The next morning, Mina arrived with scraped knees and muddy hands.
“I’m sorry I didn’t come yesterday,” she said breathlessly, flopping down beside him beneath the cedar tree.
Eren didn’t look at her right away.
She picked at the grass between them, her fingers moving in little circles.
“Papa made me stay in. Said I had to finish writing all the letters. I hate letters.” She stuck out her tongue like they tasted bad. “He wants me to be a proper girl.”
“You’re not,” Eren said.
She blinked at him.
“That’s good,” he added.
Mina laughed and leaned back on her elbows. “You’re weird.”
He watched her then. Her neck, the soft curve of it when she tilted her head to the sun. The way the wind caught the edge of her dress and made the red string flutter slightly between them.
“You missed the stone,” he said.
“What stone?”
“The one I buried. For you.”
Her mouth fell open a little, surprised.
“Where?” she asked.
He pointed to the dirt beside them. She immediately dropped to her knees and started digging with her hands. Her fingers were small, stained pink from berries and dust. The moment she uncovered the stone — smooth, flat, and white like a river shell — she grinned.
“You polished it?”
He nodded.
She held it to her chest like it was a crown jewel.
“I’m keeping it forever,” she said.
Eren’s chest tightened again.
Forever. Again.
She keeps saying it.
They wandered the woods together that afternoon. Mina liked to step only on the stones, pretending the forest floor was lava. Eren followed silently, making sure she didn’t fall. She always nearly did.
She talked about everything.
Her dreams. Her baby brother who cried all night. How the baker gave her a bun because she sang a song about honey. How her shoes made a fart sound when she stepped in moss.
Eren listened.
That was enough.
When they reached the old wooden bridge over the dry streambed, Mina stopped.
She pointed up at the sky.
“Wanna see my secret?”
Eren frowned. “What secret?”
She pulled something from her pocket — a glass marble, cloudy with a swirl of red inside. It looked like blood trapped in snow.
“This is my wishing marble,” she whispered, holding it out like treasure. “I tell it my dreams. Only mine. Nobody else.”
He reached for it.
She pulled it back.
“You can’t touch it,” she warned. “Or it’ll forget my dreams.”
He stared at the marble. At her fingers wrapped around it. He wanted to rip it from her hand.
Instead, he said, “You trust it more than me?”
She blinked. “No! Silly, it’s just a game.”
But Eren didn’t laugh.
He just turned and started walking.
She caught up a few seconds later, huffing.
“I’ll tell you one of my secrets,” she offered, skipping beside him.
“I don’t want it,” he muttered.
But she told him anyway.
“I think I want to marry someone with black hair.”
Eren stopped.
“What?”
She looked up at him. “Like yours! Black hair. And he has to live in the forest and talk to animals. And he gives me flowers every morning. Like, every day. And we live in a big house with—”
“You said you’d marry me,” he said, voice flat.
She tilted her head. “When?”
“Last month. Under the chapel tree. You said we were buddies forever.”
Mina laughed. “Yeah, but buddies don’t get married!”
He didn’t laugh.
He stared at her.
She doesn't understand.
She keeps saying things like they don’t matter.
But they matter.
That night, he couldn’t sleep.
The marble.
The flowers.
Her laughing face.
He sat by his window with her ribbon in his hand, and whispered her name over and over until his throat was dry.
---
⚠️ Next Part (Coming Soon — Part 3):
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Butterfly Strings
RomanceA 7-year-old boy who's already showing deep, obsessive attachment A 5-year-old girl who is sweet, innocent, and unaware of the boy's growing obsession She was the girl who saw the world in colors. He was the boy who only saw her. Mina never knew the...
