Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Taro Yamada knew how to feel .

He knew how to laugh with merriment, groan in frustration, and cry with sorrow. It was second nature to him—but not his first. The art of having emotions was a skill that he’d built up after years of practice and observation, not a talent that he’d been born with from birth. 

When his ordinary, loving, concerned parents realized that the only time their son had ever crie d was when he left his mother’s womb, they immediately went to the doctors, asking, ‘Why doesn’t my son feel anything?’ It seemed a silly question at first, but after countless questions, conversations and experiments, they, too, understood the situation. 

All sorts of people, beyond professionals and Taro’s parents, tried to fix him, cure this unknown condition. It was tiring, the toddler boy thought at the time, to go around so many places, to be overwhelmed with concerns and reactions that he couldn’t comprehend. Despite everyone’s efforts, he didn’t feel anything at all, except exhaustion . 

When Taro first noticed that the doctors were growing tired and that they’d soon deliver his parents the bad news of the illness having no remedy, he wanted to let nature take its course and to allow his parents to give up on him. It was a win-win situation for everyone in his eyes. However, he began to suspect that the bothersome gazes of the adults around him, the disdainful behaviour of children that went to class with him and the constant sorrow radiating from his family would continue to be expressed within the people he would meet for the rest of his life. And so, one day, while at a children’s theatre, he imitated the upturned lips and the wrinkled eyes of the boy next to him when he knew his mother was looking, and the tear of relief that fell from her face marked the starting point of his deceitful way of life. 

He could say he was pretty good at it, though. If all of the ways a human being could act, move and speak were labelled onto a massive board of switches, buttons and levers—something akin to the cockpit of an airplane—Taro Yamada could operate it effortlessly. He’d managed to convince the people around him—as well as himself—that he was just a regular human with regular human thoughts, ideas, and hobbies. Despite all this, Taro was constantly aware of a gaping hole within his artificially-mended heart. It was the one unpleasant flaw of his otherwise perfect being that he couldn’t be rid of no matter how hard he had tried. 

In the few years of his the early stages of his childhood, he’d learned that gaining popularity through the persona that he so carefully built earned him the admiring gazes of the students around him. While, in the end, this held no emotional value for him, Taro still felt as if it was a decent substitute for the missing piece of his heart, like a thin gas that occasionally passed through the holes of his body, giving him the temporary illusion of feeling rebuilt. However, this came with its repercussions, too—he ended up having to deal with more attention and expectations than was convenient for his ability to endure it all. Along with that, he had gained himself a red-haired, pigtailed companion that had followed him all the way into high school. 

Osana Najimi didn’t annoy Taro, even though he knew he should’ve been annoyed. Well, he only knew this because other students that he’d hung around with over the years were all amazed by the fact hat he wasn’t annoyed. When he had first heard this, his initial reaction was to go over to Osana and prepare his excuse for why he didn’t want to be called her friend anymore—after all, anything that made Taro appear more unusual than he wanted to be was a liability. 

But when he saw her, her innocent gaze and rosy cheeks, clearly indicating the appearance of a girl in love, kept Taro from voicing any of his meticulously arranged words. It was something about the fact that she was so attached to him that kept Taro from wanting to let her go. Something about Osana Najimi made her… special to Taro. For a moment in time, Taro had even wanted to keep Osana, in a way that went beyond friendship and intimate relationships. 

Taro had followed Osana around for a few days afterwards, both with her knowledge and without. Through this curious phase, he ended up learning about her many passions and opinions, all of which had nothing to do with him nor his own interests. Slowly, this short-lived feeling begun to fade, a moment in time too brief for Taro to be able to decipher its meaning. Eventually, Osana Najimi had become to Taro what everyone else was calling her—a childhood friend, someone who he didn’t feel anything significant towards, but had stuck around him for much too long for him to be able to just dismiss casually. Eventually, their friendship had lasted for so long that it came to the point where Osana Najimi knew Taro Yamada better than he knew himself.

Surprisingly, this made the girl more useful to him than he’d expected—she acted as his guidance, of sorts, by pointing out whether or not what he was doing was deemed strange for the character he was playing. With Osana’s unintentional assistance, Taro had successfully managed to transition his initially lively and favourable persona into a reclusive, inconspicuous one as the two grew older. If anyone were to ask why Taro had suddenly become such a quiet person, someone else would have a reasonable answer. For that, he had his childhood friend to thank. 

Taro had now successfully made it into his third year of high school. As far as the people around him knew, he was just some guy they went to school with, with a story that no one had bothered to learn, and that was just fine to him. If he could live the rest of his life like this, with no one to notice his synthetic personality, no one to bother him with their pointless worries, and no one that could see through the ever-present hole in his beating heart, Taro Yamada would be at the closest thing to bliss. He didn’t need to be ‘fixed’. That wasn’t ever important to him, and it seemed like it never would be. All he wanted was to live normally, and live as if he was always normal. 

Then one day, he crossed paths with a certain girl.

Ayano Aishi had met her other half. 

It was a trivial incident, one that began with her forehead slamming against a human wall, continuing with her palms hitting the floor, and ending with a slight sting across her body. Her expression remained as detached as ever—all she was thinking was how troublesome it would be to deal with the disconcerted apologies of the person in front of her. When she looked up to meet the boy’s eyes, though, everything changed. She didn’t even have to hold his hand to know…

‘This is the one.’

