Chapter Text
“Have you heard the rumor?”
“They say, on the third floor of the old school building, in the last stall of the boy’s bathroom, you can find Hanako-Kun!”
“Apparently, he’s a ghost. Knock three times, and say his name, then he’ll grant whatever wish you have! But…”
“It comes with a cost…”
“The price of your wish is equal to the wish itself… so be careful!”
Amane rolled his eyes as he listened to his brother spin another folk tale.
“Seriously Tsukasa, believe that stuff?”
Tsukasa didn’t seem diminished, he just grinned nodding his head and bouncing on the tips of his toes. The classmates around them in their first-period English class seemed slightly perturbed by Tsukasa’s obnoxious enthusiasm, however, despite most of them already leaving or packing up their things for the end of the class.
Tsukasa didn’t mind, he just kept that catlike grin as Amane sighed and shook his head.
“Tsu’ you can’t just listen to everything you read online, remember the ‘microwave incident’?”
Amane shuddered, thinking of the time when Tsukasa had watched a video online somewhere about charging your phone in the microwave. His genius little brother decided to test it on Amane’s phone of course.
Suffice it to say Amane needed a new phone and the pair were banned from the kitchen for a month after that.
“Awe c’mooon~! This is different, I heard it from an upperclassman!”
Amane looked at him incredulously, since when was his brother hanging out with upperclassmen?
“Yeah? And I’m the king of France.”
He said sarcastically, picking up his backpack and making his way toward the door. Although he knew that Tsukasa was more popular than Amane had ever been, he always wished he could have the same confidence and charisma. Still, he doubted Tsukasa’s story.
“But- but it’s the truth! He came up to me in the library and told me aaaaalll about the supernatural stuff at the school!”
Tsukasa chased after Amane, his backpack splayed open and dropping homework and various other papers that Tsukasa had to catch while walking.
“Mhm,” Amane replied, eyes half-lidded as he reached his locker and began replacing his textbooks with ones he’d need in the next class.
“I dunno his name, but he said he’d tell me more about it if I wanted to know!”
“Great,”
“Isn’t that cool?”
“Yup,”
“Amane are you listening?”
“Mhm,”
Amane was suddenly jolted by his brother grabbing his shoulders, a frustrated look on Tsukasa’s face.
“Amane! I’m talking to you! Stop ignoring me!”
Amane sighed, pushing his arms off of him. “Sorry Tsu’ I’m just busy—“ he clenched his teeth, his resentment for his boisterous twin growing.
“I gotta get to class.” He said as he turned in the direction of his second-period math class. As Amane walked, he heard Tsukasa’s disappointed farewell, muffled by the everyday bustle of the other students in the hallway.
Amane stared down at the ground as he walked. Sometimes he wished that in crowds like these, of classmates he’d been with for nearly two years, he didn’t feel so alone.
Amane never had real friends. Tsukasa had friends, lots of them, and Amane always knew Tsukasa’s friends. But they weren’t his. Amane was just an accessory to his brother, the other twin, or a cool thing about Tsukasa that most people stopped caring about after a few days.
No- Amane seemed to attract more bullies than friends. People saw he was weak, weird, and unlike his brother, socially inept, which meant he was the perfect target.
Suddenly the bell rang. Amane’s feet, which had slowed to a snail’s pace, suddenly kicked back into high gear and he made a B-line for his class.
If there was one thing he could do right today, it was to (hopefully) learn something.
That’s what school’s all about, right?
——————
The second period whizzed by much easier than the first. Amane always had a knack for math and science. His brain was all analytics, and his brother always teased him for “not having an imagination”. But it’s not like Amane could help it.
Amane subscribed to the facts, ghosts, demons, all those supernaturals his brother so enthusiastically believed in simply weren’t real. They clashed too much with his own ideas of how the world worked.
Still, it wasn’t like Amane didn’t want such things to be true. He wished he could dream so freely like Tsukasa.
Amane sighed, making his way out of the class and to the garden, passing by groups of friends on their way to the cafeteria. Amane preferred to eat alone, it was just easier that way; he didn’t have to worry about being looked at weirdly for sitting alone and could usually avoid his bullies.
Today, however, he wasn’t so lucky.
A group of laughing kids, much bigger than himself but the same age as him, approached Amane. Walked around the school and spotted him. Even the way they walked was intimidating.
“Hey Yugi- whatcha doing out here?” The biggest in their group sneered. Amane didn’t respond, he clutched the sides of his bento tightly as if his life depended on it.
“Looks like he’s slacking,” another quipped, “did you finish our homework, Yugi?”
Amane’s mouth went dry; every weekend those jerks made him do their homework. He’d been so swamped with his own that he hadn’t had time to do theirs too. He looked down and stammered, “Well- about that-“
He didn’t even get to finish his sentence before his backpack was hoisted off the ground beside him and the contents dumped all onto the dirt.
