set before the daze, during their school life.
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ocean of noise
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He found her on the roof, smartphone nearby on the cement, with her headphones on, blaring a faint static that resembled music, along with a 3DS in hand.
"Takane," she couldn't hear him, "Takane, you skipped lunch with us again—"
He put his hand on her shoulder, only to have it slapped away. But Haruka is a patient person, and he starts again, "Why did you skip lunch?"
Her eyes squint as she glares, and her mouth twists when her grits her teeth. "I just don't feel like being around you all right now," she pauses, "Why does it matter?"
"Because we're all friends and we're worried about you."
She mumbles something under her breath; so quiet it was like she wasn't even saying anything out loud. He can't quite make out her words, and she puts her headphones back on.
For once, he feels like all he could do was walk away and leave her alone for a moment.
He makes his way back down the stairs.
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"She's not coming to lunch again?" Shintaro, of all people, asks.
"I don't think she is," Haruka says while scarfing down on assorted junk food. He finished his bento five minutes ago. "It should be alright though."
"You talked to her?" Ayano looks at him with curious, curious eyes, the purely caring way she looks at him almost burns a hole through his chest.
"Yeah, I did." He gives his underclassmen a small smile and they shrug, going back to their conversation.
Haruka feels like it's not right, right now. His entire lunch was finished, eaten clean, every last crumb, but he still didn't feel satisfied. He respects Takane and gives her the space she needs, like the friend he should be.
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He wakes up two hours before his alarm goes off after this dream, the kind that leaves a person out of breath and disoriented. It felt unpleasant in his clothes, sticky with an unnatural cold sweat.
He dreamt of a girl with twin tails, with eyes he couldn't see clear, who undoubtedly had to be Takane. He dreamt of kissing her, holding her, and loving her, then losing her.
"… Shower." Haruka's own voice was foreign to him in his grogginess, and he cleared his throat. Not worth going back to bed now.
His list of things that had been unsettling him has been growing, and he tries not to let it get to him. Unsettling doesn't always mean bad, though.
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Class begins, and he gets a glance of Takane for the first time today. She looks otherworldly, and like she belongs to a different dimension. No headphones, no music blaring, just the two of them, alone. It's rare for her to seem untouchable these days, without the headphones too, but today is a different day.
Haruka's face burns when her eyes meet his and she makes that look for a split second. He's embarrassed, but her reaction makes him feel good. Make her notice him.
It makes him feel close to her and him grow more confident about them, as a pair, as separate people. She hasn't directly put him down like he was a joke in a long, long time, but they've known each other for months now, maybe close to a year at this point. But she's not only close to him only anymore. At least not with Shintaro-kun and Ayano-chan around, her love and attention is divided amongst them.
They make Haruka feel like he ate something bitter and sour, his thoughts. I am still important to her, the most important, definitely, definitely.
Does she even remember when it was just them? Just the two of them, in one classroom, every single day?
He feels like he's forgetting those times, too.
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She's on the rooftop again today, music blaring at volume 100. The sound so loud, he can hear it five yards away, even with the breeze, he can make out the lyrics to the song.
No 3DS today, just her phone in hand, but her eyes are closed. Sometimes he can't tell if she's napping, passed out from narcolepsy, or if she's in her own world, thinking.
He squats in front of her, watching the rise and fall of her chest. She's in a deep sleep. He'll leave her alone, just today. Her still body and how calm she seems, brings out a yawn and makes a single teardrop fall from his eye.
He hates skipping lunch, because it's one of the best meals of the day, including breakfast and dinner. But he's too comfortable to stand back up right now.
She always makes him relax, but she also always makes him tense up, feels like a pendulum, back and forth, back and forth.
He naps until he feels that his shoulder become cold again.
"We almost missed class! Why didn't you wake me up?" Cold.
He yawns, "I'm sorry, it just looked so comfortable. Plus, sensei told me not to wake you if you do fall asleep at school. You can't help it."
"You should've just left me alone up here and went to class, then," Her twin tails quirk up when she's embarrassed. It's sweet, her tone, her eyes, the way she can look, the way she can actually look at him.
"Sorry. Next time?"
She extends her hand and he takes it. Her palms are hot and a bit clammy, and her hands are small in his. Haruka wishes he could hold her hand for longer, maybe forever if possible, but he needs his drawing hand.
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He starts to dream of her every night. His dreams make him feel like she's out of his grasp, like she's going to leave him. She can't, she couldn't leave. Could she?
Haruka understands that people aren't permanent, and especially that life doesn't last forever; he's been conditioned this way. Especially when you have heart problems, he doesn't expect to make good friends that stick around.
In his regular dreams, he can hear normal sounds and normal voices, but in the dreams with Takane in them, it's like endless noise. Three seconds of a track rewinding, cutting off, and repeating. He can't make out of its voices, or if it's the sound of a machine, or music.
The sounds are just there, she doesn't talk, and there are no voices or speaking. All the dreams are just all his actions, her actions, their movements, and their feelings, enveloping all senses.
Every time, he wakes up a shudder and a jolt, always a few minutes before his alarm. Is this how love is supposed to be? He's come to terms with his crush, which definitely means that he is deeply in love with her.
She can only be reached in dreams with the way he is right now, and he can't approach her in the waking world.
He does not dislike sleep, but it's always a reminder of how he feels won't reach her ears.
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He falls asleep in class Tuesday, and wakes in the middle of lunch period. The sky isn't perfectly clear, and the room is partially shaded over in speckles of shadow.
Takane is next to him, asleep during her lunch. Typical, but at least she didn't go to the roof today.
No music blaring in those headphones for once, but they're still over her ears.
"Sometimes, I wish that I could tell you everything."
Haruka sighs, pulling out his phone to apologize to Ayano and Shintaro, but sees they already texted him back in their group chat.
We saw that you were both asleep! Didn't want to wake you. Shintaro and I will see you guys after school, okay? Ayano's Line message read.
He texts back a "sorry," and Shintaro replied right then, No worries.
He could hear Takane's phone vibrates a couple times on her desk. Forgot she was in this group chat too, since she almost never replies. He would have expected her to have muted and left this group by now, but she hasn't.
When he looks up from his phone, he hears a new sound, a low static, unfamiliar and familiar all at once. Awake, Takane was on her phone.
Her shoulders was relaxed, like she was really groggy, but she looks at him dead on with clear eyes. The sound was coming from her headphones again.
He froze out of instinct, breaking eye contact right away. Who was the only who wasn't moving forward? Was it his doing? Or hers?
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lowkey surprised because i started writing this (dec 2014) before any translations of the 6th novel came out, and i felt like my headcanons came to life in it, especially some of haruka's thoughts about takane… good stuff. i only recently started adding onto it again in dec 2016, but after some more tweaks, i don't know what else to say. but, thanks for reading!