Chapter Text
You peel your eyes open to the dawn of a new day, tiredness scraping at them as they do any time you awaken. A deep groan leaves you and you force yourself to sit up before you can shut your eyes again, because you know if you do, you'll fall asleep and forget that you even had school.
The first thing that always comes to mind is your calendar. The date April 8th is next to be crossed off since that's today's date. The squeak of the marker on the plastic board indicates you need to get a new one soon. But that isn't half your troubles. You were too exhausted the night before and you wound up forgetting to sort your pills.
When you left your room, your foot skidded across the carpet; you forgot to get dressed. Your heart sinks with relief that you remembered to get dressed, sort of like your life depended on you remembering that. It sort of did. You couldn't afford to show up to school in your pajamas again.
Your eyes drift to the mound of clothes overflowing in your laundry basket that you keep telling yourself you're going to wash until the next minute it's dark and you're tired again. You remind yourself again that you should probably do that, though you probably won't.
You fling open your closet to see what's left of your apparel now that there's an entire two week's worth of it in your basket. You thankfully catch sight of a fresh uniform, which you hate especially while in your slum but you pull them out and dress yourself after stripping down to nothing but your undies. It's uneventful anyway, no need to go into much detail.
Your feet carry you over to the bathroom again and it causes you to take out your phone. How long did you spend getting dressed? In the haze of morning, you always seem to let the time pass you by too quickly. You forget how long you might've been staring off into space or how slowly you might've been going while dressing. Only a few minutes. You breathe another sigh of relief and pull out your pill holder.
Flip. Flip. Flip. And you open up three more after that, leaving out Monday since you'll just be taking Monday's pills anyway. You pull out two pill capsules and twist off the caps, putting one pill into each of the containers; one for depression, one for anxiety. After that, you take one of each and pour some water into a paper cup so you can swallow them. It tastes bitter on your tongue before they go down your throat.
You stare at yourself in the mirror for a good thirty seconds.
'What am I doing now...?' you think to yourself as your eyes flick over your face. You hate looking at yourself in the mirror but you find yourself doing it a lot.
Then you remember your unruly hair and your teeth and how you have to brush them so you do so promptly. But you check your phone again after that to make sure you haven't wasted too much time. You've still got fifteen minutes before you should probably be leaving to catch the train. You still need to put on your shoes and your bag. Do you have enough time to eat something? You'll probably just grab a couple pieces of toast before you go, but you don't like wasting time before you leave encase you take too long to get to the subway.
After getting on your shoes and getting on your bag, you lose your train of thought and end up forgetting to eat something before you leave. But you realize it about five minutes into your walk. You look back, you can still see your house from your current standpoint but it's too late to turn back now. You guess you'll just have to wait until you have a lunch break to actually eat something. But you're used to it so it doesn't bother you all that much.
You arrive at the train station, which is almost always crowded. The sounds of people walking and bustling fills your ears as you descend the stairs into the pool of cheap perfume and nameless faces. Your brain simply doesn't have the capacity to recognize the faces of people trying to get to work every day, or school like you.
You let the crowd of people carry you to your train and don't bother trying to shove through people since you know you'll just be shoved back anyway if you try and probably end up with some kind of broken bone. It happens.
Pulling out your phone again, you check the time and try to calculate the time it takes to get to school. A sigh of relief leaves you. You'll be on time.
Eventually you're pushed into the crowded train that takes you to Shujin Academy. You don't even bother trying to grab a free pole or handle and you know for sure all the seats have been taken, so you just stand awkwardly, drowning out the spokeswoman as she announces that this is the last call for boarding passengers and that the train will be departing shortly.
You pull out your phone again and tab through your apps and games to see if you have anything to do to pass the time but find nothing so you just put in an ear bud instead, hoping that will be somewhat better than all the chatter on the train.
It takes you twenty minutes to arrive at school and when at last you do, you almost glare menacingly at the building itself, like it's alive and might eat you if you're too docile toward it. It ends up eating you anyway since you have no choice but to walk inside. You don't have any friends to talk to, at least not this early in the morning, so you make way for the courtyard to sit until it's actually time to go to class. When it is, your day kind of fades together from there. But it stops when you make it to gym class. You hate it because your teacher actually acknowledges you as a human being and makes you do things your poor body can't even dream of doing.
Twenty laps around the entire gym is your warm up and you're in the volleyball unit so he makes your life and everyone else's a living hell.
Ann walks over to you with a warming smile, noticing you're trying to hide behind the bleachers today like usual. You'd like to find another spot to hide so that not even she will find you, but there's no other place out of sight from Kamoshida.
