Title: Fools are Awkward

Summary: It's Christmas and Hiratsuka Shizuka wakes up from a dream, where she and Hikigaya were, shall we say, intimate. No, the mere thought makes her blush. Dammit. She is supposed to be his teacher. He is supposed to be fantasizing about her. Wait, that's not what she meant. Well, there's nothing she can do really. Just think about all the foolish stuff her rotten dead fish eyed loner – I mean, student said, get ready for school and look for another normal day of work as a responsible teacher. Yes, she is a responsible teacher. She can handle this. Oh who is she kidding? This is gonna be so awkward.

Note 1: Part [6] of The Best Shizuka x Hachiman Chapters I Have Ever Written.

Note 2: Continued From Chapter 39: Fools On Christmas Eve.

Hiratsuka Shizuka opened her eyes with a start and blinked away the last granules of sleep from her tired pair of eyelids. After taking a moment to compose herself, she sat upright on her own bed and took a sweeping look of her present surroundings.

She seemed to be in her own empty apartment and inside her own single bedroom. A slow realisation came to dawn upon her foggy little mind like another swiftly approaching morning and she shook her head to clear herself from the last remnants of a fragmented dream which should have been better left forgotten. Hiratsuka Shizuka already knew this compassionate reverie was destined to plague her throughout a large portion of this seemingly pleasant day, which would always involve more than a handful of interactions with one of her students, namely a certain rotten dead fish eyed, Hikigaya Hachiman.

"I will bring some more flower next time sensei."

A miniscule bead of sweat rolled down her forehead and landed on one of her clenched fists which were resting stoically on top of her lap and clutching onto a handful of her blanket with an excessive amount of strength to keep her firmly grounded onto this cold, cruel world of reality. Hiratsuka Shizuka was beginning to cross her legs and starting to switch into a more meditative position, but her elevated heartbeat was making her incredibly aware of her own apparent need to focus on anything other than her own erratic breathing pattern, which was making her extremely flustered without even acknowledging the rather alarming shade of red which was currently colouring both of her cheeks in a crimson hue of embarrassment, as evidenced from her own reflection on a vanity mirror, which was situated at a close proximity to her comfortable and recently dream riddled spot of slumber.

"I will come to your house tonight sensei."

Hiratsuka Shizuka raised one of her hands and placed it over of her heart. She felt every beat against her breast and kept listening to this steady rhythm without paying any attention to her clothes, which were already sticking to her body in an uncomfortable manner due to sweating profusely, after she had woken up this morning with a rather troubling epiphany, which would never cease to fade away from her lonely mindscape, whenever she made another painful mistake and even dared to dream of a reality where a woman like her could simply be happy with herself and her choices, which might consist of another individual willing to accept her for herself, nothing else, nothing more.

"Thanks sensei. Love ya."

Alas, such a plain of existence simply did not exist in a modern society of today. Nonetheless, Hiratsuka Shizuka considered herself a woman of fortitude, capable of keeping her hope alive even against numerous amounts of insurmountable odds. A girl could only wish, couldn't she? Unfortunately for her there was never an answer floating around whenever she spoke aloud to these four walls which consisted of her own secluded bedroom. However, today was Christmas and maybe, just maybe a miracle was right around the corner.

Hiratsuka Shizuka made a personal vow to herself to never believe in any kind of miracles ever again after having such a disastrous start to this seemingly pleasant day, mired by occasional glimpses at a weak sun, followed by a cold rush of a freezing wind in every street corner, which would help her down a path towards reaching her school at an hour considered exceedingly early by most normal standards, both from teachers and students alike.

However, she was tired of being cooped up in her own home, where she would be constantly bombarded with figments of an insignificant dream, which she should rather not remember, even before considering to carry out her duties of a remarkable teacher, whenever she went outside the confines of her own home for work and into a morally acceptable and a blatantly judgmental society, where there will always be certain rules and regulations kept in place to discourage behaviours of a more reckless and careless nature, which went without any kind of consequence in a world of dreams, but would always be brought to book in her current world of harsh realities.

"Fancy meeting you here, Hikigaya."

"Likewise, sensei."

