An Unheard Voice - Chapter 35: Chapter 35

".. Have a good day." Ena mumbles, peeking out of her room. That's weird, she usually doesn't wake up until I come back and have to fight her. I slightly smile back and wave.
"Yo, Akito!" An shouts, running up to me and practically chokes me. It's too early for this. And I'm definitely not putting up with her bullshit today.
"Hold up, what's wrong?" She gets off, grabbing my bag to keep me from walking away. I turn around, sighing loudly.
"What are you talking about?" I ask, taking her hand off. Can she seriously tell something is wrong already..? I hate this about her.
"I'm the one person you can't play dumb with. You know I'm just going to annoy you until you tell me what's up with you, carrot." She sighs and crosses her arms.
That day she followed me everywhere for a week until I told her what happened. The worst part is Ken would have to drag her home and she'd show up again at 7 in the morning.
I guess there's no getting out of this, then...
"Toya and I.. uh, we.."
How the hell do I say this? She only found out that we were dating recently.. she'll definitely think it's my fault, too.
"We broke up yesterday."
Her jaw flies open and she looks at me for a moment before blinking awkwardly.
"S.. Seriously? This isn't a prank, right? This is where you say 'September Fools', right..?"
Is she stupid? .. Actually, never mind.
"I don't even know what to say. Well.. he did seem off yesterday. L-Listen, maybe he was just.. making an excuse to be alone? You know, some people have to be alone with their thoughts if something really bad happened." She says. He did say that he would like for me to leave him alone.. So maybe that was just his way of saying that?
"Yeah, maybe. But wait, do you think.. you could try to ask him if he's okay with speaking to me? Or when he'll be able to? I just don't want to.. you know." I rub the back of my neck, getting embarrassed.
"Oh, uh- Yeah, sure. I can do that. I'm.. in his class, anyway." She smiles, laughing slightly.
Now I'm being stupid, I'm going to school.
°•°•°
Should I visit his classroom? I really want to see him. I'm being weird, but I don't care.
Before I can get near the door, someone grabs my shoulder. I turn my head to see Airi, she's back already? I mean that's good, but I have a feeling she's not recovered fully. I'll have to apologize for not responding if she texted me.
"Uh.. I wouldn't go there if I were you. I heard something happened.. so. Let's talk." She grabs my arm and drags me away.
I look behind and manage to look through the crack of the door, and see Toya hiding his face with his hands, shaking as a few people surround him.
Is he crying..?
Wait a minute, that guy next to him. What.. I feel like I've seen him before. Weird... Damn it Airi, let me get closer..!
"Can you tell me what the heck happened?" She asks after taking me to the cafeteria, sitting across from me. There's people staring at me and mumbling to their friends.
I'm so confused. I shake my head, sighing. There's no point in waiting my time making excuses if she already knows.
Did An seriously tell everyone already? Normally I wouldn't care if it was just about me, but this is involving Toya, so I won't let this slide.
"That's okay. But quick question, who.. did you tell about your situation? I know nobody knew you two were dating. So even this is.. sudden!" She continues, but tries to keep her voice down. Huh?
"What do you mean? An told you, didn't she?"
"That's the thing-- I didn't hear it from her. There was a group of girls talking about it. And.. I think it was the exact same girls who you said made a rude comment when you first met Kusanagi." Airi says, and it just shocks me.
What the hell..? An would never talk to them. In fact, she avoids people like that. So why would they..?
"I don't know what, or when this happened. All I know is that An was just as surprised as I was we were asked about it." She scoffs, grabbing my hand.
"Just tell me if anyone tries anything stupid, I'll handle it. I've got your back."
I think I'll talk to An about it later. I just want to try to forget this whole thing for now. Even though everybody knows. Such a pain in the ass...
°•°•°
"I know, and he's not even in our grade.. I just can't remember how I know him. Well, if I can't remember then he's probably not important." I grumble, running my fingers through my hair.
"Right.. But it probably must be someone I didn't like! But onto the most important thing, I think.. someone overheard us. Eavesdropping! You know I would never spread that kind of stuff around..." An sighs, looking apologetic. How can I stay mad at her..?
"I know you wouldn't. Thanks for that." I mumble, yanking her hair slightly.
"Stop doing that! Should I just cut my hair shorter..?" She screams, rubbing her head.
We continue thinking in silence, except it's interrupted by the sound of Mizuki's loud ass chewing.
"Can you shut the fuck up?" I hiss, glaring at them.
"Absolutely not," They cackle, putting their feet on the table. I swear, if they weren't dating my sister...
Wait. I didn't even invite them.
"How about we save this for tomorrow? I'm sure we all have too much on our plates right now.." An crosses her arms, looking the other way. Huh?
"I don't-" Akiyama says, but An grabs their hand and grumbles.
