Katawa Shoujo Forums

Thanks. Though I spelled Mutou wrong. Not my mistake. v1 spells Mutou as Muto.

Some lines from Chapter 4.
get fucking lost from here
But

Okay. Till tomorrow.

P.S.: I want a little help on one of my song/poem. Can anyone help me? Reply please. I'm in desperate need.

Aww, no one helped me.

Anyway take Chapter 4, after which I will be gone for a long time.

And in between, can anyone give me names for my Chapters? I'm finding it kinda hard to give them names.
And if you can, please tell me your views on my fic name 'Cheery Blossom', as I don't seem to know why I choose the name in the first place.

CHERRY BLOSSOM
CHAPTER — 4

Silence. It is the only entity that is between me and Lilly, between me and her answer. I feel as my future depends on her answer.

Will that decision really affect my life? I think so. Still I don’t dare meet her eyes; still I don’t dare to breathe a word. Why? Because I’m scared; scared of the refusal, scared of the loneliness and most of all scared of the world.

The time continues to trickle away mercilessly, and every passing second stamps on my heart, crushing every hope of acceptance. The silence is getting too thick for me to sustain in. I want to hear her answer and at the same time I don’t want to hear the refusal.

I hear a sigh, a long, deep sigh coming from Lilly’s direction. Still I don’t look up, my muscles feeling like lead. I can feel the answer in the air, and my heart at once starts beating. It’s not as it wasn’t beating from the start; but now it has started beating in his forcefulness again. Every pump of blood, feels like a hit of jackhammer on my ribcage. The pain is unsettling and unbearable, but somehow I am able to bear it. My knees buckle a little as my breath hitch.

“Hisao…”

Metabolism of my body stops, coming to a sudden halt. And then as the words sunk in, it comes back to life with more force than before. She sounded resigned and a little impatient.

The answer to me is as clear as it will ever be. The tone of her voice clearly tells me that get fucking lost from here. She will never use obscenities, so she will rather say, Go away Hisao.

Yes that sounds perfectly right. Not too harsh, but nevertheless clears every doubt from the mind. Just the way Lilly would say. My face fell and I start to turn away, trying to hide my chest from her view. Because my heart is hammering so hard against my ribcage, that I will not be amazed if the rise and fall of my heart is clearly mimicked by my shirt.

You should wait.

A sound echoes in my mind, from somewhere unknown. I want to laugh at this thought. Wait. What am I doing from the past five minutes, or were they hours? Her answer is as cleared as it is said on my face.

My stomach grumbles and I snarl at myself. What a bloody perfect timing. I hear the laughs of Lilly and Hanako, which instantly turns me red.

“Hisao,” Lilly says again, and my body stiffens in response. This time she didn’t sound resigned or impatient. It was a good sign… maybe.

“Have you eaten your lunch?” she asks me. I shake my head in response, feeling confused.

“Come and we may have food for you,” Lilly says and my stomach instantly starts to do some kind of flip-flop dance. I don’t know whether it’s because it is going to get food, or because Lilly has talked to me. Guess I will never know.

Not wanting to give her a time to back out, I nod. I instantly feel guilty about accepting such gracious behaviour when I have behaved like a complete jerk. But guilt can only stop me this much.

I enter the classroom. It’s just as same as before. I don’t know what was I accepting, but somewhere in my mind I have thought that now this place will change, it will not be the same.

I take my usual chair beside Hanako. She looks a little discomfited sitting next to me. Lilly brings me a steaming cup of tea, which I whole heartedly accept, all the while thinking about my current status with Lilly and Hanako.

“So…”

I try to initiate a conversation. But as soon as the first word escapes my lip, my mind blanks out. The topic I have been thinking vanishes to some place unknown. Now the only thing zooming in my head is ‘Are we still friends?’

The answer, as predicted doesn’t come from my mind. The question is sitting on my lips, ready to jump out. But I resist. Our new ‘relationship’ is much better than having no relationship at all.

“Siiiiiiiii…”

I hiss. I haven’t notice that the cup is still pressed to my lips. I feel the sting of blisters on my tongue, as I press it between my teeth. Somehow miraculously, I have managed to have a firm hold of the cup throughout the whole ordeal; so, its contents are still secure.

“What happened?” Lilly asks, sounding worried. She is looking in my direction.

“Nothing,” I reply, trying to dodge the subject.

“It doesn’t exactly…” Lily trails off. She must have remembered last night. And see me, I’m still doing the same thing; kicking out my friends from my life.

Are we still friends? The question echoes in my mind again. Yes, we are, at least for me.

So, I decide to tell them or her, seeing that Hanako must have seen the whole ordeal by herself.

“My tongue burnt a little because of the hot tea,” I confess, leaning a little on my chair.

“Oh,” Lilly say, sounding surprise, “I’m sorry.”

What the… Why is she saying sorry? It’s not her mistake that my tongue fancied a dip in tea. Now I’m utterly confused. As I try to connect the dots, which I’m not even remotely good at, my mind swishes to an old memory. A memory concerning my introduction to Yuuko. Even at that time, when Yuuko had banged her head against the table, Lilly had thought it was because she had called out to her.

