you keep me up all night

That is, until he met Kanae. She was, as a whole, perhaps one of the sunniest people he had met. All bright smiles and shining eyes. At first, it disgusted him. Playing the typical optimistic protagonist wasn’t going to change anything. There was no plot armor to save her in the real world. Pair her happy-go-lucky attitude with this god forsaken, hell of a bright day? Unbearable.

Sanemi found, however, that it wasn’t quite as bad as he had anticipated. For one thing, Kanae was mostly quiet today, gazing at their surroundings. They were having some sort of post-training picnic thing that Kanae had dragged him on without his permission. As they settled down, Kanae handed Sanemi his food and they began to eat in silence, perched on benches that sat conveniently by the side of the road. This place was relatively isolated today, leaving them in blissful peace.

While eating, Kanae pointed out small things Sanemi hadn’t bothered to pay attention to in years. The birds, flitting from tree to tree, their chirping filling the air. A gentle breeze, swaying the trees and the grass. A lone butterfly that circled a bush, landing on a blooming flower, its wings opening and closing lazily. The distant sound of voices that were swept towards them through the air. The clouds that seemed to avoid the sun, never once obscuring the light.

As she spoke, Kanae’s eyes flicked from one thing to another, a smile gracing her lips. Sanemi found himself losing focus on her words, noticing smaller things about her in their proximity. The barely-there gradient of purple in her eyes, the way her eyelashes curved subtly forward instead of towards her. Little dimples that accompanied each smile, strands of hair that flew astray in the gentle wind. Her bangs bumping against her cheeks as she moved her head, the slightly crooked way she had clipped on one of the butterflies. Then he realized she had turned towards him, tilting her head slightly, eyebrows quirked.

“Shinazugawa?”

He started, face heating up. “Uh- What?”

She gave him a bemused smile. “You were staring.” Then, as an afterthought, she added, “at me. Is something wrong?”

He cleared his throat, scrambling to save his food that had almost slipped off his lap and turning back to her. “No. No, uh, I was thinking.”

“About?” She rightened herself, tucking a stray strand of hair behind her ear and placing her now-empty container of food beside her, offering him her full attention. “You haven’t eaten much,” she noted.

He frowned, looking down at his own container. He realized that he had, in fact, eaten very little. God, how long had he been staring? Feeling his cheeks burn, he averted his eyes, hoping his hair covered the worst of his blush. “Not hungry.”

“Ah! I’m sorry, is the food not good? I made it in a rush, so it may not be-“ she started. Sanemi interrupted her, raising a hand.

“No—it’s just that we were training recently and the adrenaline is still there,” he said quickly, making a show of beginning to eat again. Then he ate more quickly, deciding he liked Kanae’s cooking.

She let out a relieved breath. “Okay, then!” She turned, wrapping the cloth back around her container. “I’m glad you don’t mind it.”

“Mhm. Er, are you leaving?” he asked awkwardly, after a moment of contemplating if he should ask.

“What? No, not yet. Unless you’d rather eat alone,” she said apologetically.

He shook his head a bit too quickly. “No! I mean—it’s fine. I don’t… mind. Really.”

She nodded slowly. “Alright!”

As he finished eating, Kanae idled around, walking around the scattered flowers and somehow looking ethereal with the forest framing her, rays of sunlight that streamed through the trees making her eyes shimmer more than usual. Putting his container aside next to hers, he joined her, crouching down beside her to where she was looking down at something beyond his view.

“What’re you doing?” he asked. He didn’t understand why he was being so casual with her, but supposed he never understood her either so that was fine.

She looked up, smiling, and lifting her hand to place something in his hair. He frowned, reaching up and batting her hand away. Removing whatever the hell she had put on him, he found that she’d tucked a small flower there. Its petals were white with a gentle gradient of lavender. He raised an eyebrow and glanced back up at her.

“The hell?”

She laughed, a sound perceivable to music, really. “It reminded me of you. You know, you have white hair and purple-ish eyes.”

“Hm.” He turned, searching the ground and the field of random assortments of plants, looking for the right one. He stood, circling around. Spotting some roses that skirted around the edges of the forest, he strode towards the bushes, finding one in full bloom and returning back to her, offering her the rose. Its petals curved outward and down in a bright pink, the stem a green much more vibrant than it should be allowed. “Like your clip.”

Her cheeks warmed a rosy bloom and she smiled. “Thank you,” she said, delicately taking the flower.

For a moment, Sanemi didn’t understand her reaction. Then he realized he was giving her a flower—a rose, out of everything!—after eating lunch alone with her—which could basically pass off as a date—and he panicked. He was sure he would catch fire what with the temperature suddenly rising and he shifted. “Uhm. Anyway, thanks for lunch, I guess,” he said stiffly. “Bye.”

Kanae laughed. “I’m glad you came. It was fun.”

He decided to mention he hadn’t had a choice, nodding. He turned to leave, following the path they had taken earlier. She would probably follow later. As he reentered the forest, he turned once to see her still standing there, gazing at the flower in her hands with an expression he couldn’t make out from here. He continued into the clusters of trees, deciding that maybe—just maybe—he may enjoy sunny days now.