Work Text:
Harua thinks that a lot of things in the world are pretty.
Like, say, the flowers that grow in the small grass patches just outside of his Astronomy lecture hall, or the fountains outside of the campus library that spew endless amounts of water from ornately sculpted spouts into equally beautiful basins.
Sunsets over crystal blue waters, animals racing each other across branches outside of the classroom windows, rosy pink blush placed high on his friend’s cheeks, and faded caramel highlights over dark brown hair; Harua believes it’s beautiful.
He lives to see, to observe the beauty around him rather than immerse himself in the middle of it. An outsider viewing in, watching blooming cherry blossoms through an old, pink-tinged film strip.
Harua lowers the camera from his eyes, sighing as the cherry branches flutter chaotically back and forth in the wind. It’s almost impossible to capture the still shot he needs for his assignment with the way the wind howls through the park, blowing pink petals all over his head and camera lens. The thin, frail branches of the newly blossoming cherry trees aren’t thick enough to withstand the harsh breeze, creating a blurred image of brown and smudged pink no matter how many snapshots he takes.
He slouches down, not particularly caring what he may look like from another person’s point of view. He’s too busy sulking to care, really.
Not a single one of his pictures is even decent to look at, and he’s been at the park for a few hours now. The sun hadn’t even bothered to come out from behind the thick veil of clouds that coat the sky, leaving Harua to constantly adjust his camera settings as the lighting changed every other five minutes, and he’s had too many close calls with leaning over the fencing around the waterway to have the confidence to try again.
There’s not even any people here to watch from across the waterway, let alone keep him company. Most students tend to stay indoors when evening rolls around, keeping clear of the residual chill that descends with the eventual setting of the sun.
His camera weighs heavy in his hands as he clicks through his most recent photos. Each one gets more and more depressing, and Harua can quite literally feel his confidence dropping when more and more defects begin to appear.
Why did he have to choose photography as one of his main pathways? He’s never really held a professional type of camera before, always preferring to take dumb pictures of his friends with his phone camera instead.
He supposes his inexperience with cameras shows. One photo just has the trunk of the cherry tree in the shot. Another one has a cherry petal on top of his lens, obscuring half of the picture in an opaque shade of light pink. The one he took before giving up and sitting on a nearby bench is so blurry that Harua can’t even tell what part of the cherry tree is in the damn shot.
Harua sighs and powers off his camera. He leans his head back against the backboards of the bench, closing his eyes and letting the falling cherry petals cover him as they please.
If he closes his eyes long enough, maybe he could imbed the feather light touch of petals on his cheeks into something tangible, something he could print and hang on the walls of his lecture halls.
He opens his eyes, squinting at the sky. None of his photos are usable–hell, most of them aren’t even clear–so perhaps it’s time to call it quits. He’s been here for a few hours already, and his stomach has been sending him signals for the past thirty minutes or so to take a break anyway.
So, as any sane person would, Harua monopolizes the bench. He sets his camera beside him on the wood, keeping a careful eye on it as he unpacks the bento his older brother made for him.
The camera stays in his field of view when Harua picks out the bunny themed toothpicks from the Miffy themed sandwiches, and he even pushes it further into the bench just in case whenever he has to reach over it to grab the juice bottle from his bag.
He sets the bottle on the opposite side of him, purposefully away from the expensive camera. Euijoo’s always packed him the same juice since middle school—a normal sized bottle of apple juice with another smaller bottle of something else he’d bought from the convenience store across the way—and Harua knows from experience that juice plus electronics equal something absolutely unholy.
So, he’s absolutely sure to pack away every liquid possible before he touches his camera again. Both juice bottles go into their respective places in his lunch bag, held in place with two loops of elastic string that Euijoo’s boyfriend, a guy with long black hair and scary eyes, had sewn in for him. Harua doesn’t know his name, Euijoo hadn’t been able to figure out the signs for it when he asked, so for now the guy is simply dubbed “Euijoo’s boyfriend.”
The box that held Euijoo’s sandwiches is packed away neatly at the bottom of the bag, and then Harua is holding his camera up in front of his eyes again, aiming the lens toward the trees and walking trail on the other side of the waterway.
His lens isn’t focusing right. Again.
