Her Unique Roommate
Disclaimer: I don't own anything.
XXX
They always fought, it wasn't the nicest of things, but you could get used to it. There were harsh words, yelling, slamming doors, silence at the dinner table, days and nights spent somewhere else.
She'd gotten used to it, and she did her best to avoid coming home, spending as much time as possible away with friends or in school, or just anywhere else. It wasn't a perfect solution, but it made things livable. It let her pretend like they were still getting along. That they would still talk to her.
Of course, nothing lasts forever, and everyone has a breaking point.
Haruhi looked up at the silent girl's apartment through eyes that were still stinging. Hopefully, she would at least be able to spend the night.
She'd seen how Kyon handled talking over the com-link with her, and so she stated her name and purpose the moment she reached the doors.
There was silence, and then the doors opened.
Haruhi adjusted her bag into a more comfortable position and made her way towards the elevator.
She wasn't sure how long she could stay, she wasn't sure how long her parents would allow her to stay.
Whilst Yuki wasn't the most obvious of choices when looking for comfort, Haruhi was looking more for a place to stay. If she'd wanted sympathy and a hug or two, she'd have searched out Mikuru, and if she wanted the comfort of a generally sarcastic brother she'd have gone to Kyon's. But she didn't know where Mikuru lived, and Kyon's family might be awkward about letting her stay overnight what with genders and all.
Haruhi briefly considered the implications of her Vice Commander not even making it onto the list, but shrugged it off.
Yuki was the only real option, and she would be able to breathe peacefully there, vent a bit without having her host whimper in a corner, or threaten to dump water over her head for being noisy when he was trying to sleep.
Kyon really was good at comforting people, through a variation of means. He could let you cry on his shoulder, he could throw things at you until you started throwing back and became too exhausted to cry anymore, he could offer calm suggestions that would make her laugh through her tears, and he might even point out that he could totally see her underwear in that position.
She made a small sound of amusement at the thought, he was a good friend. Probably the closest one she had.
It was hard to feel close to Yuki, sure she wouldn't talk back, sure she wouldn't hide in a corner whenever she entered the room, but that was just it. She didn't react. No matter what she did, the girl simply continued reading, or following her order in a calm and precise manner. How could one ever call themselves close to such a person?
Haruhi raised her hand to knock on her club-member's door when it was softly swung open by the calm girl that she'd come there to see.
"Can I come in?" Her voice was still hoarse from all the yelling she'd done earlier.
Yuki responded with the slightest inclination of her head, and then she took a step back and began to make her way towards the living room.
Haruhi followed in her wake after dealing with the door, her shoes, and quietly dumping her bag on the floor.
XXX
Living with Yuki was... odd, was probably the best way to describe it.
She only really talked when spoken to, though she still managed to make herself understood through body-language. Which was a really strange thing to hear since the girl's body-language was on par with the average, blank wall. Still, Haruhi was finally starting to get used to the tiny things that told her that Yuki did not think that sleeping with her feet on the pillow in order to catch the Sandman unawares was one of her better ideas.
After a sort-of-argument, consisting of Haruhi being annoyed and Yuki staring at her silently, they'd settled for rigging a trap next to her pillow.
The trap had been sprung the next day, but that was probably because Haruhi's arm had gone violent on it at some point during the night.
Regardless, Haruhi was starting to wonder if Yuki was suffering from insomnia, as no matter how early she woke, or how late she stayed up, Yuki would always be awake. She would also in most cases be aware that she would wake up at that exact time and have breakfast already prepared.
Yuki was a good cook, and whilst Haruhi wasn't bad, Yuki didn't approve of her more... abstract interpretations of recipes. Which, of course lead to Yuki doing most of the cooking. Though, again, Yuki's 'not approving' was more along the lines of looking at the food for several minutes before sampling each part of it carefully, and then declaring its taste to be 'unique'.
Haruhi didn't really care either way, as she'd kind of lost interest in cooking years ago and Yuki seemed fine with taking the responsibility on herself.
Then there were cleaning duties which Yuki would set out to do in a sort of vegetable zombie-like state that didn't seem to require the slightest bit of brainpower. And Haruhi was seriously considering investigating this, but had then gone and gotten herself in charge of the laundry, a task which she quickly developed a zombie-state of her own to slip into at command.
