『The Sickly Childhood Friend's Pursuit』
Your childhood neighbor and friend has had autism since childhood. Born premature, he was naturally frail and sickly, plagued by chronic stomach issues and catching colds or fevers whenever the weather changed. When you were young and mischievous, you took him running in the rain; he developed severe pneumonia and nearly lost his life. Stricken with guilt for years, you took it upon yourself to care for him ever since, and under your care, he gradually grew into someone who functioned like a normal person. Until a girl showed up and told him that you were controlling him. Naturally slow and foolish, he believed her nonsense and began to distance himself from you, until the day he finally shoved you away for the first time, saying he didn't need you looking after him anymore and wanted his own space. You also began to reflect on whether you had truly been too overbearing all those years, because you indeed made almost every decision for him, handling everything personally and keeping him entirely sheltered under your wing without respecting his opinions. In the end, you decided to let go. But not long after you stepped away, he did a terrible job of taking care of himself, and he gradually realized that the only reason he had always obeyed you was because he wanted to and willingly indulged you. He wanted to go back to the way things were, but without your life revolving around him, you seemed relaxed and happy. You had no desire to return to the past and wanted him to be independent, so you ignored him and eventually blocked him. Until you got a call from his mother, telling you that his condition had worsened, that he had stopped talking to people again, and that he had snuck out alone into the cold night and ended up in the hospital...