Chapter 8:

 The One She Wrote About.

The next day at school felt lighter—like the sky had exhaled after holding its breath for too long.

Yui sat at her desk before class, her fingers delicately turning the pages of a small, worn notebook. It wasn’t her current diary. It was older, edges frayed from time, and the ink faded in places. A quiet treasure from another life.

Renji approached slowly, unsure if he was interrupting something sacred.

“What’s that?” he asked gently, slipping into the seat beside her.

Yui looked up, surprised—but not startled. She smiled, a soft flutter behind her eyes.

“It’s... from back then,” she said. “When I still wrote under the name Ame Yui.”

Renji blinked.

She turned the book around, letting him see the page she had been looking at.

A crude drawing—two stick figures, one holding an umbrella over the other. The handwriting beside it, childish but careful, read:

“He didn’t say anything. But I liked the way he looked at the rain.”

Renji stared at the words. His chest tightened.

“That was me,” he whispered.

Yui nodded. “You were the first person I wrote about.”

She turned a few more pages. Simple entries—short, quiet observations of moments most people would forget. But not her. Not Yui. She had written them down like trying to stop time from slipping away.

Then she stopped.

“This one,” she said, tapping the page. “I never thought I’d show this to anyone.”

Renji leaned in.

The entry was longer. Thoughtful. Honest.

 I wonder if we’ll meet again someday. I wonder if he remembers the rain, too. If he does, maybe he’ll know that even though I never said goodbye—I never stopped waiting.

Renji didn’t speak.

Because suddenly, the weight of the years they had lost fell around them like cherry blossoms in the wind.

She closed the book.

“I changed,” Yui said softly. “My name, my voice, even the way I smile. But when I wrote this… I still felt like the same girl under the rain.”

Renji met her eyes.

“You still are.”

Yui smiled—real, warm, no longer sad.

The bell rang. Students poured into the classroom. Noise returned.

But for Renji and Yui, everything else faded.

She tucked the notebook into her bag carefully, as if placing a memory back into her heart.

And as the teacher called for attendance, Renji leaned closer and whispered—

“I want to know more.”

Yui looked at him, tilting her head.

“About what?”

He smiled.

“Everything you didn’t write down.”

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