Crossover Fan Fiction ❯ Happy Endings, And Other Lies ❯ Happy Endings: 7 ( Chapter 7 )

[ Y - Young Adult: Not suitable for readers under 16 ]

Chapter Seven

 

Summer break was a relief, and I put much of my daily effort into first exercising my body, and then later into studying the guides. I finally caught up on my classwork, papers, and exams in July, near Obon. We took the week off for Obon to visit family and on return I found a message requesting an escort to a festival with both Saki and Yui, so I invited Komachi and she invited her young man. The six of us gathered in traditional summerweight yukata, ladies very lovely, and sister romping the cuteness factor. I wore a plain one, and the girls went with bright colors.

It was warm at the festival entrance, but the site by the seaside was cooler and we wandered the stalls, laughing and happy. I spotted people I knew from elsewhere, from school some of them, others from Middle School. They did not recognize me surrounded by women, as I was. I shrugged. The girls went for the usual treats, some competitive games like catching goldfish with a paper lined hoop, and other typical nonsense people throw away money on because everybody does it. We got the warning shot for the fireworks and climbed the slope of the hill until we ran into a flimsy barrier, designating VIP seating. I heard a voice call my name there.

“Hikigaya, is that you?” I looked. It was Haruno. The devil herself. She was in a much better mood, from what I could see so I waved.

“Come on over. Bring your guests.” I lifted the barricade and the bevy of women and my future brother in law stepped into cowboy country. There was grass, carefully mowed, seats, light music playing on speakers. It was… refined.

“I hate these things, but one of us has to show up,” sighed Haruno, beckoning to the chairs lined up, facing the fireworks. I heard pops and took the seat beside the sexy woman. I’m not blind. Don’t hate me.

“So Yukino loses again?” she mumbled. “You seem popular.”

“This is my sister Komachi and her boyfriend Taishi. This is Taishi’s older sister and my classmate Saki. This is Yui, whom you met, from our club. I was under the impression Yukino was not available this evening? She did not answer her phone.”

“She rarely turns it on. If she didn’t have your number in there she might not know who was calling,” sighed Haruno.  

“That is unfortunate. I think she would have enjoyed joining us here this evening. I shall have to make it up to her later.”

“She likes the violent panda park. Take her there for a date. She would like that.” I looked at her in the changing lights of the bursting fireworks, their pops and booms overhead. She was beautiful. I could see why Yukino felt so overshadowed by this being, even if most of what she showed the world was a lie. Who was Haruno really? Would I ever see it?

“Don’t fall for me, loverboy. Yukino used up all her personal capital saving you. She’s probably attending functions for our parents right now. Pretending to be a perfect doll. I didn’t want this life for her. I wanted her to make her own choices, and be her own self, not a copy of me,” she said, quietly enough only I could hear her.

“Thank you for the perspective, Haruno-hime.”

“You think I’m a princess?” she chortled.

“In a tower, all alone. The masks reveal as much as they conceal,” I responded.

“You are a sharp one. Stop reminding me of those politicians. At least you keep your hands to yourself.”

“For now. For now,” I teased. Haruno shook her head mildly. I examined the bursting fireworks.

“Ta-may-ya!” shouted Komachi, giggling and hugging Taishi. My sister was happy. That should be enough.

+++++++++

 

I asked out Yukino to the Funland park. She admitted to having a season pass and offered her family limo to carry us there. The same car that hit me. I stared at it.

“The damage was fixed, both with the car and with you. I didn’t even know what happened at the time. I was in the back seat, anxious to get to school. The ambulance took you away and I never saw your face until later. So can we set this aside for now?” she asked. I gritted my teeth and held the door for her, assisting her into the car by one hand. I went around to the far side where the driver who had literally run me over blankly held the door for me. I got in. I was in the car that almost killed me. What is the meta of this situation? My pain mantras were helpful.