Hiratsuka Shizuka was already beginning to feel awful for today and unsurprisingly enough she had not even taken a single step inside her place of work. She was far away from reaching Sobu High and waiting rather patiently at a bus stop which was unsurprisingly vacant, since it was way too early in the morning, except for her own miserable self and a certain creepy, dead fish eyed student of her, who was currently failing to display his rumoured stalking tendencies by already letting his presence be known to her, by simply halting his bicycle more than a couple of feet away from her present location.

"We keep meeting a lot nowadays, don't you think, Hikigaya?"

"Seems so sensei."

Like always Hikigaya Hachiman kept his words to a minimum and Hiratsuka Shizuka simply chalked his lack of communication skills to one of his less then endearing personality traits. However after a moment lapsed between them in compensable silence, a morbid sense of playfulness seeped through her voice and her beautiful amethyst eyes twinkled with a juvenile kind of fascination more akin to one of her former students, a certain mischievous elder sister of another one of her current pupils, namely Yukinoshita Yukino and although she already knew that Yukinoshita Haruno would have made a killing wounding him up so tight by asking him, Hikigaya Hachiman, such a scandalous question, for Hiratsuka Shizuka, his homeroom teacher, there would never be a more fortunate opportunity available in their near distant future.

"Are you stalking me Hikigaya?"

"I really am not. You would not know if I was, sensei."

Once again he gave an ample amount of evidence in regards to his terrible sense of humour. Hikigaya Hachiman couldn't tell a proper joke to save his life. Hiratsuka Shizuka always appreciated his lack of effort towards this particular form of communication to break the ice before commencing a long round of conversation but unfortunately for her, today was simply not her day and hence even this rotten embodiment of gloom and doom was making a lame attempt at a comedic endeavour to further worsen her foreboding mood. He should have just spluttered and stumbled all over himself at her half hearted yet completely false accusation, which would have made her feel much better about herself, before making her feel far worse at her obvious attempt to rattle the cage of one of her more troubled and problematic students from her own homeroom.

"You should probably leave the joking to me, Hikigaya. You would definitely get arrested if you said that stuff to anyone else."

"Maybe you're right, sensei. Even I thought that sounded extremely creepy."

"Well know you know. Do better next time or better yet stop trying."

"A sound bit of advice sensei. You are certainly brimming with all kinds of wisdom today."

Hiratsuka Shizuka would have definitely smiled at this self depreciating admission of his any other day, but today she simply choose to press her lips into a thin line and just looked away from his general direction, by convincing herself to take away a rudimentary note of offense from his latest remark which was dripping with disdain like usual.

"Sarcasm suits you."

"You think?"

"Yeah, especially if you're going for that whole 'broken jaw' look today. Keep going, Hikigaya and if you are lucky I will help you out a little, you know."

"…I will be shutting up now."

"What a shame. Punching you always make me feel a lot better."

"Good to know."

Hiratsuka Shizuka exhaled a small humourless breath of air from inside her mouth and started cracking each of her knuckles in an ominous manner and after realising his fatal mistake, Hikigaya Hachiman raised both of his hands upwards in a placating manner. His voice sounded small and his throat was only a tad constricted.

"Sorry sensei. Please don't hit me. It won't happen again!"

"I believe you, Hikigaya."

Normalcy was ensured in a comically violent manner and although it led to both of them, refraining from speaking altogether in a rather abrupt manner, both of their reckless actions would never be a cause of concern between them for much longer, since they were usually unable to hold onto a trifling grudge against each other over most matters regarding mainly to their witty interactions.

"You said you believed me, sensei."

"I was being sarcastic, Hikigaya."

As it was already established, she was his sensei and he was her student and a few punches and a couple of clever remarks would never come in between them from relating to one another in a seemingly innocent manner. Hiratsuka Shizuka allowed a small smile to grace her lips and Hikigaya Hachiman was forced to grimace while rubbing his stomach to ease away the pain caused by one of her unblockable punches.

"Ow! That really hurt."

"What else do you expect?"

"I don't know sensei. Maybe a little more compassion."

"…Shut up."

Hikigaya Hachiman looked a little confused after hearing his sensei mumble these words in a voice which was nothing more than a mere squeak, as she would normally tell him to shut up using a much louder voice, but perhaps he was over thinking everything like usual. Maybe today her voice came out different because of the chilling cold permeating their present surrounding. Hence, he thought nothing about the matter and stopped paying attention to her strange behaviour, before choosing to simply follow her order and remain silent which inadvertently saved him a lot of trouble for the next handful of minutes.

