I head back to my room and try to take a nap, but only end up laying in my bed for an hour or so. It's nice to have time to myself, but after a while I feel like I'm being unproductive. I consider doing some homework, but a quick glance at the first piece of paper in my pile of unfinished work reveals that I have no idea how to do it. Oh well.
Even though I'm not going to start running until later, I may as well head down to the track now, since I apparently have nothing to do. I change into some random running clothes and head out into the afternoon sun. It's strange, I've spent so much time fantasizing about being out of class at this time of day, but I've never really thought about what I'd do. I guess I could go into town somewhere, but having already eaten lunch, and with nobody accompanying me, there aren't really that many places to go.
So I find myself at the track, sitting on the bleachers and staring at the trees surrounding the track. Normally a few kids would be playing soccer on the field in the middle of the track, but they're probably still in class at the moment. Class… I hope I haven’t fallen too far behind, though if I have, it’s certainly not just because I missed today. I really shouldn’t be worried, though; I’ll just go through Suzu’s notes some time tomorrow.
After a fairly long time spent staring at the few lonely clouds in the sky, the bell for the end of school rings, and a short while later the first few students begin to spread out onto the campus. Eventually the group that usually plays soccer trickles onto the field. I guess that this is about when I would normally have finished changing and walking out here, so I get off the bleachers and begin stretching.
After pulling each arm and leg every which way, I jump up and down to make sure that I’m fully stretched, then head out onto the track. I’m a little worried that my legs will be worn out from my unscheduled run last night, but they hold up pretty well, which is a good sign, I guess. As I round the final corner and cross through the line where I started, I make a mental note that I’ve completed the first lap. It’s not super important that I count how many laps that I do, but it helps me feel like I’m making progress.
It can’t keep me totally occupied, though, and soon my mind starts wandering. It was strange earlier, realizing that I had nothing to do. I guess it was just because everyone else was in class; usually I’d hang out with Suzu or someone, maybe talk to anyone from the running team who wasn’t already out on the track, but without any of my friends around, I was kind of lost for what to do.
Speaking of friends, I wonder how cooldown laps with Hisao are going to go. I know that he said the nurse recommended walking as exercise, but how much? Could I push him too far?
Nah, he’d probably tell me. Besides, he walked around with me a fair bit at the festival, and he seemed okay there, so I doubt he’ll have any issues.
Speak of the devil, as I round the next corner I see Hisao making his way down onto the bleachers by the track, so I start jogging over to him, and call “Hisao!”
I guess he hadn’t noticed me yet, because he seems startled at someone calling his name, but as soon as he recognizes me approaching him, he waves.
As I get to where he’s sat, I raise one eyebrow. “You’re a bit early, aren’t you?”
“Yeah, it’s just that once I finished my homework I realized that I had nothing to do, so I came down here.”
“Oh. Well I’ve still got some running to do, but once I finish I’ll come over and get you, okay?”
“Sounds good.” The promise of returning later complete, I head off to run again. As I pass through the line on the track I started from, I add to my mental lap counter. That’s, uh… That’s…
Damnit.
Oh well, I’ll just have to go without a count on this one. It would be easy to blame it on stopping to talk to Hisao, but thinking back, I actually can’t remember the last time I took count of finishing a lap, besides my first one. I guess I just had too much stuff on my mind to keep track. Speaking of which, as I round another curve, Hisao comes into view again, though this time he’s focused on the soccer game being played on the field. His stare is kind of blank, but wistful, almost like he wants to join in. It takes me a second to realize, though, that he probably can’t.
Wow, that’s… That’s kind of sad. I feel sorry for him now. Another lap passes, and his attention to the students out on the field hasn’t faltered. I decide that, rather than make him sit there and wait, I’ll just finish up running now. I was getting kind of tired anyways.
He notices me walking over to him, and raises an eyebrow. “Finished already?”
“Yeah, I’m just feeling a bit tired today, so I’m stopping early. Are you ready?”
“I guess so.” He tugs on his purple shirt, showing that he’s dressed for exercise, and then hops off of the bleachers, landing next to me. “Lead the way.”
I walk out onto the track, up to the all-too-familiar starting line, and once I check that Hisao is standing next to me, begin walking out onto the track. The first few steps are fine, but after a few meters, I have to concentrate in order to keep myself from running. It’s just so instinctual to be going my fastest here… Luckily, Hisao seems content with our pace, so I try to focus on him.
It’s only once we reach the first bend that I realize that both of us have been completely silent this whole time. Hisao’s busy staring at the sky, and I’m busy trying to keep myself from sprinting away from him.
Still no words have passed between us by the time we complete our first painfully slow circuit. “One,” I say out loud, determined not to lose count this time.
Hisao looks over at me, as though he’s surprised that I’m still here. “One what?”
