The next few days in the music room were a fragile, terrifying revelation. Practice was less about creating a perfect product and more about demolition. Ren was relentless. He would stop me mid-phrase, telling me I sounded "too clean," "too plastic." He made me sing the same line over and over, not to perfect it, but to break it, to force me to find the raw, ugly feeling underneath the polished notes. Kaito and Mio watched, their initial hostility slowly morphing into a kind of grudging respect. I wasn't the ghost anymore. I was a novice, and they were watching me learn to walk.
I left the club room late one afternoon, my throat hoarse and my head buzzing with music. The others had left a few minutes before me. I decided to take the long way home, along the sea wall, wanting to hold on to the strange, new feeling of exhausted accomplishment for just a little longer.
The setting sun cast a golden light over the water, and the air was cool and salty. For a moment, everything was peaceful. But as I rounded a bend, a prickle of unease traced its way up my spine. The feeling of being watched. It was different from the usual whispers and stares. This was heavier. More focused.
I glanced over my shoulder. Three boys were trailing about fifty feet behind me. They were third-years, I recognized them from the hallways. They were the kind of boys who walked in a tight, loud pack, their uniforms artfully disheveled. I'd caught them staring at me before, their gazes lingering in a way that made my skin crawl. It wasn't the curious appraisal of my classmates; it was a hungry, predatory assessment.
My heart began to beat faster. I picked up my pace, my sneakers slapping against the pavement. Their footsteps sped up behind me, a mocking echo of my own. I told myself I was being paranoid. This was a safe, quiet town.
I turned off the main path, ducking into a narrow side street that I knew was a shortcut. It was a mistake. The alley was hemmed in by the high walls of old houses, the evening light cut off, plunging me into shadow.
Before I could make it to the other end, they were there, blocking the exit. The leader, a tall boy with a cruel, handsome face, stepped forward, a lazy, confident smirk on his lips.
"In a hurry, transfer student?" he asked, his voice dripping with a false sweetness.
I stopped, my school bag clutched to my chest like a shield. My mind went blank with a white-hot panic. The Hoshiko training had prepared me for obsessive fans and aggressive paparazzi. It had not prepared me for this.
"I have to get home," I said, my voice small.
"We saw you at the club," one of his friends chimed in, leering. "You think you're some kind of rock star? Too good to talk to anyone?"
The leader took another step closer. I was backed against the rough, concrete wall. He was close enough now that I could smell the cheap cologne coming off him. He placed a hand on the wall next to my head, trapping me. "You know, we just want to be friendly," he purred. "You should be more grateful for the attention. I want you to want me."
His other hand came up, reaching for a strand of my hair. My entire body went rigid. A scream was trapped in my throat, a silent, useless thing. This couldn't be happening. Not here. Not in my safe, quiet world.
He pinned my shoulder to the wall, his face just inches from mine. "Come on. Don't be like that—"
"Get your hand off her."
The voice was low, flat, and utterly devoid of emotion. It cut through the tense air of the alley like a shard of ice.
The boy holding me froze. We all turned.
Ren Takanashi was standing at the entrance to the alley, his school bag slung over one shoulder. He wasn't breathing heavily; he didn't look angry. He just looked... bored. But there was a coiled stillness in the way he stood, a dangerous energy that was far more intimidating than any overt threat.
The leader scoffed, though he did take a step back from me. "Well, if it isn't Takanashi. What are you gonna do? Write a sad song about us?"
Ren didn't answer. He just took one slow, deliberate step into the alley. His eyes, dark and unreadable, were fixed on the boy who had touched me. He didn't look at me. He didn't acknowledge my presence at all. It was as if he was dealing with a pest, a piece of trash that needed to be cleaned up.
The third-years exchanged a nervous glance. Ren's reputation, the one Yui had whispered about, was a palpable thing in the narrow space. He was a known quantity. A problem.
"Tch. Whatever," the leader finally spat, trying to salvage some of his pride. "We were just leaving anyway. She's not worth the trouble."
They pushed past him and disappeared down the street, their bravado evaporating into the evening air.
I was left alone in the alley with my saviour. I sagged against the wall, my legs shaking so badly I thought I would collapse. The adrenaline drained out of me, leaving a cold, nauseating terror in its wake.
Ren still didn't say anything. He walked over, picked up my school bag which I had dropped, and held it out to me. His face was a blank mask. No kindness, no concern. Just an impenetrable, silent presence.
I took the bag, our fingers brushing for a fraction of a second. The contact was like an electric shock.
"Let's go," he said, his voice still flat. "It's getting dark."
He turned and started walking out of the alley, not waiting to see if I would follow.
