Kiyotaka Ishimaru had never met someone with as much of a hatred for themselves and the rest of the world as Touko Fukawa. He wasn't the best at picking up on social cues, or emotions, or anything that had to do with other people, really, but even he could see that Fukawa had a lot of hatred in her.
They had been 'hanging out' more and more lately, usually in the library, Ishimaru would do his homework and Fukawa would sigh at her homework. Eventually, he asked her out on a date, and she had accepted. They had gone out a few times since, and now they were both in the library. Ishimaru was finishing up a few math problems when Fukawa sighed. She sighed a lot when she was doing homework, but this one was quite loud.
"Is something wrong, Fukawa-kun?" Ishimaru asked, glancing up. More than anything, he was a bit perturbed that she had interrupted his studying, but he would ask what was wrong, and then he could get back to his homework.
"It's nothing," she said.
"Okay," Ishimaru said, and finished his homework in his usual time. "Would you like me to walk you back to your room?"
"If you feel you have to," she grumbled. "It's not like anyone would ever willingly choose to spend time with me."
Ishimaru didn't quite have a response for this type of comment and, either way, he could have just heard wrong, so he stood up, collected his books, and headed for the door. Fukawa followed him, hunched over the books clutched to her chest.
She tripped going out the door and he caught her, shifting the weight of his books to one hand and catching her with the other.
"I'm so clumsy," she said. "Ugh, and it's not even cute like when that cow is clumsy. I'm just the stupid kind of clumsy. No, I'm just stupid and unpleasant."
This was clearly audible and Ishimaru would not have her saying such things about herself. "Please stop saying such things about yourself," he said, and she glanced at him. She was chewing on her lower lip like she had some sort of personal vendetta against it. "You are a very smart girl."
She snorted. "Sure, whatever, I can write," she said. "But nobody ever wants to be around me, I can tell that you just can't wait for the second you leave me in my room so that you can finally get away from me. I want to get away from me-"
"You need to stop," Ishimaru said, dropping his books and gripping her shoulders tightly. "You're a very beautiful, intelligent, wonderful girl. You have the discipline to get your writing done on time as well as working on your schoolwork. You deal with everything admirably, and your only flaw is that you don't see these things about yourself. You- you-"
He was getting choked up now, his words failing him and face growing red and eyes filling with tears. She was just standing there, listening to him, a hunger in her eyes. He swallowed past the lump in his throat and continued, focusing on every word he was saying so that he would not make her feel worse. He hoped that he would not make her feel worse.
"It is a shame that you can't see how beautiful you are. It is not just your physical appearance that makes you beautiful, but also your small 'jokes' and your sense of responsibility. It is when you get a new idea for a writing project and you get so excited, and you will not tell anyone what it is about but I can always tell when you have a new idea because you seem so alive when you do."
The first few tears had managed to slip out of his eyes and he had to fight to keep them back. It was getting emotionally intense, his face was burning bright red, and he still had that ball of emotions stuck in his throat. Still, he would make her see reason any way he could.
Perhaps it would be best for him not to speak. He didn't trust himself to speak well enough anymore, anyway.
He put a hand on the back of her head and kissed her. She inhaled sharply through her nose and, after a brief hesitation, tangled her fingers in his hair and pulled him closer. After a few moments, he pulled away.
Strangely, she giggled. There were tears sparkling in the corners of her eyes, too, though she seemed to have a better control over her emotions than he.
He laughed, too, and she clutched him, giggling and crying and the ball of emotion melted and they stood there, holding each other, tears coming out of their eyes and embarrassed giggles coming out of their mouths.
This should have been done a long time ago, ha. But, uh, anyway, an anon wanted Ishifuka where Fukawa was talking about how she hated herself and Ishimaru says all the things he likes about her, and they end up laughing and crying and stuff.