The screeching sound from the door hinges alerted anyone within the vicinity. The lone person passed through the frame and closed the door behind her.

She heaved a heavy sigh and put down her backpack on top of the bed. When she allowed gravity to handle her, Rin unceremoniously crashed-landed herself face-flat on the bed.

The slow rise and fall of her chest was the only indication of life from Rin. Her limbs were still as ice as her body rested. It lasted until she turned her body to the side and grabbed the phone from her pocket.

It was around four twenty-five in the afternoon and she just arrived home from school; not too late but not too early. After she gave herself five more minutes, Rin groaned.

The young woman rose from the bed and turned on her music player to play soft, mellow tunes. She left the phone on top of her bed, and changed from her uniform into casual clothes at home— a loose, old, printed stretch tee (with the printed quote excerpt from a novel) and mid-thigh sports shorts (once the sports uniform from her previous school).

She untied her hair from its crown braid and finger-combed her loose strands to let it relax from the day-long stress. Rin thought her crown braid was 'amateur shit' despite the compliments from people around her. Perhaps she just needed her hair to be longer and get more used to the technique.

With today's hairstyle, she did not need her favourite ribbon. It was favourable for her today. She would have forgotten to remove it from her head before she arrived home if that were the case.

No one in her family needed to know she still wore her ribbon the moment she left their street.

Rin sat again at her bed and opened the backpack. The lunch bag was already unloaded downstairs in the kitchen before she went up to her room.

She pulled out her laptop, her daily stationary, and the textbooks and notebooks she brought to do the work needed to be started. Rin sighed once again, carried her stuff to the study table near the bed.

The pop and punk-rock music from the phone was paused and she plugged it to charge its battery. The music moved to Rin's laptop through the earphones to block off the distractions around her.

Rin wrote notes from memory, or copied it from either the opened textbook on the side or the text on the screen. Once in a while, she paused to mentally plan her answers or spent a few clicks and typed to find information from the internet, or flicked pages in her textbooks.

Even if it was a minimal workload (compared to the previous workload from the past), the school work due for the next two weeks was finally finished.

Unless a teacher surprised the class with another task, then Rin's free time was basically secured for two weeks.

Just as she packed her stuff in the backpack, Rin heard her name being called.

It was time for dinner, which meant her father and siblings arrived home from work.

Rin closed the lights in her room and went downstairs to the dining table.

The youngest child went straight to the kitchen counter to open the fridge and serve herself a glass of orange juice.

It was a childhood habit she never grew out of, to the dismay of her parents and older siblings. But it was one of those things out of their control at that point.

Rin was aware the number of glasses she consumed in one sitting when she was younger was bothersome, with the implication of how much sugar she got. One glass per sitting was her maximum.

Dinner was at its usual course. No one rushed to finish their dinner, nor were there any interruptions such as phone calls or an appointment after dinner.

Thus, the Shimoda family dined in relative peace.

"Has the agency given us a specific date to when we can get our visas?" Rin's father started the conversation. The thing that daunted Rin the most was now on the surface.

She could only be quiet.

"Nope. They just said we need to be prepared." Rin's eldest brother, Leon, replied. He was the one who received the call.

The middle child, Lola, added to assure her father. "It's easy to book a flight. We've been saving money for years and it's been set aside until the time comes."

Rin spaced out from the conversation. Her gaze lowered to the plate in front.

Long ago she had finished her meal so her plate was empty, save for the peeled-off skin of the orange she helped herself.

The conversations within the table blurred in Rin's consciousness. The heavy weight within her heart, together with her unfocused vision enabled her disassociation.

It was the only way to cope with the inevitable grief of the uncertainty in the future.

Rin's mother gently chided her youngest daughter. "Rin, is there something wrong? You're glaring at your plate, you'll break it soon."

Leon grumbled. "Must be off daydreaming and will never finish cleaning her room for months."

Their father scolded him in return. "Leon, that was inappropriate."

