Soraru x Mafumafu

Goodbye - Chapter 2

Warning: This is an AU fanfiction (Sakura Tree x Boy).

If you're fine with it then please enjoy!

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But I made a mistake.

-

"Soraru-san" Mafu said his name aloud, testing the name on his tongue, and he liked it. He liked how his tongue twists and rolls in a certain way when he reads his name. He giggled at it.

His giggling seemed to have caught the attention of the man up on the tree. "What?" it did not sound like a question, it sounded as if he was demanding an answer out of him.

Mafu closed his eyes as he shook his head, feeling the cold spring breeze. "It was nothing really, I just thought that it's a nice name," he replied, he thought he should be honest because he really did like the name for some reasons. "Soraru-san," he called out again.

He heard Soraru hummed, seemingly uninterested in his answer or perhaps his existence to be exact. Mafu knew he should leave him alone but he was curious. He wanted to know more about this person who sat on the tree when he just so coincidentally saw him the moment he looked up to enjoy the cherry blossoms from under this particular tree.

Mafu made sure that Soraru did not have a tail on him, thinking that maybe he was a monkey. But he looked human enough for Mafu. He could not take his eyes off of Soraru. All he could do was stare since he does not want to talk to him anymore. He took in the sight of Soraru. His curly dark hair, his pale white skin, his dark blue eyes that shone like sapphires. When he looked at him with those pair of eyes, Mafu felt like his whole being was drowning into them. The yukata he wore was a dark blue as well, Mafu was not good with colours but he liked the blue he was wearing. The whole of Soraru could only be described with a word: 'beautiful'. 

Just like the cherry blossom tree he is currently sitting on.

"Why are you sitting on the tree?" he decided to be the one to start a conversation or he felt as if this would be the first and last time they meet.

Soraru glanced at him with the corner of his eyes. "Because I can't leave this place,"

"Why?"

"Human, why do you want to know?"

"Why are you calling me that? Aren't you a human yourself?" Mafu tilted his head to the side, he could not seem to understand him. "And the name's Mafumafu,"

Soraru sat up and dropped himself from the branch, landing on his feet in front of Mafu, his *geta making a clacking sound as he landed. "I'm not," he replied to his one of his questions. The second one he replied to, today.

"Then, what are you?"

"What, are you interrogating me?" Soraru asked back, feeling annoyed. With his hand still in his yukata sleeves, he turned his back to Mafu and looked up at the tree. Without looking at Mafu, he asked the same question again, "Like I said, why would you want to know?"

Now that Soraru was right in front of him, Mafu did not need to crane his head up to look at him. The closer he got to see Soraru, the more he finds Soraru a beautiful existence. As he thought about it, he blushed. This is bad, he thought. He should be careful so that he does not get too attracted to this stranger. Mafu remembered that he needed to answer to Soraru's question.

"I'm not sure," Mafu decided to not make up a lie, he did not think that lying would help. He did not see a point to it. Because the moment he met Soraru's eyes, he knew he could never hide things from him, as if he could see right through him with them.

Soraru finally turned to look at Mafu, observing him. Mafu fidgeted uncomfortably when Soraru put all of his attention on him, his heart began beating faster like it never before, causing his body to heat up under his gaze. What was this feeling he has in him? He really wanted answers to them.

"I'm a spirit,"

"... Huh?"

"... I'm a cherry blossom spirit," Soraru looked back at the tree again, putting one of his hands on the thick tree trunk, caressing it. Mafu wondered how it would feel like if those beautiful hands caressed him. "And this is my tree," he said.

Mafu approached Soraru, and stood beside him, also putting his hand on the trunk. He knew that what he was about to say was not going to be scientifically acceptable but he still blurted it out. "It's warm," Mafu smiled at the tree, gently tracing the rough and crumbly barks of the trunk. It did not matter if it was not possible for the tree to have temperature in them, but Mafu felt it. This tree was definitely different from the others.

He heard Soraru chuckle. Mafu turned to look at him and managed to catch his smile. "It is," Soraru said.

It was a broad smile, showing that he was happy, forming dimples on his cheeks. It would be great if he was smiling at the statement he said earlier, Mafu thought. It felt like his chest was filled with chocolate and marshmallows, warm and melting inside him, sweet and bitter at the same time.

This tree must be important to him.

Will he ever possibly be important to this person too?

"It is proof that it's alive," said Soraru. It was the first time he said something to him, not asking him questions or answering his questions, but a casual conversation. "Aren't you supposed to be afraid of me?"

Mafu stood at where he was, he lifted his head up and looked at Soraru, confused. "Why should I?" he said after some time, failing to think of a reason to be afraid of the man.

"Because I'm a spirit,"

"A cherry blossom spirit,"

"I'm not a human,"

"But you're not a ghost nor you're something that would do anything bad to me, so why should I?"

Soraru sighed at him. "How are you so sure I wouldn't do anything to you?" He does have a point there. "As a cherry blossom spirit, I don't follow those human laws and regulations you people obey. Which means even if I killed someone, I wouldn't be guilty,"

"But you won't," Mafu did not know why he was so sure of this but he somewhat knew Soraru would not do such things. "I know you won't,"

-

What made him so confident that he would not do anything to humans? And especially when he was a stranger to him, also a non-human at that. He had been hating humans ever since he first got into the world as a cherry blossom spirit. The Spirit King had lectured him for countless of times and yet he still did not change his attitude towards them. So why would he not kill a human?

"So can I come again tomorrow?"

Soraru climbed back up to his tree, choosing to ignore that Mafumafu who was still under his tree.

"Will you still be here?"

He waved his hand with his back to him, asking him to go away. Soraru heard him walk away, his footsteps slowly fading as the distance between them increased and then there was no sound.

Did he really leave?

Soraru looked down. The boy was indeed gone but there was something at the bottom of the tree. He jumped down to the ground and picked it up. It was a can of beer, the one that he likes too. He brought it back up to the usual branch he sits on and looked at it, a little hesitant to drink it. Soraru decided not to drink it and put it nicely into a 'convenient' hole the tree made for him to store items.

Because this was the first thing he got from a human.

*Geta – A traditional Chinese-Japanese footwear, a combination of clogs and flip-flops.

TBC