"Is this the payment you demand for your courier services?"

"What if it is?"

"Well, I'm not sure I've seen the last one yet, maybe at the end of the day I will decide one can be shared."

"You'd better at least go on a date with him after all this work, like, come on, gotta admire a guy's effort. Unless he's weird or creepy."

"Weird? Absolutely no chance of that. Look how normal this behavior is," he says, brandishing his chocolate box.

"...I mean, okay, that's a bit... yeah, but, it's, you know. It's a thing teenagers sometimes do! I meant weird in a bad way not weird in a way where he gives you chocolates and books you like and writes you poems."

"I think that if I were inclined to disrespect his efforts I would at least have the courtesy to refuse the gifts instead of keeping them."

She squints at him. "Methinks you do like him back."

"Eeeeee," squeals Anju.

Haru's class after lunch is English, though, and when he walks into the classroom he has an invisible boy already there, waiting for him, sitting on the desk behind Haru's usual with his head on his arms and a golden rose in one hand.

Anju and Masako are very invested in the romance now. Haru manages not to look too strangely at the empty space before he takes his seat.

And Yutaka surreptitiously places the rose inside Haru's bag. You can say it's a special dye. You can even say it's magic, it's not like people will care, most people are terribly incurious.

I guess I can, if anyone asks.

You should pick it up, he suggests.

Haru plucks the rose.

He grins. "This rose glows, but not as brightly as you. How could I not love someone who shines like you do?"

And inside the flower bud there is... a glint of something else, reflecting the faint light of the petals.

...what is in here.

"You can turn the rose over to see."

Haru shakes it gently over his other hand.

An unassuming silver ring with a small clear gem on it falls onto his palm. "You don't need to wear it. Not until you're sure. But... even if I can't loudly proclaim my love to the whole world, I can at least whisper it a bit, and let everyone who's listening hear it. It's not a wedding ring, but it's still from me, and I'm still yours."

Here Is That Smug Joyous Feeling Again.

He admires the ring for a moment and then carefully pockets it.

"Should I distract you from English with what I discovered about Walpurgisnacht, light of my life?" he asks, getting up without moving the chair so that the students trickling in don't notice it.

Yeah, what'd you find out?

Yutaka sits cross-legged right next to Haru's chair and rests his head on Haru's thigh while running his fingers up and down Haru's calf. "It's been around who knows how long. It shows up, attacks, then it's gone for a while. There's a bunch of natural disasters that actually were the witch. You remember Haiti a decade and a half ago? That was the witch."