1: White Carnations

The Yamanaka Flower Shop sat quiet in the late afternoon.

“Ino! Watch the shop for me—I’ll be back soon.”

Her mother stood in the doorway, bag in hand, already half out the door. Her voice carried the easy authority of someone who expected to be obeyed.

“But Mom, I was going out too.”

A small girl came running from the back room—four, maybe five years old, dressed in a cream sleeveless top and a pale lavender skirt, a light blue hairclip pinned in her short golden hair. She skidded to a stop beside her mother and looked up with barely-concealed urgency.

“I made plans. With a friend.”

“Dad’s working, and I just need to pop over to Aunt Yoshino’s. I won’t be long.” Her mother crouched down and ruffled her hair with a warm smile. “Be good, okay?”

“But I promised—”

Her mother studied her for a moment—the carefully chosen outfit, the slight pout—and her expression softened with understanding.

“Thirty minutes.” She held up three fingers. “I’ll be back in thirty minutes. Deal?”

Ino wavered. Then she let out a small, defeated sigh. “…Fine.”

“That’s my girl.” Another ruffle of the hair, and her mother stood. “Back soon!”

“You have to come back fast!” Ino called after her retreating figure.

No answer. The door swung shut.

Ino turned back to the empty shop. She dragged a stool over behind the counter, climbed up, and flopped forward onto the glass surface, chin resting on her folded arms, staring at the door.

“Sakura’s going to think I stood her up.”

She exhaled slowly.

“Sorry, Sakura.”

……

Time passed. The flowers sat fragrant and still in their arrangements. Outside, the street went about its business.

Then a shadow appeared in the doorway.

“Welcome to the Yamanaka Flower Shop.” Ino straightened up automatically. “How can I—”

She stopped.

The boy standing at the entrance looked about her age. He wore a plain black yukata, and his dark hair fell straight to his shoulders, ink-black and perfectly still. He didn’t move, didn’t speak—just stood there with his hands at his sides, taking in the shop with calm, grey-tinged eyes.

He’s…

Ino blinked.

Really pretty.

She slid down from the stool and came around the counter to meet him. Up close, his features were fine and pale, with an almost cool beauty to them—like something carved rather than grown. But those dark eyes held a flatness that gave her pause.

“Um. What are you looking for?” she asked.

“Carnations.”

His voice was quiet. Direct.

“For your mom?” she tried.

“Yes.”

Ino went back behind the counter and climbed up to reach the display shelf, pulling down three bundled arrangements—pink, red, and yellow. She laid them out on the counter between them.

“These are the three we have. Pink means wishing her beauty and youth. Red is for health and long life. Yellow is for admiration—like saying thank you for everything.” She tilted her head. “Is it her birthday?”

He shook his head. “Do you have white?”

“White?” Ino hesitated. “White carnations aren’t really… a gift kind of flower.”

He shook his head again—not arguing, just certain. “One white bunch. Please.”

She looked at him. At the stillness in his face. Something clicked quietly into place, and she swallowed the rest of what she’d been about to say.

“One moment.”

She put the other bunches back and reached for the white carnations kept toward the back of the display. When she lifted them down, their scent drifted up—clean and faint, the petals translucent as thin paper, each one layered soft and precise around the hidden center.

She set them on the counter.

“Two hundred ryo.”

He reached into his yukata and produced the coins without comment. Ino counted them, and as she did, she found herself studying his face again. She’d never seen him around the village before. With a face like that, she would have remembered.

He picked up the flowers and turned to leave.

“Wait—”

He paused. Looked back at her, puzzled.

“Ino.” She pointed to herself. “Yamanaka Ino. That’s my name.”

A beat of silence.

“…Shin Takami.”

Shin.

“We’ll see each other again,” she called after him as he stepped out into the street.

He didn’t answer.

Ino stood in the doorway and watched him go, the white carnations clutched at his side.

He looks a little like Sasuke, she thought absently. That same kind of pretty.

She was still standing there when her mother’s familiar silhouette appeared at the end of the street.

“Ino! Back in thirty, just like I promised.” Her mother smiled as she approached, reaching out to pat her head. “Were there any customers?”

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“Mom…” Ino said slowly.

“Mm?”

“Someone just bought a white carnation.”

Her mother paused. Looked at her.

“White ones are so beautiful,” Ino said. “Why do they have to mean that?”

Her mother was quiet for a moment—piecing it together. Then she crouched down and met Ino’s eyes, her voice gentle. “There’s a lot of sadness in this world, sweetheart. We can’t undo what’s already happened.” She tucked a strand of gold hair behind Ino’s ear. “But if you ever run into that boy again—be kind to him, okay? Sometimes that’s all anyone needs.”

“Does he… need my help?”

“Maybe. Maybe not. But kindness has a way of coming back around.” Her mother smiled. “Now—didn’t you say you had plans with Sakura?”

“…Sakura!”

Ino was already running.

The Memorial Stone stood at the edge of the forest, a great diamond-shaped slab of dark rock etched with names that seemed to go on forever.

Shin stood before it alone.

He was small against it—barely reaching a third of its height. His hands were pressed together, eyes closed, posture still.

At the base of the stone, the white carnations lay in a careful bundle.

Six years ago, a massive fox with nine tails had torn through the village like a natural disaster. His parents, both shinobi, had rushed toward the chaos like everyone else.

He’d been a newborn then. His last memory of his mother was her arms around him—the warmth of them, the trembling—and then she’d passed him to a stranger and run toward the screaming.

Neither of his parents came home.

Life is so fragile here, Shin thought.

The thought didn’t come with grief anymore. Just clarity.

He opened his eyes. Let his hands fall.

What a miserable world.

He turned to leave—and stopped.

A man was walking toward him down the path. Silver hair. A black mask covering the lower half of his face. His left eye was shut, and above it, a long vertical scar cut down through the lid. He moved with the unhurried steadiness of someone who had walked hard roads for a long time, a bundle of white chrysanthemums cradled in one arm.

His visible eye briefly noted Shin. Then he looked away, calm and unsurprised, and kept walking.

Shin stepped aside and let him pass without a word. Two people visiting the dead didn’t owe each other anything.

The man stopped in front of the Memorial Stone. His gaze drifted down to the white carnations already resting at its base, and for just a moment, something moved behind his eye—a flicker of something that wasn’t quite pain, but lived close to it.

“So many unfortunate people,” he murmured to no one.