Did I mention editing??? well i didn't.
Stalker - Matsuoka Natsumi Version
She stared at the girl that sat in front of her, it was becoming a bad habit – staring. Yet she couldn’t take her still sleepy eyes off of the girl, perhaps she had been mesmerized by her features. It had started at the beginning of the term when she had first noticed the girl; her first thought was that she was a little plain. What attracted her then were not her features, but her voice - it was pretty, she didn’t really know how to describe it but it just felt nice to her ears, almost comforting. For a while it seems that she would unknowingly just notice her little movements, it probably helped that the girl had taken a liking for the seat across from her.
She probably sounded more than a little creepy, actually more like extremely creepy but it’s not like she wanted it to be like this. She would just find her eyes falling onto her, it’s not like she meant to notice the way she brushes her hair or how she would sometimes pout in her sleep.
She really did seem like a creep.
She didn’t know when it was that everything changed, when she was given this false hope. Perhaps it had started when the girl had moved from her usual seat near the end of the bus to the one right across from her. She thought that just maybe, she had seen her looking, or at least pitied her sore neck. Whatever it was, she didn’t really care what mattered was that it was slightly less creepy to be looking at someone across from you than the one at the back of the bus. Still a little creepy though, she would sigh to herself.
This is what she had been demoted to, some sort of creepy stalker. Ah university sure did bring out the best of me she would mutter sarcastically. She blamed it on all the studying that it had taken her to get there though, surely that had something to do with her new obsession of the plain girl that sat across from her.
It continues, and the longer this continues the more paranoid she was getting. This obsession, as her friends would joke about was getting the best of her. She didn’t even know what it was that was attracting her eyes towards this girl. It was to the extent where she would slump down in her seat in disappointment if she didn’t see the girl across from her. This was her daily half an hour of happiness, just to see the girl in the morning. She was sure that was the only reason why she would bother to go to class at all.
She doesn’t usually get to see her at the end of her school days, she were sure that the girl’s classes ended earlier than her 5’oclock economics class. She would sigh and curse, surely if she saw her at the end of the day her fatigue would fade away. She was right though, seeing her at the end of the day wiped away all her fatigue. It only happened once, and that’s what disappointed her. She remembers Madoka animatedly talking to her, but she was forever staring at the girl out of the corner of her eye. The things that caught her eyes were the stares that the girl was giving Madoka. She pouted hoping that girl didn’t actually find Madoka more interesting than her.
After what seemed like hours of daydreaming about the other girl, which she would scream from because it seemed oh so creepy when she thought back about it. She had decided she’d finally bring up the courage to talk to the girl, or at least try seeing as how awkward she becomes in the other girl’s presence. She was hopeless, and she was sure every other person that has seen her stare would agree.
It was the last day of classes and the first thing she notices when she steps on to the bus was how the girl seemed different than usual. She shrugged it off and was about to open her mouth to greet the other girl when alarms blasted in her head and she freaked out. Throwing herself into the seat as quickly as possible she tries to hide her blushing face behind her backpack. She’s warm, she would think to herself the whole bus ride. She was so comfortingly warm that she unknowingly falls asleep, missing the chance to awkwardly stare at her for half the bus ride.
Between exams and long bus rides without her, she finds herself getting frustrated. It was awfully foolish for her to be harbouring such a crush on the girl that merely sat in front of her every morning for the last 2 almost 3 months. She didn’t even know what to do; even burying her head in the books wouldn’t remove the girl’s face from her mind. Surely she was going insane; at least that’s what her grades at the end of the exams tell her. Too distracted she thinks before throwing her notes away hoping that they would never come back to haunt her.
She started the new term, thinking that she had already hypnotized herself out of thinking about the girl. The first day back and she had already ruined her self-hypnosis. She grabs her usual seat and stares at the empty seat in front of her; she would admit it had been a little disappointing. Although it would only a little though, she was trying to forget her stupid crush on the girl. A week passes and she still boards the bus in despair, hopeless really she concludes.
She finds herself lacking sleep, having all these whats or if’s running through her head. Fed up, she decides to get to school earlier and see if she can take her mind off of things. She had already given up on seeing the girl, but alas something up there in the sky had other plans for her. The bus was rather early so there were only a few people scattered through, however she sees a very familiar figure trying not to fall asleep. She’s delighted, and she can feel a dumb smile and blush crawling up her face. She almost trips and prays that nobody saw it. That blush doesn’t leave her face after she gently sits down beside the girl, hoping that she wouldn’t be awoken.
The silly smile she sees in the reflection of her phone helps her decide that she would take this bus every morning. She thought she was going to be content with this, or at least she still hoped that this silly crush would go away. She never thought of even speaking to the girl, so surely she didn’t know what her dizzy sick mind had decided when it mumbled something to her – may a hello, she really doesn’t remember. Surely she didn’t know what had taken over her when she woke up and almost snuggled into the figure beside her. Or why in the world her head was resting on the girl’s shoulder, she usually had better sleep posture than that. She blamed it all on the sleep as she embarrassedly apologized to the other girl, only to be stunned by the face she had.
