A never-withering dandelion.

I was crawling when she was carrying me. It was just the two of us in the empty hallway. The stinging hurt even more, numbing my leg. The more I moved it, the more the pain felt. But in the midst of it, my attention would shift to her at irregular intervals. It was distracting.... in a good way. It distracted me from my pain.

"By they way, how did you get such a horrible wound, Kouta-kun?", she asked, with concern mixed with her voice.

"Eh! Ayane-chan, you remember my name?", I was surprised. If I were to go in front of my class, most people would think I am from a different class. Yet, she remembered me. Why? What did I do to her that she remembered my name? Im invisible, then how?

"?", her face was showing visible confusion to my surprise.

"Uh... I was surprised. You remembered my name...", I said, shyly and embarrassed.

She giggled. I wonder if I sounded like an idiot there- ... ... ...

I was speechless. I looked at her when she was giggling. It was... unexplainable. I have never seen beauty this astonishing, this perplexing, this attractive. I forced myself not to blink, or I could not see this dandelion ever again. I wish I had photographic memory. I tried to force my brain to burn her smile in my brain. Forever there, in my mind, framed with gold and hung on the central wall of my mind...

She started a fire inside my heart that could not be stopped by anyone except her. People get butterflies in their stomach, I got fire in my heart. I got a motivation. A reason, to go against the flow for her.

She was frail, slim, easy to break. Like glass, like chalk, like... a flower. A flower that never withers. A dandelion... a never-withering dandelion.

"I know the names of everyone in our class.", she replied, smiling. Do I even deserve seeing her giggling and smile?

It was an important question. And I answered honestly. I was not...

That set a goal within me. The fire in my heart. I will become someone who is be worthy of that. Someone who deserves it. I want to become someone who can protect this dandelion.

I want to protect her...