The world was officially unfair, Yuu decided. Scratch that, actually; the world was literally out to get her.
Her day had started out nicely, with coffee and a plan pulling her from her bed bright and early. Said plan was simple enough: get to the culture festival before everyone else did, abuse Mei's participation in one of the student-run cafés to score some free sweets, wander the festival as she pleased. Maybe catch the play if it fit within her sweet-hunting schedule.
It really was a nice plan. Yuu was rather proud of it.
The plan died an untimely, painful death when Mei called her. Mei never called her unless she was about to unfairly infringe on Yuu's life and felt as though the extra effort of a phone call was necessary to not seem like the worst person alive. Thankfully, this was rare – they probably wouldn't be friends, otherwise – but Yuu knew that her plan was going to suffer if she answered the phone. She vowed not to answer and to enjoy her day as she picked up the phone and accepted the call.
Damn. Maybe next time she'd finally learn to let it go to voicemail.
"Oh, Yuu, hi! Look, there's been an emergency at the café – Harumi said she'd come in and there's no sign of her and she's not answering her phone and we're about to open for business but we're understaffed and we can't run properly without her and we really really really need someone to please fill in for her so that's why I called you to ask if you could fill in please."
She could still say no. Refuse, apologise, and stick to the plan. Nobody would think badly of her.
"Thank you thank you thank you! Okay, just get here as soon as you can and we'll fill you in on what you need to do and oh my God I can't thank you enough Yuu seriously!"
One day she'd figure it out.
Harumi proceeded to be a no-show for the rest of the day, which meant that Yuu had been enlisted for the entirety of the festival. The café had somehow been squeezed into the tiniest room possible, with repurposed miniature ping-pong tables for sitting and eating at taking up most of the scant space available. They took up so much space, in fact, that there was no room for other important food preparation items, like ingredients, or school-sanctioned paper plates and cutlery. This was a little bit of an issue when food needed to be prepared and people needed to not eat off the floor.
Yuu's job, therefore, was to run like a madwoman around the school whenever they ran out of something, find the random cubbyholes they'd stored their necessities in, and then run back. Owing to the size of the room, they ran out far too frequently for Yuu's taste – about once every twenty minutes or so. Tripping over a ping-pong table was not particularly fun and doing it several times over did not improve the experience.
While it was something of a miracle of organisation that the student council had even found a place for them, Yuu couldn't help cursing the shoebox she'd found herself in in. She did manage to escape briefly to watch the play, hoping that it could maybe bring some joy to her otherwise ruined day, but apparently the world was not content to allow Yuu even the shattered remnants of her once-great plan.
Nanami Touko had obviously stolen the show in her role as the antagonist of Split reimagined as a pretty girl, but the whole thing had left a bit of a bitter taste in her mouth. Yuu wasn't quite sure why: the play was unique and interesting, the acting was genuinely impressive, and she'd managed to smuggle a brownie or four into the repurposed gymnasium. Clearly, even when she stuck to her plan, she simply wasn't permitted to enjoy herself.
Following the play, she got back to tripping over ping-pong tables until the students began to gradually trickle homewards. Afternoon turned to evening as golden light filtered gently through the solitary window, painting the room in a warm ambience. Teenage exuberance gave way to quiet murmurs and quieter smiles as day began the gradual transition to night. The slowly fading sunlight danced on the surface of the tables in a way almost nice enough for Yuu to forget she hated them.
Finally, the café emptied out. Mei had calmed down considerably over the course of the day once it became clear that her pet festival project was not going to crash and burn and thanked her profusely for helping out. A muttered promise to wring Harumi's neck was tactfully ignored by Yuu, who thought it best to ensure she wasn't implicated in any murders by pretending to not hear a thing.
Yuu's last ordeal for the day was to drag the ping-pong tables back to the sports shed, lock them up, and then drop the key to the shed off at the teacher's office. Thankfully, they were of the folding variety, but even this blessing was not enough to prevent Yuu from grumbling all the way to the shed, repeatedly banging her ankles against the tables as they bumped along the ground behind her. The air was starting to cool, with the fading rays of the afternoon sun slinking back from the grass under her feet. She shivered slightly as a gust of wind rushed by her, hastening her pace to reach the now slightly creepy-looking shed, and heaved the sliding door open quickly before dragging the tables in, shutting it behind her to keep the bite of the wind out. Best to get in and out of the spooky murder-shed as fast as possible.
Yuu let her eyes gradually adjust to the darkness as she scanned the interior of the shed, looking for a place to dump her tables (the tables, she corrected herself mentally –death sounded preferable to being associated with the awful things) and never think about them ever again. A spot between two shelves seemed an ideal dumping ground, though it wasn't until she had began the arduous process of dragging the tables over that she realised the spot was taken.
She was sitting up against the wall, legs pulled in tight against her chest with her chin resting on her knees. Dark eyes rimmed with red stared vacantly at the wall ahead of her, strands of dark hair just beginning to fall over her face and gently brushing against the rough floor of the shed. It seemed she hadn't noticed Yuu's entrance, or perhaps didn't care; she hadn't moved from her position, arms still hugging her legs tightly. The last vestiges of light from the shed's solitary window just grazed her shoulder, weakly casting the ground next to her in a slight amber and only serving to obscure her figure further with the contrast.
Yuu inched forward cautiously, tables all but forgotten.
"…Nanami-san?"
No response. Nanami may as well have been cast from stone.
"Nanami-san?" Yuu tried again. Nothing. She bit her lip, unsure of what to do. "Touko-san? Is everything alright?"
Yuu was almost glad for the lack of any response. 'Is everything alright?' Really? Everything was quite obviously not alright. She mentally berated herself as she edged forward again, close enough to touch.
"Nanami-san…is there anything I can do? I'm happy to leave otherwise," she said. "Really, I don't even care about these stupid ping-pong tables." She laughed awkwardly, hand coming up to scratch at the back of her head.
A beat.
Nothing.
Yuu sighed slightly and turned to leave. She wasn't going to force support on Nanami if she didn't want or need it. Maybe she was just one of the types who preferred to stew on things alone. Yuu could definitely sympathise with that. She'd leave Nanami to it, and maybe try and check in with her in a few days to check that she was doing a little better. Attempt to be marginally less awkward.
She made it about half a step before a hand shot out and clamped around her wrist tightly, causing Yuu to jump slightly and whirl around. Aside from her hand, which remained locked around Yuu's arm, Nanami remained still, empty grey eyes fixed on the opposite wall like she wasn't currently attempting to crush Yuu's bones to dust.
Despite herself, Yuu felt the beginnings of a smile touch her lips. She shuffled closer, leaning against the wall and sliding down to sit next to Nanami, sides just barely grazing each other, before pulling a knee to her chest, allowing her other leg to remain stretched out. Only after Yuu stilled did Nanami remove her grip from her wrist, wrapping her arm around her legs once more. The only disturbance was Yuu pulling her phone from her pocket and quickly typing a message to her mother: hanging out with a friend. back later. Nanami's eyes had drifted slightly in Yuu's direction while she did this, as if to ensure she wasn't about to run away. Only when her phone was back in her pocket and Yuu had returned to her original position did they slide back to the wall.
Yuu leant her head back against the wall behind her, exhaling softly and letting her eyes fall closed. She could stay a while.