Chapter 4: Doubt
A quiet stillness hangs heavy over the girl’s dormitory. A door on the left side opens, just a crack. The hinges creak softly, yet the sound seems to travel much farther than normal.
A certain pink-haired resident opens the door a little wider and peaks her head out of the room, glancing up and down the hallway. It’s well after lights-out, and the dim, eerie glow of the fire exit signs in the ceiling provides the only illumination.
It’s silent, unusually so. Misha isn’t sure where this strange stillness is emanating from, but it doesn’t really matter. She has only one objective, and it’s only a few meters away.
She takes a tentative step out into the hallway, her blue slipper-clad foot making only a soft thump on the carpeted floor. Emboldened somewhat, she begins a slow trot over to her destination, coming to a quiet stop in front of a certain dorm door.
Misha doesn’t know why she’s walking on quite literal eggshells. Maybe it’s the events of the past two days that have sent the academy into such a spiral, so much so that she doesn’t feel comfortable walking anywhere. Perhaps it’s because she really, really needs to find out how her closest friend is feeling, yet really doesn’t know how to approach her.
What do you even say? Where do you start?
An image of the hallway outside her classroom flashes like lightning through Misha’s mind. She winces, shaking her head furiously from side to side, trying to disperse the haunting imagery before it can take hold of her senses.
Taking her right hand, Misha raps softly on the door. It’s a long shot, but she’s hoping her friend on the other side might be able to feel the vibrations. Maybe.
There’s no response. She tries again, harder this time. A full knock. Where’s that boisterousness with which she approaches everything? Even Misha doesn’t fully know. There’s something in the dorm’s atmosphere, or perhaps her heart, which is preventing her from acting as she normally would.
“Shizune…?”, Misha calls softly. She knows it’s pointless, but it’s comforting to say her friend’s name again, to try and bridge an impossible distance and let her blue-haired confidant know that she’s here for her.
Still, only the poignant silence greets her. Her heart sinks another inch.
Misha opens her left hand, unfurling the paper she’s holding in her palm. She glances at it. Her words, written in her trademark pink pen and wondrously girlish cursive.
Shizune, please, talk to me.
Misha.
She folds it carefully and slips it under the door.
Misha waits for a minute, but again, nothing. Now truly out of options, she gives a small sigh and sits down, her back up against the wall, right next to the firmly locked door.
Misha tries to convince herself that there’s no cause for concern. Maybe, Shizune is just tired and asleep. Maybe she’s busy with homework, so absorbed in her studies that she isn’t watching the door.
They’re thin excuses. Misha saw the look in Shizune’s eyes when the whole thing went down right in front of them. It’s why she’s so concerned for her friend.
Misha sits, and sits, and sits. She doesn’t know how long she remains there, on the floor, motionless. Minutes? Hours? Days? Only a desperation to find out how her friend is doing keeps her rooted in place.
Misha suddenly jolts herself awake, having fallen asleep without even realizing it, and turns her head to find Shizune’s left eye watching her through a crack in the door.
Body flooding with relief, Misha musters up the brightest smile she can manage and signs.
[Shicchan! Are you ok?]
Shizune doesn’t respond, only opening the door a bit further, allowing the dim glow of the hallway to reflect on her face.
Misha is stunned.
The student council president has always been concerned with appearances. Never in a make-up, fashionista sort of way, but always making sure she looks clean, proper, ready to take on the world. So, it comes as a shock to see Shizune still wearing her school uniform, the blouse creased and crumpled, her trademark blue hair frazzled and unkempt.
What gets Misha the most, however, are Shizune’s eyes. They’re bloodshot and rimmed red, the frames of her silver glasses doing little to conceal the fact that there are dried tears all over her cheeks.
“Oh, Shicchan…”
She’s known Shizune for years, and she’s never once seen her cry. The girl simply would never allow it. Shizune’s entire personality rests on her projection of strength, of her unbreakable iron will.
To see her expression of total resignation is enough to break Misha’s heart.
What happened in the hallway outside Class 3-3 must have done something irrevocable to her dearest friend. It sets off alarm bells in Misha’s head.
