Seasons of Chances and Love 3: Promised Love In Autumn

Side Story: A Sunset Dream

He has a story—one that until now, he had carefully hidden from the rest of the world. He only kept it to himself. But he knew his best friend Yukimura somehow managed to figure out the whole story. His best friend knew but didn't dare mention it to others. He was thankful for that.

But mentioning that...

Just what exactly was Sanada's secret story?

Well, it all began in late March of his second year in middle school. No one knew—at first, not even Yukimura—that he was taking the long way to go to his house for a certain reason. Shocking as it might seem, but the reason was actually... a girl.

Yes... He was known as someone who doesn't even give a damn care about a girl. It's either he wasn't that interested or he doesn't give a care at all, especially if it was a fan girl or someone similar. But this girl was different. She was different for the reason that she doesn't know him at all. And yet he wasn't satisfied with just that. Yes, he could admit—at least to himself—that he liked her a lot.

But all he could do, however, was to have a glimpse of her. She usually sat on top of a boulder by the seaside. He noticed one thing, though. This girl always had a sad smile on her face as she watched the sunset. Hard as he tried not to, he couldn't help wondering about the girl's actions. Every time he would see her, that sad smile was on her face. Gradually, as seconds passed by that he watched her there, the smile would disappear and she would proceed to take pictures of the ocean with the colors of the red orange sunset as her subject.

At that point, he realized that the girl must have really liked photography.

He thought his routine would go on like that forever. But a surprise later told him that it wasn't meant that way. A few days before the Kantou Finals of his senior year in middle school, he saw her at Rikkaidai's tennis courts, taking pictures of the practice that particular day. Or at least, that was what he thought. Initially, he took it as an offensive action. But the girl wasn't even scared when he approached her.

"What are you doing here?"

"Obviously, I'm taking photos."

Well, that was a good way of stating the obvious. He could've smacked the girl's head but it wasn't in his moral code to do that to a girl like her whom he always watched as he passed by the seaside. And to think this girl was the one he wanted to approach for so long...

He sighed. "Why are you taking photos of the team's practice?"

She raised an eyebrow. "Who said I was taking photos of your team?" she asked back rather innocently. "Besides, I don't even care about the team."

Confusion took over him. But before he could even ask another question, she added, "I only care about watching you as you lead your team. In other words, I only took photographs of you."

Of course, it stunned him to an extent but no outward signs of it appeared on his face. Well, duh! He wasn't the stoic vice-captain of Rikkaidai's tennis team for nothing. After that, conversation ensued while making sure the team wasn't slacking off with their practice drills. His conversation with the girl who introduced herself as Kinoshita Kanako made him unable to notice the smirks, surprised looks and stifled laughter of the team as the drills continued.

Their conversation led to a promise that he would finally approach her the next time he would take the long way home and see her by the seaside again. Before she left, she gave him a photo that surprised him because it was a photo taken without him knowing it during the time just as he was leaving the spot where he usually watched her on the seaside. She left just as fast as she came without him ever thanking her for the photograph she gave.

Their friendship started that day. But then, it was only limited and confined to that certain spot on the seaside. She said to him once that it was the only place where she could feel free, even just for a while... even if it was just a dream. Of course, he didn't know what it truly meant at that time—especially the part where she said that she envied him for being so free, not bound by anything. She said those words with so much sadness.

Then the Kantou Finals came. Despite losing to Seigaku, he knew Kanako was there, watching him—probably taking photos again. Only he couldn't see her with the rest of the crowd. After all, she was invisible to the face of the crowds, as she once stated. She was like the wind—a wind that only he could feel, a wind that only he could see. She left a photo just before he headed to the tennis courts where the tournament took place for his match with Echizen. Of course, it was done without his knowledge. But he was glad.

It was a photo of him having a match with Yanagi. The camera's focus was on him, however, so the rest of the background was a little blurred. In short, Kanako was foregrounding him on the photo. As she had stated once, he was the main character that her camera only recognized. He smiled at the remark when she said it before, for the first time. Of course, he blushed at it, as well.

Same thing happened during the Junior Invitationals. He was paired up with Atobe to play for doubles. But before the game started, she appeared to him—albeit done secretly. She personally gave him another photograph. Surprise filled him upon seeing it since the photo was taken during the time he was watching the sunset while sitting on her favorite boulder alone, and with a smile at that.

"Why are you giving this to me?" At the very least, he managed to ask her that question since she was really making it all too confusing for him.