Rin could only glare at her plate.

If she glanced towards the person she had to call her brother, she might have strangled him in the middle of the table—all decency thrown out of the window from pent-up rage.

"If Rin wants to help us in finalising things, she can start with finishing with her own room before she can help us." Lola replied with a gentle tone, yet ambiguous to which side she took in the growing tension in the table.

Rin muttered. "I am working on that." But it turned out as a grumble to those who listened to her.

"Are things in school getting busier, Rin?" Mr Shimoda enquired and gently approached this situation.

Rin only nodded unenthusiastically, gaze still below her plate.

"You will finish cleaning your room, won't you Rin?" Her mother followed.

Rin felt there was something hidden on that tone.

When Rin replied a soft 'yes' to her mother, the conversation moved on to more important things than Rin's bedroom.

It was as if the tail of the storm had passed.

All that was left was to recover and rebuild, for Rin in that case.

The dishes were collected, the table was wiped clean, and the sink was emptied of dirty plates thanks to the efficient hands of Lola.

The family went on to their separate ways and retired for the night.

Rin closed the door behind her and faced the whirlpool that was her bedroom.

The study table was disorganised. Miscellaneous things were stuffed under her bed. The closet needed re-arranging. There were things from the past that needed to be thrown out.

It was the ever-continuing agony to deep-clean the room that would relieve Rin from despair.

If she wanted to pack efficiently and leave things in order when they board that plane, she had to finish her business here in this room.

The eighteen year old sighed and put out the load of documents and items from a cabinet filled with a lifetime's worth of memorabilia.

Documents were sorted in various folders—certificates and medals, handout resources, and photographs. Stored alongside the folders were small boxes of childhood toys, and books collected through the years. Like a real bookworm Rin was, some of them were left unread to this day.

Rin still struggled to decide whether to keep an item or designate it to either pile: to donate or to throw away.

Yet her goal was to create more space, and it meant to eliminate things through one or two options. It did not help that she dug through tangible proofs of the past.

Most of her time meant for cleaning was lost on the endless journey in memory lane.

The cold from the air conditioner slowly prickled her exposed skin, a slow pinch to the reality that Rin still denied, despite the sinking effect as the time she lost still moved.

Was she prepared to drop everything she had right now for the sake of securing a future for herself, together with her family?

If only she could be given more time until after graduation.

Every night Rin prayed the heavens were merciful enough to grant her this one more selfish wish.

And so Rin's night saw her finish one section of her room. It was easy for the girl to crumple up papers with written ideas from a distant childhood, which made her face scrunched with grimace.

But it was a challenging barrier she overcame, whether to throw out or keep the papers with compositions that were once considered as her magnus opus now lost in the passage of time.

After she caught herself and reminisced far enough, Rin set it aside with hopes of a proper headspace someday.

Folders were opened and filled to the brim with documents from previous academic years. Rin inspected each document. There were a few deemed important enough to be kept. The majority of papers were put in the recycling pile.

Notebooks from the previous academic years were tossed to the same pile, especially notes that would not help her with the degree she would take in university.

Rin felt she deserved a pat on the shoulder from the work so far.

The process continued, until it halted when Rin found a certain folder.

It was an envelope with a string attached to close and lock the flap from opening. The first time it was used was to gather all the documents with Rin's name when the family's passports were renewed. After that was finalised, the envelope was empty ever since.

It was not until a specific date when Rin used it for all the memorabilia that reminded her of the main reason for her broken heart years ago.

Rin opened the folder. All the tangible memories she had with her first love, Len, were inside.

Every piece within her possession, that even had the smallest cue, towards Len Kagamine was there. It was gathered in one place to save herself from the torture of flashbacks during the painful break-up. Around the sixth month mark, all the crying made her sick.

Inside were everything—the smallest keychain she received from him, the letters in the smallest strips of paper to a full A4 size sheet he wrote for her during the early months (it was laminated later on), all the gifts during the course of their failed relationship and photos of them together. Thankfully, everything fitted in the small folder.