Harua frowns, fiddling around with zoom and placing his hand in front of the lens. He moves back and forth, zooming in and out, but not a single thing helps. In fact, it actually makes the scene blurrier, if that’s even possible.
He lowers the camera, holding it tight as he takes a deep breath. In and out, in and out. He will not throw this expensive, school sponsored camera over the water. Mainly because it’s expensive. He doesn’t want to repay the fee(s) that would come with breaking a camera of such a caliber.
The horrors of repayment briefly subside as his eyes catch on a flash of something in the distance, weaving out from behind the trees in a fashion much too fast to be a person on a brisk stroll.
Huh. Perhaps Harua wasn’t as alone as he previously thought.
Upon further inspection, the flash that first caught Harua’s eyes was from a silver keychain hanging off its owner’s front belt loop. He supposes it makes sense. The sun is setting somewhere behind him, poking holes through the clouds with ambivalent rays. It makes sense that one would reflect back into Harua’s eye. He has bad luck like that, unfortunately.
Then, he registers that the keychain is connected to someone.
Harua blinks. The sight that greets him is a boy who’s just emerged from the treeline, brushing off the sleeves of his black zip-up jacket.
The boy’s hair waves crazily in the wind, exposing gentle, down sloped eyes, pouty lips, and rosy pink cheeks. He’s quite lanky too, Harua muses, with his jacket and sweatpants being just a tad bit too short for his long limbs. He sweeps a hand up, brushing his bangs away from his eyes with one smooth movement that has Harua paused in place.
The boy who emerged from the trees is cute.
He’s not looking in Harua’s direction. His head is bent downward, letting his hair hang freely over his face as the boy continues to brush off grass blades and leaves from his clothes, but Harua knows what he sees. The world that’s full of noise, of wind that whips the cherry blossom petals around his face and eyes, of high pitched ringing only ever present in Harua’s ears, quiets down to a quiet dull pulsing when the boy lifts his face to the sky.
Cherry blossom petals fall gently around the stranger’s face, yet despite their onslaught, he never once looks down. His eyes seem to be searching for something amongst the clouds, flickering back and forth, toward and away from where Harua sits, enamored.
So, it’s only instinct that Harua raises up his camera, centering the boy in the middle of his viewfinder. A chorus of angels burst into song as the boy raises his hand up, fingers curling ever so slightly as the cherry blossoms cascade down around him, landing in his hair, over the bridge of his nose, over the collar of his jacket–
Harua’s camera shutter flickers, a visual cue that captures the stranger in all of his heaven sent beauty.
And perhaps when Harua takes the picture, the camera shutter clicks. He hasn’t checked the volume settings on the expensive camera; he’s too scared of messing it up like he did with all of the other settings, really. But it must click quite loudly, because when Harua lowers the camera, the boy is looking back in his direction, his curious gaze landing on Harua’s frozen form.
They lock eyes, Harua and the stranger, both unmoving. The quiet world around them swirls with cherry blossom petals, the wind whipping them around without a care for who or what happens to get caught between.
The boy nods toward him, lifting a hand up in an attempt at a wave. And when the petals gathered on his palm consequently cascade to the ground, swirling around the stranger’s legs, Harua snaps a picture of that too. The opportunity to capture someone seemingly so in tune with the changing seasons is rare; Harua wants to make use of his meager skills too, if only just to capture the essence of spring standing before him.
The camera must click again because the boy looks a little confused, taking a step toward the waterway’s fencing. His lips move, possibly calling out to Harua before his head jerks to the side, attention pulled away by another unknown auditory cue.
Another person emerges from the walking trail, only discernible by the gray track hoodie and light wash blue jeans that adorn their equally lanky figure. There’s a black cap pulled over their eyes, and when they reach the cherry blossom boy’s side, a hand emerges from their pocket to ruffle his hair. A gesture of affection, judging from the boy’s embarrassed smile.
They must be close, Harua notes, promptly turning the other way when he sees the boy smiling. He doesn’t want to be interrupting anything, intentional or not.
He does have a pretty smile, though.
Harua’s mouth pulls into a line. What a strange thought–he doesn’t even know the person across the way, but perhaps he’ll allow himself to think as such every now and then.