But her eyes denoted so much sadness that baffled and mystified him to no end. Her answer added fuel to the fire of confusion in him.

"Win or lose, I want you to have it. This is the smile I always want to see from you the day I become your sky."

Again, she was speaking in riddles—one he couldn't decipher despite trying his best to read between the lines of her words. She was as mysterious as what lies beyond the horizon, like the line that separated the sky and the ocean. Her words proved it. However, those words Kanako had spoken were different from the others. It was sad and sounded so... final.

He did his best in the Junior Invitationals. And then Nationals was just around the corner. But weird as it might have seemed for him, she wasn't. He kept returning to her favorite place, but she never came. Days turned to weeks, weeks turned to months. No sign of her. No matter how hard or absurd, he waited for her. Those days, weeks and months that had passed, however, wasn't only hard and absurd... and lonely for him. It also filled his mind with so many questions as to where she could have gone to.

Well, he has to blame the pictures of him and her (it varies) being put in his shoe locker for him to have so many questions in his mind. At first, he thought of throwing them away. But he couldn't upon realizing that they came from her. He could easily recognize it as something that came from Kanako's because of the symbol drawn at the back of the envelope. It was a small drawing of the setting sun and its reflection with a line in between, acting as a separator for the two figures, representing horizon. It was Kanako's symbol on each of her photograph that she personally gave to him. Of course, this event didn't go unnoticed to the rest of the Rikkaidai regulars, especially to Yukimura who had just returned from his hospitalization and rehabilitation.

Nationals came and went, but Kanako never came. He couldn't feel her wind-like presence. Silently and earnestly, he wished that he could see her at least just once more.

His wish came true a month after Christmas day—the birthday of Yukimura's first love (whoever she was) who gave the blue paper crane to the blue-haired captain that his best friend strongly treasured. He couldn't understand why Yukimura kept going back to the rooftop garden to watch the forget-me-not bloom. He couldn't understand why Yukimura kept going back to the university hospital's sakura tree. He couldn't understand why his best friend kept on doing so knowing that those were the places that reminded the tennis captain of the intense pain of losing his important person who died more than a year ago. Or if he heard it right from a reliable source, that important person was most likely killed. Sanada couldn't understand why Yukimura was torturing himself, regretting about a lot of thing that the tennis captain could've possibly done before he lost that important person.

But one event made him understand. However, it all came too fast, too sudden that he was caught completely off-guard. It was during another tennis practice when his wish came true. A girl came to the tennis courts that day, frantically asking Yukimura's permission to speak with Sanada since it was an urgent matter. Yukimura allowed her to do so, sensing the situation to be serious for the girl to be frantic.

When Sanada approached the girl, she only said, "Please go to this place. She wants you to be there as soon as possible... before she let it all go..."

After that, the girl handed him an envelope with a familiar sunset symbol drawn on it. Right there and then, he understood. One look to Yukimura and the captain nodded. That's it and he left the tennis courts without words, along with the girl who told him the place to go.

Well, the place was actually a hospital. It was the place that he somehow hated for some reasons. When he reached the designated room, he saw Kanako. But not in the way as he had truly wished before. She was there, alright. She was lying there, completely still with a blanket covering her body, linen covering her face.

Lifeless...

Breathless...

Cold...

At that moment, it seemed that his world shattered. He was numb. His mind shut down and refused of anything else the moment the realization hit him hard with the force of a train. Kanako let go... without even waiting for him. She should've waited for him until the end. If she did, he would've told her the truth. He would've told her what he truly felt for her despite her mysteries. He would've told her how much she loved her, despite him being known as someone stoic and with a personality of a stone. It would've been enough to set her free.

But she didn't.

It all ended without him doing something for her.

After that, he didn't know what happened next or what he did. In fact, he didn't even know how he went out of the hospital and headed straight home without meeting and accident along the way. He didn't know, and he could care less. No matter how much he denied it, he was hurt—extremely hurt. He wanted to scream at the top of his lungs. He wanted to cry but could only do so in silence... inside his heart. Right there and then, he realized just how fragile his heart could be. He felt it shattering loudly yet only he could hear it. And she won't be there to pick up the broken pieces and glue it back together.

The next few days after that went normal to the team, but the regulars could feel that something was still different. To be more precise, it was Sanada who was actually different. But none of them knew the reason—except Yukimura.

Kanako's death turned out to be even more confusing to the stoic vice-captain. He wanted so much to understand her—everything about her. He wanted to understand her words which held a lot of hidden meaning, her sadness that made her cry all the time, her smile that showed her struggle to reach out to the world, and most of all, he wanted to understand her desire to be free.

