038: Fools send text – Part [4] of the best Shizuka x Hachiman chapters I have ever written.
Hiratsuka Shizuka had a lit cigarette between her lips, a stack of unchecked papers on her desk and an offending piece of paper clenched tightly in her hand, which was coming close to bursting out in flames by the intensity of her gaze.
After wasting no less then fifteen minutes trying to decipher this abomination, which had somehow made its way into her pile of unchecked assignments, without spreading illiteracy and idiocy more likely to be found in crackpot scientist, foretelling about an oncoming apocalypse and predicting the very end of our world. She was amazed to find that despite being a complete piece of garbage, which went completely out of the set parameters of the topic, this essay, if she dared to call it that, was still written in an articulate and sophisticated form, which made the other essays in her pile read like doodles drawn by elementary school kids instead of the usual high school brats.
Hiratsuka Shizuka was dealt with a bad hand and her luck refused to shine despite this immense passage of time. She had improved her outlook and attitude towards people and she had done her fair share to get along with most of them, but there seemed to be some unwashable stain, some unwashable stench sticking to her body and soul, which was dissuading her from completely changing her personality. She had come a long way from her university days, she had learned from her mistakes, made peace with her past, but something was making her unable, discouraging her even, to completely let go of her own ideals. Miscalculations regarding relationships and human emotions continued to plague her and like her family loved to point out, it was messing with her chances of getting married.
She took a long drag from her cigarette and watched these swirling clouds of smoke gather over her head and reach towards the ceiling of the faculty room where they slowly vanished into thin air from the breeze passing through from an open window. She drew a parallel of her entire life with these vanishing strands of smoke. Outwardly she looked free, dancing and swaying, caught up in movements of a playful wind, but within a fraction of a second, a gust could blow her away and extinguish her fragile reality.
Hiratsuka Shizuka shook her head to clear herself of these melancholic thoughts and then she proceeded to smoke silently while mentally complaining about the unfairness associated with reading pessimistic essays written by a loner with dead fish eyes. She was expecting him to arrive any moment now to further elaborate upon this outlandish essay of his in a vain attempt to propagate his twisted logic and warped sense of reasoning onto her.
She gave a deep sigh, flicked some ash from her cigarette into an ashtray and then continued smoking like always while entertaining her thoughts. Mandatory school hours were already over by a final chime from an electronic bell and here she was waiting for him to make her day end on a miserable note. After tutoring him on her Sundays it was only fitting to have him contribute to her Monday Blues but at least now she had a better reason to drink after returning home.
Hikigaya Hachiman received summons from his home room teacher and like a good student he made his way towards this faculty room which had gradually become a place closely associated with divine retribution and physical violence, aimed at improving his outlook towards life to make him a mediocre member of society. Without any further delay he walked towards a figure clad in a lab coat and waited for her to finish her cigarette.
Hiratsuka Shizuka stubbed out her cigarette in an ashtray and looked at him with doleful eyes. Like always, Hikigaya Hachiman averted his gaze from her direction and found a solitary chair in a forgotten corner far more worthy of his attention.
"Say Hikigaya, do you ever read your essays out loud before submitting them to me?"
"…I tend to read them silently sensei."
"Of course you do! Otherwise someone might have heard these by now and thrown you into prison for crimes against humanity."
"…"
Hikigaya Hachiman continued to avert his gaze from her direction, but he had excellent peripheral vision, a skill which he had carefully crafted and honed, after he made a commitment to himself to pursue this solitary path of an exemplary loner and refrain from willingly associating with sociable members of society. Utilising this skill he took a look at his teacher and her work desk while remaining constantly on high alert for any oncoming punches aimed at his gut.
Her work desk was not an exemplary example of a dedicated teacher who considered teaching a higher calling and her service, a noble profession aimed at creating a better future for every student who would one day become excellent members of society. Like his sensei, her desk, gave a false impression about her personality and sullied her image of an educator who tried her best to redeem lost souls like him.