“Hey!” He yelped, jolting to his feet before one of the boys grabbed him by the shoulders.
The boys picked through the papers in his backpack while Amane tried to struggle free from the hold the bigger boy had on him.
“Why didn’t you do our homework, Yugi?”
“I meant to- I was just busy- I’m sorry-“
“I’ll give you something to be sorry about,”
The boy took a step closer and Amane’s heart pounded. He quickly ducked out of the way to avoid the incoming attack and darted away. He couldn’t just escape that easily, though, the bullies chased after him, right at his heels.
Amane cursed himself for not being more athletic, his lungs burning as he ran.
He ran into the school, noticing how absent it was, since everyone must still be at lunch. Still, all the doors were closed to the classrooms. He ran harder, faster, feeling the bullies still hot on his tail as he ran up two flights of stairs.
His chest was aching by the time he got to the top, but he hardly felt it. Suddenly, he saw an open area, the bathroom, and bolted inside, quickly locking himself in a stall.
His heart pounded as he heard footsteps grow louder before a shout, “he’s probably at the roof!”
Then the pounding footsteps proceeded past him and Amane, for what felt like the first time in minutes, let out a shaky breath.
Amane stayed there for 5 or 10 more minutes, listening as the boys came back from their search of the roof, stumped, and headed back downstairs in defeat.
It was at this time that Amane suddenly took in his surroundings, creaking open the door of the stall he was in. In his fear-blinded daze, he hadn’t realized that the building he’d ran into wasn’t his normal school building, but the old school building.
His heart skipped a beat as he realized not only that, but the restroom he’d run into was the boys’ restroom. The 3rd floor boys’ restroom.
On the third floor of the old school building, in the last stall of the boy’s bathroom, you can find Hanako-Kun
His brother’s words, for some reason unbeknownst to Amane, sent a shiver down his spine. He knew ghosts weren’t real, he knew it, and yet-
He couldn’t help but turn his head to look down the line of stalls he’d exited from. He spied the third, and last, stall and gulped.
Logic told him to leave, and yet some tug deep inside told him to stay.
Slowly, on bated breath, Amane made up his mind and crept toward the door.
Once standing in front of it, he felt a chill encompass his body. It’s probably just the faulty air conditioning…, he rationed.
He stared at the red, paint-chipped stall again, a little dumbfounded.
“How does it go again…” he muttered to himself softly, “right… knock 3 times and say his name…”
Amane shook off his nerves and raised his knuckles to the door.
“Hanako-kun… Hanako-Kun… Hanako-Kun are you there?” In three swift motions, he knocked against the door, his timid voice mixing with the hollow sound to make an eerie melody.
Nothing.
Amane stood there, waiting for what felt like ages before his face turned red with embarrassment. “What am I doing…” he scoffed, disappointed and frustrated in himself for even stooping so low as to believe in one of Tsukasa’s little fairytales.
What did he expect was going to happen? Some magic fairy-like ghost to appear out of thin air and—
Suddenly smoke started to pour out from the bottom of the door, it was an unnatural fog-like bluish color. Amane took a startled step back— this had to be a joke- this couldn’t be real—
Then he heard laughter.
It wasn’t like he would have expected. The laughing didn’t sound all that malicious, instead, it first sounded garbled and disjointed until it morphed into something more like the excited giggling of a girl.
Amane didn’t even have a moment to process, his knees shaking with uncontrollable fear before the stall door slowly creaked open.
Amane was paralyzed with fear as he stared at the door, unmoving, waiting for some kind of wraith to drag him into the stall and do god knows what. He really hoped he wasn’t about to be dragged into some kind of deadly swirly and be drowned in toilet water.
Amane kept his eyes on the space between the door and the dark inside of the stall, but nothing appeared. Somehow, he gathered the courage to move his feet, to peek inside and—
A toilet.
A disgusting, stained toilet with contents floating in it that Amane didn’t even want to know the origins of.
Amane let out a sigh that softly receded into a chuckle. He guessed his mind had just been playing tricks on him. He took a step back, chuckling softly to himself.
Well, even if the rumor wasn’t real, Amane couldn’t wait to tell Tsukasa how he’d debunked his little myth. He pulled out his phone, snickering, and getting ready to take a picture. He’d go up to Tsukasa, show him the evidence, and say-
“Not over there, silly~!”
A feminine voice giggled in Amane’s ear and he whipped his head around fast as lighting. He saw pale skin, blonde hair, and a red uniform, but that was all he could register before he let out a terrified scream, and his fight-or-flight instincts kicked in.
For some reason, his fists chose “fight”.