=Short. Depressing. Dream-inspired. Written in the twenty minutes between dressing and eating.=
Far Too Long
***
"When did it happen?"
"Ah, last night. After the party."
"Finally, our Tsukasa's become a man!"
"Shut up!"
I felt my stomach rise into my throat. I had to hold onto the wall for support. How long had it been? Two years. Two years since I'd spoken to him, two years since I'd seen him smiling, smiling just for me. Two years was far too long--and now had he not only forgotten me, he had long moved on. I wondered if he was really in love with her.
"Tsukasa said he loves me," she had said to me. Sunny smile, long blonde hair, she was perfect. Beautiful. Someone just right for him. "We're together now. He'll never remember you... don't see him anymore."
"I don't."
"I'm just..."
"Stop talking. I know. I don't need to hear it from you." Those were my last words to Umi. I was cold--so cold--to her. Cold inside, cold outside.
But I had never spoken to Umi or Doumyouji ever again, I had done as she asked. He had forgotten me; he was happy. I had no right.
I had no right.
So I had avoided the four of them like the plague. We all went to university, but the university was a big place. I only made contact with them when I saw Hanazawa Rui. He sought me out sometimes, alone, and we went out somewhere together to talk and reminisce and never once mention him. It was only he that looked for me. I never spoke to Mimasaka Akira or Nishikado Soujiro.
I never spoke to Doumyouji.
When I saw him raise his head, I knew I was lost. I had dropped my vigilance in my daze and stepped out from behind the building just a little bit, but it was enough. He saw me. I supposed it shouldn't have mattered, as he didn't know me anyway, but as his eyes picked me out from head to toe I knew he briefly recognized me. At first, I think I didn't register with him--he blinked, as if in a haze.
Then it happened. He dropped his head and raised his hand to rub his temple as if he were in pain. The moment lasted for only seconds before he allowed his eyes to lock with mine, and then I knew that everything had disappeared for us. I saw recognition, rejuvenation--only to be crushed as he looked around him at his three friends, all concerned, curious eyes, still smiling from his revelation, and the slight tremble of hope on his dear face was crushed.
He had remembered, but there was no going back for us. I saw it in him when he watched me, begged me for forgiveness, wished for me to come to him, so I turned my back to him and walked away.
Two years is far too long. Things can never go back.
I wonder if someday we'll be friends again.