Chapter 33

Hamuko found herself at the gym again.

It happened pretty often, especially in the last several days. Of course, she wouldn't always find herself at the gym, but she'd just find herself at her destination with no real recollection of her journey. Her feet just… moved, apparently. And while she usually tried to make her thoughts wander as aimlessly as her body, inevitably, they always steered their way back to murky green, a foreboding moon, an enormous monster, a teenage girl, and a giant sword swinging down-

...You know. That stuff.

And her mind never focused on things like sprinting on the treadmill, lifting weights, using a punching bag for so long that a small girl asked for her autograph and said: "One day, I wanna be a professional boxer, too!"

(On a whim, she did oblige with the autograph. You never know, maybe Arisato Hamuko would become a professional boxer someday.)

But even throughout all those interactions, it was a rare treat when she could fully focus on whatever the task at hand was. She felt like she was stuck on cruise control, auto-piloting her way through each hour. Every once in a while, normalcy felt back in reach. Yet inevitably, her dark thoughts swooped down from on high, screeching the same tired refrains in her head and casting their shadows over her.

So here she was, once more back at the gym, which had become a habit recently. It turned out, Akihiko had been right - they really did need to train more. Maybe none more so than her.

"A-ah, excuse me… H-Hamuko-chan?"

Reality broke through her dark thoughts, and Hamuko blinked and turned around. Standing right behind her, with a simple, black duffel bag slung around her shoulder, was one of the newest members of S.E.E.S. - Yamagishi Fuuka.

Hamuko hadn't seen much of Fuuka - not that she'd been trying too much, she realized. Every once in a while, she caught a glimpse of Fuuka in the gym, but Hamuko was usually far too focused on her own workouts (or - perhaps more honestly - entirely too unfocused on reality) to pay much attention. However, as far as Hamuko knew, Fuuka was still doing well at school, and had been continually tested at least every week by Mitsuru and the chairman to see if there were new developments in her Persona's manifestation.

So far, nothing of note had happened. But at least Fuuka's interest was held enough that she kept coming around.

"Hamuko-chan, a-are you alright?"

"Yeah. Doing well." Hamuko reflexively responded, a smile automatically snapping onto her face (and oh boy, that was a habit she'd have to re-think soon. She'd been trying so hard to not smile recently, partly because she was trying her best to focus on way more important things, but also since she did not trust herself to look natural. Sadly, it was too late now.).

"O-oh. That's, uh, good." Fuuka swallowed. "I was just asking because… well, y-you've been staring at the door for…" Fuuka glanced at her watch. "...one minute and twenty three seconds."

Hamuko blinked. "Oh. Sorry. I'll, uh, I'll move over here. You go on in. Have a nice workout."

She scooted over to the side, her red drawstring backpack swinging behind her, before looking back over to Fuuka. Fuuka took a step forward, reaching for the door and giving Hamuko just enough hope that she would walk through it and forget about this trainwreck of a social interaction. Alas, luck was not in Hamuko's favor today. Fuuka hesitated at the door, before turning around. Hamuko had to hastily paste the slapdash imitation of a smile back on her face as Fuuka looked back, expression drawn together.

"Hamuko-ch-chan. Are you… are you really alright?"

Though she was still stuttering, Fuuka was directly facing Hamuko, her stance wider than normal and back a little too straight. She stared into Hamuko's face, her focus as clear as her determination.

Hamuko felt her smile begin twitching at the edges.

"I… I will be fine. Truly. I appreciate it, Fuuka-chan, but I'm perfectly alright."

Please go away, for god's sake, you're too kind and I don't deserve it and I really don't want to talk about it.

Hamuko's smile felt plastic - factory-line manufactured, a dollar store accessory - but at this point, she just needed Fuuka to go away, and so still she held it up like a shield. And yet, Fuuka kept her eyes on her target, looking ready to speak, but not saying anything else for the moment, her tense thoughts swirling around her expression as she tried to conjure up words.

As Fuuka refused to back down, Hamuko's gut swirled with a foreign feeling of frustration - so foreign that she nearly forgot to stamp it down. "You're being… awfully persistent." Almost wincing at her bluntness, her smile wavered. "I mean, that's fine, it's very flattering, but-"

"M-Minato-kun's worried about you."

Internally, Hamuko reeled as Fuuka's sentence slammed into her with the emotional weight of a dump truck. Her emotions roiled like a tidal wave, nearly out of control. Ah, yes, another failure. Thank god, I was almost running out of fresh ones.

Her smile had completely fractured, but she clung onto its shards anyways.

"Wow. He said that?"

Fuuka was already shaking her head before Hamuko's comment was out of her mouth. (What, did she know what Hamuko was about to say?) "He didn't tell me. But I-I can tell. H-he just tenses up more whenever you come up, and i-it is relatively obvious if you know him."