I shake my head and say, “How it can be your mistake Lilly?”

She don’t say anything and suddenly I feel the hairs of my neck rising. It’s the same feeling one feels when one is supposed to confess something horrible. So, maybe this is my time, this is the moment. I can’t find a way to chicken out. It’s not as I don’t want to make amends, it’s just that my resolution is crumbling.

“I,” I start, not knowing what I am going to say. I can feel Lilly and Hanako gazes burning hole in my bowed head.

I draw a deep breath, trying to cool off the burning feeling in the back of my throat. It doesn’t help. If it wasn’t for my male pride and need to make amends, I will probably have run off by now.

My traitorous stomach grumbles again, loudly than ever, demanding food. I feel like a loser, a bloody loser. I can feel Lilly questioning stare. I try again.

“I want…” I stop again, but this time feeling a little pride in saying more than a single word. But that pride is short lived as understanding dawns on my mind. It’s now or never.

“I want to, I mean, I re, no, no,” I jumble with my words, making a complete fool out of myself. But this only strengthens my resolve. Taking a deep breath, I again repeat the words, I have said earlier, “I’m sorry, Lilly… Hanako.”

I pause, waiting for a nasty retort or accusation. When none come, I’m forced to continue, while to be honest, I want nothing better than the floor to open up and swallow me whole.

“Can you forgive me for my earlier behaviour?” I say, biting my lower lip, “I acted like a jerk and I now know that. It was false judgment on my part to hide things from you, both of you. Because after all you both are my friends and friends share everything with each other.” I finish with a resigned sigh, feeling like a great deal of weight has been lifted from my heart.

Silence surrounded us, silence thick as ice. I don’t dare move even a single muscle, the cup held securely in my hand. I can hear the tick tock of clock in the background. The hot surface of the cup burns my skin and I’m force to shift it on the table, breaking the silence.

“Sorry,” I say and shake my palms a little.

“It’s okay,” Lilly says and smiles; actually smiles. I cannot control a sigh of happiness. But it turns into a yawn, the effect of less sleep coming into immediate affect.

“Am I forgiven now?” I ask Lilly, tentatively.

She smiles and repeats the words she has said to me once, “You will find that people around here are more forgiving then the other.”

“So I take it as I am forgiven,” I say, smiling smugly to myself.

“I would think so,” Lilly answers, a tiny smile on her lips. My traitorous stomach grumbles again and I without further ado drink the tea in one gulp. It isn’t much hot, but hot enough to make me gasp.

“Have you something for lunch?” I ask, eyeing the two half-eaten lunchbox which are lying on the table.

“Hungry?” Lilly ask, with a teasing tone.

“More than you can imagine,” I reply and sweep her lunchbox from the table, “Mind?”

She raises an eyebrow, and I look at her skeptically, before I remember that she can’t see.

“If I eat…” I start but was cut-off by Lilly.

“…if I devour the lunch,” Lilly ask, smiling, “No. But I was wondering whose lunchbox is it?”

“Guess,” I reply, playing along. Lilly giggles and I hear a something like half suppressed giggle from my left side, suddenly remembering that Hanako too is sitting with us in the room.

And the tragedy of the year befalls. The clock tower bell rings, signaling the end of the lunch break. I eye the chopstick wistfully, which is settled over the lunch, waiting for me to pick it up.

I stay put as Lilly and Hanako get up and walk toward the door. Hanako stop with a questioning look on her face, and Lilly too soon stops, probably after not hearing foot steps following her.

“Are you not coming Hisao?” Lilly ask, and I’m dumbfounded. Is it a plain fluke or does she have some sort of inhuman ears?

“Contemplating whether it’s safe to skip class and devour theses lunchboxes. After all you shouldn’t waste food,” I reply with an innocent look on my face, which of course goes unnoticed by Lilly. Though Hanako seems to notice it as she giggles a bit. I think this is one of the rarest times, when I have heard her giggle so freely.

“You don’t want to make Mutou mad,” Hanako says.

“Shit,” I all but scream, jumping up from my chair, almost toppling the table in process.

“Oh yes, the morning incident,” Lilly says, obviously enjoying herself.

I stop at the door for a second to say, “You know about it.”

“Friends share everything,” Lilly say, walking out of the class, “Do they not?”

Getting balled off by your own words feels worse than getting punched. I groan and look at my wristwatch. Five minutes late already. Now personally I don’t fancy walking in the lion cave willingly. Ripples shoot through my body as I picture Mutou standing in the doorway, a predatory glint in his eyes. I visibly shudder, my mind going in overdrive trying to make a Mutou-worthy excuse. Somehow none comes and I’m left feeling like a man who has just been given a choice; either jump in the well or jump down the cliff. Death at both the fronts, you just get to choose the way. Yay!

I glance around and my eyes stop. A smile spread on my face as I stare at her.

“Hanako,” I say my tone, cheerful.

Hanako looks at me skeptically, her eyebrows raised.

“What?”

“Nothing,” I say, walking to her side, “Let’s go back to the classroom.”