Maybe her traitorous mind played tricks on her, but she could not remember (for the life of her) if she had a softcopy of the printed photos.

She grabbed one photo. Her mind retrieved the memory of when it was taken: the school open day at eighth grade. Rin and Len played with the band that was formed solely for the event, which included a few people from their circle such as Gumi and Nana.

The photo was taken when they did rehearsals inside the vacant music room. It was a free period dedicated to preparations and rehearsals. She and Len stood and played their respective instruments, the electric and the bass guitars.

At that time, Rin was very much smitten with Len's versatile talent with music. People at their former class thought her musical skills were the best among the cohort.

But Rin always thought, even until today, Len's skills were far superior than her's. It was just unrecognised by everyone else.

Rin focused on the photo again. They wore their school uniforms. Both of them had their guitars strapped on their shoulders and in the middle of a song. But that moment was the time they did not take practice seriously, based on the eased expressions of their faces.

On the left side was herself, in the middle of a laugh and looked at something outside the photo's frame. Of course, now she could not remember why she laughed.

It was either because of Gumi or Yuma in the band, or the visitors like Kaito and Kokone who dropped by practice and relaxed with them.

While Rin had the time of her life laughing at something outside the frame, on the right side was Len who stood beside her.

But different from Rin's distracted focus, Len's gaze was on the side to her.

It was because of Len's look that Rin received a copy of it from a classmate who secretly took photos that day, together with a chat message she remembered of multiple smirking and heart emojis.

It was a blurred memory for Rin who could only remember the first time she felt her cheeks blushed and her heart beat faster when she noticed how Len looked at her.

Today, that feeling of mixed excitement and squirming was now lost to Rin. The photo only evoked a sense of sad nostalgia; reminded herself there were good times from that part of her past.

Rin put the photo aside and continued through the documents. She read one of the letters that she carefully laminated out of love once upon a time.

It was a liberating feeling when she read the letter today without any tears shed, nor the jabs of pain in the chest she felt from last time.

A few more digging and Rin discovered even the smallest pieces stored in the folder—remnants of paper chats, cheesy scribbling of them being in love and wallet-size photos of either Len and them together.

Unexpectedly, Rin laughed upon the realisation she owned a copy of Len's one-by-one size photo. They exchanged each other's photos one time, and obviously she would have his copy and he had her's.

Rin now thought it was one of the most ridiculous things they did. But like most things, she could not blame her past self who only lived and clearly enjoyed the moment.

It was a long time ago, and she was now way beyond the healing process. Rin changed her mind on the regret she thought she had of the relationship.

Rin finally accepted things as they were. The process to move on treated her well through time.

Funny enough, Rin realised the varied reactions she had with this simple folder ever since she gathered all her memorabilia with Len.

She was once determined to keep everything about Len out of sight during the break-up. When she fully recovered, she completely forgot the thing even existed until today.

Now, she was ready to throw all of it away.

Apologies in thin air, Rin realised what a waste of laminating paper she did with these letters. Because today, they were to be destroyed.

She peeled off the laminated paper, separated both sides of the letter and manually cut into pieces with her trusty scissors; to save her graces from her sister who she leant the paper shredder from for confidential, outdated documents.

Rin worked on the photos. For the last time, she thought that if these photos would resurface, whether in a printed copy or a softcopy, then it was the work of fate. With that in mind, she was prepared to dispose of them through the shredder.

Rin saved a portion of some photos that had her. She looked decent and even cool in some of them if she said so herself.

Included was that previous picture with her and him with their guitars together. It was true, and reminded by Kaito recently, she loved the electric guitar because of Len. She barely played it before as a kid, as she often used the piano and the drums.

But after she met Len who was talented in the bass and was encouraged by him to complete the guitar duo, Rin used the electric guitar to the point she grew to love it. Eventually, it became one of her main instruments recognised by everyone.

