Sharing the Same Sky, We Are as Close as Lovers

Tokimeki Memorial Girl's Side First Love

Himuro Reiichi x Heroine

By Gabihime at gmail dot com

Part One: He's already waiting.


The summer sky was bright with the uncountable stars of a distant heaven, the air was heady with the ticklish smell of food frying and the sounds of people talking and laughing, and paper lanterns hung like persistent magic from stall eaves, but Yumeno Midori had no eyes for the resplendent heavens, no ears for the pleasant, incomprehensible drone of layered human communication, and no heart for sidewalk miracles.

She had done a terrible thing.

She had not intended to do this terrible thing, and she was not even sure how the thing itself had occurred, but suddenly she found herself with the consequences of the action, and no idea of when she had actually done the terrible thing she had done.

But the thing was still done, and she had most certainly done it.

When you were guilty, and you knew that you were guilty, there was no way to plead your innocence, because you weren't innocent. Even if you weren't sure when you'd committed your crime, that wasn't any excuse. Particularly if your crime was negligence.

She had been criminally negligent.

"They ought to put me in prison for a hundred thousand years," she wailed aloud, but not so very aloud, as she did when she was in the habit of talking to herself. She shook her head, suddenly disagreeing with herself. "No, they ought to put me under the prison for a hundred thousand years."

She was dashing up and down the shopping arcade, weaving in and out of the crowd, her arms hugging her chest, and trying very hard not to burst into tears. She was trying very hard not to burst into tears not only because she was a girl all of seventeen years old, and really too old to go bursting into tears any old time she went and did a terrible thing, but also because she was hunting up and down through the festival stalls, and she knew that if she started to cry she would have a very hard time seeing anything.

So she fought her tears as valiantly as she could, biting her lip hard to try to keep from crying, and resolving even as she did that she wouldn't stop hunting even if she did cry, even if everyone saw her, crying like the silliest, smallest little girl. This thought made her sniffle alarmingly, and she brushed her sleeve across her eyes to try and clear them even as they stung with salt and tears.

But, although she had shut her eyes tightly to rub the tears out of her eyes, she had not stopped running, which, given her circumstances - dashing about a crowded shopping arcade at festival time - was probably not the wisest exercise of pure stubbornness, even considering how upset she was.

Not surprisingly, she collided with something.

In a crowded shopping arcade at festival time there were many things she might have collided with: a small child, a hot grill, a tub of goldfish, one of the poles holding up the strings of colored lights - it was undoubtedly a sign of good fortune and divine providence that she did not run into any of these things.

Perhaps it was less fortunate that what she actually ran into was potentially even more dangerous than a hot grill, a tub of goldfish, or a tall wooden pole with electrical lights strung on it. Possibly combined.

Naturally, having barreled into it with one arm struggling to rub the gritty tears from her eyes, Midori had no idea at all what she had run into, only that it had not hurt too terribly much, and that she had not, as a consequence of having run into it, landed square on her bottom on the street.

"Yumeno," came a startlingly familiar voice, crisp, like snapped fingers, immediate, like someone calling roll.

"Present," she responded without thinking, and this strange circumstance, the sudden vision of herself, a convicted, criminally negligent felon, sobbing in the middle of class while the students and teacher looked on with disapproving, disappointed frowns, made her lose the tenuous grip she had on her composure and she began to cry in earnest.

"Yumeno, why are you crying?" demanded the stern teacher, standing above her, ready to mete out the punishment she clearly deserved. She shook her head furiously, ashamed of her faults, rubbing her eyes with her sleeve, unwilling and then at last unable to keep from confessing.

"I've lost my grandpapa. I really and truly lost my grandpapa," she sobbed, burying her face in her hands as all the students in the class pointed at her and chorused, 'She lost her grandpapa! Let's go throw her into a bottomless pit!'

Only, this did not actually happen, as Midori expected it would.

Instead, the stern, crisp voice said, "What?" the way one says "What?" when one is completely and utterly baffled. It is the sound one makes when one has just seen a dancing giraffe wearing a dress.

It was at this moment that Midori realized that she was not actually in class 2-C of Habataki Gakuen, withering under the baleful stares of her classmates. She remembered with a start that she was at the Tanabata festival in the downtown shopping arcade and she realized that there were steady, long-fingered hands firmly gripping her shoulders.

