Forget Me Nots • CHISHIYA SHUNTARO

PROLOGUE

MR. FORGETTABLE

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Kento wanted to be a musician. He wanted to learn how to play guitar. He wanted to write music and perform for crowds. He dreamed of becoming a singer, of playing music that people could relate to and love. He wished to hear crowds chanting his name.

Arata Kento wasn't allowed to have a guitar. He wasn't allowed to sing. Instead, his parents forced him to study hard. To live up to the massive shadow his older brother had cast over him with his successes. His parents had hoped to recreate that success in him. When it became clear that Kento wasn't nearly as intelligent, outgoing or as driven as Keichi, his parents stopped trying.

In the wake of being forgotten, Kento tried desperately to regain his parent's attention and affections. He studied even harder, tried following in Keichi's footsteps to become a chemical engineer. But no matter how hard he tried, nothing was ever enough. He upped his grades in high school? He was reminded that Keichi always had perfect grades. He placed second in his math competition? Keichi placed first. Kento passed his university entrance exams for the Tokyo Institute of Technology? Keichi passed his exams for the same university with the highest marks of his year and gave the first year welcoming speech. Eventually, Kento gave up trying. He drifted to the background, allowing his parents to revel in Keichi's successes. Successes he would never achieve.

He was forgotten. Cast aside and left to dig his own way through the world. He allowed the shadow Keichi casted to grow larger, watching the distance grow between himself and the rest of his family.

Once he moved out to continue his studies in mechanical engineering, he stopped talking to them altogether. And not once did they contact him. The closest he came to it was seeing Keichi's name in the news after his brother had won some sort of scientific achievement award. Kento didn't have enough heart to read the rest of the article.

He drifted his way through university, focusing on his studies, wanting to graduate and find himself a steady career where he could live an unassuming life. He wanted to stay in the background where no one would expect too much of him.

Arata Kento's favourite flowers were Myotosis'. Forget-Me-Nots. Which he found extremely ironic considering he was always the one forgotten. Even throughout his university life. No one ever bothered to get to know him. He was always Arata. Never Kento. He was the quiet guy that sat in the back of class, diligently taking notes whilst his classmates gossiped around him. At lunch, he sat alone, headphones in and dreaming of a life that could've been. He wrote down musical melodies, song lyrics that came to his mind when the inspiration struck. He mourned what he could've had if his parents had allowed him to follow his passion.

He went through the exact same routine for a year. No one approached him to offer an arm of friendship. He stayed forgotten in the background of other people's lives, never living out his own story. He had spent so long in that place that it became his preference.

"What's that you're writing down there?"

Until Hajime.

Chiba Hajime came barreling into Arata's life like an over enthusiastic hurricane, turning his carefully crafted persona inside out. Flipping his routine upside down. It started one lunch time in his second year of university studies. Arata was engrossed in his usual routine, when inspiration struck watching the withering flowers outside the window of the bustling cafeteria. He was absorbed in writing and didn't feel the shadow cast over him until it spoke.

Upon hearing the unfamiliar voice speak, Arata twisted in his seat to see a tall figure hovering over him, dark hair brushing at the end of neck, half of it messily thrown into a bun. He had large, curious eyes that stared down at the notebook Arata was writing in.