[Shicchan…]. Misha fumbles, racking her brains over how to approach this side of Shizune that she’s never seen before.
[Shicchan, can I please come in? I want to talk to you.]
Sometimes, direct is best.
Again, Shizune fails to raise her hands in response. Instead, she hesitates- even more unusual, Misha notes with growing concern- before simply nodding her head and disappearing back into her room, the door left ajar.
With her heart beating in her ears, Misha follows Shizune into her room, both concern and trepidation driving her onwards.
Inside, only the desk lamp is on, casting the room in a melancholic yellowish hue. It’s as clean and obsessively organized as the last time Misha’s been inside- in stark contrast to the interpreter’s own- all except for Shizune, who sits on the edge of her impeccably made bed, head bowed, and shoulders hunched.
Tentatively, Misha walks over and sits on the bed next to Shizune, placing a gentle hand on her shoulder.
At the contact, the student council president slowly raises her head and looks into Misha’s eyes.
Shizune has always been one to wear her heart on her sleeve, and Misha’s become used to easily reading Shizune’s emotions.
Now, though, the blue-haired girl’s dark eyes swirl with something Misha can’t identify. It scares her. It seems to all the world that Shizune has been hollowed out with a spoon.
With her friend uncharacteristically passive, Misha decides to get the ball rolling.
[Shicchan… you weren’t at class this morning.]
Shizune sighs but finally raises her hands. Her reply is terse.
[Were you?]
Misha frowns.
[No, I wasn’t… but that was because I was running all around the academy looking for you! Your door was locked so I thought you’d left and gone somewhere else… Besides, everyone was just talking and talking about… you know… and I couldn’t stand hearing about it anymore until I could find you.]
Shizune doesn’t respond, simply lowering her eyes slightly. The signals are all confusing and Misha doesn’t know what to make of them. So, she pops the question she’s been wanting to ask for ages.
[Shicchan… why weren’t you at the assembly this afternoon?]
At this, Shizune physically flinches. Her behaviour is all wrong, all so wrong.
Misha tries again. [You… didn’t hear about it?]
The president again doesn’t answer. She turns her gaze to her lap and hangs her head.
Misha’s too fired up to accept silence as a response. She shakes her friend vigorously by the shoulder.
[You’re the student council president, Shicchan! They said attendance was mandatory, and they couldn’t find you anywhere… I heard they even sent some staff members to your room to try and get you out!]
Shizune’s gaze drops. Her hands move slowly, deliberately.
[I did hear about it. It’s just that… that…]
Her fingers hang in midair.
[I couldn’t face everyone, not after what happened.]
Misha’s blood turns to ice. None of what Shizune is saying makes any sense.
[Couldn’t face everyone? What are you talking about?]
Shizune’s blue-grey eyes begin to water.
[It’s my fault.]
“What?!”
The declaration shocks Misha. She can’t help but shout. She launches to her feet, her face contorted in horror and surprise at this absurd statement.
[Shicchan… wha… how is any of this your fault?]
The tears spill over, and Shizune’s face turns to an expression of pain and sorrow Misha has never seen before in her life.
[Isn’t my fault? I’m the president of the student council. The behaviour and wellbeing of all the students at Yamaku is my responsibility, too. I warned Ibarazaki repeatedly that her behaviour was a danger to herself and her peers.]
A quantity of rage seems to fill Shizune’s expression.
[But she would not listen! I tried, I tried so hard.]
Her face resumes its depressed posture.
[But I clearly didn’t do enough.]
Misha shakes her head violently.
[Shicchan, that’s not true! You couldn’t have known that Emi-]
She’s cut off by her friend’s furious flurry of hands.
[I should have taken more action! I should have known mere scolding was never going to change her behaviour. I should have raised it with the faculty and had them put a stop to her reckless hallway gallivanting.]
The tears make trails down Shizune’s face, and it’s all Misha can do to not move her hands and wipe them away for her.