Thankfully the drive to Funland wasn’t terribly long and we were let off in front of the gates. I purchased a day pass and ride bracelet for myself, Yukino merely presenting her annual pass and slipping on the jeweled bracelet and its RFID. Actual jewels and actual gold. It was a chilly day, early for Chiba. A storm had blown across the previous night and the grounds were wet and the Pacific winds blustery, surging through the park which was sparsely populated at the moment. We had the place to ourselves, with the attendants and rides starting up as we approached. It was nice. They even wiped the seats dry for us.

I held her hand as we dropped over a steep fall on the roller coaster and she shrieked in happiness, flushed with more vitality than she usually allowed to show. I smiled and she didn’t frown when she saw me. Perhaps in another world, with different circumstances she might be more guarded around me, but here, maybe because of deeper understanding between us, she felt more comfortable.

We rolled and twisted on the various rides until we were tired, then walked around, snacking on junk food. Eventually we visited the exhibits, strolling together with a limited edition samurai panda doll under her arm. Yukino seemed happy. I was grateful to Haruno for the tip.

As the sun rolled towards the Western horizon I returned to Chiba via the same car, and there was a moment were we probably would have kissed but chose not to take that step. Just a pause, and a smile.

“Thank you for today, Hachiman,” she said, with warmth. We bowed to each other with politeness and she returned to her car and they drove away.

I found Komachi at the front door frowning.

“That was the car that hit you. That was Yukinoshita, wasn’t it?” she said. “That’s… wow. Heavy irony.”

“We went to Pan-San Land,” I said. “It was a date.”

“What about Saki? What about Yui?” she said with concern.

“I… Yui? What about Yui?” I asked, confused.

“Stupid Gomi-Chan. She’s got a crush on you, dummy! She visited you in the hospital a bunch of times, but you were always loopy from those drugs.”

“She what? I don’t remember that,” I spluttered, trying to remember anything more than the blur of pain through my hospitalization.

“It’s why she changed her hair back. You were half conscious on drugs but you said you wanted to see the real her, not some anime image. She seemed really touched by that,” Komachi said.

“I did? Wow. I do not remember that at ALL. Huh. She’s a nice girl. A very nice girl.” And I’d complimented her on her new look, too. That’s Flag Setting activity, right there.

“So what are you going to do? If you pick one you hurt the others,” said my cute little sister in her most serious frown.

“And the Tenchi Paradox applies: not picking one also hurts the others,” I pondered aloud. 

“Only you would apply anime harem logic to real life, Gomi-chan. You better take them seriously. These are nice girls.”

I sighed. She was right. Completely right. My changes, my maturity, was attracting women, and I would hurt them no matter what I did, who I chose. I could drag this out, see who fit me best, let them decide if their interest in me was superficial, transitory, a mere flutter in the hearts of maidens in their youth? And it probably was. What if I was just the idea, an image, a mask that fit a rebellious and romantic fancy that had gained their attention? And it would fall away, like all such fancies did. I really don’t know.

School that week was more of the routine, punctuated by various tasks for Fall and a looming request in November to meet with a neighboring high school. Iroha kept peeking into Student Council, helping out as a staff member and trying to rub elbows with Hayama, who’d been sent from our homeroom class. I was, ironically, the council secretary. Mostly because I was good at typing and organizing, and I filtered a lot of the stupid garbage away from Yukino so she wouldn’t get angry. There was frequent death threats sent to my shoebox, along with my growing tack collection, which I actually used for pinning up notices around the school. That was part of my job on the StuCo, too. The threats I put into a binder, properly preserved because this sort of thing is deeply amusing on multiple levels. Some of the threats were accusations of impropriety and playboy behavior, often with printed photos of myself and one of the three girls I was dating. Yui got a proper solo date with me. So did Saki. Both were individually very nice people and calmed considerably without another woman to compete with for my attention. We held hands, shopped, visited family, met parents and siblings. It was all very complicated and nice. Actually nice. Of course it had to end.

