Devilish Deeds

“Not another one” You take the small bag of candy out of your shoe yet again. This is the 9th time since this started 4 months ago. The flavor is, as per usual, orange. The candy is actually tasty but orange is the most meh flavor. You neither hate it or like it but you won’t refuse it. Candy is candy after all and this brand of candy is particularly delicious. As you take a couple pieces out you can help but think that once again, your hazer has struck.

You have a solid idea as to who is doing it. She’s not exactly...subtle with her trying to see your reaction. For some reason or other, our local devil/angel Tokoyami Towa, has decided to perform some devilish deeds and you seem to be her target. You’ve never caught her in the act but she’s always there to see her handiwork in action and gives a giggle whenever she strikes. Such misdeeds have been the aforementioned candy in your shoes, your shoes being swapped left and right, the inside of your desk being organized to the left instead of the right, and other horrible actions. All in all, slight inconveniences. You would have asked her to knock it off but she always seems so happy whenever performing a trick that you don’t have the heart to. She’s honestly the most sweet and kind girl you have ever met that doing anything that could hurt her would break you as a person. Plus you actually enjoy these little surprises and play it up as an annoyance for her. You learned near the beginning that she gets more happy the more you think it bothers you up until faking actual annoyance. You screwed up and acted annoyed and now you don’t get slightly stiff cookies on your seat that you carefully fake sit on and jump off. They were so good too.

The reason as to why she has chosen you has always eluded you. When it first started, you couldn’t help but wonder if you did something to her. You’ve always tried your best to be a stand up guy and be helpful to everyone, no matter how big or small the task. You’ve replayed memory after memory in your head to see if you ever did something like forget to hold the door for her or something. You even asked your friend Subaru if she knows anything from whatever girltalk she is a part of if she heard of you doing anything wrong, but she has no idea either. She said that they even talked about it earlier this year and everyone pretty much has a very high opinion of you in class with only the boy haters having a neutral opinion. Eventually, you decided to give up on trying to figure it out. Nothing points to anything wrong and she’s clearly enjoying herself so as long as she’s happy, you can be slightly inconvenienced.

The day continues as normal until you after lunch. You sit back down in your seat and reach into your desk to bring out your book but a crumpled piece of paper blocks the book. You pull it out and unfold it to reveal a message that says,  “Meet me on the roof after school.” Ah. The fabled confession flag note. You try to play it cool but your heart is beating like crazy. Who could it be? Maybe it was Sora or Aki? Perhaps Okayu or Mio? It could have also been Noel or Aqua. Naw. Those two would never. Noel is only tolerant of you and Aqua mumbles and hides when speaking to you. Now that you think about it, your class is stacked with beauties. In fact, you are the only guy in the class. Weird but it seems like there was a significantly higher number of females born that same year as you so the dice just rolled up that way. Regardless, you just have to wait until the end of school to see who it was.

School takes forever and finally ends. Everyone somewhat rushes out as normal as you hang back a little bit until the rush ends. Even though you were excited for school to end, now you have butterflies in your stomach and wish you had more time. You glance outside and see that it’s raining and it doesn’t look like it’s going to stop anytime soon. You already feel bad waiting a bit and don’t want the person to wait for you in the rain so you quickly gather your things and head on up.

As you reach the door to the roof, you see a lone umbrella next to the door. Looks like your secret admirer planned ahead. As you open the door, you open your umbrella as well. The rain is coming down at a steady pace and luckily there’s no wind. You glance around and don’t see anyone about. Perhaps you got there a bit too early. You decide to walk out and wait in the middle while still thinking about who it could be. You get along really well with Polka, Subaru, and Matsuri but you can’t imagine any of them having a crush on you unless they hide it very well. Oh god please don’t be Haato. While you won’t turn her down, you are unsure about whether you are prepared for her eccentricities. You’ve already had to suffer a couple Haachama Cooking's that she inflicted upon others. You were passing at by at the wrong time and got dragged in by Luna. Can’t exactly blame her though. Misery loves company and we supported each other through that conflict. You still remember having to carry Luna to the nurse’s office while your stomach felt like it took a cannon ball hit directly. You feel a cold tremor slide down your back from remembering that fateful day.

