Author's Notes: Don't worry, I'm sticking to my promise not to put author's notes in every single chapter. I just wanted to let anyone interested in looking at the full size version of this fic's cover art know that it's now up on DeviantArt, with the title "Commission 0085, Haruhi and Kyon". While I'm here, thanks again to everyone who has reviewed! It's always a great reassurance to know whether or not an aspect of my story worked.
Chapter 2: In which Kyon comes out of the catatonic shock he experienced immediately following the end of chapter 1 somewhat worse for the wear, and it falls to Koizumi to pull him together and provide a reasonable assessment of the situation
There was a comma in that sentence.
Of course, you can't actually hear a comma. And I certainly didn't want to believe that there had been a comma. If Haruhi had said "You moron", then that sentence was just an insult, and quite tame by Haruhi's standards. She was either annoyed that I hadn't already guessed who her boyfriend was, or offended that I had the impropriety to ask.
But I knew that that wasn't it. She had said "You, moron." The answer to my question.
There were three reasons why I couldn't escape this fact. First, as usual, Haruhi enunciated very deliberately. While not impossible, it was exceedingly difficult to confuse a comma for an absence thereof when she was talking.
Second, as soon as she said it, everyone looked at me. Even Nagato. Most striking was Miss Asahina, who let out a little dismayed gasp at the revelation, clutched her hands to her chest as though trying to hold together the pieces of her breaking heart, sending me a look through tear-filled eyes that seemed to say, Why didn't you tell me?
Third, all those pieces I mentioned from Friday and Saturday were finally falling into place. The implication that I had wanted to ask Haruhi out but always believed she would have said no. Haruhi asking, rather than ordering, me to come with her to Lake Tenapa. Her lack of concern over our inability to find Miss Asahina there. The homemade lunches. The ponytail, the sweatshirt, the head resting on my shoulder for no good reason! It all added up to one thing!
Hunting for aliens with me at Lake Tenapa fell under Haruhi Suzumiya's definition of a date!
Sitting there in the SOS Brigade clubroom, all eyes upon me, fresh with the knowledge that I was the official boyfriend of our club's leader... If someone had asked me at that moment if I would like to die, I would have answered, "Oh god, yes please, and quickly."
I was a little fuzzy about what was going on around me after that moment. I think Haruhi promptly moved on to the next order of business, the band, thus averting any questions that would otherwise have been posed to me by Koizumi and Miss Asahina. Which was good, because I don't think my brain was ready to process conversation again.
At any rate, some minutes later Haruhi, Nagato, and Miss Asahina had left the clubroom, and Koizumi's face was within two inches of mine, saying, "Kyon? Didn't you hear Miss Suzumiya? We're leaving for band rehearsal now."
Instead of falling backwards to get away from Koizumi's face, I grabbed him by the tie and pulled that face an inch closer. "Get me out of this," I pleaded.
"Well, if you simply play as badly as you did on that final number last Friday - or worse, if that's possible -"
"I'm not talking about band rehearsal!" I jerked on his tie, and was rewarded with a slight choking sound. "Haruhi already works me to the bone just with my being an ordinary low-ranking member of the SOS Brigade. Being her boyfriend will kill me!"
"Ah, so it was a misunderstanding. I suspected as much. Well, the solution is simple then, isn't it? Simply explain to Miss Suzumiya that she misinterpreted your intentions, and that you do not want to go out with her."
"Oh yes, of course, a perfect solution. Except that then she'll kill me with her bare hands!"
"I was joking."
"Well, stop joking!"
"Certainly. After you let go of my tie."
For a moment, neither of us moved or said a word. My usual calm reasserted itself. I released Koizumi's tie. "Sorry," I said.
"Quite all right," he smiled. "Now, I want you to maintain your calm... as I tell you that I think the best thing you can do is let things run their natural course."
"Which is?"
"That you and Miss Suzumiya spend time with each other in a romantic fashion for as long as she desires."
"But that could be for the rest of my life! It's your belief that she's in love with me, isn't it? You imply that over and over. Do you expect me to walk up the altar with her if it comes to that?"
Koizumi shook his head, still smiling. "Now I think I understand why you got so upset about this. You've confused the courtship process with love. The two are related, certainly, but not the same, and the differences are most crucial in Miss Suzumiya's case. Yes, Miss Suzumiya has strong feelings for you, and perhaps is even in love with you, but she does not realize those feelings. If she did, she would have pursued a relationship with you immediately, and with enough vigor that you could not possibly misunderstand your being her boyfriend. In addition, Miss Suzumiya has rejected the social conventions of dating, courtship, and marriage."