Hiratsuka Shizuka found him acting like himself and for once she was glad at his notion of maintaining his sacred 'status quo'. She was slightly worried about any change taking place in their interactions during high school after those occurrences which happened at her home during their scheduled tutoring sessions. Calling them occurrences might be an over exaggeration but she had nothing else to label his abrupt offerings of flowers to her without having any amorous connotations.
After his first tutoring session caused irritation to his sensitive nose, a complaint he wisely kept to himself, he decided to eradicate this problem by undertaking certain steps which he failed to mention to her while leaving her apartment after his tutoring session came to an end.
On his second tutoring session he brought lilies and upon asking, he specifically said that these flowers were not for her but for her living room, and then he unwisely went on to mention how her apartment stank from her smoking and drinking habits and needless to say he left this tutoring session after getting taught several lessons from an irate educator who took offense to his hurtful comment, pertaining to her apartment carrying a stench. Her lessons left a mark and formed a bruise but afterwards his flowers found a place on her nightstand. After giving her lilies he once dropped by announced into her apartment to discuss a foolish request made to the service club to which she gave him some very important advice which amounted to rejecting that request downright. He left without saying anything else except promising he would be back again for their next scheduled tutoring session. On his next tutoring sessions there was a lot of confusing caused by him which was finally cleared when he made a promise to bring her more flowers to solve her bedroom problems. Needless to say he was dumb and stupid and completely misunderstood this situation resulting in her getting completely embarrassed which made her unable to reject his offer. By time she came to her senses, she was already late and there was nothing left to do but accept his offer of hyacinth to improve her home décor. They matched nothing in her home but these flowers had the exact shade as her eyes. But once again she found this nothing more than a mere coincidence. However, she had her doubts which cleared completely when he chose to ignore the latest addition on her faculty room work desk.
Hiratsuka Shizuka had everything cluttered on her work desk except for a slim vase capable of holding only two flowers- one was a white lily and the other was a purple hyacinth. Hikigaya Hachiman shifted his eyes only a little when she habitually ran one of her fingers over a few petals of this small floral arrangement.
"Got you attention, I see."
"You never lost it sensei."
Miniscule changes, almost negligible in nature, had taken place in their interactions and though anyone in their present vicinity paid no heed to them, she was certain he was not completely absent minded. Her work desk reflected her personality and defined her individuality. Strewn books, stacks of unchecked assignments, uncapped pens and markers, dull pencils and dirty erasers, made her into a three dimensional figure, not an uneven caricature. A pack of cigarette and an astray spoke of her tragedy in life but everyone, especially her colleagues mistook it for callousness and insensitivity towards her teaching career which was marred by troubled students and him.
Hikigaya Hachiman belonged to a separate breed of high school students. He had no other and by his propensity to remain alone and lead a solitary existence, it seemed he was in no hurry to start an occult or spread a religion. Without meeting him, one can have the unfortunate capability to formulate his character and identity by studying his twisted essays which was tremendously close to being called hate speeches. He was not a bigot by any means, he was severely lacking in extremism on any department but his writings had a tendency to evoke thought which she found nothing more than a guilty pleasure.
"Now Hikigaya, remind me. What was the topic of your essay?"
"Uses of wind energy sensei."
His voice was flat and toneless like reading items from a grocery list and his eyes continued to evade from her scrutiny. She tapped a finger ominously over his essay and caused a small crease with her fingernail which made him wince on a subconscious level.
"And now tell me Hikigaya, how did you begin your essay? What was the very first sentence that came to your mind?"
"'Like airheads, wind energy is completely unreliable and unpredictable, causing major noise disturbances and threatening wildlife, hence it should only be allowed in hilly areas away from populous civilisation."
"There! You see where you went wrong Hikigaya."
"…"
"You don't see, do you?"
Hiratsuka Shizuka sighed and rubbed her temple to prevent an approaching headache. Hikigaya Hachiman was asked to write about uses of wind energy and he began his essay by comparing it to airheads, which he then chose to elaborate further by explaining various disadvantages of this particular form of renewable energy with his typical rotten reasoning and sophisticated writing.
