The River Came Pouring Down

Instead of confronting Haruko and inadvertently admitting to my spying tendencies, I should have asked her friend for help. If I had talked to Sato, she would have assured me there was no need to worry. Why, you ask? Because Haruko wasn't flirting with the teacher in the Staff Room.

"It was supposed to be a surprise but I guess you kind of ruined it, huh? I'm trying to convince Mr. Ando to let me run for student council president even though I'm applying late. I'm not flirting with him," she said, suppressing her laughter.

They let first-years run for student council president?

"For two weeks? And you kind of were being a—"

Haruko had started an impromptu game of charades, mimicking me digging my own grave. Okay, I get it, continue.

"He wasn't budging on that technicality so I told him I'd come by every day until he let me run, he's pretty close to cracking," she said. "The only reason I'm blessing him with my presence in the first place is because he gets the final say in the matter. You know what, though? I feel a little bad for him. He has to deal with so many annoying people every day…"

Isn't it a little insincere to pity the man for something you're contributing towards?

"It's what I've got to do, so I'll just pull up my bootstraps and get it done!" she said.

"You wanna run for student council that badly?"

She paused for a moment and gave an overwhelmingly tentative: "Absolutely…"

Would you make up your mind?

"I mean, I sort of need to, but there's a lot of dumb work that goes into it, y'know? Plus, I don't actually care about the position. I do think it would be cool if people had to call me President though."

Pretty sure they don't.

"So we're all clear now, right? Good!" she said.

As much as I believed her, I was also convinced she left something out. I hadn't mentioned her classroom scouting sessions, but I still didn't have an explanation for them. Maybe she was campaigning? But to start before she had the go-ahead was a little presumptuous. I suspected there was more to this story, but I wasn't about to pry.

"You know you owe me a secret now, right? I'll even let you pick what it is and save you the misfortune of my godly powers revealing something too personal."

A secret, huh? The first thing that came to mind was the incident in junior high school. But I wasn't about to unleash that wild beast into the world, maybe I could make something up? Instead, I told her I couldn't think of anything good. That seemed enough for her to allow me some time to come up with a secret as "juicy" as hers.

We parted ways and I kept up my brainstorming session, I probably would've come up with something good too, if I hadn't been interrupted. It was someone introducing themselves to me on the train, right after Haruko had gotten off at her stop.

"You seem like you get along really well with Arakawa," he said.

The boy who'd sat down next to me was also wearing a River High uniform. He had a face mask on, sniffling occasionally. Of the face I could see, he looked normal.

"Oh, yeah. Do you know her?"

"We went to some church group together when we were little. She probably doesn't remember me, but she's pretty hard to forget."

He sniffled again, or rather, it sounded more like a dog tracking a scent. Sniffing it out.

"I get what you mean, I wasn't sure how to deal with her at first."

"Hah, yeah. She's a total cutie so it really throws people for a loop."

A total what now?

"I didn't introduce myself, you probably don't recognize me with the mask." He pulled his face covering down briefly. "I'm Hitoshi Fujiwara, I sit next to Takamoto."

The name rang a bell. Oh! He was the guy who launched Takamoto into classroom stardom by getting help with his math homework.

"We haven't talked before, huh? I had no idea you knew Arakawa. I guess it makes sense people would know each other already."

He shuffled in his seat. "Yeah? You don't know anyone?"

"Nope. I guess no one from where I went got in. It wasn't a feeder school or anything, so…"

He slapped his hand against my shoulder. "Good shit, man! Couldn't have been easy."

I gave a mandatory grin. If I hadn't been so obsessed with movies it probably would've been a lot easier.

He looked over at me for a second, "You know what? I was supposed to go to this new arcade with my buddy from another class but he bailed on me last minute. I wasn't gonna go but—"

"Retro Days?"

"Yeah! Holy shit, you know it?" he asked.

"I wanted to go with Takamoto but he kept giving me excuses."

"Shit man, let's go then!" he whipped out his phone like a cowboy in a Spaghetti Western.

Without hesitation, he handed over his hip-mounted revolver to show the arcade was only about twenty minutes away. I never understood people who could give their phone to a stranger. Either way, I wanted to see this place. I don't consider myself a retro games otaku, but there's a unique charm to never-ending rows of beige gaming cabinets. Fujiwara was in complete agreement.

The unexpected encounter led to a pretty late Friday evening for an impromptu outing. Fujiwara and I got ourselves sucked into a two-player shoot-em-up and we only stopped when we ran out of cash. Upon our eventual retreat from the allure of 8-bit game over screens, we quickly agreed on burgers to eat.

Most of our conversation revolved around strategizing how to beat the level we struggled with, trading tactics between bites. But once we finished, Fujiwara said something strange. Picking away at his fries, he shifted the topic of conversation back to Haruko.

"I was wondering, what's it even like with her? You seem to talk a bunch."

I rattled the ice in my cup. "Well, it's usually kind of one-sided."

"Is she still doing the thing where she pretends to be God?" he asked.

Wait, you know about that? Considering she'd made such a big deal about keeping it a secret, why did Fujiwara know?

"She kind of asked me to keep quiet about it…"

"Ah yeah, figures. She did the same thing when I knew her. Picked one dude to fuck with more than the rest though. I heard he totally got the wrong idea and asked her out the day before summer vacation. Got his heart stomped on. Poor dude."

My wrist stopped, and the swishing of my ice along with it. "What are you talking about?"

"Well, I guess I ought to warn you." Fujiwara briefly inspected a fry and then popped it into his mouth. "I'm not trying to shit-talk, but Arakawa used to be pretty big trouble. I won't stop you from talking to her or anything, but she had a shit reputation. I mean, I heard she flirted with a bunch of guys from junior high—"

"Flirted?"

"I mean I don't—" Fujiwara lifted his hands beside his face, swallowing either a fry or a lump in his throat. "I don't know what it was. I didn't go to the same school so I never saw it first-hand. It's just what I heard. Would flirt with guys just to get them to come to our church group or some shit," he said. "You've got the right to know."

"Huh. Thanks."