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Description
There is an unforgettable memory;
Your shoulder, holding a single red leaf.

The piercing whistle of a flute paralyzes me, and the following crash of an imperial drum shakes me from my frozen position, but leaves me trembling helplessly. My hands are still in your hair, still clinging uselessly to a pair of rusted scissors.

You notice immediately, of course. The smile – the one no one had ever been able to refuse – that you had given before asking me to carry out this horrendous task comes to grace your gentle features once again, and with a touch so unmistakably delicate I would know it was yours even with my eyes closed, you take my now limp wrists, and worm the blades from my grip. It occurs to me with an agonizing wail from my chest for the first time as you do so, I'll never see that smile again.

The clash of metal against the floor serves somewhat as a wakeup call, and my hands burst back to life, making their way once again to your hair. It's so strange now, so short, though still a little wavy as it was before. If it weren't for the apparent femininity of your eyes – which, come to think of it, are my favourite shade of blue – and the daintiness of your jaw line and the perfect structure that is your nose, I think to myself while massaging a terrible black that destroys any and all trace of your pale pink hair into your scalp, I would have thought you a boy and this guise successful.

I try to think you make a handsome man, but the only word that ever seemed fit to describe you was beautiful, and is still all that feels correct.

When I can no longer see pink, I pull away. I find myself wondering how I'm to get by, no longer able to run my fingers through your soft, soft hair as I used to in your arms whenever I was upset, as I watch you neaten it out and pull a repulsive greenish brown cap over it. Looking over your uniform, I can't help but cringe, but I make sure to run through my head all the instructions you had given me before – to make sure to address you as Megurine Luki, and not Luka, in my letters, and not to forget that you are now a man and that nothing different could ever be suspected.

You sigh, and extend your arms to me, your smile from before descending into sadness.

'A hug before I go?'

Do you really need to ask?

I can feel a stinging at the edge of my gaze, so I'm quick to act – I fling my arms around your waist and bury my face deep into the crook of your neck before you get a chance to see the tears that threaten to spill.

I've been trying to keep them at bay all this time, but suddenly I feel myself beginning to drown in the memories of the simple happinesses we'd shared all these years. All too late, I realise that what I felt for you had been so faint at first I'd taken it for granted.

I fear at the bottom of the ocean I'll be unable to remember, but as you leave to answer the call of war in your old father's stead and your figure begins to fade into the burning, bleeding red of an autumn morning, you leave me with one memory, at least, that I can never forget – your shoulder, holding a single red leaf.

Description
There is an unforgettable memory;
Your shoulder, holding a single red leaf.

The piercing whistle of a flute paralyzes me, and the following crash of an imperial drum shakes me from my frozen position, but leaves me trembling helplessly. My hands are still in your hair, still clinging uselessly to a pair of rusted scissors.

You notice immediately, of course. The smile – the one no one had ever been able to refuse – that you had given before asking me to carry out this horrendous task comes to grace your gentle features once again, and with a touch so unmistakably delicate I would know it was yours even with my eyes closed, you take my now limp wrists, and worm the blades from my grip. It occurs to me with an agonizing wail from my chest for the first time as you do so, I'll never see that smile again.

The clash of metal against the floor serves somewhat as a wakeup call, and my hands burst back to life, making their way once again to your hair. It's so strange now, so short, though still a little wavy as it was before. If it weren't for the apparent femininity of your eyes – which, come to think of it, are my favourite shade of blue – and the daintiness of your jaw line and the perfect structure that is your nose, I think to myself while massaging a terrible black that destroys any and all trace of your pale pink hair into your scalp, I would have thought you a boy and this guise successful.

I try to think you make a handsome man, but the only word that ever seemed fit to describe you was beautiful, and is still all that feels correct.

When I can no longer see pink, I pull away. I find myself wondering how I'm to get by, no longer able to run my fingers through your soft, soft hair as I used to in your arms whenever I was upset, as I watch you neaten it out and pull a repulsive greenish brown cap over it. Looking over your uniform, I can't help but cringe, but I make sure to run through my head all the instructions you had given me before – to make sure to address you as Megurine Luki, and not Luka, in my letters, and not to forget that you are now a man and that nothing different could ever be suspected.

You sigh, and extend your arms to me, your smile from before descending into sadness.

'A hug before I go?'

Do you really need to ask?

I can feel a stinging at the edge of my gaze, so I'm quick to act – I fling my arms around your waist and bury my face deep into the crook of your neck before you get a chance to see the tears that threaten to spill.

I've been trying to keep them at bay all this time, but suddenly I feel myself beginning to drown in the memories of the simple happinesses we'd shared all these years. All too late, I realise that what I felt for you had been so faint at first I'd taken it for granted.

I fear at the bottom of the ocean I'll be unable to remember, but as you leave to answer the call of war in your old father's stead and your figure begins to fade into the burning, bleeding red of an autumn morning, you leave me with one memory, at least, that I can never forget – your shoulder, holding a single red leaf.