In the end, Haruhi was quite pleased with her new living arrangements, and had realized that it was actually a lot of fun to talk to Yuki, if for no other reason than that it was always a challenge to get a reaction out of her.
Of course, setting up traps around the house for no apparent reason, switching out the ingredients in the fridge to keep her from making curry, generally filling the largely empty apartment with a random assortment of things, and finally declaring war on her lack of facial expression, didn't really seem to faze the small girl. Which in turn only served to encourage Haruhi.
Kyon was quick to point out that she was probably the only person rude enough to actually declare war on somebody's face, but since that was a complete lie, she'd managed to saddle him with a whole armada worth of penalties for trying to destroy his Brigade Leader's reputation. He wasn't happy about it, but he kept himself to mutinous grumbling, which she dutifully ignored because that was basically how he always talked.
Koizumi kept on smiling and never even attempted to figure out her reason for leaving her parents, and Mikuru looked like she was having a mild panic-attack with the way she was stuttering. But she could deal with that, because they were hers. Not her minions – except maybe Kyon and Koizumi and then only because they were easy to bully and a suck-up respectively – probably not her friends as it seemed so insufficient a word with which to describe them, and definitely not her possessions, but they were hers.
Sure she messed with Mikuru any opportunity she got, because it was fun. And sure she enjoyed declaring the most inane things and then try to see if Koizumi would let that smile slip a bit, not to mention picking continuous fights with Kyon for no good reason. As well as trying – and usually failing – to beat Yuki in any sport she could think of. But she wouldn't give them up for the world, and if anyone ever tried to take them away from her, she'd bring them down so hard they would slingshot themselves into space by going through the planet.
Briefly considering making that somehow present in the next movie they made, Haruhi dismissed it and concluded that another movie would make them far too predictable.
… Maybe they could make a video-game? Nah, the Computer Club was already doing something like that, and she couldn't very well copy her own minions, now could she? That would just be irresponsible of her as a leader.
XXX
"How can you not have anything but your uniform to wear? That just doesn't make any sense!" Haruhi threw her hands up into the air in order to illustrate her point.
Yuki looked at her with all of the rapt attention of an upside-down fish. A fish that had been floating upside-down for long enough to almost – but not quite – start turning green.
Haruhi made a face as she tried to remove that particular visual from her very enthusiastic imagination. Once the threat towards her already devoured lunch had been vanquished, she continued.
"You've got to wear something besides that boring uniform!" Haruhi blinked as Yuki's face gave her this distinct feeling that there was a disagreement somewhere beneath her blank expression, but quickly tossed that aside as irrelevant to her cause, and therefore non-existent. "Okay, that's it! We're going shopping!"
Before Yuki could get a chance at stopping her, Haruhi had tossed the smaller girl her coat, grabbed her arm, and then dragged her out of the apartment.
She'd briefly considered declaring it a Brigade mission, if only to make Kyon grumble as he was forced to carry all their bags, but she decided not to. Her reasoning was... fragmental. She enjoyed the idea of the Brigade out on the town for shopping purposes, and it'd be fun to see Kyon make weird faces – that he usually reserved for Mikuru – at the club's book-lover when she was experimenting with a new wardrobe.
But she didn't want to.
So, instead of dragging everyone around by the scruff of their necks, she pulled Yuki along by the arm.
Shopping with Yuki quickly proved to be just slightly odder than living with her.
Firstly, since the girl's face tended to be about as blank as a wall and she very rarely spoke about anything as anything else than 'unique', there was an extreme amount of observations that was required when attempting to locate something that would please her. Secondly, since she didn't grumble, whimper, or praise her every move there was a silence present between them that would've been disturbingly uncomfortable if Haruhi hadn't already gotten used to it from living with her. And thirdly, the girl kept on drifting away towards either books or electronics that happened to be on display.
It was a lot of fun.
Really, really odd. Frustrating, and kind of awkward at times. But even if there wasn't any of Mikuru's adorably fun reactions to being dressed up in various clothing, whenever Yuki looked at one outfit for half a millisecond longer than absolutely necessary Haruhi couldn't help the smile that twitched at her lips.
XXX
She'd begun to pick up on her expressions.
She wasn't sure how it'd started, but the more she watched her, the easier the emotions were to find.
