Chapter 38: For The Golden Flower I Stole In That Rain (II)

The television played some New Year’s countdown shows.

It was filled with bright voices, flashing lights and a cute pop idol group I didn’t even know.

My sister, Kaori, sat cross-legged at the foot of my bed, swinging her legs, already drowsy from too much juice. My mother—Shimizu Aino—sat beside me, helping me slurp a bowl of toshikoshi soba noodles as the seconds of the year ran out.

Kaori told jokes that sounded too naive to be called one, but Mama never failed to be a great supporting cast.

It must’ve been enough for someone—you had a room filled with laughter, an unexpected but comfortable reunion, being surrounded by warmth and love that people treated as a precious commodity not everyone had the privilege of having.

I appreciate it, really.

It’s just that there is something missing.

It’s something I couldn’t find on the hot and savory soba.

Not in between the loud cracks of fireworks either.

It’s the kind of discomfort that slips behind your ribs and leaves you asking why.

Why do I still feel like I’ve left someone behind?

Why does this night taste like parting instead of beginnings?

Why does it feel that this world is missing colors?

“It’s almost midnight!” Kaori chirped.

I smiled faintly and tousled her hair. “Yeah…Happy New Year, Kaori.”

After that, I stood up on weak legs, and even though a sharp throb flared at the back of my head, I steeled my resolve not to let any reaction surface.

But mothers had that innate ability to see through their children. I should’ve reminded myself.

“Are you okay, Itsuki-chan?” she asked gently.

I looked at her, and turned away.

“I…I think I just need some air.”

She moved slightly, as if to stand. “Do you want me to—”

“No. I’ll be fine.”

She paused, then nodded. “Okay. Don’t stay too long. It’s cold.”

She wrapped Kaori in a thick blanket and started humming softly to lull her into sleep.

I pushed myself up, dragging the IV stand beside me, and walked to the room balcony.

As soon as I opened the sliding door, winter bit into my skin.

The streets below erupted with cheers and horns and the frantic joy of people who still believed that the New Year promised miracles.

The city lit up. Fireworks exploded into kaleidoscopes of pink, blue, and gold.

It was beautiful, objectively.

But I still couldn’t feel them.

It just lit up my face but not the unknown world that got stolen away from me as Kousaka-san departed.

I watched for a long moment, a bit moved by the spectacle before me, then slowly sat down on the cold metal chair where Kousaka-san’s sketchpad was resting.

I hesitated for a moment, but then I remembered her words—to look at it whenever I feel alone. If I want to know what kind of person I was and what kind of person I had loved.

Right now, I feel alone.

I want to know what kind of person I was.

I want to know what kind of person I have loved.

And for the tradition of New Years granting wishes, this is my first prayer.

To remember who I am.

With the IV pole my lone witness, I opened the first page.

"Recueils de croquis d'Aurélie Fontaine/Kousaka Akari."

The handwriting was so delicate as if the pen danced in a ballet. In the world of digital uniformity, this feels like a secret told by long fingertips that breathed life on a static page.

The first few pages were filled with sketches of places—cathedrals, cobblestone streets, riverbanks—that didn’t feel Japanese. They were too ornate, too wide, too soaked in a kind of ancient loneliness I didn’t recognize.

“Are these…from France?”

A drawing of a river, sunlight gleaming on its surface.

Below it, her handwriting in delicate strokes:

La Seine.

A firework boomed just above, lighting everything up beneath it with the colors of its grace.

And there was a flash brighter than the world above, the one within, inside my head.

Me, sitting in a place resembling a cafe, with a girl with golden hair just sitting across, her expression as if trying to scold and discipline me.

“...You sound awfully defensive for someone caught red-handed…”

“...I brought you here to apologize, not debate semantics…”

My body lurched.

I gasped, breaking out of my trance.

Those voices, although it's just faint, I recognize them.

I blinked, shaking my head.

No, this couldn’t be real.

But the next page said otherwise—

Notre Dame.

I felt my chest tighten.

“...You saw right through the structure. Not many people could pick out those flaws. As expected from someone who lived in art…”

"...And died with it…"

My fingers curled tighter around the edge of the page.

