AN: Hachiman's life with his partner, Kawasaki, is interrupted by the intrusion of a strange seventeen year old girl named Yukinoshita Yukino. She's the sister of the famous model Yukinoshita Haruno- and she should have died ten years ago. AU

So this is another fairly old idea that I've always wanted to explore. What with the ongoing Broken Glass re-write and While the Snow Fell, I shouldn't have found time for this, but lockdown has given me so much of it that I couldn't resist. It's a ghost story, but not in a frightening or disturbing sense. It's also somewhat a romance, but again in a very unconventional way.

It says AU in the summary because, like the set-up for Love and Coffee, Hachiman never met the Yukinoshitas at high school. In this story, they always lived in Tokyo and are an even more high profile family/business, with Haruno becoming a model as it suggests in the summary.

I know exactly how this story will end (the ending is the reason I think this idea is worth writing) but unlike Broken Glass/Shattered Memories/While the Snow Fell, the inbetween chapters will be something I discover as I write. The style is first person, and is written with quite a conversational style, as if Hachiman is talking to the reader personally. Also, there's frequent references to sex in this chapter, but it's neither smutty nor explicitly described, so I've kept the rating at T. Hope you enjoy this.

The Flicker of the Streetlights

Chapter One:

I didn't dream her. Of that, I can assure you.

Everybody has to make choices. Sometimes, a choice can yield such a profound influence on a person's life that they spend the rest of it wondering whether they should have chosen differently. I am by nature an over-thinker. In high school I, Hikigaya Hachiman, was the loner type; a person who preferred to observe and delay rather than choose or pre-empt.

Though I still have a decidedly misanthropic streak, the many formative experiences that came with growing up, falling in love, getting a job, have culminated in giving me more of a 'no-regrets' outlook on life. Choices make us who we are, and I honestly believe that it's moronic to spend time brooding over what may or may not have been a mistake. For any life choice, there were a thousand smaller ones that led to it becoming necessary. There wasn't enough time to regret those, so why should I regret the big ones either?

But the moment that changed everything for me didn't even involve a choice. I had no say in the matter. An idiot would say that it was the work of fate, but I would like to think that I am not an idiot.

All I did was catch her eye. Yukinoshita Yukino's eyes were a startling shade of blue, though of course I didn't know that at the time. I only saw her from across the street.

What did she look like? I wish I had a perfectly suited metaphor to describe her with, but in all honesty, you'll get a much better impression of her appearance if I just say that she looked like Yukinoshita Haruno. Y'know, the really famous model that you see on the cover of all the fashion magazines? They were sisters, after all.

Although I suppose only their basic characteristics were the same. The same long, far-reaching black hair, but the younger sister's was longer. The same unusually pale skin, but the younger sister's was paler. Their body shapes were different, one thinner and the other more curvaceous. The only clothes Yukinoshita Yukino 'wore' was a dark school uniform, while the other sister, considering her profession, had more immaculately chosen outfits than stars in the sky.

Thinking about it now, I never saw either of the Yukinoshita sisters in the light, though for very different reasons. For Yukinoshita Haruno, it was because meeting anyone in the daytime would lead to her getting swamped by fans, so she insisted we meet much later in the evenings. For Yukinoshita Yukino, it was because the light served as a cruel reminder that she wasn't truly there.

I found that out the hard way. One particular night, I became so enraged with her that I demanded she show herself to me. Without the cover of darkness, I mean. We had been walking together in the middle of a back street, and eventually we came across one of those blue LED streetlights. She protested, but eventually realised that I wasn't going to let it go. Not that time.

If Yukinoshita Yukino had to intrude on my life, that I wanted to see her. Properly, and truthfully.

The blue light had burnt straight through her school uniform, as if she were nothing more than a reflection in a mirror. The LED glare had been the same colour as her eyes, cold and lifeless.

As I said earlier, I am not the the kind of person who regrets. But Hikigaya Hachiman also used to be a rational man; I was confident that, nine times out of a ten, I would make the right choice, take the right path, because that rationality would see me through.

… I didn't dream her. Of that, I can assure you.

But there are times when reality can be crueller than the imagination. Looking back, I find myself increasingly sure that it would have been better if Yukinoshita Yukino had been a dream.

I just turned twenty eight two weeks ago, but I was still twenty seven when all of this happened. In fact, it's almost ten months to the day. That means it must have been… it must have been September when I met her.

But the start of that all important day had nothing to do with Yukinoshita Yukino, or Yukinoshita Haruno either. At the risk of sounding like a teenage girl, it started the same way that quite a few of my days from that period started: with making love.

