Bologna Study Abroad Diary 13

Chapter 13: The Morning of Departure

The morning of my departure was quieter than I had expected.
Toko woke up early and spent a while staring at the ceiling in the dim room.
Outside the window, the city of Bologna was beginning to stir as usual.
The sound of shutters rising, a distant motorcycle, the presence of a broom sweeping the portico.
Each of these felt as though it were already slightly outside of her own time, yet not entirely detached from it.
The suitcase had been mostly packed the night before.
Clothes, notebooks, books, copies of documents, a half-used pen, a small set of keys.
Even after putting those in, Toko could not bring herself to close the lid for a while.
It was because deciding what to leave behind felt much heavier than deciding what to take home.
In the corner of the room lay a poetry book she had bought here and a copy of a letter she had finished reading.
If I need them, I can just have them sent later.
While she thought that, she already knew that some things would remain behind, never to be sent.
When she stopped by the bar for breakfast, the owner gave his usual brief greeting.
Toko ordered an espresso and drank it standing up.
The bitterness felt much more familiar to her body than before.
There was no longer that sharp surprise she felt when she first drank it in this city.
Instead, there was a stillness that settled into a somewhat deeper place.
She set down the cup and looked around the shop.
The morning light, the wood grain of the counter, the voices of the regulars.
Even though she had seen them all many times, they looked a little different today.
Perhaps on the morning of departure, the usual scenery is seen most clearly.
When she left the shop, the spring light was spreading across the square.
The columns of the portico cast soft shadows, and the cobblestones retained a slight warmth from the previous days rather than feeling cold.
Although Toko was not carrying heavy luggage, she felt something strangely heavy inside her body.
It was not fatigue.
Rather, it was closer to the sensation of two years of life falling silent all at once.
She had not planned to stop by the university again, but Toko walked to the front of the archives room one last time.
Standing before the door, she did not enter immediately.
She was reluctant to quickly close the time she had spent in this room.
Before long, the door opened and Marco appeared.
He seemed both surprised and as if he had been waiting.
"You came."
"Yes. I wanted to say goodbye one last time."
Marco nodded and remained silent for a while, as if searching for words.
Then, he said in his usual gentle voice,
"You worked well here. The letters, the keys, the boxes—they all became a little quieter through your hands."
Toko smiled slightly.
Became quieter.
It was a fitting way to describe this place.
She did not know for sure if the things she had organized here had truly become quiet.
However, something within her had certainly been put in order.
Elena also arrived a little later.
She held a small paper bag in her hand, which seemed to contain baked goods.
She held it out to Toko and smiled.
"Eat this on your journey. Before returning home, it's better to have something sweet."
Toko accepted it and thanked her.
Not knowing what to say, Elena stepped a little closer and gave her a light hug.
It was a brief, natural, yet unexpectedly deep way to say goodbye.
"Don't forget that you were here."
Toko could only nod at those words.
I won't forget.
Not 'I can't forget,' but 'I won't forget.'
She understood the difference well now.
The time spent here would likely return from somewhere in her body at some moment, even without her trying to remember it.
The smell of the bakery, the rainy square, the unopened letters, the sound of her name being called.
Two years spent in this city was a little too long to forget.
On the train to the airport, Toko kept looking out the window.
The spring scenery was endlessly gentle when viewed from the side of someone leaving.
Fields, houses, low hills, the outskirts of the city, and the red roofs receding into the distance.
The outline of Bologna was gradually fading.
But fading and disappearing are not the same thing.
Rather, there were many things in this city that remained even after they could no longer be seen.
In time with the swaying of the train, Toko opened the notebook on her lap.
On the last page remained the unfinished sentence she had written the night before.
The end begins a little while before.
Below that, she slowly added just one line.
—But even after it ends, life remains within the body.
After writing it, she stared at the words for a while.
Perhaps this was the most accurate way to describe what she had gained in Bologna.
It was not knowledge, a qualification, or a romance.
But it was something that had certainly remained within her.
It would surely appear again, changing its form many times, even when she lived in another land from now on.
When she arrived at the airport, the line for departure procedures was shorter than she had thought.
That, in turn, delayed the realization of the farewell.
Toko carried her luggage, went through each check, and moved to the other side little by little.
Looking back does not mean you can return.
But you can watch until the very end.
For the first time, she stopped beyond the gate and looked toward Bologna.
What she saw was, of course, not the walls or the light, but the time itself she had been in until just a little while ago.
Her name was called.
It was the mechanical voice of the boarding announcement.
As she heard that sound, Toko felt both a small pain and a quiet relief deep in her chest.
The place to return to is no longer simple.
But there are things lost by returning, and things that can finally be brought home by returning.
She finally understood that before takeoff.
Sitting in the cabin and fastening her seatbelt, Toko closed her eyes.
The sound of the engines hummed low, and soon the aircraft began to move slowly.
In that moment, she knew clearly that the two years in Bologna would not become a distant memory, but would become the foundation for her future self.
The city was moving away.
But moving away and losing are different.
Rather, it is only after leaving that a city sometimes becomes a true place within oneself.
Outside the window, the spring light broke through above the clouds.
Toko let out a small breath, and with the notebook still on her lap, she repeated the last line in her heart.
—Life does not end when you return.
—By bringing it home, it begins in a different form.
That was her Bologna.