Stars Fell on Tokyo | ✓

17 | we'll meet again

       THE DAY WAS clear blue skies like it usually is especially on the weekends. Louanne had already packed up some of her belongings, she was going to be in two days from now. She was finally going back home to Hawai'i, only 4,000 miles away from Japan. She tried to think of a million ways to tell Kohei about her departure and to be creative with confessing her love for him. Like most days, the two would have breakfast at the spot and figured that it would be the most romantic place to have breakfast and dinner because it's by the sparkling stream.

       Louanne was already two seconds out the front door after she finished her morning routine to go see him. As expected, he waited for her by the tree with his hands shoved into the pockets of his pants and the wind had blown in his hair. The corners of his mouth lifted and his eyes lit up with excitement.

       "Good morning, beautiful," his hand was behind his back as he walked up to her. Kohei cheerfully smiled as he held out a bouquet of pink flowers.

       Louanne gasped. "Kohei! Did you bring me flowers? You didn't have to do that,"

       "Nonsense! I wanted to show you how much I care about you. How much fun we've had this summer,"

       "You are just the sweetest person I've ever met," Louanne took a whiff of the flowers, "these smell wonderful. What are they by the way?"

       "Oh, they're Japanese lotuses. I figured that this was the most romantic way of showing you how much I—" Kohei stopped himself before he could finish the sentence.

       "How much you what?" Louanne asked.

        "H-how much I care about you and that you mean the absolute world to me," Kohei was blushing hard now.

       Louanne immediately pressed her lips against his, lightly laughed, and then took a step back.

       "Now, let's eat before the food gets cold," Kohei clasped his hands together.

       They sat underneath their tree as they ate breakfast like they always have after they got together. Talking and laughing as time went on... she was easily forgetting that she will be leaving very soon but not until Kohei finally popped the question.

       "So, when are you going back home?" he asked.

       "Less than two days," she quietly answered, "sooner than you think,"

       After that, it was five minutes of silence while it was the same old ambiance in the background that they hear when they are by the stream. Louanne wanted to pick out his brains and figure out what he is thinking right now. She wanted to know if he was mad, sad, or both. The two only knew each other for almost three months and now their summer love was about to come to an end.

       A tragic end.

       "Aren't you going to say something?" Louanne asked him but he didn't respond.

       Kohei had looked at the glistening water, twiddling with his fingers, and then he picked at the small fray on his pants. He wasn't mad or anything but he just didn't look happy.

       "Kohei, are you mad at me?" she asked again, "it's okay if you are. I know that this was such short notice,"

       His eyes seem watery when he finally looks at her. "I'm not mad, Lou. I could never be mad at you. I'm just sad, that's all,"

      "That's all?"

       "Yeah, I mean I go from spending the best summer of my life with the girl that I love to find the fact that she's going back home. I am truly grateful for those moments that I—we have had,"