sunshine and midnight rain

Chapter 7

Three years before

3rd person's pov

"Yujii, wait!"A soft voice called for him, hoping to make him hear her. He turned around, immediately recognizing her voice, who could have been if not her? She ran happily towards him, till she leapt onto his neck, him embracing her by putting his arms around her waist.
"Hi, Lily."
"Goodmorning, Yuji. How are you?"
"I feel well, you?"
"Yeah. I'm happy to see you."
"I am as well. We should go, the bell will ring at any time."
"Yes, let's go then."
This was their routine.
Yuji's middle school had a beautiful entrance, fully adorned with garlands of flowers, on the occasion of the beginning of spring. The school was situated on the top of a small hill, to reach it, there was a straight white paved path that students could follow to arrive directly on the top; the characteristic of this path was its beauty: white tiles made it bright and elegant, shiny under the light of the sun, and large cherry trees ran along the sides, wind passing through their branches, letting their petals fly away and fall on the tiles and on the grass. Since it was March, cherry trees were a beautiful spectacle. Students had to wear a uniform, but unexpectedly, they appreciated it, clearly not everyone could like it, but the general opinion on the school uniform was positive. Composed by a not-too-short plain aqua green skirt, a white shirt and a little darker aqua green elegant jacket for girls, probably too formal to be a school uniform, and an equal uniform for men, except for the skirt, since they had long pants having the same colour as girls' skirts.
Lily was the extremely sweet type of girl, she was kind with everyone and willing to help everyone who needed it, gentle and generous. She was the first ever real support of Yuji apart from his grandfather, always staying by his side, defending him whenever something happened, even if it meant going against everything and everyone, and always worrying about him. He was, in fact, her first love. She has never loved anyone like she loved him, even now. Everything started during the first year of middle school, despite their young age, Lily felt deep admiration for him since she saw him for the first time in the school sports festival of October, really at the beginning of the year. She then meeted him casually in the hallways and always blushed at the sight of him, even if he never seemed to really notice her, but, in reality, who wouldn't notice her? Lily was a beautiful girl, always admired by both boys and girls for several and different reasons. She looked like an angel, both physically and mentally. Light blond, long, ringlet hair made her look like a princess, thin lips, white, very clear skin and beautiful emerald eyes made her look like a divine being. She always styled her hair with a small clip that looked more like a small butterfly, since it kept just two frontal strands on the back of her head, leaving her delicate and soft face exposed. The truth is that Yuji noticed her, he just didn't think of her in that way, he wasn't interested in relationships at the time, understandable, they were both still little and immature, they were kids. They certainly grew up till second year, but they were kids anyway, after all. Despite that, Lily decided to make the first move during second year, after a school conference in Spring, giving him a small bouquet of light blue roses, telling Yuji to go home and search for their meaning and then give her an answer. Yuji was surprised to see that a girl like her could like someone like him, he had heard that she got the best grades inside the whole school, and it was true. They had had a ranking at the hall of the school, that showed the results of the exams, just the first fifty best students were shown, and she was always first, while he never got inside the ranking, not once. He went pretty badly, also considering that he didn't want to study when he had to, but he was always thinking about sports and nothing else. Nevertheless, she loved him, or, at least, she fell in love when they first kissed, before that, she just had had a huge crush on him. He was handsome and funny. Nevertheless, she's sure that she'll remember that kiss forever. When  it happened, they were both full of feelings, a mixture of really strong affection and happiness, caused by the laughs they had that afternoon, genuine laughs and small signs of affection towards each other, connectable to those relationship ones: holding hands, laying their head on the other's shoulder (especially Lily did that, not only for her sweetness and affection, but also because Yuji surely would have had some problems; indeed, he was particularly tall while Lily, on the opposite, was really short) and giving small cheek kisses. However, that first kiss made her completely fall for the pink-haired boy. They were in that white paved path leading to school, when he softly picked her up from the ground, placed her on a little raised wall, that reached approximately his belly, and crushed his lips onto hers, while Lily, totally surprised and red, hesitant and shaky, sticked her hands in his hair, as she melted into the kiss and felt a warm discharge cross her body. After the kiss they stared at each other's eyes, and Lily understood that she was already hopelessly in love with him. Their story lasted a year and a half; they were incredibly mature for their young age and grew up together, but some problems made their way inside their relationship, one of them was Yuji's feelings towards her. He cared a lot for her and had had an enormous crush on her for a period of six months, after that, he just shared strong feelings towards Lily, while she never stopped loving him. Their relationship had been full of good and bad moments, like every relationship, but support and respect for each other had never been lacking. Yuji got to know also her parents, they loved him and spent all together instants of joy, like New Year's eve, Christmas, her birthday and afternoons spent laughing. After their breakup they understood that it would have been better if they stopped talking to manage to move on. Fortunately, high school had already started 3 weeks before and they didn't have to see the other since they attended different schools. However, that wasn't their last  encounter. A year and eight or nine months later, precisely during May, at the end of second year, both, without knowing, decided to participate at Aoi's party, one of Yuji's friends. He knew that lots of people would have participated, because Aoi was popular and had large groups of friends and acquaintances around all the schools. That's when they met again, in a room full of people, while music was so loud that it was hard to hear people, and where you had difficulties in recognizing people, since lights of different colours were the only source to see. They were now teenagers, incredulous to see each other and how they changed. They were both dressed in fancy clothes, her in a shiny black dress and having a large vent on her leg, black high heels, while Yuji wore a total black suit, accompanied by black elegant shoes and a pink shirt. She had missed him, like nothing in her life before. He was her most precious thing. They spent the whole evening sitting at the bar counter and drinking cocktails, but still fully conscious. Despite that, they got carried away by emotions and they spent their first and last night of love. That night, was also the first time Yuji smoked, he had tried not only cigarettes but also weed. He didn't regret that.

He was now sitting on his couch, late at night, six months after that party, two hours after Fushiguro came back home, wondering why she, out of all people, wrote a message to him. Why at that moment? Why that night? Why? His ex wrote a message to him the night he finally fell in love for the first time, with someone else, what kind of fucking coincidence was that? He stared blankly at the message, sent on Instagram, wondering if that was all a nightmare or a joke.

lily_yuukoyn
"Hi, Yuji, how are you? I spent some
time thinking about what happened
between us, our dynamics and our
relationship. You know that you are
my  first love but that's not the point;
I know that we both have been moving
on since then, we were just kids who
were not really capable to love
properly and think reasonably, just
kids who tried to have a relation-
ship despite all the problems and lack
of maturity and responsibility.
I miss you and I miss us. Try to move
on from someone who is your first love
is not simple and I'm convinced I
still have feelings for you, even if
quite I moved on. Now we are
grown up, not totally of course,
we are still teenagers, but we
have the chance to be more ma-
ture and willing to pass all the
difficulties and problems toge-
ther, without breaking up at the
first try. We can grow up toge-
ther even now. Can we try again?

(shorter chapter x2)