I am a year late with this, and for that I apologize. I'd had most of it ready last year, only to fall down the stairs and nearly break my leg. That led to a Covid-19 infection, longCovid brain fog (seriously, mask up, stay away from this damned disease), grandmother dying, so... Secret Santa kinda slipped my mind.
Thank you to the Prof for reminding me. This is without a beta, so don't mind the errors. I will be curious if you can spot the three paragraphs I didn't have finished before my misadventures last year:
Victim: NoticeMeOppai (Naryzhud)
Prompt: In a Christmas Miracle your favourite character becomes unkatawaed. How do they react? What do they do?
With the cacophony from his door, the repetitive strokes wake Hisao from his slumber. Grumbling he cracks the door to peek out, he finds not the thick glasses and garlic breath of his hallmate, but the bob cut and glasses of someone else instead.
Glancing left and right, the lack of a particular pink haired foghorn stands out.
“Where’s Misha?” he asks, before realizing how dumb it was to say out loud. Grabbing the notepad by his door, he writes out the question before holding it up to the student council president.
Lifting the pad out of his hands, with a flourish she scratches out the answer, handing the pad back to the boy. “At home with her family.”
“Shouldn’t you be home with yours?” Hisao writes out.
Huffing a bit, Shizune writes out, “I have to take care of the lost sheep who didn’t go home for break. Make sure they don’t hang out in their room the whole time.”
Sticking his head out of his door, the boy stares at the ‘Keep Out’ sign on the other occupied door in this hallway.
“He’s gone home, in case you didn’t know,” she writes out with a smirk.
Sighing, Hisao accepts his fate. Not bothering with his notepad, he says out loud, “Fine, you win.”
With the smirk of victory, Shizune turns in place and starts off, the boy trailing close behind.
The eerie silence of the snow covered terrain punctuates that almost everyone had headed home to Hisao as he follows his companion. Everyone that is but a shock of red hair hustling down the walkway quickly.
“Hey Rin,” he calls out to the girl.
With lazy eyes, the girl looks to him and says, “You’re still here.”
Shizune turns to watch as the pair exchange greetings, only to watch Rin swiftly move past the boy, her conversation finished.
“Yup, never change, Rin,” Hisao mutters to himself before spotting the amused smirk on the other girl’s face. “Oh ha ha, laugh at me. Don’t know why I’m bothering, you can’t hear me anyways.”
Clearly satisfied, the girl continues on her path; the school looming over them in the winter snow.
Stepping inside, the sounds of light festivities wafts through the hallway from the cafeteria. Within, a handful of kids are chatting in a corner, a lot of empty tables, Miki is chatting with a girl he remembers named Orie from second year, Emi is dancing by herself in front of a boombox.
Looking over the buffet table, the boy finds himself shadowed, still, by the student council president.
Ever since summer vacation, when Lilly dumped him and ran off to Scotland, Shizune has been quietly there. But while she could have rubbed him being the fool he was in his face, instead she never brought it up.
Hisao would have preferred it if she mutely judged what was a doomed relationship, or better, rubbed his face in how foolish he was. Instead, she was just there, quietly waiting for something.
Moving to an empty table by the window, he finds the seat next to him occupied. Fighting the urge to snap at her, he settles for a sigh.
Still unconvinced Shizune can’t read lips, Hisao turns to face away from his shadow to talk.
“You know, I wonder at times how things could have gone differently. I think it was that first Wednesday, when I defended that… girl. Maybe if I hadn’t, I would not have wound up manipulated like that. I still wonder why you looped me in then, just like I’m wondering why you’re bothering with me right now,” he grumbles.
When he turns back, he finds the girl with a sour look on her face. When Hisao is fully looking at her, she snaps her fingers and points at his notebook.
Snatching it from him as he pulls it out of his pocket, the girl hurriedly writes down, “Nobody should be alone for Christmas,” before tossing it back to him.
Considering a moment, Hisao sighs, and says “Thank you,” before realizing how dumb that was and reaches for the pencil.
With a quick motion, Shizune slides the writing instrument away, and with a playful glint in her eyes snatches the writing pad back as well.
“Well, how am I supposed to talk to you then?” the boy asks, a bit frustrated.
She considers, then holds her hands out, palm up, gesturing him forward.
With much confusion, he mimics the pose, only to have his hands grabbed and forced into position. Forcing his hands flat, she maneuvers them so his right hand is resting on the back of his left wrist. Then with a jerk, she makes his hand tap it quickly before letting go.
“That’s how you say, ‘Thank You’,” she writes out.
