Chapter 2: A Like
Hachiman couldn't remember the name of the woman who brought him to the hospital. She probably saved his life. Well, if he wanted to get technically he was hit by her car and she could be held responsible for whatever happened to him. He could die, people usually did die when they get hit by a car. The woman probably didn't want that on her conscience. Then again she rode a limousine, she probably had a driver, she was probably getting annoyed with having his blood stains on her blouse and didn't care about him, so he decided not to feel sorry for her. He was probably doing her a favour. He was probably doing himself a favour. He wasn't sorry, he wasn't going to apologize, he was not a good boy and he would probably not grow up into a good man.
His parent visited him in the hospital but they had their own jobs to do and when the doctors and the nurses reassured them that he was gonna live and his life was in no immediate danger, his mother and father breathed a sigh of relief. His father was probably worried about the medical bills and his mother was worried about taking a leave from the office and staying by his bedside. He was his parent's child through and through and he didn't know how to deal with all the extra attention all of a sudden, he didn't know how to deal with all the hugs and kisses and the pats on the back and telling him how brave he was. He half expected himself to be dead and all this was happening in heaven in some kind of dream world.
He was happy when his parents stopped visiting him in the hospital. Komachi didn't though. His little sister always made the time to show up in the hospital and she sneaked in some of her homemade food because he might have complained once or twice that the hospital food was very bad. Komachi was such a good sister. He should have thought of her more before doing something stupid. Saving a dog from getting hit by a limousine was stupid according to his father. This was his father's way of telling him that he cared. And they wonder why he grew up into the rotten dead fish eyed loner that he was. He was truly his father's son.
Komachi got the goodness and kindness from both his parents. He didn't think it was unfair though. She was his sister and he wanted her to be good, he wanted her to be the best. He didn't deserve anything. He was alive because if he was dead his sister would have been unhappy, she would get sad and depressed. He was living for his sister. She was all that mattered in his life and he wanted to think he mattered to her as well. His parents they were too busy with work and earning money and he didn't really blame them, because money was important and he enjoyed his allowances and pocket money, but he needed Komachi to be there in his life. He didn't know what he would do without her. He was dependent on her so much. He didn't even realize it.
Komachi was smart though. Even in middle school she had formed what he called a grown woman's intuition. During one of her hospital visits she asked him why he saved the dog and he gave the rehearsed answer. His body just reacted, he didn't think, it was the right thing to do. They had a cat, he added, she should get it. But he sometimes forgot that Komachi was smarter than she looked or behaved sometimes.
She wasn't buying it. But she let him live his lie and stole the chocolate someone had left him in the hospital while he was wheel-chaired away for some basic medical exams. He didn't ask who the chocolates came from. He didn't want to know and Komachi didn't tell him. He liked that about his little sister. She was smart enough to know what he needed to know and what he didn't. He didn't want get well soon cards and chocolates from the woman who hit him with the limousine. He didn't want to meet them again.
In the hospital he had lots of time to think. He would be staying in the hospital for a while now and there was nothing left to do but kill time and he killed time by thinking up a storm. Why did he save the pet dog? Was he really that much of an animal lover? He really didn't think so. He had an answer rolling around in his mind though and he didn't want to admit it. He was scared of the truth. He wanted to lie. He hated lies but he lied expertly all the time. He was a hypocrite and he hated it but that's what you call being a grown up. He was copying his father. He was becoming the man he was. He was lying to himself and that was the scariest lie of all. He was afraid, so very afraid. This was worse than the physical pain he experienced sometimes from his injuries. This was something else.
Hachiman knew why he saved the dog. It was not out of the goodness of his heart as everyone liked to believe. He was not a good man. He was not a nice guy. He hated nice girls. He just wanted an excuse and he took the opportunity when it presented itself with both hands. He didn't want to die, he was not suicidal, because if he took his own life he knew Komachi would be sad and she would cry buckets and grow depressed and even in death he wanted her sister to be happy. So he didn't have a death wish, he didn't want to kill himself, that much he knew and that was the truth and it felt relaxing to finally acknowledge this.
