tampered | LOG: ONGOING

LOG: ONGOING

When; April 23rd, 11PM -- LIBRARY
Rating; PG? G?
Characters; Ishida Uryuu [

anti_buttons] & Fujioka Haruhi [

commoneresque] & IN A BIT Hitachiin Hikaru [

ourculminant] and Hitachiin Kaoru [

ourdenouement]
Summary; Thou shalt not deny the work ethic that has Uryuu present for his late late shift, nor Haruhi's fear of storms.
Log;

As if it wasn't enough that the previous day had ended with Uryuu thoroughly coated in mud, and with a bloodied nose (Inoue-san had hit the ball with her head; the ball hit him). Today produced weather that was, perhaps, actually worth talking about. And, of course, Uryuu had a late shift at the library. Dutifully, he had set out, plowing through the storm. Despite his umbrella, ridiculous rubber boots, and rain coat, he arrived rather wet through and thankful for his plastic wrapped change of sock and shoe.

He could not disagree with employment and attempt at order in the Library, but given how things kept changing, it did make things frustrating. Even with a fairly successful system of thinking around the Library's idiocsyncrasies, it could take him fifteen minutes to get the right shelf for a particular misplaced item.

Now, an hour before he could trudge back out, was one such time. Uryuu found himself walking past the same set of study tables for the sixth time, a vein in his bruised nose pulsing with his irritation. Lighting flashed, followed instantly by an ugly crack.

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The rain hadn't started out so bad, really. Haruhi was able on the first day to even go out, do errands, go about her normal business. When the thunder started earlier today, that's when she first was unnerved, but she had somehow made it to the library, willing herself to believe that she could get over this, and in addition to that, that if nothing else, the organization of books and other things methodical would be a proper distraction. As it happened, she had bitten off more than she could chew, and it was only half way into the afternoon that the storm outside became so severe that she found herself reduced to curling up in a corner of the vast reading establishment. If things changed around her--as they tended to do in the library--she barely took notice, if at all, and at all costs she kept her network device clutched in her white knuckled hand and turned to the off mode.

The last thing she wanted was for anyone to see her like this. Despite having been told before, having tried to adapt and learn to accept help in such few instances, she couldn't ask for help this time. Maybe it came from being in the City too long, a cause of regression? Or was that just a hollow excuse for not growing despite one's environment? Whichever it might be, Haruhi didn't think about it much, not in the day, and not when day turned to evening or evening into the pitch of night. Now under a table in what she could only gather to be one of the more rarely used areas of the library, she felt cold and had the vague notion of being hungry, or more along the lines of knowing she should eat rather than an actual desire of food. It was, in no large terms, a little pathetic, and she knew it, biting her lip and bowing her head, eyes clenched shut as tightly as possible.

Whether it was bad luck or bad timing, she would never guess, but shifting now, uncurling her arms from around her knees--pulled close to her chest for hours now--she only just managed to hear footsteps nearby through the dull roar of the storm before a particularly violent shock of thunder seemed to stop her heart. The only accurate way to describe the sound that escaped her was one of distress and fright in most concentrated form, mixed to make some even solution of depressingly small and possibly foolish looking, but she couldn't be bothered to lift her head again, forehead to knees, eyes closed again, and fingers gripping under her elbows like holding onto herself might make her feel less afraid.

A mouse? In the aftermath of the thunder's tumultuous strike, Uryuu had thought he heard it. Something sharp and high and desperate, more a squeak than anything else. Uryuu paused; the lights overhead flickered. He could feel his lips thinning, pressing together in a grimace of the severest disapproval. The electricity would go. How could it go? If something was mixing up all the books, then it ought to be able to keep things--

Ah, but there had been that sound. The lighting kept. He considered this. It wasn't as if Uryuu much cared about it, he had no fear of rodents, and little concern that the Library might have them. All the same. The walls did not change; he thought to glance at the hole, where it might have come from, and walked to the edge of the table closest to the wall. Crouching, Uryuu peered along it, and happened to, out of the corner of his eyes--

The book hit the ground with a slap as he jumped back, almost falling onto his back, and banging his shoulder against the wall. There was a person under the table.

Having seen ghosts for most of his life, any and all fear faded with his initial shock. Of course, there weren't ghosts in the City. He thought. But this one looked corporeal. Not a ghost.