She rushed to wipe her eyes with her fists so she could see who it was that was holding her up, who it was that she had thrown herself so unfortunately into.

When her eyes were at last clear enough for her to make out her captor she cried out in alarm mixed with delight.

"Himurochi!" she said, and it was as if a radiant angel in a grey, nondescript suit had descended from heaven expressly to brighten her localized despair. There was not a person in the world she both adored, and dreaded, more.

He was staring at her, expressionless, nonplussed. She stared back at him for a moment, from where he held her by her shoulders, balanced on her tip toes, and then she laughed nervously, a small touch of hysteria.

"Sensei," is what she said then, and then, as if it might have been a mantra to give herself courage, or some sort of self-punishment that ought to be repeated a hundred times, she continued, "Sensei, sensei, sensei - "

"Yumeno," he said again, deliberately, and she silenced herself immediately in response. Satisfied that he had her attention at last, he began slowly. "Yumeno, tell me again why you were crying."

At this she sniffled again, and might have begun crying had she not been under the watchful eyes of Himuro Reiichi. As it was, she manfully fought back her woes and worries and confessed to him as if he might have been her priest.

"Sensei, I lost my grandpapa," she said. "I was supposed to stay with him the whole time we were at the festival, but I've lost him and I don't know where he is and if something happens to him I don't know what I'll do and it's all my fault for being such a bad granddaughter - " as she continued to pour out her troubles, her voice had begun to tremble and she seemed to be about to break down into tears again, despite the fact that she was under the eye of her beloved homeroom teacher.

"Yumeno," Himuro repeated again crisply, a call to focus her attention and hopefully distract her from crying. It worked, and he was inwardly relieved. "Calm yourself. I am sure your grandfather is someplace nearby and perfectly safe."

Although comforted, Midori was not entirely convinced. "But Sensei, he has a very hard time getting around, and he has a hard time breathing, and has to take medicine if he has an attack, and he almost never even gets to go out of the house, but I promised to bring him to Tanabata, and he's so been looking forward to it, and I don't know how it happened, but he sat down on a bench and I went to get him something to drink and then when I came back he was gone and I've lost him and can't find him and I shouldn't have left him, even for a minute. I feel really horrible right now, and I'm so worried. I've looked and looked and I can't find him anywhere - "

Her hysteria had abated, and the tears were gone now, because she found Himuro very comforting, in his way. Now she only felt worried and uncertain as opposed to guilty before the inquisition.

Satisfied that his student was no longer coming apart at the seams, Himuro released his grip on her shoulders and let her settle again onto her feet. Then, as if unsure what to do to comfort her, he patted her on the head awkwardly.

"It's all right, Yumeno. He's certainly somewhere nearby," he said levelly. "I'll help you find him."

"Will you?" she asked hopefully, as a new star was born in her heart, "Will you really, sensei?"

If Himuro-sensei helped her then she had a great faith that they would find her grandpapa well and safe. This is because she had supreme confidence in Himuro's abilities to accomplish whatever it was that he set out to accomplish. It was not as if she viewed him as completely super-human, but she did think that if he said something was so, then it would be so. He had commanded it, and the world would comply, because no one with any sense at all disobeyed Himuro-sensei if they knew what was good for them.

"Of course," he said, as if this answer was obvious. "You're my student. You're my responsibility. I'll help you. It's my duty as your teacher." Having dispensed with this formality, he looked around himself, as if getting his bearings, then looked down again at her. "We should go to the place where you last saw him, and begin looking there." He said, and she felt this was very sensible.

She sighed, as if a great load had been lifted off her shoulders and then looked up at him smiling. "Thank you, sensei, really."

He looked at her for what felt to her like an impossibly long, still moment, but then he suddenly looked away and cleared his throat.

"Come along, Yumeno," he said, and moved purposefully up the arcade, but he was stopped by a small but insistent tug on his suit jacket.

She had caught him by the tail of his coat, and she stood, unmoving, while he stared at her again.

"Sensei," she said after a moment, "It's back the other way."

He straightened, and then turned. "I'm sorry. I wasn't thinking," he apologized seriously. "Where did you last see him?"