Actually, that feels a bit too real. And wet. As you get brought out of your trauma, you can’t help but flinch as a water droplet hits your nose. That’s odd. You notice some more falling before glazing around and seeing a lot of droplets falling. You look up and see a bunch of droplets coming from the umbrella. In fact, you can see light coming from the top. The umbrella has a bunch of tiny holes in it. You turn around to get back inside and catch Towa peeking through the door. You make eye contact for a second or two before she goes running off in a hurry. Oh. Oh, I see. It was a prank. Huh. This kind of...hurts a bit.

This was something new from Towa and you don’t care for this. A clear line was crossed but you don’t exactly know how to react to this. You suppose that the first thing you should do is get out of the rain and toss the umbrella out. No sense in getting more wet and having someone else get wet from that umbrella. As you proceed to do that, you try to sort out your feelings. You feel a few things. Embarrassed, betrayed, sad, empty, and a hint of anger. At least no one saw this. You stew in your emotions as you proceed down to the entrance to head home. You pass by a couple of the girls who saw you were wet and asked how that happened. You gave a white lie and said you were helping someone and got a bit wet. You tried to smile but you know it doesn’t match a normal smile. You can tell that some of the girls knew something was wrong but you bravely retreated before they could ask. You took a bit longer to get home and proceeded to just kind of lounge about in a depression. You were really keeping track of time so by the time you finished your homework, it was already late and you decided to just go to bed. Sleep was a bit rough as you were still trying to process your emotions but you eventually fell asleep.

The next day you arrive at school later than you normally do. Just barely enough time before class starts. You feel a bit better after sleep. Not so much depressed or sad anymore but definitely still empty and a bit bitter. The girls gave their normal greetings as you entered the class and you gave the best response you could in your state. The few that you passed still look a bit worried but thankfully didn’t press you. As you pass by Towa, she decides to speak up.

“Umm...Hey Anon.” She’s clearly hesitant and unsure what to say.

“Hello.” Was all you responded as you continued to walk by. You felt...nothing. Like you’d think you’d at least feel angry but there was just nothing. Normally you feel a happy greeting someone and you assumed you’d feel a bit angry with Towa but there was just nothing.

“Uh. Hey. I wanted to....” She trailed off as you just kept walking to your desk and didn’t acknowledge what she said. A few of the girls around her noticed that it was giving you a confused look but you just got to your desk and sat down while closing your eyes. After a few minutes, a voice speaks up next to you.

“Hey Anon.” You open your eyes and look to see who it was.

“Hello Subaru. How are you doing today?” You gave her a small smile as you responded to her.

“Doing alright. How about yourself? You seem a bit out of it.”  It was pretty obvious she was prying for some info about your state.

“I’m okay.” You couldn’t think of a good response so keeping it short and simple was your only move. You couldn’t help but glance over to where Towa sits. She’s looking down at her desk pretty hard.

“Really? Cause it really seems like somethi-”

“Alright. Everyone sit down” Your homeroom teacher, A-sensei, saved you as she entered the room to start class.

Everyone takes their seats but you can tell that a few are staring at you. Subaru in particular, you know is giving you a look. School resumes as normal but you aren’t really paying attention. A-Sensei calls you out on it a couple times and you can only apologize. After the third time, you know she knows somethings up as you’re almost never caught slippin. Break time hits between subjects and you just close your eyes. You can hear people talking near you but you tune it out. You can tell someone moved up close to you and was trying to talk to you but you gave them no acknowledgement. You’re pretty sure it was Towa trying to speak to you but between you not acknowledging her and her not knowing what to say, she eventually gave up. The others got the hint and left you be each break. The school day ends and you head on home without saying much to anyone except for responding to the occasional, “Goodbye” with a soulless, “Have a nice day.” When at home, you still feel somewhat empty inside and lounge about doing nothing until you go to sleep.

It’s been two days and you feel yourself starting to get back to normal. Still hurt and locked down but you feel yourself adjusting to it. That is until you get to school. The second day is pretty much the same as the first. You come in, say a few hellos, sit down, and shut down. That is until the final break where you feel a soft punch on your arm.

“Oi. Wake up.” You glance to your side and see Subaru looking a bit miffed.