His hair was as dark as his kind eyes, obscured by the bangs now floating in front of his face as he leaned down to lend her his assistance. His reassuring grin was awkward, as if he, too, was bothered by such an occurrence. His fingers twitched just slightly as his hand came forward, revealing his desire for Ayano to take it quickly so he could just walk past her and they could both forget about such an experience. 

But Ayano wasn’t going to forget. 

This was her Prince Charming, after all, the man who had come to save her from her dire situation without knowing it himself. He was the one she was waiting for, inside the gloomy castle she had been trapped in all her life for years upon years, the thorny vines growing taller, the entrance becoming more obstructed, Ayano left to start thinking that no one would be able to break through with the puzzle piece of her heart that she so desperately longed to have. But someone did.

“I-I’m sorry. Are you alright?” he asked once he’d pulled her up, his voice deep and sympathetic. 

All Ayano could do was nod, to which he smiled gratefully. Just as he was about to brush past her, she grabbed hold of his uniform, a blush flaring across her face. The boy’s hands were much larger than hers—they looked firm, but inviting. As she was speaking, all she could think about was how she wanted to wrap her Prince Charming’s hands in hers, turning her face even redder. Her voice was quiet, timid, comparable to that of a girl in love— Ayano was in love . 

“Thank you… What’s your name?” Ayano stuttered as she spoke, her head turned down, the only things visible to her being the tiled floor, the shoes of her prince, and the bangs that were hiding her expression.

“Oh!” The boy laughed, a beautiful laugh, as flustered as it sounded. A delighted smile appeared on Ayano’s face in response, and she was inwardly grateful that her prince wasn’t able to see such a peculiar reaction.

“I’m Budo Masuyama. It’s a pleasure to meet you!”

‘Budo Masuyama… Budo… Masuyama…’ The words turned over in her head as she offered her own name, as she looked back at his departing figure, and continued to fill her mind for hours afterwards. When she was in the privacy of her own bed, she pulled the blanket up to her nose as she voiced the name of her prince for the first time, an enamoured smile filling her face as she kicked her feet in glee.

“Budo Masuyama.”

He was going to spend the rest of his life with Ayano Aishi. She was going to make it that way.

Chapter Text

Taro opened the door to outside his house, bracing himself for an angry Osana. As expected, she was there—red-faced and fuming. 

“You’ve been late three times in a row! Are you sick or something?! If you’re so ill, why don’t you just stay home, idiot! And on the first month of school, too!” Osana grumbled, responding to her own sentences as she ranted. Taro gave her an apologetic smile as he adjusted the strap of his bookbag. Osana seemed especially irked today, for whatever reason. 

“Sorry, I’ve just been caught up in this book lately.” 

“Dummy! You have to stop prioritizing your silly 200-year old books over your sleep!” she berated him, and he laughed in response as they both made their way down the street. 

Osana cared about Taro—this was clear to him, who was an expert at conveying his words in all sorts of ways. Her harsh demeanour was a result of her nervousness rather than any real malice. Typically, after such a back-and-forth, Osana would go back to normal, and they’d have a bit of conversation before they made it to school together. Today, though, she seemed to be much quieter. Taro glanced to the side to get a good look at his childhood friend, whose face was completely flushed. 

“Is everything alright? I’m starting to think you’re the sick one,” he told her, and Osana flinched at his words. She shook her head vigorously. 

“It’s nothing! J-Just hot outside…” she stammered, turning her face away from Taro’s. After a few moments of silence, she added something else.  

“...My friend’s going to confess to her crush today. Under the big tree… I’m just hoping it goes well for her, because… Well… You’ve heard of the saying, right?” 

Osana was referring to the rumour about confessing under the cherry blossom tree on the hill on Friday. “Nope.”

“Wha- well, of course someone as stupid as you wouldn’t know!” Osana grumbled.

“Is this the same person who’s called me an egghead for only listening to classical?” Taro wondered, and he grinned when she could only retort with a “Hey!”

Osana seemed to be thinking about love confessions a lot lately. The other day, Taro had overheard this conversation with her friend, and he recalled her expression looking equally as flustered, as if she herself had been caught pondering the concept. 

“I was just thinking about how happy I was for her, that she was so confident in her crush reciprocating her feelings…” Osana continued, adding in a quieter voice, “Meanwhile, I’ve got this big dummy over here…”

“What was that?” 

“N-Nothing!” she turned away once more, covering her face with her pigtails this time. 

Right before class began, and Taro had dropped Osana off at her own classroom, he stopped at the second floor to get a cold drink for his lightheadedness. Truthfully, he was a little sick—not nearly enough to warrant staying home, though. 

However, the coil had stopped rotating just as the can was about to tip over the edge, and he clicked his tongue in discontent when he figured it wasn’t going to move any further. “...this box of metal…” 

In all other cases, Taro would have put up with the dryness in his throat and have just gone to class, but when he checked his surroundings and couldn’t hear any footsteps, nor see any students, he decided to take his chance and lifted his foot to kick the machine.

A loud BANG! resonated around the same time as the short sound of a quiet girl’s surprise, so Taro had simply assumed he was imagining it as he picked up the can of juice, flicking it open as he began to walk to class. But right there in front of him was, in fact, a girl.