Regardless, he made an effort, which was evidenced by his ability to recite it without having to take a single look from his assignment, which was lying face down on her work desk.
"You were supposed to write about various uses of wind energy, not its disadvantages. Did you write about any of the uses of wind energy Hikigaya?"
"…I wrote four uses sensei."
"Mind telling them to me."
He took a moment to gather his thoughts before starting an imaginary countdown. Hiratsuka Shizuka hoped he would be smart enough to skip over a certain detail although she already knew he would hardly miss a single thing even if it was stupid and idiotic, not to mention completely unacademic to mention in a high school essay which was later handed to a respectable teacher.
"Pumping water, grinding grain, generating electricity and assisting in tennis. These are the four uses I wrote about sensei."
"…Assisting in tennis? Really Hikigaya! Do you think I'm stupid?"
"Of course not sensei. But during a past request made before the service club I utilised the sea breeze to win a tennis match. I felt it was as good a use as any of wind energy and so I wrote about it in this essay."
"Writing about changes in sea breeze is not the same as writing essays about wind energy Hikigaya."
"Why? Air is air, sensei."
Hiratsuka Shizuka took a moment to careful come up with a retort but she found herself lacking in forming any witty comeback. Hikigaya Hachiman had a point and though academically he was wrong, in a literal sense he was right.
Of course that hardly made up for writing an entire paragraph about using wind to win a tennis match and the possibilities it presented towards other games and sports. Hikigaya Hachiman was clearly wasting his time and by an extension he was wasting her time as well.
She already knew which request he was talking about and though he was careful enough not to mention any names, he was unable to refrain from highlighting certain characteristics from several players involved with that particular scene on that particular tennis court. From his descriptions she could clearly picture Totsuka Saika, one of her students, and on a subconscious level it made her shudder to wonder about certain implications of this meticulous pen picture.
Hiratsuka Shizuka toyed with a glass paper weight and decided to humour those thoughts another day when her mind was not trying to mimic Ebina Hina, a fujoshi, who was in a habit of shipping Hikigaya Hachiman with Hayama Hayato. Truly, Hiratsuka Shizuka had a miserable luck when it came to her students and their prime representative was standing before her with shifty dead fish eyes and a suspicious demeanour, which can be easily mistaken with that of a creep and a stalker. But she had a way to paint him into a corner which was only possible by continued exposure to his demented ways and twisted logic. He was a forgotten book in an abandoned library but she was willing to run a finger over those dusty bindings and unfurl a few pages to quench her thirst for curiosity and elevate her own loneliness by proxy.
"You quoted a scientist in your essay Hikigaya. Do you remember who it was?"
"…Yagami Kazehana."
"You forgot to mention doctor."
"Oh sorry, Dr. Yagami Kazehana."
Hiratsuka Shizuka smiled from ear to ear and looked at him with the eyes of a predator playing with his prey. Her nails scraped over his assignment paper and left more marks, once again making him flinch over an unexplainable feeling of dread.
"Now Hikigaya, I might be wrong, but here me out. Doctor Yagami Kazehana seems like a wonderful and intelligent expert of her field but sadly I found no reference of her in any documents or studies. Not even in the internet. Why is that?"
"…I don't know sensei. Maybe her quotes are lesser known to normal people."
"I thought so too. But then I wondered why did this name sound so familiar to me and after thinking about it for a while I stumbled onto something very clever. Do you know what I found clever?"
"…"
"Oh, you don't have to answer Hikigaya. It was a rhetorical question. You see, Yagami Kazehana is not a real name, in fact, it is a combination of two different names from two contrasting characters from two distinct series. Kazuma Yagami from Kaze no Stigma and Kazehana from Sekirei."
"…"
"Feeling not so clever now, are you Hikigaya? I also know where this quote is from. Though I will give you some points for picking up such a memorable quote: 'Life is like trying to sweep during windy weather' If I'm not mistaking, this is from Kekkaishi. Anything else you want to add Hikigaya? I found your essay full of many references but I don't think there was anything original about it except for your usual sophistry and cynicism."
