Hikari Hinomoto ran after the car as fast as her childhood legs could carry her, her little heart pounding with the the effort. Her movements were uncoordinated, the clumsy steps of a child but still she tried. Tears filled the side of her eyes, clouding her vision as she ran.
A careless stumble, a moment's try to get her balance back before she fell to the ground, grazing her knee, just like she had done several days ago. Only now...there was no him to help her up, no him to comfort her when she was crying. She looked up to see his face staring at her from behind the window of the car and their eyes locked with each other.
"I'll be back," his eyes, soft pools of amber, promised even as he disappeared from her view.
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A tokimeki memorial 2 fanfiction
by Sining
"Memorial of the Heart"
#1
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Hikari Hinomoto woke up to the soft golden light of dawn, blinking as she lay in bed. The dream, it brought such bittersweet memories with it, memories of when two young children had happily played together, memories of _him_. The thought brought a familiar aching within her heart and she nearly cried, remembering how it had been.
There was a gentle knock on the door. "Hikari?" her mother's voice came from behind the door, "it's time to wake up."
"Hai Okaasan," Hikari sniffled as she got off the bed.
There was a worried pause before her mother spoke again. "Hikari, daijobou?"
"Daijobou, it was just a bad dream," Hikari lied, not wanting to cause her mother to worry about her. There was no reply but she could hear the shuffling of her mother's feet as she walked away.
"Gomen ne," she said, feeling guilty. She turned to look at the photo, so delicately framed in gold-plated metal, a memory of happier days. It had been the last one she taken with him, right before he had moved away. And more importantly, she looks at the glass ring lying beside it.
//Shin-chan...// she thought, picking up the ring and staring at it sadly.
--
He stared out of the window into the city, a city he had not seen in seven years and had never expected to see again. //It's been so long,// he thought, almost a lifetime ago. It had changed so much in the years he had been gone, changed till it seemed like he no longer knew it at all. It had changed...like him.
Briefly he wondered if Kasumi and Hikari still lived here. Maybe they did, maybe he would bump into them once again. Maybe they might even remember him. Part of him hoped they would but seven years was a long time, too long to remember childhood friends and neighbours.
Brushing his too-long fringe of hair out of his eyes, he continued staring out at the city.
--
The first day of High School, he supposed he should have been feeling nervous and all, what with being in a new school with strangers all around him, but he wasn't. In fact he was strangely calm, it was going to be one of those days he felt.
He started looking on the billboards in the school yard for his name and the class he was assigned to. It didn't take long and he was almost ready to depart to class when he noticed something that sent a shock through him, paralysing him as he stared at the characters on the board.
Hikari Hinomoto.
Hikari Hinomoto...inadvertantly, memories of her came up, her red hair and easy nature, cheerful and yet so hopelessly incapable of taking care of herself at times. Of playing in the sandbox together and countless other memories. Hikari Hinomoto, funny how several characters could bring back such bittersweet feelings in him.
Ka-bump!
"Ittai nani ga!" He whirled about to shoot a scathing remark to the person who bumped into him, only to face empty air. He heard a slight groan from below him and he turned to stare at the figure sitting on the ground.
Hikari groaned as she rubbed her head. She had been gazing around at the school, eagerly taking in the sight of the place where she would be studying at for the next three years when she had turned around and there he was, right in front of her. She had tried to stop but her momentum carried her through and she knocked into him.
"Hikari," he breathed in a slightly disbelieving voice as he stared down at her. He had just been thinking about her, and here she was, or at least a person he thought was her. It was just too much of a coincidence.
Hikari stared up at the stranger in front of her, wondering why he knew her name. Something about him tickled the back of her mind, like the faintest brush of a spiderweb. She took in the black hair, the golden eyes nearly hidden away by the thick and thoroughly messy fringe and a name snapped into her mind.
"Shin-chan!?"
The right side of his lip quirked upward as he gave a small smirk, extending his hand to help her up.
"It's been a long time."
End #1