“But—”

“No buts,” I say, “we’re already late and I don’t want to be get late than I can help it. After all studying is important. Don’t you agree, Lilly?” I add, glancing over my shoulder at Lilly. She has a smile on her face and her cheeks are huffed a little. She probably understands my intentions and can’t think what to feel about it; amused or pissed-off. But nevertheless, she nods.

“See, even Lilly believes it,” I say and start dragging Hanako up the stairs to our classroom.

Lilly suddenly stops and says, “What about our lunchboxes?”

“No one will steal them,” I reply dismissively and resume dragging Hanako.

We part ways from Lilly in the front of our classroom door. I glance at my wristwatch and sigh. We are around fifteen sixteen minutes late already. Now, I don’t want to go inside.

I glance at my saviour and smile. She replies with a smile and I chuckle. I grab her wrist and push the door open. I feel like a very nasty criminal being taken to jail, as eyes of each of my classmates are fixed on me, the intensities of their gaze scorching my body.

As I suspected, Mutou glance at me, looking ready to kill. His eyes dart from me to Hanako and the predatory glint is lost somewhere in his eyes. My mind starts to do Congo. I hurry off to my desk and sit silently, pulling out my notebook, book and a pen, giving an exemplary impression of a model student. Mutou side-glares at me, if it is possible and I feel very proud of my ingeniousness.

The bell rings, signaling the end of the period and the start of Mutou free time. I sigh and hastily pack my bag, my eyes darting between Mutou, Hanako and my bag. I am trying to rush from here before Mutou gets a chance to ambush me, but one can be never sure. So, I’m keeping a tab on Hanako, fully intending to use her as a shield if the time comes. I feel guilty, but my guilt can’t do anything in front of my surviving instincts.

I slung my packed bag on my back and rush to the door, narrowly missing Mutou who have just finished his work and is glaring at my empty desk.

As soon as I get out of class, I start walking aimlessly, feeling relief pumping through my veins. Finally, the day has passed and I don’t want to relive it again, ever.

During my mindless strolling, I see Hanako from the corner of my eyes. She is going downstairs and I follow her to say sorry, in case she knew that I was using her as a shield.

I immediately come in stride with her, seeing that she is walking unusually slowly with uneven pace, her eyes fixed on the floor. I have to walk very slowly in order to walk by her side.

All things forgotten, I ask her, “What are you doing, Hanako? Are you fine?”

Hanako stops dead in her track, looking thunderstruck. She is behaving as she didn’t know that I was here. Maybe she didn’t, seeing the fact that I didn’t even give her some hint to announce my presence.

“N—Nothing,” Hanako reply, as pink blush rise in her cheeks. Her gaze settles back on the floor, but she doesn’t move.

My curiosity piques up, and I apply a little more pressure.

“Oh tell me Hanako,” I say, “Friends share everything with each other, don’t they?”

Hanako looks up at me, a peculiar expression on her face, somewhere between amazement and anger. But she doesn’t say anything, instead she look like she may flee from here.

I think of applying a little more pressure, but quickly think against it. Everyone wants to keep some part of their lives private, though I can’t say what’s so important about it; I choose not to intrude on her privacy.

We walk side by side to the library. No one is in the unused classroom, Lilly and Hanako use for eating lunch. Maybe she is doing something else.

I enter the library beside Hanako, questioning myself what I am doing here. Hanako marches to her usual spot and pulls out a book from her bag. As soon as she sits on her beanbag, her eyes fix on the book.

I sigh and taking use of the opportunity start skimming through the rows and rows of books, my fingers sliding over their spines, occasionally pulling out a book and then pushing it back again. What felt like an hour long search, I finally found a light novel. I pull it out and make my way toward Hanako, sitting at my usual seat. None of us say anything to the other as both of us are engrossed in our respective books.

Time continues to pass. I have hardly read fifteen pages, but I still don’t feel the attachment toward the book, I usually do with other books. So, fully planning on putting the book back and heading to dorms, I stand up and make my way toward the shelf in which this book was kept.

“Hisao,” Hanako says to my retreating back. I stop; turn around, my eyebrows raised.

“What?”

Hanako blushes, mutters something incoherent and says loudly, “Sorry.”

Not buying that apology, I walk toward her and sat beside her. Hanako looks ready to run-off, so I sit in an attentive position, ready to bounce to my knees when the situation demands.

“Now, don’t try to change the subject,” I say, spinning the book on my finger, “Tell me.” I add with a firm voice.

“I—it’s nothing,” she says, blushing spectacularly. I smirk, trying to connect the dots in my head. Nothing connects, or maybe I just suck at it. Yes, I really suck at it.

“Yuuko,” I hear Lilly’s familiar voice. I jump up at once, quickly stow the book in its respective shelf and hurry-off to meet Lilly. She is standing with Yuuko, discussing something. Yuuko looks more comfortable than she looks with me or probably with anyone. I approach them, unnoticed by Yuuko. Lilly’s head jerks a little in my general direction. But when I don’t give her any indication of who I am, she resumes talking to Yuuko, ignoring me completely.