“One lap.”
“Oh.” He thinks a bit. “How many do we have to do?”
“I don’t know. I’d say 10 is our stretch goal, but whatever we can do should be good enough.”
“Okay.”
We go back to silently walking, and halfway through the second lap, I’m growing surer and surer that this was a bad idea. Hisao’s not a talkative guy, why would I rely on him for conversation?
I sigh, and Hisao hears it. I’m on the verge of telling him that he might as well go when he gasps in realization.
“What’s up?”
“I just remembered that I had something to ask you earlier, at lunch.”
Right, when he was about to say something but didn’t. “What is it?”
“I was going to ask why you couldn’t come to class for the second half of the day.”
Oh. “Well, basically, if I showed up then Mutou would ask me where I was for the first half of the day. If I told him anything too mild, he wouldn’t accept it as an excuse, and if I told him anything too drastic, he’d wonder why it didn’t keep me from coming in for the second half of the day.”
“I guess that makes sense.” He pauses a bit. “So why were you out, anyways?”
“I just couldn’t get to sleep last night, and woke up this morning feeling horrible. I was so tired that I basically slept in all morning, and woke up when the bell rang for lunch.”
“Oh… So, like, insomnia?” Not at all, but I guess this is the best excuse I have.
“Yeah, pretty much. Just tossing and turning, trying to get to sleep.” I mean, technically…
“Okay.”
He goes quiet again, but something from earlier is still bugging me. “So why didn’t you ask me at lunch?”
“Huh?”
“You said that you were going to ask me why I couldn’t go in for the rest of the day, but you stopped yourself. Why?”
He makes a nervous grin. “Well, I wanted to know, but then I remembered yesterday, when you were about to ask me about doing this walking.” His expression grows a lot sadder, and he stares at his feet. “I felt so nervous, just to have you mention my condition when people were listening.” He looks back up at me, eyes a bit brighter. “But you noticed, and you stopped, and I was really grateful that you did. I figured that I had no right to bring up what could be a personal issue of yours when you had tried so hard to avoid doing it to me.”
I giggle a bit. “Well, your thoughtfulness is appreciated, but I wouldn’t worry about it from now on. Not all of us can hide our disabilities like you, you know.” I nudge him with my left elbow for emphasis, and he chuckles a little, but is still a bit sad at the mention of his condition. “Speaking of which, were you ever a soccer player?”
He’s taken aback. “Y-Yeah… How did you know?”
“I saw you staring at those kids playing. You seemed pretty down about it.”
“Oh, that. No, I wasn’t really down, just… Nostalgic, I guess. I used to play with my friends back at my old school, but never seriously, just pickup games and the like.”
“And your heart didn’t stop you from playing?”
“Well, actually, at that point, I didn’t even know that I had arrhythmia.”
“Really?”
“Yeah, I didn’t find out until this past winter.”
“How could you not know? Didn’t it affect you?”
“Well, yeah, but nothing that abnormal ever happened until my first heart attack.” He sighs. “They said it was a miracle that it hadn’t happened sooner.”
“Oh.” I’m not quite sure how to respond to that, so we’re both silent for the next two laps. His ‘first heart attack’… Did he have more? What were they like? He probably doesn’t want to talk about it, but I can’t contain my curiosity. As I look over at him to ask, though, I notice that he’s breathing pretty heavily. I stop, and he stops next to me, hunching over. “Hey, you okay?”
“Yeah, just…” He gasps, “Just a little winded.” After a few more labored breaths he adds, “But we can keep going, if you want.”
“Are you kidding? You look like you’re about to pass out.” He glares dejectedly at the ground. “Besides, I’m probably cooled down enough. After all, we did… Uh…” I realize that my deep thoughts have again caused me to lose count of how many laps I've done. “We did enough laps.”
“Seven,” says Hisao, looking a little better having been stopped for a while. “Seven laps.”
“Oh! Well that’s more than enough. I was willing to stop after 5, to be honest.” We both walk over to the side of the track, by which point Hisao seems to have regained his breath, for the most part. “Well, I guess I’ll see you tomorrow.”
He raises his eyebrows hopefully. “You’ll be in class again, right?”
“Yeah, I guess. I’m going to get to sleep early tonight, just in case.” There’s really no telling whether or not I’ll be up again tonight, to be honest. Sometimes my phantom pains are a one-day thing, and sometimes they keep me up every night for a week, though I guess that only happened once. Either way, better safe than sorry. As much as staying out of school was nice, I do need to actually keep up with the material, at least enough to pass tests.
Hisao smiles, a nice change given how down he looked when he was talking about his heart. “Great, I’ll see you tomorrow morning, then!”
With that he’s off, and I head back to my room, determined to be rested for tomorrow.
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