It was almost time for our meeting. I was in my room getting ready and fastening my yukata, which I had rented just a while ago. I had just finished taking a rejuvenating bath to wash away the day's fatigue in my single room. A normal room with a bed and a TV placed in front of a medium-height cabinet, and the small bathroom located to the right of the room's exit door.
So far, so normal, except for the highlight, the view. Being on the fourth floor, I had the honor of looking at the distant lake due to the height. For now, I could only admire the lake in the evening since the sun had already set by the time I got up, but the evening view did not disappoint me at all. It was as if a large rainbow was immersed in the water.
The city's evening lights, also due to the festival's preparations, were reflected in the lake, coloring it. The starry sky above the lake could only make the scene even more perfect. Taken out of context like this, it might seem like a painting by some famous painter. Before leaving, I took the opportunity to take a picture of that fantastic picture that nature had given me and sent it to my aunt. It was a way to "involve" her, even though she was distant.
A quick glance at the mirror inside the closet next to the TV cabinet. I was ready. I left the room, locked the door, and headed to the ground floor reception via the elevator, where we had agreed to meet. I was a bit early, but I went anyway. Coming out of the elevator, it was surprising and somewhat gratifying to see Yuto-kun already there. It reminded me of our first date together.
"Hello."
"Hello…" One of the things I like about Yuto-kun is his expressions.
Even then, his face had turned slightly red from emotion and embarrassment. He was so taken aback seeing me in the yukata that he inadvertently blurted out,
"You look cute, um I mean… it really suits you."
He tried to cover his embarrassment with a simple phrase, but by now, I had engraved the words "You look cute," along with his expression of surprise, in my mind. The effort to wear the yukata was not in vain.
And so, we headed towards the festival.
It took us a few minutes to get there. All we had to do was follow the crowd heading in the same direction.
We could tell we had arrived at our destination by the presence of the classic tsuridourou lanterns used for the occasion. They almost entirely filled the streets, and stalls with carts selling food began to appear. Many people were dressed in traditional Japanese clothes, especially women. The city was full of life. Yuto-kun chose to avoid this and came in his normal clothes.
From then on, we did everything from walking around to trying almost every type of game, food, or attraction in general. We tried to catch a fish, but we couldn't. Yuto-kun gave up after the third attempt, but I tried several more times. In the end, I didn't succeed and only ended up wasting money.
Another game we played was trying to win a plush toy by knocking it over with a small gun that shot cork caps. This time, the roles reversed, and I was the one who gave up almost immediately, while Yuto-kun tried several more times. "Thum" The plush toy was hit and fell backward from the shelf where it was displayed as a target. It was nothing special, a simple teddy bear, but it looked extremely cute to me.
"Here, have this?" He said, noticing my gaze.
"Can I really have it?"
"Sure. I'm not a plush toy type." I thanked him with a big smile, pleased by his kind gesture.
For food, knowing our "greed", we took a little bit of everything, takoyaki, yakisoba, yakitori, taiyaki… we tried them all. While buying the taiyaki, we were informed by the seller that there would be fireworks over Lake Biwa. As we were about to go and buy some dango, as if everything we had eaten wasn't enough, a man pushing a cart passed us, and a glass bottle fell from it.
The height was so insignificant that, fortunately, it remained intact instead of shattering into a thousand pieces on the ground. Apparently, the man hadn't noticed the loss because he kept going, and none of the others present, except for us, seemed to have noticed anything. Yuto-kun picked it up...
"Look!"
... it was a bottle of sake.
The exact moment I was about to open my mouth to tell him to return it to its owner, Yuto-kun took my hand and we started running at full speed.
Eventually, with the stolen item, we headed towards the lake and found a secluded spot on the shore.
"Are you crazy, why did you take the bottle? We should have returned it."
I was pretty upset about the theft he'd just committed. He should have stopped the cart's owner and given it back.
"I know I shouldn't have done it, but... this is also something on my list I want to do."
He said, breathlessly.
"Try alcohol?"
"Yes, I added it afterwards." We sat on the lake shore and opened it.
"Since we're students, we can't just go into a store and buy it. When I saw it, I didn't think twice."
"Such a strong smell."
The aroma of the alcohol was so potent that it began to surround us. It was as if it couldn't wait to escape the bottle. Without hesitation, Yuto-kun slowly brought his lips to the bottle's neck and took a quick sip:
"Uh! Damn. I didn't think it would be this strong."