Harua doesnt stay at the park for much longer after that. He packs away his camera—for good this time—and instead focuses his attention on his phone, snapping away at anything he deems pretty enough to grace the trenches of his phone gallery.
And maybe he thinks of that pretty boy on the other side of the waterway a bit more, surrounded by swirling cherry blossoms, with a smile pretty enough to rival the flora surrounding them. Maybe he wishes to be able to hear his voice, shouting greetings over the sound of gentle flowing water over deliberately placed rocks and concrete blocks; to hear the sounds of his laughter when being adored so openly by another, or to possibly have the opportunity to introduce himself with his best qualities first, lacking human senses second.
He passes the threshold of the park in less than a minute, mind racing and steps steady. There’s no time to think about lofty what-ifs and pretty box shaped smiles. He has pictures to edit and print, for crying out loud!
….
Oh, but perhaps he’ll go back to the park tomorrow, if only to see if the boy returns too.
“Harua.”
Harua blinks, rubbing at his eyes with his palms. Hands adorned in layers of silver flutter in his peripherals, drawing his attention away from his laptop, forcing him to straighten his back for the first time in what felt like millennia.
He’s been staring at a blank screen for ages now. Just him and the blinking cursor staring at each other, minute after minute until the screen of his laptop enters sleep mode again.
Oh well, Harua laments, pressing the power key to shut the whole thing down. The essay will have to wait.
Silver flashes in his peripherals again, and Harua finally turns his head. It’s Yuma who stands beside him, blond hair pinned back with an elastic headband and frown adorning his lips.
A quick scan reveals that the photography club captain’s got Harua’s camera around his neck—the strap looks a little too short to be Yuma’s school rented camera, not to mention that the plush charm hanging off the side easily identifies the camera as his own—and it doesn’t take long for Harua to figure out what exactly Yuma wants to talk about.
“Yeah, none of the pictures I took are good enough, I know.” Harua pouts, his signs growing smaller as Yuma’s expression shifts from neutrality to something more complicated. Harua has to snap to get the club captain out of his thoughts, forcibly pulling him back to reality–which is never a good sign with down-to-earth Yuma.
Harua links his pinkies together, shoving them forward so Yuma can properly see his words. “I’ll try to take some more later today, I promise.”
Yuma opens his mouth, seemingly about to protest out loud to Harua’s going to the park, and then thinks better of it, reaching for his phone. He spends a solid minute just standing there, thumbs typing something into his phone while Harua waits impatiently in his seat for Yuma’s ultimatum.
Yuma’s not very good at signing; Harua knows this because he’s the one who taught the older boy most of the signs he knows now. It’s not because the boy didn’t want to learn, no, no. Yuma just happens to have ridiculously bad spatial awareness. Like, seriously bad. Bad enough to knock down any glass of water within two feet of his wingspan, bad.
It’s as comical as it is detrimental, for Harua who can’t understand Yuma and for Yuma who is trying his damn hardest to speak to him. Harua appreciates the effort, of course, but he really would prefer if Yuma stuck to typing on his phone. The last time he tried signing something, Harua’s laptop had suffered its first ever screen crack, and Harua’s not quite intent on repeating anything similar to that.
Case in point, Harua is absolutely endeared by Yuma’s efforts, but most of the time, he ends up reading Yuma’s words off of his phone screen.
“I wasn’t going to talk about the first few photos.” Yuma types, taking his phone back and tacking on some more after Harua’s read the first sentence.
The phone is back a second later, with another line of text beneath the previous one. Yuma’s hopeful eyes are barely visible over the top of the screen as Harua squints at the text.
“I was going to ask if we could use the last two you took. The ones with Asakura at the center.”
Now. Harua has exactly two thoughts in his head.
One: Why is Yuma asking to use his photos? The other boy usually takes without a second thought, and Harua is sure that the photos he took can’t be any better than the ones Maki takes on the flip phone his parents gave him after four-too-many shattered, machine washed smartphones.
And two, arguably the more important question in Harua’s opinion;
Who in the world is Asakura?
The answer to his second question comes hours later, after Harua’s safely in his bedroom, scrolling through the images saved on his camera’s memory card.
He’s sent a few over to Euijoo—praise be to whatever higher being bestowed him with a professional photographer of an older brother—for editing to see if they could be saved from his novice camera skills.