Hiratsuka Shizuka had a smug look on her face and she was enjoying teaching her student an important lesson on discouraging him from trying to hoodwink his teacher. No matter how many times he tried, her success was inevitable. She was well read in all types of mangas and caught up with all the latest animes. However, now she was waiting for him to make a negative comment over discrepancies between her age, her reading material and her television viewing pleasures. These mangas and animes she mentioned were relatively new but he could always make a comment about her age whenever she mentioned mangas and anime regardless of them being either old or new. Her age was always a basis for comparison and her inability to play her part in a role unsuitable for anyone irked everyone. She was a teacher who loved reading mangas more than some of her students and one of them was standing before her with rotten dead fish eyes and a corrupt personality.
"…Do I have to rewrite this essay sensei?"
"Excuse me?"
Hiratsuka Shizuka openly stared at him with wonderment and Hikigaya Hachiman finally found his eyes resting on her humbly seated form. His eyes remained neutral and inexpressive and betrayed neither any sentiment nor any emotion. He was not displaying any signs of anger over having her dismantle his entire work and neither was he getting worked up over repeating his mistakes again and again for only her to correct and amend. Hikigaya Hachiman was completely abnormal and unmalleable but he played his part and kept his head down, careful in limiting himself and stopping from overreaching his bounds.
Hiratsuka Shizuka found herself lost for a moment. Hikigaya Hachiman never brought up her age during this entire conversation, even though he was presented with an opening which meant he was serious when he apologized after giving her lilies. He was taking her sensitivity into account but she failed to understand what that meant. At present it meant he was paying respect to his teacher.
"Yes Hikigaya, you have to rewrite your essay and give it to me today."
"But, sensei. How is that possible? School is already over."
Hiratsuka Shizuka looked at an overhung clock located over the entrance of the faculty room and realised her student was in fact, telling her the truth. Everyone was trickling out from this faculty room and only those with a penchant for gossip remained behind. Hiratsuka Shizuka was not one of them and she spent her time wisely by rebuking her loner student, although she had to say this was slowly growing tedious. Club activities finished a long time ago and only students serving out punishments remained behind under strict vigilance of their respective teachers.
"You can stay behind and finish it. How long will it take Hikigaya?"
"But sensei I want to go home early today."
Hiratsuka Shizuka never missed subtle changes in interaction and such protests when made by Hikigaya Hachiman always registered in her cluttered brain. She tried again to make sure he was clearly capable of understanding the meaning of this particular utterance.
"You want to go home early? Why?"
"I promised to help Komachi with her homework today. She is lagging behind."
Hikigaya Hachiman was many things and he was capable of using many outlandish means and deplorable methods but Hiratsuka Shizuka knew for a fact that he would never use his own sister to satisfy his own ends. He could concoct many a lies but not one of them would be about his own sister.
"You can leave Hikigaya. Just remember to resubmit you work tomorrow."
"Alright sensei."
Hiratsuka Shizuka watched him turn from her direction and make his way towards the exit. Unknowingly or knowingly, she didn't know but Hikigaya Hachiman had capitalised on their subtle changes in interactions to escape from a punishment. She was capable and it was within her rights and duties, directed towards a slacking student, to hold him back for detention and stop him from leaving until he finished his routine school work. She was his teacher, he was duty bound to follow her instructions or else he would suffer the consequences like her other students. Hiratsuka Shizuka was disgusted with herself when she felt like she was giving Hikigaya Hachiman preferential treatment. She was trying to help his studies but he was taking advantage of her by his offerings of lilies and hyacinths. They meant nothing to him and by essence they should mean nothing to her but on her cluttered work desk there remained two flowers in a slim vase, waiting for a caress from her fingers. Hiratsuka Shizuka solidified herself and carried out her responsibilities of a teacher.
"Hikigaya, wait just a second."