“Ah,” she said, once more, in an expressionless voice, when he widened his eyes after seeing her.

And then, the moment he looked into her dark, deep eyes, something within him clicked.

He didn’t realize this yet—right now, he was too busy with trying to make up an excuse for his behaviour. He waved his hands as he pleaded, “I-It’s not what it looks like, I swear! I was just…”

But before he could finish his sentence, the girl simply smiled reassuringly and walked off without another word. In these few seconds, Taro had noticed many things. He had seen her polished shoes and her recently-ironed uniform. He had noticed her black socks going up to her thighs. He observed the way her black hair subtly swung back and forth as she took elegant, yet almost robotic steps. He also subconsciously noticed that her phone had been in one of her hands the whole time. 

What he did not notice, until she was completely out of his sight and he could not hear her footsteps any longer, was the throbbing in his chest, to the point where it was nearly painful once he was finally aware of it. 

Taro clutched his heart, taking heavy breaths as he did. It wasn’t like he didn’t have a pulse—of course he did, because everyone had one. But never in his life had he ever been so aware of it, being able to feel the blood being physically pumped in and out of it. Taro felt strange… he felt alive. 

He muttered a sound of disbelief, letting himself relish in the confusion of the new sensation for a minute or so. There was nothing pleasant about the way he suddenly sensed his heart crashing against his ribcage, but the feeling wasn’t bothersome, either, when it had slowed into steadier beats. What was this supposed to mean, exactly? And… was that girl the cause of it? Surely his fever had to have played a part, as well. 

Taro didn’t get time to ponder this any longer, because the mental clock in his head had been warning him for a while now that he shouldn’t be arriving to class so close to the bell. Such thoughts are unnecessary, Taro decided, before ignoring the way the rhythm inside his chest had sped up ever so slightly as he paced down the same hallway that black-haired girl had gone. 

Taro Yamada rested his head on his palms as he continued to stare at the picture of the black-haired girl on his monitor, as if doing so would give him any more clues as to who this girl was. 

Ayano Aishi was a year below him, making her his underclassman—his kouhai. There were no rumours about her, nor any photos of her, besides the one that the school itself provided. She never accidentally made her way into the selfies of other student’s posts, nor did she come up in any online conversations besides ones that included her in a list of others. Whoever this girl was, she was truly skilled at hiding her presence… until someone noticed the lack of it. 

While Taro was looking at his kouhai’s lifeless non-breathing portrait on an LCD display, he was slowly forgetting why she’d piqued his interest in the first place. To any other person, and to him at this moment, she simply gave off the atmosphere of an outcast, someone such as the occult club leader or other loners at school. 

He closed his eyes and remembered the moment she had passed by him, recalling the fact that he hadn’t noticed her at all until she spoke, the dull shine in her eyes when she apathetically smiled and the instant he’d felt his heart contracting when she turned away. Suddenly, he was bringing his hand back up to his chest now, soaking in the sensation of the fluctuating pulses that Taro didn’t realize he had been longing for since that morning. Now, he could conclude that Ayano Aishi was the cause of it. Something about her made her special to him. 

Unbeknownst to him, Taro’s lips were curling up as he recalled every miniscule detail of the black-haired girl. He could have been sitting there for the rest of the night, trying to grasp to the thrilling feeling of his own heartbeat, finally having the evidence to prove to himself that he was a human being, too. However, it was dinner time, and when his mother noticed that for the first time in a while he hadn’t come downstairs on time, she called for his name. 

Taro’s dad talked about how uneventful his day at work was and how insufferable his coworkers were, just like on any other day, and Taro’s mother filled in the silence with her own anecdotes about conversations with their neighbours and relatives. Taro, like always, politely listened and responded with what he knew would satisfy the both of them, with words of sympathy or indignant agreement. However, something was different about him today, and his mother noticed it first. 

“Did something happen today, Taro?” she asked, when she noticed that he seemed to be trying to bore a hole into his plate of food. 

“Huh? Oh, no, nothing in particular,” he said. “I’m not that hungry, that’s all.” 

“Hmm, if you say so,” she replied. “If anything’s wrong, dear, don’t be afraid to talk to us. We’re your parents, after all.” Taro’s father nodded in agreement, and Taro smiled at the both of them. 

“Haha, alright. There’s really nothing wrong, though,” Taro dismissed, steering the conversation back to its original course.

Taro could tell that his parents were still wary of his condition as a child, even years later. They were just as desiring of a ‘normal’ child as Taro was of being one, and should even a hint of his apathy come back again, they would most likely be all over him in worries and questions and contemplation over going back to the doctors about it. Taro could see the glint of anxiety in his mother’s eye as she spoke, and he could sense that a shroud of doubt was now enveloping the dinner table. 

If this is how it’s going to be, Taro thought, I have to keep myself low profile. If anyone were to learn that some average guy was expressing interest in someone that seemed to be worlds apart in personality from literally anyone else, questions and interrogations would lead to rumours and eventually the discovery that he and and she were not so different, after all. With the type of people surrounding Taro, he didn’t want to deal with the consequences of such a situation. If he could maintain his facade for years upon years without letting it slip, he could do it while investigating this Ayano Aishi. 