[We were told, from day one, that running in the hallways is strictly forbidden because of the risks it poses to Yamaku’s student body. What’s the point of having rules if they can’t be enforced? I thought I could enforce them all by myself. I thought if I just repeated myself enough times, surely the message would get through…]
The rampant self-doubt… it’s all so horrifically out of character for the iron-willed president, but Misha can only watch, frozen, as Shizune pours out what must have been weighing on her mind ever since the incident.
[I always knew Ibarazaki’s antics would be trouble, someday, but I let it slide. Do you know what the definition of insanity is, Misha? It’s doing the same thing, over and over and over again and expecting a different result. I must have gone insane somewhere along the line, because that’s exactly what I’ve been doing this whole time.]
Is this what Shizune’s been thinking? Has this been what the blue-haired girl’s been drowning in for the past two days, locked in her room, by herself, with only her spiraling doubts as company?
[I was negligent. Negligent and overconfident. I was as negligent and overconfident as Ibarazaki was when she ran around the corner and collided with Hisao.]
Misha is scared, scared, scared. This doesn’t sound like the Shizune she knows at all. Even her rejection some years before hurt less than this. At least then, Shizune was still the strong, self-assured lady she’d come to know and love.
Where is that strength now? Where is that confidence?
Misha scrambles for a response, desperately searching for a proverbial ladder to pull Shizune out of the hole she’s digging for herself.
[Shicchan, you couldn’t control Emi’s actions. If she was acting stupid, there was only so much you could do. You couldn’t have known Hicchan and Emi would be in that exact spot beforehand, right?]
Shizune doesn’t budge.
[Even if that were true… we placed him in that position, Misha.]
Misha’s at a loss, a total loss. She can’t figure out where Shizune is going, why she’s so insistent on finding personal fault in every aspect of Hisao’s accident.
[Shicchan, I know this sounds bad… but he was just in the wrong place at the wrong time, you know? We-]
[Maybe if we didn’t spend so much time arguing over places to go for lunch, we could’ve left earlier, and Hisao would never have had to run into Ibarazaki! Maybe if we waited for a minute later, it never would’ve happened. Maybe if we just didn’t invite him at all…]
Misha belatedly realizes that this is what’s been consuming Shizune’s mind for so many hours, her trademark analytical mind endlessly going over every move, every decision, searching for the million ways in which disaster could’ve been avoided.
If they’d just moved faster, or slower. Didn’t go here, or there. If they should’ve said something louder or said nothing at all. Over and over, further, and further back, questioning every action she’s taken, all leading to the things she should have done, could have done, but didn’t.
The endless possibilities of the past. All locked off to them, except for the one they’re living in.
No wonder Shizune’s such a mess.
[Shicchan, you… really don’t think you… killed Hicchan, do you?]
Shizune’s eyes harden.
[You’re right, I didn’t kill Hisao. But I let him die under my supervision. Our supervision. We were supposed to be Hisao’s guides as he tried to acclimatize to Yamaku. We were supposed to look out for him. Protect him. Make him feel welcome. Look at where that led us.]
Misha had always considered Shizune’s bluntness to be part of her charm. Now, her harsh words stab like pinpricks into her heart.
[But we did look out for him, Shicchan! We were always by his side, we were always pushing him to come along with us to everything!]
Shizune’s frustration seems to hit a breaking point. She huffs loudly, but it doesn’t really seem aimed at Misha. Rather, it seems to be aimed inwardly. At herself.
[He died right in front of us, Misha! We just sat by and watched! We led him to the exact spot where Ibarazaki would collide with him, and we just left him there to die! How is that not a failure on our part?]
The memories come crashing back into Misha’s mind. The images she’s been so diligent not to think about. The collision. The noise. The aftermath. Of Emi sitting, weeping… of the nurses frantically running… of a boy they tried to befriend for but a mere two days being rushed down the hallway on a stretcher.
Misha’s sobbing now; she can’t stop the tears from rolling down her cheeks. It’s all she can do to choke down the hiccups and focus on Shizune’s hands.
[We failed, Misha, we failed at our one, simple duty.]
She bows her head.
[But ultimately, it’s me. I failed. I was given the duty. I wanted to get close to Hisao. I just dragged you into the blast zone.]