For the first time in a while she started questioning her tastes in a girl, because the girl she thought was plain and suddenly seemed to be so much better in her eyes. Beauty is subjective; she could remember some random professor she wasn’t paying attention to say. She could only think of one thing, that half smile she had was stunning.
Things change between the two of them; she was bent on making them change even more. She wouldn’t be satisfied with just hellos and polite smiles. Granted that she wish they would take things way more, but she would bury those thoughts shrugging them off as mere delusions. She was bent on at least becoming her friend though, it was only then that she noticed didn’t know anything about the girl. Well… to be correct she didn’t know anything that couldn’t be gathered by having stared at her every morning for almost half a year. It would be an understatement to say that she actually knew a fair share about the other girl. Her name though, was something that had escaped her. Which she concluded was dumb because she even knew all the subjects that the girl was taking – she would see the girl pouting at her textbooks early in the morning before giving up and sleeping.
She puts her plan into motion, not really her plan but Madoka’s. Madoka was fed up with her filling her mailbox whenever she couldn’t control her dumb feelings for the other girl, which was every morning. Needless to say, Madoka wasn’t enjoying waking up every morning at 7o’clock to such mails. The girl even tried to help her – a pitiful mess of a baker bake some cookies for her crush. In all honesty she would conclude the only thing that Madoka hasn’t done for her is push her into the girl’s arms and confess on her behalf. If she kept on mailing Madoka though, maybe she’d do her confession for her.
Her heart beats faster than usual, hands sweating as she fights off the urge to hide in some corner. Valentine’s Day had never been her thing; usually she got things not the other way around. She stalls a little in front of the girl, unable to bring up courage. It was only after spending the whole bus ride in despair and self monologues that she borderline shoves the bag of cookies in the other girl’s arms.
“Happy Valentine’s, I’m Natsu.”
Not the type of confession she was aiming for, or Madoka who broke out into laughter after hearing about it. Good enough, she concludes before waiting for the next morning to come.
Excited and maybe a little worried she steps onto the bus the next morning. She tries so hard to wipe away the foolish grin on her face when the girl greets her by her name. Surely this was the improvement that she had been looking for, although she really wouldn’t mind if the other girl confessed undying love for her too. She introduces herself and finally after half a year of stalking, she finally knows the other girl’s name. Not bad for something she thought wouldn’t have a good ending, not bad at all she thinks to herself while still trying to wipe away her grin.
She starts looking forward to every morning just a little more because every morning she would hear her greeting her by her name. What more could she possibly want, after all it was the girl’s voice that had attracted her in the first place. It was certainly better than trying to strain her ears and listen to the girl thank the bus driver while the other students rushed off the bus towards their busy day.
She didn’t even remember that it was White Day until the girl turned around with this shy and utterly adorable smile and handed her chocolates. A thank you gift, she hears the other girl says but she’s too busy smiling like an idiot to reply properly. She thinks she might actually be in love with the girl, something that she had been avoiding this whole time. Surely there was a difference between love and my fondness towards the girl; she would try to convince herself. However the chocolates, they destroyed any hope that she had of convincing herself. And thus, Madoka’s claim that she was some sort of lovesick stalker came to be verified.
Before she even knew it the two of them had become closer, and it took all her efforts not to come off as some sort of creepy lovesick stalker. She knew she probably seemed a little dumb to the people around them as she hanged onto every word that came out of the girl’s mouth. She really couldn’t help it her voice was just very attractive, she would mutter to herself as an excuse. She comes to understand the girl more and more, beyond that mere plain girl description that she had given the girl during their first meeting. She was glad that she had noticed the girl, that as every day passes and as more words flow between the two of them those feelings don’t fade.
She wakes up to another reason now, not to stare at the girl from in front of her, and not to secretly glance at the girl from beside her. She wakes up every morning excited to greet the girl, to talk about another meaningless topic in hopes that the two would get closer. However there are just some mornings when she’s just about dead tired from studying that she passes out the moment she sits down. She looks forwards to those too, because she finds herself waking up on the girl’s shoulder. All those annoying heartbeats were worth it, to be so close to the other girl who would often times be resting their head on hers. All that’s missing would be hand holding, she concludes while staring at the other girl’s hands. Maybe someday, she wishes.
The long awaited end of term has come and while others may be celebrating, she sulks. She wonders if maybe she should have taken a summer course too, perhaps the same one as the girl but chemistry in the summer really didn’t sound that appealing. She didn’t want that bus ride to end, she wished that maybe there was just a little more time left between the two of them. Somehow it just felt all too painful, to know that it was most likely going to end just at that. Her day brightens, still as it always does as the other girl steps on the bus. She tries her best to stay awake, and enjoy what felt like the last moments. However, she didn’t expect the other girl to ask for her phone number, something that she herself had been too shy to do. She gives it to her, with a delighted grin. Surely there was hope for them to continue, into whatever it was that it would become.
