My ACTs are DONE! God, that was so stressful. 0/10 would not recommend. But, on the bright side, at least it's over now! Well...unless I have to take it again because it's possible I failed, like, half of it. Who the hell made the decision that you only get ONE HOUR to answer 60 math questions? Sigh...anyways, at least it's done for now! And I can get back to working on this book! We're getting very close to the end here, so from now on I want to ask you guys for some suggestions! What kind of Miritama book should I do after this one is over? Keep giving me suggestions, as many as you like, and in the final chapter I will put a poll in the end notes and let you all vote for the story you want!
Mirio was seated in the hallway, legs folded to his chest, when he spotted Akiyama-sensei running from the other end of the hall. She didn't even stop to look at him, simply running past him and entering Tamaki's room in the span of about three seconds. Frowning, Mirio stood and moved to the doorway so he could examine what was happening.
The nurses had Tamaki on his side, the same way he'd been told to position him in the bathroom at school when he'd had the first bad attack. As he watched, Akiyama-sensei crossed to the other side of the bed and examined him thoroughly, pressing her fingers to his throat and listening to his chest with her stethoscope. Her face remained pinched with a look of concern.
"Tamaki!" He jumped at the new voice and spun around to find Tamaki's mom, looking like she'd run all the way from their house to the hospital. Her work clothes were wrinkled, so she probably had been running. She was breathing heavily and the second Mirio stepped aside to let her inside, she ran to her son's side.
"What happened?" She asked nobody in particular. "The person on the phone just said it was an emergency."
"It seems he had another attack...from the looks of it, even worse than the one that landed him here." Akiyama-sensei said, standing up straight and looking towards Mirio and Tamaki's mom. "We're very lucky he was here in the hospital where he could recieve immediate help. He may have suffocated otherwise."
Tamaki's mom gasped and sat (or maybe collapsed was a better description) into the closest chair. Mirio stayed put beside the doorway, knowing there was nothing for him to provide to this conversation. In all honesty, he probably should have left, but he just couldn't make himself turn away. This was his fault. He should have just kept his mouth shut; he was the reason Tamaki had just nearly died.
"Can you-" Tamaki's mom's voice broke as she tried to talk. She cleared her throat a few times before trying again. "Is it possible for us to move the surgery up?"
Mirio inhaled sharply, but not a single person in the room so much as glanced his way. Akiyama-sensei pursed her lips before giving one single, grave nod. "I think that might be for the best. I don't want to take any more chances of him having an attack like this again and there being no way to stop it."
Tamaki's mom started thanking her profusely, tears running down her face as she kissed Tamaki's forehead before excusing herself. Mirio watched as Akiyama-sensei began calling out orders to the nurse and pulled out her cell phone to make calls. His stomach felt unbelievably tight, like someone had a rope tied around him, slowly increasing the tension every few seconds.
Pushing past his shock at everything that had just happened, he turned and rushed back out into the hallway to catch Tamaki's mom. He grabbed her arm, not even stopping to think about how rude that actually was, and she turned around to face him. "You can't do this to him." Mirio began. There was no time to beat around the bush.
She shook her head. "I know you're just trying to convince me to comply with what he wants, but...I just can't do it, okay? I can't just...accept my baby's death, I can't just sit back and let him die because that's what he wants. I'm sorry, but I'm not changing my mind." She tried to leave again, but Mirio stopped her.
"Wait! Wh-What if there was another way to save him?" He asked desperately. "A way where he could stay alive and be cured of the disease?"
She stifled a sob. "Obviously, that's what I want. But...it's-"
"It's not impossible!" Mirio clenched his fists in determination. "I'll prove it!" And with that, he turned around and once again ran into Tamaki's room.
Once inside, he walked over and grabbed Akiyama-sensei by the shoulder. She seemed startled, but not annoyed. She looked more sympathetic than anything. "Yes, Togata-san?"
"Don't do the surgery on him." He said, careful to keep his tone even and determined. "Just give me some time, and I swear I'll find the person he loves and bring them here to help. I promise. Just don't bdo the surgery, okay?"
The woman stared at him for a long, long time, lips pursed in thought. Finally, she seemed to deflate a little before walking into the corner of the room. Mirio followed her, and as soon as they were out of earshot she leaned forward and whispered to him. "I can give you one hour. No more than that. If you're not back with Amajiki-san's love by then, I'll have no choice but to perform the surgery. I can't go against his mom's wishes."