"I thought she had, too. But she asked me out on what she apparently thought was a date, and now has declared me her boyfriend..."
"Correct. But you remember when she had the SOS Brigade form a baseball team? She considered baseball boring, but she did it with us anyway. Her selecting you as her boyfriend is really no different. She has no interest in dating of itself, but she sees it as another way of spending time with you."
"As if we didn't spend enough time together as it is," I grumbled.
"It's not a question of how much time you spend together." His smile became very bright. "I believe Miss Suzumiya wants to get to know you in as many ways as she can. From as many angles as possible. Therefore, she is trying out different experiences to share with you. Dating is simply the latest in the series."
"That's a relief, I suppose. So if I break up with her, it won't hurt her feelings?"
Koizumi shook his head. "Again, I recommend you let Miss Suzumiya make the call as to when your love affair should end. While I doubt that your breaking it off would affect her at a deep enough emotional level to prompt her to, say, destroy the world, these things can be unpredictable. Besides, you may find dating Miss Suzumiya enjoyable. You must have desired it at some level."
"I don't even like Haruhi, much less want to date her."
"Permit me to doubt you. A minute ago you indicated that it was Haruhi who made the first move in asking you out, did you not?"
"Yeah, so?"
"I find it hard to believe that someone as proud as Miss Suzumiya would do such a thing unless she had seen some indication that you liked her. Think carefully. In the past month or two, was there not even a single moment that you thought you might fancy Miss Suzumiya?"
"Nnnn." I thought back. "...The day after the school festival. After she gave that amazing performance with the band. She'd been so incredible, and the band were so thankful to her, and when I spoke to her during lunch break, she seemed so thoughtful, that I thought maybe she'd learned something from the whole thing, that she had come to like helping people. And so yes, I started to feel a bit fond of her."
"Good. So perhaps -"
"It lasted all of thirty seconds," I said with cold frustration. "That's how long it took her to demonstrate that the thoughtfulness I saw in her was as centered on her own self-glorification as ever. ...She got me to like her for the same amount of time when she offered to help me edit our movie. I was stupid enough to assume she really meant help, not badger me while I did all the work."
"I see." Koizumi pondered a moment or two. "Then, you have faith that Miss Suzumiya can become a better person."
"She had damn well better. As it stands, she's so selfish and obnoxious that she'll never have any real friends, just sycophants who are afraid of her destroying the world."
"So you not only have great faith in her, you're concerned for her well being," he observed. "Can't you then find it in you to simply enjoy her company?"
"Now you're the one confusing two different things. Not even related things." I turned to go. "Being worried about someone is completely different from wanting to spend time with them."
Needless to say, both Koizumi and I arrived late to band practice, to Haruhi's displeasure.
"The whole lot of you are trying my patience!" she yelled. Behind her Takuma rolled his eyes; I got the sense that he and Nagato had had to listen to her ranting up until we arrived. "Bad enough that I had to send Mikuru home because she wasn't feeling well -"
"Miss Asahina was unwell?" I wondered if it had something to do with the revelation that I was Haruhi's boyfriend. I wished I'd had a chance to talk to her before she left. Actually, I guess I did have such an opportunity, but I was too out of it at the time.
"Only a stomachache or something like that. I'd have made her stay, but I couldn't see the sense in her hanging around when we didn't even have all the members we needed to do any rehearsing! You two have thrown everything off-kilter! Come on, get your gear together and let's go!"
We got down to business, ripping through a half dozen songs. This time, Miss Asahina's absence was nearly as distracting as her presence. I couldn't help but worry about her, and wonder when I might have the opportunity to explain to her about my dating Haruhi. My bass playing did approximately follow along with the rest of the band, but I felt even less motivated than usual to give my best.
Hearing Haruhi perform, even in mere rehearsal, was an experience at once inspiring and infuriating. You couldn't stop wondering how someone could sing with such passion and tenderness yet be so completely rotten and heartless on the inside. It was unfair, in the same way that her stellar academic performance and stunning beauty were unfair.
After we finished playing and started packing up our equipment, Takuma announced that his home would not be available to the band for the next couple days. Haruhi decided that we'd made enough progress that we could have a day off from band rehearsal, and would reconvene on Wednesday in the SOS Brigade clubroom.
