The Dandelion Field
It was just a slight change of pace for Hisao, in the terribly ordinary life of the school of the disabled. Despite numerous encounters with women, all attractive and having quirks in their own way, Hisao Nakai could not get a girl to accompany him during school festival. However, he did spend some time with Kenji upon the top of the school building's roof, most foolishly drinking their frustrations away with whiskey, in a cold night, and thither, the mind played games of deceit upon them, seemingly protracting the smallest of minutes into immemorial days. Hisao dreamed of a queer situation, whither Kenji came closer and closer to him, still talking of the inane, and the more he drew close the farther his person was, and his very image spiraled into a singularity. From afar, Hisao thought there was a faint beating of drums and the hideous piping of cacophonous flutes. But, before he got to that unknowable point, there was a flash of queer light, and the smell of the flowers of the field, the warmth of the sun tickling the skin, and the cool air breezing through his body, and the sweet song of melodious maiden. And then he woke up. He apparently slipped and hit his head on the gray and cold concrete floor of the rooftop. There was a hectic commotion after Kenji summoned the teachers and prefects, which was strange to Hisao, though he felt relieved that Kenji had some kind of concern. The rest of the days, Hisao could hear no end of lecturing and scolding by teachers, by the nurse, by his parents, and of course, as if entitled, Shizune and Misha, though the execution was lacking in Misha's part. Still, he was disenchanted by the incident, and grew more distant from them all, he grew tired of the council's overbearing desire for him, grew restless in the closed spaces of the tea room, grew weary of the that brick-colored track, grew frustrated by Rin's ineffability, and even grew hesitant of using the library, despite his fondness of books and tomes, no matter how ancient or precious to him. Neither, the lands of Dunasny, nor the languages of Tolkien could spirit him away from the tiresome world he was living.
Indeed, it was a change of pace from such a terrible long count of days. In his restlessness Hisao, would often go away from the troublesome noise of his classroom, more importantly, of his school, and would often visit the nearby field in the school, sitting upon the benches, and listening the twittering of the birds fluttering about, going about their everyday life of simplicity and the uncontrived. He would often prefer the solitude of the benches next to the great and ancient trees during lunch, rather than the bustle of the cafeteria, or the stigma and strong winds of the rooftops.
And yet, he still longed of a more wondrous sanctity of greenery, and in nights, he tried to capture in his thoughts that whiskey-fueled fleeting dream, of that flowery meadow and the voice of a haunting and distant maiden of seemingly rustic origins. He longed for such a place, though, he knew not to find them—hidden in secret corners of the earth by the heather gods of old, or spirits fearful of envious men.
One day, he had heard from Rin, that were was a forest and then a meadow nearby. Not wanting to waste such an opportunity, Hisao traversed towards the far-off places of the area whither he now laid, and this is how this story came to be.
Traversing that lonely path that showed the cycle life, his feet, singing the hymns of earth with each step, nature in all of its glory, he looked upon the dead leaves, the squirming worms, and the weeds; yet he also looked upon the march of ants, the passing of small beasts, and the swaying of flowers. He is nearing it, a place of where men forgot, unperverted and free, as if stolen by Time and made a part of his demesne.
After a considerable amount of treading down that earthy path, he came upon a clearing in the forest, wild and untamed, betraying no secret of the chthonian things to him, with the sinuous and many-headed hydras that sprung forth from the bottom of the barked and leafed-ridden giants that dwelled thither for years.
Continuing onwards, he thought to have heard a voice of young woman, singing. He presumed it to be of Rin, as she is no stranger to this hidden world, even if she has a world all on her own that Hisao could not wholly understand. The voice was familiar, but bears no resemblance to any of the ordinary aural tones of the women he met in the school, perhaps he was just thinking too much of it as he was tired. Indeed, he was trying to take in breaths that were taken away by the day's journey. Knowing that it would be most unwise to continue further, he lied upon a particularly aged tree, and lied there, hoping to turn away all his worries.
He slept, and for what he could not say how long, was woken by the singing of that familiar voice he has heard. He could not tell how he could've managed it, but he rose up from that place, half-awake, and moved towards the voice he longed to hear in and full, and hoped to see its owner. Listless in his state, still he pressed on forward away from that small clearing whither the light had blessed and into more wildernesses, as giants towered before him, covering the sky, and darkening it with green. And thither, the voice became clearer, but than the song became even more beyond his ken. However, the voice, rhythm, and melody, still connected with a part of him, ancient but somewhat relevant, eldritch, yet lovely, he did not know how many ears have heard that song, but to him, it seemed to have been sung from that voice for him alone, and by chance, connected with the heart that has been broken for some time, and he never allowed to be whole once again.
And then he opened his tired eyes, and he could see the sun sinking low over the horizon, a heart cut in two, and its blood and life painting the colors of the sky, all for the world to see. And yet, in that twilight hour, countless hillocks, hummocks, and hills tower in several differences, shadowing him, and keeping from him a secret color of that place. It was covered there in plain sight, colored in gold and in orange and in red by the blood of the cut sun, were humble little dandelions, yellow showing all its sides to him. And the wind sounded, and flowed and billowed through the hills, and moved only a little the grasses, the leaves of the trees, and the dandelions, as well as the hair on his person. But to him, the wind was the final blow upon him, as it moved him greater than any wind he has come to know of, and with that place before him, he knew of that song that men forgot, and that the earth has hidden, and that Time has ruled over.
Hisao smiled and breathed in, and for the first time he felt something in his scarred heart, that may end his fleeting life, but he cared not for it at all, as spirit his put aloft into something unreachable by those winds and thither at that high place could see the entirety of that wondrous for a passing moment—another gift of a loving nymph of the earth? Perhaps the first was the song he heard from that ill-fated drunken session at the school food. Then he heard a voice behind him, bringing him back down to the earth, a familiar voice, and familiar in all of its incomprehensibility. He turned around, knowing of its owner, and thither she wondered why he had gone there upon that field, whither wild dandelions grow. He said with a smile, as if knowing she would understand despite all known experiences with her pointing to the contrary, under that red head and green eyes of hers. She had heard a voice calmly saying unpretentiously: "Nothing."