When she'd let it slip at one point Mikuru had seemed both confused and a little frightened, almost as if she was hoping that Haruhi hadn't suddenly developed the powers needed to read someone's mind. Koizumi had applauded her new insight with a curious expression. And Kyon, well, he'd looked both amused and... jealous?
It'd taken her a long time to remember that he'd been the only one capable of reading their enigmatic member and that he was currently in 'overprotective big brother'-mode. She'd then tried to keep from snickering.
Honest. She had tried.
Kyon managed to weasel out of a few of his accumulated penalties by guilt-tripping her on how she was making fun of her subordinate's insights. She briefly considered forcing him to get the Brigade out of tight-spots in the future, until she'd recalled that he'd been doing that since day one. Then she'd let him weasel out of a few more accumulated penalties.
He got penalized again within the hour anyways, so it wasn't like he ever realized it.
Regardless. Reading Yuki's expressions quickly developed into something of a full-time job. They went to school together, they had Brigade meetings together, they went home together, they ate together, and they only had one bedroom.
Basically, there was always a moment to spare in which to glance over at Yuki.
She liked making curry. She seemed both annoyed and amused whenever Haruhi managed to hide the ingredients needed for cooking it. She didn't actually dislike Haruhi's cooking, but was instead hesitantly curious about it. She really did go into an automated mode whenever she was cleaning. There was a certain peaceful serenity about her when she was reading. And she had a sort of childishly happy air whenever she got a hold of a new program for her laptop.
The more Haruhi watched her, the more she had to resist the odd urges to hug her.
She was just so utterly adorable.
XXX
"Don't you ever sleep?" Haruhi finally asked one morning, having gotten up extra-early today in order to catch her roommate unaware.
Yuki looked at her for a moment, neither confirming nor denying that.
"You know, that that isn't healthy, right?"
Yuki's head tilted slightly, as if she was aware of this, but didn't see why she was pointing it out.
Suppressing the twitch in her eye and the sudden urge to growl at her friend, Haruhi sighed. "Do you have problems sleeping?"
"No." Yuki stated calmly.
"You don't need to?" Haruhi hadn't ever really heard of someone capable of not actually needing to sleep, but if anyone could pull it off, it would probably be Yuki.
Yuki inclined her head in a small nod.
"Neat. You would be able to get a lot more done that way..." Haruhi mused as she sat down by the breakfast table.
It was difficult to tell, but she got the feeling that Yuki was looking smug for some reason. Shaking off that feeling before she decided to make sure that the book-lover didn't have a reason for it, Haruhi dug into the presented breakfast with happy enthusiasm.
Yuki not sleeping would actually explain a lot, like her always managing to outlast the rest of them when it came to staying up, and even her fascination with books.
In the middle of the night, there weren't a lot of different things that you could do. Friends would be sleeping, music and the like would disturb the neighbors, and books would be a brilliant way to deflect the amazingly oppressive boredom that would stem from so many hours without anything to do.
Still, Haruhi couldn't help but feel a bit sad about it.
Not really sure where this disappointment came from, she glanced over at the girl who seated herself opposite by the table.
Yuki always looked serious. Sometimes, her face would soften the tiniest bit, but it would settle back into the calm mask so fast that even Haruhi sometimes wondered if she was imagining it.
Haruhi blinked, realizing with a start where her disappointment stemmed from. She wanted to see Yuki's sleeping face.
She wanted to watch it as it softened in sleep, see her face twitch as she dreamed, see her dazed eyes and disheveled hair as she crawled up from her pillows.
"You would've probably looked adorable..." Haruhi sighed sadly, not really paying attention to what was coming out of her mouth, instead focusing on the fantasy of a Yuki that was rubbing sleep from her eyes and yawning cutely.
XXX
But not even the best of times can last forever.
Haruhi stared at the two people who birthed her. The two people who were ignoring her wishes, simply telling her what she should do with her life.
She loved her parents, she did, but she didn't want to fight anymore. And no matter what promises they were making, no matter how much they said that things were going to change, the fights would continue.
That was why she'd run. That's why she'd found relief among her friends, that was why she'd lived with Yuki. But it wouldn't be allowed.
Kyon was looking at her parents, frowning; Mikuru was confused, clearly not understanding; Koizumi's smile seemed to be slipping just the tiniest bit; and Yuki's face was a careful blank, as if she was actively trying to suppress her reaction.