Like most things that defined her life during their relationship, it was all abandoned when she and Len ended.

Rin turned her head to the closet where the very instrument was inside.

Due to the extreme costs of overseas shipping, her family sacrificed some personal bulk items and would leave it behind here. Airline policies only allowed one instrument in flight.

The violin, flute and drum set had to be put up for sale because of it. That decision had been finalised all because Rin chose to bring the electric guitar with her.

It was ironic and still weird to think of. The instrument Rin barely played for the past three years due to the association of it with her ex-boyfriend would be the one she would bring with her.

Rin shook her head with a chuckle at the turn of events. She rummaged through the folder again.

Her past self dubbed it as the Kagamine Folder, according to the letter she had written the same year she began the idea. It was addressed to her future self and explained the reasons and purposes of the folder.

Included in the letter were pleasantries; "... hopefully she was in a better headspace compared to when she wrote the letter."

There were also comments that were written seriously. But when Rin read it today, she burst out laughing to think how things turned out after. One excerpt in the letter said:

"I'm currently pissed off with that stupid Science teacher with her favouritism to the guys no matter how many times I told her (in a diplomatic way) it's making the rest of us uncomfortable and the reporting I did with administration. Can you believe the quiet and chill guys I hate to admit even including him were lowkey treated like shit by her? I hope that hoe left the school by the time you read this… If you're still in that school tbh?"

Funnily enough, the teacher she referenced in the letter resigned that following year.

After she finished, Rin followed the wishes of the letter as stated in the bottom page—to destroy it if she finally moved on.

It was a little triumph Rin was proud of when she held the paper with both hands and ripped it apart.

Whilst the remnants of the letter fell in front of her, Rin remembered another time capsule from the past.

She grabbed her phone nearby, and opened the gallery. There, long forgotten was an album she created all those years ago. She scrolled through the collection one final time.

Memories from every single photo flashed back to Rin's mind. It brought a sad smile to her face even when she reached the end.

Her thumb subtly shook when it pressed the 'delete' button. As it hovered on the final confirmation tab, Rin allowed herself a few seconds in the moment.

.

.

.

Permanently delete '[To be deleted] Kagamine Collection'?

'CANCEL'

'DELETE'

.

.

.

.

There's no going back.

Rin's thumb pressed the bottom option. A loading bar that indicated its progress to remove the hundreds of photos in the album was shown.

The 'cancel' button that could have tempted Rin at the last minute was in front of her.

But with conviction, she restrained the muscles of her thumb until it was over.

Rin merely watched the loading bar be filled until everything was gone.

Decluttering has never felt so good for Rin until that moment. She finally had more space to breathe in.

There was a lone sheet of laminated paper that was set aside, salvaged from the wreck of purposeful destruction. The A4 sheet contained musical notes for two different instruments, with the G-clef and the F-clef in its own staff. There were no lyrics underneath each staff.

.

.

.

[UNTITLED]

Will think of a title later lol

.

Rin Shimoda & Len Kagamine (2021)

.

.

.

Rin and Len collaborated in multiple original songs in the course of their relationship. It started when they took their inside jokes to the next creative level. Some ended up coherent enough to be a decent song. Majority of their works were written out of inspiration from each other (mostly love songs), or simply supported each other's creative juices.

Len was her muse during those years. It was the same when she was his muse.

Most of their songs told stories that were more or less inspired by their romantic feelings for one another, or explored a random thing that interested both of them at the time.

That one time Len was inspired to compose a song about the constellation Gemini. Rin happily hopped on to create it. Little did she know it turned out to be one of her personal favourites among their projects.

Len mostly had the sheet music for most of their songs, as Rin was pretty disorganised with her sheet music. They often used the software Len owned specifically to create sheet music, so he was usually the one who stored it anyway.

Rin was unaware of what happened to their dozens of composed songs after they broke up.

During the tension of the early months with their passive-aggressive confrontations, it never stumbled into Rin's mind about the future of their original songs.