My legs felt like they were made of string, but I forced them to move, scrambling to follow the dark, silent shape of Ren Takanashi as he walked out of the alley. He didn't slow down, didn't look back to see if I was keeping up. It was clear this was not an escort; he was simply leaving, and I happened to be going in the same direction.
We walked in a heavy, suffocating silence for what felt like an eternity. The only sounds were our footsteps on the pavement and the distant, cheerful noise of the town settling in for the evening—a dog barking, the clatter of dishes from an open window. The contrast between that peaceful, domestic world and the cold, lingering terror in my veins was a physical ache.
I had to say something. The silence was too loud, too full of my pathetic, trembling gratitude. I took a breath that felt like I was inhaling sand.
"Thank you," I whispered. The words were barely audible, snatched away by the sea breeze.
Ren stopped walking. He didn't turn around, just stood there for a moment, his back to me. When he finally spoke, his voice was as flat and cold as it had been in the alley.
"You're a nuisance."
The word hit me with the force of a slap. Not cruel, not angry, just a simple, blunt assessment. A problem. A piece of trash that needed to be cleaned up. The shame was so intense it almost buckled my knees. He was right. I had brought my chaos to this quiet place, and he had been forced to deal with it.
"Don't take shortcuts," he continued, finally turning to look at me, his expression unreadable in the deepening twilight. "And stop walking around with your head in the clouds. This isn't Tokyo."
He started walking again, and I followed, my head bowed. We reached an intersection. The main road, the one I usually took, led straight ahead. But Ren stopped and pointed down a narrow, uninviting path to the right. It was little more than a set of worn stone steps disappearing into the overgrown space between two old houses.
"This way is safer," he said. "It lets out on the road behind the Tanaka's place. Fewer people."
He had noticed where I lived. The thought sent another strange, unsettling jolt through me.
He looked down the main road, then back at me. "You'll be fine from here." He adjusted the strap of his bag.
"Aren't you... going home?" I asked, the question slipping out before I could stop it.
A flicker of something—annoyance?—crossed his face. "I have work," he said simply.
The word hung in the air. Work? A high school student with a job that started after club practice? It was another piece of his puzzle, a piece that made no sense with the others.
Without another word, without a goodbye, he turned and walked away down the main road, leaving me standing at the mouth of the hidden path. I watched until his silhouette was swallowed by the darkness.
I stood there for a long time, the word nuisance echoing in my ears, a strange counterpoint to the fact that he had just gone out of his way to show me a safer path home. He saved me, insulted me, and then gave me a clue to his own mystery, all in the span of five minutes.
I finally turned and took the first step onto the hidden path. The stones were cool and solid under my feet. He was a wall, a strange and impenetrable one who had appeared out of nowhere to stand between me and the ugliness of the world. After all the fake smiles and empty praise, his blunt, unvarnished presence felt like the only real thing I had encountered in a very long time.
I was broken. I had known this for a long time. But I was beginning to understand that the broken parts of me were not just the sadness or the fear; it was my fundamental understanding of other people. My entire life had been a series of transactions. I performed, and in return, I received applause, money, or Ryouko's conditional, temporary approval. Kindness was a currency used to purchase future compliance.
But Ren Takanashi didn't fit the algorithm. He saved me, an act of kindness. Then he called me a nuisance, an act of contempt. Then he showed me a safe path home, another act of kindness. The data points were a contradiction, a paradox that my mind, so used to clear directives and predictable outcomes, kept turning over and over. It was a new kind of obsession, a mystery that completely eclipsed the fear of the previous night.
I found myself watching him all morning. He was the same as ever: a void by the window, occasionally roused from a near-slumber to jot down a note before retreating back into his own world.
People help you, you thank them.
The thought was a line from a television drama I'd once seen. It was a social rule, a piece of code for the game of human interaction that everyone else seemed to know instinctively. The "thank you" I'd whispered in the street felt insufficient. I had to perform the action correctly.
During the lunch break, while Emi and Yui were debating the merits of going to the rooftop, I slipped away to the school co-op. I stood in front of the shelves of bread and snacks, my heart hammering. What was the correct thank-you food? I bought a melon bread—it seemed safe, popular—and a can of black coffee, remembering the one he'd been holding in the hallway.
My return to the classroom was a solo mission into enemy territory. A few students were still there, eating at their desks. Ren was, predictably, asleep, his head pillowed on his arms. The first rule of Class 2-B, a rule I had learned through observation, was: you do not wake Takanashi-kun.
Ignoring the curious stares of the other students, I walked over to his desk. I stood there for a moment, my shadow falling over him. "Takanashi-kun," I whispered. No response. I reached out and gently prodded his shoulder. It was like touching a stone. "Takanashi-kun," I said, a little louder this time. "I brought you something."
