The wind of the spring welcomed him when finally he stepped down the cab. He looked around and suddenly feeling contented when he saw the cherry bloomed everywhere. It made him reminiscence his old days before he decided to leave this place. It was a sudden decision, and he actually didn't prepare anything for his new life. He just went and never sent even one letter for everybody he left. He had readied himself for one or two punches or kicks when he decided to go back here weeks ago. They deserved to be mad at him for his selfish decision. He gave them no explanation, not a reason, and even not a good bye. He just left.

A bunch of high school boys passed by, ranting about their teachers that they considered as stupid people who were to proud with their pride that actually wasn't even exist. He smiled slightly, could clearly pictured himself on the boys.

He stepped forward and inhaled the air deeply, made it refreshed his lungs. It's so fresh here. I really miss this place.

"Shin?"

A doubtful voice called him from behind. He turned to be faced to a very fat young man, still on his bicycle, with one of his feet hanging in the side of it, looked at him in disbelief.

He smiled widely at him. "Yo." He raised his hand and greeted him.

"Shin!"

The fat man went down from his bicycle and parked it where he stopped before and ran to him.

"Shin! Long time no see! Where did you came back? Why didn't you give me a call? You should stop by my shop."

"Wow, wow, one by one, Kuma. I just got back. I came here straight from the airport."

"You should tell me if you want to go back here. I can pick you up from the airport."

Shin smiled slightly, feeling warmth suddenly fulfilling him. This is what I've missed. My friends.

"It's okay. I can take care of myself. This is still my hometown though."

Kuma grabbed his arm. "Come on. Come to my shop and I will treat you a lunch."

Shin smiled. "Nice idea. I didn't touch anything along the flight. I slept all the time actually, and very hungry now."

"Nice time, huh? Let's go."

"Are you done with the deliveries?"

"Mm. I was on my way back to the shop when I saw you. I thought I was dreaming, but it's really you. You don't change much. You still look exactly like years ago."

Kumai reached for his bicycle and they walked side by side.

"There's no way I don't change." He snorted. "It's been years. Everybody changes, so am I. I cut my hair this short, my skin got tanned, and everybody said that I grew fatter each day."

"I mean not your look. You changed, of course. You look matured than before but you still have your cool aura around you. You still have the smell that it's you. That's how I recognized you. You don't look fat at all for your information. It fit you more. You were just too thin back then."

Shin chuckled at the comment. "I take that as a compliment."

Kumai smiled. "I am complimenting you. You look better now. Much, much better."

The latter was shaking his head and smiling slightly. He breathed deeply as if he was never enough. "I really miss this place."

Kumai smiled again and nodded. "It always brings memories, doesn't it? I always riding my bicycle through this park everyday to do the deliveries and I never had enough with this place too."

They went through a walk path with row of cherry blooms in the side and felt the cool air swallowed them in a comfort. The spring was never been boring. The fresh air, the beautiful scenery, they were like a magnet that pulled everybody to miss it all the time.

"You can live here until you find a room." Ami poured him another cup of sake for the second time. "We still have one room available."

"Yeah. Stay here, please."

Shin looked at the couple in front of him in awe. He really missed everything for years. Once again, warmth swallowed him. He smiled slightly and nodded. "Okay."

Ami smiled. "I'll prepare the room."

Before he could thank her, the woman walked away.

"She's very nice."

Kuma turned to the direction where his wife left and looked back to Shin. "She is."

"How you met her again? You don't meet her again after the incident, right?"

Kime smiled widely. "It's a long story."

"I have all day."

He looked at Shin and decided to tell him when he a customer went in. "Later." He stood up and welcomed him. "Ah. Long time no see. Are you alone? Or your friends will be here too?"

The tall young man smiled widely. "We promised to meet here today. I guess I came too early." He looked at his watch and smiled again. "It's still fifteen minutes to our appointment."

"Do you want to order first?"

"Nah. I will wait for the other."

Right when he finished his talk, the door of the shop opened and revealed the not so tall young man, who almost skipped through the door.

"Kamiya! Long time no see. Kumai-San, you don't change too! You look so healthy!"

"Hahaha ... I'm always healthy, you know." He laughed hard at the comment. "How's work, Kuraki?"

Kuraki almost emptied his glass of water and turned to Kumai with a wide grin on his face. "So far so good."

"You don't get trouble like the last time, don't you?" Kamiya narrowed his eyes while looking suspiciously at him, made him received a slap on his arm.

"Of course I don't. Everything went smoothly like a silk."

"You can't say that when you just yelled at the boss yesterday. He's still mad at you, you know." A tall person appeared from behind and sat right away in front of him.

"See. You always got trouble all the time. How's the story?"

"Ask him."

"Ren, you shouldn't tell him that." Kuraki whined and pouted at him to receive a shrug from him.

"Explain." Kamiya demanded him with a very deep voice.

Kuraki looked at him in silent. He just realized that he looked more matured than before, and he turned to a stern person each day so he sighed realized that he didn't have a choice than telling him the story.

"It's his fault, not mine."

"What fault?"

Two other guys showed up and joined them, made Kuraki sighed again. He couldn't run away now, with three person stared at him intently, waited for his story to be told.

"He didn't give me time to breath. I was just arriving from the delivery and just taking my nap when suddenly he yelled at me. He said I'm too lazy and promise to fire me if I don't get my ass out to back to my work."

"The delivery was just three blocks from the company." Ren said flatly.

"Were you playing a game until morning again, Kura?" Another guy joined them again.

Kuraki curved his lips and nodded slightly, while giving them his innocent look as he could.

"That's your own fault then!" Everybody yelled at him at the same time.

"You shouldn't do that." Kumai whined at him too, shaking his head in disbelief.