Thankfully for him, Hiratsuka Shizuka was quick enough to turn her face away from his direction before he could even catch a glimpse of the warm blush spreading across her cheeks. Like always Hikigaya Hachiman had said something which was quickly taken out of proportions by her overactive mindscape which returned to pepper her crazy imagination with glimpses of a rather embarrassing dream. Unluckily enough, 'compassionate', was one of the words she had thought about while addressing her vivacious dream back in the privacy of her own apartment and as expected the same word was thrown back at her face by none other than Hikigaya Hachiman.

"Are you alright, sensei?"

"Y-Yeah! Of course! Why wouldn't I be? Why are you asking?"

"Nothing. It's just your voice sounds a bit different."

"Oh that! Um, it's probably because of the cold weather. I think I'm getting a sore throat."

"Oh, um, is it bad, sensei?"

"…it's probably the worse."

Unbeknownst to him, Hiratsuka Shizuka meant something completely different by her ambiguous choice of words and like she expected Hikigaya Hachiman fell for her trick and took away another meaning altogether from her carefully crafted phrase. She should have been proud at herself and her own resourcefulness as a great language teacher, but there was a rather chilling sensation settling around her present surrounding, which had nothing to do with the cold weather.

Both of them were way too early to participate in a meeting of such a volatile nature, which would be termed completely bizarre by most individuals after they had accidentally stumbled upon one another in a purely coincidental manner, on a fine day, in a winter morning, which would inadvertently lead to spreading of a merry cheer, following many greetings and celebrations, even in a place of teaching and schooling, owing to today being none other than Christmas, but currently both of them found each other stowed away in a secluded moment of privacy, relatively distanced from playing their respective roles at a school and its forbidding four walls of firm discipline and rigid decorum, which instilled a more self conscious approach to broaching a more candid and open minded subject of conversation.

However, at this present moment they could speak rather frankly with one another and if either of them came forward and chose to take a chance, they could make a rather positive headway into comprehending a significant portion of their puzzling dilemma and like many previous occasions, Hiratsuka Shizuka took the bold initiative and Hikigaya Hachiman held himself back.

"…It's a perfect day, isn't it?"

"…it's a little cold."

"Well, it's the end of December, Hikigaya. What else did you expect?"

"You're probably right, sensei."

"I'm always right, Hikigaya! You should get this through that rotten brain of yours by now. It's you who are in the wrong more often than not, you know."

"I never said otherwise, sensei."

Hiratsuka Shizuka sighed to herself in defeat and Hikigaya Hachiman shifted uneasily on his bicycle in despair. She could never imagine him making small talk with anyone without having an adequate amount of coffee in his system and likewise, he should have expected her to at least have smoked a couple of cigarettes in a relatively relaxing atmosphere, before attempting to engage anyone in a polite conversation, especially someone as tasking as him. However, like she mentioned earlier both of them were taking into account their lack of patience with a general populace into their respective strides and hence, being a little rigid and rough around the edges was completely understandable and equally reciprocated by both parties involved in their allegedly pleasant morning conversations.

"Well, you don't seem to be learning anything from your past mistakes and sometimes, I seriously doubt whether you have changed even a single bit from that fateful day when I forced you to join the service club."

"I think of that day too."

"Really? You think about it?"

"More often than you think, sensei."

Hiratsuka Shizuka was taken aback by his seemingly honest admission. According to her past knowledge of his obnoxious character, Hikigaya Hachiman would have never admitted to such a piece of information without being threatened with both physical harm and mental torture of a more dubious nature. However, at this present moment he was disclosing to her a rather secretive strain of one his own more private of thoughts, without even being placed under either any kind of duress or any type of exigent circumstances in his unexpectedly interesting way of life. Asking him for a small confirmation on her part was a rather futile effort, but that would never dissuade her from enquiring him yet again.

"Are you really telling the truth, Hikigaya?"

"Of course, sensei. What would I gain by lying?"

"I don't know, Hikigaya. Why does anyone lie?"

"…now that's a terrible question, sensei."

"Only you would call it terrible, Hikigaya."

"Huh, maybe you're right, sensei."