A girl in the front row gasped. A boy snickered. Still, he didn't move. A part of me, the old Hoshiko part, was professionally insulted. No one had ever ignored me so completely. Defeated, I placed the melon bread and the can of coffee on the corner of his desk, a small, pathetic offering to an indifferent god.
The rest of the lunch period was a blur. My friends asked me what that was all about, their faces a mixture of shock and amusement. I just mumbled something about him loaning me a book.
After lunch was PE. As we changed into our gym clothes—standard blue shorts and a white t-shirt—I caught my reflection in the locker room mirror. My body was a tool, honed by years of dance practice. It was lean and strong in a way that had nothing to do with normal teenage fitness.
Today was volleyball. As soon as the game started, the muscle memory took over. My movements were efficient, precise. When the ball came to me, I didn't think; I just moved. I dove for a save, my body hitting the polished floor and rolling back up in one fluid motion. I jumped for a spike, my timing perfect, sending the ball rocketing over the net to a place no one could reach.
I was aware of the shift in the atmosphere. The game, which had been a clumsy, cheerful affair, had suddenly become a showcase. The boys on both teams were staring, their mouths slightly agape. I could hear them muttering between points. Her reflexes are insane.Did you see that jump? It was the same old story. My features, my abilities, the product on display.
After scoring another point, I instinctively turned, my eyes scanning the sidelines where the students who were sitting out were supposed to be. I saw the expected reactions on the faces of the boys—awe, surprise, a dawning, hungry interest. And then my eyes found him.
He was there. Leaning against the far wall, away from everyone else.
And he was fast asleep. His head was tilted back against the wall, his chest rising and falling in a slow, steady rhythm, completely oblivious to the spectacle, to the whispers, to me.
All the boys were watching me. But the only one I wanted to see me was the one who never did.
The final bell rang, shattering the strange, suspended moment in the gymnasium. The spell was broken. The boys who had been staring at me with slack-jawed awe suddenly remembered themselves, turning away with red faces. Ren, miraculously, stirred from his slumber against the wall, blinking slowly like he was emerging from a deep-sea dive. He saw nothing. He was oblivious. And that, for some reason, was the most infuriating thing of all.
I walked to the music room in a cold, controlled fury. The locker room had been a gauntlet of curious questions from Emi and a quiet, worried gaze from Yui, both of which I deflected with the practiced ease of a seasoned liar. But underneath the placid surface, a war was raging.
My mind, which for so long had been a barren landscape of fear and Ryouko's aphorisms, was now consumed by a single, useless variable: Ren Takanashi. His sleeping face. The way he ignored me. The way he saved me. The way he called me a nuisance. My thoughts were a tangled mess of contradictions, a chaotic static that was completely unproductive.
Why do I always think of a boy now?
The question was an accusation I leveled at myself as I pushed open the heavy door to the club room. Kaito and Mio were already there, tuning their instruments. Ren was plugging in his guitar, his back to me. The professional part of my brain, the part that Ryouko had built from the ground up, was screaming. This was an amateur's mistake. A rookie's error. Feelings were a liability. Feelings were a distraction from the work.
I walked over to the microphone stand, my movements stiff, precise. I would not be a nuisance today. I would not be a confused, flustered girl. I would be a vocalist. A tool. An instrument.
"Ready?" Ren asked without turning around, his voice a low rumble.
"Ready," I replied, my own voice coming out clipped and cool.
He started the song, the same dark, melancholic piece we'd been working on. The notes from his guitar were clean, precise, and filled with a feeling he never allowed to show on his face. Kaito and Mio came in, their rhythm tighter now, more confident.
It was my turn. I took a breath, not the shuddering gasp of the girl learning to sing, but the controlled, diaphragmatic intake of a professional. I opened my mouth, and Hoshiko's ghost stepped forward.
The notes were perfect. My pitch was flawless, my vibrato controlled, my phrasing precise. I sang the words of teenage loneliness and drowning stars not as if I felt them, but as if I were a world-class actor paid to portray them. I hit every mark. I didn't get lost in the sound; I commanded it. I poured all my frustration, all my confusion over him, into the performance, weaponizing it into a cold, technical perfection.
I was shutting him out, just as he shut me out. I was showing him that I didn't need his validation, that I didn't need him to see me. I was a machine built for this. It was a declaration of independence, a desperate attempt to regain control in the only way I knew how.
I closed my eyes, focusing on the sound, on the mechanics of my own voice. It was a familiar fortress, the one place where I was not a runaway, not a charity case, not a confused little girl with a crush. In here, I was a queen in a kingdom of my own making. It was a lonely, sterile kingdom, but it was safe. The work was all that mattered.
It's a bit hurt to say this, but I'm a performer.
And a performer has no time for the messy, unpredictable, and utterly terrifying business of caring about a boy who falls asleep in the middle of her life.