I jolt out of my thoughts, fingers still grasping the little bottle. I look down at the red haze swirling inside it, winding and curling around the black smoke but never quite managing to surround and dissolve it. I could never figure out what it is that the bottle contains. A part of me believes that maybe I'm holding a part of Sakura's soul in my hands. I don't know if the thought is comforting or terrifying because if the red smoke is her, then that must mean she's trapped inside the glass with the demon and that is not something I'd wish on anyone. Yet at the same time, I can't let go of the vial. My mind is about to wander off again when I sense someone coming closer.

"Konnichiwa," she says, slightly out of breath after climbing the stairs to the temple. But there's a hint of a smile on her face when she tucks a strand of hair behind her ear.

"Hi," I greet back. Up close, I can see that her red kimono is covered in big prints of cranes and butterflies. They seem to move with every flutter of her sleeves. She opens her mouth and closes it again as if she's trying to say something but can't quite figure out how. Her hands fidget around the handle of a basket lined with sprigs of cherry blossoms.

The scent hits my nose, the memory of a red hoodie flashes before my eye and my chest clenches painfully.

But as I look at the girl in front of me again, I slowly begin to really see her. Her eyes are hazel, shifting from green to brown and back again with every movement of her head. Her hair is not raven black, but the colour of ground coffee, dark but warm. The strand she tucked away just a moment ago comes undone again, brushing her cheek.

It's not her, my heart whispers and my chest feels a little lighter.

Sakura always seemed to know what to say and she wasn't afraid to do it. She didn't waste time on being hesitant, she didn't let her nervousness show. She was, in a way, so much stronger than I ever was. And that was what had me drawn to her.

The girl speaks and her voice pulls my attention back to her. I think she asks me if I want to go to the hanami picnic with her. I find myself nodding and smiling back at her.

Maybe, I think, I should try to live again.