"What," he said, dropping a knee to the ground, and leaning to pick up the book, "are you doing?"

Footsteps shuffling closer, even a voice asking her the all too sensible question of what she was doing, couldn't stir her, much less draw her out of her well formed clutch, a ball of curved spine and bowed head, and curled limbs. She wondered a little at how familiar the person sounded, aware that Hikaru and Kaoru had promised to come and find her--not that that made her feel any better. If anything, it made her feel worse, more ridiculous, more foolish, more childish, but she knew she wouldn't make it back on her own, and even with all her well practiced stubbornness, Haruhi had no desire to stay in the library over night--not in this storm.

Biting her lip, swallowing a hard nothing down her throat--odd how nothing felt sharp and a little nauseating--she tried to find words to reply with, not that it would make a big difference with her mouth pressed against the top of her knees, or near there, but acknowledgment should be issued. She knew that much, common sense, and then, courtesy, but the storm outside only seemed to thwart her at every beginning of a thought, and a flash of lightning alone was enough to cause tentatively opened eyes to squeeze shut again. For a while, she isn't sure how long it was, she knew she just sat there, huddled and miserable, aware of someone staring at her, and well they might. What an absurd sight this must make. All her life she had been able to handle most things on her own. That something as literally elementary as bad weather continued to be her undoing never failed to bother her greatly, but never enough to break her out of her fear either. When words finally made their way into audible format, her voice cracked, or creaked maybe, like floorboards stepped on too heavily, the new kind that squeak rather than groan, young but easily under pressure.

"Waiting," she managed with eyes blinking open by what manner of willpower she didn't really know, but it was something and she wished she didn't feel like she might cry at any moment. So stupid.

That took awhile. Another few seconds and Uryuu would have been forced to poke her with the book. It was a she, he thought, but recognition would have to wait a little longer. He couldn't see much of her from the way she had curled into herself. He could see, even through the shadow of the table, that she was shaking.

Any cold or dry retort withered fast. She looked awful. Every ounce of his frustration, irritation, and general surliness had been replace with an ample amount of concern and an even bigger slab of discomfort.

Logic: she had squeaked at the thunder. A fear of the storm? Uryuu had never had a dog, but heard of animals that crept under beds or quivered in basements during poor weather.

So pointing out the existence of the chairs would be, all too likely, met with silence. Or worse.

"Oh," he said. Dumbly, he knew. Hopelessly, he actually poked her with the book.

"... Look," Uryuu coughed more than said. "You... can't. Shouldn't. Here."

A pause.

"There's a mouse. So..."

Something managed to shoot through her severe case of fright, possibly the mention of a mouse---actually, that was definitely it---and it caused her to look up this time, head still pressed down with hands, which must have made for an awkward image, but she couldn't quite bring herself to stop just yet.

"Mouse?" Her voice echoed and broke strangely in the otherwise silent room. If the discomfort was Ishida's alone before, the same could not be said of the present moment, in which a couple of things happened. One, Haruhi recognized who he was.

And two, the mouse ran by.

Who knew there had been an actual mouse present, in addition to Haruhi's unintentionally excellent rendition of one squeaking. Blinking again, enough that some careless tears escaped---not that she noticed---she watched it scurry across the floor, down the length of a bookcase, and around its sharp wooden corner.

After that, a pause passed and she almost said hello, almost apologized, a hand reaching out reflexively to the sometimes curt but rarely troublesome individual in front of her. Almost. The intermittent weather saw fit to disturb her down to the core of her very being again instead, however, which made the extended hand sort of curl over in what would generally be called a lame clutch, a grasp for something, a sleeve for example, and she held on because the thunder was loud, and once again she felt reduced to not knowing what she was doing, and feeling very small about it.

A couple of things happened. Not quite simultaneously, but so fast on the tail of one another that they may as well have been.

One, she properly looked up and at him, and in that moment, he recognized her. Uryuu blinked, and

Two, the mouse ran by. Once again he found himself jumping, now only a tiny start, not, again, of fright but sheer surprise. Tears slid over her cheeks, and Uryuu was aware only peripherally as he stared, wide-eyed, at the mouse darting past and away. He glanced, slowly, back at her, as much to confirm that there had been a mouse as to move on with this, and noticed the reflection of the dim light beyond the table in the wetness on her face. He noticed exactly as the sky exploded.