“So, this is the boy?” declared an extremely stern version of Haruno. It was, undoubtedly, Mrs. Yukinoshita-dono. I bowed properly.

“Thank you for your support. I am grateful to the Yukinoshita family for their charity and forbearance during my time of need.” I waited. She humphed out a proper response at last and I raised my head to regard her cold mask, glaring at me. She turned to regard Yukino.

“Mother, must you?” asked the girl in a small voice. She sighed.

Haruno appeared, grinning.

“Mother! And Hachiman! And Yukino. Aren’t you just the cutest!” she cheered, effectively derailing a pending rant from their mother over something or other. Her sharp eye remained upon me before turning to observe her elder daughter fussing over her younger.

“I understand you knew my mother in school?” I said quietly to the matriarch of the Yukinoshita clan.

“We were… rivals. Friendly rivals at first, but bitter later. Konsou chose me over Keiko. It made for some bad blood between us.” Keiko is my mother’s name.

“You could have let me die,” I pointed out. She shuddered.

“No, I couldn’t.”

“Then I am doubly grateful.” She seemed satisfied by this. The girls finished fussing, Haruno leering briefly from and angle only I could see. That woman.

“There’s going to be an interschool Christmas festival. There may be mild media coverage of the event. It must be done by the students cooperating with their peers rather than Our operational staff. This is a good test for you, Yukino. Are you prepared?” ordered the matriarch. Yukino firmed her expression and met her gaze.

“I am.”

 

+++++++

 

The meeting site was the city civic center, in one of the meeting rooms. There were tables setup and representatives from the other school, Kaihin Sougou High School. It was nearby, a few kilometers away from Soubu. I recognized the uniforms, and the guy waving his hands around. That will be useful. I also noticed, unfortunately, the face of the girl from my middle school crush, the one who broke my heart and made me a better man in the process. Some say that emotional pain scars you, but they are wrong. It makes you stronger. She grinned at recognizing me and faltered as I met her gaze. Yukino noticed, setting up her laptop beside the hand-gestures guy, evidently their student council president. He tried to start the meeting with some jargon and I glared at him. When he saw me he faltered. I gestured to Yukinoshita-hime to speak. He blinked, recognized me suddenly with panic and froze. Yukinoshita cleared her throat very quietly and there was absolute stillness in the room. Now THAT is how you do it.

“We have three weeks to design and implement a civic holiday program for the community, and that is not nearly enough time. We do not have time to argue or debate. Ordering supplies takes a week. Assembling them into decorations and seating will take a few days. Other events will be taking place here so we will need to stage them at the last minute, only a couple hours, so that will require all of us working together to get it done.”

“But what if we synergize the synergy!” began the Kaihin chief, waving his hands.

“Stop that. You’re repeating yourself. And the hand gestures are unbecoming,” Yukinoshita struck a verbal blow for against middle managers, and salarymen everywhere across Japan cried out, and suddenly silenced, satisfied.

“What about asking local elementary schools for volunteers to help with the decorations?” asked my former crush from her side of the table. Not a terrible idea.

“Acceptable. Please pursue it, and get a firm date of attendance on the 23rd of December in work clothes they can get dirty. There will be glue, glitter, construction paper, paint, and safety scissors involved.”

“What is our budget,” asked Hand Gestures, finally composed enough to speak. His hands remained still. She told them. It only sounded like a lot but it was actually not much.

“What about a band?” hoped one of the students from the Kaihin-side.

“Too complicated. We’ll use PA music, something softs and not too raucous. There will be elderly people here, as well as their grandkids. It has to be seasonal, inoffensive, cheap and cheerful. Now, how do we make this happen? Time is wasting, so all ideas need to be quick and not rely on external points of failure. What we can’t control can be lost, broken, and ruin this event,” reminded Yukino sternly. It was a different side of her I don’t often see, but I liked this about her. She was raised to be a commanding woman, from a family of politicians. Even if she fragile looking, she was strong as winter.