"Shut your ass up."
"Yes ma'am."
"Uh.. sure. See you both tomorrow." I wave at them as they leave my room. But I can't seem to get this out of my head...
Whatever, it'll come to me sooner or later. Plus, I'll try to get a chance to talk to Toya.
But this doesn't seem like him at all. It's like there's something else that happened but he won't tell me what it is. This is the only thing I hate about him, he won't express his emotions with me.
I love him too damn much to let him go...
°•°•°
"Oh- U-Uh, hey..." I awkwardly smile, waving. I look so fucking stupid right now. He just stares at me with those adorable fucking eyes for a moment, like he's frozen or something. That's so cute..
Wait, fuck!
"Um.. I had a question. Are you--"
"Aoyagi-kun! There you are. Come on, let's go eat together with the others!" Some girl wraps her arms around his and drags him away. I'm gonna cry.
"Ugh, and I saw it again, throw that ugly thing away from your bag! It makes you seem childish." She huffs, tugging on his ear.
It's been like, a week already since it happened.
I've been seeing him in the hallway, but he just walks right past me like he doesn't see me. Or sometimes he even goes another way just to get away from me.
Seriously, I'm starting to get bummed. An also said he rejects any offer to go where I am.
I swear I've seen him go to the bathroom once to eat by himself.. what's up with that?
But since yesterday, there's the same annoying ass guy or his stupid friends that take him away from me all the time! I fucking hate him! The way he wraps his arm around Toya makes me want to snap his fucking neck!!
And so I found myself in the library because I recently found out he voluntarily helps out here. He's such an angel...
I see him putting away the books on a shelf near me. Why am I so nervous to even say hi to him?! I really want to respect his decision, but I feel like that all happened way too suddenly!
Toya's also never the type to speak his mind, either. It pisses me off.
He turns around to grab another stack of books, and we accidentally make eye contact. Shit, I forgot I was pretending to study! Well, I was originally supposed to...
I lost my best friend, boyfriend and tutor all at once. This sucks. He looks away, trying to walk fast. This guy--!
"Toya, wait!" I say, getting up from my chair and approaching him.
"I.. Look, can we talk? Just for a minute!" I say, hesitating to grab his hand but stop.
"I-If you don't need help getting a book, then please leave me alone." He mumbles, walking away. I want to go after him, but I can't. There's something wrong with me today..
"Please..? I know you want to be by yourself and I get that, but I know there's another reason! What aren't you telling me?" My voice cracks, and he stops. I feel like crap right now...
It's silent for a few moments before he looks back, his lip quivering and.. his eyes becoming watery.
"I'm sorry."
He whispers, and continues to walk away. Is he finished for the day?
Is he going to cry? Why can't he be honest with me..? I don't know why this hurts me so much. Damn it, at least answer one of my millions of questions..!
I want to slap myself.
"Ah, Aoyagi-kun, you're back." Kutabare says, waving as I approach him. Lately he's been giving me advice about everything. Tsukasa said I could trust him, saying it was kind of him to offer to help.
"How did it go today? Judging by your sulky face, I'm assuming Shinonome came crawling back?" He chuckles, lifting my hand and strokes the back of it with his thumb. Why is he so touchy..?
I wanted to punch him so much! Why does he have to make this so hard for me?! And why did I say that?!?
"I did what you told me to if that were to happen, I avoided a conversation with him.. but he seemed a bit sad. I really wanted to speak to him."
"Aoyagi-kun. We've talked about this over and over, you shouldn't show any weakness. You hurt him in the first place, this is all your fault. You reap what you sow." His mood changes quickly, and his friendly smile disappears.
It hurts, but.. no matter how much I try to deny it, it's true. Nobody has ever gave me advice like this before, however...
"Are you two going to be done soon? We're going to the mall, and I don't want to stay out too late. I have a date tonight." Shinjimae pouts, putting her hands on her hips.
"With which guy?"
"Shut up! Wait..." She marches up to me, snatching the keychain off of my bag. It broke. What-
"Throw this damn thing in the trash! It's so ugly, what even is this?!"
"Aw, Shinjimae-san, you broke it." Kutabare sighs.
"Whatever, it was ugly and old anyway! I'll get you a better--"
I cut her off by taking it back, almost slapping her hand.
"D-Don't.. touch it. Go." My hand trembles, and I hold myself back from raising my voice. Stunned for a moment, she recovers and rolls her eyes.
"Whatever. Keep the ugly ass piece of crap, but now you have a reason to dispose of it now that it won't work anymore. I don't know why you're so attached to it." She stomps out of the classroom, slamming the door shut.
She gets on my nerves sometimes. Especially her flirting, I get extremely uncomfortable. I've seen her kiss about 3 guys in front of me, and it's only been a few days since I've known her.
