Lights softly danced across the water at the lantern festival. The July air felt humid, but cool with a breeze. The sounds of laughing and posing for pictures sounded like white noise to the bored fifteen year old. Yeri's mom tugs at her hand trying to encourage the young girl to keep up. She didn't care about the lanterns, she didn't care about taking pictures, she didn't care about anything other than her computer at home. She felt safe there, in the dim room and the only source of light was her computer monitor. She could be whoever she wanted, play whatever games she felt like playing, and didn't have to pretend to be someone she wasn't. 

"Yeri, do you want a cotton candy?" Her mom asked sweetly while pointing to the sugary stand. 

"Yeah, sure I guess," she lazily replied as they fall into line.

In front of them was another mom and her daughter. The other girl looked to be Yeri's age and was slightly taller than her. The girl turned around and made eye contact with Yeri, she smiled and tucked her hair behind her ear. Yeri froze at the sight of her gaze. 

"W-whoa," she said under her breath. 

She's never been taken aback before by someones smile. Yeri turned her head quickly trying to bury her flushed cheeks. 

"What flavor are you getting?" Said a sweet sounding voice.

Yeri turned to see who was attached to such a voice, and it was her. The girl ahead of her in line. 

"Umm, I don't know. Blue?" 

"Blue?! Blue isn't a flavor, that's a color!"

"But blue has a specific flavor. It taste's like blue."

"Hmm, well in that case I'll get pink."

"The pink color is strawberry though."

"What?! I thought colors had flavors?"

"Only blue and red are flavor colors. Everyone knows this."

"I'm not everyone," she replies with a little bit of attitude.

Yeri smiles to herself and blows air out of her nose. She's never met anyone who could match her humor, or at least, not in person. 

"I'll take a strawberry and a blue one please!" The girl politely asks the cotton candy man.

After she receives both flavors she turns to give the blue one to Yeri. Yeri raises her eyebrows in confusion. 

"For me?" 

"Yeah! You said you wanted blue, so I got you one. But you owe me!"

"Owe you what?"

"You have to walk around with me because this lantern festival is boring with parents."

"Fine."

They walked silently at first, side by side, down the river looking at the colorful paper lanterns. Each taking a generous bite out of their cotton candy but too nervous to say a word. Yeri would purposely try to sneak glances at the girl, too shy to look at her directly. With every look she stole she could see the light from the street lamps illuminate more of her face each time. She was beautiful. 

"Do you live around here?" Yeri ask while looking away, appearing cool and collected. 

"No, I'm just visiting my relatives here. I live overseas," the girl replied.

"Oh? When are you leaving?"

"Tonight is my last night here. We leave in the morning!"

"Oh, I see," Yeri replied with her voice trailing off. 

The girl could see that Yeri was upset that this was the only night they could spend together, but she wanted to make the most of it. 

"Hey! Why don't we go light a lantern?!" The taller girl says as she grabs Yeri's hand to lead her. 

They run through the festival, hands intertwined, bobbing and weaving through the crowd until they reached the beach by the water. There they saw a beach full of people assembling and lighting lanterns. They both make their way to an unoccupied lantern and start setting it up.

"Do you want to write on it?" Yeri asks.

"Of course! Do you know what you're going to write?" She asks.

"I don't know yet," Yeri replies, thinking about her wish. 

She looks past her side of the lantern and at the girl furiously scribbling her wish. 

"All done! Do yours, quick!" 

Yeri panicked and wrote the thing she wanted the most in that moment, but kept it to herself. 

"Okay I'm ready!"

They stand up, and Yeri holds the lantern on each side while the girl lights the candle. The lantern becomes full of light, tugging at Yeri's hands for lift off. 

"Grab the other side, we can let go together!" Yeri exclaims.

She feels the other girl grasp the other side and they count down.

"3... 2... 1!"

They let go and watch the lantern float it's way into the sky. They watch it as far as they can until they lose it in the night sky full of identical lanterns. 

"What did you wish for?" The girl asks Yeri.

"I can't tell you or else it won't come true, right?" Yeri tries to verify the superstition. 

"Yeah you're-" She's cut off by the sound of a mother's call.

"Yeri! Time to go home!" Her mom beckons. 

"Ugh! I have to go, do you have an email address? I can email you or something!"  Yeri tries to find a way to stall.

"No.. I don't I'm sorry. My parents think I'm too young. I wish I did... So we could write to each other. What's your address? I'll try to remember it and I'll write to you when I get back!"

"Yeri! Let's! Go!" 

They verbally exchange address, none of them having any way to write it down. Both of their parents didn't think a phone was necessary at that age. 

"It was really nice to meet you but I have to go, I'm so sorry!"

"It's okay! Thank you for all of the fun tonight, Yeri!"

Yeri waves as she walks back to her mom, looking back every now and then to make sure that the girl was still looking at her. 

"Looks like you had fun with that girl! What's her name?" Her mom asked.

"Her name is-"

Yeri stops mid sentence. She realized she never asked for her name.

"Hold on! Be right back I forgot something!" Yeri yells as she runs back towards where the girl was standing.

She weaves through the crowd again, just like they had did earlier. When Yeri arrived to where they were just talking she searches desperately for her friend.

"I... I can't see her! Where did she go?!" 

Yeri goes to each vendor and asks if they've seen a girl that fits her description and they all say that they saw her leave with her family shortly after Yeri left. With ever answer Yeri receives, the more her heart drops. She's confused at how she could spend hours with someone, and she didn't even know what her name was. After accepting her fate of the mystery name she tries to repeat the address in her head over and over again, being sure not to forget it. Slowly making her way back to her mom she kicks at the ground underneath her, feeling like she had misplaced something very important to her. Yeri's family pile into the car and drive home. Yeri looks out the window, slumped over and still bummed that she never got her name. As they drive away she stares at the lanterns in the distance wondering if theirs was still flying, or if it had already fallen just like her hopes of meeting her again.

As Yeri gets home she goes straight to her room. She throws her jacket onto the floor and heads to the bathroom attached to her room. Once inside she turns the sink on and stares at herself in the mirror. Her big eyes looking back and the sad expression on her face. 

"Gosh, you're so stupid. You know that?" Yeri says to her reflection.

Reaching down she feels the water against her fingertips. She can see out of the corner of her eye that her hands were dirty. She beings to wash them with soap while staring at her self directly in the mirror still. After noticing that her wrist seemed dirty she glances down and sees it etched into her skin: 07/15/2014. That was today's date. Yeri gasped and held her wrist up to the light, rubbing it hard with her other fingers. 

"No..No.. No. No. NO!" 

The feeling of the Love Date felt smooth against her skin like the numbers appeared from underneath her skin. She ran to her room and looked at the hanging calendar on her wall that she only used for a few months at the beginning of the year. Flipping aggressively through the pages she goes through each month until she finds what she's looking for. 

"Hmm, July. July... July! Fifteenth. Fifteenth... That's... Today."

Floating in the night's summer breeze was a lantern with the same wish written on each side: I hope to meet you again.