I never believed in something as ephemeral as destiny.

If everything we do and the path we travel it has been already decided, then we are not just prisoners at the mercy of the flow of time?

My parents given me the name Kaname. Was it fate who decided this? No, it was my parents who chose this name for me.

My older brother would become my father’s successor and take control of all of our family’s businesses. Was this something destiny had dictated? No, this was because of the archaic premise of the firstborn.

The fact that I refused to accept this premise and that I tried to knock down my brother’s position showing better results. Was it a path that destiny had imposed on me? No, it was something I had decided on my own. I envied the special treatment my older brother received from my parents, and the attention he received from all the surrounding people, I wanted that for myself.

That my parents paid little attention to me and left my care largely to their employees. Was this something destiny had dictated? No, this was the behavior of parents who prioritized their business over caring for their second child. They had already hard work to mold an heir; I was just a backup that would probably they never require.

‘It is destiny’, every time I heard someone around me justify any unfortunate event; failure or inability to accept their failures with those words, I had to do my best not to make fun of that person.

Destiny? I would not accept something as absurd as the existence of a force that chains my steps and my decisions to its whims, I am what I am based on my decisions and my desires. My path belongs only to me and nobody else.

As I grew, my world view caused me friction with other people, and despite my overwhelming academic results, my teachers labeled my personality to was conflicting. How can I be labeled as conflicted just for pointing out their mistakes and flaws?

My parents, whom I saw little, did not notice my results although it was better than those of my older brother, they only focused on the criticism directed at me by my teachers.

Being considered ‘a troubled boy’ by my parents, my brother suggested a way by which I would be of use to family businesses, engaging me with the daughter of our greatest competitors.

Without a voice in this, because they considered me a rebel, I ended up accompanying my parents to a grand celebration for the new year, an event during which I would meet the girl with whom my brother wanted to engage me.

Her age was like mine, thirteen years old, her eyes were bright and her lips showed a great smile that never seemed to disappear, and to my surprise, her name was the same as mine, Kaname, however, she was the opposite to me.

She always smiles, always looking at everything with bright eyes full of curiosity and always expressing everything that’s on her mind.

She was everything I hated.

Because of my ‘rebellion’, I had no voice in this, so my parents established the engagement.

Because of her strange personality, Kaname was attending a public school of her choosing, and to ensure that this mercantile alliance was will successful establish through our marriage, my parents transferred me to the school she attended, and probably through under-table arrangements, they got me placed in the same class as her.

The academic level of a public school turned out to be much lower than I thought, the teachers made more mistakes and the classes were repetitive. It didn’t take too long for my personality to show, and once again I pointed out flaws and correcting inaccurate data exposed by teachers.

Because of the humiliation of being corrected by a student, the teachers became very stricter, and this upset my classmates. Public school students are carefree, or their intellectual capacity is worrying. They had quickly isolated me.

The only person who continued to interact with me nonchalantly was she, Kaname. She was annoying, her very presence nauseating me. I had to feign interest in every word that came out of her smiling mouth to ensure the success of the task that had been forced on me. If I ended up ruining something as important as this, surely my parents would get rid of me. The last thing I wanted was to end up being sent to live in a third world country.

People, men, and women alike always surrounded her, even the teachers smiled as they talked to her. Her annoying smile looked like some kind of black hole that drew everything to her and engulfed all in that annoyingly relaxed atmosphere that always surrounded her.

During our senior year of school, I continued to be isolated from others and because our names were the same, through mockery our classmates chose a nickname to differentiate us. They called her ‘Kaname of the Spring’ and I became ‘Kaname of the Winter’, while I considered this stupid, she giggled saying that this nickname went with me, was she making fun of me? I didn’t care, even if she kept talking to me for the sake of the mercantile alliance between our families, this was irrelevant to me.

It happened with graduation getting closer, perhaps motivated by the atmosphere of the impending separation, one of our classmates declared his love to Kaname in front of the entire class. He was probably confident that given that false kindness of Kaname that everyone blindly believed in, she could not reject him in front of other people.

To my surprise and the rest of our class, Kaname rejected that boy with a smile and revealing to everyone that she was already engaged. In the current age, marriage arrangements only are common among the highest spheres of society, so it caused a great commotion that led everyone to ask Kaname about her fiancé. With an enormous smile on her lips, Kaname raised her hand and pointed at me. Had she lost her mind, or was she trying to humiliate me one last time before graduation?

To save us trouble, she and I used false surnames and tried to hide our status.