If I am, supposedly, a rational person, then why am I using a phrase as nauseating as 'making love'? Well, love is very probably the strongest feeling of them all, and anyone whose felt it will tell you that 'making love' and 'having sex' are by no means interchangeable.

I have only ever had sex with two people in my life. The first was a dreadful one night stand with a girl named Hiriko, during my first year at Chiba University. It was also the time that I lost my virginity, but I had the unfortunate dishonour of losing it to a girl with experience. If her lack of enthusiasm was any indication, it had been a far superior experience too. Thankfully, we were both very drunk. I was another of the virgins that found themselves hopelessly indebted to alcohol.

That was only 'having sex', and very poorly at that. The other person, and the only one I have ever 'made love' to, was Kawasaki Saki. She was the best thing that ever happened to me, and being a pessimist, I'm inclined to believe she will lay claim to that title for a great many years.

I have a distinct memory of waking up that morning hard; sleeping next to a woman tends to do that to you, and all the more so when she's an attractive woman that you're completely and utterly obsessed with. The memory continues with me turning over, staying under the bed sheets in the hope that the prospect of waking up would kindly fuck off, and pulling Saki closer to me.

This was only routine. The sensation of my arms snaking around must have woken her, because I heard that 'why-would-you-do-that?' moan of her's, like a cat disturbed from their doze. It wasn't an aroused moan at all, more annoyed than anything else.

"What time is it?" She mumbled.

"Six," I mumbled back.

"… Are you lying?"

"Of course I am." The red digital clock on our bedside read six forty five, and we had to get up at seven if we wanted to get to work on time.

"… I'm tempted to believe you anyway."

"Please do."

I pulled her closer, pressing my hardness up against her.

She snorted tiredly. "Subtle as ever, Hachiman."

"I don't see you complaining."

"I'm too used to it to care."

This annoyed me for some reason. I moved my arms down to her waist, digging my fingers into her figure, and pushed some of her gorgeous blue hair away so I could kiss her neck. She always seemed to have a higher body temperature that me; lying next to Saki was like being in a sauna.

I can't remember what she was wearing that morning, but it was probably just a thin T-shirt. She only wore one or two to bed- there was a pink one and a light blue one. She wore even less down below, usually just a pair of shorts, sometimes just her underwear, sometimes nothing at all. Naturally, I adored her even more for this. It certainly made things easier in the morning.

We 'made love'; as I say, it wasn't just sex. In hindsight, this distinction seems incredibly important. I loved Kawasaki Saki. I loved her like a writer loves his words, compulsively but safely.

Saki had gone to the same high school as me, Sobu High, but at that age we had rarely spoken. We only really started talking at Chiba University, which both of us got into on a scholarship. At first, it was the talking of two relative loners who'd found a kindred spirit. Then, it was the talking of a cynical but uncomplicated friendship. By our third year, when we were both twenty one, it was the talking of two morons whose hearts had been captured for the first time.

Six years later, and we were much better at making love than we had been at university.

It must've been seven fifteen when we actually got out of bed that day. Neither of us cared all that much about punctuality, but y'know how employers are.

I would have ogled her as we were getting dressed. I am not exactly unattractive, and the same three suits that I wear for my job do nothing to change that. But Saki was, and always will be, a knock out. She often wore tight pencil skirts to work, with a button up shirt or some kind of white blouse trying against all hope to keep her chest down. She had the kind of body that would send anyone into a drooling mess, sultry and effortless.

"Do you know what I'd do if I always got my way, Saki?"

She smiled, pulling on one of her blouses. "Something very inventive, probably."

"I'd make it so you never had to go to work, or ever leave this apartment. If I got my way, no one would ever see you but me."

"What, I could never leave these two shitty rooms? Sounds like an abusive relationship to me, Hachiman."

"You didn't complain about the second part either."

"… Idiot."

When men stared at her, and fucking hell did they stare at her, it made me as angry as a rabid dog. If I had less self-control, I would have got into a fair few fistfights over Kawasaki Saki, and not regretted a single one.

I think she liked my possessive side though. I exaggerated it because of that: I suppose it's nice to be reminded that someone loves you. Our love was passionate and often creative, but never all that different.

Once we were dressed, Saki flicked on our crummy old TV, hoping to catch the weather. Our collective income back then was hardly enough to keep our landlord happy, and definitely not enough for both of us to take the trains. That is, if we both wanted to eat properly for the month.

We both worked non-regular time as teachers, her at the Yachiyo elementary school on practically the other side of Chiba, and me at the Izumi high school much closer to our apartment. Us being younger, inexperienced and essentially glorified assistants did no favours to the salary. So, it was always her that took the trains.

