Chapter Text
For Taro, Monday started out like normal. Osana walked side-by-side with him, cradling a black bento box. Her orange hair glowed gold in the early morning sun. He didn’t pay attention to what she was saying. Instead, he thought about how odd it was that he couldn’t hear any birds chirping.
Then, she tripped. Her onigiri spilled onto the pavement. Blood dribbled down her chin as she writhed on the ground. Taro wanted to reach out, needed to help her, but his feet would not obey him. He could only watch as she kept coughing and coughing—
Taro woke up in a cold sweat.
Walking to school by himself made him realize how quiet his neighborhood was. There were the muffled sounds of traffic and his own footsteps. If he concentrated hard enough, he could hear birds chirping.
He stopped. Behind him, so soft he almost missed it, was another pair of footsteps. Slowly, he turned around. An Akademi student stood behind him, fiddling around on her phone. She had black hair which she wore in a ponytail, with two strands framing her face. One of the straps of her bag had fallen off her shoulder.
Something about her felt vaguely familiar. He might have seen her around the plaza a couple of times. Taro remembered bumping into her on the first day of school, a million years ago. Had she always walked behind him? He didn’t remember.
An especially loud car horn jolted Taro out of his thoughts. Right. He still had to get to school. He picked up his pace a little, praying that the other girl didn’t notice his staring. The last thing he wanted was to be mistaken for a creep.
***
When he walked into class, Taro found a glossy white present on his desk. He blinked, looking left and right to make sure that he was at the right desk and that this wasn’t meant for someone else. Carefully, he undid the red bow at the top. It was a CD of classical music.
For the first time in a week, he felt himself smile. He searched the box for a card of some sort, but nothing revealed the sender’s identity. The only person he could think of was Amai. He’d have to thank her when he next saw her. He neatly folded the wrapping paper and set it aside. Crumpling it felt too rude for such a nice gift.
Lunchtime arrived sooner than he thought. He chose to sit at the fountain in lieu of the rooftop bench. He found that the sound of running water soothed him more than anything else.
In no time at all, he spotted Amai coming toward him carrying a box of sweets.
“Taro! Do you want a cupcake? I just baked these this morning.” She opened the box, revealing cupcakes that were frosted to look like sheep. Truthfully, he didn’t feel very hungry, but she looked so proud of her work that he couldn’t help but take one.
“Mm, this is delicious!” The frosting was thick, but not too sweet. He almost felt bad for devouring the poor sheep, but the joy on Amai’s face was worth it.
“You think so? I'm glad you like it!” She tried to hide it, but there was no mistaking the pride in her eyes.
“Oh, before I forget, I wanted to thank you for the CD,” he said.
Amai tilted her head. “CD?”
“The one you left on my desk this morning. It was very thoughtful.”
“I’m sorry, that wasn’t me. But I’m glad someone else is looking out for you!” she quickly added.
Behind her, Taro caught a glimpse of pigtails and pink scrunchies, and his heart nearly jumped out of his chest.
“Taro? What’s wrong?” Amai's voice cut through his panic. He blinked. It was just Raibaru talking to a Cooking Club member.
“Sorry, I spaced out.”
Amai smiled. “That's okay.” She followed his gaze, and her face lit up. “Hey, why don’t you eat lunch with the Cooking Club tomorrow?”
“Are you sure? I don’t want to bother you guys…”
“You won’t, I promise. It’ll be fun!” She sounded so excited, and Taro had felt rather lonely these past few days. Maybe more company would be nice for a change.
“Okay, sounds good to me.”
***
Taro knew today was going to be a long day when he slept through his alarm. Last night, he dreamed of Osana again, and he couldn’t fall back asleep. His limbs felt like they were made of lead.
By some miracle, he wasn’t late for school. Class passed by in a blur. All he could think about was lunch. Amai welcomed his presence, but he hoped the others wouldn’t think he was intruding.
He didn’t remember walking to the clubroom, but Amai was there to greet him.
“Taro! I’m glad you could make it.” She led him inside. The cheery pink walls of the kitchen lifted his mood. Amai introduced him to each member and let him sit next to her at the table.
They talked about their days and the topic inevitably turned to cooking. Taro didn’t speak much. He mostly just nodded his head at the right times. He lost track of the conversation around the time Kenko told everyone about his new recipe for vegan cupcakes. He wished he knew more baking jargon so he could follow along.
It was around then when Saki took a bite of her food and started coughing.
His blood ran cold.
He couldn’t move. Why couldn’t he move? His instincts screamed at him to do something, anything. Any moment now, her face would turn blue and her eyes would roll back into her head. And all he could do was sit and watch—
A hand squeezed his shoulder. Amai stood by him, green eyes full of worry. It took him a moment to realize that Saki wasn’t choking anymore. Everyone stared at him with varying levels of concern.
Shame flooded him. Taro flushed red and glanced at his feet.
“I’m sorry. I’ll go.” Before anyone could object, he stood up on shaky legs and left.
He sped past the other students in the hallway. He never should have agreed to this. He was an idiot for thinking it would go well. His plan was to hide in the bathroom for the rest of lunch to save himself from any further embarrassment. He probably shouldn’t go back to the Cooking Club any time soon. Hopefully, Amai would understand.
Just his luck, he rounded the corner and collided with someone else. They both fell to the ground.
“I’m so sorry, I should’ve watched where I was going…” Taro trailed off when he saw who exactly he ran into.
It was the same girl with the ponytail from yesterday. She looked just as surprised to see him.
He helped her up, overpowered with deja vu. So much for not embarrassing himself. If he left now, maybe he could save the remainder of his dignity. But now he was just standing there, and she hadn’t said anything, so he thought he might as well break the silence.
“I’m Taro. What’s your name?”
“Ayano.” Her voice was lower than he expected.
“Well, sorry for running into you, Ayano.” He walked away before he could make things more awkward, mentally beating himself up.
Long after he went back to class, long after he got back home, he could feel her eyes lingering on the back of his head.