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Regret is an unavoidable facet of life. No matter how hard one tries, making the correct choice at every moment, at every crossroads, simply can't be done. Perfection is unachievable; the complexities of life are far too great. There will always come a choice where you falter. From the simple kind of choice, like chosing to eat something you know will lead to a stomach ache down the line, or saying something you don't mean in the midst of a heated argument. But these regrets are the temporary kind of regret, because when your stomach troubles are no more, so too will the regret be gone. And while saying something you don't mean to a friend can lead to an end to said friendship, so too can it be resolved becoming water under the bridge.
This was not the kind of regret that Suzukaze Suzu found herself grappling with. Her regret was the sort that spanned countless decisions over the course of three years, all of them wrong, all of them leading to one heart crushing moment. The kind of regret that will never go away, the kind that she will find herself pondering on every sleepless night till the moment that she dies, wishing she had chosen to do anything else at any of the opportunities she had to do so - and she had been given many. She would never forget the day that her darling Yuu slipped through her fingers for good.
It was the day of Atori's graduation, a day Suzu had been foolishly looking forward to. With Atori out of the picture, she was certain she'd finally have her chance to make a move. Yuu would be heartbroken to be parted from her precious senpai, and she would be there to pick up the pieces. She was certain of it, and perhaps that certainty became complacency. After two years running in circles around one another leading nowhere in particular despite Suzu's support, there was no way it'd go anywhere once Atori went off to university. She'd get to secure her place as the one by Yuu's side, and everything would go back to normal. She was so sure of it.
She went looking for Yuu after the ceremony, doubt creeping into her heart when she didn't recieve a wall of "HELP ME" on her phone. She searched and searched, asking around until she finally found her in an empty classroom - with Atori. She leaned up against the wall next to the door, afraid to interupt, and listened. She had been just in time to catch the tail end of a confession.
"- will you go out with me?" Atori asked, a question that left Yuu squeaking and stumbling over her words and foaming at the mouth all in sheer ecstasy.
Suzu didn't need to see the rest to know that Yuu would say yes, so she did the only thing she could think to; she ran away, holding back her tears. She ran and ran, down the halls, out past the front gate, and down the street. She didn't know where she was going, only that she needed to get away. Away from the school, away from Atori, away from Yuu, and away from her feelings. She ran until her legs gave out underneath her and she collapsed onto the sidewalk. She didn't want to get back up. As the sky darkened overhead, she considered what might happen if she never did.
The discomfort of the pavement eventually won out of her internal agony, and she sat up on the curb. She was scraped up, trickles of blood on her knees, but the pain inside was far greater than any scrape or bruise could ever be. She looked around herself, and realized that she was hopelessly lost. Not that it mattered, because even though her body had stopped running, her mind hadn't.
Why did it end like this? Suzu was always there to support Yuu, to take care of her, she could give her everything she wanted, she was sure of it. How could she have lost to Atori? But she already knew the answer. She hadn't even been competing with her in the first place, at every chance, Suzu put aside her own feelings to help Yuu chase after someone else. Even in her moments of irritation and jealousy, symptoms of a heart shattering every time Yuu looked to Atori instead of her, she chose to do everything she could to push them together. She told herself it was the right thing to do. She couldn't be selfish, if Yuu wanted someone else there was nothing she could do about it.
And now that Yuu was out of her reach, Suzu didn't care about being selfish. If she had chosen to be the bad girl that Yuu always thought she was, and simply taken what she wanted, maybe it would have been different. If she had been more assertive, if she didn't hide her feelings away like a thing to be ashamed of, if she didn't constantly support Yuu in her quest to win Atori's heart, if she had just done something, anything, different, maybe she wouldn't be there on the side of the street alone. Maybe she'd have Yuu in her arms like she always wanted.
But it was too late. As the rain begin to pour, Suzu finally allowed herself to cry. Silent tears streaking down her cheeks mixing with the droplets of rain soon turned into sobs, the kind that wracked her whole body and left her trembling. Every feeling she had set aside for Yuu came pouring out and left Suzu a pathetic mess. She loved her. She loved her with her entire heart, and every time she should have said it she squirreled that away in hopes of finding an opening that never came. There was nothing to do but let that love become tears, but it wasn't enough to make it go away.
When Suzu inevitably found her way home to find Yuu there waiting, bouncing up and down like a puppy ready to share the good news, that love began to twist into something else. The mild irritation born of jealousy grew in intensity into a kind of anger she'd never felt before. She opened her mouth to try to wish her well in her new relationship, another voice spoke for her. It yelled and screamed and threw Yuu out, locking the door behind her to make sure she couldn't come back, all while Suzu watched in horror as pain twisted on her love's face.
Suzu wanted to be alone, and not just for that night. She transferred schools for her last year, reworked her schedule to make sure she never once bumped into Yuu, and blocked her everywhere she could think of. Yuu fought this, of course, and when they lived next to each other that made it particularly difficult, but Suzu was stubborn. Stubborn enough to climb out her window and run off when her parents let Yuu in on a whim. Eventually Yuu gave up. That stung even more than avoiding her did.
When the time came for university, Suzu chose one far, far away. And every night she could't sleep, she stared at the ceiling wondering how it had come to this, and cursed herself for not being able to do things differently.