Author's Note: I tried my best, but I just couldn't decide on one song I wanted to use for my story which is why this will be a multiple-shot instead. Since they will all connected by the presence of Kai and the idea of travel, I'm just trying to find songs that would suit that theme.

Once again, the Cherry Poppin' Daddies have inspired another song-fic, but although there version is really upbeat, mine is a little more reflective. Still, please enjoy!

Disclaimer: I have no ownerships of Harvest Moon or its characters, nor do I own the song So Long, Toots! which was both written and performed by the Cherry Poppin' Daddies.

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So Long, Toots!

So long, Toots, bound for Chicago!

It's been swell...

You got your hooks into me, Mamma-

You know damn well...

She'd appeared out of no where without a single warning, like a summer breeze, and as soon as I caught a glimpse of those soft, cotton-candy curls and bright, ruby-red eyes, I felt my heart jump right out of my chest. She was perfect in almost every way, from her girlish, playful charms to her sweet, lingering kisses, yet I knew that not too long ago I'd felt the same way about another young woman. I'd left her in a distant land with no intention of ever sending word to reassure her that I still thought of her each and every waking moment. Of course, I also knew that the fantasies wouldn't ever last... since things like love rarely ever do.

Maybe I should've explained that from the very start.

You know I gotta leave

Before you're up a tree...

And our good thing

Comes crashing to the ground!

I was never one to stay in one place for long, and although I knew she knew this as well, there was very little I could do to console her once our house of cards began to fall. Women and tears... Why did it always have to come down to those two things? Better yet, why did I let them get so attached to me in the first place when I knew it'd only end in heartbreak for them? She deserved better, just like so many others that came before, but for some reason unknown to me, they always felt the need to love a rambling man such as myself.

What a terrible mistake that was, too...

So long, Toots, bound for Chicago!

It's been grand...

It might as well be

Morocco or Pakistan...

Adventure and passion... they're really one in the same when you think about it. After all, both can be wonderfully thrilling, and there are times that the feeling consumes every thought until nothing but nonsense remains. That's all we ever had in the first place, I suppose, as that's all it ever amounted to in the end. Just two kids playing a silly little game until they were called back home...

That's exactly what we were when I think about it now.

Tonight is New Year's Eve,

But there's nothin' up my sleeve...

But a place to play

Where all the people play around!

Life there would always too quiet for a guy like me anyway. A sleepy little town in the middle of no where could never keep my interest for long... regardless of any little beauty that found herself stranded there. My mind was sure to wander elsewhere only to be followed by my feet soon after. I needed excitement, and that was not the place in which to find it although I'd certainly searched for it as best I could.

If only for the sake of that lovely, little girl.

So long, Toots, bound for Chicago!

It's all right...

I can't stay as long as I oughtta.

It's almost light...

With eyes all around to watch our every move and ears to hang on our every word, it was no wonder we'd found ourselves lost in the darkness at the very end of a pier while gazing down towards the gently lapping waves of the ocean below. Maybe I should've cried with her, or at the very least, offered a few comforting words to ease the growing ache in her chest. However, the problem was that I just couldn't find it in myself to do that for her. There wasn't any point in giving her false hope, after all, and so I let silence fill the space between us.

Better to leave her hating me than pining for a day that would never come.

And that's the final star,

And you've been the best so far...

But you're sleepin' all alone

In that big sky!

Put a girl on a pedestal and she's doomed to fall, and I knew I could only blame myself for putting her there. No matter what lines she'd rehearsed, they would only fall on deaf ears by the time she said them. Soon the curtain would come down just before her last line was to be spoken to the adoration of her last remaining, ever loyal fan, and there she would remain, poised for a performance that would never be complete... all alone with the ghost light. If I were a sentimental man with compassion left in my carefree heart to stir, I surely would've shed a tear for the poor girl.

Yet I was nothing more than another actor with no lines left to say.

So long, Toots, bound for Chicago!

There isn't any looking back into her eyes...

So long, Toots, bound for Chicago!

Because there isn't any way to save what's already been lost.

So long, Toots, bound for Chicago now!