Into The Rain With You

The days after my talk with Haruka felt like I was slowly learning how to breathe again. The weight of the past hadn't disappeared—how could it? It was always going to be there, lingering like a shadow. But something had shifted. The hardest part wasn't the memories themselves, but the way I had buried them so deeply that I couldn't even see them anymore.

Talking about it felt like peeling away layers of old, stiff skin, a slow, painful process. But in the moments when I allowed myself to be honest with her, I felt a little lighter, a little less like I was drowning.

But even as the fog in my mind began to lift, the reality of it all settled back in. The guilt, the fear, and the uncertainty—they were still there. I couldn't expect to heal overnight. I couldn't expect to just wake up and be okay.

I had spent most of the last week with Haruka and Kaito, finding small pockets of relief in their company. We joked and laughed and talked about everything and nothing at all. But I couldn't shake the feeling that something was still missing. That I was still holding back.

——~

It was a Tuesday afternoon when I found myself sitting on the courtyard of the school, the same place I had gone to escape during lunch breaks when everything felt too overwhelming. The sun was starting to dip lower in the sky, casting long shadows over the courtyard below.

I had come up here to clear my head, but it felt like I was running away again. I didn't want to feel this way—like I was still hiding parts of myself. But no matter how hard I tried to open up, I couldn't shake the sense that I was only letting

people see pieces of me, never the whole picture.

As I stared out at the view, a voice broke the quiet.

"You know, you're a lot harder to find than you think."

I turned to see Haruka standing a few feet away, her eyes soft but determined, the breeze catching her hair. She must've known where I'd gone. We'd been spending so much time together lately that it was almost like she had a sixth sense when it came to where I was.

"Should I be flattered?" I said, managing a small smile.

She smiled back but didn't laugh. "I just thought you might need someone to talk to."

I didn't respond right away. I didn't know what to say. I wanted to be honest with her, to let her in. But I still felt like there was a wall between us, like I wasn't ready to let her see the parts of me I had buried for so long.

Haruka sat down next to me, the silence settling between us like a comfortable weight. It wasn't an awkward silence—just one of those moments where words weren't needed.

She continued, her gaze on the horizon. "It's hard to let people in, especially when you've been hurt before. But you don't have to face everything on your own, you know? You don't have to carry all of it alone."

I felt my throat tighten, the familiar lump of emotion creeping up. I wanted to say something—to tell her how much that meant—but the words didn't come.

Instead, I just nodded. I was scared to let her see the parts of me that still felt broken, still felt like they weren't worth saving.

But as I sat there with her, I realized something: Haruka didn't see me as broken. She saw me as I was—flawed, yes, but real.

And that was something I wasn't sure I was ready to accept.

—-~

The next day, Kaito caught me after school. He had been acting a little more distant than usual lately, and I couldn't tell if he was picking up on my unease or if something else was going on.

"You're avoiding me," he said bluntly as we walked out of the school gates together.

I shot him a quick look, surprised by the accusation. "What?"

"You've been distant for a while now," he said. "You talk to Haruka more than you talk to me these days. What's going on?"

I felt my chest tighten, an old, familiar feeling of defensiveness rising. I hadn't meant to shut Kaito out. It wasn't like I wanted to ignore him, but something had shifted in the past few weeks. And I wasn't sure how to deal with it.

"I'm not avoiding you," I muttered, looking down at the sidewalk.

Kaito didn't buy it. He stopped walking and turned to face me, his eyes narrowing with that familiar sharpness. "Come on, Kai. What's going on with you? You're always thinking, always overthinking. You're just like you've always been, but worse. Like you're afraid of something."

I felt the heat rise in my chest, the familiar wall I'd built starting to form again. He didn't know. He didn't know what it was like inside my head, what it was like to carry all of this around without anyone noticing. He didn't know how exhausting it was.

"I'm not afraid," I snapped. "I just… I don't know. I don't know how to deal with everything. I don't know how to let people in without ruining everything."

Kaito was quiet for a moment, studying me as if he was waiting for me to say more. But I didn't.

Finally, he spoke, his voice a little softer than I expected. "You're not alone in this, Kai. But you've got to let people help you. You can't keep carrying it all on your own."

"Just don't shut me out, okay? You've got people who care about you. Don't forget that."

I watched him walk ahead of me, the weight of his words hanging in the air between us. I didn't know how to respond. All I could do was stand there, caught between the person I had been and the person I was trying to become.

——~

That night, I sat at my desk, my math homework spread out in front of me, but I wasn't really looking at it. Instead, I was staring at my phone, my thumb hovering over Haruka's contact.

It was tempting to text her. To talk to her about everything I was feeling, all the things I hadn't been able to say out loud. But I didn't.

I didn't want to burden her. Didn't want to drag her into my mess.

I had always believed that if I just kept everything inside, I wouldn't hurt anyone. But that wasn't true, was it? I had hurt Kaito. I had hurt Haruka. And I had hurt myself in the process.

The guilt twisted in my stomach, making it hard to breathe.

I wanted to tell them. I wanted to tell them everything. But the fear was still there. What if they couldn't handle it? What if they didn't want to be around me anymore?

But I couldn't stay like this forever. I couldn't keep pretending everything was fine when it wasn't. I couldn't keep hiding.