"I understand, and thank you. I'll be back before an hour has passed." He grinned before dashing back out into the hallway. Immediately, he pulled out his phone and dialed Nejire's number. While the call was connecting, he quickly ran over in his head every single person Tamaki was close with, excluding himself and Nejire. The list was extremely small, so it would probably be easy to figure out who it was by trying to talk to those people.
"Hello?" Nejire picked up the phone, but she didn't sound much like herself. That was to be expected.
"Nejire, I need to ask you something very important."
"Hm? What is it?"
"Does Tamaki have any other close friends besides us?"
She paused for a moment. "Why do you ask?"
Mirio sighed before explaining everything that had happened. He told her about the deal he'd made with Akiyama-sensei and repeated his first question. He went silent once he'd finished, expecting Nejire to start talking, but the line remained quiet. After several seconds, he spoke up again. "Nejire? What-" He cut himself off when he heard the unmistakable sound of someone crying. It sounded distant, like whoever it was had set the phone down and walked somewhere else. And yet it did nothing to mask the sounds that got increasingly louder and louder.
"Nejire?" He asked again. No response.
He waited a few more seconds before there was a rustling sound as someone else picked up the cell phone. "Mirio, it's Yuyu." The new person spoke up. "Wait for us in front of the hospital. Nejire has something she needs to tell you."
Before he could even think to question what that meant, she had hung up. Mirio stood there stunned for several seconds before he started towards the elevator to go outside. Based on her reaction, Nejire had to know something that he didn't, and it sounded like she'd known for a while.
He made it to the ground floor and hurried out the front doors. He took a seat on a nearby bench and started anxiously waiting for the girls to arrive. It didn't take longer than ten minutes before a cab pulled up and Nejire stumbled out, immediately throwing herself onto him in a hug. Yuyu lagged behind her to thank the driver and pay him before he drove off.
"I'm sorry!" Nejire said. She was crying, clinging to the fabric of Mirio's shirt. "I know I should have told you before, but Tama-chan asked me not to so many times, a-and I just couldn't go against it because I didn't want to betray his trust-" She hiccuped, cutting herself off. Mirio wasn't sure how to respond, so he just sat there and waited for her to get ahold of herself.
She clung to his shirt and took deep breaths to calm down. After a few minutes, she lifted her head and faced him. Her eyes were red and puffy and she kept sniffling, but she had calmed down enough to speak. "I'm sorry," Her voice was so soft, it seemed wrong coming from the usually upbeat and cheerful girl. "I know who Tama-chan is in love with, I've known the whole time, I just...he told me not to tell you. I couldn't betray his trust like that, but...I can't let this happen."
"You...knew?" Mirio's eyes widened, and he reached out to grab her shoulders. "Who is it? Is it one of our classmates? Or maybe one of the underclassmen? Or-"
"You," It was one word, one measly word, but it was enough to stop Mirio in his tracks. It took him a second to figure out how to get his mouth to move to ask for clarification. "Wh...what?"
"It's you," She said again, rubbing at her eyes. "The one Tama-chan is in love with...it's you."
His hands fell from her arms of their own accord, suddenly feeling like they weighed a thousand pounds. "He's...in love with me?" The words felt foreign to him because in all the ways he'd imagined this scenario happening, this was definitely not one of them. Over the years, he'd fantasized about having Tamaki love him back, and usually it was a super cliche scene like those in anime and manga. He'd thought about kissing Tamaki in the rain, or in a field of some sort.
But he'd never imagined he would have his life's dream come true on a park bench in front of a hospital. And he'd definitely never thought the person he loved would be inside of the hospital, dying.
His body seemed to move of its own volition. He didn't even stop to thank Nejire for the information, simply rushing past both girls to go back inside. He ignored the elevator and turned for the stairs instead, taking them two at a time. He needed to get back up to Tamaki's room as soon as he possibly could. This entire time, he'd had the power to heal Tamaki, but he hadn't know until that very moment. But now that he knew, he refused to let it continue any longer.
His goal was still the same; save Tamaki's life no matter what. Except now, he actually had a way to do it.
I'M SORRY THIS CHAPTER IS SO SHORT. The next chapter should be the FINAL CHAPTER. But I will also be adding an epilogue! So y'all will hopefully be very happy with the ending. Yay, Mirio's finally knows! I can't tell you how long I've waited to make this happen. It was absolutely excruciating, but now he knows and he is going to save Tamaki's life. I am very happy. And don't forget to give me suggestions for what kind of story I should do for the next Miritama! There is a severe lack of Miritama fanfiction, and I am here to change that. So give me suggestions! Again, I'll be adding all of them to a poll that will be posted in the epilogue! Thank you all for reading, and I'll see you next time for the LAST CHAPTER!