I walk to Lilly, and this time Yuuko notice me, her expressions going from normal to panicked, maybe thinking that I’m going to ask for help in finding some book. I shake my head, and press my finger to my lips, indicating that she should keep quiet. She looks at me skeptically, and at the precise moment Lilly asks,

“What happened, Yuuko? Does someone need your help?”

Yuuko looks like she will faint any second.

“No, L—Lilly,” Yuuko replies; her fingers fidgeting with the hem of her shirt. I silently approach Lilly, making sure to keep my path zigzag so not to give her any indication that I’m approaching her.

When I’m just a couple of steps away from her, I move hastily and cover her eyes with my hands, before suddenly realising how futile it is. She can’t see, so it makes no difference. How wrong I am!

As soon as my hands envelop her eyes, her cane hits my shin painfully, almost scorching the skin of my shin away. I hiss in pain. Before I have the chance to declare who I am, she treads on my foot, making me wince in pain. Yuuko stare at Lilly, looking dumbstruck.

“Stop it, Lilly,” I hiss, jumping away from her. My right foot is incapable of holding my weight, and so I come crashing down on the floor, landing painfully on the hard floor on my butt.

“Oh Hisao, that were you,” Lilly says, her voice worried.

“Who do you think I was?” I ask her, massaging my foot. It has gone red in many parts, and even when my fingers touch it, it burns with indescribable agony and pain. I lift my pant and glance at my shin. Blood is slowly dribbling down from the numerous cracks and most of my shin is burning in pain.

“Is it hurting?” Lilly asks me, walking tentatively in my general direction. A sarcastic comment is dancing on the tip of my tongue. I swallow it back, and say the truth, rather bluntly,

“Yes and what did you excepted?”

I feel a painful stab in my heart after saying these words. I instantly regretted them. Lilly seems to freeze on the spot. Jumping up, I cover the distance between us in one long stride.

“Hey, it is not your mistake,” I say. My instinct is to wrap my arm around her shoulders, but fearing the consequences I keep it to myself, instead just squeezing them reassuringly.

“Honestly what did I except?” I ask her, “I was literally ambushing you. It was my luck that I managed to find my voice in time, otherwise…”

I let the sentence trail-off. She looks up where my face should be, but isn’t. So, instead pointing that out to her, I move myself, so both of our eyes meet.

“Is it hurting much?” she asks me.

“Not much,” I assure her, even when I can feel the angry prickling all over my skin.

“You are lying,” she plainly says, grabbing hold of my hand, “We are going to the head nurse.”

“Why?” I protest, but nonetheless walks with her, “How can you say that?”

“Your breathing,” she replies, continuing to drag me, even when I’m willingly following her, “it’s kind of ragged and deep.”

Once again, I’m bowled over by her ears. A couple of students laugh at me. Not knowing what they are laughing about, I continue to walk beside Lilly, or rather I am continued to drag away. I don’t even protest, knowing that my protest will fell on deaf ears.

On the way to the head nurse office, I meet Misha and Shizune. Misha looks at me, and signal something to Shizune, who looks ready to blow out. She too, like the other students is eyeing us, but not with the amused grins, or teasing smile; she is eyeing both us with loathing, I think it is loathing, no damn, it is loathing.

I glance at Lilly, who continues to pull me, oblivious to all the commotion around her. I glance down at the floor, trying to ignore the scorching gaze of Shizune.

I still don’t know what the whole ordeal is about, but now I have a rough idea and that rough idea is enough to make me blush redder than rose.

I try to pull my hand away from her and I am met by a strong resistance. I try to halt our progress, making Lilly stop with a jerk. She turns around looking irritated. Maybe she isn’t that oblivious of her surroundings.

“What?” Lilly ask, her calm demeanor lost somewhere unknown.

“I can walk you know,” I complain, quickly striding to the steps to the ground floor. I hear the taps of Lilly’s cane following me. Someone taps on my shoulder and I turn around, my embarrassment turning into irritation.

I glance at the person and see Misha and Shizune standing there, looking quite irritated.

“What?” I say, glaring at her which goes unnoticed.

Shizune just glares at me and that glare is so um… dangerous that I back several steps hastily. I trip on the first step on the stairs and my body is tossed in air. For a fleeting moment I feel the wonderful sensation of air rippling through my body and I feel weightless. The feeling is so wonderful that I think of doing it again.

Then I see the world slopping upside down, and I hear a distinctive clatter of something, something hard striking something hard. And then an unbearable pain pierces my head as I feel angry prickles and ripples shooting from my back, burning my back. My head bangs against something hard and the world around me is lost in whirls of colour. The last thing I hear before giving into the darkness is the forceful beating of my heart and the crying out of my name.

Oh boy, cliffhanger O.o

Good read for sure ^_^ One little nitpick:

The last thing I hard before giving into the darkness was the forceful; beating of my heart.

Present tense works better here, in my opinion >_> And what's that semicolon doing there, anyway? O.o

Thanks Leotrak. Corrected it.

It turns out that writing in dead of the night is never helpful.

Shizune's bitchy attitude is quite something. Perhaps it's so bitchy that's why her route wasn't complete yet. *HINTS HINTS HINTS HINTS*

Damn first time i forgot to log in.
Now on with the reply:

I didn't plan it that way. To share a secret, the tap on the shoulder was first done by Lilly, though seeing as how big fan of L/H and H/H I am, I chamged it to Shozune.
Because i don't want to scar my beautiful thoughts of Lilly.