She stumbles through her usual summer routine bored, saddened and occasionally she sleepily gets up in the morning and changes only to realize that she didn’t need to go to school. Only to realize that she could only see the girl in her dreams now and even then they were vague and sparse. She bundles herself up in her covers and stares at her cell phone wondering just when the girl would phone or even text her. The days continue and her hope slowly dwindles, perhaps she was just too gullible. She had hoped, believed that perhaps maybe the other girl would share the same feelings. She finds herself, wailing to Madoka every morning to distract herself after all she had memorized the girl’s summer schedule too.
Madoka throws her out into a pit of sharks, at least that’s what she keeps on threatening. Apparently she would come to realize Madoka didn’t enjoy being woken up at 7am in the summer. She fumbles and stutters whenever Madoka tells her to meet up with the girl – to have initiative. She really just couldn’t bring herself to face the girl, what if she had been merely forgotten, placed aside. It would break her heart, granted that somewhere along the time she had handed it to the girl. She wasn’t even in control of her own feelings anymore, as if they were missing, off riding on that very bus next to the girl.
She knows that she doesn't have the courage to go and see the girl; she doesn't even have the courage to stop staring at her phone and just text to girl. That was how insecure she was, she was after all just some creepy stalker. To her it was already a blessing to have spent the last term sitting beside, slowly getting to know the other girl and somehow along the line have her previously denied feelings become so much more. She should have predicted how much it would hurt, she should have shirked away but instead she allowed to herself to be fooled into the comfort of fantasy.
A month passes by and slowly, ever so slowly she stops constantly checking her phone but the memories, the thoughts they don't disappear. She stops talking to Madoka about the girl, and she tries her best to forget the girl was only one bus trip away. Things get worst though, she dreams of being on the bus with the other girl. She dreams that she confesses and the other girl rejects her, and laughs.
She feels a little insecure, her dreams have been repeating as if to show her all the things that she fears. She doesn't know how to stop them, they just keep on happening. It isn't until Madoka pulls her aside, noticing how horrible she looked with her panda eyes. It isn't until she breaks down in Madoka's arms that they finally realized the extent of her crush. They talk for a bit, and she gets a little more confidence from the normally cool girl. Never had she really imagined that it would have to be Madoka that gives her love advice.
She's really thankful for the other girl, after all it was her who spent a year listening to her ramble, her who gets waken up at 7am to text messages filled with incomprehensible words, and it's her who shoves her on the bus one week later saying that if she doesn't settle this she would finally fulfill that threat of throwing her into a shark pit.
She fidgets, she doesn't see the girl getting on the bus and she can feel her heart drop. It didn't matter since she knew the where the girl had class but she felt that meeting on the bus with her was something special, that if anything she wanted to meet the girl again here. That maybe if she finally brought up the courage to tell her how she feels, it should be in the same setting where they met, became friends and she hopelessly fell for the other girl.
Her dejection goes away when she sees the other girl get on a few stops later. She can feel a very familiar dumb smile crawling up her face but she doesn't even bother to mask her joy when the girl takes her usual seat. She wanted to slap herself at the answer she gives the other girl who wonders why she's on the bus.
"You never contacted me so I thought I would need to take another bus ride."
Dumb pick up lines, surely she failed that class too. She bites her lips nervously as the girl looks away to her phone, and her heart feels like its dropping. She too, looks away at her phone trying to mask her embarrassment when she gets a mail from a number she has memorized by heart - her's. Her head whips up, trying to fight off the urge to pull the shy girl beside her into a hug. The dumb grin she gets whenever she thinks about her comes back, and she doesn't care anymore
"Why of course Chihiro, I'd be honored to date you."
She's always wondered what people meant when they said they're on cloud nine, she thinks she understands know.
All that it took was a little, maybe violent push from Madoka to get to this. If she had know she would have taken that first step earlier and had not missed the time the two could have spent together. They would not have had to spend half their summer wondering when the other would take the initiative to phone. But she doesn't really mind, after all it was the ending that mattered the most.
The term starts up again and her long awaited bus rides come back. Every morning, she would wake up in excitement for the bus ride. She feels her heart stop every morning when she is greeted by the other girl's smile. This was a good habit she concludes before entwining their fingers together and feeling the other girl rest her head on her shoulder. She smiles to herself because she knows the other girl doesn't have early morning class, she knows that the girl tries to hide that fact but she doesn't point it out. It was the thought that mattered after all; she after all loved the bus rides just as much as the girl. She laughs when other people ask why they don't take the other bus which is faster. Why would she sacrifice the time that she has with her girlfriend to get to school faster, she concludes before calling them insane.
The two of them step on the bus for their last day of school, hands entwined. They speak of everything that the bus has brought them and their time spent on the bus awkwardly glancing at each other. Surely they would miss their early morning bus rides that had become a tradition, but they looked forward to bidding their school lives goodbye. Their future beyond was vague but what matter to the two was that they would be holding each other's hand and facing whatever was brought forth together.
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