High school came like the turning of a page Hina hadn't realized she'd already reached.
The uniforms were new, the school grounds larger, and the expectations heavier. She adjusted quickly. She made friends and found a rhythm in the class schedules and club activities. Her archery improved. Her laugh has slowly returned. Life moved forward without Yuto by her side.
And that, more than anything, scared her.
There were days she would walk home with her new friends and suddenly wonder, Why hasn't she thought about Yuto today? The realization would sting more than she expected. It wasn't that she didn't care—it was that time had dulled the ache. It had made her heart quieter.
Their emails slowed. From weekly to monthly. From long updates to brief check-ins.
Their video calls became rare, timed awkwardly around school hours and time zones. But when they did speak, there was always a softness that never changed.
*****
During Hina's fifteen's birthday, Yuto called her.
"Happy birthday," Yuto said, smiling faintly from his desk in Paris, a steaming mug in his hand. "Did the gift arrive?"
"It did." Hina held up the hand mirror he'd sent, etched with a sakura design on the back, her name engraved along the edge. "It's really pretty. I almost don't want to use it."
"You should," he said. "It's for you."
Hina hesitated, then asked, "Do you still wear the jacket that I sent during your birthday?"
He looked down, then leaned out of frame and returned holding it up a black jacket. "Of course. I wore it almost every day."
Her heart fluttered, but she said nothing.
And the latest call was during Christmas.
Yuto appeared on screen wearing a Santa hat crookedly over his unruly hair.
"You look ridiculous," Hina laughed.
"You're welcome." He raised an eyebrow. "You got my gift?"
She held up a light pink knitted scarf. "You didn't have to."
"I know," he said. "But I wanted to."
"What else did you get for Christmas?"
Yuto shrugged. "Nothing special. You?"
"You." She said it before she could stop herself, cheeks flushing immediately. "I mean—not you. Your gift. The gift—you know what I mean."
He smiled, quiet and soft. "Yeah. I know."
*****
Time, however, moved as it always did. Quiet. Unstoppable.
By the time she entered her second year, Hina was more composed, more aware. She had friends who liked makeup and talked about dating. Group chats buzzed with photos of café outings and secret crushes.
And then it happened.
A senior, handsome and polite, one year above her, confessed under the ginkgo tree behind the school.
"I like you," he said, eyes steady. "I've liked you for a while. Will you go out with me?"
Hina stood still. She had sensed his interest. She suspected her friends had seen it coming too.
But the first thing that came to mind wasn't excitement. It was a single, haunting thought: Has Yuto ever been confessed to? Has he fallen in love with someone in Paris?
The thought made her stomach twist.
That night, she sat by her window and stared out at the moon, clutching the ribbon bracelet still tied around her wrist. She didn't reply to the confession right away. She didn't even tell her friends.
Instead, she opened her inbox. There was no new message from Yuto. No missed call.
And for the first time in a long while, she wondered if the person who had once been her whole world… might now be slipping into just a memory.
After dinner, Hina found herself lingering in the kitchen while Emi rinsed out tea cups. The quiet hum of the dishwasher filled the silence, and Hina fidgeted with the hem of her sleeve, unsure how to start.
Emi glanced at her daughter and smiled. "You've been quieter than usual. Everything alright?"
Hina hesitated, then mumbled, "Someone confessed to me today."
Emi paused, setting the last cup down with care. "Oh?"
"He's a senior. Nice guy. I think a lot of girls like him," Hina said, trying to sound casual.
Emi didn't press. She simply leaned on the counter, arms crossed loosely, and waited.
Hina shifted her weight from foot to foot. "I didn't say anything back. I just stood there like an idiot."
"That doesn't make you an idiot," Emi said gently. "It means you're thinking it through. Which is a good thing."
There was a long pause. Then, in a quieter voice, Hina asked, "Mom… do you think it's possible to love someone for so long that it starts to fade without you realizing?"
Emi looked at her daughter carefully, then moved closer. "Are you talking about the boy who confessed to you… or someone else?"
Hina bit her lip. "Yuto."
Emi nodded slowly. "I thought so."
"I don't think about him every day anymore," Hina admitted, eyes lowered. "And that scares me. Because I used to. For years. But now I go a few days without even remembering to check if he messaged me. And when I do think about him, I wonder if he's changed… or met someone else. And I don't even know if I'm allowed to feel sad about it."
Emi reached out and tucked a lock of hair behind Hina's ear. "Hina… growing up doesn't mean forgetting. It just means learning how to hold things differently. Yuto was… is important to you. That doesn't change just because time passes. Sometimes we love people quietly, from far away, for a long time. And sometimes that love changes shape. That's not a failure. That's just life."
Hina blinked rapidly, swallowing hard. "But what if I don't want it to change?"
"Then you wait," Emi said softly. "Until your heart knows what it really wants. Not what it used to want, or what it thinks it should want. But what it truly wants now."
Hina nodded slowly, and Emi pulled her into a hug.
"You don't have to have all the answers right now," Emi murmured into her daughter's hair. "But you do have time to find them."
Later that night, unable to sleep, Hina padded softly into the tatami room where her great grandmother, Chiyo, was seated in front of a small tray of tea, quietly folding paper into intricate floral origami.
"Obaachan," Hina said in a whisper.
Chiyo looked up and smiled warmly, already knowing something was on her granddaughter's mind. "Couldn't sleep?"
Hina shook her head and sat beside her, curling her knees to her chest.
Chiyo passed her a half-finished origami camellia. "Want to help?"
Hina took it and quietly followed her grandmother's instructions, the familiar paper folds soothing in their simplicity. After a while, she said, "Did you ever miss someone so much it scared you?"
Chiyo's hands paused mid-fold. "Many times. And sometimes I missed people I hadn't even lost yet."
Hina glanced at her. "How do you deal with it?"
Chiyo smiled, soft and wise. "You live your days. You let time carry you forward. And if that person is meant to stay in your heart, they will find ways to remain—no matter the distance."
"I'm scared I'll stop thinking about him," Hina confessed. "That one day I'll wake up and he'll just be… gone from me."
Chiyo reached over and placed a gentle hand over Hina's. "Hina, when something or someone truly matters, they don't disappear. They become part of you. Not always loud, not always visible—but always there. Like breath. Or the echo of a lullaby your mother used to hum."
Hina felt her throat tighten.
"And if he is still part of your heart," Chiyo added, "you'll know it when you see him again. Not with your eyes—but with the way your heart remembers to beat a little differently around him."