“Why did you do something so troublesome?” —we supposed to attend a public high school because that was her wish. In that case, revealing our engagement would undoubtedly be a problem that would follow us into high school.

“What is the problem? I just told the truth”—she was too carefree on the subject. Was she just a hollow head who could not understand the consequences of her actions?

I was wrong. Behind her smile was not a manipulative mind, but a carefree fool woman. This was strange to me, that meant that she had not kept close to me for the sake of this ‘destiny’ that had been forced on us by our parents, in that case, why did she stay close to someone who was it openly avoided by everyone?

I never cared what other people thought about me. For me, the only thing that mattered was the results, and even if my situation has ended in this way with my parents considering me troublesome, my way of thinking never changed. It wasn’t me who was wrong; it was my parents, how could they be right when they didn’t even know me?

However, slowly I became obsessed with knowing what that naive woman had in mind regarding our situation.

Unable to contain my curiosity, I asked her directly on our graduation day.

“It is destiny”

“Ah?”

“We’re destined to be together” —she showed her characteristic carefree smile as she gave me her answer.

Destiny? This woman was dumber than I imagined. Would she just agree to marry someone whom even his parents avoided just because she believed that was her destiny?

“You are very intelligent and kind” —this was her answer to my question about what was her reason for not opposing our situation.

I was smart, but where did this strange woman get the idea that I was kind?

“You always listen to me carefully and help me study”

This woman was much more foolish than I thought, I did those things because I did not want to end up being sent to a third world country, there was no kindness in my actions.

However, I could not get mad at her...

I grew up under the care of servants who kept a great emotional distance from me for fear of my parents.

My only interactions with my older brother occurred during celebrations held in his honor because of some of his achievements.

Most of the time I could only contact my parents through letters that were rigorously subject to review by their assistants.

I never worried about making friends, my life always comprised trying to knock down my brother and gain the recognition of my parents.

Until that moment when she thanked me for helping her study and for always listening to her, my existence had no value of any kind to someone else...

I, for the first time in my life, I felt what it was like to be useful to someone else...

I had always struggled to get my parents’ attention, and I only got has been labeled a problem person.

With no kind of logic that could explain the reason, I ended up longing for her company; I wanted to see her smile and see the sincere sparkle in her eyes.

After graduation, I looking for her using as a pretext to help her study for the entrance exams.

I can honestly say that those days were the happiest days that I could never experience until then in my entire life...

The more time I spent by her side, the more time I longed for her company.

When I realizing that this naive and foolish woman had stolen everything that I was, my world changed completely...

Compete with my older brother, get the attention of my parents, and excelling academically… all of this lost meaning.

“I... I think... No, I definitely... yes, I have fallen in love with you...”

Even though our relationship was calm and warm, I could not conform and I wanted more… I wish our engagement didn’t exist just because our parents had established it that way.

However, because she changed my entire world, I could finally realize that I didn’t deserve her. I was selfish, mean, and arrogant, someone who had even judged she has false and late I took my time to know her.

I confessed to her, but not expecting to be reciprocated, I offered her the opportunity to free herself from a terrible person like me. I was ready to go home to face my parents and break the engagement. She would be free to find someone better than me, and I would end up being sent to some forgotten corner of the world.

With her eyes wide open and a blank expression, she watched me for several seconds, which seemed like an eternity to me. I could only smile to see that even she was kind enough to consider an answer that would not hurt me.

Hardly regaining her composure, she approached me in complete silence and hugged me. I couldn’t ask for more than that, that kind of farewell was much more than I deserved.

“I love you too…”

She whispered that in my ear, and for the first time in my life my mind stopped working.

“Why? Why someone like me?”

It was the first time that I could fully express what was on my mind.

“I don’t know, it’s just that way”

She flashed a dazzling smile to accompany her response.

There was no reason… no, for her the reason didn’t matter.

For Kaname, the only thing that mattered was the facts, what was happening in front of her eyes and what was at her fingertips.

“Is it fate?”

As my mind and heart were in complete chaos, that question seeped through my lips.

“Probably”

After seeing the glowing smile on her lips, for the first time in my life, tears flow from my eyes. She had taken all of my first few times and would continue to do so, she would take everything from me, and I couldn’t resist.

Upon entering high school, my life changed completely.

To be worthy of being by her side, I had to change and become a better person.

With her by my side, I made my first friends.

With her by my side, the days became quick and the nights long.

With her by my side, my world changed completely.

The days were no longer cold and became colorful.

Even if our parents broke our engagement, that wouldn’t separate us. If we had to give up our luxurious lives to be together, that is what we would do.

She was now my world, my fate...