"You're not planning to have us rehearse there, are you?" I said.
She shot me her usual glare. "If you have a better idea, propose it at tomorrow's meeting of the SOS Brigade. Oh!" Her expression suddenly brightened, and she darted across the room to her bookbag. "I almost forgot! I've written a new song!" After a strangely long amount of time shuffling through her things, she brought out the photocopied sheets and handed them out to us. Then she dashed off, calling over her shoulder, "Be sure you all know how to play it by Wednesday! That goes double for you, Kyon!"
I was a little afraid to look at the sheet, worried that she might have been inspired by our recent date to write something romantic. But my hesitation passed, and reading it over I saw that no, it was some esoteric anthem about espionage in space, or something like that. At the top it read "Iridescent Moonrise". And as usual, it was unfinished.
However, it was clear that romance had not been entirely off Haruhi's mind. Written in the margin of the sheet in pencil it said, "Meet me outside my place at 7 tomorrow for dinner and movie". Apparently, our second date had been scheduled, and with no input from me whatsoever.
Takuma lowered his sheet and looked at me. "So, you wanna hash this song out?"
I sighed and shrugged. "Might as well get it over with."
We sat down at a table in his bedroom and poured over our copies of "Iridescent Moonrise". After we finished mouthing out the melody like a couple of scat singing goobers, Takuma suggested a simple bass line. Even with my still-deteriorating memory of bass lessons, I could play it without trouble. I guess Takuma had gotten a sense of my limitations as a bass player.
We rattled a few ideas back and forth about how the drums should go, then picked up our sheets again to get a look at the lyrics.
"So," Takuma said. "You and Suzumiya, huh? When did that become a thing?"
If it had been someone else, I'd have held onto the possibility that he was referring to our relationship as fellow SOS Brigade members or our relationship as bass teacher and student. But this was Takuma we were talking about.
I played it cool. "What makes you think it is a 'thing'?"
He snorted. "Dude, her love letter's right there on your copy of the song. Right in front of my eyes, dude."
Oh, right. I didn't think of that. In my defense, though, even if I had taken the public visibility of Haruhi's penciled note into account, there wasn't anything I could have done to prevent its discovery. It was written right next to the song, so the only way to hide it would be to crumple it into my pocket before the songwriting session started, and that would have aroused Takuma's suspicions for sure. Haruhi, you could learn a lot from Nagato and Miss Asahina about leaving discrete notes.
"Okay," I held my hands up in surrender. "It started this weekend. She asked me out, just out of the blue. We've only had one date."
"And she still doesn't cut you any slack." He shook his head in commiseration. "Don't take this the wrong way, man, but have you started to think yet that maybe she's not worth it?"
Oh, great. Now I have to defend Haruhi against criticism that I completely agree with. "She's not an easy person to deal with," I said. "But she keeps my life exciting."
"Yeah? What's she like between the sheets?"
Unbelievable. Every time you start to think Takuma is a guy you can have a halfway decent conversation with, he drops something like this.
"How would I know?" I shot back, putting on a layer of disinterest in hopes of discouraging him.
"You will before too long." He grinned. "When a girl's that bossy and aggressive all the time, it's 'cause she's all pent up and rarin' to go."
That did it.
"Like you'd know anything about that," I retorted. I got up and stormed off.
I know, I know... You're probably wondering why I didn't deck the jerk. Honestly, if it were Nagato or Miss Asahina we were talking about, or heck, probably just about any other girl I knew, I would have. Honest. But I just couldn't get that outraged on Haruhi's behalf. Of course, she didn't deserve to have things like that said about her. Not even remotely. But she just wasn't the sort of girl to have men defending her honor with their fists.
...Alright, alright. I don't know. Maybe I was just afraid he'd punch me back.
"Hey," Takuma called after me. "Aren't we gonna work on the lyrics?"
"Why bother?" I grabbed my jacket and my bass. "You know Haruhi will just ignore whatever crap we come up with."
Heading out the door, I saw Takuma hovering over the song sheet with pen in hand, grinning as he scribbled out lyrics. Moron. What did I just tell you? I don't know why we even bother completing the musical parts of Haruhi's songs. I guess we keep hoping that eventually Haruhi will decide to let us have a voice in the band's songs, and let us use bass lines that I'm capable of mastering.
Fat chance on either count.