Natsuki’s eyes flickered from the illuminated screen and back to the fallen phone. She dimly heard her mother’s voice screaming worriedly from the earpiece. Her hand reached out to pick up the phone.
“Sorry,” she muttered into the receiver, “I saw something that surprised me.”
“You had me scared for a moment,” her mother said, laughing nervously. “I guess old feelings die hard.”
“Yeah,” she grunted, distracted, her eyes still focused on the screen where Shizuru stood on the podium. She couldn’t hear what she was saying, but Natsuki could sense the pleasant tone in Shizuru’s voice.
“I’ll call you later,” she muttered and hung up, not giving her mother a chance to reply.
Duran whined and moved closer to her. The phone hung loosely in one of her hands as her other absentmindedly scratched the Ainu’s head. Natsuki’s eyes focused and she abruptly stood up, muttering a curse underneath her breath. She went into the kitchen, rummaging to find Shizuru’s address book that the other had left. Finding the number she wanted, she rapidly dialed it, and pressed the phone to her ear.
“Moshi Moshi,” she heard the other side say politely after a pause, “Who is—”
She angrily interrupted, “you knew, didn’t you!” She nearly yelled, “Why didn’t you just tell me?”
The other side was silent for a moment before gently replying, “Natsuki-san, I don’t know what you are talking about.”
“Why didn’t you just say that she was in Kyoto instead of giving me that cryptic bullshit about ‘Kyoto Festivals? You think this is fun for me?”
“Natsuki-san, what are you saying?”
“She’s there…Kyoto,” she said, trying to calm down. “I just saw her there…on the news.”
“Oh,” Takako said in surprise, “so this is what you were yelling about. Do you know how late it is?”
“…sorry.”
“Never mind that. I knew Shizuru-san always visited Kyoto in the spring, especially during festival time. Isn’t the Aoi Festival soon?”
“...”
“Good. Now that we have this matter settled, I will bid you goodnight. It is an ungodly hour for an old woman like me to be up. And you know how much I need my beauty sleep,” Takako cackled, “so good night.”
“Night.” Natsuki said speechlessly as the other hung up. She had made the call in search for an answer. However, it had only served to make her more confused. Green eyes closed in meditation, trying to calm the raging flames of inquisition in her mind. She could feel her mind pulse with an influx of ideas, situations—the many “what-ifs” began to resurface.
When she looked up, she saw Shizuru laughing at something a reporter had said before calmly replying. It was nostalgic to see her. Had it only been three weeks?
That was when she decided to go to Kyoto.
*~*~*~
Saturday, May 15 came excruciatingly slowly. She hated how time always seemed to pass so slowly when one wanted it to move faster. It was the last few weeks of her studies: she was supposed to be studying instead of making these “jolly journeys.”
Kyoto: the ancient city, former capital of Japan. From the large buildings that scraped the edges of the sky, the old wooden buildings preserved for centuries upon centuries, every part of the city pulsed with strength, beauty, and almost of history’s past regrets. In that way, the city reminded her of Shizuru.
She had woken up early to get on the first subway to Kyoto. Natsuki then had spent her morning and much of her afternoon wandering around, lost in the seas of people who, they too, wandered about, celebrating an ancient festival in this ancient city that reeked of the past…
And future. She had drifted towards the more urban part of the city in the early afternoon, engulfed in the sights and sounds of the large city. She had always lived in Fuuka, a small island that she doubted more than a handful of people knew even existed. She had been here before with Shizuru, but the city’s magnitude still caught her off guard.
In truth, she didn’t know why she was here, why she even came. It was futile, she knew it. How would she find her in this city of past and future? Even if she did meet her in a chance encounter, even if she found her walking down a street, their eyes suddenly meet…what would she do? What would she say to her? Natsuki didn’t know. She only acted on impulse. All she knew was that she had to be here. Something told her she had to.
And so, Natsuki continued to wander on without any purpose, any destination. Like a blind woman, she felt her way around, trying to see something. But she was blind—how could she see?
