fate, destiny, & love

01 | anacrusis

01

anacrusis [lat.] - the note or group of
notes which precede the first full
measure; also known as a 'pickup note'

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"it's hot!" quqi whined, holding up her portable mini fan and aiming its head at her neck.

it was june, which meant that it was summer and that it was hot hot. the summer heat beat down on everyone who was standing in the open this fine day, all of whom were at tokyo university's openhouse. students were running around handing out flyers and whatever freebies that their respective departments had to offer, high school students were roaming around and checking out different booths.

at present, huang quqi and her best friend and companion, do remi, were on their scheduled break. they were walking around the main building, looking for a very specific blue and white ice cream and frozen yoghurt stand that one of their cohortmates had mentioned.

"that's why we're looking for the booth, remember?" remi reminded her, happily walking on, the heat not bothering her in any way, despite her forehead already glistening with sweat.

quqi sighed as she trudged on behind the taller girl, wiping away the sweat that threatened to fall into her eyes, "okay, but can we just take a short five-minute break?"

"fineee," remi drew out the word and looked around, "oh, over there! there's a bench underneath that tree!"

the two walked over to the unoccupied bench, immediately taking refuge in the shade. a blissful sigh left quqi's lips as she stretched her legs out in front of her while she let her eyes flutter shut for a good five seconds.

and all it took was those five seconds for someone to trip over her legs.

now, quqi did not have long legs - in fact, she had rather short ones, along with a short torso, which accumulated to 155 centimetres of vertical height in total. so the fact that she tripped someone up shocked her (with her short legs, along with the sudden realisation of holy shit, i made someone trip), which caused her to snap her eyes open and come to her feet.

"oh my gosh, i'm so sorry!" she blurted out in english as she crouched down, reaching a hand out to the person who tripped, then remembering that good lord, she was in japan, and switched back to japanese, "are you okay?"

the tripper, a gingerhead boy, came to his feet and grabbed her hand with appreciation. he lifted his head up and met her gaze, wide round hazel eyes set on fair skin bore straight into her dark chocolate ones, and a smile appeared on his face, "i'm fine! no worries, it was my fault; i should've watched where i was going!"

quqi's eyes darted down to his white tee that he sported, which read 'kinesiology department' in black kanji. so he was also a fellow student. if not for his shirt, she would have thought that, judging by his young-looking face, he was a high schooler.

meanwhile, the boy's own eyes darted down to quqi's wrist (which was upturned in his direction), carefully eyeing the thin lines that were imprinted onto her fair skin. two small ovals with a line sticking out of each them, which, in quqi's opinion, resembled minims. his eyes lit up and he pointed at her arm, "oh, this is perfect timing! you're my friend's soulmate!"

"i'm your friend's what now?" quqi's brow furrowed in confusion as she turned to remi for help, who simply cackled and waved her goodbye. quqi might be decent at japanese, considering she had to pick up the language since she was living in japan, but sometimes native speakers spoke too fast for her to catch all the words. for instance, this boy.