[A/N]: and here we are again~ If you are a new reader, welcome! If you are a returning reader, welcome back! This is the remastered version of Sound of Madness, in which many things have been changed and improved. I'm not quite sure about my updating schedule, but for now the first ten chapters are ready for the interwebs. We'll see how it goes. Anyways, I hope everyone will enjoy this even more than they did the previous version~
As always, unless specified, all chapter songs belong to Shinedown.
What a Shame
What a shame to judge a life that you can't change.
The choir sings, the church bells ring, so won't you give this man his wings?
What a shame to have to beg you to see we're not all the same.
"Haruka, if you don't get up now you're going to be late for school! This is the last time I'm telling you!" Haru's mother called from downstairs. She could hear her voice through the shut door and the blankets covering her head.
"I'm coming, I'm coming…" she muttered groggily, still half-asleep.
"Haruka!" her mother's voice called once more.
"I'm coming!" she yelled this time, throwing her pillow at the door.
After kicking the blankets away, she rolled out of the heavenly warmth and landed on the floor with a crash. Now completely awake, she smiled when she heard her mother mutter a complaint about the racket she caused every morning. Glancing at the clock hanging on her wall, she noted that she did not have very long to get ready, so she got up. As she swapped her sleeping attire for her school uniform, she kicked her pillow back onto the bed. Save for a short comb through her shoulder-length brown hair, she didn't spend much longer on her appearance before stumbling down the stairs.
"I'm off!" Haru yelled at her mother as she shoved a piece of bread into her mouth and grabbed her schoolbag. All that while she skipped through the hall, trying to pull on her shoes without losing too much time. Before long, the door slammed shut and Haru was on her way to school.
Halfway there, she allowed herself to take a look at the time on her phone. With a smile she found that she had left earlier than expected, and so she decided to take it slow for the rest of the walk.
It seemed as if today would be a pleasant day. She could see the clear sky, beautifully blue as only a summer sky could be, without too many clouds. The summer weather hadn't quite arrived yet, and the lack of sweltering heat or a cold winter's wind made her feel almost like floating.
She had a feeling that today was going to be her lucky day…
With a sigh, she stared at the piece of paper that her teacher had just handed to her. The look of disappointment on his face had been enough to inform her about the results she had gotten for her latest test.
Just like all the others before this one.
Failed. Again. Her lucky day, huh?
Well, her locker had been empty this morning when she had switched to her indoor shoes. But then again, nothing had happened for the past few weeks. All because she tried to keep her distance from her classmates?
Whenever she had the ill luck to talk to a boy who happened to be the crush of one of the girls in her class, they would start to bother her. Since their crushes happened to change every now and then, and because Haru had not managed to befriend any of her female classmates, she had no way of knowing who liked when.
In the beginning, she had tried to become friends with them. But she never knew what to say and when to say it; boys were simply much easier to communicate with. They treated her like one of them, while the girls usually treated her like a lackey, if they paid her any attention in the first place.
And so instead of trying to make friends with the people in her class and risking certain death, she had decided to stay away from everyone. It made for rather lonely schooldays, but she preferred silence to bullying.
The brunette sighed as she stared at the sheet of paper lying on her desk. Friends or no, that did not take away from the fact that she failed at basically everything but sports and maths. She thought back to the other test she had taken some time ago, of which she should receive the results any day now. If she managed to pass it, she would get a recommendation that might allow her into a special sports school.
A small smile appeared on her face as she thought of the possibility of actually getting into that school. She would have to do nothing but her favourite pastime all day long, every day. And some occasional studying, of course, but she was sure that even that would become a cinch.
"Sato-san, please try to keep your mind in the classroom," Haru's teacher said, cutting through her train of thought.
Her cheeks burned bright red as she moved her gaze to the blackboard at the front of the class. Even then, she couldn't concentrate on the task at hand. Next class was maths, though, so it didn't really matter.
Yes, maths and sports, that was really all there was to Haruka Sato.
The sound of a bell signalled the end of the day. Without even listening to the teacher, who quickly tried to finish his last sentence, the students packed their bags and rushed out of the room. Haru, as usual, waited until he had given up trying to speak before leaving. She politely nodded her head at the teacher on her way out, though he hadn't seen.
Students crowded the hall outside, making so much noise that Haru couldn't hear herself think. They made plans to do homework or other things together, or said goodbye to their friends before leaving for the lockers.
A group of boys from her class ran past her, and one of them bumped into her.
"Sorry, Sato," the boy – Arata Fujimoto was his name – started.
"Don't worry about it, Fujimoto-san," she replied, deliberately adding honorific.
"Would you like to join us in our game?" he continued, tilting his head as he waited for her response.
"Ah... I..." Haru began. The voice in her mind screamed at her to say no, but she heard herself ask, "What game?"
Fujimoto grinned at her before pointing to his friends, who stood waiting on him a distance away. Two girls stood with them as well, and Haru recognised them from her class as well. "We wanted to go and play baseball. Want to join us?"
"I, uhm," she stammered. What was wrong with her? She had never been this awkward when talking to others. Any minute now and they'd all start to believe she had a crush on this boy. That seemed to spur her tongue back into action. "I'm sorry, but I can't. Homework, you know?"
She even managed to throw in an apologetic smile. Fujimoto merely shrugged and gave her a quick wave before running off to join his friends.
As she made her way to the lockers as well, she tried her best to ignore the happy faces surrounding her. She couldn't help but be jealous of them, even though she chose to create the distance between herself and her classmates on her own. Even some of the other girls in her class had tried to befriend her, but for some reason it had never worked out. Girls were just too much of a hassle, in her eyes. They wanted to go shopping together, or visit cake shops, or spend evenings together doing nothing but talking. Haru didn't even know whether she had enough to talk about to fill an entire hour, much less an entire evening.