"Come on, (Y/n). I'm sure it won't be that bad today," she says but you know she's lying.
It's bad every time she says that, it's just what she says to get you to come out of hiding and you know you need that grade so you listen to her. And this time is no different so you roll your eyes and come out of hiding.
Ann is your only friend. She's nice but popular so you think that's the only reason she talks to you. You wish you were as pretty as she was and you try to ask her about her routine or how she gets her hair to look so nice. You do this far and few times in between so you both forget ever having the conversation. But when she does tell you, you remember you'd probably never have the time in the morning for all of that (unless you want to start getting up earlier, which you don't) or even the patience to do anything else that doesn't really require doing in the morning. So you're just sort of doomed to the five dollar shampoo and conditioner in your bathroom and the cheap soap that dries out your skin.
You care, but at the same time you don't enough to actually do anything about it so you don't complain much.
Soon it's your turn to start practice with Kamoshida. The first ball hits you in the forehead which usually happens to everyone who steps onto the other side of the net. But it doesn't make it any less embarrassing. Your face still reddens and the kids who actually know what they're doing still laugh at you.
You get hit a few more times before actually striking a few of the balls. Some go over the net, others fly far from it. Soon it's not your turn anymore and you slink out of the classroom since you know nothing else is going to happen for the rest of the class and you don't feel like watching anybody else get popped in the head by volleyballs.
You wander the hallways until you find a bathroom and stay there until it's time to go to your last class. But on your way there, you hear something strange hit your ears. It's coming from the adjacent hallway and you don't know why you decided to, but you walk over to check it out. When you turn the corner, you see Ann sitting against the floor with her legs hugged close to her chest and her head buried within them. You realize then that the sounds are coming from her. She's sobbing.
You're not really sure what to do so you kind of stand there silently for a few moments, nails digging into your clothed arm as you try to rack your brain for what to do in this kind of situation and you worry that you're unable to comfort your friend. How do you start? Do you lean down to hug her?
You don't. You speak first. "Ann? Are you all right?" She must not have heard you because she doesn't move or do anything to show she acknowledged your question. But then the thought that she actually did hear you crosses your mind and you get an awkward feeling in your belly. You don't know if you should turn and walk away or stay and try to find out why she's crying.
Your morality gets the best of you and you crouch down to tap her gently on the shoulder. This time she notices you and you're glad it hadn't just been that she ignored you the first time. "What's wrong?" you ask her.
She scrambles to wipe tears from her cheeks. "(F/n). I didn't even hear you."
You wait for her to answer your question without speaking, knowing if you don't, she'll eventually be forced to face it.
Ann gives you a sigh before placing her forehead back onto her knees. "It's just Kamoshida giving me a hard time, that's all," she answers softly like you knew she would.
Kamoshida gave everybody a hard time, even you. You figured after this much of the school year that maybe she would have gotten a grip on his behavior and would be able to hold in her tears. Ann was a strong-willed person too, so you deduce that there must be something else wrong.
"Are you sure?" Her breath pauses. It's such a simple question that you know her response must confirm your suspicions.
Ann's eyes flick toward a nearby clock and yours follow hers. "You should get to class. You don't wanna be late, right?" She was definitely avoiding the subject.
You hate it when people pry (whenever they do), so you figure maybe Ann is the same way and nod your head. You move from your crouched position, sending a quick wave her way before heading toward your class. It's just thirty seconds before the bell rings and you're relieved you end up making it in time.
It's a study hall, so there's a lot of talking all class long. You put in an earbud and play some games on your phone. But there's just one conversation piece that keeps getting tossed around which distracts you from playing your games. It's the words "transfer student". It confuses you because why the Hell would there be a transfer student so late in the year? Why not just wait until the next year starts?
You've never been put in a situation where you've had to be a transfer student so you don't really know what circumstances would put you there. You don't spend all that much time thinking about it though.
The study hall ends and you feel like you've just walked through a portal, because now it seems like everybody you pass is talking about this transfer student. Maybe you didn't realize it during the earlier parts of your day, but now you really didn't have a choice. You had nothing to listen to because your phone battery had drained to nothing while playing games with it.
You're relieved when you get back on the train to go home because now the sound of about a hundred other people who don't go to the school are drowning out the chatter of the ones that do. Even if you can't listen to music, you still find watching out the windows of the train to be a lot more enjoyable than listening to mundane conversation.
Soon you're home and you toss aside your bag when you set foot into your bedroom. Your medicine has worn off by now and you're left feeling drowsy. Homework will have to wait, you tell yourself as you proceed to be enveloped by the warmth of your blankets. Hours later, you're awake at 3 AM. You anticipate morning since you can't fall asleep again.