Things moved forward under the firm leadership of my Yukino. Mine? I was getting ahead of myself, but I suppose this part of her was also attractive. I worked with the food committee to prepare large quantities of pea soup, with ham, and bread rolls we ordered from local bakeries. It would be served along with cookies and cakes and other sweets so the guests would have something to eat. There would also be non-alcoholic beverages. I perused the preparations coming together on the twenty-third and found the various elementary kids working with my sister, Taishi, Saki-san, and Yui showing off their maternal qualities. And one girl left out, folding paper stars all by herself. I approached and sat down. After a long while she spoke.

“What are you supposed to be?” she grumbled. She was probably eleven.

“I am the ghost of Christmas past. The fearsome riajuu!” I snarked. She looked at me, up and down.

“I saw the girls you came in with. You some kind of playboy?” she said. Eleven, I had to remind myself.

“So you’ve heard the rumors. And my heart is black as my gaze.” She laughed at that, a more genuine smile she choked down.

“Yui and Yukino told me there was a girl at the Chiba camp being bullied by the other girls. That was you, wasn’t it?” I probed. She looked sharply at me, daring me to accuse her further.

Eleven. She’s eleven. What if I’d been like this at Eleven? Would I have survived?

“Tsurumi Rumi. What’s your name, playboy with the black heart?” she finally said.

“Ah, another victim of the medical establishment. I’m Hikigaya Hachiman. Soubu High School student council secretary,” I answered.

“Victim of the medical establishment? What?” she asked. Eleven. How smart was she?

“There’s a number of students whose given name is a short form of their family name. Over there is Yuigahama Yui, next to Yukinoshita Yukino. That guys is Hayama Hayato. Over there is Kawasaki Saki. Are you seeing a pattern?” I said, waving at the crowd. She chortled, which sounds really weird from a contralto voice of a grade schooler.

“Does it get better?” she finally asked. Her eyes were OLD.

“Eh. When you go to middle school you’ll have different friends, and different kids to bully you. Then that ends and you might not see many of them again. I went to Soubu, which has hard exams to qualify, so I could avoid the kids I knew, who mostly end to Kaihin, the school for minions and NPCs. They’ll end up Middle Managers with hand gestures and communications problems which stifles their careers and general happiness.” She laughed at that.

“When you go to middle school you probably won’t talk to many of the kids you knew in elementary. That’s just how it is. You leave people behind, and you go forward with your life, step by step. You make friends or don’t. You interact with people for temporary social advantages which probably won’t help your academic career in the long run, and that only matters to an employer who cares about that. Quite a few jobs that used to require lots of college degrees, from the right colleges ONLY, are falling back on personal recommendations for knowing the right people, and being owed the right favors.”

“Is that what you do?” she asked. Eleven. If I’d been this sharp at eleven the other kids would have HATED me.

“Eh. I have my own qualities which makes me valuable to the elites. Developing those and demonstrating them to the right people has long term rewards potential. If you want to beat the bullies, living well is the best revenge. Becoming their boss’s boss is generally even better,” I added on, as an afterthought. She considered this.

“I suppose this is why power is so addictive.” Eleven. She’s eleven. Worth knowing.

“You’re interesting to talk to. Here’s my contact info,” I said, offering it with my phone. She dug her own out, beeping when the share was done.

“You’re not going to be a creep are you?” she finally asked.

“Eh. I have enough attention to balance. Ask me in nine years.” She laughed at that. She’ll give Haruno a run for her money one day. Maybe an apprentice. It bore consideration.

“Hey, do you like to read?” I asked her.

“I’m into Artemis Fowl at the moment,” she said. The genius master criminal of Ireland. Good choice.

“If you want recommendations, contact me. Literature is my strongest subject.” She raised an eyebrow at that admission. Eleven. What was her IQ?