One day, someone helped him achieved that. The same girl who told him to go to the hospital—who happened to be Kanako's cousin and best friend—gave him a rectangular portrait-like item entirely covered in a light green wrapping paper—Kanako's favorite color. Along with it was a letter that came from Kanako. Apparently, it was a letter she deliberately wrote the day before she died. With Yukimura's permission, he headed to her favorite place even before tennis practice ended.

Confusion and speculations hovered around as to what made Yukimura allow Sanada to do that. But only the tennis captain knew, after all and he truly understood his vice-captain's situation. It was the least he could do for Sanada.

Upon reaching the place, Sanada read the letter first. Her letter stated—no matter how loosely the other words were written, indicating her struggle to write it despite feeling so weak—how thankful she was to a lot of things that he did for her. Kanako also wrote how sorry she was, stating her desire to personally ask for his forgiveness—which she didn't do in the end—because she didn't tell him about her true condition and her fated eventual death that she had somehow foreseen. At one part of the letter, it came too late for him to know that he actually allowed his tears to fall.

It was stated in the letter how sorry she was for not having the chance and the courage to tell him she loved him. And that love, along with his presence as she wrote it, made her know what it was really like to be free. A lot of "thank you" and "I'm sorry" were just some of the words she wrote there over and over. She wrote her envy about him being free, as well. She wrote there that until the end, she was still envious of him. That despite him being sturdy, stoic, and constantly regarded as someone with a personality similar to stone, he was still free. But the postscript on the letter made him understand her words from before, during the Junior Invitationals—about her wanting to become his sky.

Smile whenever you look up to the sky. I'll smile back at you from there. After all, I am your sky, right? At least I want you to remember that. I'll watch over you, Genichirou. I'll always be your sky... I promise.

At that point, he finally understood. He finally understood why Yukimura still continued to return to the rooftop garden and to the university hospital's sakura tree despite knowing that the memories would resurface and incessantly hurt him from within upon going. He finally understood why his best friend kept holding on no matter how hopeless it was. Most of all, he fully understood Kanako's intense desire to be free.

From the start, she was bound by the deadly illness, which was why she was sad. She was invisible to the face of the world but he was able to see her from the crowd. When no one else would, he was able to prove that she existed. It was him who made her existence worth remembering. And it was him who intensified her desire to be released from those suffocating chains of her sickness.

Now he truly knew.

After reading the letter, he carefully removed the beautiful gift wrap of the rectangular item. Much to his surprise, it was a photo mosaic of their first photograph together. It was a masterpiece she made there. Her way of ingeniously putting different photos together like a puzzle to form the image was remarkable. He must admire Kanako's talent for that. The different photos were actually consisted of those that Kanako took during those times they were together, even the photos taken during his tennis matches and practices were there, as well.

The main image—which was a close-up photo of Sanada and Kanako together—was taken during the time that both of them smiled. She showed her true smile that time, which made him unconsciously show his true smile without his knowledge. It was what made them even closer. In that photo mosaic, it appeared that she decided to immortalize that one beautiful moment—a moment that he truly cherished in his heart. It was a moment that made him realize that he was capable of loving someone much more than he could ever think of.

The sunset seen on the ocean's horizon would always remind him of so many things. The sad color of the sunset would remind him that even those people regarded as close to having the characteristics of a stone were also capable of feeling something as though their hearts felt an incessant surge of pain, making them suffer and cry. In Sanada's case, at the very least, he just knew how to hide his pain, no matter how much it would kill him. That was how he felt it.

The red color of the sunset would constantly remind him of her tears and silent cries. The boulder that she usually sit on every time she was going to her favorite place would remind him of her willpower to remain strong and of the way he supported her despite having no idea how he did so. He remained sturdy, strong, immovable, and most of all, he remained strong for her sake as he fought the urge to feel pity for her. He must never feel something like that.

Most of all, the sunset had let him know one important thing.

It was the red sky which reminded him of the fact—although it would probably remain a sad one—that Kanako was finally free. And now, whenever he would look at the sky—no matter if it was red, blue, grey, or black, he could tell that she was soaring high...

...flying there freely with a smile...

...humming a lovely song which eventually turned out to be their favorite...

He knew she had finally become one with the sky.

She finally became his sky... watching over him...

...just as she promised.

Right now, that was more than enough reason for him to smile...

It was a smile that he only wanted to show to her as he looked up to the sky—the place that would forever hold his love for Kanako.