Understanding, he repeats the gesture, saying to himself, “Uh, okay.”
Shizune sits back, the smug expression appearing like always before taking her notebook and setting it down in the middle of the table, pencil on top of it.
Hisao picks up the pad and writes out, “I’m surprised you’re not with your family.”
“They’re out of the country,” she writes out in clean, sharp letters, a sour expression on her face. “I don’t agree with the decision, so I chose not to go, before you ask.”
“I haven’t seen you around much lately,” he writes down.
Shizune’s response is a curt, “I’ve been busy with post-graduation plans.”
“Decided which school to attend?” Hisao asks in the notebook.
Sliding her glasses up, she nods. “The offer from that school in Vienna is just too good to pass up.”
“So far…” the boy’s voice drifts off as the thought of someone else moving to Europe sinks in. Catching himself, he changes the topic. “Going to be near family?”
With a shake of her head indicating negative, she scratches out, “Absolutely not.”
Glancing around the room, Hisao says out loud, “You know, haven’t seen Hanako for a few days. I was expecting her here.”
Looking back, he sighs, and writes down, “Was looking for Hanako.”
As she reads it, Shizune’s eyes widen slightly before a frown settles in and she writes out, “She didn’t tell you?”
“Tell me what?”
Sigh a long sigh, she stands up, and gestures for the boy to do the same.
Leaving the room, Hisao finds himself led into the girl’s dorm. Pausing at Shizune’s doorway, the boy is nothing but confused why she brought him here.
With the sharp snap of her fingers, he jumps in place, before slowly leaning in and looking around. Within the room, he finds the girl holding up an envelope.
Crossing the floor cautiously, like a cat expecting to be chased off by a troublesome dog, he takes the envelope, finding it unopened and with her name on it.
When he doesn’t do anything, she rolls her eyes and takes the thing, ripping it open and handing the card inside over to him.
Hisao recognizes the format as some kind of invitation. Written in English, the handwriting is immediately recognizable to him. Without meaning to, he begins to read it out loud, “You are her… hereby invited to the… wedding of Lilly and Teiji Satou…”
Across from him, Shizune stands, obviously angry as she writes out, “Miss. Ikezawa left with my father and brother two days ago. I refuse to deal with this farce.”
“But, how?” he asks out loud, shocked.
Understanding the question without needing to hear, she writes out, “Her father arranged it. That’s why he recalled her.”
When Hisao just looks confused, Shizune sighs, and pulls out a folded sheet of paper. Opening it, the title makes it clear, “Implanted sight restoration.”
Sight restoration.
“Lilly’s not blind anymore?” he asks, the world around him fading away in his shock.”She’s… fixed? She’s not broken anymore?”
When the world returned, Hisao was surprised to find his face buried into the blue haired girl’s shoulder, tears openly flowing down his cheeks. Now seated on her bed, he tries to stand up, only to find himself pushed back down.
“I should go,” he mutters, only for her to snap her fingers, forcing him to look at the girl. With a long sigh, she opens up her bedside table, and pulls out a notebook, opening it before forcing it into Hisao’s hands.
“What’s this,” he starts, only to get her pointing at the page, insistently.
Looking down, he wipes his eyes before reading the words on the page aloud. “I am not broken. I don’t need to be fixed. There is nothing wrong with me.”
He looks at the date, finding it almost three years ago. The beginning of April, just before school starts. The handwriting is clearly Shizune’s sharp, clear lettering.
“You wrote this? Why?” he asks out loud, not even considering her hearing loss
Her eyes dart to his mouth, and she nods. Taking another deep breath, she does something he has never witnessed before.
She clears her throat, making what is the first sound he has ever heard from her. Then, looking him dead in his eyes, she opens her mouth, and in a flat and odd sounding speech, says, “My father forced me to pretend that I was like everyone else. That I should be ashamed of my hearing. He wanted to fix me in his words. I wrote that down to remind myself, I am not broken.”
Poking my chest in the middle, just over my scar, she, probably unknowingly, reminds me why I am here. But as I raise my hand, she begins to cough, making an ugly face before grabbing the little notepad and jotting down quickly, “You are not broken either, and neither is Lilly.”
Standing up, coughing once more, she puts her hands on her hips with that all too smug smile on her face before writing down, “Now how about dinner at the Shanghai? My treat?”
Rubbing my own chest for a moment, I consider, then shake my head. Taking the pad away, I write down, “No, my treat.”
She reads that, smiles, and gives a single, curt nod.
Crossposted at AO3:
https://archiveofourown.org/works/43845603
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Now on to ‘22!