Disclaimer: Honey and Clover is not mine.
He's about to enter the room, hot tea with just the right amount of honey and lemon mixed in held in hand, when he stops.
Her face is made paler by the moonlight that enters through the window. She is motionless, save for the fine trickle of tears and the slightest shaking of her hands. A small cardboard box laid on the table, open with its contents – a card and something else that he can't discern from where he is – in front of her. But even before he looks at the box for the sender's address, or glances at the handwriting of the scrawl on the card, or looks at the glass rose laid on bubble wrap, he knows who the sender is. There is only one person who can evoke that kind of emotion from Hagu. She doesn't make a sound but it's the most response she's shown in the last six months.
She picks up the glass rose – it is almost colorless, just the slightest shade of pink but it doesn't need anything more than that – and when the light hits it, it is more beautiful, more glittering, more alive than any real rose ever was and ever will be. Her eyes are dry now, filled with something he cannot decipher. Is it the admiration merged with fear that used to be there during their University days? No, it's different. It may be envy, because deep inside she fears that she will never catch up to Morita-senpai now, if she ever believed she could before. It may be anxiety, because she hasn't made much progress, despite rehabilitation, on her art. They might have been as different as yellow and blue – she was quiet and wavering while he was rambunctious and obnoxious) but put together, they became a beautiful green – they were both stars, after all. They weren't made to be another humble artist in the streets; they were meant for the big stage, for the world to have its breath stolen away by their creations.
It may as well be none of those; it may just be life in her eyes. Nothing has captured her attention like this for a long time, but now – Takemoto notices – even her hand has stopped shaking and he wonders if she's stopped breathing too.
And even if he would like to step closer and take a look at that rose with Hagu (Morita-senpai hadn't been lying when he said he was experimenting with glass blowing, after all), his feet won't move. He wants to wipe away the tears that have pooled in her eyes but his hands are frozen. He wants to ask who the package is from even though he knows the answer, but his mouth won't open.
That fragile rose, which he could probably crush with a hand (and then he would be like her too, he wonders for the briefest moment if that would bring them closer, even though deep inside he knows the answer) works better than any fence that could keep him away from her. He would have preferred a real fence, even. At least he could have climbed over that. But he can't climb up into their world, no matter how hard he tries.
A part of him that he thought had been stamped out a long time ago crumbles as her lips press against glass petals.
Why is it, he thinks, later, when Hagu is asleep and he is staring down at the fragile artwork that looks back up at him mockingly (he thinks). Why is it that I've fallen deeper in love with someone who has slipped further away from me?
Sometime between midnight and dawn, when Hagu stirs in her sleep, he kisses her bandaged hands.
Because falling out of love with her would hurt more.
A/N: I'm not technically doing the 30 kisses challenge anymore, because I couldn't update often enough (yes, even with the 3 months interval that was required between each update...) but recently I rewatched Honey and Clover season 1 and decided I wanted to write a little again. This scene is supposed to take place after season 2, even though the only thing I remember from that is Hagu hurting her hand. This was done before I went to sleep. I didn't even read it over once I finished typing, so if you see errors, please correct me when you see them.