Don't Fade Away (Past Lovers)

「愛してるって」 (A.K.A "What's This?")

While P21CS isn't flowing right now, this one definitely is. Kinda wish more people would check it out because I already love this story.
The Yagyu crest as it appeared on the cloth wrapping and the Japanese letters are, well, in yellow. Comment if you can read it without Google or a translator ;) >>>
It's pronounced "ay-shi-te-ru" and when said aloud (by a native speaker) flows wonderfully. I feel it is one of the most beautiful ways to say... well, you'll probably find out in the comments if there are any.
~Rawiya

Her hostel wasn't too far away, so she walked there, heavy kimono-filled chest and all. It was much too wide for her arms, and she dared not upend it, not with such valuable cargo. So she ended up carrying it on the soft underside of her forearms, fingers clutching at the front of the chest as her arms began to shake.

Farrah struggled her way in the front door, opening it carefully with her fingertips, turning sideways and angling the chest slightly to get it through. The house was traditionally styled, and thus there were no stairs. She could have kissed the architect at that moment as she carefully went down the hall and opened the door to her room with one toe, sliding it open by catching the extremity on the wood lattice of the rice-paper door and sliding it open with no pressure on the fragile paper.

It would rip at any pressure. Apparently all spies in feudal Japan had to do to look inside a room was to lick on finger and touch it to the rice paper and it would rip soundlessly. She wasn't about to test that, because she already had no money and authentic rice paper cost a few extremities.

Once inside, she set it on the same mat that held her luggage-not a tatami but a carpet mat because heavy things ruined tatami. She collapsed onto the futon-she'd forgotten to put it away that morning-and wondered why Aoi had given it to her, let alone why her name was on it. Carefully, she knelt in front of it and unlatched the lid on both sides simultaneously. The box had to be at least as old as the dress, and she tentatively lifted the wooden lid, inlaid with precious materials, placing it gently on the carpet beside its chest.

She removed the folded kimono/yukata carefully and placed it on the tatami tentatively. When she reached to put the lid back on, however, she noticed something in the bottom. A package. Carefully, she removed it as well, placing it beside the dress. It was wrapped in cloth, as the Japanese had been wont to do, and it was sewn with a symbol.

A circle, outlined by leafy stems and little dots. It took her a minute to realize that it was a stylized wide-brimmed hat, with two birds and their wings making up the part that was raised to rest on the crown of someone's head. Swallowing, Farrah carefully unfolded the kimono's sleeve and compared stitches.

Both were masterful in stitching, proving that the maker had been very good, despite being male. Since males now were still unwilling to learn something so feminine, let alone a proud Japanese-apparently a Yagyu-warrior, she was surprised the stitches were so perfect.

Exhaling slightly, she tried to remember if there were any known interracial marriages between a Japanese samurai in the 16th century. She drew a blank, and sighed. So there had to be something to it. She stared at the fancy cursive of the English letters comprising her name on the sleeve of the beautiful dress. It definitely hadn't been random. The sewer would have needed to know the English letters, cursive script, and her name, not to mention had to know how to sew intricate designs.

But there was no way she'd been in 16th century Japan to teach this man her name and cursive, not to mention her particular manner of sewing designs. So how else? Her ancestresses never left their home countries and none of them were from Japan or married an elitist samurai. Samurai marriages-usually even marriage to a concubine-was made solely for the profit of their family.

Love marriages were non-existent and affection for one's spouse was developed inside of marriage and not before. She sat there, rubbing her temples as she looked at the cloth package and the kimono. It had to be some sort of coincidence, she decided. Maybe an ancestress' female relation had gone to Japan. Her name had been passed down in the family, so maybe this samurai had met a Farrah and fallen in love with her or something.

Such a marriage would never have been allowed, so it was easy to predict the ending. Perhaps the man's longings had been passed down from generation to generation in the form of this dress, hoping it would be returned to a relative of hers someday. Farrah nearly awwed at the adorable thought.

Getting more and more brave, she picked up the package and flipped it over, slowly unwrapping it. A piece of paper and a bound ink stone, along with an old-looking calligraphy brush and a hairpin clattered onto the carpeted area.

She picked up the hairpin first. It was silver, and looked like a tuning fork, the kind a conductor used. The flower on the end and its trailing strings of petals were a pinkish-lilac. She held it carefully. It might have been expensive or it might not have-she didn't know. Either way, it must have been treasured. It was beautiful and clearly spoke of the love between the giver and the recipient.

She placed it carefully down on the unfolded cloth and picked up the paintbrush. It had still-soft bristles, and its long body was sleek and made of shiny wood, the binding attaching the bristles a ring of silver. Once again, a gift that was expensive and showed how treasured the recipient was. She placed it down beside the hairpin, and picked up the ink stone next. It had to be over two hundred, and was probably unusable now.

She rewrapped it in its paper wrapper and put it beside the paintbrush. Next was the letter. She carefully laid it on the tatami and unrolled it, holding the corners down as she looked at it.

The first thing she noticed was the "愛してるよ" that replaced the letter's ending. The rest of the Japanese was much too complicated for someone who couldn't read any of the three Japanese alphabets. She recognized only the phrase put in lieu of the farewell, and only the first character of that.

At the beginning was her name in elaborate cursive, with looping letters and definite preciseness, followed by a へ, which she knew was the same as a "dear..." when writing a letter in Japanese. So she could read the beginning at least.

Dear Farrah, was how it began, or so it seemed. Definitely a letter, likely a lover given the ending.

愛.

Ai.

The character for "love" as compared to the more commonly used 好き, meaning "like" or 恋, which could be likened to crush-like feelings. 愛 meant love, eternal and unchanging, all-powerful and unconditional. She'd read somewhere that most married couples didn't even use it. It was for when you loved someone from the bottom of your heart, more than you would ever love another to the point where you would die for them. At times, Farrah felt that these different words for love in Japanese were much better than the sole English word that was supposed to represent them all at once.

She rolled the letter back up, feeling like an intruder upon the private letter of a man to his beloved though she couldn't read most of it, and then packed everything in the box, locking the lid and getting to her feet. Farrah placed the box on the top shelf of the Japanese-style closet before retreating out of her room, sliding the door shut, in time for the music signalling dinner to play over the house-wide PA.