"I left him on a bench right to the left of the Delicious Taiyaki stall," she answered with equal gravity.

"Delicious Taiyaki," he confirmed, and she nodded. "All right. That's where we'll go first."

This time he moved purposefully in the correct direction, and she made to follow him, but he paused suddenly to look at her over his shoulder, expressionlessly. He offered her his hand without saying a word, and she understood his intentions, because the arcade was crowded, noisy, and chaotic with summer enjoyment.

She took it and she felt her small hand enfolded by his larger one. He held onto her firmly, as if he might have been leading a preschooler across the street. This was a strangely pleasing image to her and she smiled again.

"After all," she said cheerfully, "I don't want to lose you too!"

He did not respond to this, only led her purposefully through the crowd. For Midori, it was both worrying and blissful, being led along to her destination. She found it was very nice to hold his hand, which was just as she had expected it: firm, strong, deliberate. But it was also worrying because she enjoyed it. She did not think Himuro-sensei stayed up nights thinking about holding her hand, and this was disappointing. Although if he did stay up nights thinking about it, then that would be worrying. And blissful.

She felt very mixed up, and then remembered that they were looking for her grandfather, whom she had negligently abandoned. Then she felt even more guilty for wishing insomnia on Himuro-sensei while she ought to have been honestly worrying about her grandfather.

Himuro stopped at last and Midori found herself before the bench directly to the left of Delicious Taiyaki: the site of her grandfather's mysterious disappearance. Again, she examined the scene for any clues that might offer a lead in her investigation, but she found nothing save the bottle of water she had dropped in her panic when she realized her grandfather was no longer waiting for her. There was no new material evidence on the bench at all, but this time, there was a witness.

There was a very small boy sitting on the bench, eating a piece of taiyaki from the tail first. Although she had not noticed him the first time she had searched the area for her grandfather, it would do no harm to ask him.

Before she could open her mouth, Himuro spoke, as grim and terrifying as a reaper.

"Did you see an older gentleman sitting here earlier?" he demanded.

What went unstated was depending on your answer, there will be consequences.

The little boy drew his legs onto the bench and sidled away from Himuro, as if her sensei might have been long-haired and newly emerged from a well.

"Sensei," Midori chided, and tugged on Himuro's arm in hopes of softening his expression a little before her only witness died of stark terror. "You can't be that way around people who aren't used to you, certainly not around little children. He doesn't know how kind you are, so of course he's frightened."

Midori was already bending down to reassure the little boy, so she did not notice the inadvertent stare that Himuro directed at her again. She wouldn't have known what to make of it anyway. She was thoroughly convinced that her sensei was a very kind person, because she felt he had always been very kind to her. She would have been therefore confused to find out 'kind' was not a word he would have used to describe himself, any more than he would have used the words 'jolly,' or 'loquacious.' 'Fair,' perhaps, but not 'kind.' But she knew that he was more than fair to her, and so she believed he was particularly kind to everyone, because she was the sort of person who believes so well of people that other people think they are silly. Himuro, although he did not think of himself as being particularly kind, was pleased that she thought he was.

Although he was initially nervous of the looming specter that was Himuro, Midori was in such good spirits that she managed to cajole the little boy into telling her that he was the grandson of the Miboshi family, who ran the ceramics shop in the arcade, and that her grandpa had gone there to drink tea and gossip with the other grandpas. The boy, it had seemed, had been left to tell her where he had gone.

"But you weren't here when I came back before," she said, and felt sheepish. "I'm sure you weren't."

The little boy had nothing to say to this, only kept munching at his taiyaki.

Midori was trying to think of how to apologize to Himuro for wasting his time, when she felt him looming directly over her shoulder. The little boy shrank back again.

"You like taiyaki," Himuro said slowly, and each word had weight. Midori did not know if Himuro was asking a question of the boy, or telling him a fatal truth: You like taiyaki. The words were such that it ought to be a question, but coming from Himuro, it did not sound like one.

"Sensei," she wheedled, "I told you. You can't make that face when you make conversation with little children. Try to smile at least a little, so he knows you're friendly."

