Author's Note: You guys are amazing, seriously. I can't believe how many amazing reviews everyone left after the last chapter. So I bring you good news and bad news. The bad news is that the next update will most likely be late. The good news is, when I do update, I'll be updating again faster than I have before. So basically, I probably won't be updating next Saturday. Instead, I'll be updating shortly before the Friday after that and giving you three updates through my spring break. A day or so spaced out between each chapter. Hopefully that makes sense.

Anyways, that said, thank you guys so, so much. I'm so glad you're enjoying this story. Bless you all for being such amazing readers. I hope you enjoy this chapter!

dreaming comes so easily, 'cause it's all that i've known
true love is a fairy tale, i'm damaged, so how would i know

chapter seven

"Tomo-chan, hurry. Go in there and stay there. Don't come out, okay?"

A warm hand, that is pressed gently against her lower back, guides her into the confines of a small closet, and she is hastily tucked between the dresser and the folded blankets therein. She gets only a fleeting glimpse of her mother's face—smiling at her—and a hand caressing her cheek.

"Be a good girl," her mother tells her.

Two gray irises stare questioningly back at the woman. Why is this happening again? Her mouth feels dry—her tongue like sandpaper. It makes it difficult to swallow, let alone to speak. And her mother doesn't want to hear what she has to say, anyways. She's just expected to nod obediently. So she does.

"No matter what happens, no matter what you hear, don't come out, okay?"

Those words stir a panic within the small child, and she snatches her mother's wrist just as the older woman is about to draw away and nudge the closet door shut. "Mommy, let's hide together," she offers.

"Tomoe!" a bellowing voice echoes within the house as the front door bursts open, followed shortly by angry, resounding footsteps.

All color drains from the older woman's face as she shoves the little girl away. "Don't come out," she hisses again with more urgency in her voice than any time before. She quickly draws the door shut before Tomoe can protest.

—

The sound of something slamming against the top of her desk—and the subsequent vibration that rings in her ears—rouses her from her sleep. Startled awake, Tomoe sits upright, rubbing the sleep from her eyes.

"Kurosawa," a familiar voice croons.

She does not have to look to know who has come to visit her. "Hanamiya, why are you here?" The exhaustion is evident in her voice—as though she has no energy to deal with his usual antics. Perhaps she had expected his persistence to wane once he thought she was "broken," but either he has determined she has some other worth, or he is not fully convinced that he's crushed her thoroughly enough yet.

"I missed you at lunch."

His two-faced demeanor, switching between menacing to so sickeningly sweet just makes her want to vomit. She frowns. "Since I wasn't hungry, I didn't go to the cafeteria. I'll be at practice tonight. That's enough, isn't it?" Where Hanamiya will play at being innocent in front of other people, Tomoe has no such reservations.

"You should eat," he continues, ignoring her clear attempt at shaking him off. Hanamiya sets down a packaged sandwich and a juice box in front of her. Then he takes the seat from the desk in front of her, spins it around, and plops down on it. Placing his elbows against the surface of her desk, he holds his face in his hands, watching her intently—as though he honestly expects her to eat in front of him.

"I said I wasn't hungry." She is lying about that, of course. She can feel the ache of hunger in her belly, but she's not about to accept something from him as though it's some show of kindness on his part. It's creepy enough that he would go out of his way to come see her, and to offer food besides? That is not within Hanamiya's nature. Something is off.

"I won't leave until you eat."

She sighs impatiently. If that's what it will take for him to leave, it's a rather small concession, she has to admit. So she peels the packaging off the sandwich and hastily bites into it. It actually tastes very good—although she's not particularly surprised about that. They have been with each other for years. For as uncaring and negligent as Hanamiya is, it would be odd if he didn't at least know her taste.

Hanamiya seems at least a little satisfied to see that she is eating now. When she glimpsed at his face moments prior, he had been frowning—and now he's wearing his trademark smirk once again.