Her eyes were titled towards the earth in perpetual reflection. There was this feeling…that feeling she was beginning to know all too well. It was a feeling of…something. It was so vague, but it existed, on the tip of her tongue, sunken deep into the pits of her stomach. So aggravating, she desperately wanted to reach out and grasp it, to reach that epiphany so she could become complete.
She growled in annoyance. It was an unending cycle for her. She seemed to be always searching. Once she thought she had found what she was looking for, it just fired back into her face and she became more lost and confused.
She sighed. She might as well just give up; forget about everything, about trying. There wasn’t anything else she could do.
No. She couldn’t. Her personality refused accept no for an answer. She had to find the truth, even if it destroyed her as it did all those times before.
She looked up, shot out of her reverie, and back into the world around her that was filled with alien faces. Here she was, once more in the heart of springtime Kyoto, filled with thousands of people in the midst of the graceful Aoi Festival.
Natsuki noticed a group of middle-aged women. They were talking excitedly to one another. Her acute sense of hearing picked up their foreign northern accents: they were tourist. Indiscreetly she followed them and, unsurprisingly, they merged with a sizeable crowd. She tilted her head up to see what they were looking at. She gasped; Natsuki felt her body become numb.
She was dressed in a formal lavender kimono that was obviously made of expensive silk. The juban was of pure white color. The obi was a shade darker. And Natsuki knew from experience that the elegantly styled golden brown hair was as soft as it seemed even from a distance.
A tea ceremony demonstration. Had she been in any other position, Natsuki would have laughed at the irony. Instead she stood transfixed at the woman who moved so stylishly through the customary etiquette as if it was as simple as breathing. The woman that she had always been close to was so far away from her now, an image, an ideal—a vision of perfection that made her wonder how she had managed to capture her for all those years.
Natsuki continued to watch her as if under a spell. All she could do was follow Shizuru with her eyes. All these years she had been holding her back. This woman had once refuted everything—all she could’ve been—to stay with her. Now, looking at her, she saw that Shizuru was free. Free from her.
From a distance, Shizuru’s face was in a neutral expression, pleasant and characteristically gentle, forever serene. It was so different from that image that had been permanently ingrained into her head: that teary eyed, broken woman whose entire form seemed to shudder in melancholy.
As she watched her, Natsuki wondered why she let her walk away. Could she have done something? Couldn’t she have reached out, call her name once more, and beg her not to go?
No. Even now, she couldn’t. She was still so broken, lost. Full of holes…Shizuru would only flow through those cracks once again even if she could hold her.
But, Natsuki just couldn’t leave. So she stood, watching, staring at Shizuru who moved with ritual purpose, lost in the customs of time in this city that stood in between the edges of past and present.
Before she could snap herself from her daze, it was over. Shizuru had stood up, bowed, and departed. People had already started to leave, all talking to one another in excited or awed voices. Natsuki just stood there, like she had done weeks ago, only able to stare at where the other woman had left.
That indescribable feeling returned to her, stronger.
When she regained her ability to walk, Natsuki left as fast as she could, only to return the next Saturday. She had heard from a passerby that Shizuru gave a demonstration every week.
She now spent her Saturdays in Kyoto. Perhaps she was slightly masochistic…every moment she stood there staring at Shizuru was like a dagger through her chest. Every single time, every second, Shizuru seemed to untouchable…unreachable to her. She seemed like a glorious dream, the green light that she sought to reach, to touch, to hold in her grasp and never let go.
Yet, every single time, at the end of the demonstration when the Kyoto native would look up from her presentation to take questions, Natsuki found herself unable to move from her spot. She found herself unwilling to be recognized from the crowd. It was because those feelings of inadequacy would return. She was afraid, so very afraid.
And so, every week the cycle began anew.
*~*~*~*~
“Are you one of her fans?” A man asked her during her third visit.
“What?” She snapped, annoyed that someone had the nerve to ask her that question.
She turned to look at the speaker. He was young, likely only a few years older than her. He had on a fancy business suit. Bright, intelligent brown eyes were the most prominent feature on his otherwise plain face and his hair was cut practically yet still remained fashionably long. Nasuki swore she somehow knew him, but couldn’t recognize where.
