Climax

Haru races down the hospital staircase following the glowing petals as they lead the way. Upon exiting the stairway he heads into a hospital room as he loses sight of the pink shimmer. Stepping inside, Minori comes into view laying on a hospital bed connected to an array of medical equipment. The petals take the form of her silhouette and hover above her before gently falling onto her body and being magically absorbed. She slowly opens her eyes, looks over at him and smiles.

“Hi Haru.”

Tears flow down his face.

“Oh Haru, please don’t cry.”

“But I'm just so happy to see you awake and back to your normal self. It has been a painful few months.”

“Has it really been months? My memories are still a bit fuzzy but I do remember us being on a date at lovers hill. I was wearing a pink yukata that you bought for me. The last thing I remember is hearing your voice slowly get muffled by this loud ringing noise until I stopped hearing you completely.”

“Yeah we were visiting lover’s hill before coming to the hospital, but much more happened after that.”

He took a seat right beside her, grabbed hold of her hand and took a deep breath.

“You suddenly collapsed onto the ground when we were there and had to be rushed to the hospital by ambulance. After being stabilized you awoke with memory loss, unable to remember anything that you experienced over the past few years. It turned out that you had a brain tumor on your temporal lobe. Luckily there was a doctor experienced enough with the procedure that took charge of your care. The tumor was successfully removed about 9 months ago and you’ve been laying here in a coma ever since.”

With a face of sorrow tears welled up in her eyes.

“Oh but please don’t worry. The tumor was benign so there's no chance of it coming back. And besides I won in my bet with that crafty little magic Daruma doll so he made sure to heal you so you could have a full recovery.”

“Wait, a magical daruma? Haru, what are you talking about?”

“I'm sorry. I know this is all a lot of information to take in. I can tell you about that later.”

“About the magical daruma?! No, I want you to tell me about that right now.”

He let out a small chuckle.

“Even after all of this information your curiosity is still as strong as ever. Well I guess I’ll just start from the beginning then. Your family and I visited you everyday to keep you company. The doctors were very hopeful that you would wake within a few weeks after the surgery, but after 6 months they became much less optimistic about your condition as it only continued to worsen. In my string of visits to multiple shrines while praying for your full recovery, I met an interesting shrine priest. He reached out to me after seeing me break down in tears while praying one evening. After explaining to him your situation and the deep pain I felt for being powerless to do anything to help you, he handed me an ominous box covered in talismans. He told me that if I was willing to risk losing my soul in order to get you a full recovery, the contents of the box might be able to help me.”

“Haru, please don’t tell me you exchanged your life for mine.”

She burst out crying.

“Minori, I'm not going anywhere. There’s no need to worry.”

A cloud of smoke appeared at the foot of the hospital bed. And out appeared the pink daruma.

“Haru, you're really dragging out the suspense in this story of yours. Let me just finish telling her for you. Your boyfriend unsealed me from that box and pleaded with me to save you in exchange for his own soul. After a bit of talking we came to the agreement that I would save you in one month’s time no matter the outcome of our bet. However, if he couldn’t prove to me that the love between you two was deep enough to reignite despite your memory loss, I would take his soul as payment. The whole shinigami and magic thing was based on a manga I pulled out of your memories. It made things much more entertaining for me to watch. Besides, it was a familiar personality for your soul to temporarily mimic in a physical form since your memories were still so fuzzy.”

Haru glared at him with an annoyed face

“Yeah, all that magic and shinigami stuff really threw me off guard at first. Honestly, I thought you had just called off our bet and sent a shinigami to kill me. It wasn’t until I turned around that I realized how you decided to set the stage for me, so I fully committed to it and played along. It did end up helping me win our little wager though. And at the very least it would have given me the opportunity to relive a few of my favorite memories with her before you took my soul.”

Memories began flooding into Minori's mind, merging the adventures they just shared in her shinigami form with their time as a couple since high school. Visions of their first date at the amusement park, riding on his bike to get takoyaki, trying kendo and rock climbing together, going to the aquarium and zoo, visiting an onsen and so much more.

“Wait a minute, did you really plan every single one of those adventures to coincide with our favorite dates?”

“Yup, I was hoping it might help you remember something even if it was just some of the feelings you had for me and I even got to get my revenge on you for that takoyaki prank from high school.”

“Oh be real, I still didn’t react as bad as you did.”

She sticks her tongue out at him.

“What date was the zorb one supposed to coincide with?

“Don’t you remember that one time we raced our hamsters in their exercise balls? You told me that if they made human sized ones I could never manage to run in it.”

“Oh yeah. Looks like I was right huh?”

They both burst into laughter.

“Well I know when I'm no longer needed. I wish you two nothing but happiness. And you be sure to keep that kanzashi as a present from me.”

The daruma vanished in a cloud of dark smoke just as Haru received a notification on his phone.

“I forgot to tell you that I let someone know that you would be waking up tonight.”

The door flung open. Ichika came running inside and hugged Minori.

“Big sis?”

“It's about time you remember me.”

Minori gasped.

“That’s right… I got to spend time with you in that shinigami form too.”

“Yes you did. I originally thought Haru was trying to play a cruel joke on me at first, but after watching you for a bit there was no denying it.”

“I may not have remembered who you were, but even with my memories gone I still felt a deep connection to you.”

“I’m so glad you’ve come back to us… or more like that you were brought back to us.”

She smiles over at Haru.

“I just had to rush over here and give you hug but let me give you love birds a bit more time alone. I missed dinner anyway so you two enjoy yourselves and I’ll be back tomorrow bright and early.”

“You better not be here any later than the blue hour.”

“I promise.”

She waves at the two of them as she exits the room, closing the door behind her.

“So Haru, did you know for sure the love pact you made with me would end this way?”

“All I could do was hope that it would, but knowing that you were going to be saved either way was solace enough for me. Besides, all I had to do was get you to fall in love with me again.”

He put a huge smile across his face.

“Now come on Minori, how could you not fall in love with a face like this?”

She hit him with a playful punch across the chest and let out a small laugh.

“You big dummy… I love you so much.”

“I love you too.”

He pressed his hand upon the side of her face as tears welled up in his eyes.

“Finally, the emptiness I’ve felt from not having you with me is gone. Don’t ever let me experience a moment of life without you by my side again.”

A final tear from each eye slid down his face and fell from his chin as he gently pulled her face in close until their lips met with a kiss.