#aka i haven't slept but insomnia we love/s

[anoiximera]

Part 7: Rethink

Arc 1: Reacquainted (Finished)

This part was 11 pages and I had to combine the last two pages to make it all fit but the quality suffered I sob. Anyways, first arc done! I've planned out the story/dialogue for the next arc but it might take a bit for me to get it out. Either way, thanks for sticking around so far. Appreciate it.

First Previous

[flydotnet]

Good Deeds and Alas

WHUMPTOBER 2023, DAY 12: “I haven't slept in days but who's counting?” Red | Insomnia | “I’m up, I’m up.”

I think a lot about the HSAU character's pasts, especially that of the teachers'. I'm biased towards CT characters, because of course I am this stupid-ass manga occupies 25% of my brain at any given moment, and this is how this entry was born! Yee-fucking-haw.

I've been meaning to showcase a bit of Hikaru and Co.'s backstories, in part because it's my responsibility in the group, and also because I put so much of my own past into those of these characters that, sometimes, it's my nostalgia speaking haha.

In terms of the timeline of the HSAU, this is set around 5 years before the main story, when Hikaru and Yoshiko were themselves high school students. To be precise, they're in June of their last year of high school and preparing for national finals, aka, the Baccalauréat (aka Bac for my French homies).

I also can't write children, so you'll have to put up with that here, woops.

--------------------------------------------------

Good Deeds and Alas

Summary: So, maybe entrusting your studying-for-finals brother with your children wasn't a good idea for either of them. Or: Hikaru falls dead asleep in front of his own girlfriend and it's not going according to keikaku.

Fandom: Yes it's CT again, but it's the French high school AU!

Word Count: 2K words

AO3 version available here.

--------------------------------------------------

A shrill at the door jolts Hikaru awake. He didn’t even know he had fallen asleep, or at least started dozing off, so the wake-up call isn’t welcome. When did he even doze off? Dammit, that coffee wasn’t as effective as it should’ve been… Oh well. Whatever it is, it’s probably Kenta or the twins messing with him, which means they’re starved for attention yet again.

And to say he still can’t drill the formula to derivate a root-square function without looking it up. It’s like he isn’t getting anywhere with his exam studying yet the fateful day is looming closer and closer.

“I’m up, I’m up,” he mechanically says as he gets up from his chair, hoping he’s speaking loud enough to be heard.

The world isn’t supposed to tilt when you get to your feet, and it’s also not supposed to creep in blacks in the corners of your vision – but his formula should also be in his brain by now, so whatever.

When he walks back into the living room where he’s left all three kids, he finds them still doing what he was trying to get them to do before attempting to study: Kenta is reading over his book while the twins are staring at the TV, as if nothing had happened.

“Did any of you three ring the door?” He asks anyway, wondering in the back of his mind if he isn’t going insane.

You know, just in case not sleeping much for days on end was bad for your health.

“No, we didn’t, Uncle,” Kenta replies without as much as a second of hesitation.

His brothers follow with a shake of the head.

“Nu-uh, we stayed here too!”

“Then… Who is it?” He wonders out loud.

“Maybe it’s Mom?” Kenta asks.

“I don’t think so, she’s got a spare key…” Not that she would be available to go ding-dong-ditch on his ass. “Oh, whatever. I’m gonna go check, so don’t move, okay?”

As the sole (almost) adult here, he walks to the door of the house and opens it – only to gawk at who’s actually there.

“Good afternoon, Hikaru,” his very own girlfriend tells him.

“H-hi, Yoshiko,” he barely gets out, stunned for some reason. “What’s bringin’ you here?”

“I wanted to check up on you,” she replies without a smile (why?). “I know you’ve been neck-deep into your studies and…”

She scrutinizes his face, maybe, and freezes.

“What’s wrong?”

Then she looks horribly worried.

“You look absolutely exhausted, Hikaru,” she comments.

That’s no surprise.

“Oh, y’know, finals season! It looks worse than it really is.”

She doesn’t look convinced at all.

