Misunderstanding

Presented with a major dilemma, there was one thing I needed to ask Haruko, or at least get her clarification on, before I could accept the task of accompanying her outside of school. The rumour. Fujiwara seemed fairly genuine—and fairly hot-headed—so I was expecting his less-than-savoury opinion of her to be some kind of misunderstanding.

I also had the secondary dilemma of Haruko asking me out on a date. Well, less asking and more telling. I had slipped my way out of committing to anything on the spot, but Haruko's deadline for a decision by the end of the day would soon be approaching.

First of all, I wanted to get my money's worth, even if it was only fast food. I could easily get a full meal out of this. On the other hand, and probably much more relevant, she was calling it a date. Now that I thought about it, she called the last time I was forced into a restaurant with her a date as well, but nothing about it had signified itself as a date in any modern sense of the word.

Wasn't a date more like, you know, going out to the aquarium and getting food afterwards? Walking them home and bashfully chatting about how you had a great time? Exchanging a goodbye kiss at the end of the night? (Not that I was interested in that.) Instead, what I had experienced was getting rushed into a cheap Italian restaurant, told I was sitting across from God almighty, robbed of my potato wedges, and ditched at the door.

Oh, bingo! That must be it: she doesn't know what a date is! Why didn't I realize any sooner? Sure, she'd heard a guy should pay on the first date, but she probably thought the word applied to friendly meet-ups too. One of those people who calls every platonic get-together a date. Now it makes sense.

Part of me wondered if this was what caused Fujiwara's misunderstanding too… I guess I would have to find out myself. Especially since Fujiwara gave me a freaky look when Haruko and I strolled into class a couple of minutes after the bell. It wasn't entirely resembling of disapproval, but not of concern either. Some strange facial expression amalgamation that made him look like an annoyed cat.

After a regularly scheduled day of uneventful classroom activities, it was off to the club room. I should at least mention Fujiwara had been pretty keen to sit with me and Takamoto during lunch, though he hadn't bothered to bring up Haruko. Maybe to save Takamoto from getting involved in the whole ordeal or maybe to save him from the confusion.

The club room looked the same as before: drapes letting light into the room and Sato sitting in her cloak, surrounded by a plethora of random items. That room was a total mystery to me. Who's idea was it to form a club of assorted interests, anyway? Did the school force kids whose hobbies weren't popular enough to sit in a corner together? Was it the students who'd felt left out deciding to form an alliance? And more than that, which assorted interest did Sato belong to?

Either way, the meeting went in one ear and out the other. Most of it revolved around Haruko's main campaign strategy: QR codes and a website. She expressed some dissatisfaction with the process of making a website, and eventually, Sato volunteered to set something up. Meanwhile, she put me in charge of "market research." Pretty certain that was the wrong term for the job she had assigned me, too.

The real shocker was how seriously Haruko took the election. Knowing her only driving motivation was to be called President, I hadn't expected this level of preparation. However, I did recall Haruko saying she needed to run for student council and she never did mention why it was a need.

After Haruko's half-baked plan was laid out for me and Sato to finish up, the cloaked girl excused herself and hung her garb on a hook by the door, leaving me alone with the devil. I guess now's as good a chance as any other.

"Do you know Fujiwara? From our class? He sits next to Takamoto."

"Who's Takamoto?" Haruko asked.

"Octopus Boy."

"Oh! Yeah, I know Tako-moto!"

"Do you know the guy who sits next to him?"

"Nope! But you sure are asking a butt load of questions today."

It really wasn't that many. But I was starting to make sense of why I hadn't remembered asking her anything substantial before. I must have already tried and given up. The leading theory behind my memory loss was that my brain hid the traumatic experience away from me. Thanks, brain.

"Well, there's gonna be at least one more question. I was talking to Fujiwara a few days ago and he said he knew you from junior high school," I said.

"Junior high? That's a lie, I would know him. You know, you shouldn't go around believing every little thing you hear from classmates."

The irony.

"Well, he didn't say he went to your junior high school. He said he went to your church group."

"Oh…" Her face grew still.

That's abnormal. "You alright?"

"No, just… I forgot about that. What did he say?"

"Uhm, well, he said you… In fairness, he told me he could be wrong. But he did say you flirted with guys? To get them to follow you or something." Haruko was silent and unmoving. "But I'm sure it was just a misunderstanding. He told me himself they were mostly rumours."

Her entire demeanour had changed. Her slow breathing alone gave me whiplash. She closed her eyes and took a few deep breaths. Her nose ruffled. Her voice was just a little shaky when she spoke. Slight enough I wouldn't have noticed if I hadn't known how she normally sounded.

"Mmm… yeah. I used to do that," she said, looking at the floor.