Reply.

P.S.: I will be really happy if people would review more. I feel like no one likes my story and I'm just troubling KS fans by writing and posting my story. If this continues maybe I will just leave it hanging seeing that newer stories get more reviews. Ouch, I'm being jealous.

My reply wasn't completely directed at you, but about the reviews there's only one advice I can tell you. Write and hope for nothing else.

This forum doesn't get a whole lot of traffic in the middle of the week. Give it time.

Indeed. I wrote a new fic two days ago and post in on two sites without a single review T_T. But the satisfaction of completing a story is way better.

I was never serious about what I wrote. Mayne i should have used a smilie. Or maybe my sense of humour is weird.

Xuan wrote:Indeed. I wrote a new fic two days ago and post in on two sites without a single review T_T. But the satisfaction of completing a story is way better.

Indeed. I am writing four other fanfics and I myself have gone through months with dry review list. It's the fan decision to write a fic. Oh, I'm feeling like a hypocrate now.

Read the next chap and if I, in any way, hurt your feeling, I'm terribly sorry. I didn't do it intentionally, so sorry again.

CHERRY BLOSSOM
CHAPTER — 5


I feel groggy. There is a soft buzzing in my head. I try to open my eyes and my eyelids resists. It’s the same feeling one experiences after he has been drugged with anesthesia.

After what feels like summoning all of my strength, I manage to open my eyelids a crack. My vision is a little blurry, but I manage to make out that I’m not in my room. Beige walls are surrounding me and the bed feels odd, kind of hard yet soft. I shake my head trying to clear out the blurriness from my eyes. Needless to say, it didn’t help.

Through my blurry vision I see that I am all alone.

After some moments of aimless staring, my eyes manage to comeback in focus. I can now clearly see the window. The white curtains are still drawn, but they are not illuminated by light. I guess it means it is night. Now I notice this, I can also hear the faint rustling of branches and chirpings of insect. I can also hear the tapping of footsteps in the deadly silence and the dripping of faucet. The light in my room is very dim. It looks like a scene directly taken from a horror film.

I smile to myself and lean against my bed, pressing my back of the head and back in the mattress as I stare at the ceiling. There seems to be no immediate pain in my body but still some part of my body especially my back feels a little sore and itchy. Except it I feel completely fine.

Time continues to trickle away at snail crawl. I glance at the clock and groan. Surely more than three minutes have passed since the last time I glanced at the clock. But the clock seems to tell me a completely different story.

I snap my eyes shut and force my head to get clear from every thought. It doesn’t help; I just lay there, on the mattress, me eyes snapped shut as I try to induce sleep on myself. What a pathetic life!

I open my eyes tentatively and once again look at the clock. I don’t know how I should react. Fifteen minutes have passed since the last time I saw the clock, but I feel like hours should have passed.

I slowly get up from the bed and head towards the window. I pull the curtains away and with a soft push I open up the window. I poke my head out and look upstairs in the night sky. The beautiful night sky, which I have been accustomed to admire here, is different tonight.

Stars usually flank the night sky here, but today they have taken residence under large grey clouds. Moon has hidden itself in a group of clouds, and its shine is creeping through the cracks in the clouds, which gives of a eerie feeling. Everything today around me is disturbingly eerie. It’s making me feel like I have just landed in a horror movie.

But nevertheless the sky today is beautiful. Not elegantly beautiful, but there’s just something, something that I can’t name. The slow breezing clouds, the hide and seek of stars, gentle moonshine, all of it gives me a calming feeling.

A silent wind breeze around, ruffling my hairs in the process. As the cold wind hits my face I’m mesmerised by its smell. It carries a faint hint of the smell of moist sand and of trees. It fixes me on my spot as I continue to savour the perks of nature.

I hear a creak of opening of a door. I don’t bother to turn around, instead continuing to taste the wind with my nose.

“Hisao,” the head nurse voice comes drifting in the silence towards me, “you are awake.” It is more of a statement than I question and for one second I thought of replying sarcastically. I quickly dump the idea and instead turn my head to look at him and I nod a little. Then I turn my attention back toward the night sky, ignoring him completely in the process.

He doesn’t seem to mind. I hear the sound of footfalls coming closer to me and soon I could sense his body closer to mine.

“You will catch cold,” he says plainly.

“It will be worth it,” I reply as I continue to look at the night sky.

“Is it so?” he asks me and stands besides me, looking out of the window himself. He too, like me, is mesmerised by the beauty of the night sky.

“It looks like it will rain,” he comments. I don’t care about it; I never have a problem with rain.

“Not a trouble, at least not for me,” I reply back.

He turns around sharply, as I have said something wrong. He looks me over from head to toe and I suddenly feel cold. I glance at the clothes I’m wearing. Green hospital pyjamas. Of course I will feel cold in this thin clothing.

I quickly make a beeline toward the bed. I flop on it and pull the blankets up, wrapping my body securely in it.