He said, sticking out his tongue, bothered by the taste of the alcohol.
"Drink it slower. Do you think it's fruit juice?"
He handed me the bottle.
"Here you go."
"No, no. I don't drink."
"Come on, try it. The taste is strong, but it quickly dissolves in your mouth."
I was hesitant about it, but thinking about it, after all, it wasn't that big of a deal, it was just a sip. The real problem was something else. If I had drunk from the bottle, right after him, it would have been...an indirect kiss.
He realized that this was the real reason for my reluctance, in fact, he looked at me smugly, seeing me embarrassed and thoughtful about it, but not to let him win, I took a quick sip, just enough time to keep my lips as little as possible on the bottle's opening.
"Uh!" I had the same reaction as Yuto-kun.
"How do adults drink this stuff."
I said as my adventure companion laughed. Meanwhile, he pulled a note from his pocket. It was the one where he was writing down all the things he wanted to do. He drew a horizontal line. He must have been checking off the "drink alcohol" item.
We stayed there, accompanied by the full moon reflecting in the blue of the lake. It was so clear and bright that it seemed like a large divine eye watching us from above as we continued to sip the sake, the taste of which we had now gotten used to.
The intoxication of that moment was interrupted by a sentence that came out of Yuto's mouth:
"They've set the date for my operation, just before we leave."
It left me taken aback for a moment. I knew the time would come, but I didn't think he would tell me at a time like this, although I was glad he had told me on his own initiative instead of finding out at the last minute or worse, not finding out at all.
"I see. And...when would that be?"
"December 7th. But I'll be admitted the day before."
"It'll be fine. I'm sure of it. You're strong. You'll be able to leave this moment behind you."
Staring into the distance, his hair slightly moved by the breeze, he said:
"I'm not strong. All I do is try to take example. I told you, when I was permanently hospitalized. Well at that time, when I was hospitalized, there was a girl my age in the room next to mine. She was also ill. When you're in that environment, you get the chance to meet people who are better off, but also worse off than you.
She was on borrowed time. Unlike me, she was really strong. Her illness had been treated several times, but it always came back. It was incurable. But despite this, I don't remember a single day when I didn't see her with a smile on her face. Needless to say, she died. The news of her death, as much as it hit me, didn't surprise me that much."
"I'm sorry..." Meanwhile, the sake bottle swung like a pendulum between the two of us, so much so that the contents of the bottle had halved.
"Yeah, but she was strong not just because she laughed; it was the reason behind her laughter that fascinated me. Once she told me: 'sooner or later we all die, some sooner, some later. The important thing is what you do with the time you are given.' It is with these words that I go on every day. That's why I want to do as many things as possible while I'm alive and that's why I'm making the list. The truth is that people complain because they don't have enough time, when in fact they do have time. They just waste it. She was not sad or unhappy about her situation, but she was sad because she didn't have time to do what she wanted."
In a way, I could understand what he meant:
"Living is not about getting old, but about what you do in your lifetime. Living means making choices every day, knowing how to put yourself on the line in everything, risking doing something rather than not doing it. You can experience all this even if a person's life is generally shorter compared to a person who lives longer. Is this what she meant?"
With a slight smirk, he replied:
"I don't know. Maybe. This is just my guess. I never had time to ask her..." He took another sip from the bottle. He came out with another strange statement to my eyes:
"Ayame, you remind me a lot of her!"
"A person like me can't remind you of a person like her." I said, smirking slightly as well.
The bottle kept swinging between our hands and this time I took a sip, finishing it completely. Both of us, having drunk half of that bottle, began to show signs of surrender.
"Well, I look at you that way. For me, between the two of us, you're the strong one. No matter how much you fall, you always get back up..."
As he said this, his face was getting closer and closer to me. I just stood there and listened as he came closer. It might have been the alcohol, or the tiredness, but at that moment I felt helpless and hot.
"...no matter how much you've suffered, you still have the strength to smile..."
He kept getting closer and closer, coming within less than half a meter.
"...and that's what I love about you."
And then, just as he finished that sentence, a firework was shot up into the sky, the first of a series. The exact moment it exploded in the night sky was the same moment our lips touched, followed by other fireworks being shot into the sky continuously.
Yes, we kissed. A kiss under the moonlight on the edge of a lake with fireworks exploding in the sky. It felt like I was in a movie.