Chapter Text

He would wake up at the same time every day, sometimes a bit earlier or later depending on when he went to bed last night. 

He would brush his teeth, using the time to sneak in another chapter of a book. 

He would put on his uniform, bottom to top, and run through his hair a couple times before going downstairs.

He would wolf down his breakfast, done out of habit after a few years of Osana coming directly inside his house to reprimand him for being such a slow eater in the mornings. 

He would come outside to meet her, have their typical banter and casual conversation before they parted ways at school.

There, he would chat with a few classmates before class started, attempt to focus on the lecture, get flustered when the teacher would suddenly call his name. 

Come lunchtime, and he would seat himself next to Osana at the rooftop. As she would chat with Raibaru, he would get through a few more chapters while eating his lunch. 

After school, he would clean the plaza with Osana and her friend. Once they left school, they would walk home together, reporting their day and their plans after school. Osana’s would always be more eventful than his own—she had a lot of friends. 

Once he had stepped into his house and greeted his parents, he would go into his room, change into his casual wear, and complete any assignments for the day before going back downstairs and reading in the living room. 

He would have some light conversation with his parents over dinner, and occasionally they would ask him if anything noteworthy happened at school—The answer would always be no. 

He would go back upstairs, brush his teeth, grab a good book and read himself to sleep. Once he woke up, he would repeat the same things, over and over. 

It was a boring life, a bland life, a life carved into perfect monotony. 

These days, it was the same thing. The only real difference was undocumentable—minor details that could be easily omitted.

Sometimes, he would walk past a black-haired girl in the hallways, quickly calculating a prediction in his head of where she was headed, noting the people who were talking to her and the expressions she was making. 

Sometimes, he would steal a few glances at a black-haired girl during lunchtime, who was eating a few feet away from him, before flipping another page of his book.

Sometimes, right before he went to bed, he’d get on the computer and stare at the school pictures of a black-haired girl, thinking about nothing in particular, before becoming aware of the time and shutting the monitor down.

Of course, it was never anything obtrusive. Taro never planned on taking any risks, after all. Not when everything was going so well. 

This was just a little hobby—nothing that would get in the way of his real life. As interesting as a subject Ayano was, she was off-limits. 

…At least until he figured out what he wanted to do with her.

Ayano Aishi was a very specific kind of beautiful. 

She wasn’t attractive in the conventional sense, and everything about her appearance was completely average. Her face was too stiff, resembling that of a mannequin’s; whenever she smiled, frowned, or glared, she seemed to be trying too hard, as there was always something off-putting about her expression. Her voice wasn’t cold, but it was overbearingly neutral, too smooth, too indifferent. She moved mechanically, as if she was constantly waiting on someone to tell her what to do next. 

A blank slate: the perfect descriptor. It was beautiful, to Taro, how someone could be so unaffected by the world around her. A bit funny, as well—how Ayano walked around like she was the involuntary protagonist of a world that didn’t want her. 

Her detachment didn’t seem to come from any sort of arrogance, but rather resignation. Perhaps at some point in time, she’d tried to live a life like the others, laughing and gossiping and blending in, but it didn’t work out the way she’d wanted it to. Or maybe she thought it was too much work. Interesting, really, when in Taro’s case he had turned out just fine. 

Ayano’s activities were usually as uneventful as his own. The only notable thing about her day at school was the fact that she ate in the same space as Taro did. 

The first time he truly saw her there, his heart skipped a beat. He had to grin a little. 

However, this afternoon, she was missing from the rooftop. Her bento wasn’t left on any of the seats to mark her spot, either.

When Taro thought about it, it wasn’t that strange that he had missed her—he didn’t have many gaps in the school day to always know what she was doing, so it was entirely possible that someone had just asked her to run an errand or two. 

Still, the missing bento tugged at some part of him, so Taro, on a whim, decided to go to the edge of the roof to do some sightseeing. 

Ayano wasn’t anywhere near the outdoor cafeteria. She wasn’t walking along the pavement, either. Honestly, there was little chance she was even outside of the building, but for some reason, Taro kept analyzing the view in front of him. 

There were a few girls eating on the tables in the outdoor cafeteria, Shiromi walking past the zen garden, and the Martial Arts Club practicing inside—something that didn’t happen often during lunchtime, but there were always exceptions once in a while—

Behind one of the trees, he saw a feminine figure. 

Her back was flat against the trunk, and her head was turned to the side, facing the practicing members. Her expression and her posture were too far away to read, but the mere outlandishness of what was before Taro struck him all the same. 

‘Is she… stalking them?’ 

There was no mistake—that figure was Ayano Aishi. Ayano Aishi, peeking at the Martial Arts Club. She was always on the rooftop, but today, for some odd reason, she was in the zen garden, hiding behind a tree. 

Taro’s face was as blank as ever, but for a split second, or maybe even less, his eyebrows had furrowed together. 

Someone was walking up to him from behind. He grabbed Taro by the shoulder, causing him to yelp in response. 

“Hey, Yamada!” Fureddo Jonzu grinned as Taro turned to look at him. “‘Sup?” 

Taro didn’t talk to the leader of the Photography Club often, unless they were in class. He shivered from the touch of his warm hand on his shoulder before muttering, “Gosh, you scared me, Jonzu. Hey. Um… Did you need anything?”