“How are you feeling?” the head nurse asks me, as he glance at the clipboard which has just materlised in his hand out of thin air.

“Fine,’ I reply automatically and the head nurse raises a skeptical eyebrow, “but a little soar and itchy around my back. And there is a soft buzzing in my head.” I finish with a defeated sigh.

The head nurse nod, and says, “It is to be excepted. That was quiet a trip down the stairs you thought of having.”

“I didn’t fancy it,” I reply, feeling a little indignant.

“And still you do such a daring task,” the head nurse replies. He says the word ‘daring’ with a bit of disdain like it is the most inappropriate thing in the world.

“I didn’t do it,” I say, “It just sort of happened automatically. And no one can control everything in his life. And anyway it was just a small fall.”

“Small?” he says, looking as the word has revolted him somehow, “You came very close to a second heart attack. I mentioned clearly to you, any stress on your heart in your condition can have very disastrous result. Or did you not understand that simple statement.”

The head nurse today is being very shirty, suspiciously shirty. It is not my fault after all, Shizune has just sacred me out of me wits. As much as I am embarrassed by the fact, I will not hesitate to use it as my shield because I don’t fancy listening to the head nurse rambling for hours.

“It’s not my fault,” I say, “I just got scared by something and took some step backs and tripped down the stairs.”

The words sounded worst than what they sounded in my mind. My life is something; heart attack because of a girl told me she likes me and a fall down the stairs because a girl glared at me. I don’t even want to know how my life is going out to turn out.

I glance at the head nurse. He is looking at me expectantly, looking like he wants me to elaborate more. But I won’t cause myself further humiliation. So, I keep quiet, purposely looking away from him.

After some moment silence, the head nurse says, “Okay. But do try to be on your guard. You can’t afford such kind of events, if you want to live.”

Blunt. Blunt as an axe. Couldn’t he say that line more subtly, so that it don’t scare me. It’s not that I don’t know, but hearing it from someone other’s mouth; it feels a little more depressing.

“Okay, I will try,” I reply, turning my face to look at him.

“Try?” he asks me, his eyebrows raised. He looks angry, impatient and frustrated.

“Yes, try,” I reply, “I can’t just control everything that happens around me. All I can do is try to come unscathed from the event.”

The head nurse seemed to understand my prospective as he nods and starts to head out of the room. Well, it was surprisingly short.

Suddenly a question pops in my head.

“Wait,” I call to his retreating back. He stops, and turns around, looking weary.

“What?” he asks me as he start to walk toward me.

“When will I be discharged?” I ask him, suddenly feeling very lonely in the empty hospital ward.

“Soon,” he mumbles and glances at the clipboard, “After a brief check up tomorrow, you will be free to go. And if we time it correctly, we can complete it before lunch.”

I look of utter disbelief cross my face. What the check up will comprise of to take the full morning. The head nurse seems to understand my panic, as he says,

“It will be a short test. Five to ten minutes at the longest. It’s just that there are some other students who need the medical facilities.”

I nod, suddenly remembering that I’m in Yamaku. There are many students here and all of them are disabled in a way. So, of course they will need the medical facilities, maybe more urgently than me.

I sigh and hear the faint thump of closing of a door. Once again I’m left alone. So, I once again try to fall asleep, but it is to no avail. Even the ticking of the clock and the rustling of the tree branches are breaking my attempts at sleep.

I glance at the clock. It shows two o’clock. Having nothing better to do, I start to think about useless things.

Then suddenly a thought pops in my head. What was the head nurse doing here in the dead of the night? Shouldn’t he be dead asleep in his bed?

Maybe it is the duty of the head nurse to be around 24X7. But how can one person survive without sleep. He must have been here because of some other reason.

Maybe I am the reason, though I doubt it somehow. Maybe he was just going back and thought of checking on me. Yes, that fit perfectly well.

I sigh again and I get up from the bed. I drape the blanket around my shoulder and prowl around the empty room. But it turns out that seeing well in the darkness isn’t my forte. So, I light up the night lamp on the table. The eerie yellow light it illuminates reminds me of a horror movie I saw once. The person who had designed the hospital wing must be a big time fan of horror movies.

The light from the lamp isn’t much, but it’s all I can manage right now. If I switch on the light, there are full chances that one of the staff members will come and push me back in bed. And in all honesty, walking around is a better option for me than laying on a bed looking like a chained victim of a mad doctor.

Hey, the horror theme of the hospital seems to getting on my head. I smile and squints my eyes, in a futile attempt to make out the things which are falling under the light of the lamp. But the light from the lamp is somehow darkening the objects on which it is falling. But I have no alternative and so I have to keep up with the darkening light of the lamp.

And I stride to the first thing that catches my eye. I can make out what it is, because it has been darkened by the light from the lamp. I touch it, feeling the circular built of it. The surface is smooth and curvy. It seems like it is a vase of some sort.

And I move on. I have lost all of my interest in finding out the truth about the darkened things. So, I start to just randomly snatch things from around and tossing them back, if they don’t satisfy my need, which to start with, I don’t know what will satisfy my need. But it is the only time pass I have.

