The Maid Outfit I Alluded to at the Start [REWRITE]

"We can go when we're done!" Haruko said.

"I was just curious. You're acting like I'm pressuring you."

"You've asked five days in a row."

My shoes squeaked to a halt. One, two, three, four… Damn, she's right. Do you think that makes me seem desperate?

Haruko turned on a dime and grabbed my wrist. "Hurry up! Lunch ends in fifteen!"

The days following my half-confession at the bridge all unrolled themselves in a similar fashion. My arm in tow behind Haruko's marching gait, up and down the school halls. She had spun the not-quite confession into an opportunity to enlist my help in another one of her stunts. Though, this time she was aggressively keeping it secret.

From the lunchtime routine of patrolling the halls to our newly established after-school hours in the clubroom, I was finally starting to see my high school life take shape. An irregular shape, but a shape nonetheless. Speaking of the club, it had made an almost unrecognizable transformation.

Instead of shelves stocked to the brim with knick-knacks and books, they'd been cleared out to make way for a singular bronze typewriter. On top of that, much of the dust was dusted and that thick purple cloth was replaced with something thin and bright. In large part due to Sato's hard work, and in small part due to my own.

The one person who hadn't contributed at all was Takamoto. It started when I dragged him along to the clubroom by my side. Two days later, he came on his own. At first, he made the excuse he was hiding from classmates, but after I caught him giving a stern "do it yourself" to someone asking for their homework checked, he dropped that particular justification.

Haruko wasn't much help either, though you could occasionally count on her to rile up one of the sports teams into carrying boxes filled with books over to the library. It was quite helpful in its own right, so she got a pass. But it does make you wonder if the sports clubs are a breeding ground for non-traditional views on school policy.

"Was any of that real in the first place?" Takamoto asked, feet propped on the center table, balancing on the back legs of a classroom chair he'd dragged in.

"Of course it was! I bet you didn't even read it, did you? There's real value in there if you're willing to see it for what it is," Haruko gave a lilt to the last few words as if she'd been asked the same question a hundred times today.

"If you're willing to see it for what it is," Sato parroted.

"I think it was all real, except for the God part. She's a little flip-floppy on that," I said.

Haruko raised an eyebrow like she was thinking of exposing something about me.

Then, Sato stood. Her stool clattered out from underneath and everyone's attention was drawn to the girl. "I think I did it," she said, holding an old, digital camera she'd been tinkering with for a few days.

"You got it working?" I asked.

She nodded. "Try to take a picture."

Takamoto perked up in his chair. "A picture?"

"Well, I don't know…" I took the camera from Sato, mostly to be polite, but as soon as the chunky plastic box sat comfortably in my hands, a cold sweat broke out on my brow.

Haruko leaned her body over the center table, physically waving the conversation aside. "Would you all stop getting side-tracked? This is supposed to be an important meeting!"

Good thinking Haruko! I can work with that. "You know what? For once, Haruko might be right. Plus I don't think anyone wants me handling a cam—"

"Screw that! Come on, huddle up!" Takamoto grabbed both of the girls by their shoulders and let off the most diplomatic grin I've ever seen in my life.

I glanced at the viewfinder, and without thinking, I'd framed the shot perfectly. I let out a sigh. If Sato and Haruko hadn't both looked so pleased, I probably wouldn't have taken the picture.

"Alright! Time for the strategy meeting! The fate of the universe hinges on what I'm about to tell all of you today."

"You said that yesterday." I kept my eyes on the old camera, flipping through the menus.

"That's because yesterday was a big deal too! If you'd listened you would have realized that. Gah, what's wrong with you three!" Haruko's arms pumped her fists towards the ground, like a stereotypically angry cartoon character.

I rolled my eyes, carefully placing the camera back on the table. "Fine, what's the plan?"

"Aha! I knew Naru would be interested!"

Blech. Still not used to her using my name.

"We're going to…" Haruko paused for dramatic effect when, instead, my phone rang and ruined the suspense. "Hey! No phones in the clubroom!"

Since when was that a rule?

I pulled the device out of my pocket, and with one glance at the screen, I knew it wouldn't be a fun call. "I've got to take this."

Through disgruntled Haruko complaints, I stepped outside to answer. From the other end, my dad's voice came through like a freight train.

"Get out of my house."

And the spider's web simply melted away.

"What?"

"You're not living under this roof anymore. You've got two days to pack your things and then your Uncle Jin's coming to pick you up."

"Pack my things? You can't just kick me out of the house."

"Like hell I can't."

"Are you being serious right now? You're kicking me out of the house?" My voice caught the attention of a student passing by.

"You don't live by my rules so you don't live off my paycheck. Should've thought twice about who you're—"

My hand drifted away from the side of my face for a second and I lost his voice. My eyes glazed over. Before I had the chance to drop my phone, a couple walked by, and the thought of Haruko brought it back to my ear.

"—with all we do. Got it?"

"Doesn't Jin live in Yokohama? How am I supposed to get to school?"

"That's your own damn problem," he said.

"But—" And then my dad hung up the phone.

Yokohama? That's a four-hour commute every day… The club's exterior wall caught me as I stumbled backwards, the thud returned my awareness to the real world. My back slid down the wall until my butt thumped against the ground.

The club buildings looked odd from this angle. I didn't often get to sit in the dirt and appreciate different points of view after all. There was something serene about it though. Something unique. It almost reminded me of a shot from a movie.

Now that I thought about it, Haruko would probably help me shoot a movie.

"What the hell are you doing on the ground?" Takamoto peaked around the open door.

Startled, my eyes darted up to him.

And he recoiled. "What's up with the creepy grin?"

Grin? Oh. I guess I'm smiling.

"Nothing. Just got some good news from my dad." I stood and dusted my pants off. "I think I sat on a rock."

Takamoto snickered. "That's for keeping us waiting, get in here. Arakawa is way more metal than I thought she was."

"Metal?"

"Yeah, metal. Audiences are no joke, man. Whenever Horiguchi asks me a question in class I go pale. Can you imagine performing in front of a thousand people?"

The boy slipped back into the clubroom, and all I could do was follow.

"What took you so long?" Haruko motioned for me to come over.

The three of them were huddled around an unfamiliar laptop. The mechanical clicks from Sato's typing only served to further pique my curiosity.

"We need your measurements," Haruko said.

"My measurements? Are we learning to sew?"

When the laptop's screen came into view, the first thing that caught my eye was a maid outfit. And then I noticed that Sato was buying it. "Who's that for?"

The three of them looked up at me in unison.

I blinked twice before I realized what it meant. "Okay, someone's gonna need to explain what the hell's going on."