I kept blinking it out, but the images…the voices…lingered.

And they were louder than the bright cracks on my background.

A memory—a dream? I wanted to shut the sketchpad, to run back inside and pretend the soba and the television were real enough.

But the pages—they kept pulling me in.

Rue de la République.

Kousaka-san in a coat, eating something that I probably cooked that day.

And I was handing her a gift.

She smiled at me, and said the words ‘Merry Christmas, Itsuki.’

A sharp twinge flared at the edges of my head, followed by a ringing in my ears.

More voices.

More flashes.

I turned to another page.

Marseille.

Calanques.

My chest constricted. I didn’t know how I knew those names. I’ve never been to France.

But I did.

And suddenly—

Torrential rain.

Me, standing across from a woman, holding an umbrella that covered her instead of me.

My voice: “You’ll catch a cold.”

And hers, “Worry about yourself.”

I gripped the sketchpad tighter.

Another memory came crashing in—the heat of a small room.

I was shivering under covers and she was feeding me with porridge, huffing about how I never took care of myself and was planning to die mid-winter.

I stared down at the next page, and my tears started to fall before I could stop them.

Why…?

This was just a sketchbook. Just paper and ink but…

Why does it hurt so much?

Why do I feel like I’ve lost something irreplaceable?

I wiped my eyes, but the tears wouldn’t stop.

I flipped the next page—

The port market. Rue Paradis.

A memory slammed like a freight train.

A rain at the balcony.

A deep kiss, her weight on top of me.

Her face red from embarrassment, and my voice saying something about a romantic gesture was better under the rain.

A broken sound escaped my throat.

Was that really me?

More pages—rapid fire now.

The first dango she ever bought.

And me, across a wooden stall, fumbling as she kept the wrapper on her pockets.

As I reach the final pages, I can almost reach the familiarity I've been longing for.

It was a wooden stall with Mitarashi Dango kanji on it.

Then a boy slouched in it. It was me. She drew it with such care. Every scratch. Every smudge of rust on the tin roof. Even the crooked banner that I never fixed.

And finally…

Kousaka-san…and me.

Sitting on a bench.

We were close.

Too close for strangers.

The warmth—the way her hand intertwined with mine in the sketch—said more than words ever could.

It never needed any speech bubbles.

The way we looked at each other was loud and bright enough.

I saw it clearly now.

We weren’t friends. We weren’t strangers.

We were in love, hanging by a thread.

The sob escaped before I could swallow it. I choked on the sound, folding over the sketchpad as my body broke into pieces I didn’t know how to hold anymore.

“I… I remember…” I whispered, voice cracking.

I turned to the last page, breath shaking.

Her handwriting again.

“You can always find me in the place that mattered most for the two of us.”

I stared at it.

And for a long moment, the fireworks didn’t exist.

The world didn’t exist.

Only those words remained.

The bench.

The stall.

The rain.

The girl.

Kousaka Akari.

I remembered.

All of it.

The nights I wanted to disappear.

The loneliness I lived with.

The way she barged in and filled it.

The day we pushed each other away.

The night I found her sleeping outside the park.

The kiss under the rain.

The night I caught her hand when she leaped.

The pain in her voice when she said goodbye.

The sketchpad.

My promise.

I was shaking uncontrollably now. Weeping so hard I couldn’t breathe properly. The pages were wet with tears I had no strength left to wipe away.

I pressed the sketchpad to my chest like it was all I had left of her.

“I’m sorry…” I whispered. “Kousaka-san…I’m so sorry…”

I wasn’t sure who I was anymore.

But I knew who I loved.

And I’d let her vanish into the world like she was just another fading firework.

The fireworks above burst into golden chrysanthemums.

But the only thing I could see was the color in her eyes—eyes I finally remembered—shining just as bright.

The sketchpad trembled in my hands.

My body was shaking. My breath—unsteady.

Tears fell from a feeling so overwhelming.

A truth finally resurfaced.

I pressed my forehead to the last page, eyes blurred and swollen.

And then I whispered it—no, breathed it—like it was the first thing I’d said all my life that mattered:

“Kousaka-san was the color I was missing.”