Suddenly, she was clutching his sleeve.

Much as Uyruu could read other people, he had little experience in knowing what to do. Outside of well-practiced lines for battle and general, surface-level exposures, outside of what kept him apart. How did one handle this, what was he supposed to do? Of course he must do something. He could not equate this problem to being something that, perhaps, a parent or otherwise tenderly inclined person would handle, because he had never-- no--

Awkwardly, stiffly, and with something like a blush, he let his other hand cover hers.

"... My grandfather used to tell a story when it got like this. Of course, I wasn't afraid. I think... he might have been, even then, and telling it made him feel better."

Three things were enough for her to open her eyes again, wide this time, not expecting him to actually respond to her nerve wracked attempt to grasp onto anything---better than nothing.

One was his hand. It covered her own with a combination of awkwardness and ease, a sort of gentle contradiction in what one might call a crutch of knowing to do something but not exactly what. Haruhi had some distant awareness of that, eying it almost as if it was an alien sight, though really it only fell under the more familiar category of unexpected, and on another level, relieving.

Two was the way he spoke to her, different than previous times, though not entirely unlike any of those either. It held itself a mix or balance between that night at the dance and other more daily conversations about missing arms, auctions of time for company, and the rate of one's stitching. A softness reserved, perhaps, for privacy and not necessarily knowing all that one might be conveying, he struck her in the grace period of distant rain and storming, as confusingly kind.

Three was, not in proper order, the blush, which did nothing but make him human, for which Haruhi could not have been more grateful if she tried.

"You," she paused, pressing her lips together, dry then wet, "Don't have to--" it died off in an escalation of a squeak as the grace period came to a sudden halt, lightning flaring across the room and more thunder causing all kinds of a ruckus that threatened to shake down the very wells around them. Well, maybe not, but the table did shake above her and likely the books on it as well. "Youdon'thavetotellmethestorybutIwouldappreciateitIthink." she hurried to get it all out before her hand in his slipped away, all frantic nerves and no idea of what to do other than curl back in on herself, shaking and feeling more ridiculous for it all over again.

"S-sorry!" was the very, very short-lived apology, possibly lost in the way her voice was muffled and the patter of rain seemed to harden against the windows at the same exact time.

To make himself feel less - well, to feel less how acutely he felt her hand in his, her eyes on him, Uryuu found himself resorting to the brisk and dry, the critical.

"How surprising that the wonderful Blair isn't here. -- Or the Host Club, for that matter." Not that he knew much about the Host Club. (Or Blair Waldorf, come to it).

Not that it mattered once the lightning made its flamboyant show, and the thunder, and the lights went off for a full five seconds. Instinct and less thought had him, reflexively, following her hand with his, quicker, and grabbing it tight. He would not do more, could not do more, but at least, he could try to keep her from becoming a breathing, trembling ball.

Her apology: heard and ignored as Uryuu picked his words.

"The god of the wind and sky, and the goddess of the clouds and rain -- or, the god of rain and the goddess of sky, Grandfather would tell it one way then the other, sometimes saying of course a woman is always pushing and blowing at a man to move and act, sometimes saying of course a man is always making a woman cry. But, either way, they were married. And, of course, what is a marriage without conflict?"

He paused; lightning flashed only dimly, thunder struck far off.

"... Of course, we both knew that the only "gods" were the false death gods, but he would tell it..."

Edited 2009-04-24 08:47 (UTC)

If she didn't expect him to cover her hand with his, she absolutely and completely did not expect for him to reclaim it in mid-retreat, clasping it tightly as a knowing friend might, though he is not quite the both of those things. Another sort of pathetic noise got caught in her throat, one of surprise and remaining fear, trembles running through her every attempted word and thought, but his hand was warm and his presence more than anything an anchor into reality she so badly needed, even if, for all her common sense, her stubbornness prevented her from saying so. Her earlier apology having gone unnoticed or overlooked, she didn't try to repeat, but she felt a little bad, her fingers threading with his, plain with the need for what a simple holding of hands could offer, did offer.

