Chapter 4: Aftermath

It took almost fifteen minutes until Yukino came back. Yui leaped to her feet the second she entered the room.

"It's getting late, Yukinon. I'll be going."

"You..."

"I'm... thank you for the evening, Yukinon. I'll... see you on Monday, I guess."

"I'd really appreciate if you stayed. Look, I haven't even offered you something to eat or drink yet. Let me bring something from the kitchen."

Yui looked at Hachiman. Hachiman looked at Yukino.

"Please stay," she repeated.

Hachiman shrugged. Hesitatingly, Yui sat down again.

"Would you help me carry something from the kitchen, Hikigaya?"

"Sure."

They left the room. Yui stayed back, absorbed in thought.

o o o

Yukino was arranging drink cartons, bottles, and three cups on a tablet. "You'll find snacks are in the cupboard up there on the very left."

"I told her to go. In no unclear terms," Hachiman whispered. He opened the cupboard. It was stuffed with junk food. "That's kinda unexpected."

Yukino smiled. "Yuigahama brings them with her whenever she comes visiting me. In any case, I understand your motives but that wasn't necessary." She looked at him. "We need to agree on a few rules. First, I'm the one to tell people to leave my apartment. I fought hard enough to make her stay."

"And then more things happened."

"As I said, I understand. Still."

"Then two quick things, Yukinoshita. First, whenever you want me to leave, give me a sign. Second, give me another if you want me to drag Yuigahama with me. Kicking and screaming, if necessary."

"Hikigaya, we need to talk, To her. With each other. Because for now, she won't stop talking anyway. So if we don't talk, we're only giving her the monopoly to interpret the state of the club."

Hachiman looked at the door, unsure. "If we had more time..."

Yukino went to the door and closed it.

"Yuigahama for sure knows that I didn't want you here just for carrying snacks to the living room. We can take all the time we need." She poured tea into two of the cups and offered one to him.

"So I preferred if you stayed, too. Unfortunately, I don't know how long this might take. Until very late, perhaps. You might want to call your parents."

"My parents aren't even at home this weekend."

"That simplifies things."

"Komachi is, though. I need to call her at some point or she'll worry. But are you okay with that?"

Yukino gave him a questioning look. "Why do you ask?"

"She knows we went to the park today. She even knows Yuigahama wasn't with us. She won't tell our parents but she will draw her conclusions."

The look changed from questioning to annoyed.

"But that's a problem for another day, I guess," Hachiman mumbled.

"Indeed. If it makes you feel more comfortable, I will talk her out of any conclusion she might draw. On another day. Now, let us get back to the problem at hand. We need to talk." She looked at him, invitingly.

After a few seconds, Hachiman finally reacted. "I apologize for having you made feel uncomfortable."

Yukino raised a brow. "Me? Oh, 'ready to jump on whatever girl...'"

"Yes," he hurried to answer.

"Hikigaya, I hope you won't find this appalling, but I'm not squeamish when it comes to such things. You'd need stronger verbal calibers if you wanted to shock me. Yuigahama is the one you've made feel uncomfortable, to say the very least."

He didn't respond.

"I really had hoped we were beyond these games by now. Do you know what made me really angry, Hikigaya? That your plan had almost worked, and that despite I had looked through it. Or maybe because. I hate being manipulated in any form. It took Yuigahama to put some sense back into me."

"I knew the two of you would look through it," he admitted, "but yes, it didn't matter as long as it worked."

"But it didn't."

Hachiman shrugged. "It would have been for the better."

"You complete overreacted. That letter..."

"Yukinoshita, the problem isn't the letter. And it also didn't start today."

Yukino shook her head. "Hikigaya, you won't make anyone happier by taking yourself out of the picture."

"In the medium term..."

"No. But this discussion is fruitless." She took a sip of tea and leaned against a cupboard. "Let us talk about Yuigahama. I allied myself with her when you performed your little maneuver, just as you had planned. But maybe that wasn't entirely fair. She was a bit hypocritical in her reaction."

"So you noticed?"

"Although it took me some time."

Hachiman nodded. "Me too, I must admit." He paused. "You said we needed to talk to each other and to her. To each other: We're doing it now. To her: Weren't we also already doing that in the end? I tried, at least. It's just that Yuigahama won't listen."

"You tried to redirect some pressure she put on me to yourself. I noticed. Thank you. I still haven't given up to talk some sense into her. She finally declared her love to you. You rejected her, as she probably already had expected. Maybe we can see that as a good start for something new?"

"She might continue to do so. Throwing around her love declarations."

"I doubt she would really bother you in public. In the club, maybe. But is it that terrible to have a beautiful girl declare her love to you?"

"No," Hachiman confessed, "but I don't want to hurt her. I know that's not possible."

"I believe it is very much possible. Just thank her, for example. Could we make that a rule, too? She will finally grow tired of it. If she hasn't already."