“I don’t blame you and it’s not like you’re the only one.” The man smiled, his eyes sparkling at his joke as he indicated with a lazy wave of his hand the rest of the crowd. “But I’ve never seen anyone stare at her with such intensity. Do you know her? Actually, I probably should ask if I should call security.”
She was taken aback for a moment, but Natsuki quickly regained her bearings. “Why do you care?” She answered angrily.
The man’s hands moved, palms out as if he was trying to placate an angry beast, “Woah. No need to get all defensive. I was just asking, Creepy Stalker person.”
“Who are you and what the hell do you want?” She shot back angrily even though she knew it wasn’t the best action. Out of her the corner of her eye, she noticed that a few people had turned in curiosity. She shot them her best irritated glare and those people quickly turned back, the crowd unconsciously moved farther away from her.
To this, the man only laughed and pretended to shield himself from her onslaught. “Seriously, just calm down. It’s not like she is your…”
The man paused, staring at her as if he hadn’t quite seen someone like her before. Natsuki brazenly stared back with her turbulent green. She knew him somewhere. She knew his oddly formal accent yet impolite speech.
“…No way! You’re that girl, aren’t you? The one that Shizuru-chan was always talking about?”
Natsuki looked at him oddly, “Shizuru…chan?”
He only laughed and continued to observe her as one would an amusing animal. “Ah, what was your name again? Kuro...Kura…”
“Kuga Natsuki,” she spat. “Who are you?”
Her question caused the other to look almost offended. “You mean you don’t recognize me?”
“Should I?”
“No.” His brown eyes sparkled with unbridled mirth. “I have a rather forgettable face. I don’t expect that half my employees remember what I look like.” He held out his hand. “Koizumi Yasuo at your service.”
Natsuki only looked at his outstretched hand before looking back to his amused face. Her annoyance seemed to be almost tangible.
He visibly sagged.
“Um, I was the former president of Fuuka Academy? Two years ahead of Shizuru-chan? That Koizumi Yasuo?”
She shrugged. No, she didn’t remember.
Yasuo stumbled back as if he had been hit before he started laughing again. “Aww, I guess some people never change. I remember you now, Kuga Natsuki, the cute middle school student who was always getting into trouble, who nearly failed every single year due to a dismal attendance record.”
Natsuki merely glared at him, her hands where clenched into fists. She was seconds from jumping on to him and ripping out his throat and or his perfect teeth.
“And you’re that one that Shizuru-chan was always so interested in. She watched you all the time. I don’t think she knew it back then, what she felt. I did wonder why she never showed any interest in her many suitors.” Yasou said candidly as if he was commenting on the weather. “Just like I wondered why Shizuru-chan didn’t immediately come back home after she graduated. But she’s back…and you are here.”
Natsuki watch him warily as she tried to discern how this bumbling fool was connected to Shizuru. She never did pay attention to the outside world, always absorbed in her own. It was becoming painfully obvious that she was paying for it now.
“So…why are you here?”
She didn’t know what to say to his question. Why was she here? She couldn’t think of anything and so, she did what she did naturally: act upon impulse.
“I wanted to talk to her again. I just…didn’t know how.” She lied.
Yasuo kept his amused smile on his face and shrugged. “OK then.”
“Ok what,” she asked, confused.
“I’ll arrange a meeting between you and my cute kohai-turned senpai. She’s free tomorrow afternoon from three to five PM. Just come to the company headquarters and tell the front desk I sent you.”
Natsuki didn’t know what else to do but accept his offer.
“Great. It’s a date then,” he said, winking at her before he walked away.
When the gravity of the situation finally hit her, Natsuki cursed inwardly, wondering what was she thinking. No, she didn’t want to talk to Shizuru, not now at least. It was too early; she wasn’t ready to face her again. Besides, what would she say?
She turned to look up at Shizuru, trying to regain her unstable wits. Once more, she cursed at her weakness before she too left.
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