Almost subconsciously, Hamuko's smile smoothed out into a more genuine warmth, her true emotions peeking out from behind their carefully guarded walls. "...He's not nearly as much of a mystery as he'd like to think."

The lines around Fuuka's eyes eased up. "I agree. Not much of an enigma at all."

Sharing a moment of solidarity together, the two girls relaxed a bit, losing a degree of the tenseness straining between them. Hamuko looked up, and finally noticed a brilliant blue sky above her. Birds chirped from the top of a nearby tree, basking in the kind sunlight, while in the bushes a cicada choir sang. The smell of summer flowers wafted through the air, carried on the comfortably humid breeze. From the nearby road, languid chatter rose and fell, as scattered gaggles of people passed by.

The day was perfect - and Hamuko hadn't even noticed until right now.

Fuuka broke her posture first, distracting Hamuko from her own thoughts as she glanced down and adjusted her grip on her duffel bag. "I-I am sorry for pushing you, Hamuko-chan. I know w-we do not know each other very well, and… I admit, it is not in my nature to, er, b-b-butt-in, as you would probably say." Injecting a hint of steel into her posture, Fuuka looked back up to Hamuko. "But, I want to be... b-bolder, I guess. And I-I… I owe Minato-kun a lot."

Hamuko listened, feeling her frustration ebb between the recently-noticed beautiful day and the sheer honesty in Fuuka's words. She shifted in place. "I… do understand. And it's really sweet of you to ask, honestly. It's just, I don't want to talk about-"

Too late, Hamuko realized her slip-up. She jolted, glancing in alarm at Fuuka's face and her unchanging (yet still all-too-knowing) expression. "Er, uhm." Clearing her throat, Hamuko raised a hand to her mouth and coughed, turning away from Fuuka. "...I'm alright," she repeated. "There's nothing to talk about."

(Her conscience sarcastically clapped in her head. Good show! A fantastically dumb move by Arisato Hamuko! What idiocy will she pull off next?)

Fuuka looked at Hamuko with an unreadable expression, then glanced down, scuffing her feet together. The silence grew taut as it stretched onwards. Hamuko cleared her throat.

"I… I really am alright," she said. "I guess it might be hard to swallow, but… I really am going to be fine." I'm already in much better shape than I ought to be in. "What makes you think otherwise?"

Hamuko's conscience poked into her consciousness again, rearing its ugly, sassy head. Ah, such a brave question. Foolish Hamuko, why would you even ask that?

Because I don't know, shut up, you are really not helping, go away!

Unaware of the conversation in Hamuko's head (at least, probably unaware - with Fuuka, you never knew), Fuuka responded. "W-well, you have just been… off… for a little while now."

At that comment, a dry chuckle slipped out of Hamuko's mouth. "...I'm guessing, ever since the last Full Moon, huh."

Hamuko had been so confident in her response that she hadn't even deigned to glance at Fuuka. But from the corner of her eye, Hamuko saw Fuuka quietly shake her head. "I had thought that something was wrong even before that."

Hamuko's blood turned to ice.

Trying to etch a neutral expression into her face, she slowly turned back to meet Fuuka's eyes, which looked far too at ease for someone who had just made Hamuko's world stop spinning.

Unaffected by Hamuko's sudden rush of adrenaline and fast-pumping heart, Fuuka continued. "Your recent behavior aside, it seemed that whenever someone acted in a negative way towards you, or mentioned something that could be construed as negative, you… panicked. I couldn't figure out what the emotion was at first, but I think it's panic. I noticed it when Rio mentioned how you were naturally cheery all the time, and when Yukari snapped at you when you were teasing her. I'm sure there have been other times, but-"

"It's not p-panic!" Hamuko finally burst in, fronting her weak words as bravado. "I-It's just - I'm the field leader, and Mina's perfect little sister, and, and, everyone looks up to me, in their own way. I can't let anyone down. I won't let anyone down."

Hesitating, Hamuko swallowed, bringing a hand up to hurriedly scratch her face before she brought it back down to re-grasp one strap of her drawstring pack, barely noticing that Fuuka remained quiet.

"...You're not the first person to try to talk to me," Hamuko said, voice now hushed. "Junpei-kun, Mina, even Mitsuru-senpai… they all did, too. And I appreciate it. But, even if there was something to talk about… talking wouldn't make anything better. It'd just make me forget what I need to do."

Fuuka's face twisted and her lips pursed, and Hamuko's heart clenched. (Phenomenal job assuaging her fears, Arisato.) But this time, Hamuko did not even try for a reassuring smile.

"I just… I have to keep going - keep doing what's right." Tightening her grip on her pack, Hamuko felt her shoulders tense. "Since everyone looks up to me in their own way, I have to be strong for everyone. I can't be the same carefree Arisato Hamuko that everyone is used to. So I won't talk, so no one can convince me otherwise - so no one can distract me from what I need to do. So even if that means avoiding Mina and his good intentions. Even if that means not visiting Yukari-chan as much, so she won't see me when I'm at my worst. Even-"

"Don't."