The ones that Harua looks over aren’t exactly giving him any good chances, though. A blurred cherry blossom branch, falling pink petals from a dreary gray sky, a strangely off center picture of what Harua can only assume to be a duck (?) in the waterway—all blurry, uncentered, and certainly unusable.
Harua’s phone flashlight flickers, signifying a new text message, and he’s quick to flip it over to reveal the screen.
It’s Euijoo, sending his messages in short sentence fragments as always.
“so”
“like none of these are salvageable except for the last two”
Harua frowns, trying to remember which images Euijoo is referring to. He hadn’t sent them in any specific order; just piled them up in the message bar and sent them as is. There’s no telling if they sent in a different order either.
Another set of messages set his phone flashlight alight.
[4 images attached]
“i tried my best to unblur and sharpen the first four but it sorta made them worse”
“so i just color corrected them to make the pinks look better against the grey instead”
And indeed, when Harua opens up the message with the four photos included, he sees that not much has changed at all.
The images are as blurry as ever, just a little more saturated in the cherry blossom’s favor. Pink blobs get clearer as they closer to the Harua’s camera lens, shifting from indistinguishable smears of color to a much more defined oval looking thing.
The branches are also easier to identify, along with the small blossoms that sit at their very edges, but again, nothing clear enough to be put into an assignment.
[2 images attached]
“these last two were really nice—but when did you get jo kun to model for you? last i saw he was swamped in his philosophy work”
Jo? Does Euijoo know him?
Harua tilts his head, hands hovering over his keyboard. Was that the name of the boy he’d caught clamoring out of the cherry blossom trees? Yuma had called him Asakura the other day…
…so that would make him Jo Asakura! And if he’s currently swamped in philosophy work, then that would make him a Philosophy major! No one takes Philosophy on their own accord, unless they’re already majoring in it, after all.
Harua smiles, shaking his bangs out of his face to better see his screen. He’s so good at this, wow. Maybe he should change his major to Criminal Justice—he needs a change of pace, anyway.
“whatever the reason, jo looks good”
“you did a good job centering him—the cherry blossoms make him look like a character from those dating sims you like playing kkkk”
Harua pouts, a little offended, really. Because who is Euijoo to judge him for playing dating sims when he literally met his boyfriend at some dumb college mixer event that the photography club held a few years ago?
(Harua hadn’t been old enough to attend since the event was being held at a local bar, but he had been there at the arcade after when Euijoo and his newly acquired sharp eyed, long haired, arm-around-his-waist-twenty-four-seven boyfriend couldn’t stop making heart eyes at each other.
It was disgusting. Disgusting enough to spite Harua into breaking Euijoo’s high score on the basketball game. Again. For the fifth time that evening.)
Harua runs a hand through his hair. Dating sim mystery boy or not, this was good. He’s getting information about Jo Asakura, which is good because he does need to ask before he plasters the guy’s face all over his assignment.
Right, permission. Harua blinks. In order to ask for permission, he has to meet the boy first. And then comes the arduous task of relaying his message to someone who can’t understand the way his hands gesture and point opposed to the way his voice should echo.
His fingers no longer hover frozen—they start flying across his screen, relaying words that could only be heard through black, twelve point font over a white LED screen.
“do you know where i can find Jo Asakura? i gotta ask him something”
“you don’t have his contact? after taking those pictures of him?”
“i didn’t even know his name—he’s just a pretty stranger i saw under the cherry blossoms tbh”
“pretty enough to make i-only-take-pictures-of-scenery Harua betray his own morals? (＃＞＜)”
“now who said anything like that”
“i just thought he was pretty, okay?”
“mhm mhm”
“whatever you say, you dense little brother of mine ( ˘ ³˘)♥︎”
“do you know where i can find him or not.”
“hold on”
“nicho says that jo will be in the park tmrw—idk apparently the kid is looking for something”
“cool, thanks”
“no problem, rua
Euijoo’s next message arrives after a series of disappearing message bubbles, showing that his brother was typing and deleting his words right after. It makes Harua a little curious of what Euijoo could be trying to say, really.
But, as expected, Euijoo is simply worrying.