But what Hachiman was, was a coward and cowards always get scared. It was the first day of high school and he got up early and he was cycling to school and he was so very afraid. He liked to think he was better than this, he liked to think he was braver than this, but something in him had made him so very afraid and he was thinking that something would never change. He was going to become a man and he would always be a coward and he was okay with it because the brave were always the first to die and he planned to live longer, if not for his sake than for the sake of Komachi.
What happened with Orimoto in middle school had left it's mark on him and even though it happened a couple of years ago and he liked to believe he had grown and learnt from the experience and gotten better, he was still afraid. This was not like the first day nervousness of kids who were afraid to go to school. This was an entirely different beast, a different monster altogether.
He knew he was a loner, he couldn't change that about him. He had tried to reinvent himself in middle school and make friends, trying not to make the same mistakes he did in elementary school. He was brave, he confessed to Orimoto and got rejected, got his heart broken and he accepted it. But he couldn't accept what happened afterwards, how Orimoto told the entire school about what happened and how everyone in class made fun of him, made a mockery of his feelings for a girl.
It was the first time he had been in love and it might have been a stupid crush and she had every right to break his heart, but he didn't deserve the ridicule which followed afterwards. But he couldn't do a thing about it though. He couldn't stand up to his bullies and he couldn't confront Orimoto because he still loved her.
He became a loner again in middle school and for a second he thought he never stopped being a loner ever. He was who he was and he was not going to lie to himself and make excuses. He was a loner and he was proud to be one.
Then middle school came to an end and he was about to enter high school and everyone was pumped and talking about reinventing themselves and a new beginning and even though he was a loner, even though he didn't talk to anyone unless he was spoken to, even though he was never part of the conversation, he couldn't help getting influenced by all the talk of a new beginning.
Everyone wanted to wipe the slate clean and restart their lives and he was no different. He brought into the hype. High school would reset everything. This was his third chance to make things right. He was sure of it. He had been sure of it. He had been so very sure until the very end and then on the first day of high school, he didn't know what he did wrong, perhaps he got up on the wrong side of bed, perhaps he had a lousy breakfast, perhaps the eggs weren't great, whatever the reason, he came to a sudden realization and stopped eating, stopped breathing altogether.
Nothing was gonna change.
He was not gonna make any friends on the first day of school, he was not gonna make any friends on the first week of school, he was not gonna make any friends in the first month of high school and then he would become a second year student and then a third year student and then he would graduate high school, friendless, alone, like he was expected. He was a loner, he should have gotten used to it by now. He liked being alone. He didn't want friends, he didn't want people to talk to him. So what was he afraid of? The truth hurt more than a fractured leg, the truth hurt more than getting hit by a limousine.
Hachiman was a man of logic, not a man of science, there was a clear cut distinction and it was a very important one. In his mind, he wanted the choice. He was a loner, yes, but he wanted the choice to reinvent himself and make friends in high school, maybe if he was lucky he could meet a girl and fall in love and not repeat the whole Orimoto debacle again. If he was lucky, very, very lucky. He didn't like his chances though. He could settle for a friend.
But logic dictated that he was incapable of making friends. He was a loner. It was in the very name. He was destined to be alone. What kinda loner has friends? That isn't a loner. That's just some emo edge lord and he was a loner not the other one because those guys were weird. It was an important distinction. He wanted to have the choice to make friends on his own terms, yet he knew he was not gonna have the choice because of who he was as a person. There was something wrong with him in a fundamental level, something which he couldn't fix, something which was definitely not a fractured leg.
So, being a logical being, his brain supplied him with an alternative, a choice. He would become a loner again, but it would be on his terms. He would have an excuse, a perfect excuse on why he couldn't make friends. It was not because there was something wrong with his personality, it was not because there was something wrong with him, no, no, he was just a victim of circumstance.
Hachiman saved the dog because he could save the dog and it was the right thing to do and he got hurt saving the dog and got into an accident because he was a sixteen year old teenage boy and not some superhero or an action hero from a movie. This was totally believable, this was totally expected. He threw himself in front of a speeding limousine because he wanted to skip out on his first day of high school, because being friendless and alone and unable to talk to anyone was much sadder than risking your life to save someone's pet dog.
