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He’s not coming back, Karin tells herself, and she should know better.
Even so.
Whenever winter came again and snow began to fall, she couldn’t help but be reminded of him. The green scarf he liked to wear. The frown that he tried to hide behind a cloud of condensed air.
Winter was his season, after all.
(They met in summer, under blue skies and sunlit grass, but it is winter that Karin finds herself missing him the most.)
There’s something comfortable about the cold, about the crispness of snow that makes Karin smile, despite it all, and want to go out.
It’s such a silly thought, after all. A young girl’s wish, once a joke, then a prayer, now a tradition.
To think — to fool herself that first snow marked his arrival.
Then all she had to do was notice it falling, and see him through the window, and wave at him with such carefree joy.
Why would he come back? Karin chides herself, her smile fading. The danger was over. Her world was safe. The Hollows that terrorized Karakura Town are no more.
(For her, then.)
Stop it, Karin sighs, grabbing a red scarf and loops it round her neck. She knows very well that looking for him will only end in inevitable sorrow.
And yet, what’s the harm in trying?
Next year, she promises herself, she’ll stop hoping, stop wishing, stop looking.
Next year, the hurt won’t be so bad.
I am so foolish, Karin thinks, despondent but pushing on anyway, and steps outside, fully aware that it’s a promise she’ll make and break again and again.
Year after year, her heart can’t help but stumble and yearn for him. If he can’t come to her, maybe she can go to him. Maybe the footsteps left in snow will lead them to each other, meeting midway.
Because what if, her treacherous, aching heart whispers, against all the layers, and lies, and losses, what if this time he’s back?