“I know, but you look like you don’t even rest…” She cups his face, loving gaze digging into his for answers. “How many hours of sleep do you get at night?”

“Honestly?” He tries to chuckle, but it sounds like the auditory equivalent of a flaccid pancake. “I haven’t slept in days. But like, who’s counting?”

Her expression worsens even deeper and now, now it actually aches like a bitch. Goddammit Hikaru, you’ve scared her. Congratulations, you fucking idiot!

“Can I come in?”

“Oh, uh, sure. Make yourself a home, I guess.” Then he remembers. “Wait, have you seen my nephews before?”

She stares back in shock.

“Your nephews?”

She doesn’t wait for his answer to step inside, even if she thinks of closing the door behind her as she does so.

“Yeah, my nephews. I’ve never told you about them?”

“No, you have, it’s just… I didn’t know you were babysitting them. Is that why you’re not resting?”

“Uh… I’m just giving my parents a hand. Right now, they’re at the supermarket for the groceries,” his vision keeps dimming, “and you know it, it’s easier to do grocery shopping without… three kids in tow…”

Keeping his eyes open is starting to become really difficult. But he can’t fall asleep in front of Yoshiko, of all people, so he wishes them back open. Dammit, he will not ridicule himself in front of his nephews nor his girlfriend!

“Maybe you should ask them to let you rest,” she quietly says. “Let them handle it. Please, you look so…”

“I-it’s fine.” He moves aside to let her come in, closes the door behind him. “I should probably… introduce you to them, though.”

Everything is floaty, as if he was underwater.

“Hikaru, I think you should sit down. You’re swaying on your feet…”

Both of their voices sound distant. That’s not good… he supposes. Truth be told, sleeping sounds amazing right now.

“I am? Damn.”

He trips on thin air and, as she catches him, the darkness finishes consuming his vision.

--------------------------------------------------

For all she expected coming here, Hikaru dropping dead in her arms wasn’t one of those. Alas, it doesn’t come off as much as a surprise, now that the initial shock has passed, there are numerous little things around that tip her off that this was, unfortunately, unavoidable: the strewn around papers on his desk, the messy kitchen with wrappers spitting from the bin, the cans of energy drink in the bedroom’s trashcan that don’t seem like Hikaru’s usual self. Where’s his concern for his physical condition?

Fortunately, it “only” seems to be exhaustion: his temperature registers as normal and, now that he’s lightly snoring, she realizes he just has a good night of catching up to do. It’s still… concerning, though. Hikaru has never had trouble falling asleep before, at least, not that you’d know of, none that Kazumasa has ever spoken about.

A knock on the door is followed by timid footsteps – it’s a boy, around eight years old. She watches him shyly walk to the bed, standing right by the chair she’s sitting on. Because of the situation being as chaotic as it was, she hasn’t had the time to lie a good eye on him, she can see a bit of her boyfriend in him: their eyes are the same.

Yoshiko has never seen much of Hikaru’s family. He doesn’t invite her over often, and when he does, his parents aren’t impeding on them much. She’s never seen his sister, not even on pictures, and has never asked any further than that. It’s none of her business.

“Who are you?” The boy asks her.

“I’m, uh…”

She didn’t even think for a single moment she’d be a complete stranger to these children. Has he wondered all this time who she was?

“I’m Hikaru’s girlfriend,” she decides to plainly reply.

Immediately, his eyes start sparkling.

“Oh, you’re Uncle ’karu’s wife! That’s so cool!”

Her face immediately burns.

“O-oh, we’re not married!” She calms herself with a good breath. “I was visiting him because I haven’t seen him in a while. Do you know what happened?”

His mood immediately dips down and it aches.

“No… He’s just sleeping?”

“Yes, he’s sleeping, he isn’t sick.”

Immediately, the boy turns to the occupant in the bed and starts slapping him.

“Uncle ‘’karu, wake up! Your girlfriend’s here!”

Without thinking, Yoshiko grabs him, alert.

“Don’t wake him up, he needs to rest!”

“B-but… Mom said he was watching us, but he never does!”