“Thanks then, Sempai,” she finally said, gathering up the stars she’d finished making and heating to the glitter area to decorate them. I waved, opting to stay clean from glitter sprinkles, thanks very much.

“Adding to your harem? Isn’t she a little young?” breathed out the sensual voice of Haruno into my ear. I swear that woman tries to give me a stiffy any chance she gets.

“I just found you an apprentice. I swear she’s got a 200 IQ. Like me, if I had been smarter and frequently bullied in grade school.”

“Really? Planning on world domination already? And who I am in this scenario? Your mistress? Or would I be the legal one?” she teased.

“We’ll see. You have to up your game if that’s your goal,” I taunted back. She laughed, a glorious golden sound.

“So proud. I like it. Have a care you don’t fall from all that hubris, Hachiman,” she taunted and I heard her move away. That woman. I noticed little Rumi glare at me pointedly, shimmering with glitter under the lights.

++++++

 

The event came and it went well. Not flawlessly but we covered the errors by moving fast and adjusting to the reality of human error. The soup was heated properly, with my help, and the rental service arrived on time. We got things setup, sterno lit to keep things warm in their trays, and all the decorations setup. It was a pleasant evening with gentle music, not too loud, some kids singing Christmas song, outfits Saki had created worn by the children serving the elderly visiting our event, and no real problems. Takedown afterwards was exhausting and I was relieved to eventually go home, soak in the bath for half an hour and sleep properly. Christmas eve found me shopping for last-minute gifts for the girls I’m dating, the guys I’d made friends with over Fight Club, of all things, and something appropriate for Haruno because for all her troubles she did help several times. And something proper for the Yukinoshita parents and the Miura family. That was pretty much all my savings but it was necessary in the face of all I’d received this year. Last year had been terrible. This year I hit bottom and recovered.

The hard thing, however, is how do you spend time with your lover on Christmas day when you’re underage and have three to choose from and don’t want to hurt any feelings? I spent it with family and sent out greetings to them with pictures of Komachi and my parents, eating Fried Chicken. I also got some thank you messages for the gifts and sent some out in return for packages which arrived on our doorstep. We put out a box, since it was raining. I have to admit I was touched. Totsuka had given me a DVD of a movie called Big Trouble In Little China. It had Kurt Russell. Reviews were favorable. I watched it with my family and my parents commented that it was a cult classic they hadn’t seen in years.

“Oh… He’s the SIDEKICK. Hah!” I finally realized halfway through the movie. I laughed hard. Meta! I messaged Totsuka and got a thumbs up in response.

Gifts from Yukinoshita included an annual pass to Pan-San Land, from Yui a hand knitted scarf. I hadn’t realized she was making that for me. I was honestly touched. It made me want to kiss her, which was exactly the point. I wore it and sent her a picture with thanks. The Yukinoshita parents sent me the generic thank you greeting for the holiday season, probably with something more direct and personal next I saw them.

Haruno sent me an indecent photograph of herself in lingerie, with closeups. I saved that in the password locked folder for later use. Don’t judge me. She’s hot. Confusing, but hot.

Cake sensei I’d given a gift certificate to a local liquor store, with Mom’s help. She thanked me with various confusing emoticons. It is possible she was drunk. Being alone on Christmas must be extra painful.

Miura replied with family photo around a kotatsu, like us. She sent me some high grade scar removal cream which was supposed to work. I’d given her earrings, which she was wearing. I hope that wasn’t too personal. The fact that I’m asking that means it probably will be taken as such.

There was just one problem. I know what I want to do with my life, and it’s not be a house husband or a Plus One or a salaryman. I want to write novels. Properly. Published, professionally paid fiction. I can dive in without decent preparation, or I can spend a year or two at a serious school of the arts in Nara prefecture, one that’s produced geniuses. And has a serious creative writing program with an actual focus on the money side of publishing. All the talent in the world doesn’t matter if you can’t get paid.

And I have to tell the girls.