“No, nothing. Just wondering what was so interesting.” He leaned over to try and match Taro’s perspective, and his eyes immediately landed on Shiromi. “Oooh. Ogling that Torayoshi, I see. Won’t judge!

“W-What? Ahaha, what are you talking about?” Taro stammered, taking a step away so the blonde would take his hand off his shoulder. He looked away, rubbing the back of his neck ashamedly. “I was just looking for Osana.” 

Right. Osana wasn’t on the rooftop, either. While Taro was, in fact, aware of that, the first thing that crossed his mind when he stepped onto the rooftop was the fact that Ayano wasn’t there, instead. 

Weird. 

“Ohhh, that girlfriend of yours,” Fureddo replied. Taro turned to look back at him as he put his hand to his chin. Taro inwardly remarked how his posture, paired with the camera around his neck, gave him the perfect aura of an detective. 

“Hmm… Pretty sure she’s down by the fountain—at least, that’s where I last saw her.” 

He was probably right. Taro remembered lending her his book last night—there was a chance she was reading it at his usual spot at the fountain. “Oh, really? Thanks for telling me!”

Taro gave him a polite grin before waving and turning to walk back down the stairs. He leisurely made his way down, wiped any thoughts of his recent observation from the front of his mind, and checked his right hand to make sure he was still carrying his bento and hadn’t left it on the parapet of the rooftop.

As he walked through the doors to the plaza, Taro was unsurprised to find Osana sitting right where he thought she’d be. She seemed incredibly engrossed in the book he had lent her earlier that day, judging by the fact that she didn’t immediately notice his presence. Her eyes were practically glued to the pages, and he swore he could even see a few tears. 

“Enjoying it?” He leaned over to ask her, to which Osana yelped in surprise. Once she looked up at him, her eyes wide and watery, her cheeks flushed with recognition.

She quickly scooted away, muttering, “What’s it to you, i-idiot? Why’d you scare me like that?” Taro observed that as she rushed to close the book and put it aside, she kept one of her fingers inside the book to mark her spot. 

“Didn’t mean to,” Taro shrugged, “Plus, that’s my book you’ve borrowed. I have the right to ask, don’t I?” 

“Whatever,” Osana mumbled, before inconspicuously slipping her finger out of the book—but not after a bit of hesitation. She started playing with her hands as she nonchalantly added, “You know, it’s way more interesting than I expected…” 

“Really? I’m happy to hear that,” Taro grinned. Osana looked away from Taro as he smiled, and her eyelashes fluttered as she softly added something else, too quiet to hear under the sounds of crashing water.

 “... with me … instead of reading old books …” 

“Huh? What was that?” He blinked innocently, and Osana’s face turned a brighter shade of red as she rapidly stood up from her spot at the fountain. 

“T-That was- I said there are better novels than this old book! I said nothing!” she stuttered. “W-What were you off doing, anyway? Were you eating alone on the rooftop or something?” 

“Oh,” Taro replied, “Bathroom.” 

“Sure took you a while!” She huffed, and Taro shrugged apologetically. “Sorry, I guess.” 

In his head, as Osana reacted with bewilderment at his apology, Taro silently thought that she was right to be suspicious.

Budo Masuyama’s headband went missing from school today. 

It was a simple feat—He took it off to wipe his sweat and got distracted after he left it out in the open. Ayano Aishi didn’t even have to do anything except grab it while his head was turned. 

The feeling of the damp cloth made her blush—the fresh sweat of her beloved. Ayano grinned like a madman when she rubbed it against her face, feeling brighter by the second. She basically hit the jackpot! In fact, her first instinct was to lick it, but Ayano decided to save that for later. Maybe on special occasions. 

Senpai’s reaction when he realized it went missing was adorable, as well. Widened eyes, a baffled expression, and just a touch of anger that made him all the more attractive. Maybe one day, after they got married, she’d tell him the story of how his headband went missing. She could already see it: an expression just like the one she was seeing now, right before he burst into laughter and pulled her closer to him, leaning his head against hers as he would tell her that part of him suspected that was the case. 

Ayano had to stifle her giggles. Oh, the possibilities! She was addicted to the rush of love, the colour brought into her life simply from the presence of the man fated to be with her. She couldn’t believe she had gone so long without knowing this feeling.

There was not a second where it crossed Ayano’s mind that her Senpai wouldn’t choose her. Not a single moment in time. Not even when, while trailing behind him in the hallway, she’d spot him shooting wistful glances at a short-haired girl in the hallway…

…

Raibaru Fumetsu. Somehow, Senpai was connected to this girl. And truth be told, Ayano didn’t care how . She just wanted her gone. Gone from Senpai’s eyes, attention, thoughts. Gone. 

Sometimes, Ayano just wanted to run up to the girl and pin her down. Kick her in the head, torso, anywhere that hurt. Twist her arms, break her bones, watch her bleed, hear her cries. She wanted to dispose of her body, to make her disappear.

Still, she had common sense. That stupid girl was a master of martial arts, although not as good as her benevolent Senpai. Additionally, Ayano was aware of how deeply her Senpai cared for justice—if Ayano was truly able to succeed in exterminating Raibaru, and the case was left unsolved, Senpai would go his whole life wondering about her. 