Hiratsuka Shizuka knew she was starting to sound more and more annoying by the minute, but her prolonged interaction with him was making her a little more self conscious of their own close proximity, and she was having trouble keeping herself focused on their present stream of conversation, without drawing certain parallels to a rather fragmented piece of a damnable dream. Much to her chagrin she was unable to make him even a little bit infuriated with her present behaviour. Perhaps even Hikigaya Hachiman was also attempting to be a little more understanding of their situation and hence, trying to be a little more socially flexible than his usual self.

"If you say so, then. I would have never guessed."

"I know what you mean, sensei. I surprise myself sometimes."

"I would hardly call it surprising, Hikigaya."

"Perhaps not sensei."

Any other person would have even considered getting more than just a little offended by her lack of acknowledgement at his effort to appear amicable and would have definitely rebuffed any of her future endeavours to hold a civilised conversation, but unlike any of those simple minded individuals, her rotten dead fish eyed student simply choose to shrug his shoulders in a lack lustre display of nonchalance and balanced one of his legs on top of a revolving pedal of his resting bicycle.

For once Hikigaya Hachiman chose to voice his thoughts about their entire conversation and Hiratsuka Shizuka found it in herself to listen to his plaintive words without even making a single move to strangle him with her bare hands.

"Don't you normally take your car to school, sensei?"

"Yes Hikigaya. Like you said, normally I drive to school."

"Then what happened today?"

"…Nothing happened. I just decided to take the bus for a change"

Needless to say she was currently lying through her teeth and bitterly cursing herself upon remembering a lame joke said by Eikichi Onizuka, her bastard of a friend, back from her university days. Back then she had heard this rather crude joke about how most women were terrible drivers because they kept getting distracted by a rather well defined phallic shaped object, which would keep sticking out from the gear box of their vehicles and draw their eyes away from the road, leading to them causing a lot of road accidents and killing many innocent bystanders in the process.

Now it is important to note that Hiratsuka Shizuka was a terrific driver and she had an awesome car back at her home, but today she just felt like taking a long walk to the nearest bus stop and catching a bus to work, instead of checking the credibility of that horrible joke. She blamed her perverted imagination into forcing her to take this decision, which was prolonging her own suffering, by causing her to further embarrass herself before one of her students and although, she knew Hikigaya Hachiman would never hold any kind of judgement against her, but there would always be a small lingering doubt present at the forefront of her mind over his lack of insight upon her recent disclosure. Surely, he would have spotted her blatant attempt at lying to save some face.

"Oh! Okay then. But you might have to wait for a while, you know. Buses run a little irregularly this early in the morning, sensei."

"I-I knew that! This isn't the first time I had to take the bus to work, Hikigaya."

"Alright then, sensei. I better get going. See you at school."

"Y-Yeah! S-See you at school, then."

Without further ado Hikigaya Hachiman corrected his posture on the seat and gave a gentle nudge to the pedal which made them spin in motion while he made himself busy by straightening his bicycle instead of making it lean sideways and soon, he was ready to take off with both his hands placed firmly on top of the handlebar, while one of his legs casually rolled over a pedal and the other kept put on the solid ground and only hovered slightly in the chilly air, while waiting patiently to kick off from their stationary position on the road, where he was getting glowered at by his homeroom teacher, who was gradually losing her patience, after waiting for a bus to take her away to his destination.

Meanwhile, Hiratsuka Shizuka was busy watching Hikigaya Hachiman making certain elementary preparations to leave her standing on the dirt, while he would be busy riding away on his bicycle and much to her chagrin, a small niggling sensation made a heartfelt appeal to her more emotional side and a tiny sound of protest left her open mouth, before she could have placed a tighter hold upon her lips, which should have never reduced themselves into persuading an indifferent, good for nothing student for a couple more minutes of his stinking time.

"Wait a second, Hikigaya!"

"Hmm? Something you want to say, sensei."

Now, Hiratsuka Shizuka was perfectly capable of waiting entirely by her lonesome in this vacant bus stop, devoid of any other sociable human being, but at least one of her students was unlucky enough to stumble upon her location and according to her, he had immediately gotten burdened with a misplaced responsibility to accommodate her loneliness and despite being his rotten, miserable self, Hikigaya Hachiman should have the common decency of giving her company, until her means of public transport arrived and eventually took her away to her place of work and his place of education.

