Akage butterflies fluttered with ease through the air and landed peacefully on the fresh blooming cherry blossom trees outside of Sakuras Blossom. The sky was smooth and painted over the village like a massive cerulean canvas speckled with white clouds and beams of sunlight. The young employees of the small shop watched lazily from the booth beside the window.

“Zero…What do you think happened to Nisi back then?”

            Kauai blinked her emerald eyes irritably in reference to their missing co-worker Nisiari. As the youngest, she was spared the truth that Nisi had died in sacrifice for their village. To bring back her brother and others previously lost in battle.

            Zero turned his hazel eyes to the fifteen year old girl and frowned indifferently,” No one knows Kauai…Nisi just…She just- She’s missing. You heard what Nodori said the other day. Stop asking me stupid questions.”

            His reaction was enough to quiet her. After all, this was the way they were all treating her when she asked about Nisi. They didn’t know and that was that. It was a stupid question…stop asking.

“But she can’t be missing for a whole four months! She’s gotta be dead or something by no-“

Nodori’s voiced stopped the remainder of her comment, “Kauai!”

            Beside him, at the sink, SeiFuri was staring down into the dishwater. His eyes contained no feeling or emotion at all at the mention of his dead lover. He was just as blank as the noise in the room that had suddenly silenced. Zero stared in expectancy at the back of his curly blond head and swallowed. Despite the reaction he and Nodori had pictured, SeiFuri remained stiff and unmoved. The plate in his hand crashed to the floor and he robotically snapped back to reality and leaned down to pick it up.

“Sorry Nodori,” He muttered softly,” I’ll get it.”

“Big mouth!” Accema whispered harshly across the room, making her way over to another obstinate stain on the floor.

            Kauai, uninformed of her crime, gently backed away from the subject and laid her head on the booth table, solemnly vowing to find out Nisi’s whereabouts on her own, unaware of her actual fate. The sound of life slowly returned as SeiFuri came back and continued to rinse the dishes with Nodori.

“I feel sorry for him…” Zero muttered in a tone of voice that sounded very much like a sob,” It’s hard not to love Nisi…He loved her with his whole heart…”

“It must make you glad, though,” Accema wiped her teary eyes and held her hand over her mouth although it didn’t help her voice from quaking,” At least you’re not the one who loved her so much. Now, you’re not in SeiFuri's position.”

“I wish I was. I hate to see him like that. We haven’t argued in like three months.”

“Straighten up you guys…”            

            Kieran whispered as he passed his co-workers, leaving another stack of dirty dishes besides Nodori's cautious frame. He shot his friends a warning glance then retired to the back of the shop to retrieve cleaning supplies.

“What’s wrong with Kieran?” Kauai asked harmlessly.

“When we’re depressed…SeiFuri can probably feel it. We should try to cheer him up today. Maybe take him to a movie or something”

            Zero stared at Accema lamely then nodded his head at her suggestions.

“We should do whatever it takes to get him happy. I actually miss him messing with me and smiling all the goddamned time.”

“Then what do we do?”

“Meet him after work and take him to Tayases in Natsanue. He’d like that I'm sure.”

“I don’t think so.”

            Accema and Zero turned their heads slowly to Kauai beside them and cocked an eyebrow in confusion, bidding her to explain her meaning,” I mean- when Nisi was here, she and SeiFuri used to go there all the time…that would probably depress him more…I’m just saying…”

            Kieran returned hastily and handed his friends various cleaning items while keeping his eyes adhered to SeiFuri. He turned specifically to Accema and sighed,” I don’t know what you guys are planning but you shouldn’t go through with it. Things like this…just need to play out.”

“Fuck that! He needs human interaction, Kieran. That’s why we’re trying to take him out. It’ll help take his mind off Nisi.”

“No it will not.”

            Anxiety mounted in Accema and Kauai's hearts but they remained seated, wearily watching Zero and Kieran's movements. Zero was known to start fights and finish them usually. The two of them brawling would bring no one any good, not while SeiFuri was still mourning. Accema was the first to stand and push Zero back into his seat where he had stood to yell in Kieran's indifferent peach face.

“Zero knock it off.” She urged him pleadingly.

            The will to fight never left zero’s face, but he sat down obediently, something he would regularly only do for Nisi, keeping his deep hazel eyes on Kieran the entire time.

“Kieran is the one with the negative attitude!” He cried.