It was pretty stupid now that he thought about it and if he died while saving the dog, well he was pretty sure he was gonna win a one-way ticket to heaven. Nothing beats saving a dog from getting mowed down by a limousine. He had definitely hit the heaven going lottery. And his family would definitely be better off, because his mother was definitely gonna sue the family who ran him over with a limousine and the court would have ruled in their favour, because again, he died saving a dog. He couldn't do anything worthwhile for his mother and father and Komachi while he was alive, but if he died while saving a dog and his family won a multi-million dollar law suit in court, then he was gonna become the best son/brother in the whole wide world.
His death would have some meaning while his life had none.
But he didn't die, because obviously he didn't want to die in the first place and the limousine driver probably saw him throw himself in front of the limousine, even if he didn't see the dog and probably hit the breaks. He was still hit though and he suffered a leg fracture and other injuries. The doctors told him he might be walking with a cane for some time in the future. Komachi was worried and so was his father, but his mother was happy because if he got bullied in high school, he could beat up the bullies with his cane. And then his father had to explain to his mother that if he was walking with a cane and still got bullied he would be in no condition to beat up his bullies, because when he was in middle school and got bullied he didn't have the courage to stand up to his bullies and then both his mother and father got into a small argument which by now both Komachi and him knew was their way of expressing love. Really, there family was so weird. Hachiman liked them though, he liked them for who they were and he wouldn't change a thing.
He hated change but change loved him it seems because one fine day he was in the hospital thinking how if he didn't make any friends when he finally was able to start high school, it was not because of who he was but because he was unable to start his high school journey on time and he missed out on his first day of high school because of the accident. It wasn't his fault, it was because of the accident, because of the dog, because of the rich girl and her limousine. He was fine with that logic and he was gonna stick to that line of thinking throughout all three years of high school. That was the bright idea, but someone threw a wrench into his whole plan.
Hachiman didn't know who Ai Hoshino was, never even heard of the woman before in his life and now his whole family was telling him that it was all over the news that he had fathered two kids with her.
At first he thought this was some kinda prank. Him, fathering two kids, how was that even possible? He was only sixteen years old.
"They are twins, you idiot." His father said. "Are you really this horrible at biology?"
Oh right. Twins. He had forgot about couples having twins. But when you think of a woman having two kids for some reason your brain doesn't immediately think of twins. Why? Well, he has been alive for sixteen years now and he has never seen a pair of twins. Now that might be because he was a loner and didn't get out much and didn't have any friends or maybe it was a testament to Japan's declining population rate and the unwillingness of new age couples to not have children and the rising trend of getting abortions if you fall pregnant with twins, because in this economy raising one child was bad enough, but two, that was gonna be a real nightmare.
Then Hachiman thought about the kind of thoughts he was having in his head and he was caught off guard. Why was he thinking about the economy and how difficult it would be to raise twins in this country? He didn't know this Ai person, he definitely didn't father any kids with her, because last time he checked he was still a virgin. Really, never before in his life did he feel so glad to be a virgin. Was there a test to make sure that he was still a virgin?
"Why are you asking that?" His mother asked quite alarmed. "Did you really knock up an idol?"
"What idol?" Hachiman fired back.
"Ai Hoshino." Komachi added. "She's a member of the idol group B-Komachi. Or at least she used to be a member. I don't know if she will be able to continue as an idol anymore. Her fans have turned on her. According to them, Ai had betrayed their trust and played with their feelings. Some of the stuff they are saying online is pretty crazy."
Hachiman didn't know what to say. He was an otaku, yes, but he was never involved with the whole idol scene. He didn't get the whole aesthetic. The whole thing looked gimmicky and fake. He also didn't get why fans worshipped idols and made them up to be something they are clearly not. He liked singers and musicians and bands but he didn't get the whole appeal of idols. The whole idol business was a bit like wrestling. Everyone knew it was fake or at least the smart ones knew it was fake, but the dumb creeps bought into the whole idea and when something shattered their whole image of what an idol was and what an idol couldn't be, well they reacted as was expected of overgrown man-children who lived in their mom's basement.