“don’t be scared to ask me for anything else you need, okay? i haven’t seen gotten to hang out with you in a while”
“you’re busy, i know”
“i’ll be okay”
They don’t chat much after that. Harua knows that Euijoo has other things to do, including being a good boyfriend to his Nicho, so he leaves him be.
Euijoo would text again when he was free—he always makes sure to send Harua at least one rabbit themed image or meme every day, comparing them side by side with a picture of a younger, smiling Harua—and when that happened, Harua would always respond, if only to ensure Euijoo doesn’t decide to walk two steps across the hallway to bust down his door.
Harua has other things to think about anyway; like how exactly he’s going to walk up to one Jo Asakura and ask for permission to use his likeness. Maybe typing out a message on his phone would be enough. But would that be too insincere? Would he come off as haughty and prideful to him?
He could take him out of the park to get coffee, but Harua doesn’t know if Jo would like coffee; he doesn’t even know if Jo would want to leave the park, really. Harua is as much of a stranger to him as Jo is to Harua. It would be weird to ask a stranger to get coffee together on their first, real meeting, right?
Harua tosses and turns and tosses and turns, and eventually falls asleep to the chaotic rhythm, letting his mind carry him away into dreams of swirling pinks in a gray-scaled afternoon sky.
And just like that, Harua is back.
The park is just as desolate as it was the other day, Harua muses, readjusting the strap of his camera bag to better sit on his shoulder. Evening sun rays coat every possible surface in molten gold, chasing after the frightened feet of students as they try to meet their inevitable deadlines within the next few hours of early night.
Harua isn’t part of that crowd. Luckily, he’s done his work before the impending deadline could weigh heavy on his shoulders. The only thing he really needs to finish now is his photography assignment, which he’s been making progress on in the past ten minutes or so he’s been meandering down the park’s walking trail.
He raises his camera to the sky, snaps a few shots of cherry blossoms bathed in liquid gold light, and hopes to spot Jo Asakura soon. Most of his day has been waiting for the right time of evening to set out for the park. He didn’t want to risk being there too early or too late, but he also doesn’t know what time Jo was meant to be coming to the park either.
It’s a shot in the dark, but Harua is betting on him coming to the park at around the same hour they saw each other last time, which is to say, sometime during the late afternoon to early evening. Harua doesn’t carry a watch on him–his phone is running low on battery so he would rather not use it too much while he’s out–so he can do nothing but hope he’s right.
So, he loiters. Walks up and down the path a few times, and crouches down to take pictures of the newly planted Bunny Tails and annual flowers along the edge of the fenced off water way. Walks up and down a few more times, angles his camera up to the branches above his head, and eventually, after snapping way too many photos to send to Euijoo later, he sits down on the same bench as the day before, resting his head on the edge of the back wooden paneling.
Jo hasn’t appeared yet, Harua laments, raising a hand to block out the dimming sunlight from his eyes. Or maybe he has appeared, just not where Harua expects him to be? But where else could the boy be? If he was looking for something in the trees before, wouldn’t he be looking for it in the same place again today? His head is tired. He’s thinking too much for someone who barely has the STEM inclined brain cells to keep up–a true liberal arts student issue.
He lowers his arm back down to his side, letting it fall limp once his face is safe from any sort of self inflicted injury. Ugh, his arm is tired. Even more so than his head, actually. Professional cameras are heavy, and he’s been hauling one around for a few hours now, not including the walk from his place to the park.
The setting sun sends its rays over his face, tinting everything in gold. It’s bright, too bright even, but Harua is too lazy to lift his arm back up to guard his eyes. He’s not looking directly at the sun anyway. It takes less effort to squint his eyes than to lift his arm all the way back up.
That is until another arm blocks the sun for him, of course.
There’s a thin silver chain decorating their wrist, with a small charm at its very center, and Harua barely has enough time to spot the glint of metal around their fingers before his mind catches up to his eyes.
He gasps, and can only assume the stranger does the same when Harua’s head shoots up from the back of the bench, moving just slow enough to avoid colliding with the mystery arm above him as the owner jolts it back.
Harua whips his head to the side, following the other’s arm until his eyes land on the person next to him. Rosy pink cheeks and down sloped eyes meet his own, and, oh.
There, sitting on the bench directly to Harua’s right with worry filling his eyes, is Jo Asakura.