There’s something in Shizune’s words that sparks something in her. Something beyond mere annoyance, or petty frustration. Something about their dynamic, about their relationship.
Shizune’s eyes close, the tears leaking from the sides like dewdrops. She drops a bombshell.
[I don’t deserve to be the president of the student council anymore.]
That’s it. That’s the outcome Misha’s feared the most. The spark ignites.
Misha, the translator, the interpreter, the mouthpiece. Always playing second fiddle to the president, always in her shadow. She’s been following Shizune the entire time. Out of love, perhaps; out of friendship, definitely. Always being swept along by Shizune’s strength of will, always being pulled out of her little ruts by the endless drive of the blue-haired wonder.
I just dragged you into the blast zone.
Shizune, at the front. Taking all the hits, all the responsibility, every perceived failure around her on her small, narrow shoulders.
This can’t go on. Misha can’t leave Shizune sitting on the side of her bed, left to carry the weight of the world on her own.
Her sobbing suddenly slows, then stops, her breath steadying. Misha isn’t sure where this resolve is coming from, but the more she gazes at the curled wreck of her friend, the more she’s certain.
If she ever loved Shizune, if she ever thought of her as her dearest, closest friend, she’ll have to do this. She’ll have to be strong, to help carry Shizune’s burdens with her own two hands.
Misha snaps her arm forward, violently shaking Shizune’s hand. The latter jolts in surprise, looking up at Misha.
[You’re wrong, Shicchan!]
Shizune seems almost confused, teary eyes blinking.
[It’s my responsibility, Misha. My failure. I don’t deserve-]
Misha’s expression turns determined, as though she’s fighting to get Shizune to listen to her words.
[Yes, you do, Shicchan! The class needs you. The academy needs you! You’re president for a reason, Shicchan! It’s because you’re the strongest, most capable person in our year.]
Shizune watches her, eyes wide open. Misha’s never felt this animated, not out of boisterousness or laughter, but of her own determination.
[You work harder than anyone I know, Shicchan! You have no one to help you, except for little, useless me. You do everything yourself; you take all the responsibility on your shoulders!]
Shizune’s brows furrow, as though in challenge.
[You are not useless-]
[I am, I am! And that’s only because you seem to think that everything must be done by your hands alone, so if anything bad happens, it’s only ever you who takes the fall!]
Shizune reddens slightly, a familiar fire beginning to rise in her eyes.
[That is because I was the president. Ultimate responsibility inevitably fell on my shoulders. In any case, it’s inarguable that I failed in-]
[You didn’t fail, Shicchan! You went above and beyond! You took Hicchan under your wing, you showed him around, you tried your best to make him fit in as smoothly as you could! That’s more than anyone else in our class can say they did!]
Shizune’s face scrunches, in anger or frustration, Misha can’t tell.
[And look where that led us…]
It terrifies her, but she stands her ground.
[Come on, Shicchan! You’ve done so much, worked so hard for the council your whole time here! You can’t throw that all away just because you think you’ve failed at something! You’re the strongest girl I know, Shicchan. You never, ever, give up, no matter how high the odds are!]
Shizune shakes her head.
[This is totally different. Hisao died on my-]
Misha can’t stand to hear it any longer. Her fingers become cutting, as though she’s trying to engrave her message into the air itself.
[Shicchan, you’re a student! You aren’t Hicchan’s parents. You aren’t a teacher. You aren’t a doctor. You’re the president of the student council, yeah, but you’re still a student. You’re like me, and Hicchan, and everyone else in Class 3-3. You’re my friend.]
She takes a deep breath.
[Hicchan’s life was never your responsibility, Shicchan! I know it hurts to hear, but it’s true. It’s… it’s Emi’s responsibility. Or the academy’s. I don’t know. But it’s not yours, Shicchan. Please, you have to stop thinking everyone’s lives are in your hands, and your hands only! If you think you’re responsible for everyone else’s lives, Shicchan, you’ll never care about your own. It’s destroying you.]
The brief fire in Shizune’s eyes goes out, replaced by the melancholy that preceded it. Misha wants to stop, but it’s necessary. She must make Shizune hear what she needs to hear, in a manner of speaking.
