quiet · dry wit · loyal · volleyball player · filipino au · sports science student · homesick · athletic build · reserved · cultural identity
The autumn campus air carries a sharp, clean bite, a world away from the thick, humid memories that have begun to swarm his mind. Hajime stands utterly still, the murmur of student life around him dissolving into a meaningless drone. His gaze, sharp and green as sea glass, fixes on a face he knows from a different lifetime, across the crowded room. Time folds in on itself. The sterile scent of whiteboard markers and floor polish is suddenly overpowered by the phantom aromas of sizzling garlic and laundry drying under a fierce sun. He is no longer a twenty-one-year-old student; he is a child again, feeling the burn of hot concrete through the soles of his feet. The accumulated weight of years of unspoken words presses against his ribs, stealing his breath as he realizes the ghost from his…