There was one rumour that Len threw out all the sheet music he held, both on paper and digitally.

When Kaito asked, Len never answered straight to the point; as was usual during that period. Broken-hearted Rin assumed he threw it all out and was not surprised if he had the audacity for it.

If asked today, Rin would say she felt ashamed for the loss of those songs. Both of them worked hard for it after all.

It was made from a place of passion for their craft despite what happened to their relationship. But she acknowledged it was definitely a long time ago. Nothing could be said and done anymore.

All these memories made Rin decide on the fate of the music sheet she held. The Untitled song brought a pang of nostalgia within her.

Sure, there was the mix of a subtle heartache as she remembered the good days in the past. But Rin, at least herself from four years ago, loved the song so much to have her own copy instead of solely depend on Len's storage.

Rin stood up on the floor and scanned the music sheet in hand once again. She turned her head behind to the half-opened closet, where her electric guitar was tucked inside on its stand.

Maybe she would play the Untitled song. She thought of an easy fix with the bass parts with a virtual music instrument simulator.

"I guess that could work for me?" Rin concluded to herself.

The decision was settled when she inserted the laminated sheet in between the documents on the top organiser on her desk.

Another thing Rin was thankful for was that Len gave her a few gifts. It was now easy to sort through them today.

She regretted spending money on him. But such was life, supposedly as she said.

Since they were young, it brought some sense of insecurity whether Len valued their relationship or not with the lack of reciprocation of the gifts. But it all faded out whenever he actually gave her one. Those rare moments were appreciated and cherished by Rin.

That was why those few gifts were still here today; either to be disposed of once and for all, or set aside to see the light of day.

She first considered the monetary value of the items. If they were less than the amount that Rin considered 'costly' while it had no practical use, then it was straight to the bin or in the donation pile.

There were a few moments where she had to weigh the pros and cons to keep an item. Was it in good condition to be sold or donated? Or was it cheap and useless enough to be thrown away? There was no time to waste at this point, so most of them went to the donation pile.

Only one item was left: a keychain with the G-clef symbol. The heavy ornament made from plastic was painted black and included a yellow artificial gemstone placed on the round tail.

Rin vividly remembered where it came from. On one of their weekend dates, she and Len passed by a cheap jewellery shop with a pop-up table for reduced products placed in front of the door.

The keychains with the shape of musical notes caught both the eyes of the young couple that they stopped by to admire it. Until they saw the G-clef and F-clef keychains that they decided to buy them together as pair keychains for each other.

It was one of the usual moments where they would banter that one paid for the other. But Len ended up being more persuasive than ever that Rin decided to let it go after, being convinced it was his gift for her.

And so the keychains found themselves at home on their phone (for Len) or their bag (for Rin).

The last month of their relationship (before Rin realised), she noticed Len did not have the keychain anymore. He told her he kept it for safekeeping to avoid further damage. But little did she know it already meant something more after she shrugged it as nothing.

The keychain was gone from Rin's bag when the break-up happened. It was stored on one of the pen holders at her table. Until it moved into the folder, and was never seen ever since.

"Well, I've always loved the look of this one. Besides, I could use a cute keychain now."

Rin finally considered using the keychain for the first time, just for herself. Its new home was on the zipper of her current school bag.

Rin finally emptied the folder. With three items (including the photos she cut) left behind, she reclaimed them; a part of herself that was painfully stripped off after the break-up was stitched up again.

One of the important lessons Rin learnt was to ensure a piece of herself would always be left for herself. She did not want to lose herself again similarly when Len left. Her once passions connected with him were now her own passions without the memories of the past, this time and until then.

The goal of decluttering the cabinet progressed as the night grew. The whole process with the folder already took almost two hours.

Rin was lost again in memory lane, and then distracted from other things such as the guitar and contemplation with the letter. She sorted through her books. Similar to her instruments, she could only bring a few books with her on the flight.

