It was a dark and stormy night except it wasn’t.

...Although...no, wait...what?

That can’t be right, right?

The drizzle...You can feel it. Drumming against your head.

No. Tapping?...No, no, drumming. Like the way you drum your fingers against your desk, straining to read the standard classroom clock. You brace yourself for the thud of Aubery’s elbow jamming into your side, tender and sore from hours of dribbling. For the buzz of your bratty, grating, girlish whine against pursed lips and spit from a raspberry if she feels like stooping to his level this...cold...afternoon (You think. Or hope?...No, no, think. You never liked the rain. Too lonely).

...It’s not coming. how do you know that?

Weird. Sure, you’re...well, you’re not in a classroom, but it feels wrong, imagining a classic moment like that without its signature...feeling. That woman never passes up a socially acceptable chance to bruise you (read: your “friendly” basketball matches).

The sentiment brings unreasonable tears to your eye, washing away with the…the downpour (Yes, the purple downpour). She only shoves you out of your seat to wake you up with the shock of cold tile. You're sure it's just to embarrass you in front of Ms. Ṃ̷̨̙͕̞̫̪̻͛̾̎e̸̡͎̻̰̳̦͚͚͛̈́̏̏̂̚͝ͅd̶̡̡͎̣̤͓̰̺̦̮͈̈́̊u̷̡͙͓̝͔̥͙̻̠͒́̏ͅs̵̹̏͗a̶̖̅́̀̆́͌̀̓̓̄̍͌͛͌̚. That her rough, calloused hands are laced with anger, or frustration, or resentment, or whatever those trailing fingertips burn your skin with!

The vague, wavy...consciousness? Reverence? washing over you lets you entertain Basil’s warning. Her promise to keep you on track—the one she half-assed whispering into a crouching Hero’s ear, tugging at his sleeve—so they could compare heights and grades?

Maybe he was meant to hear it. Could it have been addressed to the both of them, tied up nicely with a smirk?

Oh! Maybe he should treat that like her bow. Yank it out of reflective neon locks and tease her about it. Use it as a scrunchie and ignore her adorable pleas for it back after practice is finally done with you. Say it looks better on you. It doesn’t.

Hero had addressed something to him, too.

...Yeah, yeah, he had.

You figure he’d rather give it to you in person, though, and suddenly, without due formal warning, you feel mortifyingly important.

Undeserved importance is hell. And rude. And unbecoming of you and all your inherited potential. You don’t remember Mari saying those last two lines, but this doesn't seem like the right time to suck at "remembering", if you can call it that.

Still, how is she doing it now? Her mouth hasn’t let go of its smile yet, even as she bends down to meet your stuttering eyes.

Can you bring yourself to laugh at the Shonen protagonist holding the an? The envelope out with rigid arms like it’s a fucking rooftop confession scene? No. Not even with him bursting into restrained giggles, like always. All you can do—all your body can do, like it's poorly pre-programmed—is kiss her aching cheeks and tears and tell her that it’ll all be alright and we’ll figure it out. Together. And you love her, you all do, and for god sakes, stay!

If not for your sake, then Sunny’s. Then Aubery’s. Then Hero’s (You have a feeling he could use someone to love up there). Then yours, if she can find room in that hideous mess while restraining her grimace.

Her taunting smile stays, positioned right where Hero’s should be. A rude, hellish compromise, unbecoming of her familiar all-or-nothing and yet just as unnerving. It glitches out of sight, tugging at the edge of the 2d plane.

The force pulls you and Hero just a bit closer. well, someone had to do it.

The darkening gradient of the sky shades everything but the letter glowing white and your light-up sneakers, taking off as if the allure of the ball hadn’t distracted you from your faint intrigue in track. You think, defiantly. (You don’t know. You can’t know in??? Here, it says.) You think it's braiding, not drumming. Something carding its dull nails through your brittle hair to yank something beautiful out of it.

You need to know if it’s him. You need to know if he sees something in that tangled, crusty mess. In you.

If he’s willing to get his hands dirty (Sunny’s words, not yours).

You run until you see white.

Kel awoke with a fright and a frightening young boy tracing his fingertips down from his scalp to his back, rubbing little circles as he nudged Kel’s face into his shoulder.

Oh. Huh.