His mouth is moving, probably asking Harua something along the lines of are you okay? But then he keeps going, past the usual greetings and sprawling out into an entire conversation topic that Harua cannot catch for the life of him. Reading lips was never his strong suit, unfortunately.
Suddenly, the boy in front of him stops talking. It jolts both him and Harua out of whatever tension’s formed around them, the bubble popping with an imaginary cascade of soapy wisps.
He looks down at Harua, because Jo has a few inches on him even when they’re both sitting down, and then he’s frantically digging through a sling bag that seemingly appears out of thin air.
A small, metal ringed memo pad is held in front of his face seconds later. In fact, it’s held up so close to his face that Harua has to push it forward a little to better decipher the handwriting on the actual paper.
He sees Jo’s smile turn a little awkward out of the corner of his eye, and the boy is quick to readjust the way he’s holding the notepad. Cute.
“sorry, i didn’t mean to scare you (╥_╥)”
Harua looks up from the paper to reassure the boy, but stops short when he sees his face.
Jo is mimicking the drawing on the memo pad, the corners of his mouth turned downward and a hand held up under his eye to portray the tears. He holds the face for a second longer before opening one eye, most likely waiting for Harua’s response.
It’s enough to startle a quiet laugh out of him, not really expecting that much effort to be put into simple communication.
Harua holds out a hand for the notepad, quickly scribbling down a response when Jo hands it over. And just like the boy next to him, Harua makes sure to tilt his head to convey the question that comes along with his unspoken words. ”it’s alright, you didn’t scare me too badly—where were you anyway? i didn’t see you around anywhere”
Jo snaps his fingers–it must be a habit because it serves no purpose to help Harua figure out what could be going through his mind in those few seconds–and then points over his shoulder. Harua follows his finger to find even more trees and greenery covered in a thin layer of fallen pink petals. ”i was on the other side of the park because i checked that side yesterday”
Oh. As much as Harua wants to complain about wandering around in the wrong area for the past hour or so, he can’t really blame Jo for looking in a different spot. It makes sense to check the area around where you lost an item if you can’t find it exactly where you think it would be anyway.
”did you need me for something?” Is Jo’s next question, quickly followed by another hasty set of scribbles. ”euijoo told me that his brother was looking for me, but didn’t tell me where you’d be :( “
Harua grimaces, but nods an affirmation nonetheless. Right. Time to be assertive. ”yeah, i wanted to ask you a question or two. i took a few pictures of you yesterday and wanted to know if it was okay to submit them as part of my final assignment? i think they’re pretty, if that’ll convince you to let me use them”
”can i see them?” Jo asks, eyes curious and ears dipped in rosy pinks. He looks almost embarrassed, with his hands unable to sit still in his lap, fingers fidgeting with the hem of his hoodie.
Harua does his best to not let his eyes linger on the other boy for too long, averting his attention to trying to find the two images Euijoo had retouched just the night before.
As cute as Jo may be, Harua doesn’t think that he should just start dropping random compliments on their first official meeting. He doesn’t want to come off as pushy or rude about it; he wants Jo to be comfortable in his skin, casual instead of tense, just like in the photos that bear his figure.
Even so, Harua so desperately wants to see Jo’s reactions to the two images he’s in. He can’t feasibly stare at him, though, not when they’re both looking down at his phone screen as he swipes through his gallery, cursing at the amount of pictures he’s accumulated in the span of a single night.
Harua wants to raise a hand, to blame the newly discovered images on that one group chat Taki insisted on including Harua in, but stops short when Jo suddenly taps at his screen, selecting one image out of the seemingly thirty thousand little pixelated squares.
He purses his lips, watching Jo’s reactions from his peripherals as the boy swipes back and forth between the two pictures of himself.
The first one is where he’s truly caught off guard, faced up toward the sky as the petals swirl around his form. There’s a soft warmth in his eyes, the edges of his lips ever so slightly turned upward in the beginnings of a smile.
Harua is quick to note the mirror image sitting next to him, all soft and smiley as his finger swipes to the next picture.
The second one is the one that makes Harua’s cheeks warm. Jo is looking at him in this one, eyes piercing through the camera’s lens with one hand raised in a tentative wave.
