dried flower.

two.

'Gallagher...do you promise never to forget me? Never to forget that I existed by your side someday?'

Once, long ago, when you and he were still young, when the memories were far more vivid than they are now, the question looms in the atmosphere for a while, and Gallagher allows it to sink in.

Gallagher observes as you run a hand over the cold steel, the other remains inside your parka. You pause your faint steps, soft eyes, deep their transparent clarity, lock into his.

The motionlessness of the Rooftop Garden added to the silence, overlooking a thousand towering buildings yonder.

Gallagher regards you in return— something about that gaze pours an unfamiliar, lonely, helpless sort of feeling. Something akin to searching. Something akin to an attempt to convey something, something that is formless, something that you could not grasp within, and therefore, had no hope of ever turning into words.

'I'll never forget you,' he grabs your hand and places. 'I could never forget you.'

Though these reminiscences within began to dissipate; of course, you knew it all would evanesce along the fleeting time. This is precisely why you begged not to be forgotten, to remember that you had existed.

The thought fills him with an almost intolerable despondency; you never loved him.