So, rather than an apology that might be useless or a thank-you that felt like it fell rather short of the target, she settled for accepting what he gave in addition to a companion pulse and in that familiarity she could get her mind around, even in the midst of closer and farther thunder dappling the seconds. Instead of focusing on that, however, she tried to listen only to his voice, oddly soothing in its own calm and mild-mannered fashion. The way he went on about the story, it felt more like he was telling a story about the story, which in a way he was, but it was still done in such a manner that made it seem even more so.

Almost, it made her smile, but not quite, head still bowed harshly enough against her knees to leave a red mark, shivers running through her like one sick, which maybe she was at this point, but it was hard for her to differentiate between the results of her phobia and just not being dressed warmly enough in early spring.

Threading, linked fingers. For an extended period. Uryuu was forced to focus on the story with all the energy of how exceedingly uncomfortable he was. The rain beat at the windows, still quicker than his heart beat, and he forced himself to ignore his hand entirely. Given certain recent events, the process was a little ironic.

Little known fact: Uryuu had been one of those boys who stood in front of the mirror and practiced. Not funny faces, but "cool" ones, all the right phrases, which at times required acting the opposite part that would allow his super cool, sometimes straight from a book, movie, comic, or show, lines. Captain Hook squared off against Peter Pan (though admittedly, Uryuu thought of Pan as somewhat irritating), the tragic and battle scarred samurai against the demonic warlord, The Termina-- er. And so forth.

Unfortunately, this would soon become pretty obvious.

"Perhaps they fought because of the God of Wind's infidelity, for he would not settle, and his roving brought both grief and rage to his stricken wife. Or -- well, he tended to tell it that the God of Wind would be unfaithful, or the God of Rain would - er, spread his - well, it was rarely the goddess's fault, however he told it. His favorite way to spin it, though, involved a particular telling of the Wind God's infidelity, as he swept against the earth, whispering through tree leaves, caressing the grasses - seen all the while in the overcast sky, and her heavy heart became the heavy clouds.

I will drown the earth,, the goddess resolved," his voice, yes, lifted to imitate the tragic woman, "and so she let her tears fall, and the ground began to fill and the grasses choke. It did not please the Wind God to see his lover drowning."

With his growing enthusiasm it was easier and easier to pay attention to that (having the minor suspicion of being in the presence of one who did things like practice theatrics) than the storm, and while she did not disentangle their fingers--this was one instance in which Haruhi could not claim to be entirely brave and self-reliant--she did lift her head a little higher, watching him not unlike a tentative animal, willing to believe bad things might not happen but still not absolutely convinced. Here and there she almost smiled, held back only by the flash and ever unwanted bang of lightning and its partnered rumble. This story, she felt she had heard a version before (maybe a few) but it felt a little newer than it might have, in different situations and told by another individual, for which she found herself grateful. So grateful did she find herself, in fact, that in the moment that Ishida Uryuu's voice raised in a quite commendable rendition of a female scorned, she didn't even laugh.

Well, okay, that was in part, due to the remnant fear of the way the building continued to feel like it could shake itself to pieces around them (made worse in her head no doubt) but a grace for a grace, or something, and all she did was smile. It was an unconscious motion of lips turning up at the corners and desperate eyes unfurling like scared children learning to be unafraid, and she thought, for a moment, that for all his curt and somewhat dry behavior, she had been right about him.

Ishida Uryuu was a kind person, whether he wanted to be or not, and this perhaps, made him all the kinder for it, though never (she guessed in that secret way of people who do not know each other well enough to presume) to himself.

When a singularly deafening crash echoed through from low floor to high ceiling and into what felt like the very center of her spine, she felt fractionally less ashamed for the way her grip tightened, because if there was one thing could be said of a person who wanted to be less kind than he actually was, then it was that---as awkward as a clenching of hands might be between him and a person too stubborn to ask for help and too average to push it away---in the heart of hearts, she would not be faulted for being human in her fear. He probably would roll his eyes at her choice of hiding place (she almost expected it) or the like, but this, she didn't mind even in thought. A table was just the first thing she thought of, having always been slight of figure and as tables were so normal an accessory to any room that she might find one at any unexpected time of need (unlike a wardrobe or a closet or...well, whatever.)

Moment having passed, she loosened her grip---apologetically so, if the softening of threaded fingers could convey an adverb---and peered up at her only company, as if to say she was still listening.

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LOG: ONGOING

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