He stopped and turned around. His dead fish eyes glanced at her direction from the threshold of a quick exit. His face carried no signs of outwards impatience but a small fidget of his clammy hands against a door knob found her attention. He was in a hurry to leave but sadly he was not capable of taking this decision.
"Anything you want sensei?"
"I changed my mind. You have to stay behind and complete this essay. Otherwise I will not allow you to leave."
Hikigaya Hachiman made his way towards her direction once again but this time his dead fish eyes made steady contact with her purple gaze. She was unnerved by only a slightest fraction but she remained seated on her swivel chair like a throne. No one else was there in this faculty room and they had the complete privacy all to themselves.
"Sensei, I really want to go home. Please cut me some slack."
"No Hikigaya. You are to finish this essay right now."
Hiratsuka Shizuka watched Hikigaya Hachiman descend into deep thoughts. She wondered what his rotten little brain was planning and she waited from his to come up with a response. For now only thing she could think of was for him to offend her by showcasing a glaring loophole coincidentally missed during the course of this entire conversation.
Hiratsuka Shizuka was his homeroom teacher and his modern Japanese teacher in Sobu High. However, this essay of his was written for one of his science subjects and hence she should have no say in this particular matter. This was between him and his science teacher. This was not the first time this has happened and there were other instances before. Hiratsuka Shizuka remembered his ecological essay stating he wanted to be a bear and in that instant also, she was asked by his science teacher to deal with him and help him see reason.
Hikigaya Hachiman had one choice. He had to offend her by saying her senior colleagues dumped their work load on her and shirked responsibility leading to a failing education system to which she would counter with the usual punch to his gut. Afterwards, she would force him to finish his essays by giving threats of bodily harm and then making him lose hope of ever passing high school within three years, thus prolonging his youthful suffering. This was her routine and when it got him into joining the service club, she believed it could get him into doing anything.
"How about I rewrite this essay and deliver it to your home."
"…Excuse me?"
"I will come to your house tonight sensei."
Hiratsuka Shizuka lost her train of thought. Gaping at him like a fish out of water, she closed her mouth and nodded her head having nothing better to offer for a reaction.
A moment later she banged her table top with enough force to leave a dent. Hikigaya Hachiman had managed to take advantage of their teacher-student relationship and escaped from finishing his essay within a fixed time period. She took another look at this offending piece of paper which he dared to call an essay and then without sparing another thought she crunched it into a ball and threw it into a dustbin.
Despising him and his very existence and most importantly his stupidly, idiotic essays, she deliberately forgot to water her vase containing the two flowers given to her by him. These flowers would survive a day without water, she thought.
Hiratsuka Shizuka was alone at her apartment and she was down to her second cigarette packet for tonight. At some hospitals terminally ill patients received plenty of cigarettes to smoke without any stringent rules and regulations and tonight she was depressed enough to pretend that she was dying from boredom. She was dressed casually in a pair of short shorts and a loose tank top. At home she was at ease and not expecting anybody.
Hikigaya Hachiman had played her like a fiddle and she was stupid enough to fall into his carefully laid plan. He was laying a foundation and developing an excuse to escape her clutches and now through a clever choice of words, he had outsmarted her. She should have expected nothing else from a scummy student like him and it was hardly surprising that she fell for his act. In actuality, he was not pulling any act or performing any stunt, he was simply being himself. Hiratsuka Shizuka often wondered whether he was intentionally playing dumb towards the painfully obvious advances made to him by his club mates but now she had a better idea of his capabilities. Hikigaya Hachiman was oblivious to everyone but somehow he had this amazing ability to turn girls into blithering idiots. She was certain that girls around him found there intelligence lowered by double digits upon simply interacting with him and now she had become a causality to this unexplainable phenomenon. He had casually said that he would come to her house tonight and all it took was one word to make her lose her steady footing over realism.
'Tonight.'