As she watched, I busied myself with putting my house-husband skills to good use, and making us breakfast. That laughable aspiration of my adolescence hadn't quite come to fruition, but teaching didn't quite amount to corporate slavery either. We worked similar hours, and that was far more luck than most people our age could afford.

Luck can be deceptively cruel. It's all too easy to get used to, and all too hard to lose. I knew how lucky I was ten months ago, but such is the nature of luck that I inevitably took it for granted anyway.

How many more relaxed, steamed up mornings did I have left to enjoy with Saki, in our two room apartment? If I'd known back then, I would probably have insisted we made love even more than we did. Or that I told her I loved her more, at least. Not just with those three all important words, but with a kiss, a glance, or even a crude gesture.

Saki and I knew that we were smitten with each other. We were so comfortable in that knowledge that we said it aloud less and less as time went on.

"You might want to take a different route to the school, Hachiman," she'd said, as I handed over her breakfast. "… Fried egg and rice? Not bad."

"If only you'd make miso soup every morning, then you wouldn't have to suffer my cooking," I teased.

"Your cooking is a lot better than most. Compared to Taishi-chan, it's practically cuisine," she replied back, offering me a kiss. "Still, you really shouldn't go the usual way."

"Why's that?"

"Apparently there's some kind of movie being filmed, and they're using the park you walk past as a set."

"It's not like I'm driving. It should be fine."

She shrugged. "Your loss if it isn't. There's a famous model playing her first movie role, so they'll be a lot of fans around to see it."

"A model? You should have led with that."

Saki rolled her eyes, still shovelling her breakfast down. "Very funny."

That point in our morning, just before we were about to leave the apartment, often concluded with me pulling her in for another long, indulgent kiss. We didn't fuck every day, though I think both of us saw this as a tragedy of Monzaemon proportions. Sometimes, if it didn't happen just after we woke up, then this would be the moment we persuaded each other that trying half-heartedly to teach could wait.

It's odd, but I think I preferred it just before we left for work, regardless of the time-consuming inconvenience of having to get dressed up all over again. It meant we ended up doing it in a new and just as inconvenient place- on the floor, over the table or, in one particularly loud occasion, against the door. We would both be too tired upon coming back from work, so pleasure, in true Japanese labour force fashion, ended up being compartmentalised.

Thinking about Saki now is enough to drive me half-mad. She, too, was one of the few people who could remove all hint of rationality from my actions, before all rationality abandoned me.

Sometimes, I wonder whether listening to her advice and walking another route to Izumi high school that day would have made any difference. Maybe, maybe not. That's the kind of 'no regrets' response that I've made my forte.

But reflexively, I would say no. It wouldn't have made any difference, and though nothing can prove that assertion to be true, I since had many a conversation with Yukinoshita Yukino that suggested she would have always found me at some point, at some time, and the opaque happiness of my life would always have been broken.

Reflexively, I would say that I was hopeless to prevent any of it. But I suppose anyone whose made a mistake would flatter themselves with a notion like that. I am the upmost authority on myself, but I rarely seem to be the upmost authority on what I say, or what I do, or even what I think.

I suppose it's other people's job to judge me, and my job to brood over simpler times in my life.

"See you tonight gorgeous," is the kind of thing we would say to each other once we emerged from our apartment, which was on the second floor of the block. The weather had been grey and windy, but no more grey and windy than the typical day of another September in Chiba, and there was already a line of similarly-suited men queuing up outside our street's Family Mart.

"The world is an unfair place to take you away from me," I said, my voice low. My eyes ate up the sight of her blue hair tied back into a ponytail, although personally I preferred it flying loose, and the black skirt that clutched her smooth hips as if to make me jealous.

"And you've only just realised this?"

"I realise it everyday. Doesn't make it any less irritating."

I brushed my hand over the small of her back, which was as sensual a thing as I would let myself do in public. There might've been a time when we were more adventurous back at university, but even then we were never all that obscene, and I was more than willing to settle for being adventurous in private.

She laughed, a little girlishly. "Alright, alright. Later, Hachiman."

"Later, Saki."

She smiled, and then the two of us began walking in the opposite direction, her left and me right. Saki would head towards the metro station a couple of streets away, whereas I would take my usual pathway to Izumi.

I slipped my headphones in, listening vaguely to the faint tones of an anime opening that I grew out of years ago. It was a shonen show, and I only listened to it now out of tradition; there had been a time when I couldn't get motivated at all without it, and Hikigaya Hachiman had once been a creature of habit.

Acquiescing to a habit was what first brought me closer to Yukinoshita Yukino. That is, not bothering to change my route.

I would see her for the first time just twenty minutes later.