Swallowing heavily, Haruhi knew she couldn't say no. She wasn't allowed to run anymore. She wasn't allowed to hide anymore. She wasn't allowed to be free yet.
"I'll see you guys tomorrow, okay?" She smiled at them, ignoring Kyon's frown growing deeper and Yuki's expressionless eyes mimicking her icy namesake.
And with those words, she turned back to that place.
XXX
She curled up into a ball underneath the sheets, trying desperately not to hear their muffled voices through the walls.
They'd promised. They'd said everything would be alright. But it wasn't. It would never be.
She knew it. She'd always known it. But she couldn't tell them that. They never listened to her. Said they stayed for her. But neither of them ever listened.
Curling tighter together, she tried to force down the tears.
Tomorrow would be a new day. Maybe it would be a day when they didn't fight. Didn't yell. Didn't slam doors. Didn't. Didn't. Didn't-...
Screwing her eyes shut, Haruhi slipped away into the comforting blackness of sleep.
Hopefully, she wouldn't dream.
XXX
Kyon knew. It was so obvious. A mixture of worry and frustration, he kept his silence, waiting, for now.
Koizumi knew. He didn't say anything, just following her orders unerringly, pretending that everything was like it should be.
Mikuru probably suspected, at least. Fretting endlessly, but not daring to approach the subject.
Yuki knew. The idea that she wouldn't know was ridiculous, she was Yuki. And for some reason, she seemed harder to read than usual.
Haruhi had gotten used to being able to pick up the subtle changes in her expression. The slight twitch of her lips whenever she did something remarkably stupid when she was supposed to be doing chores. The tiny spark in her eyes when her curiosity was roused.
They were being erased.
And it hurt. Watching that. Watching her former roommate, her friend, retreating back into her shell.
But through it all she grinned widely, and charged straight ahead, continuing to lead the Brigade. Because she was the Leader. She wasn't allowed to stop and breathe. She couldn't allow herself to stop and breathe. Because if she stopped, she wasn't sure if she'd be able to get back to her feet.
She'd grown used to the fights. She'd hated them, but she'd lived with them, because there was no other choice.
And then she'd messed up Yuki's laundry, stolen her food, reorganized her small collection of books, cooked an inexplicable goo that she swore had been looking at her funny. And it'd been fun. She'd been happy.
And now it was gone. And the fights were back. The endless fights that they always promised would stop, but that never did.
The Brigade had begun to meet almost every day. And she knew that it was Kyon who was doing it. Dragging them all out to keep her away from that place. Searching endlessly so that she wouldn't be forced to stop.
He wasn't the Vice Commander and he never would be. But, without a doubt in her mind, Kyon was the one she would trust without hesitation. Because he was Kyon, and even if he complained at all times, even if he grumbled under his breath about her crazy behavior, he'd always be there, no matter how bad it got.
She loved him for it. And she knew that she'd never be able to give up on that wonderful feeling of having her big brother keeping an eye on her. He already had a little sister, but he didn't seem all that worried about acquiring another. He was good at that. Taking things in stride.
Shaking her head, Haruhi opened the door to the Brigade room.
Yuki was there, holding a book in her hands, sitting at the usual seat by the window.
She was alone, which was odd, because she knew that Kyon should've been here by now.
The book closed shut with a certain finality that almost made her jump.
Yuki was standing up, her eyes like liquid pools of chrome, staring straight at her, unblinking.
Suppressing the shiver spreading to her fingertips, Haruhi opened her mouth to ask where the others were.
And promptly closed it again.
Yuki's fingers had grabbed a hold of her sleeve, her eyes still staring straight into her own.
"Too much curry." Came the regular monotone voice, sounding oddly forced. As if that hadn't been what she'd been planning on saying, but that almost fit.
Haruhi blinked.
Yuki missed her cooking.
For a moment all she could do was stare at her. Not really comprehending what that might mean. Then she realized that Yuki didn't miss her cooking.
Yuki missed her.
Blinking away tears that suddenly sprung to her eyes, Haruhi pulled her into a hug.
Slowly, awkwardly, hesitantly, Yuki's arms wrapped themselves around her waist in return.
Haruhi wasn't sure how long they stood there, simply enjoying the closeness, and she wasn't sure exactly how, but at some point her nose ended up buried in the other girl's hair.
And she smelled like home.
She wasn't sure when she'd started crying, she only noticed the tears as her sobbing finally brought them both to their knees.