"You should apologize." Kamiya pointed at him, forced him slightly to straighten his problem right away.

"He did, and our boss didn't fire him as the result with a promise that he won't do it again." Ren slapped him slightly on his shoulder.

"Speaking of problem, I guess I just succeeded on avoiding one." Said the tallest among them.

Everybody turned to him and gave him a silent question about his statement.

"Last week, a man came to our shop and tried to bribe us to take a loan from his company. He said that we could build bigger tofu-shop with the loan. We can produce more tofu which mean more benefit will come. As usual, my father rejected him and he insisted to continue our shop as how it is. I understood why he did it. It' all his effort to make the shop run until today and he doesn't want to speculate for something he couldn't predict. He had satisfied with the result of our shop, and he explained me his reason and I agreed him right away. I didn't fight him."

"That's not you, Honjo." Kuraki blinked in disbelief.

"Yeah, usually you will fight him for everything he decided to the shop. You always say that he doesn't have a will to promote the shop."

Honjo smiled sheepishly. "I know, but this time I suddenly just wanted to try to listen to him for once. I tried to understand his decision and thought on his side. Therefore, I went to search the company and found something suspicious with the company. I remembered that day when I got loaned from my senior and deceived so I guess it's better for us to back off. I was relieved when I knew that I was right for agreeing my father."

"I guess you just took the right decision. It's better to stay out of people when you think they're suspicious. Money is important but there's something else more important than that."

Everybody turned over to the source of the voice and found a big grimace of a sunny face of a woman who was smiling widely at her while leaning over at Kuraki's shoulder.

"I've told you many times not to pop out of nowhere suddenly! You're creepy." Yamato hissed while glaring at her slightly but didn't feel any feeling of annoy or scared at all. Even actually he missed all of those feeling, a sense of disgust of being tailed all the times. He smiled slightly at the memories where they should hide or run from her back then.

"You're the creepy one. What's with that smile? You don't smile! You didn't smile! Now you're smiling!" The woman almost screamed out of her lungs, almost having a heart attack watching her 'the most cold student ever' was smiling even slightly in front of her.

Yamato chuckled at the reaction. He leaned over and then narrowed his eyes. "I'm sorry, Yamaguchi, but you look stupid with that fake innocent face of yours."

Kumiko blinked many times before a realization struck her. "What?"

Then she received laugh from all of her former students, even Kumai was laughing out loudly, didn't believe that someone was actually dared to say those words to her. He raised his hands and gave Yamato his two thumbs up, and received his infamous grimace as the result. He went to the bar and stared to Shin who shook his head slightly, told him silently not to say anything about his presence at the time. He nodded understandingly and started to make his ramen before he realized that not everyone ordered yet.

"Guys, what should I serve you?"

The boys turned to him and yelled almost together to him about their order. It was as if they were trying to be the louder than everyone was. Even Kumiko was yelling out her order together with them, as she was a member of the group.

"Okay, okay. I got it. As usual, right?" He shook his head. This was the most noisy group of all Kumiko,s student. So far he knew, this group was the closest to her since they were still making the contact to her. They often met in the shop and usually Kumiko was popping out from nowhere. No one saw her entered the shop, nor walked over them. She was like a ghost for everyone, who could walk without any sound of her steps.

"You guys are fooling me again." Kumiko whined and took a seat among her students who were just bowing her slightly as apologize. That made her almost startled, but then she realized that those boys had changed now. They had grown into more matured people and she suddenly missed all of those days where she tried hard to get through to them.

She sighed contently before decided to accept the fact that they had grown much than the last time she met them.

"So, how's school? And work?"

"We're trying. Hard. This is the real life and we have to stand on our own feet now. We can't depend on other to keep us strong. We should fight on ourselves now."

"Wrong."

All of the boys turned to her and saw the seriousness on her face.

"You can depend on each other to keep you strong. It's just like where you were in Akadou. Real life is hard, but it doesn't mean that you have to be separated from each other. You have your own business but you still can depend on each other. Support each other, and try to be there for each other. That will make you stronger than you have."

The boys were stunned and then saw each other before chuckling to each other.

"What?" Kumiko asked them curiously.

"That's what I've tried to say but you just cut me on my way." Ren grinned widely and laughed hard when he saw her backed out suddenly as if she was doing something wrong.

"She never changes." Kamiya shook his head in disbelief.

"Something never changes, and she's one of it." Ichimura snorted slightly. "I guess she won't change at all."

"Shut up!" She hissed and embarrassed at her own self. A glimpse of sadness flashed in one face and she suddenly stiffened. It's like deja vu. "Ogata, how's school?"

The boy turned to her and shrugged. "Nothing's new. Rules, homework, just like any other school."

"Have you made friends?"

Yamato smiled slightly and almost answered her when his phone went off. "Sorry." He took out his phone and read the message. "Sorry guys, I really have to go." He stood up and reached out his bag.

"Is it a date?" Kamiya pulled his arm to stop him.

Yamato turned to him and smirked. He leaned over to them and whispered, "it's a secret," and he almost ran out of the door after that, tried to avoid everybody to stop him more.

"Hoi! What's that?" Everyone growled at the answer and made a commotion inside the shop with their whine for not receiving a satisfying answer.

"Should we stalk him?"

Everyone stopped whining and turned to the shortest of them before grinning like mad.

"Let's go."

They stood up and went away to the direction where Yamato left.

"Wait guys! I'm going with you." Kumiko reached out for her bag and followed them.

"Wait! What about the order?" Kumai yelled at her when she reached the door.

"Ah, mm, send it to my house. I will drag them there later." She turned to him and voiced the first idea came into her mind. There, she saw the familiar figure was sitting in the bar. She narrowed her eyes, tried hard to remember but found nothing in her memory. She shrugged and left to follow the boys.