Ren stared at the slip of paper in his poetry book, his heart pounding like a drum in his ears.
"Don't forget me."
His fingers trembled. The handwriting was delicate, elegant—definitely not his. He hadn't written this. He hadn't even opened the book since he bought it.
He flipped through the pages again. Nothing else. No clue as to where it came from. But the words stared up at him like a whisper frozen in ink. They matched exactly what the girl in his dreams had said. It couldn't be a coincidence. Could it?
He rose from his bed, stepping onto the cool wooden floor of his room. The Tokyo skyline glittered beyond his window, distant and detached, while inside, his world narrowed to one question: Who was she?
He pressed the note to his chest, closed his eyes, and for a moment, let the silence guide him.
---
Far away in Yukinose, Aira's pen froze above her notebook. She had just finished writing about Ren again—his smile, the fragments of memories she couldn't explain, and the strange sense that he was trying to reach her.
She looked up at the stars outside her window, now clear and unclouded. The Milky Way shimmered overhead, spilling across the heavens like a celestial river.
Aira reached out toward the sky. "Are you real?"
The light flickered. Her desk lamp buzzed once, then returned to normal.
She took that as an answer.
---
Over the next few days, Ren and Aira both became obsessed—not in the unhealthy, compulsive way, but with the quiet intensity of two souls following the same thread.
Every night, Ren scribbled notes, sketches, even short poems. They came from somewhere deep inside—like he wasn't just creating them, but remembering them. Every time he drew her, the image came clearer: the slope of her jaw, the length of her hair, even the silver charm bracelet she always seemed to wear.
At the same time, Aira began exploring the woods behind her town, drawn by a feeling she couldn't explain. She followed the river upstream one afternoon after school and found a small stone shrine she had never noticed before. Moss-covered and nestled under a maple tree, the shrine bore no name, no offerings—only a single white ribbon tied around its base.
When she touched the ribbon, a vision hit her like a wave.
Rain on a city street. A boy's voice calling her name. And a star—falling, burning, vanishing into darkness.
She stumbled back, gasping.
---
Ren experienced something similar later that night.
He was walking home from cram school, passing under an overpass when he heard music. Soft and ancient, like a lullaby. It was coming from nowhere. He stopped, turned, but the street was empty.
Then the sky cracked.
A shooting star blazed overhead—so bright it turned night into day for a heartbeat. Ren's breath caught in his throat. The moment slowed, stretched, like the world was holding its breath.
And in that silence, he heard her.
Aira's voice.
"Ren... can you hear me?"
He staggered back. "Yes. Who are you?"
No answer.
---
The next morning, Ren called in sick. He couldn't focus on anything but the growing puzzle. He spent hours on forums, searching for similar experiences. Dreams that cross space. Memories of people you've never met. He found a few posts—most dismissed as fiction or mental illness—but one caught his attention.
A user named "StardustSleeper" had written:
Sometimes, souls are linked across lives. Not everyone meets their twin in the same time or place. But when the connection is strong, they remember—through dreams, through echoes. Some call it fate. Others call it a curse.
He clicked the profile. No recent activity. The post was two years old.
But it felt like a sign.
---
That weekend, Aira visited the town library. Yukinose's archive was small but rich in local folklore. She asked the librarian about the shrine she found.
"Ah," the old woman said, tapping her chin. "You must mean the Starbound Shrine. People say it's a place where lovers separated by distance could pray to find each other again."
"Does it work?" Aira asked.
The woman smiled. "If your heart is strong enough."
Aira returned to the shrine that evening, just as the sun dipped behind the hills. She brought a piece of parchment and wrote only two words:
Find me.
She placed it at the base of the shrine, heart pounding.
---
Ren woke up the next morning to find a strange sensation in his hand. He blinked and saw ink smudged on his fingers. Confused, he sat up and saw the parchment—an old, weathered piece of paper lying beside his pillow.
Find me.
He gasped.
How was that possible?
He didn't know the answer. All he knew was that he had to find her.
That night, he opened his poetry book and wrote back.
I will.
Then, for the first time since his dreams began, Ren slept without crying.
---
(To be continued…)