standard disclaimers apply.
A/N. I have gotten myself tightly wounded into this lovely fandom lately. Oh bugger. That aside, enjoy!
He watches her – everyday, from afar.
When she walks through the door; when she bends down to unlace her shoes; when she hears her name being echoed, and she smiles that smile of hers.
But he cannot reach her - even when he slips into his seat beside her, she is far from his reach. Even though he can easily reach across and touch the folds of her sleeve; the curled tails of her midnight waves; the light dip of her red-apple lips, he doesn't.
She is too far away. Just a blink, and she's gone – and he is left wondering if it was a figment of his imagination after all.
He cannot see it; the air rippling as he lightly skims his slender fingers in the empty space before his unseeing eyes, but there is a wall between them. He sees her on the other side of the tinted window, through which he frequently gazes upon her. She turns away, her loose tresses fluttering behind her – and he lets his hand fall.
Mamura tells himself he's content with the way things are, but every time she turns her honest, azure eyes his way, only to slip right by him, no doubt looking for him –that bastard, he mutters under his breath– and then smiling with a twinkle in her eyes, he finds his day ever-so-dampened.
She never looks his way, even when he slips his cream-coloured muffler around her delicate neck, she isn't looking at him; she isn't seeing Mamura. She sees not his clear blue eyes gazing always at her and only at her, screaming out 'look at me, look at me!' It is the endless green, wise yet youthful and that man's dark tousled hair her mind conjures, and the country girl is spellbound in a heartbeat.
And when she looks up with those misty eyes –and Mamura is mesmerised; enchanted; bewitched and he is falling and falling, so quickly the wind whips at his pale face and there is nothing breaking his fall– he sees the disappointment lingering in them before she blinks, and it's gone. His fingers stilling, Mamura tells himself that his heart is fine, that it's not being ripped into pieces and forever beyond repair.
'I'm fine, I'm fine,' he repeats over and over - even when everything around him is falling apart, and he can't do anything, can't change the way he feels.
...
After three mornings of stealing glances at the vacant desk next to his, Mamura takes the train and arrives on her doorstep. He raps his stiff knuckles on the cool hard door, his headphones unplugged and the air silent. He listens for her footfalls, and when he does, he hesitates.
What if she's still weeping; still yearning for him and Mamura's presence is just a reminder of him? He sighs, berating himself that that made no sense whatsoever.
Reaching up to tangle his numb fingers in his ash-blonde locks, he lifts his eyes skyward just when the door clicks open.
He is afraid to look her in the eye; afraid to find an age-long of woe in them - imprinting themselves into his mind and haunting his nights. But he isn't surprised to see those same trusting, unworldly eyes directed solely towards him.
With the cold biting into his cheeks and reddening his nose, he smiles almost ruefully with a hint of relief. And when he steps back, out of the way of Yuyuka's angry "HOLD ON, YOU POTATO GIRL," he watches her.
Then, when her eyes stray almost unthinkingly his way, he feels silly. Of course she'll be fine.
...
She is looking at the sky again. Mamura still watches her from afar, but not that often anymore. He feels the gentle hum of her presence beside him, and he angles away, facing the front. On his desk, his Japanese history textbook is flipped open to a random page and he is lulled to sleep by the teacher's ceaseless droning.
He is almost asleep when he hears her murmur.
"Mamura."
As she intones his name, her voice rises and falls. He likens it to the strum of a cello, rich and mellow. It is unlike the other girls; they speak the off-key screeches of an untuned violin, sharp and unpleasant.
He shifts slightly to his left, and tilts his head to the side to regard her.
She isn't staring outside the window anymore, but instead she is looking straight at him. Her starless eyes are wistful, and his breath hitches when he realises that she is looking at him.
He is caught; ensnared almost in an instant when her cherry lips stretch into a small smile. Behind her, the sun throws shafts of daylight into the classroom and she is bathed in an angel's halo.
And he thinks, fleeting like a daytime shooting star.