Ayano didn’t want that; that wasn’t going to be her ‘happy ending’. She wanted Senpai’s undivided attention—for his thoughts to be filled with only her.

Violence was not the answer with Raibaru—no matter how badly Ayano wanted it to be. 

She was going to have to dispose of her in a more… peaceful manner. As much as she didn’t care for it, Ayano would have to find the source of Raibaru’s relationship with Senpai—and plan accordingly.

She went up to the girl one day and struck up a conversation. She gave her a disgustingly kind smile in response, but luckily Ayano was able to control herself. She offered to do her a few favours to get on her good side, but even still, Raibaru never let anything about her Senpai slip. It was as if she was intentionally trying to keep Ayano away from him. The nerve of that stupid, stupid girl. 

Ayano couldn’t directly ask her anything about her Senpai, either. If she did, who knew the way Raibaru would take it? She could even go and accuse her of being a stalker to her beloved, and everything would just be ruined . 

That little friend of hers wouldn’t be any help. Ayano would never be able to get Osana alone—Raibaru stuck to her like a helpless puppy. 

She was just about at her wit’s end with the situation, wondering if she should just kidnap the nearest girl and torture her into unconditional obedience when, from the corner of her vision, she saw a particular student. 

Quiet, unassuming, timid—he could keep a secret if Ayano made him. And best of all, he seemed to know both parties well enough.

Ayano Aishi slipped a note into Taro Yamada’s locker.

I want to talk to you about Raibaru Fumetsu. Meet me on the rooftop after cleaning time. 

Her plan was set into action.

Chapter Text

Everything is going as it should be, Taro thought to himself. I’m doing as I usually am. Those were the two fundamental truths of his life for as long as he’s lived it, and they still held up today.

But if that was the case, then why? There was a pressure in his chest, an unfamiliar, unpleasant gnawing at his gut, and he can’t put a pin on the moment he realized it was there. It feels as though his body is warning him that he’s reaching his limit.

‘You can’t pretend anymore.’ But why?

Taro’s life was easy to explain. There used to be nothing to explain. He showed his feelings as though he had them, and effortlessly hid the fact that he had nothing inside. But now, he can barely form words to describe the way the looming pressure is drowning out his senses, erasing his rationality. There’s not nothing inside anymore. There was definitely something, and it was threatening to escape him.

He couldn’t even remember where he was, and the thought of that finally brings him the strength to push the warnings down; ignoring them, as he was starting to get used to doing.

He’s still at school. Osana was chattering away next to him. The topic was trivial and banally familiar; her hair. Apparently she had been having dreams about it. Taro could barely pretend to be interested in what she was saying, since he’d heard it so many times before. How could a person be so obsessed with the length of their hair?

“Just cut it.”

Oh. He hadn’t planned to say that. The monotony in his voice must have caught Osana’s attention, because she’d turned to look at him with that distinctly concerned glance. That said he was wrong, he’d done something wrong.

Taro stammered, “I mean, it just doesn’t make sense to me. If you don’t like how long your hair is… no one’s stopping you. Short hair would suit you just as well.”

“W-What?” Osana gasped, rushing to cover her reddening face with her twin tails. “E-Ew, gross! Who said I cared what you think about my hair?”

He winced. Like nails on a chalkboard.

Her screaky voice was unbelievably shrill. It rang about his head, threatening to unwind the nauseating pressure he was still holding down. He went rigid at the thought of it—was he getting irritated?

Why was it getting harder to control himself?

“I’m sorry, I guess.” Whether or not the unintentional flatness to his tone was unusual or not, Taro had already spoken and revealed it. There was nothing to do about it.

The shadows cast by the setting sunlight hung at the feet of Taro and his childhood friend as they walked down the empty hallway. Osana’s silence was substantive, as if she was preparing to apologize, or say anything else, to remedy the awkwardness he assumed she was feeling now. But before she said anything, Taro’s attention had lapsed.

“Listen, I… hm? Why’d you stop walking?” She brought her gaze towards where Taro was looking, through the window of a classroom they were just about to pass. “The art club?”

The blank-faced girl—Ayano—was standing in the corner of the room, stirring a paintbrush in a small tank and fanning her face. The room was completely empty, save for the redhead scrutinizing her from his easel in the middle of the room—Geiju Tsuburaya.

It was such a strange sight. Taro was shaken by the sudden appearance of his kouhai, and he certainly didn’t expect her to be here.

She was doing a lot of strange things.

Taro had no reason to be staring. Osana was looking at him. He paused before turning to make eye contact with her. “The art club seems to have a new member.”

She raised an eyebrow. “I didn’t know you were interested in the art club.”

“Not really… I was just surprised.”

“Whatever you say.” She took another glance into the room to properly identify the girl. “That’s Aishi. She’s probably just club-hopping. She’s pretty reserved, so it’s probably hard for her…”

Taro was oddly bothered by her sympathetic gaze. “Do you know her?”

She shrugged. “She’s just my classmate. Even then, it’s hard to get to know her. Ah, maybe she’ll find a friend in the art club leader. He’s kinda similar to her, don’t you think?”

