"Week and a half from now, on Saturday, there's this party that was meant to be a garden party but that's when the witch's rain starts so they relocate. It's," he opens the car door for Haru, "complicated."

Smooch. Sit. "Complicated?"

He starts the car and starts driving out, tapping a finger against the steering wheel, looking thoughtful. "You know the thing where I'm not a very good person?"

"I mean, that's not how I'd choose to put it..."

"How would you put it?"

"You experienced delayed moral development?" suggests Haru.

He chuckles. "Alright, you know how I'm apparently chocolate-covered crack?"

"I think about this frequently! It's distracting! I will be trying to save Tokyo or do homework or something and a little voice in the back of my head goes 'he caught ethics off me like a case of the cooties'!"

"...oh my God."

"Anyway, what about it."

"...right. So, um. Father actually doesn't want me to come, because it's a li'l party for all of the Tokyo elite. Pretty sure Yamanaka-san could've come if she didn't have a show. And I wanted to come out of spite, obviously. Make a scene or two, remind everyone that it's not just because I'm in a different school that I'll stop being a pest in their lives."

"That explains why you didn't go the second time."

"Mmhm. Although, uh, after what Akira said—" He stops himself and purses his lips.

"Mm?"

"Just. I'm. Kind of uncomfortable with it. Akira said that—people like me? Um. I had this whole—self-image that—I'm kind of selfish and self-centered and too arrogant and divisive, and then he said that I—that people like me. And I started feeling even more like a dick for the way I—approached—everything. Like how I went to this party wanting to, you know, and then—I was a dick to a bunch of people—and that was when Akira and Toshiki told me they liked me, the first time."

"...I haven't seen a whole lot of how you act around people who aren't me but it doesn't exactly seem implausible that you'd be genuinely popular."

He looks really uncomfortable with that but doesn't argue. "Well, I didn't go last time because I knew that I'd—if I went I'd be tempted to be a dick. I know I would. If nothing else, being around that fucking asshole half my genes come from always makes me want to cause problems. And it's, you know. Why have the temptation around? The best way to not be a dick is to not be in any—situations—that would make me want to be a dick. Like, if I went I'd still try not to be a dick, you know, if nothing else I wouldn't go looking for trouble, I wouldn't go—God I was such a dick to Eiji, it's not his fault he's in a homophobic family and society and doesn't want to invite the headaches I invite, and I sure hope he isn't leading that girl on, but I couldn't resist going and needling him, could I? Saying shit that I knew was skirting the line of almost outing him? Why'd I go and do that? I could simply not do that?"

Has he got a spare hand for holding, Haru wants to hold his hand.

He's got a habit of making his hand available for holding whenever it is not necessary for safe driving.

Handhold.

"Sounds like you are leaning against going to the party this time around?"

He interlaces his fingers with Haru's and gives Haru's hand a small squeeze.

"Yeah, probably. I mean, if I did go I'd—I wouldn't go looking for trouble. I'd find the people that apparently for some insane reason like me? And I'd just catch up with them? And when I think about what I'd do if I knew people liked me I guess it's not like I'm thinking of totally different things so maybe I'm just really fucking stupid and I thought I was being a lot worse than I actually was, wasn't I. Wow I sound so full of myself.

"Anyway if I did go I'd be nice to people instead of being a dick, and I'd check in on Eiji in a nice way rather than a dickish way for once in my life, and I'd—probably I'd want to—not wait until Toshiki and Akira came to find me smoking outside and have a whole meltdown over it, I'd turn them down a lot more gently—but like—

"Well the other reason I didn't go last time was that I couldn't bring you with me. And if you don't come with me, then—what's even the point? Sure, maybe I'd mend some bridges and get to see some people that I—actually in hindsight realise I kind of miss, but—they won't remember anything. If. If I have to redo this loop. But also just, it's no fun without you. It's no fun to be around all of those people and think, man, I'm wasting a perfectly nice-if-rainy Saturday evening resisting the temptation to cause problems when I could instead be with my—with the boy I love not being tempted to be a dick at all, hanging out with him and hearing him talk about stuff he likes and seeing him smile, and—

"So yeah. Probably not going this time around."

"If I've made a wish by then I could go and be your invisible conscience."

—he laughs a startled laugh. "You could, yeah. The little angel on my shoulder. You know, I do kind of have a shoulder Haru. A lot of the time when I'm feeling a bit—lost—I kind of think, okay, what would Haru tell me to do, and I go and do that."

Haru kisses his hand. "I love you."

He finds somewhere to stop his car so that he can clutch at his heart and rest his head on the steering wheel. "Haah..."