That point in time when I was a different person. Sweet and innocent. The person that Juri-san still thinks me to be. But I'm not. Time and time again I shatter these conceptions she has of me. Every opportunity I can, I usually do. Yet, it's not something I see myself doing... I can't claim ignorance of the act, but sometimes I do things without thinking. And yet...
Why doesn't she see? Why doesn't she understand? Is it she or I who is the victim in all of this? I always thought I was the victim. That is until... but that's something I'd prefer not to think about now.
I sit at the windowsill. Pushing the two panels open, I stare down at the campus. Watching those students who seem so happy. Two girls catch my eye. I've never seen them before, but they stand out. One has red hair, taller than her companion. A pretty girl with short brown hair. The red head is prettier. Doesn't her friend notice?
I think to myself that she certainly must. She has to. Abruptly the two of them break into melodic laughter. A joyous ocassion for the girls and yet; as they laugh, I feel myself grow cold. I begin to pull a door of the window shut but I stop.
It isn't the temperature that has me cold. Inside. That's where the ice originates. My ice to Juri's fire. Her ice to my fire. Burning each other. We always did, unintentionally. I blink and I'm back in the real world. I always think of things too often. Dawdling on them... Plotting? No. But now I see the red head pat the brunettes head playfully and frown. I don't see how she can be so blind. Or is it I who have no vision? Do I see negativity in everything?
The girls are starting to rub me the wrong way. I'm jealous. I admit it easily enough to myself, but it doesn't mean that I accept it. I stand up, my legs are cool. There was a chill to the air after all. I push the one panel shut and go to sit at my desk.
It looks a lot like Juri-san's. That plain brown desk. It looks better in her room, I think. This isn't the same one I used while I was away but in the drawers- I pull one open and take out a few sheets of stationary paper. White sheets with orange roses at the corners. I thought it nice. I often tell myself that's why I bought it. Now I'm not so sure. My hand drops the sheets on top of the desk. They spread and I straighten them. Picking them back up and tapping them back into shape before laying them down carefully.
I can't believe I have any left. I thought I'd used them all. Luckily, I didn't. I suppose I didn't write Juri-san as often as I should have. I always did take her for granted. Leisurely writing her letters only when I got the whimsy. Yet she never made me wait very long to hear back from her.
She always asked about the two of us. Him and I. At the back of my desk I still have that picture taken so long ago. That blue gray picture in its silver frame. As I pull it to me, I feel myself starting to remember. Wasn't this the day it'd begun?
Truly begun? The Shiori that hurt Juri-san so badly, that had made so many mistakes for illusions? I think it was this day. There were other factors that led to it though. Nobody was to be blamed. Neither Juri-san or him. Not even myself. Youth and naivety on my part.
I grip the frame tighter thinking about it. I see my younger self standing on my tippy toes. My hand covering the side of my mouth as I whisper into his ear. Was I afraid someone would read my lips? Hear my lies? Now I know that while I thought I was lying, I actually hadn't been. I had been telling the truth. But to me then, it was a lie. Something to hurt Juri-san with. I don't know how those thoughts had gotten into my head then. I feel terrible about it now, but I remember doing it. Then I had enjoyed it.
The photographer had been taking too long, and Juri was a few rows below us. Him and I stood next to one another as luck would have it. I seized the moment and I told him...
My thoughts are interrupted as the one pane I'd left open slams shut. The wind has picked up more than I'd foreseen. Sighing, I stand and go to it in no rush. Latching it shut. Next to the window is a small table, standing on four sturdy legs. The blue vase on it teeters dangerously on the edge and I move it back to the center. It's filled with so many coral roses. They've always been my favorite. They display passion and brilliance. Standing above all others, even above that white noble rose. Just like Juri-san. Despite what I've done... the things I've said. I've always thought her to be above all others... except the time that I met him... but I don't want to think about that now.
The rose. That rose represents her, she the rose. And I have always been the lowly grass in her shadow. The weed that only lived like a parasite off her liveliness. Growing, but not blooming per se. Growing not with dignity or honor. Something unattended to. Someone that nobody cared for. I was always ignored. Except by her. And it was her that I turned against.
I fed off of others attention, off their compliments. I never got much of either of these. Not while Juri-san was there. Not when she was in my presence. As I play with the roses, trying to arrange them, I remember how it had all started. And how I came to harbor deep feelings of resentment toward Juri-san. Feelings that would only cause hurt to both her and myself. A path that spiraled downward to my own self destruction.