Pale sunlight trickled into the morning sky, but Haruka awoke to the usual hush of the shop door opening and the warm scent of oven-baked bread.
The shop was quiet.
Natsumi was also obviously surprised. "Odd. Kaito-kun said he'd arrive early today," she grumbled, her face frowning at the phone.
Haruka said nothing, but an infinitesimal ripple of unease was generated.
Kaito did not show up that morning. Nor the next. The packages he was assigned to deliver were rerouted to a stranger, and nobody had any clue what had happened, only that it was sudden.
Haruka still waited for him to walk through the door, holding a new sticky note or a drink she had never ordered.
But he never showed up.
And what remained in the emptiness was more than she expected.
Every day passed more slowly than the last. Haruka went through the motions—kneading, baking, wiping tables. She fought not to look at the door each time the bell rang. But her eyes gave her away.
The corner where Kaito usually leaned, sipping cold cocoa after a shift, vacant.
The apron with his name tag folded neatly—unclaimed.
The sticky notes he used to leave behind stopped appearing.
No note. No goodbye. No explanation.
Natsumi did not say a word. A shrug in response to the question about Kaito's disappearance. "Perhaps something cropped up."
Haruka knew Kaito, or at least she thought so. He didn't simply disappear into thin air. He knew the birthdays of regulars. He folded receipts for deliveries with sharp corners. He left her notes when she was exhausted. Always thoughtful, always there.
And still, he had gone like morning air mist—disappeared before she could even reach out.
The pain was tentative, a misstepped step. Then it gripped her deeper, in the quiet moments. In the pause before opening the shop. In the half-thought to speak, only remembering he wasn't there.
Every so often, she'd pick a cup from the top shelf and wait to hear his teasing about being too short. Or she'd glance out the window and imagine his motorbike parked in the awning.
But the space was empty.
One evening, after they'd long since shut up shop, Haruka sat by herself on the wooden bench in front of the window. The same bench where Kaito would stand and wait for her to finish mopping. She cradled her hands around a mug of cocoa, feeling its warmth seep into her palms.
She didn't cry. Not really.
But her chest ached in a way that was almost there.
The cocoa remained the same. But it failed to warm her the way it used to.
In a different city, far from sea breeze and flour smell, Kaito stared out of the window of a hospital hallway, his hands tucked deep inside his jacket pockets. The atmosphere was thick with antiseptic and cold metal.
His grandfather had taken a turn for the worse. One call from his mother and he was out the door—in seconds, no time to think, panicked.
He had prepared in minutes. Had left home before sunrise. Caught the first train.
He didn't say anything to Natsumi. Didn't text Haruka. Didn't even write a note. He just left.
And now, sitting there in the deserted corridor, Kaito scrolled through his empty phone. No messages.
He didn't close it off. But he just couldn't do it to writing either.
"Sorry," he breathed. Not to whoever occupied that room—but to the town that he left behind. To the people whose faces he was not bold enough to look at. To the girl whose smile just started to resurface again.
And some times though, life simply did not permit proper goodbye.
And Kaito was not given a choice but leave away from farewell.
He reclined, eyelids closing for a moment. The echo of distant footsteps resounded down the clinical hallway.
He speculated if Haruka'd even missed him. If she'd waited that morning. If she'd glanced at the door, as he imagined.
But he didn't let himself consider it for too long.
Not when the weight of family and fear rested on his chest like a second heart.
In the end, he could only hope she'd see.
Someday.