I lift up a thing, which has a rectangular built. The cover seems to be made of something hard, and has a texture feel to it. One side of the thing is covered like the rest, but one side of it is completely open.

I immediately recognise this as a book. Excitement pumps through me and hurry off to the night lamp. The light it is illuminating is not enough, but I can surely manage. I read the title, ‘I’M NOT A KILLER’ and groan. The book is by a dunderhead whose name starts with Dr and ends with P. I once stumbled across it, and oh my god, it was so boring I feel asleep just after two pages. So maybe it can be my saviour in this lonely and alert night. Maybe it can help me fall asleep. I can only hope.

But there is just a little snag. I can’t sleep here, or the head nurse will have my head in the morning. But at the same time, I can’t read without a source of light. It is a dilemma. But my need to fall asleep is so profound that I decide to give it a shot. I will deal with the results later. Anyway, what’s life without a little risk?

The head of head nurse swarms in my view, but I mange to shake it away. If I can get a little sleep, I am very much happy to sleep here because I don’t fancy spending my night all alone, wandering from one to room to another.

So, I start reading the book. It’s boring; even when I have nothing better to do, my eyes refuse to read the text. What a waste of paper. This type of books should be banned.

After many unsuccessful attempts of reading it, I toss it back somewhere. It turns out that I have to wander the halls or just try to put myself in a forced slumber. Both of them don’t appeal to me, but I have no choice to start with.

I start walking toward my bed, remembering to turn off the lamp in the process. I’m not going outside because I don’t want to get scolded in the middle of night. I drop myself on my bed, turn around so my back is pressed on the mattress and stare straight up on the ceiling, trying to find something that will catch my interest.

* * * * * * * * * * *

I open my eyes. My vision is a little blurry, but I’m able to make out my surroundings. It’s not my room, and then with a snap I remember that I haven’t gone in my room yesterday. After that uneventful fall from the stairs, I’m stuck in the hospital, again. But hopefully, it will be very shorter this time.

But it was my good luck that I fell asleep. I don’t know how and frankly I don’t want to. I glance at the clock. Six o’clock. Early to do anything else except exercising and I’m pretty sure that the head nurse hadn’t mention going for exercising. So why bother.

But lying in the bed, all alone, quickly gets over my bed. So, I stand up from the bed and start walking around. The window is still open, maybe I didn’t bother to close it yesterday. Sunlight is pouring through it, and in the background I can hear the chirping of birds and the rustling of tree branches. It’s so different from the cities. There in the morning, all I got to hear was the coughing of exhaust and the hurling of engines. Here morning and as a matter of fact, rest of the day is quite peaceful.

I glance up at the sky. It is cloudy, maybe today will rain.

“Good morning Hisao,” a voice breaks my solitude.

I turn around and in the doorway stood Lilly and Hanako. I didn’t know they get up so early. It explains why Hanako comes early in the class.

“Good morning Lilly, Hanako,” I say to them and suddenly feel very conscious in the hospital pyjama.

“Are you all right?” Lilly asks me, as she folds her cane back. She then grabs Hanako arm.

“Yes, I suppose,” I reply, trying my best to jump back in the bed.

“You don’t sound convincing,” Lilly says, as Lilly and Hanako stops to stands in front of me. My conscious feeling turns into embarrassment, as I feel a red blush rising in my cheeks.

“No, no, I’m fine,” I reply and Lilly raise an eyebrow, “Just a little sore around my back.”

“You read,” Hanako says, and then stops. She seems to be contemplating the rest of the statement.

“Did you read the book I left here?” she completes, looking at me expectantly.

“What is the name of the book?” I ask her, as the night event catch up with me.

“Something ending by killer,” she replies, a thoughtful look on her face.

“You left that muck here,” I reply, without even thinking about what I’m going to say. It wasn’t a nice route to take.

Hanako’s face fell instantly and she stares at the floor with such intensity that if it have been a living thing, it would have squirm away under her gaze.

“I — I’m so—sorry,” Hanako says, fidgeting on her feet, “Yuuko said it was a new book. So I thought y—you wouldn’t have read it.”

“It’s okay,” I assure her, “But I read it once, while I was hospitalised. Couldn’t even read three pages.”

“Is it that—” Hanako starts with a smile on her face. I cut off her, mid sentence,

“Don’t even give me a opportunity to start. You won’t hear the end of it, not in this life anyway.”

Both of them smile. As soon as the conversation ends, a silence engulfs us and I’m again aware of my flimsy cloths. I make a subtle dash towards the bed and flop on it. I quickly stretch the blanket to my chest and heave out a sigh.

“Still Weak?” Lilly asks me.

“Nah,” I say, brushing it off with a wave of hand, “just a little sleepy. Couldn’t sleep yesterday.”

“Yes I understand,” Lilly replies and I have to use all of my self control to stop a snort. She didn’t know, hell, no one can, until they go through it.

“It was quite a fall,” she continues with her theory, “I can understand if it pained you last night. Your back was bruised and several small lumps rose from your skull.”

“Hey,” I protest and bring my hand to my head, in an attempt to find the mentioned lumps, “there are no lumps —” And I stop mid sentence. There are actually some lumps. Some of them are in the process of healing, but most of them have healed. I can just feel the slightly uneven skin, where a lump must have been.

