RUSHED BEATS


CHAPTER ONE

Why am I so nervous?

Minato slowly shuffled towards the edge of his seat. He tapped his foot against the floor as he continued his staring competition with the clock.

It's nothing to be nervous about. Why do I feel this way?

He attempted to calm himself. His heart pounded against his chest. He knew that he had to escape fast. If he gave Junpei a chance to get started on a conversation, then he'd surely regret it.

Minato breathed a huge sigh of relief as the school bell finally rang. The class stood in unison to the class representative's voice. With a quick bow, he clutched his bag in his left hand and rushed for the classroom door.


He waited outside the classroom on the corner of the hall. Students came pouring out of the other classrooms, most of them discussing their plans for the next day. He wanted to keep on eye on Class 2-E. He had to be the first to get to her after school, or he'd lose his chance.

Ah, there she is!

Minato tried to walk down the hall as naturally as possible. It wasn't easy when he was feeling this nervous. He probably looked like the least cool guy in the school right at this moment. He didn't care though. He had a mission.

"Fuuka!" Minato cried out. He tried to sound as calm as he possibly could, but ended up just sounding out of breath and desperate.

He had recently taken up the duty of helping Fuuka test her home cooking. It wasn't the easiest commitment he'd made. If he was honest with himself, Fuuka was a downright awful cook. Yet he kept going back for more.

Does this make me a masochist?

He had something more important to worry about today, anyway.

Minato approached Fuuka, who had now stopped and was waiting for him. She always appeared to be alone when leaving class. He knew that she was a good friend to Yukari, but he'd never seen her leaving with anyone in her own class.

"Are you okay?" Fuuka sounded worried, and for good reason. Minato didn't look that well. He'd worked himself into a nervous frenzy in the classroom and still had no idea why he was so anxious.

"I'm fine, thanks. What's on the menu today?" Minato tried his best to sound excited.

"Oh, I think you're going to like this. Shall we go to the roof?" Fuuka sounded confident for once. She produced a playful smile. Minato had grown very accustomed to most of her expressions at this point. Her smile, in particular, always made him feel relaxed.


Fuuka and Minato sat side by side on a bench located on the school roof. From this spot, there was a great view of the city. It was a popular spot for many students attending Gekkoukan High. You could see the brilliant sparkle of the ocean and the pure blue sky from here. It was a perfect vista that was exclusive to their school.

Fuuka handed Minato a lunch box that she'd prepared. As always, it was packed neatly into a cute, pink box. Minato prised the lid open and stared at, what might be, his final meal. It certainly looked better than the previous iterations she'd made. That wasn't really saying much though.

Minato started to eat the food Fuuka had prepared. It was bad. The food turned to ash in his mouth, it even made his gums hurt.

I'm not sure this is even food.

He turned to Fuuka and tried his best to smile. Doing this had only made his gums ache more, though. "Not bad."

Fuuka gave him that unconvinced look that he'd rarely seen. She pouted for a moment, and then stared at her lap.

"If it tastes bad, you don't have to eat it."

"I'll finish it. It's not bad", replied Minato.

"But it's not good either, right?"

"Well... It's not bad."

Minato tried to avoid any further responses on the topic by putting as much of the food in his mouth as he possibly could.

I'm going to regret this.

Fuuka looked up at him. On the outside, he appeared to be enjoying the food. She smiled at Minato, who was still chewing the mouthful of food he'd put in minutes ago.

"Thanks. I know you don't want to hurt my feelings."

Fuuka seemed deep in thought at this point.

"I think that's what I like most about you... Even if I'm bad at something, you still recognise my efforts."

Minato finally managed to finish off the lunch box. His mouth felt dusty and dry. He didn't feel well at all.

"I enjoy home cooking", remarked Minato.

If you can hear me, stomach. I'm so sorry!

"I bet you say that all the time. You seem to be fairly popular around the girls. They must make you food too, right?" Fuuka responded.

"Hm? Not really."

"Huh?" Fuuka seemed surprised by Minato's response.

"Well, you're the only girl that makes me a lunch box. No other girls do that for me, so I'm grateful. Thanks."

"Oh… I… You're welcome." Fuuka turned away. She appeared to be blushing at that moment.

Minato placed the empty lunch box on the middle of the bench they were sitting on. He had finally decided that it was time for him to complete his mission. "It's Sunday tomorrow. Are you doing anything?"

"Oh, I have nothing planned at the moment. How about you?" Fuuka responded.

"Well, I was wondering if…"

Minato's sentence was cut off by the sound of the rooftop door crashing open. Stepping out on to the roof was none other than Fuuka's best friend, Yukari Takeba.

"Fuuka. There you are!" Yukari commented as she strode over towards the pair. "I've been looking everywhere for you. We were going to study in the library today. Did you forget?"

Fuuka stood up quickly. She seemed like she had just come to a realisation. "I'm so sorry, Yukari-chan. I totally forgot!"

Yukari was now standing behind the bench. She stopped and glared for a moment at the empty lunchbox.

"What were you guys doing up here? Eating lunch after school?"

"We were just talking really. I said I was hungry, and Fuuka had some spare food", Minato responded.

"Is that so? Well, anyway. You want to come to the library with us?" Yukari smiled as she asked the question.

Fuuka picked up the lunchbox and stuffed it into her bag quickly.

"I'm good, but thanks for the offer." Minato replied.

"Okay. See you later then." Yukari said her farewell.
Even though she had been the first girl Minato had met when he moved to the dorms, he still found it somewhat difficult to read her.

"See you later, Minato-kun! Thanks for keeping me company today." Fuuka had seemed reluctant to leave, but she had never been one to let other people down.

"Thanks for the food."

Fuuka shot Minato one last smile before she disappeared into the school with Yukari.


Minato sat forward on the bench. He produced two tickets from his back pocket. They were for a special technology show. He'd planned to ask Fuuka to go with him. Even though she seemed to hide it, Minato knew that Fuuka enjoyed anything to do with technology.

"I guess the show's out then."

Minato breathed a sigh of disappointment before scooping up his bag and deciding to return to the dorm.


END OF CHAPTER


AUTHOR'S NOTE


So here I am again with another Persona 3 fiction. I wanted to do something a bit different from my last one, so I decided I'd try out a romance story this time.

The story is basically going to revolve around Minato and Fuuka. I'll be including some other characters, but we'll just say stuff like Personas, Nyx, and SEES don't exist in this time line.

Rushed Beats was a name that I came up with to describe a heart, a heart in love. Awww! I thought it was suitable name for such a story anyway.

I haven't quite decided how many chapters I'll be doing yet, but I will be taking my time with this. I have some good ideas anyway. You can view this chapter as kind of an introduction, as I haven't really got round to any drama yet. It will certainly be a different writing experience for me anyway.

Well, that's all. I hope you enjoyed it.