The closest thing she had had that she could compare to a friendship was when a stray dog had roamed around the street where she lived. Each day after school she had shared her lunch with him, whether the sun shone or whether it had rained all day. But suddenly he had stopped coming, and after asking around it had become clear that someone had called the police to put the poor thing to sleep. Her father, to be specific.
As Haru unlocked her locker, she said a little prayer and opened it only to find it just like she had left it – empty. With a sigh, she reached in to grab her outdoor shoes. Her heart skipped a beat when she saw an envelope swirl to the ground. She bent down to pick it up but didn't dare to open it.
Only when she had switched her shoes and closed her locker again did she force herself to open it. As she made her way out of the building, she tore it with so much care that it took her far too long to get it open, but when she did she could feel her heart beating in her throat. The official insignia of that sports school was printed at the top of the letter that came out of the envelope, and she slowed down to read what it said.
We are sorry to inform you…
Her feet stopped moving, one of them hanging in the air as she stared down at the paper in disbelief. How was it possible to fail the admission exams for a school where sports were the main subject? Was she really that stupid?
Her brain hadn't even processed the results in the letter when she began to think of what she would have to do. How could she tell her parents about this? Of course they had hoped that she wouldn't 'throw her life away with something that couldn't guarantee her a stable income.' Especially her father hadn't approved of any of this.
But if she told them that she had managed to fail to get accepted into that 'useless place where no one has a proper future ahead of them'...? She could already feel her father's fist on her face. In a reflex her hand went up to her face, as if her body already expected the punishment as her other hand crumpled the letter into a ball.
"Failed a test?" A voice from behind her scared the shit out of her and she held back a scream by clapping her hand over her mouth.
Whirling around, surprise quickly replaced her fright when she realised who stood behind her. Mikoto Suoh was an unusual character with ruffled bright red hair and eyes that looked both warm and cold at the same time. He had never spoken to you before, so why would he start doing so now?
Suoh frowned as he got to see Haru's face and she wondered what had upset him. But then she felt her eyelashes had grown heavy, and before she even knew what had happened, she rubbed her arm against her face to wipe the tears away before they could fall.
Neither of them said anything else and she just stared off into the distance, her mind once more back to that damned letter, while the redheaded boy continued to investigate her face for any further signs of pain.
"Why were you crying?" he asked rather abruptly.
For a moment Haru faltered, wondering if the normal rules of social interaction meant nothing to him. Especially the most important one of not asking someone about their tears when they had made it quite clear that it was not something they wanted to talk about.
"I wasn't crying," she replied in a curt tone, averting your gaze again.
"Yes you we–" he started once more, but was cut off when Haru threw her wrinkled ball of letter into his face. He managed to catch it before it hit him and stared at it in confusion.
When he looked back up, he was surprised by the fact that Haru had already begun to run off. For the first time in a long time he thought that he might not be able to catch up with someone. Torn between not caring and curiosity as to what had brought this strange girl to tears, he examined the crumpled paper in his hand before unfolding it, trying his best not to tear it.
We are sorry to inform you that you did not pass the entrance examinations for x school, oriented to train athletes to their maximum potential.
Average scores:
Math: B
Science (Physics, Biology, Chemistry): D
Social Science (Geography, History): F
Language (Modern/Classical Japanese texts): D
Foreign Language (English): B
Health and Physical Education: A
Arts: D
Home Economics: C
Citizenship: E
It took Haru three days to muster up enough courage to put a stop to her routine of avoiding any and all contact with her fellow students. Technically, since he wasn't part of her class, it shouldn't cause her too much trouble, right?
Her classmates shot her curious glances as she got up and left the room. After all, she normally spent her breaks eating her food at her desk while reading some manga.
With her manga tucked beneath her arm and her hands holding the bento her mother had prepared for her, Haru pushed all the doors with her foot as she searched for him. She had already had a look in the cafeteria, but she hadn't found him there, so she decided to take a peek outside. Once out of the building she didn't even have to look for him, since his red hair stood out no matter where he went.
Mikoto Suoh sat beneath a tree, his arms folded behind his head with his eyes closed. Haru didn't even know whether he was asleep or not, but she soon found out when she sat down next to him. He opened an eye and stared at her just as she wanted to take a bite of her lunch.
She froze to the spot, her mouth wide open and her chopsticks hanging in the air. It must have made for an amusing image, because the redhead grinned all of a sudden. For a moment Haru couldn't help but wonder why people avoided this boy. They called him dangerous, didn't they?
"You want some too, Suoh…san?" she asked, picking her words with care.
"Mikoto."
"Eh?"
"Just call me Mikoto."
"Okay then… Mikoto… Do you want some too?" she asked in a second attempt to get him to warm up to her.
He only stared at her for a few seconds before shaking his head and going back to sleep. Or so Haru assumed. Oh well, that meant more for her!
The brunette was just about to take her first bite when Mikoto decided to grab her attention again by poking her with something. Slightly frustrated, she shoved the piece of fruit into her mouth and watched as he held up a piece of paper in a horribly wrinkled state. Haru put your chopsticks down and accepted it, looking it over again. Without thinking she pressed her hand against her face again.
Before she could realise what was going on, Mikoto had grabbed her hand and examined her face. She saw a sign of recognition flicker through his amber eyes as he noticed the almost invisible swell of her cheek and the make-up she had used to cover up the bruise.
"Who did this?" he asked, his voice calm.
Haru only shrugged and looked back at the letter which now rested in her lap. Much to her relief Mikoto didn't pry any further and seemed to deem it too unworthy to use his precious energy to fret about. The two of them sat in silence, save for her munching and his breathing.
And that was how Haruka met the man who would change her life forever.