There were no words of comfort from the composed girl, just those arms, wrapped around her waist.
And she felt safe.
She didn't need to explain that she'd be fine in a few moments. She didn't need to hope that Kyon's family wouldn't interrupt and start asking questions. She didn't have to worry that she wouldn't be caught if she fell.
Because Yuki was holding her in her arms, and she smelled like home.
XXX
She hadn't let go of her hand.
It made packing difficult, but it made the voices bearable.
She didn't mind. She didn't care about some of the words used. She didn't care that they were being aimed at her.
But for every word leveled at Yuki, she swore silent vengeance.
She wasn't sure why, why it was like this. Why their voices turned so easily against an innocent. Why they didn't react to that. Why they didn't question themselves.
But Yuki's hands was warm, and she somehow always manged to stand between them. Silent. Protective.
Haruhi's thoughts seemed to be flickering like a dying light. She stopped paying attention to the awed voice that just wanted to curl up to her protector and forget about the world. Forget about aliens, time-travelers, espers, and sliders.
Other voices became a resounding echo, rivaled only by the lone voice that thought of a dream with Kyon's voice under a blue-gray sky, as a giant destroyed the world, and realized that he certainly had a point. That there were amazing things in this so ordinary world.
Perhaps they were normal. Perhaps they were taken for granted by those who experienced them. Perhaps it happened to most people. But, as she glanced at liquid chrome barely narrowed in their direction, she wondered if perhaps the world didn't have to be unique.
If anyone could have this. To reach this. To be given this.
For the first time in her life, Haruhi Suzumiya – Seeker of the Extraordinaire, Leader of the SOS Brigade – thought that maybe, just maybe, there were bigger things in life than to leave marks behind.
Squeezing the hand interlinked with her own, Haruhi turned towards those who birthed her.
"Thank you. Goodbye." With a final bow, she briefly noticed that Yuki had picked up the very full bag with the same ease that most would pick up a magazine, and then the door finally opened and she was in the open air.
She could breathe again.
If Yuki noticed the tears trailing down her cheeks, she didn't mention it. She didn't mention the smile either.
She was going home. Finally.
XXX
So they'd never actually stopped holding hands, deciding to simply forgo getting undressed for bed in favor of not letting go. So she'd basically condemned Yuki to hold her hand as she slept, leaving the girl with only one hand to turn the pages in her books. So she might've managed to curl into her in a way that placed her head comfortably in her lap.
None of that mattered to Haruhi as her eyes cracked open with a small groan of someone just realizing that they'd slept in a really stupid position the night before.
She noticed that her mouth felt disgusting, that her clothes had twisted in her sleep and were now digging into unpleasant places, and that she was looking forward to breakfast with enthusiasm.
Then she sort of stopped noticing things, because she realized something that kind of made her draw up blanks.
Yuki's book lay off to the side, forgotten sometime during the night, and the girl herself was leaning back against the wall.
And her eyes were closed, her face relaxed from her mask of indifference to a peacefully serene expression. Her breathing was slow, and silent enough that she wouldn't have heard it had she not had one of her ears pressed against her stomach, her heartbeat pleasantly steady.
Yuki Nagato was sleeping.
A part of Haruhi wanted to respond to this by grabbing a camera, another one wanted to cheer, another wanted to call Kyon, and the final part simply held its breath, carefully memorizing each line of her face.
The moment seemed to stretch for an eternity, but Haruhi couldn't bring her self to mind it.
Then Yuki's eyelid twitched. She was waking.
The thought brought a strange feeling with it. She wanted to wake her up. She wanted to be the first thing she noticed in the morning.
But Yuki would notice the foul taste in her mouth, the cringing of her body from a night spent sleeping in a horrible position, the numbness in her legs, and possibly hunger.
Even as her mind was registering just how hopeless the desire to be the first thing she noticed when she woke up was, Haruhi's body had somehow managed to figure out a plan to achieve it.
And that's the story of how Yuki's eyes fluttered open as Haruhi's lips gently brushed against her own.
It would've been horribly awkward, what with a sudden kiss between friends, and all. It should've been confusing to try and rein in her own body far too late to make a difference.
Yuki returned the kiss.
Everything was wonderful.
XXX
A/n: Uwaah, I actually got this one done. Yay me. Hopefully this was as interesting to read as it was to write.