Up until Fuuka's interruption, Hamuko's words were out of control. Despite her proclamation of 'not talking,' her thoughts had built up behind a shoddily constructed dam, and Fuuka's gentle, unrelenting pressure poked holes in it until there was no stopping the stream.

At least, Hamuko thought it couldn't be stopped… until she heard Fuuka's interjection. It was quiet, and Hamuko might have missed it had it been a normal comment. But it held a smoldering intensity - an unmistakable power - that was impossible to ignore. And it stopped Hamuko's words in their tracks.

"Please don't visit Yukari-chan less." Fuuka spoke in a low tone. "And don't avoid Minato-kun. That is the last thing they would want."

Hamuko opened her mouth, then slowly closed it, staying quiet.

Earlier, Fuuka's confidence had been wavering in intensity: growing and shrinking depending on the moment. She had been holding tightly onto it, trying to wrestle it under control with occasionally mixed results. But now? Now, she wielded her confidence with effortless ease. Fuuka's words flowed straight from her heart, and when she spoke again, her voice was clear and true, like a lighthouse burning through a thick fog.

"Please don't be so consumed by your emotions that you forget to be there for your friends…and your family."

Stunned, Hamuko did not immediately respond.

Once more, she opened her mouth, and almost tried to start speaking a few times, but Fuuka's gaze kept her pinned in place. After a few failed attempts, she silently closed her mouth again, and Fuuka took the opportunity to speak more.

"Hamuko-chan… I would love it if you talked to Yukari-ch-chan, of course, but… t-talk to Minato-kun." With her energy spent, Fuuka's unrelenting confidence shrank to its previous size, and her stutter returned. "At… At least do that. Please don't ignore your brother."

When she finished speaking, Fuuka's shoulders hunched, her jaw ever-so-slightly tense. Hamuko, still entranced by Fuuka's stare, truly took in the outwardly diminutive girl for perhaps the first time.

There was such a fire in Fuuka, one that Hamuko had never noticed before - even after talking with her multiple times, and seeing just what she was capable of, analytically (she'd never forget the way Fuuka had questioned Mitsuru when first being introduced to the concept of the Dark Hour). When Fuuka found something that she was passionate about, she was unstoppable.

Hamuko's heart twisted.

"...I..." She finally started, before hesitating, looking deep into Fuuka's eyes (crinkled with worry – for her), and closing her own eyes with as light a sigh as she could manage.

"...I will," Hamuko said. "I swear I'll talk to them both."

The words came almost unbidden from her lips - and yet, they also felt inevitable. Because after hearing Fuuka's true feelings, and her impassioned speech... Hamuko couldn't just say no. Not like that. And yes, she could have just lied to appease Fuuka, but she wouldn't. Because Hamuko would not lie for herself again.

And she wouldn't let Fuuka down.

As Hamuko looked back up again, she saw Fuuka's eyes had popped wide open at her words. No doubt Fuuka had not expected an agreement, let alone a promise to do what she'd asked, but hey, credit where credit's due - Fuuka made some very emotionally compelling statements.

Offering up a small, genuine smile in response to Fuuka's deer-in-the-headlights look, Hamuko adjusted her pack.

"I'm sorry that I haven't been making the most uplifting conversation, Fuuka-chan," she said. "But…" Hamuko tilted her head to make eye contact with Fuuka one last time, and she poured every ounce of sincerity into her words: "Thank you for your concern, and your words. Truly."

"A-Ah, y-you're welcome, Hamuko-chan," Fuuka replied, still not moving from her spot. "B-But, aren't you going to go to the gym? I thought th-that's why you came here…"

Hamuko paused for a moment. Then, a smile grew over her face - smaller and not fully developed, but still a classic, authentic Hamuko smile that anyone would have recognized from a month earlier.

"Honestly, with how much you've worked my heart today, I'm counting it as cardio. See ya, Fuuka-chan."

And with one parting wave, Hamuko turned on a heel and started walking away, with wide strides, a straight back, and auburn hair bouncing in time with her red drawstring pack, leaving Fuuka frozen in place behind her.

She may have lost some of her swagger, but if nothing else, at least Arisato Hamuko still knew how to make an exit.

Shout outs to:

Reinsdd, jtmmoriarty, Marssius, Aa155, and Cowch for fav'ing;

Reinsdd, jtmmoriarty, OriginalBootleg, Kurai Hansee, Cloudy09, Cowch, Kinen228, and DARK D3CAD3 for following;

And my amazing beta Disasternoj for editing!

Thanks so much for reading everyone, and I'll see you in the next update!

[Next chapter drops on June 4th, 2024]