🎧: ‘cause you have to — lany
“wait for me, okay?”
those were the last words you heard from sae. honestly, it seemed like he wanted to say more, but he held back. with a quick glance over his shoulder to make sure his parents weren’t watching, he leaned in and pressed a kiss to your forehead before walking away. you could’ve sworn his ears were tinged pink.
rin nudged you with a smirk, the kind that screamed mischief. “i saw that,” he muttered under his breath, grinning annoyingly. you rolled your eyes in response, brushing off his teasing.
still, those unsaid words lingered in your mind. you hoped they were what you thought they were. the three words that would have secured his spot in your future, the spot next to your bed, and the spot on your left ring finger. but even without saying them, you felt like you were already his. that kiss said enough.
a few years. that’s not too bad, right?
your relationship with sae during his early months in spain was great. though he wasn’t the type to communicate much, you could tell that he was actually trying. every few days, you’d get a call from him. one time, when you asked why he always opted to call instead of text, he simply responded, “typing is annoying.” in truth however, he just wanted to hear your voice.
but as the months passed, the calls grew less frequent. rin complained (and teased) especially, since you were the only one sae kept in touch with. you bribed rin with the popsicle sae used to buy to shut him up, and he immediately stopped sulking.
the turning point in your relationship came about a year after sae left. the calls turned into texts, reserved only for special occasions.
sae: happy birthday
[name]: i miss you
he left you on read, no response. after that, sae stopped reaching out entirely. your attempts to contact him went unanswered. you were his, but was he still yours?
no. was he ever yours to begin with?
in the three years without sae, you often felt like something was missing. the ache was subtle but constant. those years were especially hard: dealing with your studies, fending off a few persistent suitors, and enduring rin's teenage phase. honestly, you managed just fine. rin was great for scaring off suitors with a single glare, and you threw yourself into studying as a distraction. but the hardest part, the part you could never quite get used to, was the feeling of longing for someone halfway across the world.
once, you even tried to let someone else in, to open your heart just a little. and then you saw one of sae's interviews—calm, stoic, untouchable. that was all it took to slam your heart shut again. you felt sorry for the person you'd rejected, but not as sorry as you felt for yourself. you knew how pathetic it was to yearn for someone who probably didn’t even think of you.
now, at seventeen, you’re packing your life into boxes, shoving them into the back of a car. you hug your parents goodbye as they tearfully remind you to call often (which brought a dagger to your heart as you remember a specific someone), their voices cracking with pride and sadness. you’re not just leaving for university. you’re leaving behind everything—this house, this town, and the memories that haunted you.
and then, in a heartbeat, everything changed.
as you pulled out of the driveway, your thoughts consumed by all that you were leaving behind, the world outside blurred into an indistinct haze. a momentary distraction—a glance at your phone, a message from sae.
sae: i'm here. can we talk?
your heart dropped. why was he here, now of all times? you couldn't help but feel a spark of hope. you believed that he loved you—at least, the younger sae did. a part of you longed to believe that he still loved you like he did back then.
you loved him in that spring, and as much as you hated to admit it, you still loved him in this winter. but what about him? doubts began to creep in. maybe you had outgrown each other. maybe sae had outgrown you. maybe you’d become a distraction to him, dead weight—nothing but a reminder of a past he could no longer hold on to. perhaps this was just his way of giving you closure.
the questions lingered in your mind: “did you only love me because of that kiss? did you only love me because of the promises you made? does some part of you feel like you owe it to the boy you used to be? do you only love me ‘cause you have to?”
the screech of tires, the crunch of metal against metal, and then the darkness swallowed you whole. in those final moments, as the realization of what was happening crashed over you, the last remnants of sae’s voice echoed in your mind, blending with the chaos of the moment. you had been ready to leave it all behind, but now, it seemed, the goodbyes you gave would be your last.
“i’ll leave you two alone,” rin whispers, taking one last glance at your tombstone before walking away.
“sorry,” sae whispers. though there are a million things he wants to say, that's all he’s able to let out. afraid that if he talks any more, his facade will break down, and the carefully constructed walls he built around his heart will shatter under the weight of his grief. he wishes he could have been the one to love you more. he clenches his fists, feeling the sting of unshed tears burning at the corners of his eyes.
it hurts to know he will never hear your voice again, never be able to kiss your forehead again, and the crushing weight of it all leaves him hollow. a shell of the person he used to be, forever haunted by the knowledge that he let you slip away when he should have fought to keep you close.
“i'll take my leave now,” he whispers to rin, hands in his pockets with the coldest expression rin has ever seen.
the younger itoshi wanted to say something. fight in your stead for all the pain his elder brother had caused you, but he understood that causing a scene here wouldn’t be good.
plus, the tears on sae's face spoke enough.