At this, Himuro smiled, just a little. It was a small smile, at the corner of his mouth, the vague, ghost of a smile, with narrowed eyes. It was a terrible smile, backed by intent.

Midori's heart fluttered, but then she glanced down at the little boy, who looked as if he were about to cry, and she waved her hands at Himuro ineffectually.

"No, sensei, stop smiling," she cried out in distress, "I think you're making it worse."

Himuro did stop smiling, although she had doubts that it was due to her request. He did not stop looming, however, and he put another 'question' to the little boy.

"The taiyaki is delicious," he said, and Midori no longer wondered if it was a question or not, because she knew that the little boy was not about to answer, and Himuro apparently was not concerned with what he might say, because he had already arrived at the solution. "So instead of waiting, like you were told, you stood in line and bought some."

"Oh!" brightened Midori immediately, "Oh, now I see. That's why I didn't see him when I came by here before."

"You made this girl very unhappy," Himuro was still speaking steadily to the little boy, who was transfixed, as a mouse is before a snake. "Are you prepared to take responsibility for your actions?"

At this, the little boy squeaked, and abandoning his incriminating taiyaki, leapt off the bench and ran terrified into the crowd. Midori looked down at the taiyaki forlornly cast onto the street and she heaved a small sigh.

"Well, thank you for helping me figure out what happened, but don't you think you were, um, a little harsh on the boy, sensei?" She asked, leaning down to pick up the sealed bottle of water that she had dumped on the bench earlier. It was still perfectly fine, having only been abandoned on the street for a period of less than twenty minutes. It wasn't like her pockets were overflowing with riches, after all. A girl had to be at least a little practical.

"No one is too young to be accountable for their own actions," he said flatly.

Midori was again not entirely convinced. "But he ran away crying," she protested as she turned to face him.

"I didn't chase him," Himuro said simply.

"I suppose you didn't," she admitted, and they stood looking at one another again. After a moment, she smiled, utterly unable to remain even mildly perturbed at him. "Thank you again though, sensei. Because of you, I know where I have to go to find my Grandpapa. I'm very sorry I took up so much of your time, although I'm grateful you were willing to help me."

At this, Himuro, looked away down the street and at the same time, silently offered his hand again. She took it and squeezed it, and while she was giving it a friendly squeeze, he spoke almost unwillingly.

"It's my responsibility to look after you because you're my student. I told you I would help you find your grandfather, so I will help you find him."

With that, he began walking again, and she followed along obediently, holding onto his hand.

But Midori couldn't resist teasing him a little, now that her crisis was seemingly averted. "Himurochi is very dependable," she announced, sing-song.

"Yumeno," he started crisply, but then stopped, as if he was unsure what to say next.

"You can't give me detention, Himurochi, because we aren't at school," she teased.

He stopped abruptly and she stumbled into his back. When she sorted herself out, hanging onto his arm, she realized that he was looking down at her. He was perfectly still, and his face was unreadable.

"I haven't given you detention for it yet, although you say it often enough. You are a serious student and musician, so I allow it."

"You really don't mind when people call you Himurochi?" Midori asked, as if the world was filled with countless dawning wonders.

"Wrong," he said immediately, as if he had been watching her work a complicated derivative on the blackboard and found her arithmetic lacking. She jumped a little at his sharpness, and again, he looked away.

"I don't mind it when you say it," was all he said, and then without warning he began walking in the direction of the ceramics shop.

So this is my attempt to write down a dream I had last night, and I apologize if it is unfunny, or terrible, or not charming in any way whatsoever, but I liked the dream well enough when I had it, so I wanted to put it down and share it on the off chance that someone else will like it.

My Himuro-suki heroine is Yumeno Midori, who is a musical genius, a thoughtful student, idealistic, optimistic, sentimental, accident prone, and who generally seems to spend most of her time thinking about how wonderful Himuro-sensei is no matter what he does, even when he is doing things like terrifying small children (or giving her detention).

There is actually a second chapter to this which I intend to write in a day or so, which details what happens to the two of them after they actually find Grandpapa again. Will they actually have a romantic evening that lives up to the title, or will Tsukushi arrive to reveal to Himuro that Midori wears kitten panties?

(probably the former, no matter how hilarious and tragic the latter would be)

Love,

Gabi