"Hana.."
You smile like a flower they had said, but he begged to differ. No, your small delicate smiles were what made the very flowers bloom. They glowed with an inner radiance that could rival the most brilliant of gods. He always tried to tell you, but his words failed him. Always stumbling over themselves or racing from his mouth before sense could be made of them. Then his cheeks would burn brighter than that of the roses he always wished he were brave enough to give you. He hated that part of himself most, but it was that part that you had found charming.
He insisted he loved when you smiled, loved to see you alight with such joy, but you always argued that his were brighter. Bright and cheerful like the sun, you had said, and so he always smiled just for you. He hoped to share that light, to shine that sunlight upon you so everyone might see your bright flower in bloom. Because as much as he wished to own them, to monopolize them, to steal them away for himself, he wanted everyone to know the warmth of your smile.
Before he knew it, he was lost without your light to guide his way. The sun could burn as intensely or bright as it wanted, and yet it would still seem like the darkest night to him. Even your small strides were more than he could take if they happened to set you a few steps behind, where he could not see. "Stay by my side," he begged, whimpered in his cowardly state like a puppy lost without a home. How far had he fallen? A god before a mortal girl, a mere candle to his eternal flame, clinging to her as if she were his very source of light.
He had said he loved you. With the heavens shining down upon you as witness to his words, he had let it slip from his lips. It was only once it was said that he realized it was a mistake. He wanted to keep you, your beautiful smile locked inside a cage, but he had no right to do so. It was far from his place. What right did he have to ask you to love him, when doing so meant throwing your future away?
For once, he didn't smile then. Not so much as a twitch at the corner of his lips for days. The sun had gone out, leaving you frightened and confused in the dark left behind. It was unnatural, draining. It left you with a void that no matter how you tried could not be filled. He was your prince, yet he denied you as Cinderella. The glass slipper was left to gather dust.
You loved him, of this you were now sure. No, you had always been sure, but he had never given you the time to say so after his own confession. Now the one you love turned a deaf ear to your heartfelt pleas. Just the same, you couldn't hear the shattering of his heart as he turned away.
He couldn't bring himself to listen, you couldn't let him not hear. The flower stood against the scorching flame of the heavens, and so it got burned. But just as your stem was scorched to its roots, the flame died down, and so the frantic but beautiful sunshine held you once again. Gently, fragilely, with all the love in the world.
He was the sunshine, but all of his lovers were plants. Now he stood in his garden, each greenery a bittersweet reminder of lovers past. He recalled your words. He remembered how you smiled as he explained your inevitable fate. He remembered how unfair he felt it was, how he had felt such scorn for your fate. "How could you smile so knowing you'll be with them someday?!" "Because even when I'm gone, you'll still be watching over me. My one and only sunshine."
Whenever he remembered, a smile made its way across his lips, tearing through the guilt and grief he felt whenever he set foot here amongst his loves. Delicately, he brushed the soft vibrant petals, your soft petals. The sunflower had always reminded him of you, for you were his favorite flower.