A/N: ZareEraz here! The idea for this story flew into my head while watching xxxHolic Kei with my friend HeartQueenVivaldi and I just had to start posting it! Bear with me on the updates because I'm working on two other long stories and any other shorts that I come up with plus school and a job, but I hope you'll enjoy taking this journey with me. Enter the dream...if you wish. Happy Reading!

{Cho no Yume}

{The Butterfly Dream: And What Happened Therein}

"One day a man had a dream. He dreamed that he was a butterfly. He fluttered and fluttered, flew and flew. He so loved the feeling of freedom that he decided that he was a butterfly. But when he woke up, he wasn't a butterfly. He was a human after all. Then the man thought, 'I wonder if I, The Man, dreamed that I was a butterfly or if this moment is truly the dream. Maybe the man I am now is a dream that a butterfly is having.'" – Haruka Doumeki

Prologue: Underneath the Blossoms

It was one of those spring days where being inside would be considered a crime against nature. The sun was hanging between wispy white clouds, and a brisk breeze whipped through the sakura blossoms in the park. Watanuki sighed and closed her eyes, breathing in the fresh smell of earth and flowers and the Sumida River that ran next to the walking path she was on. The twenty year old was burdened down with fifteen or so pounds of grocery shopping as she walked, the bags slung around her arms and the few things she couldn't fit on her arms were piled up in her full hands…and she was pissed about it. She'd just been at Yuko's shop and hour earlier and Doumeki had been there with and when dinner time was rolling around, both of them decided that they wanted several courses of dinner and that most of the things they were requesting were complicated as hell. The girl grumbled as she stomped down the sidewalk, fuming at how she was treated like a slave.

"How many times have I told Doumeki that I can't make feudal udon because some of the ingredients don't exist anymore?! But no! He just has to go and request it again and again just to piss me off! And Yuko sashimi napoleon? That takes forty minutes of prep work alone! And then there's the pickled vegetables, sukiyaki and matsusake gohan that aren't difficult per say, but to do them all at once is hard! And that witch wanted French pastries for dessert! Why do I subject myself to this sort of shit on a daily basis?!" Watanuki hissed for another good ten minutes while walking through the park, causing children to dash away from her in fear when they saw her face and the adults nearby avoided her bad mood as well. "You'd think Shizuka would be more appreciative of my cooking now that we're dating but nooooo, he just has to go along like he's always done and make my life difficult in any way he can! And not only that, but when I go to look in the kitchen for the things I need to make their ridiculous requests, what do I find?! There's hardly anything left from yesterday because Yuko ransacked the fridge for her snacks! The only good thing that comes out of all of this is that I know everything is going to be eaten."

The girl was sweating in the cool afternoon air, the fabric of her shirt and pants sticking to her skin. She couldn't stop to wipe the sweat off her face unless she put down all her groceries, so she didn't stop, trying to make it out of the park before having to take a break, but she ended up having to stop anyway. Watanuki reached a familiar grove of sakura trees and paused for just a minute to look up into the blossoms and reminisce. She unloaded her groceries onto the ground and sat down on a little grassy hill to rest, placing her hands behind her so she could lean back and stare up into the pink flowers of the cherry trees. This is where I met that boy, all those years ago. I was in primary school when he saved me, and he met me here under these trees all the time. She smiled, remembering the little boy who was just about her age when they'd met. He'd helped her out of a few tight spots when I came to spirits and he was the only one who believed that she could see spirits because he could too. But he'd had to leave and go back to his own world, and she couldn't stop him. The girl's smile disappeared and she sighed, her good mood gone again and she stood up to grab her groceries.

"I need to get back." She grumbled again. "Yuko will get on my case if I'm too long and then she'll pile on more work for me for being late." The woman started picking up her shopping bags, loading them back up into her arms and getting ready to carry her heavy load the rest of the way when she felt a chill crawl up her spine. Her head snapped around, trying to see if anyone or anything was watching her. She looked down the path she'd just come and couldn't see anything, and nobody was around either. She flipped around and looked up the path, the plastic bags around her arms shifting and rustling as she moved. Something was waiting for her up the path, sitting in the middle of the sidewalk, but she couldn't see it quite well. Watanuki edged closer cautiously, her breath coming short as her heart started beating faster. Is it a spirit? Or just a handkerchief that someone dropped? The white thing in the middle of the path started moving and Watanuki froze, staring in shock and horror at what she'd been foolishly moving towards.

It was a hand. A white hand, like a corpse's.

It was sticking up from the ground like a small white tree, only consisting of the hand and the lower arm, but it was enough to terrify Watanuk. She'd seen this spirit before…it had chased her before…and it had taken her friend away from her because it had taken him from his world. The spirit flapped its hand, the noise of grinding bones deafening to the seer as she backed up one step, two steps. The hand sensed her and started sliding forward, flapping its hand menacingly, its white fingers extended to grab onto any part of the girl it could reach. Watanuki was scared stiff at the sight. She knew she had to run, she wanted to run, but after backing away, her feet where rooted to the ground, fear getting the better of her. She didn't have any salt with her, the gift she'd been given by the boy was long gone and the safety of Yuko's shop was too far away for her to run to and not get caught by the hand. She'd have to go back the way she'd come and hope to out maneuver it.

The girl was just about ready to run, taking a deep breath and pushing down her childhood fear when the hand creeping down the path shot forward. Watanuki screamed and dropped all her groceries, the bag clattering to the ground as she took five steps, running away from the spirit when she felt something very, very wrong grab hold of her neck. She hadn't seen the other spirit hand hiding in the cherry blossoms. It had leapt down from the branch and wrapped it cold, dead fingers around Watanuki's throat, cutting off her air supply as her hands flew up to try and pry it off. She scratched and clawed, but it was useless. The spirit had succeeded in catching her, finishing its business from years earlier and just squeezed tighter. The other hand leapt and grabbed her ankle as she struggled to free herself, but the seer already knew that she had lost, gasping for air and praying that somehow Doumeki or Yuko or anyone would save her. But she was all alone this time and in a flash of light, Watanuki disappeared, frustrated tears and all.

The only indication that she'd been in the park was her scattered groceries on the sidewalk, littered with sakura blossoms and the spring breeze.

...

A/N: Hope that was a good enough taste for now! See you next time! :3