“Oh. Hey. What’s up?”

“What’s up? You’ve been ignoring us and all you can say is ‘What’s up?’” She gives you an exasperated sigh before she continues.

“Look. I don’t know what but something clearly has happened between you and Towa and she’s been trying to talk to you about it. We’ve been trying to help her but I don’t think we can do anything. She needs to talk to you.”  Subaru is rarely serious and this is one of her serious moments. Still, you honestly don’t feel in the mood to deal with this today.

“Subaru, while I appreciate that you are looking out for me. I honestly don’t want to-”

“Anon. Look at her.” Subaru cut you off while speaking softly to you in her serious mode. Another rare thing and one you cannot ignore. You glance over to Towa and take her in. She looks miserable. She looks like she was crying and she looks a mess. She gets out of her seat and rushes out of the room. You can hear her sniffling as she leaves and you see Watame, Botan, and Flare rush out after her. You weren’t prepared for that at all. You don’t know what happened between the first break and now but clearly something has. Everything that makes you ‘you’ wants you to go follow and make her feel better but something is holding you back. You look back over at Subaru with a pained and questioning look.

“She’s been trying to speak to you and glances over at you all day for the last couple days and every break she goes to the bathroom and cries. We’ve been trying to calm her down but we don’t have much success. All we can get from her is some self loathings. What happened?” Subaru asks and you can tell the others around were listening in as much as they could.

You give a sigh as you know you can’t allow this to continue but don’t want to explain the situation as you yourself still need to work it out. “Can you tell her I’ll hang back after class to hear her out?” You go back to looking forward and closing your eyes. This time in thought of trying to sort out yourself so you can forgive her.

“Okay. I’ll tell her.” Subaru confirms and you can hear a few of the girls murmur. You hear Subaru get out of her seat to probably go find Towa and pass along the message. A few minutes pass and you hear Subaru sit back down and feel a light tap on your arm. You glance over and you can see Subaru give you a nod. She still is looking extremely worried about the whole situation and a quick glance shows that a lot of the girls are too. You turn back to Subaru and look her in the eyes.

“I’ll do what I can to try and fix this. I can’t promise to forgive her but I’ll do my best to make things okay.” You try and reassure her that everything will be fine. She looks at you for a few seconds before relaxing a bit.

“Thanks, Anon. You’re a good guy.” The ‘Sorry for forcing you to do this’ is unsaid but you know that she wouldn’t have said anything if everyone wasn’t legitimately worried.

You go back to closing your eyes and processing. Everything boils down to intent. She hurt you but you can’t throw everything at her. You were the one that felt hyped up that it was a confession when nothing really pointed that it was. If she meant it to look like that, then that’s her fault. If I misread that, then it’s on me. If the prank was meant to hurt me emotionally, then that’s clearly on her. If it was one of her normal pranks, that’s again on me for misreading. Everything else is water under the umbrella. You give yourself a little chuckle in your head. You believe that’s a good sign that you are ready to forgive her. Probably super unhealthy to rush yourself like this but you’ve never been one to hold a grudge or anger. If you are ready then everything boils down to her. You don’t have any reservations that this won’t change anything. At best you’ll tell her that you forgive her and that she’ll need to mind her distance for a while before things may go back to normal. At worst, you don’t forgive her and you tell her to not interact with you any longer and that you don’t hate her. You don’t expect that last one to happen as a person who seems to be beating themselves up and crying for a few days wouldn’t have been malicious and won’t apologize.

You’re brought out of your thoughts as the final bell rings out. You hear everyone start packing up and leave fairly quickly with the exception of Towa who is looking down at her desk. Even A-sensei seemed to have gotten the message and bounced quickly. Obviously, word got around. You love these girls but they sure do gossip really quick. You see Marine and Noel hang back a bit at the door. Both probably worried though you get the feeling that Noel is more worried that you’ll attack her or something from the glare you are getting. Subaru comes up, whispers a few things to them, and they all look back at you. You give a reassuring nod and Subaru and Marine return the nod. Noel seems to be fighting with herself before giving up, shooting you one last glare before giving Towa a pitying glance and they all leave. You could never hate Noel but you wish she’d give you a bit more credit though you suppose that’s to be expected. She already gives you a lot of leeway for being a guy as is. The class is now empty and it’s just you and Towa. You wait a few minutes to see if she is going to start but it’s clear she isn’t. Hell, she’s probably expecting you to start yelling at her by the way she’s trembling. Seems like you’ll have to be kind and start this off.

