Koushiro had tried to look his best for his meeting with her, but as he stood in front of Mimi he felt more like a little boy trying to fit into his father's suit than he did the sixteen year old teenager that he was who had done what he could to look nice, even if it wasn't exactly in his comfort zone. The first nervous thought that he had when he was getting ready earlier that day was his imagination running wild that the moment that he was finally going to be in front of Mimi was going to be the same moment that he looked his most ridiculous.
He remembered just a few months prior when, following Sora's urging, he had gone to the apartment building that Mimi's family had moved to upon their return to Japan, wearing a very similar outfit, only better picked out since he had actually gotten help the last time. Mimi laughed when she saw him back then, but it wasn't the mocking laugh that he had expected, or the laugh of someone who thought that it was just too hilarious what he had gotten in his mind to do, but instead it was a laugh of something so very completely different. It was a laugh that stopped the world, and that made him feel as if he was the only person in the universe that could create that laugh. It was a laugh that stopped his heart, and her songful cadence drifted through the hallways of her apartment floor as her eyes shined only in his direction.
He would have been lying if he said that a part of him never heeded the murmurs or the jeers of those around him who said that the only reason that Mimi even paid any kind of attention to him was because they shared the same circle of friends, but every time she turned to him, her smile growing and her eyes shining brighter than ever, Koushiro knew that Mimi was sincere whenever she told him that he forever held a special place in her heart. Even if they never knew about the daring adventures in a world that was only digital, there were other guys, more conventional ones, who Koushiro knew watched him, watched the beautiful Mimi, all the while wondering how exactly a computer nerd like him was able to command the attention of a person who held as much grace as she did.
He swallowed hard as he stood in front of her, Koushiro wiping away a tear while at the same time he remained glad that there was no one else there to witness it. It would be raining soon, maybe. He set down the flowers he had brought for her, pink lilies, and as he walked away, he only gave one last glance to her.
It wouldn't be for another two months that Koushiro worked up the courage to visit Mimi's grave again.