She inhaled her cigarette and released smoke through her nose, in a comical effect similar to a mythically annoyed dragon. She had completely misunderstood his sentence and her mind was filled with nothing but lilies and hyacinths. However, Hikigaya Hachiman was not coming tonight. He might have lied to her or he might have been honest, but she would never be sure of it and quite frankly, she was happy at feeling completely unbothered over his ability to break promises. This meant, she could pummel him to her heart's content the very next day without feeling any regret whatsoever over never thanking him for giving her flowers. She already knew he was not expecting any thanks from her but unlike him, her social etiquette was eating at her and weighing on her conscience. But tonight, she would have no problem with her sensitive conscience because unlike her, Hikigaya Hachiman had broken a promise. He promised her that he would deliver his stupid essay at her apartment but obviously he had gone back on his words. For his own well being and continued existence, Hikigaya Hachiman better meet up with her tomorrow at Sobu High and give her his poorly written essay with a proper excuse in hand. She would be better prepared to deal with his obliviousness than she was today back in the faculty room when she made an error and allowed him to get away from her. But to his credit, he did that not for him but for his sister which was always commendable and Hiratsuka Shizuka promised that it would save him from at least two well deserved punches to his gut. But she would have no say over the half dozen other punches delivered all across his rotten body which would surely force him to pay a visit to the school infirmary much to her dismay. This called for another pack of unopened cigarette and forgetting about high school loners with a penchant for writing threatening essays.
At fifteen minutes past nine, she opened her front door to throw out the trash and found herself in the presence of the living breathing embodiment of everything that is rotten and disgusting. This physical entity had a pair dead fish eyes and an ahoge.
"Aren't you cold sensei?"
"What do you mean?"
Hikigaya Hachiman moved his head sideways for a moment and allowed Hiratsuka Shizuka a moment to scrutinize her own appearance. A pair of short shorts and a tank top was comfortable inside her cosy apartment while she was indulging in her vices of smoking and drinking but when she stepped outside from her apartment for a moment to throw out the trash, her body felt the chill of the fast approaching longer nights and colder months. Having her arms and legs bare was suddenly uncomfortable on various levels and she had a feeling that though Hikigaya Hachiman was averting his gaze from her general direction, his dead fish eyes might be in the process of scrutinizing her by using his more than inappropriate peripheral vision. Upon getting hit by this realisation, she dropped her trash bag onto the floor and hid herself behind the main door, thus distancing herself from him in a less than subtle manner.
"Why are you here Hikigaya?"
"…to give you my essay sensei."
Hiratsuka Shizuka now noticed that he was holding a piece of paper in his hands. She would have noticed this earlier if she were not shocked with the fact that not only Hikigaya Hachiman came to her apartment this late but he also somehow managed to catch her off guard and take a glimpse of her homely clothing. She was not ashamed of her body but she felt severely self conscious at having him here and near her presence when she was wearing less than appropriate clothing to welcome guests, especially a student of her, into her humble home.
Hikigaya Hachiman made no movement and gave no indication of wanting to enter her premises but out of social convention and proper mannerism, not to mention civility and politeness, she offered him a chance to accept her hospitality.
"D-do y-you want to come in?"
She could easily say that she was stuttering because of the cold and not because of any other obvious implication and her reddening cheeks was easily excused with this same reason. But she already knew even before asking that he would decline her offer.
"Sorry, sensei but I have to hurry. Komachi is waiting up for me. I would have come sooner but she had a lot of homework and rewriting this essay was a pain in itself. I hope you understand."
"I understand."
Hikigaya Hachiman said nothing else and gently handed his essay to his sensei. She took it from his hand without saying anything else either. Their fingers did not brush, their skins never touched and there was no exchange of a harmless greeting of a simple goodnight.
He turned his back to her and made his way towards his stationery bicycle.
"Wait a sec Hikigaya!"
He turned around and looked at his sensei with patience and serenity embodied in a skin of carefully crafted disillusionment and distortion. She looked at him with a glimmer of hesitance but her thoughts betrayed her at the penultimate moment.
"Nothing. Just remember Hikigaya, we have our tutoring sessions on weekends. Don't be late."
This was her saving grace.
"Looking forward to it sensei."
This was his missed opportunity.
