You didn't notice it until the letter appeared in your shoe locker. The infamous love letter with the request to meet the recipient under the cherry blossom tree.
But that might be because you purposely ignored it all.
All of the lingering caresses, how he stared at you when he thought you weren't looking, and how he acted when you would gush about your new crush on a character from a new game you played.
Maybe you thought that if you ignored it enough, he'd stop liking you as something other than friends. Hopefully, he'd stop being interested in you, a girl who was interested in only being besties with him because she didn't know what else to be.
Maybe it was because you didn't believe you were worthy of him. You would dump your train wreck of issues on him, and he would resent you.
Or maybe, you didn't believe that he'd still like—not love, never love—you after hearing the uncensored version of your childhood and the person you became because of it.
He'd become disillusioned that you, Ichigo Utsugi, weren't as cheerful and happy as you seemed and that the way you acted was just a mask to hide your insecurities and scars.
But it didn't mean shit with this letter in your hand. This stupid, dumb, and idiotic letter you knew came from your best friend because how can you not notice how he writes your name like it's something fucking special.
You glared at it and started ripping it to pieces like it didn't exist. That this terribly pure thing was never created. Because that's how you fixed most of your problems, pretending they didn't exist in the first place.
You knew you'd break his heart, if not now, then later. You were the type to leave a person out of sheer boredom, and you didn't want that for him.
At least that's what you tell yourself to not seem clingy.
But you just wanted to stay friends, if only for a bit longer. Even if he hated you for ignoring his feelings and he decided to leave you too, you wouldn't mind too much.
He'd leave in the end, like everyone else.
And you'd be left alone in your pit of lies.
end.