He silently watched as Ayano presented the clean paintbrushes to Tsuburaya, earning a simple nod. She returned the gesture with a halfhearted smile—if it could even be called that—and turned away to put back the brushes. A short, meaningless interaction.

Taro clenched his fist.

“Maybe.”

Osana stammered as he started down the hallway again, unannounced, “W-Wait! Hey! Don’t walk so fast!”

—

The hinges of the shoe locker creaked as it opened, and the pink-tinted envelope fell out onto the floor before Taro could obscure it from view.

“Is that a letter?” Osana asked, oblivious to his resignation.

Maybe this was bound to happen. It wasn’t the first one, after all.

He picked it up, turned it around with an air of thoughtless examination. Like all the others, the paper carried a hint of vanilla.

Osana didn’t fail to notice the feminine nature of the envelope, either. Awkwardly playing with her fingers, she mumbled, “Do you know who sent it?”

All too well, he knew. “Nothing about a sender,” Taro replied. Osana’s face fell.

“T-Then what is it?” With severe hesitation, she murmured, “Do… do you think it’s… a l-love…”

She couldn’t finish the sentence, and froze when Taro gave her an innocent look. “A what?”

Her docile tone had turned accusatory. “Nothing. W-Well, are you gonna open it or not?”

He really would rather have not. Despite that, Taro spared the girl another glance before gently lifting the seal flap, making sure to tilt the letter at an angle that she wouldn’t be able to read from. Either way, the contents of the message were tiresomely familiar to him.

Taro Yamada,

I want to talk to you about Raibaru Fumetsu, Osana’s best friend.

Meet me at whatever time is convenient for you.

Ayano Aishi

With letter that Taro had gotten, she seemed to change something about the contents, as if those were the reasons he’d chosen to ignore them. This time, she finally addressed him directly. Ayano writing his name—that felt a little nice he had to admit.

“So? Is it from a girl?” was what Taro presumed Osana had said, but his head had begun to ring again.

Promptly, he folded the letter back up, barely hearing the sound of Osana’s frustrated grumble. He barely heard anything else she’d said, either, when he layered the paper over the envelope and tore the paper in half. And then tore it again, and again, and again.

With every sharp movement of his wrists, he felt a little more relieved. It was a teardrop of a remedy, but finally the knot of pressure in his chest seemed to lighten.

As he walked out of the school, he tossed the teeny scraps to his left, letting the remains of the letter sprinkle into the garbage bin like confetti. “Let’s go.”

“W-Wait, hold on!”

Osana rushed to catch up to Taro. “What was that? Why’d you tear up the letter? That was so odd!”

“Was it?” Taro looked guilty. “The letter just wasn’t for me.”

“Are you absolutely sure?”

“It was clear as day.”.

“Then…” Osana fumed. “You could have put that in the right person’s locker, then!?”

He paused. “...Oops.”

“Dumbass.” Osana raised her hand in a fist, striking Taro in the elbow. He was too out of it to move away or react. “You’re just mad no girls like you, aren’t you?” The smirk on her face gave away her obvious relief, but Taro couldn’t care less.

The consistency with which Ayano was sending the letters clearly meant she needed him desperately for that information about Raibaru. She wanted to use him. And for what, he didn’t have a concrete idea of, but…

‘In the end, it probably has nothing to do with me.’

The force of his nails digging into his palms could’ve drawn blood, and yet the headache still didn’t cease.

Ayano gazed longingly at her senpai from outside of his classroom. Even when he was reprimanding his friends, even when he was caught off guard by their antics, even when he was only chewing his food, he never stopped looking so beautiful.

At first the rushing palpitations of her heart that came about when she felt his presence were thrilling, a comforting reminder that she found her meaning to live, but it made her so sad that the same racing heartbeat was what kept her from being close to him. She wished she could control herself, but she wasn’t used to having to control herself in the first place.

Maybe it would come more easily some day. After she would get tired of just staring. Today she couldn’t have that privilege for long though—she had business to sort out.

She dragged her finger across the room’s doorframe before eventually forcing herself to move, down, down the stairwells and towards the courtyard. The warm voice of Budo’s chatter faded, replaced by that of all the other students in the school, and simultaneously Ayano had hollowed out again.

She was starting to dislike this feeling, the lack of it. She couldn’t get used to it after finally knowing of what it felt like to have a soul.

The hallways emptied out as she strolled through them, and eventually there was no one when she’d found herself by the lockers. Conveniently, no one except the person she was looking for.

The boy was truly hard to notice unless he was alone. He didn’t seem keen on noticing other people either. It was as though he was actively trying to avoid eye contact with Ayano while making his way down the hall.

“You’ve been ignoring my letters.”

Taro Yamada froze. He finally looked at Ayano, as well.

“Huh?” he sputtered.

“At first, I thought you just hadn’t noticed them when they fell out of your locker, but then I saw my last one torn up in the trash bin,” she continued, then shrugged. “That hurt my feelings a little. I just wanted to talk.”

His expression turned sheepish, and he opened his mouth as if to say something, yet no words came out.

“I-I’m sorry,” he managed to croak, eventually. “It’s just that I don’t know much about Osana’s friends. I probably don’t have anything interesting to say.”

Seeming very ready to leave the conversation now, Taro moved to pass Ayano, attempting to shuffle past her. She grabbed him by the wrist to stop him, feeling him flinch as she did.

