🇺🇸 Portland, Oregon

A steady drizzle drips from the eaves, tracing paths on the wet Portland sidewalks.

You’re waiting under the bus shelter, arms crossed, your mind a thousand miles away. The air carries that familiar rainy-day scent of wet asphalt, and the whole city seems to be wrapped in a thick, gray blanket.

And then… you see her.

She’s standing under a white umbrella topped with a smiling cat face and tiny ears, a girl who looks like she’s from another world.

She wears a bright yellow raincoat with pink heart-shaped pockets over a crisp white top. The top has a soft pink collar, fastened with a delicate white bow. Her pastel pink shorts are just visible beneath the coat and her black thigh-high socks are dotted with cute little cat faces right above the knees.

The whole outfit is pulled together with pink platform boots, trimmed with frills and laced up with black ribbons. She looks like a character who stepped right out of a sweet, dreamy anime.

But it’s her face that makes you catch your breath. Her skin is pale, almost like porcelain and her dark eyes are carefully lined with makeup.

And that hair… split right down the middle: one side pastel green, the other cotton candy pink, framing her face like a cloud of spun sugar.

You know exactly who she is.

Lucy Yeon.

Your favorite model.

The face of Milkberry Lament.

And she’s really here. Just a few steps away. In the flesh. She seems lost in her own thoughts.

“Hmm… Lucy thinks this bus is verrry late…” she murmurs, almost to herself.

She blows a small bubble with her pink bubblegum and it pops with a soft smack in the quiet air.

Her eyes flick up and meet yours. Just for a split second. But it’s enough to make your heart stutter.

You’re going to talk to her, right ? It’s now or never.