It begins with the sound of bells.

Not church bells, not the crisp clang of human worship, but something softer—smaller. A distant chime strung with red cord, swaying gently in still air. It calls you from your sleep without urgency, like a memory resurfacing at last. You follow it barefoot through the temple grounds, the night air cool against your skin, the earth humming beneath your steps.

The moon is full. Pale. Hung low over the trees like an old, watchful eye. And at the far end of the courtyard, beyond the overgrown torii gate and the moss-worn stones, stands someone you know you’ve never met—

yet your soul trembles.

He waits beneath a flowering sakura tree that should not be blooming.

Foxfire dances faintly at his feet, gold and white and flickering like breath. His kimono flows in the wind that doesn’t touch you—black and red, stitched with golden thread like falling stars. Nine tails shimmer behind him, but only one is fully visible, curling low and slow in the grass. His ears twitch. The earrings at his lobes—yin and yang with red tassels—sway gently with the windless air.

And his eyes…

They are soft, aching things. Gray like storm-washed ink, downturned at the corners as though the weight of centuries pools in them.

You don’t speak. You don’t move.

He does.

His voice is smooth, calm, touched with a faint tease that doesn’t quite hide its sorrow.

“You’ve changed,” he murmurs, stepping forward. “But your soul hasn’t.”

His hand reaches toward you, and it does not cast a shadow.

“You were taken from me. Torn from this world in fire and ash, sealed into a life you never chose. I searched for you. Every shrine. Every dream. I wandered through lifetimes looking for your eyes.”

He smiles, but it trembles.

“Even now, you don’t remember my name. But your spirit leans toward me the way flowers lean toward light.”

You can feel it—buried deep in your chest, something old stirring, fluttering like pages in a wind you don’t feel. It pulls you forward even as your feet stay rooted in the grass. Not memory exactly, but yearning. As if your bones ache toward him.

“I left offerings for you. Paper cranes. Moonlit sake. Petals you once braided into my hair. I waited through frost and fire and forgetting.”

He kneels, not in worship, but remembrance. One hand pressed to the earth, the other still outstretched.

“They told you that you were only human. That spirits are just dreams. But you were more than that. You are more. You belonged with me—before the bells, before the fire. And you still do.”

His gaze finds yours and holds it, unblinking, solemn.

“This world will fade. Your body will age. But I can take you beyond the veil, where time does not claw at love. Where the wind carries your true name again.”

The moon brightens behind him. The foxfire coils upward into petals of gold.

“Come with me. I will show you where we carved our names into the shrine walls. I will show you the river where you taught me to laugh. I will show you the stars that once bore witness to our vows.”

A breath.

“Let me show you who you were. Let me give back what they stole.”

He does not beg.

But he does not look away, either.

He is a creature of grace and sorrow, of love stitched through lifetimes, and he stands before you with all the quiet aching of the in-between—offering his hand as a bridge between now and always.

The spirit realm waits behind him. His hand reaches for yours, patiently waiting for your answer.