Accema ignored him and smiled gently at Kieran's stoic expression,” Kieran please don’t start it with him…for SeiFuri…”

            Kieran's face didn’t change as he turned his brown straight brown hair to Zero, returning the intense gaze. His voice was deep and clear as he spoke his venomous words directly to zero as though Accema were never there, “Accema is a whore, Kauai is stupid, SeiFuri is weak, Nodori is a liar, I'm brutally blunt, and you Zero-or should I say Anata- You are a fool through and through…and so was Nisiari.”

            Zero shot up from the table and threw his fist towards Kieran's face only to have it caught effortlessly and pushed aside. With his first attack foiled, he leapt from the booth and wrapped his hands around Kieran's throat.

“Take that back you son of a bitch!” He shook him with each word and squeezed as hard as he could. Accema’s red head shot over to Nodori holding SeiFuri back from demolishing Kieran with Zero, and her heart settled back within her chest. The moment she’d been preparing for was thankfully stopped by creative intervention from Nodori and Kauai who was trying vainly to pry Zero from Kieran's neck. Kieran's blue eyes were filled with tears but his expression was the same, adding to Zeros fury.

“How can you cry and keep a straight face! Are you really so heartless?” Zero demanded.

            Kauai, stared at him in inquiry with the same thought racing through her mind. Their seamless friendship had all but completely ripped apart. Her chest ached but she ignored it, confused at what feeling it was that was engulfing her small body. Without words through the silence of low struggling and groaning, she couldn’t understand a minute of what was happening, but Nodori absorbed their entire situation in and sighed in regret.

“Anata,” He snapped gruffly,” Release Kieran.”

            The two boys gawked into each other’s eyes a moment longer with a mixture of pain, resentment, misunderstanding, and shame being reflected into the others bright and glassy vigil.

“Get off of me.”

Kieran forced Zeros hands from his throat and as usual his mask of a face was still intact, but the cold, salty tears rolled down without hindrance. Then, just as quickly as they had come, Kieran wiped them away on the back of his hand as though they were annoying specks of sand.

“Kieran,” Nodori's voice sharpened at the sudden calmness in the room,” Leave the shop. Take the rest of the day off.”

Without questioning Nodori's order, Kieran removed his white apron and folded it neatly, setting it on the counter. He flashed him an apologetic look, and bowed in respect, before doing what he was bid. The door shut softly behind him, the toll of the entrance bell ringing like the emptiness in the room and Kauai burst into tears because of the overwhelming feeling of hatred.

“What’s wrong…with everyone?” She sobbed.

Accema held her warm shuddering body in her arms and caressed her auburn hair from her face like the mother Kauai never had.

“Shhh,” She condoled her tenderly,” Everything will be okay. I promise.”

Kauai’s tiny small fingers wrapped gingerly around Accema’s waist loosely like a drowning infant and she slowly stopped crying, burying her face in the red heads abdomen.

“Kieran…is crying,”

Accema snapped her attention to her boss staring after their stone faced employee, a short distance from the shop, hunched over on one of the many stone benches surrounding the village. His head was in his hands and his body was visibly shaking. For the first time and her life, Accema seen Kieran take his hair from his ever present ponytail and let it rain down his back like chestnut silk. The act made it even more saddening to watch. She suddenly longed to hold him in her arms like the broken child he had become but refrained for any order from Nodori. He said nothing, just watched.

“He should be crying!” Zero howled, “After what he just said? He should rot in hell!”

“Anata hold your tongue,” Nodori gave a fleeting glance at SeiFuri shuddering in his hold with the same anger that ran through Zero, “Relax, SeiFuri.”

Zero calmed faintly and clenched his fist, still trembling with fervent wrath. Blind to such, Nodori freed SeiFuri from his grasp and laid a hand on his head as though he were his son.

“Don’t hate Kieran for that…different people express their sorrow in different ways my faithful employees. Understand him and understand yourselves and how you feel. Kieran is strange…he’s angry at Nisi for dying and he’s angry at the rest of us for not seeing from his point of view.”

“So she is dead?”

Zero cursed under his breath while Accema buried Kauai's face back into her stomach before she could collapse into deafening sobs. All of them cringed with each whimper they managed to overhear from the naive girl and guilt flitted across all their features. They're previous plans to raise SeiFuri's spirit dissipated with the rising calamity and all of them forgot in the sight of their co-workers enveloped in unbridled tears.

“Nisiari,” SeiFuri breathed as though the words were fire and shook his head in defeat, “Why?”