The ceiling fan in Room 207 spun with a coarse sound, its aged motor protesting the constant use during another summer day. Dust particles entered the room along with the afternoon sunlight through the gap in the blue curtains covering the half-open windows, falling straight on the collection of manga volumes stacked on the bedside table.
"Seven, eight, nine..." Hiroshi Tanaka's cracked lips moved silently, counting the rotations of the ceiling fan. Right on cue, the fan wobbled – showing a tiny imperfection in its spin that he'd memorized over three decades of watching from his bed at the Maple Grove Care Home.
A bead of sweat rolled down his temple, soaking the thin pillow beneath his head. The air conditioning had been acting up again, and the summer heat crept in through the poorly sealed windows. Ignoring all that sweat, Hiroshi focused on the manga volumes on the bedside table. His right hand trembled as he reached out and opened a specific page of volume forty-three of Naruto, the pages showed the black and white drawing of Might Guy facing down Madara Uchiha.
The manga's cover was torn, its pages wavy from humidity and countless readings. A small coffee stain marked the corner from three years ago when a new nurse had bumped his reading table. She'd apologized profusely, but Hiroshi had just smiled. The stain had given the well-worn volume another mark of character, another memory in a life where memories were measured in the smallest of changes.
His forearms ached from holding the book up, but he didn't lower it yet. The scene demanded proper respect – Guy opening the Eight Gates, pushing his body beyond its limits. Hiroshi's eyes traced every line of movement, every expression of the characters.
Suddenly, a sharp pang shot through his stomach, reminding him that breakfast hadn't come today. Or had it been since dinner yesterday? He honestly couldn't remember. His sense of time had begun to blur. His throat felt hoarse, and the water bottle on his side table was just out of reach since it had been placed too far away during the morning check.
"Gate of Death, open..." he whispered along with the dialogue, his voice barely audible over the fan's creaking noises. The words caught in his dry throat, triggering a coughing fit that sent the manga tumbling onto his chest.
Through watering eyes, he stared at his legs beneath the thin blanket – all he could see were two lifeless branches that had never known motion. His leg muscles had withered away years ago, leaving only skin and bone. Above them, his torso had grown gaunt, ribs visible through his sweat-dampened gown. The weekend staff's forgetfulness was taking its toll.
The button to call for help was on the floor where it had fallen three days ago, a red light blinking at him from just beyond his reach. He'd tried calling out the first day, but his voice couldn't go past the heavy door. By the second day, his throat was too dry to manage anything more than a whisper.
A fly buzzed against the window screen, the sound mixing with the fan's whine into a monotonous symphony he knew too well. The digital clock on his table blinked at 2:47 PM – nearly time for the afternoon shift change. Maybe the new nurse would remember to check on Room 207.
His eyes drifted to a board on the opposite wall. A single get-well card hung there, its cheerful colours faded from the passage of time, the signature from his sister barely visible after five years of sunlight. She'd promised to bring her kids to visit next time. Hiroshi couldn't remember if that had ever happened.
The manga slipped slightly on his chest, and he caught it with trembling fingers. The motion sent another wave of dizziness through him – how long had it been since he'd eaten? The pages fell open to a different scene now: Naruto standing triumphant, acknowledged by his entire village.
A bitter smile crossed Hiroshi's cracked lips. What he wouldn't give for just one person to look at him that way. The nurses saw him as a task to be completed. The doctors saw a chronic case. His family saw an obligation best forgotten. Thirty years, and he'd left no mark on the world deeper than the permanent impression of his body in this hospital bed.
His vision swam, the manga's pages blurring into black and white. The fan's wobble came later than expected – had he lost count? No, his focus was slipping. The room felt distant as if he were viewing it through the wrong end of a telescope.
"I wonder..." his thoughts grew sluggish, words barely a whisper, "what it feels like... to run?"
The ray of sunlight had moved, no longer illuminating the room. His hand fell away from the manga, too heavy to hold any longer. The pages rustled as the book slid from his chest, landing on the floor with a soft thud.
Through darkening vision, Hiroshi watched the fan's endless rotation. Each wobble marked another moment of the only life he'd known – a life measured in movements he could observe but never experience. The bitter irony of spending decades reading about ninjas performing impossible physical feats while he couldn't even get up on his own feet without help... a wet chuckle turned into another weak cough.
"In my next life..." The words were formed more in thought than speech now, as the edges of his vision grew darker. "Just once... I want to know what it feels like... to be strong... to be remembered... to be..."
The fan spun on, but Hiroshi wasn't counting anymore. The steady creak faded to a distant hum, then to silence. The afternoon heat, the ache of hunger, the pressure of the mattress against his immobile body – all of it dissolved into a spreading numbness.
His last conscious thought was of ninjas leaping across rooftops under an open sky, of chakra flowing through healthy limbs, of a world where the impossible was possible. Then everything turned white.