The sun almost sets, portraying orange-reddish ray across the horizon as the two girls are sitting on the bench near the old oak tree. One of them looking down to her lap, being embarrassed because her face is swollen for crying too much. While the other one, smiling gently with a serene look painted all over her beautiful face.

"I'm a cancer survivor." Sakura finally breaking the silence. 

"Hmm, no... I mean I ‘was’... Yeah, I was a cancer survivor." 

Chaeyeon looking up to the girl, listening quietly, do not really want to interrupt the other girl.

“I got blood cancer when I was 4,” Sakura paused, took a brief glance to Chaeyeon whose eyes are widened. “However, thanks to the efforts of my family who didn't give up on me, I could survive. After the long painful treatments I had, the cancer was gradually tamed. And thanks to that, exactly two weeks before my sixth birthday, the doctors said there are no shreds of evidence that the cancer cell still in my body, eventually.” She smiled warmly while looking up to the distance.

“And then I was enrolled in an elementary school. I was an awkward kid back then, not used to socialize with children my age. But I could finally making new friends, spent my days like any other healthy kids, instead of spending my time in the hospital like I used to…” Sakura’s voice trailed off, she chuckled. “Or not really. I could never live like a normal kid after all.”

Chaeyeon’s heart clenched as the smile on Sakura’s beautiful face slightly wavered. 

The pain. 

The sadness. 

In a brief moment, she can see all that from Sakura’s eyes. It hurts her too somewhat.

“For the next five years, I had to spend half of my times to do the regular checkups and thorough examinations. Because according to the doctors, cancer can be treated but there is no specific way to cure it completely. They need to make sure cancer in my body is still on complete remission. Hence the regular checkups and such. It’s quite tiring, but I have no choice. I don’t want to give up for the sake of my loving family, and also myself. And it’s true that efforts will never betray you because after those tiring five years the doctors confirmed that the cancer cell still in complete remission and I no longer have to undergo those tiring procedures. No more needles, no more punctures, no more constant boring checkups, no more going back and forth to the hospital. My effort, my family’s effort were paid off… I was free.” 

Sakura took a deep breath and exhaled slowly. She’s taking a good second to enjoy the beautiful horizon above her. She turned her head to the quiet Chaeyeon, still smiling.

"...I thought so." 

Chaeyeon quietly gripped her upper left chest. It hurts to see Sakura keeping that dazzling smile despite the despairs that vividly can be shown from her eyes. 

‘Don’t keep that smile. You can cry if you want to. Please.’ 

She begged in her mind, though her own tears might be going to flow again in no time. 

What can Chaeyeon do in this kind of situation to ease Sakura’s pain?

Yes, 

Nothing. 

She can do nothing besides being a good listener.

“When I thought I can live my life normally just like other people, I was completely wrong. Five more years later, when I was sixteen, things happened.” Sakura averting her gaze back to the sky. “Maybe God doesn’t want me to be too carefree. Maybe he just wants me to be more grateful for what he gave to me, which is what everyone dreamed to have. A good, wealthy, wise, loving and supportive family, the good environment where I was growing up, also good friends. It was always too perfect to be true.” She briefly beamed to Chaeyeon. “But nothing is perfect in this life after all. Every single one has a flaw, including me.”

“Last September, I suddenly fell ill. I lost weight with no apparent reason, an abnormal fever, feeling nauseous and such. At first, we thought it was dengue’s symptoms. But it’s kind of suspicious, so my old doctors asked me to run thorough tests in the lab. However, our suspicion was not proven wrong.” 

There’s a quite long silence. Chaeyeon’s heart clenched tighter as she grew nervous, waiting for Sakura to finish her story. Meanwhile, her eyes started to burn. She’s going to cry again.

“ANKL.” Sakura turned to face Chaeyeon, this time she properly facing the quiet girl, looking straight into her wet swollen eyes. “It stands for Aggressive Natural Killer cell Leukemia.” 

“The cancer cells that should have disappeared reappear and happened to be more severe than before. I don’t really understand the details the doctors has told me. But one thing I know for sure.” This time Sakura gripped Chaeyeon’s hand, “From now on, my life is numbered. There’s a countdown in my ‘days’. Because this cancer cannot be treated. There’s no chance for it to be tamed like before.” 

That smile hasn’t been wear off, causing Chaeyeon to feel more miserable. What made Chaeyeon even sadder was the fact that there was no glimmer of sadness in Sakura’s tone as if what she’s been through was not a big deal. 

Chaeyeon suddenly remembered a certain page in Sakura's diary

There's no point in being sorrowful...

Even though I can no longer spread my wings, 

My footsteps will guide me until there's no path I could walk on.

Even though my happiness has been snatched away,

I want to become someone else’s happiness.

Because happiness is the only thing that can be given even though we don’t have it.

A lone tear rolled down to her cheek as she reminisced the last sentence on that page. The phrases Sakura used were not sad. But the meaning behind those sentences somehow piercing Chaeyeon’s heart. The Image of easy going happy go lucky Miyawaki Sakura is completely broken down now. 

Chaeyeon tried her best to not cry, but it causes her breath to hitch instead and accidentally snorted.

Sakura chuckled seeing Chaeyeon’s state of emotion. She patted the younger girl’s shoulder gently. 

“Don’t hold your tears. It’s not healthy. Just cry if you want to cry.”

Chaeyeon looked up to meet Sakura’s eyes. And her tears immediately poured down with no warning. Sakura silently lets her cry her heart out.

‘Why am I so useless? She is the one who needs to be encouraged. What am I even doing here?’

“I’m sorry.” Said Chaeyeon between her sobs and snorts, causing Sakura to giggle.

“What do you keep apologizing?” 

“It must be hard for you, to endure all of this by yourself.”

“I’m not alone though. I have my family. I have caring friends, although none of them knows about this matter. That’s why I’m glad that I got to be open to you, Chaeyeon.” 

Chaeyeon looked up to the girl, still crying mess, her eyes and nose are as red as a reaped tomato.

“Look, you’re so cute.” Sakura giggled while fixing the girl’s messy hair, too bad she didn't bring any tissue. “Thanks for lending me your ears. I feel less burdened now after knowing that I don’t have to pretend to be okay in front of you. I’m glad that you’re willing to be my friend.” 

‘I have a friend.’

***

Chaeyeon walking back home slowly while gripping the lace of her backpack. Her eyes are stinging for too many tears she shed earlier. She can’t take Sakura out of her mind, she feels sorry for her friend but at the same time, she also glads that Sakura chose to enjoy the kind of life she's living. Chaeyeon might be an introvert, a loner, but she actually has great sympathy and empathy, she just doesn’t belong to any social circle to show all of her emotions besides to her family. 

She then stopped when a certain flower shop catches her interest. The new flower shop that only two blocks away from her house. Chaeyeon once visited that shop about a month ago, when it just opened. She doesn’t certainly have an interest in flowers, she is just purely curious. But to her surprise, the friendly florist not only recommended a flower but also explaining the details regarding the good effect of the flower and also the meaning behind it. She remembered that time she told the florist that lately she was being restless and stuffy, then the florist recommended the Gerbera Daisy.

“This flower helps to remove toxin in the air. You should put this in your room and it’ll be less stuffy. You just need to water it once a day and make sure to give it enough sunray so it won’t die fast.” Explained the florist. “And also,