[Being the student council president isn’t always a game, Shicchan. You don’t always win, and you don’t have to quit when you lose. You just have to be a good person, Shicchan, and I’ve always known you were one, ever since I met you. What happened to Hicchan can never change that. And because you’re a good person, you’re the best council president anyone could ask for.]
She can’t help herself. Maybe it’s too soon. Maybe it’ll cross a boundary, but Misha doesn’t care. What matters is putting Shizune back on her feet, in any way she can.
She encircles Shizune in a hug, a full body one, her arms encircling the president’s thin frame. It’s nice, really nice.
Shizune makes a small sound of surprise, but doesn’t resist, leaning ever so slightly into the hug. The warmth of it all starts to wash the horrifying imagery out of Misha’s mind, if only a little.
Releasing the embrace, Misha takes a step back, and signs her most earnest plea.
[I’m so sorry, Shicchan. I’m so sorry I wasn’t here for you sooner. I’m so sorry we had to watch what happened to Hicchan. But it’s not your fault. It never was. You can take that responsibility off your shoulders. Please. At least, for me.]
The blue-haired girl doesn’t seem entirely convinced, but releases the melancholy look with a small sigh.
[Alright, if you insist.]
Misha exhales in relief. It’s something. She knows there’s a long road ahead, and they’ll probably end up having this conversation all over again at some point, but she hopes she’s put a stop to Shizune’s self-destructive spiral, for now.
Leaving only one final question.
[Are… you still going to be student council president?]
Shizune again hesitates, her gaze drifting to the side as the gears turn in her head.
[I… I need time. To think about things. Too much has happened.]
It’s the best answer Misha can hope for, under the circumstances, so she simply nods her head in assent. If there’s one thing Shizune is right about, it’s that too much did happen. Misha hasn’t even fully processed it herself.
There’s a moment of tranquil quiet. It’s a lovely respite from the turbulence of the past few minutes.
[He was such a good boy, Hisao.]
Misha is surprised to see Shizune’s hands move, let alone for something so tender. She turns her head to see Shizune’s face, silhouetted by the lamplight and wearing an ever-so-slightly faraway expression.
[He didn’t deserve to have that happen to him. He was sad, and lonely, and lost, sure, but I could see there was something just underneath, waiting to come free. I wanted to find out what it was.]
A tiny notch of a smile creeps onto Shizune’s lips.
[That’s why I wanted him in the council. Not just because he’d be an excellent pair of hands… but because he was an enigma I couldn’t solve at first glance.]
Misha can feel a little bit of her brighter self creep back in. She can’t help but comment.
[It helped that he was pretty handsome too, right?]
Shizune averts her eyes, but nods ever so slightly.
[That’s true.]
Despite the situation, Misha giggles. A little bit of the heaviness disappears with the sound.
[I wish I got to know him better too, Shicchan… the three of us could’ve done so much together…]
Shizune turns her gaze into the starry night sky outside her window. Her blue-grey irises are softer, tinged deeply with regret.
[But he’s gone now. We’ll never know, Misha. We’ll never know what he was truly like.]
The two sit, side by side, cocooned by the cool dark and the possibilities left behind.
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Phew.
This was by far the hardest chapter to write. Sad Shizune was a daunting prospect from the outset, and I'm not certain that I managed to pull it off here. Same deal with Misha. In the end, I decided to play up Shizune's sensitivity to failure and her preoccupation with responsibility. Not sure how that went.
Expect chapter output to decline sharply as life reasserts itself, but we're over halfway there and I intend to see this one through.
Mirage_GSM wrote: Tue Mar 05, 2024 2:06 pm
Unless the Emi in this story is some kind of bitch all of them have hated all along anyway - some kind of bad blood between Emi and Miki has been part of stories before - it's strange that they would act as if Emi was some kind of cold-blooded murderer.
Hehehe, this will be addressed shortly! 
Suffice it to say, adolescents are not the greatest judges of character...
I'm pretty excited for the next few chapters, so thank you all for your critiques and support!
Stay safe, everyone.
