Haru slit the flap with his thumbnail. The paper inside smelled faintly of incense and the bookshop where they’d first met—suffused with a nostalgia neither of them had permission to own. He unfolded a single sheet. The handwriting was smaller than he remembered, the loops more daring.
Aoi shook her head without looking up. “I can’t. Not yet.” fuufu koukan modorenai yoru doujinshi exclusive
I will meet you on the bridge at midnight. Bring nothing but the coat you were wearing when we got stuck in the snow and the scarf I knitted for you that winter you insisted you were fine. If we exchange what we are for what we might have been, let us at least keep what we loved of ourselves. Haru slit the flap with his thumbnail
“That was the point,” Haru answered. “To try living the other’s choice without erasing the one we’d already made.” The handwriting was smaller than he remembered, the
“You should sleep,” Haru said. His voice was soft enough that the rain took it and carried it away. “You’ve been up all night.”
“So?” she asked.