"You already ate?" she guesses, peering at the clock to see that there is not much time left. She must have napped for at least fifteen minutes.

Ignoring her question, he suddenly asks, "Is it the Iron Heart?"

Her brows lift in surprise as her head swivels, gaze flitting back to his face. "Huh?"

He drops one hand away from his face to point toward her. The smirk has disappeared again, and now he just looks bored. "That expression you keep making. Are you making it because of the Iron Heart?"

"What kind of expression am I making?"

For a moment his lips purse, as though he does not wish to elucidate. But perhaps he wants to know the answer bad enough, because he explains, "The ugly expression where you have wrinkles here," he reaches his hand up and pokes her forehead just between her brows, "And you look like you want to cry."

"You seem to like that expression," she spits back bitterly, taking a drink from the juice box to wash down the first half of the sandwich that she has already eaten.

Hanamiya clicks his tongue. "You miss the point. I only like it if I'm the reason you're making that expression. It's boring if you're making it because of someone else."

"You're really twisted." Tomoe averts her gaze from him, trying to finish the sandwich quickly. The longer she looks at him, she starts to lose her appetite bit by bit. And there's not much time left. At least if she can sate her appetite for now, she can last the rest of the school day.

Those words elicit a grin as he cocks his head to the side, face cradled in both hands one again. "You're pretty twisted yourself, Kurosawa. Are you trying to change the subject now, because I was right? It is the Iron Heart, isn't it?"

"You should be happy that it is. You got what you wanted, right? We're not connected to each other anymore." Admitting it out loud is a little harder than she had imagined. Pain pricks at her chest again. It has been more than week since she confessed the truth to Kiyoshi. At that time, the two parted ways without any further exchange—perhaps he was too shocked to say anything.

And since then, there has been no exchange of text messages, either. She has attempted. By attempted, that is, she has typed out many apologies but never had the courage to actually send any one of them. By and large, Tomoe has resigned herself to the fact that she is once again alone. That is, aside from the jerk that is seated in front of her.

"Enough chatting for now," Hanamiya says, just before the bell rings. He stands up suddenly, shoving his hands into his pockets. "See you at practice, Kurosawa."

Mystified, Tomoe stares after him as he trudges toward his desk, bumping past a group of girls that are just coming back into the classroom. They scatter as he passes, petrified by his presence. Even though he tries to hide his demeanor, the school doesn't exactly have the best impression of him. At least not beyond the basketball team, which seems to revere—or otherwise respectfully fear—him.

But more than that, she is rather disturbed by the fact that this is by far the most... pleasant interaction they've had in over a year now. It strikes her as strange. She is usually so seized with fear around him that she just bends to everything he says. But with the loss of Kiyoshi, she feels too empty to really concern herself with the consequence of saying the "wrong" thing to Hanamiya.

Why did he come, anyways? Just to ask about Kiyoshi? What was the food for, then? Her head hurts just thinking about it. It's too out of character for Hanamiya. It's easy for her to understand him when he's cruel and condescending.

Crumpling the leftover wrapper and empty juice box in either hand, she scuttles over to the trash can in the back and disposes of them before returning to her seat, just as the teacher enters the classroom. Once the lesson resumes, she does not have the time to worry about what Hanamiya's intentions are.

Afternoon passes quickly, and soon enough the evening bell rings, signifying the end of the school day. All of the students clamor out of the classroom, chattering amongst one another. Tomoe lingers behind in the wake of it all, purposefully dragging. She does not feel particularly enthusiastic about spending the next hour in the gym. Especially considering how unsavory all the members of her school's basketball team are.

Just as she has finished tucking everything safely into her book bag, she feels her cellphone vibrate in her pocket. No doubt Hanamiya urging her to make haste—he's probably noticed that she's purposefully slow about making her way over to the gym every day.

But when she looks at her phone, the look of exasperation on her face is quickly replaced by shock. Tomoe's eyes go wide as she stares at her screen—the new text message isn't from Hanamiya. It's from...