Cherry blossoms litter the space around him, falling down from the trees behind and the few petals that were caught in his hand. Jo looks as if he was about to climb out of the Harua’s screen, calling out to him with a voice that Harua can only imagine to be as sweet and soft as the pink flowers surrounding him.
The notepad makes an appearance at the side of his phone screen. ”those are beautiful.” Is the message scratched down on the paper, written out in a deplorable purple toned ink. Harua dutifully ignores the rush of warmth traveling up his ears in favor of shrugging. He likes to stay humble, thank you very much.
”did you really need permission to use them?” Jo tilts his head, flipping a page and bringing his pen down once more. Harua peers over his shoulder, accidentally knocking their elbows together more than once as the boy writes. ”i think you could’ve just used them anyway”
Well, he’s not wrong, Harua muses. Technically, Harua could have just turned in the images as is without telling Jo or even coming out to meet him like this, but where was the fun in that?
Harua had wanted to see him again. To be able to talk to him without having to guess at what he was saying; to have him close enough to properly see his face, to bask in the sunlight formerly hidden by the trees just a few feet away.
He wants to talk more with him. To ask him to be the subject of all of his photos, and to grace every camera lens he comes upon with his beauty. And in order to do this, Harua takes the notepad back.
”if i didn’t ask, it would be rude.”
Jo starts to say something, only to get cut off by Harua practically shoving the notepad back to him.
Harua takes a deep breath, looking Jo directly in the eyes. The boy looks back at him, confusion bleeding into his pretty eyes. Time to be brave; brave enough to at least find a way to stay in contact with Jo. He doesn’t know if he could forgive himself if he simply let Jo walk away after this.
”i wouldn’t get to see you again either, if i did that.” Harua pouts for the full effect, flipping the page once he’s sure that Jo has finished reading. He sends a prayer up to whatever deity is watching over him, hoping that Jo doesn’t decide to turn him down. ”would it be weird to ask for your number?”
Harua knows the next word that falls from Jo’s lips, though with what tone, he’s unsure.
“Oh.” Jo says, his mouth holding the “o” shape for much longer than necessary.
Is it shock that holds him frozen? Or is he simply thinking? Harua doesn’t know, and isn’t quite sure if he really wants to know either. Jo is entitled to turn him down, yes, but that doesn’t mean that Harua won’t be a little heartbroken after.
What he does know, however, is that the lack of a proper answer is killing him. The wait makes him want to run laps around the park—or maybe just pace circles around the bench—as Jo bides his time, seemingly thinking his answer through to every last possible option.
A millennia passes—Harua, in truth, knows that it’s only been about two minutes—and then Jo raises his head. The wind whips up around them, a mirror of the day before as Jo hands back the notepad, its cover flipped closed.
Cherry blossom petals swirl and dance, carrying the rhythm of Harua’s heartbeat while he slowly lifts the cover of the notepad. He doesn’t know what could lay on the paper beneath. Would it be an inevitable decline? Would Jo turn him down, right here right now?
A swirl of purple ink appears at the very edge of the page, and that’s when Harua gives up on moving slow. He flips the cover up in one swift motion, letting his eyes take in the sprawling expanse of purple ink that covers the page.
A thick, hastily colored trunk sprouts from the bottom of the page, expanding and growing out into thin branches of purple inked blossoms. Each flower is drawn in a bunch, not a single one stands out against the rest—aside from the one closest to some of the smallest handwriting Harua has ever seen in his life.
”sure” It says, followed by a string of numbers that Harua is careful to tear off of the page. He tucks the torn piece into his pocket, making sure to place it near the bottom to ensure it didn’t fly away in the wind.
When he raises his head, he’s not surprised to find Jo already looking back at him. His ears are dipped in red, the same cherry tint of his cheeks and lips. How cute. How unabashedly adorable.
And when they inevitably say their goodbyes, eyes locked and steps lingering, Harua is happy to say that the world around them—the one filled with ringing white noise and endless cycles of static—quiets down to hum with every moment they share.
A dull pulse in his ears, buried by the quiet noise of a boy who embodies the spirit of spring, of dancing cherry blossom petals on a dreary gray day.
Harua feels himself blush at the thought. Oh goodness.
He can’t wait to see Jo again.