Anyway, Akito called me a few times, and continues to send me texts every now and then. It sounds like he's really worried about me.. and I think I might be messing up by ignoring them. I haven't called him back for 16 very long days...
"Aw, did she hurt your feelings? I'm sorry, that whore can be a menace sometimes." He puts his hand on my face, but I'm quick to move away. I want to fix it...
"Let's get back on track. Remember, you mustn't speak about that to those other.. freaks. They will just sugarcoat the truth and feed your delusions, you know how they can be. Sometimes the world is a cruel place and I am one of those few people who can open your eyes."
Well.. I guess he's right.. but I don't appreciate him talking about my friends like that.
He can't just call them freaks..! I'm pretty sure his friends are always making fun of me, though. But he's helped me this much, so I can't just leave them...
Yeah, they probably wouldn't want to deal with me being miserable.
"It's alright, though. I'm here for you. I know you trust me, so I promise we won't let you down, you know that."
He sounds caring. That doesn't change the fact I can't stop being anxious when I'm around him. Hm.. it's probably because of my situation with Akito. Then again, they are entirely new people...
"Right.. Kutabare, may I ask you something?"
"Go for it," He answers, moving my hair to the side. I seriously want him to stop touching me like this.
"I know this is all because of me, but.. I want to get rid of this feeling. I hate it so much. I hate having to wake up and remember that I caused this, and it's been going for far too long. What should I do, Kutabare?"
My hands begin to tremble as I hold the notebook up, afraid that he might become disappointed in me. I fear that no matter how long I resist temptation, I'll end up losing.. This is so overwhelming.
"You're so silly, Aoyagi-kun. That's easy." He answers, smiling again.
"Just disappear. Do everyone a favor and vanish. You remaining in this school is a huge burden, especially for Shinonome. If you hate it so much, just hate yourself. You're smart, Aoyagi-kun, you'll know what to do. Who knows, maybe someday you'll manage to erase yourself from history." He hops off of the desk, humming as he opens the door.
"And I think it's about time you started serving on that Aoyagi name." Kutabare winks and leaves the classroom.
Kamishiro walks past the classroom, seeing me, and frowns when he looks behind.
"Yo, let's go!" Shinjimae shouts, signaling for me to come with them.
... What?
°•°•°
When I come to school the next day, I pass by his classroom even though it takes me longer to get to mine. Is he here yet..? I mean, this is usually the time he arrives.
If he wasn't absent for 2 days in a row.
He's not here again.. I'll come back at lunch. Hopefully today he shows up.. it's been a few days now, I'm getting worried. He's not the type to skip school...
"I'll try to tell you when he comes back. Now shoo, you're going to be late! And stop coming by here!! Wait- tuck in your shirt!" An shoves me, tapping her foot. I forgot how bossy she was in school.
"Shut up!"
I hope nothing happened to him. It makes sense why he'd have to take a break from school.. I think I'll have to seriously respect his wishes. I've been annoying him too often, anyway.
I don't like to remember that he's in pain. I'll seriously kill his dad one day...
It's extremely hard to concentrate in class. The teacher has to keep smacking the back of my head with the book in order for me to snap back to reality.
"Psst! You're daydreaming again!" Mizuki whispers and throws a crumbled paper at my head. Since when did they care about what I'm doing..?
He's all I can think about now. Well, not like he wasn't before.. but now it's different!
Why is it so hard to get him out of my head?! He tells me he doesn't want to see me, but his expression tells me otherwise! This is so frustrating!
After school, Nene, An, Mizuki and Airi all walk up to me. But they look really concerned or really furious.
"I swear, what did you do to Toya?! If you hurt him I will now hurt your leg--" Nene hisses, grabbing my collar before Airi pulls her away.
"Calm down, it's not his fault. Or Toya's, we just.. need to hear both sides. After all, we've been giving Toya some space for a while."
"Is that supposed to be an explanation as to why all of you are here?" I grumble, but see An standing behind the group. They all stare at each other before looking back at me.
"An.. told us to follow her. So, what's up? It had something to do with Toya, right?" Mizuki asks, but An looks like she's just seen a ghost while staring at her phone.
"Akito. It's Toya."
"What do you mean..?" I ask, getting up from my seat. This won't be good...
".. Toya moved away." She turns her phone around, showing me the screen to their messages. A paragraph and a bunch of delivered texts.
"What?!" Everyone shouts at her, squeezing each other to see the phone.
What the fuck.
▪︎☆▪︎☆▪︎☆▪︎
The two of them return to Rui's house, the plan was to discuss their next show but now Rui has other ideas.
"Tsukasa-kun, can we talk?" Rui drops the papers on his desk, approaching Tsukasa. He turns around and nods.
"Yeah, of course. What is it?"
"It's about Kutabare."