“You can drop the act. Unless you want everyone else to know about it, too.”

Ayano looked up at him expressionlessly. Even as she bore into his gaze, all Ayano could see in his wavering eyes was pure confusion and fear.

“...What?” Taro stammered, lips upturned in disbelief.

“You’ve been working hard to keep up that facade of yours, Taro,” Ayano said, tightening her grip, “But all it takes is a few rumours for people to find out who you really are.”

For a moment, it looked like he was forever going to keep that mask up. But, it only took a moment for him to blink, and with that Ayano watched all of the light fall out of his expression.

Even when Taro was alone, and even if Ayano wanted to pay any closer attention to him, it was near impossible to see his impenetrable expression slip. But that didn’t matter—she only had to see it happen once, when he’d kicked the vending machine in a way that looked too unsettlingly violent for someone of his demeanour.

The students at the insipidly uneventful Akademi loved to spread any word that seemed at least slightly plausible. Truthfully, Ayano didn’t have any interest in doing that in the first place. She was just using this information to determine whether or not Taro Yamada was going to be a liability to her.

“And I thought I was hiding it so well,” he said, in a tone so flat it sounded inhuman. With not a single rise or fall in intonation, he sounded nothing like the person he was presenting as before. “I guess it takes one to know one.”

Something about Taro Yamada looked uncanny now. It was as if he’d stopped using the fine motors in his face to make him look… present. Ayano wasn’t sure what to make of it, especially since his blank, lifeless gaze now seemed as though it was a mirror.

But there was something unfamiliar in the depths of his eyes as well. Something… sinister.

A harsh grip settled on her wrist. Ayano winced as Taro used his other hand to free himself of her hold, roughly at that. Though the pain didn’t affect her much, she found herself rubbing her wrist at the mere surprise of it. Silently, unconsciously, she thought to herself, Budo wouldn’t take advantage of his strength like that.

Disquietly, it looked like if Taro was going to resist her, it was going to be harder for Ayano to deal with him than she would like.

“I won’t say a word if you just tell me what I want to know. It’s simple,” she stated. “It doesn’t have to be a bigger deal than it is.”

Soullessly, Taro looked at her. “Why do you want to know about Raibaru so bad? I just don’t understand you.”

“That doesn’t concern you.” Something about his directly accusatory words seemed off to Ayano, but she didn’t bother focusing on it.

He then crossed his arms, raising his eyebrow—an action that didn’t suit his unmoving expression in the slightest. “It does if I want to know. I’ll tell you about Raibaru, then.”

Ayano clenched her jaw. She didn’t like being played around with like this. But the thought of his harsh grip, something she didn’t have the strength to counteract, and the light of dangerous instinct in the void of his gaze told her that it wouldn’t hurt to tell him.

“Maybe you’d understand if you felt it,” Ayano mumbled, unable to stop the heat rising into her cheeks as she quietly added, “Love, that is.”

Taro remained indifferent, but his pause implied surprise at her words.

“Love?” he scoffed. “No, no I don’t think I would. Of all things I couldn’t feel, that’s probably the furthest.”

“That’s what I thought too, until it happened to me.”

“And who is it you… love?”

Ayano blushed. “That’s a little embarrassing. I can’t even talk to him yet, I could barely say his name.”

But being prompted to think of him brought up the memory of Budo’s smile, his direct gaze in the brief moment they’d met, and Ayano’s heart felt whole again. She couldn’t control the grin that was starting to spread across her face, as she never could. But every time she felt this way, it was like she was freed from the numbing cage she had been trapped in her whole life. Truly, she pitied Taro for never feeling this way, if he was anything like her at all.

A chill swept through the hallway. The open doors to the courtyard served as the source, but when Ayano looked back at Taro and his vacantly cold expression—so much like a reflection—she cooled down on her own.

“Is that enough for you?” she asked tonelessly.

Taro only looked at her. He didn’t say anything, only narrowing his eyes, silent judgement forming in his expression. But, when he blinked, he turned into the awkward, confused student he’d come across as just a moment earlier.

Ayano turned, looking for what Taro had put his mask back up for, and watched as a student walked past them, glancing at the two peculiarly.

Taro coughed, and smiled at her modestly. “This is kind of an awkward time and place, don’t you think? Plus, Osana’s waiting for me. We can go to that place you suggested the first time. Rooftop after school?”

Ayano nodded. She desperately wanted to go back and soothe herself at the sight of Budo again, anyway. Before she could turn away, however, Taro called out to her.

“Aishi-san, wait.”

Not having dropped his mask again, he looked at her somewhat shyly. “Don’t you want to talk about anything else?”

“No,” she said immediately.

Taro scratched the back of his neck. “That hurts my feelings a little. I thought we’d have more grounds to get along.”

Ayano didn’t know what he was talking about, and really didn’t care. “So what?”

“...Nothing, I guess. But…”

Taro sighed before stretching his hand out amicably. Unlike what he’d shown he was capable of, his smile seemed unnatural, plastered on. But he sounded sincere as he asked, “Let’s be friends, hm? I’m your Senpai after all.”

‘Not mine,’ Ayano thought to herself instinctively. But without another word, she shook his hand. She just wanted to get back to Budo.