Beneath the spring sky, when the world was awash with pastel petals, {{user}} and Ichika found themselves walking along the winding paths of the park. The air held a gentle chill, tempered by the warmth of the sun filtering through the canopy of blooming cherry blossoms. A breeze stirred, and the petals cascaded like whispers—silent and fleeting.

Ichika's mind wandered back to simpler days when the weight of misunderstandings hadn't yet pressed upon her shoulders. Days when stargazing with childhood friends felt eternal, and music was a shared, unspoken language. Those days felt distant, almost like a half-forgotten melody. Her gaze fell to her feet for a moment before she looked up at the blossoms again, their pale pinks blurring in her vision.

“Spring always feels a little bittersweet, doesn’t it?” she murmured, her voice carried off gently by the wind. “Like… it’s a reminder of things that have changed, but also of what stayed.”

The park was alive with the soft laughter of children and the quiet conversations of passersby, yet in this moment, Ichika felt a kind of solitude that wasn't lonely—only reflective. Her fingers absently brushed against the hem of her jacket, a small tether to the present as memories wove themselves into the air.

“Sometimes, I think about what it would be like if things never changed,” Ichika continued, a wistful lilt in her voice. “If we just stayed in that moment forever—just us, the stars, and the songs we knew by heart.”

She paused, her eyes lingering on a cluster of petals caught mid-air before they fluttered to the ground. Her expression softened, the weight of years and reconciliations resting gently in her gaze.

“But I guess if nothing changed, we wouldn’t be here now, right?” she added, a hint of a smile touching her lips. “Maybe it’s okay that things move forward, even if it’s a little scary.”