“So.” You start while getting out of your desk and walking up to the teacher's podium. “We have a few things to talk about. Obviously.” You end your sentence behind the teacher’s podium and lean on it. This will at least make it so Towa would have to look at you.

All you get is a few sniffles in response. Seems like she’s already going to burst into tears at any moment. It hurts to see but you continue on.

“All your pranks, I don’t mind. The candy, the shoes, the desk. All of that, I don’t mind. They were all pleasant surprises.” You say flippantly. Towa’s head shoots up in shock as if she never realized that you knew. Of course she didn’t.

“They were never really mean or anything and you don’t exactly hide very well. You always do this cute little giggle every time you get me and I’m not one to rain on the parade of harmless fun. Plus it was rather enjoyable.” You say this with a smile as you recall all the fun little events. Alas, you both aren’t here to recall better times. So you frown and carry on.

“This last prank, however, was too much.” Towa looks down and looks ready to cry again. “There’s a fine line between a harmless prank and a hurtful act. This wasn’t an enjoyable prank. This was hurtful. Hurt fairly deep if I’m being perfectly honest and I still am hurting.” It feels weird talking about it out loud. You’ve never been one to talk about your emotions but this will be an exception. Towa looks a bit startled but still hasn’t said anything so you continue.

“I’d like to believe in you. I’d like to believe that this was supposed to be a harmless prank that went horrible and not something that was malicious but it could have been malicious from the start.. So please, tell me why? Be honest. Even if it hurts, be honest and tell me everything. You owe me that at least.” You toss the ball into her court and wait. She’s full on fighting the tears now. Sniffling and wiping her eyes to keep her composure. It takes a few minutes before she says anything.”

“It wasn’t a prank.” She gets out between her sniffles.

“Huh?” You are at least 99.99999% sure you sounded like a total idiot right there but you weren’t prepared for that. Towa didn’t seem to hear or care as she continued on.

“It all went wrong. I wanted to tell you how I feel and I messed it up.” She’s given up fighting the tears and just lets them flow. You’re too shocked to even respond.

“I forgot I had that umbrella. Some jerk poked holes into it and left it at a convenience store so I took it to repair it and forgot.” Oh. That makes sense. Towa would take it, fix it, and return it. That’s just the kind of devil she is.

“But I stupidly grabbed that and put it up there. I was so nervous and you...you...I messed everything up.” Towa starts bawling at this point and puts her head in her arms on her desk. You are silently processing this new information while in shock.

Okay. WOW. You were, once again, not prepared for that but everything is starting to make sense. From what you can tell, Towa grabbed the wrong umbrella she put up there for you since she knew it was going to be raining. She gave you the note wanting to confess to you but left it vague. You got up there before she did because she was still probably trying to gather her courage. You were up there for a bit in lala land and by the time she got up there, you were already wet from the umbrella. She probably realized what happened, saw that everything was screwed up, and ran away in tears when you saw her. She didn’t know that you knew she was the one doing the pranks so she didn’t think you thought it was a prank. She tries to come up to you the next day to probably apologize and try again but when you blew her off, she probably thought you were rejecting her and she was taking it hard. That explains why Subaru said that the girls couldn’t only get self loathing from her. It all makes sense. Thank you Doctor Watson for the critical and rational thinking classes!

You confirm this with Towa and she nods along while still crying into her arms on the desk. She only added one thing.

“I thought you weren’t talking to me because you thought I was disgusting.” She lifts her head up when she says this. Her eyes are puffy and wet, the little bit of makeup she wears is running, snot if pouring out of her nose, and she’s drooling. Overall, not a pretty picture but a given due to the circumstances. You save this memory for the future to gently tease her about.

“No no no. I was just hurt.” You quickly say.

“So I’m not disgusting?” Dear god this girl.

“No. The opposite in fact. I definitely would have agreed on the roof if you asked.” You reply a bit woodenly.