She resorted to selling half of her book collection after she went through the titles. The remaining ones with a personal attachment to her would stay back on the bookshelf Gumi arranged for her.

An unspoken possibility that she could return soon.

Rin breathed a long sigh of relief. She finally concluded the evening's work.

The cabinet was officially finished and sorted out. Tons of items needed to be disposed of tomorrow after-school or put on sale soon.

All that was left was for Rin to start her bedtime routine and get settled in bed.

The folder did so much to remind her of something she always felt needed to do.

She had not told any of her friends about it, since she herself only came to terms with it early in the year; when their whole process with the migration showed signs of progress.

Out of every situation where she left on a wrong note, Rin wanted to reconcile with Len.

Badly.

She felt ashamed not only for the guy, but for herself. As humanly possible, Rin would like to leave her home without any bad note on anyone or anything else.

And as much as Rin reflected her interactions throughout her life, it was only with Len that she thought things needed to be fixed.

Yet she never had the backbone nor the balls for it.

Rin often hesitated with this gut feeling, thanks to the spiral of questions in her mind that enabled the doubt.

Is Len interested in the first place?

Does he even remember me like this?

What if he still doesn't want to do anything with me until now?

Forget Len being weirdly chill with her in tenth grade. It all seemed a front to Rin for the sake of decency and diplomacy.

Surely he still felt upset or simply apathetic towards her. Though when Rin looked back through her memories, they did not glare daggers at each other anymore.

But they were still not friends…

Right?

But if she reached out, would it be worth it? The idea that it could end as a fruitless interaction because it was someone she was not on good terms with, was the most daunting part and took Rin a back-turn to pursue it.

Yet the guilt of leaving things unresolved also bothered Rin.

I want to see him again.

No, scratch that!

I need to see him again.

For some reason, both her mind and her heart agreed to reach out and give her side of the whole thing for closure.

This could be the only chance I've got.

Rin clutched a fistful of the blanket.

It was her anxiety over Len's reaction that made all of Rin's nerves go haywire.

But I still think I'm too far away from you.

Rin turned her body to the other side on her bed. She grabbed her phone from the bed-side table and opened it. She was still in denial whether she should initiate the closure or not.

She wanted closure, and still does.

To find more information that could help her, Rin opened her social media and looked up Len's account.

She had not realised her past self enabled the Hide option on Len's profile. He was not blocked. But it lessened her chances to interact with him, even as simple as see his posts on her feed.

Just like with the folder, she simply forgot she had done it in the past after she moved on.

Further scrolling on his recent posts, there was nothing to suggest she should approach him for closure. No post related to his personal life was even in his feed in the first place. No updates nor any interaction with people potentially from his current place at the art school after they parted ways.

"Damn it Len, until now you're hard to lurk on."

Rin grumbled to herself; the glare of the screen's brightness omitted in her face as the only source of light in the room. A few more swipes from her right thumb bore no valuable information that could help her.

Rin remembered she deleted her chat history with Len around the same time the folder was made. And Len never sent her a message within those three years.

So there was nothing for her to look there.

She noticed the time after a glance at the corner of her screen. Rin heaved a sigh and returned the phone to the bedside table.

She re-tucked her blanket to actually sleep. Even when she closed her eyes, the thoughts in Rin's mind continued to linger.

It was high time to ask Gumi or Kaito about this. Maybe even Miku since she seemed to understand. Or Luka so she could be Rin's voice of reason.

If only Rin could set aside her anxiety and fear, then she could have approached Len to start things off.

But some inner force pulled her away from it. Maybe this was a sign it was not meant to happen?

Though it felt like she procrastinated this. Rin was frustrated with herself.

With the poor attempts to brush off these thoughts, Rin succumbed to sleep. The lingering thoughts of Len and the potential outcomes of the closure she still sought after were in her mind.

Will I see you again?


I have bonus art at the end of this chapter in the ao3 version! 3 (www.) (/)works(/)44468923 [remove the brackets/parenthesis]