He didn't know what to make of the news. He didn't know what to think of the idea of this lie that was being told to the world. He was trapped with a fractured leg in the hospital and there was this idol out there spreading fake news. Oh god, he was starting to sound crazy. But it was crazy.
He didn't know how crazy things would get though.
His family had tried to contact Ai Hoshino but they couldn't get hold of her manager. Apparently there had been some attack on her by some angry fan and she had almost gotten hurt. Her manager was also under police investigation, suspected for the murder of a doctor, the doctor who went missing and was later found dead before Ai Hoshino could deliver her twins. There was a lot of things going on and he couldn't make anything of it. He was not seeing something. How was he involved in any of this? It was like someone, some foreign power was dragging him into this mess and making him a part of this whole circus while he just wanted to be a spectator and observe from afar. Frankly, he didn't even want to be a spectator. He just wanted to stay in the hospital, get better and finally start his first year of high school.
Fate had other ideas though. "You are kicking me out?"
His father knew how he would react and he had planned things accordingly. "Komachi was sent to the school infirmary today. That's why I have taken the day off work. I know you were expecting her, but we need to talk, son."
Hachiman didn't hear a word his father said. "Komachi was sent to the hospital? Why? What happened? Is she okay?"
His father didn't say anything for a second. Then he collected himself and continued. "I know you got bullied in school. I couldn't do anything about it, because I didn't know what to do myself. You are my son. Nothing changes that. Growing up I was bullied too. My father didn't do anything either. Hikigaya men are always bullied."
"It's the eyes." Hikigaya said, not knowing what else to say.
His father chuckled. "Yeah, I think so too. Thank God Komachi didn't inherit my eyes." Then his eyes developed a faraway look. "But today I got a call from your mother that she was beaten up by a bunch of bullies and again I didn't know what to do. Your mother is at her school talking to the principal, she wants to see those boys punished."
"Boys?" Hachiman almost lost his voice. "What – Please –" He was having a panic attack, This was not happening, this was not happening, this was a bad dream, a nightmare.
"Ai Hoshino's fans." His father spewed the words out like a curse. "You are famous son. Or rather I should say you are infamous and it is affecting the whole family. Your mother has become the victim of some terrible office gossip and she thinks she won't be getting the promotion that she had been expecting for years because of you. I was called to see my boss today when I asked to leave early from work and was told that if I didn't do anything about my son and all the bad press that you were getting, I would be sent abroad until everything cooled down and now Komachi gets beaten up by a bunch of boys in her middle school." There were fresh tears in his father's eyes and he had never seen the man cry in his entire life. "Do you know what it felt like to ask my wife if my only daughter was raped in school by a bunch of fanboys?"
"Father -" Hachiman didn't know what to say. "What do you want me to do? You know me better than anyone. I am like a younger version of you. We have the same eyes, we have the same way of thinking, the same outlook towards life."
"No son. I am different." His father's voice was heavy with grief. "I am a loving husband and a proud father. You are a sixteen year old teenage boy who thinks he knows everything about everything when you clearly don't have the first clue about anything. I think it's about high time you finally grew up and took on some responsibilities of your own."
And so his father made the decision for him that he would be moving out of his family home that he had been staying at for sixteen years and start living in another property that a distant relative of their owned. This on paper would look like his father has taken some action and if anybody asked Hachiman was now the estranged son of the Hikigaya family. This, he hoped would take the heat off the family for the time being. He wanted his family to be happy. He didn't want them to suffer. But living in a boarding house, all alone, cooking food, cleaning up and doing all the other household chores, he didn't know how he could manage.
He was stuck in the hospital for now but his stay was coming to an end. His family stopped visiting him. Komachi didn't visit either and he was worried, seriously worried. What if she got really hurt? What if she had a permanent scar on her face? Not his little sister, not his sweet adorable little baby sister.
Hachiman wanted to make someone pay. He wanted to make Ai Hoshino pay. He wanted her to suffer for all the lies she spread that cost him so heavily. But he had no way of getting to her. He didn't even know where she lived. He didn't have any way to contact her. Except for one.
