ROSEBUD | A Heart Innocent of Love

The campus grounds began to fill with bustling students as they headed to their first class session at Kyoto University. As the early morning sun rose, the soft light came through the windows of the large lecture room. Near the corner of the room, the first to arrive, sat a sophomore student named Yuxuan Ren, a Chinese scholarship student attending the Japanese university as an engineering major. He goes by simply ‘Ren’ as his peers find pronouncing his first name difficult—well, not that many of his peers attempt to converse with him anyway. 

Being more reserved, Ren kept to his books and prioritized his studies, and that mentality ended up benefiting him. Not only is he the top student in his department, but it’s the sole reason why he got noticed by the one he admired most. 

A small smile draws on his lips while he aligns his notes accordingly in front of him. The soft light coming through the window seemed to perfectly reflect off of his light-colored hair and fair skin as his slender hand wrote the name ‘Yuri’ with a heart in his notebook.

It was a silly and cliche thing to do, but to Ren, Yurihiko Urasaki was the most attractive guy on campus. Yuri, as his peers called him, was tall with brown hair and matching eyes that reminded Ren of chocolate. On top of his good looks, he’s widely known throughout campus for playing on the university’s soccer team in the defensive midfielder position. After being aware of him since freshman year, envy wasn’t the only thing Ren felt towards him.

While Ren drifts away in his thoughts, Yuri enters the lecture room, where his peers gather quickly to excitedly greet him on the new morning. As they surround him, Yuri runs a hand down the back of his neck while he motions through the uncomfortable crowd. 

He says, “Good morning,” out of sheer courtesy with a shallow smile—which was enough to have some of his female peers squeal—and Yuri tries his best not to roll his eyes. He walks farther into the room while tuning out the sound of others asking to sit beside them. His eyes focus on a particular corner of the room that only occupies one person. 

“Mornin’, Ren,” Yuri greets him as he leans over the desk. Ren is caught off guard and quickly begins to stutter a response.

“G-Good—Good mor-morning, Yuri!” he fumbles, shuffling the pages of his notes under his hands out of embarrassment.

The gesture makes Yuri let out a short laugh. “Can I sit here?” He gestures with his hand, and Ren realizes he means the seat next to him. Ren averts his eyes as he gives a single nod.

The two current sophomores have been in the same department since freshman year, but despite sharing classes in the past, they’ve only gotten close to one another since the fall semester started. It began when their professor suggested they study together. Otherwise, Yuri would’ve had to withdraw from the soccer team if his grades didn’t improve, and although some subjects were difficult for him to grasp, Ren was impressed with his devotion to improving regardless. 

“Alright, settle down,” the professor called out as he entered the room. “Everyone take their seats. Lecture is about to start.”

Yuri throws his bag onto the desk and slides onto the bench next to Ren. As he’s bringing out the materials from his bag, he hears muttering to his left and looks over. He sees Ren biting on the nail of his thumb as he’s muttering incoherently to himself—which was most likely in his native tongue—with his cheeks flushed with a bright pink hue.

The corner of his mouth turns up as he lets out a soft and almost endearing laugh that went unheard from his seatmate. He then taps on the desk with his finger to grab Ren’s attention. 

“Don’t forget about tomorrow.” He smiles into the whisper, and Ren’s brain almost malfunctions. 

Ren gave the shortest nod as his ears burned red and then dragged his eyes back down to the pages of his textbook. Of course, he hadn’t forgotten. Tomorrow was Saturday. But more importantly, tomorrow was the Fall Fireworks Festival. 

The professor’s voice begins to drown out into the background when Ren remembers a certain day in his memory. 

They were on their way to the library to study, and Yuri had stopped in the hall as the event billboard caught his eye. When Ren turned to him, Yuri pointed to the poster pinned to the wall and simply said, “Let's go.” 

Ren has been internally agonizing since.

Much imagination and mental preparations later, the day of the Fall Fireworks Festival arrived. Steering clear from the bustling crowd, a place where not a single other person stood present but the two, Yuri knew the perfect place to view the fireworks.

As the rest of the crowd settled below where the festivities were, Yuri and Ren stood on a small cliff side off a mountain road that overlooked the city. The moon and the sparsely scattered stars painted across the dark blue canvas of the clear evening sky. The city lights twinkled in the distance and the autumn breeze blew cold in the high altitude. Although it took a bit to walk up the mountain, he would do this every day if it meant having a moment like this with Yuri again.

In the light shining from over the ledge, Ren gazed at the frame outline of Yuri’s silhouette ahead of him. It was as if there were no one else present in the world, just the two of them, and the thought made Ren’s face turn warm as his cheeks flushed against the cold breeze.

Ren hadn't ever let his thoughts speak out loud before, and he wasn’t particularly sure what it was about that night that made him take a leap of faith. Was it the sparking city lights? The clear evening sky? The numbing cold breeze against his skin? Or the silhouette of him?

Or was it when Yuri called him over as the designated time hit? When he stood beside him as the first firework lit. When the colored flares painted the night sky, all he looked at was him, standing there, smiling at the show—not knowing a thing.

Ren's lips parted as he breathed in; then, in a single breath, he spoke a word he thought would never be spoken, laced in the wind, and fell like a feather.

Lowering his head as his bangs covered his shaken eyes, he had hoped his words drowned out in the finale of fireworks and that the blush on his face was hidden in the dark of night that came after.

However, on the night of the Fall Fireworks Festival, Yuri had heard every word of Ren’s confession.