Silence engulfs us.

“I guess,” I say, having had much of silence to last a lifetime, “there were some lumps; they just didn’t cause me any pain.”

“Hmm…” Lilly hums, a thoughtful expression on her face, “I guess the nurse did good work on you.”

I have to bite my tongue to stop a protest. Lilly makes me feel like I’m some sort of test subjects on which Yamaku hospital staff is experimenting.

“I guess,” I half lie and silence again engulfs me. It’s amazing how this room in the night looks like a scene taken from a horror movie. In the morning, it’s look like a common hospital ward.

“I guess we should be going,” Lilly says, motioning her head towards my general direction.

“I guess,” I say, though I scream in my head, ‘Why? There is still much time for the classes to start.’

I hear the creak of opening of a door. I glance at my ward’s door and my eyes freeze in my socket. This is going to be a very unfortunate morning.

Misha and Shizune stand in the doorway, completely still on their spot. They both are looking at Hanako and Lilly, whereas Hanako and Lilly are oblivious of the new arrival.

Maybe after noticing the strained silence, Lilly asks, “What happened?”

Hanako turns to the doorway at this and visibly shudders. She takes some step back and hides behind Lilly, her hand going to cover her scars. Maybe she is as uncomfortable as she was the first time I met her. She is just now comfortable around me and Lilly.

She whispers in Lilly ears, whose expression turns hard as soon as Hanako lips come closer to her ear. She turns around and looks disdainfully at the general direction of the door. This is going to turn ugly, very ugly indeed.

“Good morning Misha, Shizune,” I say, trying to be the peacemaker between both of the parties. But my interjection just turns the situation hard for the other four in the room.

“Good morning Hisao,” Misha replies, her usual cheerful self lost somewhere. Maybe she too has understood the graveness of the situation.

Shizune don’t sign anything; her glare is fixed on Lilly. The intensity of her gaze is so hard, that even dead would have jump from their coffins, so it is obvious that Lilly would feel it on her body. And as I glance at Lilly, it turns out that she is feeling it. Because she is now looking disdainfully at the pinpoint direction of Shizune face.

Oh, oh. I have to do something and fast, if I want these two to get out of here without creating a scene.

“Please leave,” I all but shout out, “I need to change. I will see you in the class.”

I half lie but I will do anything to get myself out of this situation. If looks could kill, we would have two corpses lying here, one of Shizune and second of Lilly. And they look ready to pounce at each other, or whatever the girls do to resolve these kinds of matters.

All of their heads whips in my direction and I skid back on the mattress. Hanako and Misha looks relieved whereas Lilly and Shizune looks accusingly at me, like I am the reason of their enmity.

Time trickles away, but Shizune and Lilly don’t stop glaring at me. Having much of this awkward position, I nearly shout,

“I need to change. Get out.”

With an angry huff of air Shizune turns around and storm out of the room. Misha looks apologetically at me and follow after Shizune.

I look at Lilly, who don’t look pleased. She will have to bear with it, I had absolutely no choice because I don’t fancy getting my head stream rolled in the morning.

Lilly motions her head to Hanako, who smiles at me. At least someone is happy.

They both leave the room, leaving me alone to dwell in my misery.

Process to bad end, loading, loading!

Xuan wrote:Process to bad end, loading, loading!

Hanako path is still open

I have to say I didn't like this fic as much as others on this forums.
The main reason for that is the way you handle Hisao, the protagonist...
Yes, Hisao is a bit shy, but the in your story, he beats Hanako at her own game - and I'm not talking about chess
The reader is supposed to be able to identify with the protagonist of a story, and it's a bit hard to do that if you go facepalm everytime he opens his mouth. If this were a VN, I'd guss he always picks the option that will antagonize the greatest possible number of people - like Xuan said, it's like he is trying for the Bad Ending...

Another thing is the sheer amount of inner monologue. The beginning of Chapter 4 is an example. It is several pages worth of text where nothing much happens at all. It would probably be a good idea to keep such passages a bit shorter.

Oh, and while I'm rereading Chapter 4:

“Have you eaten your lunch?” she asks me. I shake my head in response, feeling confused.
“Come and we may have food for you,” Lilly said...(INNER MONOLOGUE)...
Not wanting to give her a time to back out, I nod.

By now Hisao should probably remember that Lilly is blind...

Chapter 3 is a bit heavy on grammar mistakes, probably because you rewrote it from 3rd to 1st person. The other Chapters are better, but if you need a proofreader, I'd be glad to help out.

One more thing: Do you already know where your story is going? So far, I get the feeling you are writing without a definite goal in your mind. That's not necessarily a bad thing, but if you're aiming for some sort of conclusion - romantic, tragic or otherwise - you should probably start thinking about it by now, and work towards it. Else it will seem rushed by the time you get there.

This may seem like a lot of critique, but I do by no means think your story is a bad one. (I've read worse by professional authors, whom I had to pay money for their stories.)
You wrote that your fic was supposed to be angsty, and of course you can write it that way. It's just that if you overdo it, it probably won't appeal to a majority of readers.