she had dressed up in were ruined as well. Yet she herself had the most joyful expression of until then, which could even be called a smile, ghosting her face. "Did you see it? I walked three steps, right?"
Unable to say that he had wound up not managing to witness it due to his tears, Oscar answered while inhaling snot, "Hm. Yup, I did. Thank you, Violet Evergarden," he said, with respect and gratitude from the bottom of his heart.
――Thank you for making it true. Thank you. It really was like a miracle.
As he replied that he did not think God existed, but if any did, it was probably her, Violet told him, "I am an Auto-Memories Doll, Master." That was her only reply, which neither denied nor confirmed the existence of a god.
Afterwards, Oscar warmed a bath for her, as she was completely soaked.
She did not show up for meals. Still, she did use the bathroom every day and most likely rested her body in the bedroom that she had been given. She was quite a human-like mechanical doll.
――Really, civilization is amazing lately. The advancement of science is eye-opening.
There was no way he could leave her with wet garments, even as she was an artificial girl. She probably needed a change of clothes, so first things first, he took his bathrobe, which was relatively clean, and headed to the washroom. As no one other than him had been using the baths for a while, in a lapse of memory, he entered it without knocking and ended up seeing her while she had not yet put anything on.
"Ah, I'm sor… ry… Eh?" He dry-swallowed at the overwhelming turn of events. "EEEH?!"
What reflected in Oscar's eyes was a sight more captivating and gorgeous than any statue of a naked woman. Water drops trickled from her golden hair. Her beautiful blue orbs could not be depicted even in a painting. The lips below them were of a fine shape. Her neck was slender, her collarbone outstanding, her breasts plump and her body drew feminine curves.
She possessed prosthetic arms, which were parts of her body that went from both of her shoulders to her fingertips as if they had been forced into place. Yet it was only them. Despite the many scars, other than her arms, the rest of her was clearly the bare skin of living flesh. The soft-looking bulging bits of her body, too, told him that she was a human being and not a robotic doll.
Due to the shock of having everything that he had believed in until then turned upside-down, Oscar wound up scrutinizing her naked form many times over.
"Master," Violet called with a voice that sounded as if she were reproaching Oscar, who remained frozen on the spot and ogled her out of excessive astonishment.
It was then that Oscar finally realized all of his mistakes.
"UAAAAAAH! UAAAAAH! UAAAAAH—AAAAAH!"
The fact that Oscar was the one screaming was part of that incident's outcome.
After having yelled on top of his lungs, with a beet-red face and half-crying, Oscar had inquired, "So you're human?"
Enveloping herself with a towel, Violet retorted, "Master, you are truly a troublesome person." As she whispered so while casting her face down a little, her cheeks were lightly tinted pink.
"Auto-Memories Doll". Long had passed ever since such name had caused a scandal.
The creator was an authority regarding mechanical dolls, Professor Orland. It all began when his novelist wife, Molly, lost her eyesight due to an acquired blindness. After becoming a blind woman, Molly had fallen into deep depression for being unable to write novels, which she had made into the meaning of her life, growing weaker with each passing day.
Unable to bear witness to it, what Professor Orland did was build an Auto-Memories Doll. A machine that transcribed the words said by human voices – in other words, that performed "ghostwriting".
It was said that Molly's books earned worldwide renowned literary prizes afterwards, and Professor Orland's invention was quite literally considered something necessary for the course of history. Although he had only intended to make one for his beloved wife at first, it later became popular with the support of a great amount of people.
At present, Auto-Memories Dolls could be rented for low prices and organizations that provided them had been established as well. In addition, there was one more type of those. People who performed ghostwriting just like Auto-Memories Dolls were now affectionately referred to with the same name.
Such were the "Auto-Memories Dolls".
Oscar asked his friend about it once Violet had left, and found that she was apparently famous in the ghostwriting business.
When he told said friend that he at first had mistaken her for a mechanical doll, the latter mused after a loud laugh, "You sure live under a rock. As if a machine that pretty could exist."
"It's because you said they were artificial dolls…"
"Humanity's technology hasn't reached that level yet. It's just that those robotic dolls exist too. They're cuter ones, though. But I thought… that she'd be a good medicine for an antisocial shut-in like you. That girl is tight-lipped, but she has the power to restore people. She was good, wasn't she?"
"Yep."
She was a taciturn, but indeed, she was a very good girl.
"They're no match for Violet Evergarden, but next time, I'll send you a ghostwriter that isn't human so you can have a writing assistant for a while."
Eventually, a package was delivered to the lakeside house. It contained a small doll completely different from Violet Evergarden. It was a mechanical typewriting doll, capable of processing all sorts of human voices and performing documentation, which sat quietly on top of his desk, clad in a lovely dress.
――I see; this is definitely extraordinary.
"But it can't compare to her…" Oscar smiled bitterly, seeing a vestige inside the room, of she who was no longer around.
Should he ever say, "I'm so lonely", he was sure that she would reply with her sweetly ringing voice, "Master, you are such a troublesome person". She would say so expressionlessly, with only a slight smile on her lips.
Even without her there, he had the feeling that he could hear it.