Hiratsuka Shizuka was nursing her second bottle of beer after sending off Hikigaya Hachiman without saying a proper goodnight.
These two words, 'good' and 'night' were trapped in her throat but when he turned around with a collected demeanour and expressionless eyes, her voice hitched and she fell back on her usual parting greeting of telling him to be on time for their next tutoring session. He was late only once and that was when he brought her these lilies. She looked at her two flower vases. One was on her coffee table located in the middle of her living room and the other one was on her nightstand beside her queen sized bed. After his confusion during their last tutoring session, she had come up with a clever way to cease any form of doubt from forming in his mind regarding any implausible chance that she might throw away her flowers. Currently both her flowers vases contained a unique combination of floral arrangements which consisted of equal amounts of white lilies and purple hyacinths. She had to buy a few flowers herself to even everything out but she was certainly happy over the present arrangement and paid no mind to the small cost she spent over them. Now she had flowers at her home and also at her work desk and she had to admit that it was an improvement over her overall décor.
She drank straight from her bottle of beer and gave a deep sigh. Her flowers never needed greetings. Good mornings and goodnights was a stupid concept to them and anyone who wished them such things had severe mental problem and suffered from mild delusions. Her flowers only needed a healthy serving of water and a little caress from her fingers.
Unfortunately Hiratsuka Shizuka had no clue what Hikigaya Hachiman wanted from her and by now she was uncertain about whether she was the one who was wanting something from him.
She took another sip of her beer and fuelled by liquid courage she fished out her mobile phone from inside her pockets. She found his number on her contact list and without thinking too much about anything else she typed a small message and hit send:
[Gn8]
Next morning Hiratsuka Shizuka woke up early and checked her phone which showed no new messages from anyone during the course of the entire night.
She chuckled dryly at herself and thought it was very much in his character to ignore text messages, not just from her, but from anyone else for that matter.
She specifically lacked credibility after she hounded him with countless text messages and calls to force him to join her and several of his classmates and club mates, on their summer trip to Chiba Village where they helped out a number of elementary school students on an outdoor camping expedition, where once again he employed his rotten methods to help out a small girl who was ostracised by his peers and forced to become a loner. His methods alleviated the situation but failed to completely eradicate it, but he had already foretold about it before he set out to destroy something which was never there to begin with. Hiratsuka Shizuka felt herself sympathising with those poor elementary school students but they must have learned a valuable lesson that day and now it was her turn to learn and move on.
She bathed in warm water, brushed her hair in a time consuming manner and dressed herself in her usual apparel while heading out to high school. She was in the process of wearing her heels when her phone buzzed from within the confines of her labcoat. She took it out and unlocked the screen and noticed that she received a new text message. She opened the text message and found only one word staring at her from the screen:
[Gn8]
Hiratsuka Shizuka knew of only one person who would wish her good night instead of good morning during the beginning of a new day. She chuckled good naturedly and found her spirits getting uplifted within a manner of minutes, over the stupidity of a certain loner.
What an idiot, she thought to herself while blushing.
A/N: This is a really big chapter (6000+ words)! But alas, it will all be over soon. One more chapter left in this Shizuka x Hachiman saga. Hope you are enjoying this so far.
Now onto the Ikebukuro fic –
As you know, the Ikebukuro fic is going to be more seinen and not shonen. So don't expect Naruto, Bleach, One Piece etc. But there will be supernatural, mystery, sci-fi and you know other cool seinen stuff. With that said, let's move onto the polls!
Poll#1: Which Animes Do You Want To Feature In The "Ikebukuro" fic?
Option 1: Tokyo Ghoul.
Option 2: Pyscho Pass.
Option 3: Ghost in the Shell.
Option 4: Code Geass.
Option 5: Noragami.
Option 6: An Anime From The Reviews.
Please pick accordingly.
And remember to mention the animes you want to feature in The "Ikebukuro" fic in the reviews.
Hope everyone enjoyed reading this chapter.
Leave lots and lots of reviews, follow and fave.
Won't betray your dreams.