However, considering this was him and she was her, they needed to establish a distinct line of correspondence in between them to avoid any kind of irksome miscommunications and any ensuing awkward misunderstandings.

"Why are you in such a hurry to reach school today, Hikigaya?"

"…Because I don't want to be late today, sensei."

Hiratsuka Shizuka clenched her jaw tightly and gritted her teeth together until she was absolutely certain that she wouldn't end up punching him again within such a short time. Violence resolved nothing and today was Christmas. She should be making more of an effort to remain calm. After all, Hikigaya Hachiman had logic on his side and although his answer to her question gave nothing to her in the form of a proper comeback, she could always improvise by taking a leaf out of a book which belonged to one of her more brilliant students, namely Yukinoshita Yukino.

"Well you're right about that Hikigaya. If you are this early then you won't be late. But on the other hand, chances are that some kid from school might mistake you for a creepy looking trespasser, and call security on you, who will have you arrested even before you could explain yourself or even say your name. Now that would be really tragic, don't you think?"

"…so you are saying that I should be late for school for my own wellbeing, is that it?"

"That's not what I'm saying, you idiot!"

"Oh. Um, then I don't understand."

Hiratsuka Shizuka sighed to herself and decided to simply give up on her meaningless endeavour to make Hikigaya Hachiman wait with her for sometime on this vacant bus stop just to kill some time over some nonsensical conversation or some idle small talk.

However, she could not ask this of him and he didn't have to listen to her. This was not who they were and this was not how they worked. He was her student. She was his sensei. Nothing more. Nothing less. But despite her best of efforts a small weak voice surfaced regardless of their mutual circumstances in life.

She was not being brave

"Could you..."

And he was not being a coward.

"…O-kay."

Thus, another moment was created over their lack of understanding of their present situation. However, neither of them would ever waste a single minute even wondering about discussing the ramifications of their incredibly interesting capability of comprehending one another without voicing their inner thoughts into physically intelligible words.

A look was enough.

Hiratsuka Shizuka had not asked him to wait and Hikigaya Hachiman had not agreed to stay. Nevertheless, both these individuals found themselves enamoured by a cold wintery breeze wafting through their frosty surroundings in this freezing bus stop devoid of any significant human presence.

There was only her.

And him.

This is so damn awkward, Shizuka whined to herself.

A/N: I know, this chapter doesn't work without the intimate dream, but I didn't want to write a sex scene and have it turn out to be a dream, so, yeah, sorry. Just use your imagination. Or check out "Chapter 5" of Womanizer. I'm sure it might work.

So yeah, another chapter added to my famous 'Fools Series' or 'Labcoats and Loners series.'

I only have one more chapter left and then we will move onto something else.

Now back to the Ikebukuro fic –

Now one of the early chapters will be about how Hachiman handles 'Adolescent Syndrome' from 'Rascals Don't Dream of Bunny Girl Senpai'. Now I will leave it upto you on which characters should have these problems. Onto the polls –

Poll#1 Which Will Be The First Case of Adolescent Syndrome Solved by Hikigaya?

Option 1: Izaya Orihara – Kanra Orihara, Izaya's Fake Online Persona Has Become Real.

Option 2: Yukino Yukinoshita – Yukino Has Become Invisible To Haruno.

Option 3: Hitagi Senjougahara – Hitagi's Skin Has Become a Razor Sharp Blade. She Can Cut People Just By Touching Them.

Option 4: Shouko Nishimiya – Shouko is Deaf. But Now She Can Hear. The Only Problem Is She Can Hear People Calling Her Vile Names.

Option 5: Misaki Ayuzawa – Misaki Ayuzawa Cannot Take Off Her French Maid Outfit.

Finally,

Poll#2: Pick The Character You Want To Feature in The Ikebukuro Fic?

Option 1: Niko Bellic OR Carl 'CJ' Johnson – GTA Series.

Option 2: Shizuo Heiwajima OR Celty Sturluson – Durarara!

Option 3: Light Yagami OR L – Death Note.

Option 4: Yor Briar OR Loid Forger – Spy X Family.

Option 5: Ken Kaneki (Tokyo Ghoul) OR Eren Yeager (Attack on Titan).

Please pick accordingly.

Hope everyone enjoyed reading this chapter.

Leave lots and lots of reviews, follow and fave.

Won't betray your dreams.