lost in japan | haruto ✔

vii | inevitable

ONE MONTH LATER. . .

"LOOK, ALL I'M saying is that you miss all the shots you don't take, so if you're not even going to try to look for him, you'll never find him."

"Rachel," I sighed once more, for it was the thousandth time we had had this conversation since I came back to New York City months ago, "I'll never find him anyway."

"Not with that attitude, you won't." She snarkily replied over the phone.

Every time we had this exact conversation, I would find myself wanting to just cave in and listen to her, but the truth was that I had met a stranger in Tokyo. I had nothing that connected me to him other than some fond memories and a tattoo, but I was going to get that sometime in the future anyway. But nonetheless, that was all I had of him.

We were just strangers who knew everything about each other.

"Just drop it." Mason, who was walking with me to our morning classes, took my phone and told her, "It's not your business."

Before I could say anything, he ended the call for me.

Mason was a friend I met in the recent year and even though it hadn't been long, he honestly was one of my closest friends. The high schools friends I had back home were different now; everything was different now. After the whole ordeal with James', my best friends made a big deal of it all. And it was, at the time, but I was lucky enough to have find someone who helped me move on. So while Rachel and my other friends were too scared to have any fun, because they assumed that I needed time to mope around for James, Mason was there.

Of course, I never told him about Haruto.

I mean, I should have, but he has always been the protective kind of guy friend, and as much as I loved it at times, I knew that he would scold at me for spending a night at a hotel room with a complete stranger.

While I was on the phone, he probably assumed that Rachel was talking about James, which was why he was a bit annoyed with it all.

"Thank you." I let out a deep breath.

"Yeah," He gave me back my phone, "In the mood for some tea?"

Turning over to him, I gave him a small smile, "Can we maybe get coffee?"

Mason just chuckled, but led the way to a coffee shop. He ordered his drink, waited for me to order mine, and refused to let me pay for both of our drinks. As he took out his card to pay, he teasingly asked, "When were you ever into coffee?"

He was previously obsessed with coffee before and couldn't last the morning without at least two cups. However, when we started going out for morning breakfasts, I somehow managed to convert him into a tea enthusiast. That was before the trip, though. Because ever since Tokyo, I became obsessed with coffee. Maybe it had something to do with the caffeine, or maybe Haruto.

Either way, I was hooked.

"I don't know." I shrugged, "It has nothing to do with you though."

"Alright," The smile on his face got big as he just accepted my answer, probably excited because he thought he converted me, "whatever you say, Everly."

Laughing, I nudged him back before we heard our names being called for our drinks.

Strolling out of the coffee shop, the walk to the university was only going to take a couple minutes. I had always loved to walk to school — the scenery, the air, the city — everything was just perfect and it made me feel all the more alive.

My eyes wandered from people to people, occasionally distracted by a flash of light or a loud boom somewhere close by. I never really thought about each part of it individually. Instead, I took the scene as a whole and couldn't help but find myself amazed by it all. But there was something about today that was different. I couldn't exactly put my hand on it, but it was something.

As I sipped the iced coffee in the cold weather, I stared at the large billboards around me.

"You know, I think that—" I started to say before doing a double take at a figure in front of me passing by. All it took was one second for me to recognize who it was, and it took the same amount of time for it to all be over, "Holy shit."

A / N

don't kill me for skipping forward in time so much. it was necessary, because now, shits about to go down.

haruto!!! is!!! officially!! debuting!!!!! i'm proud and sObbing and honestly f*ck yg for putting him through that stress but yes! he is debuting!

also, if you love junkyu (which i know you all do, because is it even possible to not love him?) check out my junkyu fanfic. it's called rest stops and here's the description:

in which junkyu tries to win the girl he loves back — one rest stop at a time.