"Teppei-san?" she whispers in disbelief.

Her heart is suddenly beating fast. A part of her feels too scared to open the message and see what he sent. But another part of her is desperate to see his words again. Even if they're hateful, even if they're resentful. Whatever he has to say—she wants to see it. She wants to know.

With a trembling finger, she presses down on the button on her phone that opens the message. And contrary to her worst fear and her pessimistic expectations, it's actually a short, simple message.

'I want to meet with you.'

As much as she tries to stifle her excitement to read that, she feels like screaming in delight. It's strange—because she's not the type of person that is usually very emotionally expressive. So why does she feel so happy at such a short, simple message?

Without a moment of hesitation, she types back, 'When? Where?'

The response comes back sooner than she even expects. 'The bakery we visited last weekend. I'll be waiting there.'

Hastily, Tomoe stuffs her phone back into the pocket of her skirt before lifting her bag and darting out into the hallway. She races to the front entrance, dropping her bag to the side as she fishes her shoes out from her locker, dropping the two worn brown loafers onto the ground. After taking off her inside shoes and shoving them back inside the locker, she slips on her loafers.

Just as she is about to start in a dead run out toward the front gate of the school, a shadow falls over her. "You're slow," Hanamiya comments in a chiding voice. "Let's go, Kurosawa."

She hesitates to look at him in the eye. "Something came up. I have to go somewhere," she says quickly, thankful that her words do not manage to stumble over each other when she hastily blurts them out.

"Something came up?" he echoes back with a look of skepticism.

For now, she ignores his question and brushes past him. Whatever consequences come later, she will deal with them. Right now, she just wants to see Kiyoshi. So she speeds out the gate and manages to find a taxi somewhere along the way.

It is an antsy ride to the bakery, and she nearly forgets to fork over the money necessary for the trip when they arrive at their destination. Just as she is about to reach for the door handle to the bakery, she sees herself reflected in the glass—face flushed and hair tousled by the wind. As much as she wants to smooth out her appearance, her desperation to see Kiyoshi is strong enough for her to disregard that.

Yet just as she reaches to open the door, she feels her phone vibrate in her pocket again. Although she wants to burst in without worrying about her phone, she suspects it may be a call from Kiyoshi. But when she glances at the screen, she quickly realizes she is wrong.

Dropping her hand from the knob of the door, she reluctantly answers the call. "Hanamiya?"

"Come back. Now."

"I'll be back soon," she promises, anxious to end the call.

"Tomoe-san?" A voice calls from behind her.

"Kurosawa, if you don't—"

She hangs up on him before he can finish the sentence. "Teppei-san," she greets as she turns around to face him.

The first thing she sees is Kiyoshi stuffing his face—with dorayaki, no less. Since he's eating, she cannot tell if he's smiling—but at the very least, his expression is not contorted like she remembers it being the last time they met.

"Was that Hanamiya?" he asks. His voice sounds neither harsh nor as gentle as she remembers. It's more monotone—indifferent. And that bothers her more than if it had been hateful.

Tomoe swallows hard. Although she does not want to, she answers him honestly. "Yes, it was. But that's not important... why did you want to see me?" It seems a little presumptuous to ask outright, but she wants to know—needs to know.

He finishes the last of his dorayaki before forming any kind of response. The expression on his face is more somber than she thinks she has ever seen from him before. "I heard that you rejoined the Kirisaki Daiichi basketball team as manager."

After coming this far, there is no purpose in lying to him. "I... did."

"Why? Hanamiya... isn't threatening you, is he?"

Hastily, she shakes her head.

"Then... are you friends?"

"No. I don't think either of us think of each other as friends... although we have known each other for a long time."

Her answers seem to puzzle him. "Then why did you rejoin?"

"Because..." she hesitates, unsure how to answer. "I can't completely abandon Hanamiya."