Still, when she puts him back to the ground, he doesn’t try again.

“What’s your name?” She asks him.

“I’m Kenta”

“And your brothers?”

If she remembers correctly, Hikaru told her he had three nephews, one older and twin boys.

“They’re Riku and Ten. They like to whine.”

As most young children does, as far as she knows.

“And you’re saying your mom told Hikaru to watch over the three of you?”

Kenta looks suddenly a lot more bashful, “well, uh… Actually, Mom said it was Grandpa and Grandma, but when they’re busy, it’s Uncle ’karu who takes care of us.” He sighs and glances at him, worried. “But Uncle ’karu is always so tired. He yawns all the time, but he doesn’t sleep. I dun get it.”

The way Kenta phrases it, despite his confusion, is deeply concerning to her. Would that mean Hikaru has insomnia? Or is he forcing himself to stay up to study for the exams next week? He’s always been of the sleep-late-rise-early kind, not unlike her own father, but this sounds foreign from him anyway. What’s happening? How bad is he actually doing?

“He doesn’t sleep?”

“I don’t think he does. Whenever I go pee in the night, his light is always on.”

So he’s been studying late into the night. That’d explain a lot.

“Mom doesn’t like it when I tell her Uncle ’karu’s too tired for us. She tells me I’m wrong, that it’s his duty or something. But I don’t believe it.”

Hikaru hasn’t complained a lot about his family but having his nephews “dumped” on him was one of those. She can’t imagine having to study as much as he does and having to keep an eye on three children whenever his parents are busy… and what she has in front of her face, it’s not a convincing argument of the opposite.

“Can your brothers and you watch over yourselves while he takes a nap?”

It’s perhaps a lot to ask for children their ages.

“Yeah. We’ll be calm.” He sighs again. “I like Uncle ’karu, but I don’t think he likes us.”

“I’m sure he loves you and your brothers, he’s just very tired.” It feels awful to tell this to a child. “Truth be told, at our age, it’s hard to take care of younger people than us, and right now, we’re both busy with school. It’s not that your uncle hates you, I assure you.”

“I hope.” He glances around. “I’m gonna tell my brothers. Thank you, uh… Yoshino?”

“Close enough,” she smiles, “it’s Yoshiko.”

“Thanks, Auntie Yoshiko!”

Her cheeks burn once more as she watches him out of the room.

--------------------------------------------------

The first thought that comes across Hikaru’s mind as soon as his eyes can pry themselves open is what the fuck am I doing in bed?

Then he realizes this is a very stupid question and tries getting up. Whatever this is – he shouldn’t be here. His square-root formula isn’t going to learn itse—

“You should stay in bed,” Yoshiko tells him right as his head starts swimming.

His reflexes must be dulled to hell and back, for him to barely react at all to this.

“Yo… Yoshiko…? What’re you doin’ here…?”

How long has she been here for?

“Oh, you probably don’t remember… I wanted to pay you a visit because we’ve not seen each other since class has ended and I was… worried for you.” Her face is so sad. “I was right to, I think.”

“I fell asleep on you, then, huh.”

“You did, yes. That’s why I want you to rest.”

“You’ve seen them, though, no? I need to keep an eye on my nephews. And, y’know, my exams…”

She brushes his hair, watching his eyelids flutter again.

“I’ll talk to your parents for you. Maybe… Maybe some fresher eyes will help them see the issue. You shouldn’t be balancing all of this on your shoulders alone. Not when you’re supposed to study on the side as well. But for now, just think about resting, okay?”

“You’d actually confront my family about this…?” A smile perks up on his lips. “You’re amazing…”

“Don’t worry about it for now. It’s normal someone finally gives you a hand.”

The sound of something falling downstairs alerts him immediately; yet before he can fully get up, Yoshiko grounds him back down into his bed.

“Hikaru!!”

“I’ll go check it out, so please stay here!”

His eyelids are getting really heavy, so he nods along.

“Works for me…”

He doesn’t stay awake enough to watch her leave – and it’s good enough for him.