Here is the second chapter, I hope you guys like it. Please review!:)
It was unusual for Kiriyama to show up for class every day, but for the past week he had perfect attendance. His abnormal behavior was unknown to the class, even his gang, but to Kiriyama seemed perfectly normal.
The reason for his new behavior was simply to watch Haru during class.
Now this may seem a little odd, maybe even stalkerish but ever since Kiriyama had realized that Haru was smarter than the average 15 year old he had been intrigued. Watching her every move, trying to catch glimpses of her showing off her knowledge of what seemed to be sometimes random things.
A couple days ago before school, he had seen her having an extensive conversation with Kaori Minami (a conversation Haru didn't seem to be too interested in) about some pop singer Minami was obsessed with.
Later that day, he saw her talking with Mistuko Souma, the other gang leader in the class, about something or other (most likely something illegal).
While Haru seemed to know countless, seemingly unimportant, things she did have quite impressive knowledge on the brain (this should have been obvious seeing that her father was a famous brain surgeon).
The brain had happened to be one subject that Kiriyama had not put much interest in as much as things like different ways of fighting.
…
After school that day the Kiriyama family, minus Hiroshi (he was still inside the classroom having a talk with Mr. Hayashida about him failing every subject so far), was hanging out, outside the school.
Mitsuru and Ryuhei were taking turns beating up a couple of first years who had made a nasty comment about Kazuo's defining slicked back hair.
"Don't ever say anything 'bout the Boss, ya hear me!" Mitsuru was growling into the scrawny ones ear, holding him up by his greasy, blonde dyed hair.
Another first year was on the ground, Ryuhei kicking him in his flabby stomach. That one had his hair spiked up with so much gel it was a wonder he had the guts to say anything about Kazuo's style.
The third one had managed to sneak away from the two gang members and was now slouching over in the shadow of the school digging in his pockets.
Suddenly, that same first year was running top speed at Ryuhei with a pocket knife in his dirty fist.
"Ugh," Ryuhei let out a grunt clutching his arm where the small knife went in. The first year, who was small for his age, started running the other way the second he saw what he had done.
It didn't take long however, for Sho and Mitsuru to take off after him, leaving the tiny first years friends to scramble off around the school.
Ryuhei was still clutching his bleeding arm cursing after the kid who had stabbed him; Kazuo had been sitting during the whole dispute, leaning against the school uninterested. He was now looking at Ryuhei as if in deep thought.
"What's wrong?" A quiet, girl's voice called out from around the school. Ryuhei looking up smiled realizing it was Haru, the only girl in the class he was friends with. Kazuo looked over at Haru, an indifferent look on his face, although he was glad to see her (well not really glad but thankful because he knew she would stop Ryuhei from his whining).
"What happened to you?" Haru walked over to Ryuhei noticing his bleeding arm for the first time. She had a look that wasn't of concern but more of interest.
"Some asshole stabbed my arm but I'm fine," Ryuhei mumbled, not wanting to look weak in front of a girl he released the grip on his arm.
"It's not a big deal, it's not like it hurts."
Haru walked over to Ryuhei and pushed down on his shoulders forcing him to sit on the ground.
"Let me see, you don't want it getting infected." Haru knelt down next to Ryuhei and slid his school jacket off his shoulder and down his arm exposing a bloody rip in the white shirt underneath. Rolling the red stained sleeve up she began to gently prod the area around the wound, examining it closely.
Ryuhei face and neck had turned completely red from Haru being so close. He had never had a girlfriend and as much as he wanted to be the one looking after a girl he didn't so much mind being gently taken care of by Haru.
Haru had sat Ryuhei down about two meters away from where Kazuo was sitting. Kazuo looked to his left, resting the side of his head on the school, and was now watching Haru tend to Ryuhei's arm.
She was using a tissue and water from her water bottle to wash Ryuhei's wound. Haru then wrapped a handkerchief around his arm and tied it in a tight knot.
Kazuo was captivated by the way her hands moved, delicately handling Ryuhei's arm while expertly bandaging it. He was interested in the way she didn't seem to mind Ryuhei's blood on her fingers.
Most of the girls in their class would have shrieked at the amount of blood or the disgusting tear in Ryuhei's arm. None of that seemed to affect Haru and Kazuo found that refreshing.
From around the corner of the school Mitsuru and Sho came panting.
"We lost that little wimp," Mitsuru barely got out, still trying to catch his breath.
"We chase him all the way 'cross town and he crawls through a stupid little hole in a fence." Mitsuru stopped to breath, "we were gunna climb over it but there was stupid barb wire at the top."
"And then—" Mitsuru stopped noticing for the first time that Haru was there.
"Oh…hey, when did you get here?" Mitsuru asked with an awkward smile.
"Just a while ago, she fixed my arm for me," Ryuhei answered for Haru with an equally awkward smile. He went on to tell Mitsuru and Sho every detail of how Haru fixed his arm, how she had washed and been really gentle so it didn't hurt.
While Ryuhei was going on about Haru to his fellow gang members, Kazuo had finally stood up from his spot against the school and was now standing unnaturally close to Haru.
"Do you like blood?" Kazuo asked in a tone of voice that could have been mistaken for curiosity.
Haru looked up at Kazuo with her big eyes, they were reflecting in the setting sun, giving off a sparkling effect.
Kazuo suddenly got the feeling right behind his left temple, the one he had infrequently gotten since he was a child. Resisting the urge to reach up and touch the spot on his head he wondered why it was happening now.
"No, not really," Haru answered. Kazuo, suddenly remembering the question that had almost been forgotten moments ago, looked over at Ryuhei, then the ground, then back at Haru.
"Then why did you help him?"
Right after Kazuo had said this Haru got a confused look on her face. Kazuo didn't know why, to him it seemed like a perfectly normal question. Haru answered his question with a question of her own.
"Why didn't you help him, isn't he your friend?"
Kazuo was quiet for a while so Haru decided to ask something different.
"Don't you care about him?"
Kazuo was still quiet, Haru was about to ask another question when he gave his answer.
"No."
After this Kazuo walked off over to the rest of his gang. Haru went over shortly after to say goodbye and then left.
…
Haru hadn't been particularly interested in Kazuo at first but after observing him in and outside of school she had begun to have the feeling that his strangeness wasn't just part of his personality (or lack of personality for that matter) but much more than that.
Because of her father's profession, Haru had grown up learning more about the brain and how it works than most people could even hope to learn in a lifetime. Her wealth of knowledge about the brain as well as her exceptional ability to read people gave Haru an almost psychic type of power.
If a patient from a mental institute happened to come across her, she could easily figure out what sort of mental disease the person had along with what had happened to that person to make them the way they were.
Haru had a theory that something had happened to Kazuo causing him to have either a very dull personality or no outward appearance of emotion at all. Whatever it was that made him become this way was very likely to have happened when he was much younger, like it does with most people with his same problem.
Haru was frustrated with this nonetheless, it had been a week and she still couldn't pinpoint exactly what it was that had happened to him. Most times she could figure out a person's whole life story in a matter of hours, one or two days at the most.
Her theory now wasn't that he had a traumatic experience as a child, but that something must have physically altered his brain to cause him to act the way that he did.
On her way home all Haru could think of was ways to get Kazuo to have a PET scan, she would love to get her hands on the results.
*a PET scan is a scan of the brain that can show what parts of the brain are working when people have different emotions.