He was a loner and he never saw any point in creating a social media account. If he couldn't make any friends in real life he didn't see much point in asking to be friends with someone online. But he was trapped in the hospital and he had nothing better to do, so he created a social media account and found Ai Hoshino.
There were a lot of pictures of her and these were definitely from her idol days but there was a recent one, a caption where she said that being a mother was a difficult job and the number of hate comments she got on that post was unbelievable. He thought he hated nice girls and the prince type characters in schools but he was definitely hating people the wrong way. His hate was too proper, too nice. These online haters some of whom who once claimed to be Ai Hoshino's fan, now these guys were hating on people properly. There hate felt potent, like a clear and present threat.
Hachiman wanted to leave a hateful comment on Ai's post. He clearly had a much better reason to hate Ai Hoshino than her so called fans and all these creeps and weirdos and over grown man-children. But he couldn't make himself to write something hateful down, let alone post it for the entire world to see and judge. He knew whatever he wrote would get acknowledged by those who hated the idol and he didn't care about that. He also knew he had every reason to hate Ai Hoshino and what she did to him. She ruined her mother from getting a promotion, she made his father catch the ire of his boss, she was the reason Komachi experienced bullying for the first time in her life and she was the reason he was being forced to live in some old, rundown boarding house and move away from his family home.
Hachiman had every right to hate her.
But her picture with the twins whose names he didn't even know yet, they didn't warrant his hatred. At least not online. Also, since she had not taken down the post or not posted anything new on social media, he guessed she was doing that thing that turtles do and hiding in her shell and not browsing social media anymore. He got it. All that hate aimed towards herself and her twins, that would be reason enough to hide from the world. But she seemed like one of those social butterfly types. She was an idol, so she had a huge social media presence, so that must have been hard, quitting social media and not posting anything. He figured it was something like an addict quitting his addiction in one go and going cold turkey, because social media was an addiction and very few people seem to acknowledge it for the curse that it was.
In the end, Hachiman was unable to write a hateful comment on her post. In fact he was so pitiful and stupid that he actually ended up liking the post. Ai Hoshino was a new mother and she was showing off her twins to the world. What was there not to like? She was getting enough hate as it is. One like wouldn't change anything. Besides, he wasn't stupid enough to use a username which could be easily traced to him. To the online world, he was just another online social media user who had liked the post of a popular idol. He was sure nothing bad would come of it. Yes, he was pretty sure of it.
Author's Note: Thank you so much for all the favorites and follows but I was hoping I would get some more reviews. I have only gotten 4 reviews so far, 6 if you count the two who want me to commission art work, but I don't count them as reviews, so I was kinda hoping this chapter will get like, let's say 5 reviews at least. Pretty please, with a cherry on top.
Here I will even do a poll –
[POLL (A): What should be the next chapter?]
Option 1: Hikaru Kamiki POV.
Option 2: Ai Hoshino POV.
Option 3: Hachiman POV.
But remember I get a final say in what I write, not even Betrayed Dreams who is helping me write this story gets a say in my story. You know BD actually didn't want me to write the whole Hikigaya family reaction to Hachiman fathering the twins, because he doesn't like OCs and I don't like OCs either, but they are Hachiman's parents and what is happening is kinda affecting their life too, so I thought I had to show it.
Shout out to the guest reviewer who wanted to see how Hachiman's family reacts. You got your wish, pal!
Just a heads up, Betrayed Dreams is gonna be writing his own version of 'Ai's Choice' and his fic will have more crossover elements and a lot more characters. I don't know how closely he will be following my version of the story, but I kinda made a dick move by writing this chapter, because he didn't want to explore Hachiman's family dynamic and I know he won't be covering this part of the story. At least, I think I don't think he will be covering this part.
Again, not sorry with what I wrote, BD. You are free to write your own version of MY story.
Thank you for reading my dear readers and please leave a review. I want 5! No make it 10 Review! This story has 36 Favorites and 52 Follows. I'm sure that's not a huge ask.
Good Night!