“He he” This seems to calm her a bit and she gives a little giggle between sniffling and smiles her most beautiful, snot covered smiles at you. It’s honestly the most amazing thing you’ve ever seen. It feels like your heart skipped a beat.

There’s a lull in the conversation. Well, kind of. Towa is still a bit of a mess. You come to your senses and do what you should have done a bit ago and grab a box of tissues. You bring it over to Towa and put it on her desk. She gives you a look of gratitude and begins the arduous task of trying to clear herself up. The misunderstanding has been cleared up and you can both go on with your lives.

Wait a minute. You’re overlooking something. You think back. Oh. It was a confession. Yeah. that’s what you were forgetting. A CONFESSION? Oh god. Oh man. You were not prepared for this. Dear god. Uh. Is it still on? Is there still a way to salvage this? Is that even appropriate? I mean, you DID like Towa before all this mess. You just didn’t think she even had any interest in you besides pranking you. Shit. You need a bit more information.

“So uhh...Why me anyways?” You try to casually ask.

“Huh.” Towa gives you a questioning look.

“I mean, why...why confess to me?” You want to look at Towa but man, that corner of the room looks super interesting right now.

“Seriously?” She deadpans.

“Okay yeah. I know.” You know you are blushing but at least you can look at Towa now.

You were expecting an answer as she is just staring at you before she sighs. “At first, I just wanted to do some more devilish deeds. Some of the girls tease me that I’m more of an angel than Kanata,” Sorry Towa but that’s a fact, “so I decided to corrupt someone. I figured what’s more devilish than making the nicest person lose their temper and build up some negative karma. I figured you were the best target but checked with the girls who the nicest person was and they all mostly agreed. So I decided to stalk you an-”

“Whoa wait what” you couldn’t help but interject

“It’s not as bad as it sounds!” She cries out. “I just, you know, followed you around a bit to get your patterns.”

“How long is a bit?”

“A-a month. Just to understand the target.” She sheepishly answers. This girl, I swear.

“Anyway,” She barrels on like she didn’t stalk me, “I noticed how much you like to help people and I just kind of...you know?”

Yeah. You know. Watch someone long enough and you can easily start liking or hating them. Still, if it wasn’t for this big misunderstanding, you would have been dating already.

“So...so where does this put us?” Towa vocalizes the question that we both have been wanting to ask.

“Honestly, I’m not sure. I mean, I DO like you and want to but I can’t help but think this is probably not the correct time. Socially, I think. I mean, I understand what happened but like, I think the girls would probably crucify me. A couple of them at least. Doesn’t matter how good my reputation is. Saying I’m dating you this quickly after this mess would make them think I took advantage of you.”  Towa looks like she wants to protest a bit but reluctantly gives up.

“That’s not fair. I have to wait even longer because of something stupid like that. It was just a stupid misunderstanding. I’ve already waited 3 months!” she groans. Your heart soars at the fact that she still wants to date you after this mess.

“I’m sorry for misunderstanding.” You can’t help but apologize.
“No no. It's kind of no one's fault. We both misread it. It hurt but you were hurt too. I’m just happy it wasn’t what I thought it was.”

“Same here. Still though...” You can’t help. Towa shoots you a smile. There’s another pause in the conversation as you both try to figure out what to do. You can’t really think of anything to get around the problem though besides time.

“I guess we can try again in a month? That is probably enough time?” you put forth while not exactly being thrilled about it. Towa groans after you say that.

“Another month! No! No way!” Towa slams her hands on her desk startling you and stands up. She still has a bit of a mess on her shirt but it looks a lot better. “I’m not waiting any longer! We’re dating starting today! We just won’t tell anyone!”

Oh. You didn’t even think about that. You give a sly smile, “Oh my. How devilish.” you respond. Towa puffs up in pride.

“None of the girls live near me so we can go on dates over there. It’s the perfect plan! We can go to the movies and the park and there’s an amusement center pretty close by too! I’d hear if any of our classmates are going there in advance too!” She seems to be getting herself hyped up. It’s honestly adorable seeing her get excited and preplanning dates already. Towa spins around and gives you an angelic smile. As your heart skips another beat you can’t help but think this devil has already corrupted you by being so damn cute.