"I wasn't the only one she confessed her love to," Hachiman reminded her. "If it was sincere. Which I doubt."

"Yes. That is something I will have to discuss with her in private first..."

For a minute they just drank their tea in silence.

"Yuigahama is right about one thing," Hachiman finally said. "You didn't give her answers."

"Maybe I'll finally have to," Yukino answered, "but it's not as if she has to give her approval to my decisions."

"It has something to do with your final talk with your sister, right? After that, the two of us... after that, it just somehow stopped."

"Don't make it sound as if Haruno is dead. Or as if I hadn't seen her since then. Every now and then."

Hachiman didn't respond.

"I had to make choices." Yukino looked bitter for a moment. "That's what it was all about, wasn't it? I need to learn to live my own life."

"I shouldn't have asked. It's not my business."

"Maybe if you had made it your business back then… maybe then..." Yukino mused. "Well, probably it wouldn't have mattered."

"It wouldn't have?"

"I wasn't lying when I said I didn't want the club to change. It's good as it is. You can't have everything."

"Yuigahama once said she wanted to take 'everything', remember? Right before your request about your family..."

"Yes. And now it makes me wonder..." She shook her head. "That's something for later. But I also wasn't lying when I said I have feelings for you. It's just..." She paused.

"You don't need to talk about it. It really doesn't matter anymore."

"Yes, I doesn't, I guess. You… What are you looking for now? What is the real thing that would meet your standards? Love at first sight?"

He shrugged. "Maybe. I don't think much about it at the moment."

"Or maybe you're only rationalizing your own inaction?"

He looked away. "That's not fair."

"I apologize."

"Say, Yukinoshita, if I had given in to Yuigahama's demands, I mean to 'fix' that kiss, would that have made you jealous?"

She looked at her cup. "Jealous… I don't know. Envious, maybe? I admit it."

"Well we had and indirect kiss already..."

"An indirect…?" Then she understood. "I admit I haven't looked at it that way yet. Could you please not liken Yuigahama to a drinking straw?" She kept her face down to hide a grin.

"You know, Yukinoshita," he went on, in a serious tone, "maybe I really should have made it my business..."

"Maybe I should have made different choices, but..."

"Yukino..."

Surprised, she lifted her head and found herself looking directly into his eyes.

He pressed his lips against hers.

Yukino turned out to be an unexpectedly aggressive kisser...

o o o

"Why did you do that?"

"I thought… Maybe I was wrong. It felt more like we though. Like you even, after a while."

Yukino looked unsure. "If I hadn't liked the kiss I would have pushed you away. I liked it so I went with it. Was that wrong?"

"I wouldn't call it wrong..."

"I'm sorry, Hikigaya. I don't really know how to behave in such a situation… It was a wonderful kiss. Please don't believe anything else."

"But?"

"We are, how did you put it, in free fall. And if we crash in this particular way Yuigahama will get hurt the most.

"And you don't want to hurt her."

"I don't want anybody to get hurt," she insisted.

"As I said, that's most likely not possible."

"Can we not … set up a net? To stop that fall?"

He looked puzzled. "Could you rephrase that in a language less metaphorical?"

"A new arrangement. The rules, I talked about"

"Rules, you say? Like how?" he wanted to know.

She looked a bit unhappy. "Not repeating what we just did would be one of them, I'm afraid."

"Is that so, huh?"

"I'm sorry."

"And what else?"

"That can't be decided by you and me alone. I need to talk to Yuigahama. In private, first. Clarify a few points. Then we can decide together."

"Are you sure about that? Your conversations haven't played out that well so far."

"I promise that I'll try my best this time. It's not as if your intervention had been particularly helpful either."

"So you do want me to leave after all?"

Yukino contemplated, then abruptly closed the cupboard Hachiman had opened earlier. "We've run out of snacks, I'm afraid. Could you perhaps go buy some?"

"Oh... sure."

"You might not find the convenience store right away. Or maybe it doesn't offer what you're looking for."

He rolled his eyes. "How long would you estimate will it take until I find a convenience store that offers the snacks you've suddenly remembered to have run out of?"

"Only half an hour. An hour, maybe."

"Understood."

"Thank you, Hikigaya."

"Would you just..." he began.

"Yes?"

"... call me Hachiman. Or would that be against The Rules?"

"Hachiman..." she savored the sound of that. But somehow, it didn't feel right. "Hikki," she decided, smiling.

"Hikki?" Indignation in his voice. "I would prefer..."

"So you like 'Hikki'?" she teased him. "Wonderful. 'Hikki', it is."

Hachiman drew a face. "So 'Hikki' and 'Yukinon' then?"

She smiled again. "'Yukino' is just fine."

Author's notes

So Hachiman/Yukino is still a possibility? And the next chapter will have girly tears. Don't draw your conclusions though. This fic is far from over.