(Haru's POV)
Spring never announced itself where I lived.
There were no sudden changes, no dramatic shift from cold to warm. Winter loosened its grip slowly, like it was reluctant to leave. The air stopped biting quite so sharply. The mornings grew brighter by minutes instead of hours. Patches of snow disappeared from the edges of sidewalks, retreating into memory before I could be sure they had ever been there.
I noticed spring most clearly on my walk to school.
The route never changed—past the closed bakery on the corner, over the narrow bridge where the creek ran shallow and brown, then along the street lined with old cherry trees. They stood close together, their branches reaching across the road as if they were trying to hold hands. In winter, they looked fragile and skeletal, bark darkened by cold rain. But in early spring, something subtle shifted. The buds appeared first—small, tight, almost unnoticeable unless you were looking for them.
I had started looking for them without realizing why.
That morning, the air was damp with the promise of rain. The sky hovered between gray and pale blue, undecided. I slowed my steps as I reached the trees, eyes drifting upward.
One blossom had opened.
Just one. Pale pink, barely there, trembling at the edge of a branch like it wasn't sure it was ready to exist yet. I stopped beneath it, backpack heavy on my shoulders, and stared.
It felt strange that something so small could matter.
"You're early."
The voice came from my left.
I flinched, turning too quickly, my shoe scraping against the pavement. A boy sat on the low stone wall beneath the tree, legs bent, hands resting loosely in his lap. I hadn't noticed him at all, which embarrassed me more than the fact that he'd startled me.
He didn't look surprised by my reaction.
"Sorry," I said automatically, though I wasn't sure what I was apologizing for.
He shook his head slightly. "It's fine."
Up close, he looked my age—maybe a year older. Dark hair fell into his eyes in a way that looked unintentional, like he'd cut it himself and decided not to fix it. His uniform was neat but worn, as if it had belonged to someone else before him. He watched the blossom above us with a quiet focus that made it feel important.
"That one waited a long time," he said, nodding toward the branch.
I followed his gaze. "Yeah."
The silence that followed didn't feel awkward. It stretched, but gently, like it had room to exist. I shifted my weight, suddenly aware of the time.
"I should—" I started.
The school bell rang in the distance, cutting me off.
The boy stood at the same moment I did, like we'd planned it. He stepped off the wall, adjusted the strap of his bag, and glanced at me.
"Same way?" he asked, already turning toward the road.
I hesitated for half a second, then nodded. "Yeah."
We walked side by side without touching. Our steps fell into rhythm naturally, not rushed, not slow. I tried to think of something to say, but nothing felt necessary. The sound of our shoes against the pavement filled the space instead.
At the school gate, we split off without ceremony.
I didn't even know his name.
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I expected that to be the end of it.
A brief, forgettable moment. One of those strange, quiet interactions you think about once and then lose to time. But the next morning, when I reached the cherry trees, he was there again.
Sitting on the same wall.
This time, more blossoms had opened. A handful of petals clung to the branches, soft and uncertain. He looked up as I approached, expression calm.
"You're early again," he said.
"So are you."
He smiled at that—not wide, not bright, just enough to acknowledge the shared truth.
We didn't introduce ourselves. We didn't need to. We sat beneath the tree, watching the branches sway. When the bell rang, we walked together again.
By the third morning, it felt routine.
By the fifth, it felt expected.
I started leaving my house earlier without consciously deciding to. My mother commented on it once, distracted, asking if I had an early class. I shrugged and said no.
I didn't know how to explain that I didn't want to miss something I hadn't named.
A week passed before I finally asked.
"What's your name?" I said, as we walked beneath the trees, petals drifting down around us.
He blinked, like the question surprised him. Then, "Ren."
"Haru," I replied.
He repeated it softly, like he was testing how it sounded. "Haru."
Something settled in my chest when he said it.
————————————————————
Ren didn't talk much.
At least, not about himself. He asked questions—small ones, easy ones. What classes I liked. Whether I preferred rainy days or sunny ones. If I'd always lived here. I answered without thinking too hard, surprised by how natural it felt to share things with someone I barely knew.
When I asked him the same questions, his answers were shorter.
"Do you like school?" I asked once.
"It's fine," he said.
"What about plans after graduation?"
He paused. "I haven't decided."
I accepted that. There was no sense of avoidance, just a quiet closing of a door I didn't know how to open.
Lunches started happening beneath the cherry trees too.
We sat on the wall or on the ground when it was dry enough, sharing the space without claiming it. Sometimes we ate. Sometimes we just sat. I noticed that Ren ate slowly, like he wasn't very hungry, and that he tired easily when the days grew warmer.
"You don't have to stay if you're tired," I told him once.
"I want to," he replied.
That was enough.
I began to notice other things too. How he rubbed his hands together when it was cold, even when everyone else seemed fine. How he sometimes stared into the distance with an expression I couldn't read, like he was listening to something I couldn't hear.
Once, I offered him half my bread.
"You don't have to," he said, the familiar hesitation in his voice.
"I know."
He took it anyway. Our fingers brushed, brief and accidental. The contact sent a strange warmth up my arm, and I pulled my hand back too quickly, hoping he hadn't noticed.
He had.
He didn't say anything about it.
————————————————————
Spring moved forward.
The blossoms opened fully, transforming the street into something unreal. Petals drifted constantly, settling in our hair, on our shoulders, in the folds of our clothes. Sometimes Ren caught one before it hit the ground and turned it over in his fingers like it was fragile.
"They don't last long," he said once.
"Nothing does," I replied, not thinking.
He looked at me for a moment longer than usual, then smiled faintly. "Yeah."
I didn't understand why the moment felt heavy.
By mid-spring, Ren began missing mornings.
At first, it was just once. Then twice in a week. When he returned, he looked the same—smiling softly, sitting beside me under the tree—but something about him felt thinner, like a shadow stretched too far.
"You okay?" I asked one afternoon, trying to sound casual.
He nodded immediately. "Yeah. Just busy."
I didn't press. I told myself it wasn't my place. We weren't anything official. We hadn't named what we were. But the worry stayed with me, quiet and persistent.
When he didn't show up one morning at all, I waited under the tree until the bell rang.
It was the first time spring felt cold again.
————————————————————
That afternoon, he was there.
Sitting on the wall like nothing had changed.
"You missed this morning," I said.
"I know."
I wanted to ask why. I didn't.
Instead, we sat together in silence, petals falling around us. I noticed then how tired he looked, how carefully he held himself, like he was conserving energy.
"I like spring," he said suddenly.
"Me too."
He smiled, but there was something almost sad in it. Like he was saying goodbye to something that hadn't left yet.
I didn't know then that this was the beginning of the end.
But later—much later—I would remember this spring exactly as it was.
Soft. Quiet.
And already slipping away.