Serendipity

certitude

He finds that snow is something that doesn't make him feel far away from himself. It's something that makes him feel even closer to being complete, to being his own person, like Aizawa says he is. It makes him feel like how Shinsou must feel, how everyone else in the class must feel.

He tells Mr. Suzuki about it on Sunday. He writes it down and smiles. "You like snow a lot, then. Maybe you have good memories of snow when you were little?"

Shouto shakes his head. It never snowed in the dark room. He can't remember anything before the dark room. Nothing but the white haired woman, and little glimpses of the children Shouto was replacing.

"Shouto," Mr. Suzuki calls, extending a notebook out to him. He accepts it, stares at the plain red cover while Mr. Suzuki continues. "I want you to write things down in this notebook. Whenever you feel something. Or any questions you want to ask me next time, or anything at all."

Shouto runs his finger down the spiral spine of the book, opens the front page to find it blank.

"You can decorate it, too," he says, chuckling a little. "I know it's plain, now, but maybe you can ask Aizawa Sensei to print out some comic pictures so you can tape them on?"

Shouto shakes his head. Mr. Suzuki perks up a little.

"Do you want to tell me how you're feeling?"

He knows that he's supposed to tell Mr. Suzuki how he's feeling, knows that Mr. Suzuki is going to fix him. Still, he shakes his head again, staying as still as possible.

Mr. Suzuki nods, "Maybe you can write it down, later on. Then, if you feel like asking me next time, you'll remember."

Shouto understands. He nods.

From then on until their meeting is over with, Mr. Suzuki asks Shouto about moving into the dorms. They delve into the reason for it, Shouto says that his father is threatening Aizawa and it's Shouto's fault. Mr. Suzuki assures him it's not, Shouto does not believe him.

Standing to leave, Shouto bows to Mr. Suzuki. The latter smiles brightly and bows back. "It's snowing again, today. You should go out and have some fun. Maybe your friend...remind me..."

"Shinsou," Shouto fills in.

"Yea, Shinsou. Maybe Shinsou will go out in the snow with you. That would be nice, right?"

Shouto nods, but he doesn't understand.

Later on, he thinks about what Mr. Suzuki said some more. The concept of nice doesn't reach him, it floats away so far out of reach that Shouto is forced to stop thinking about it.

Shouto doesn't ask Shinsou to go outside with him. He doesn't end up going at all, because nobody else is outside, and so Shouto shouldn't be, either. He should be in the dark room, like he was before.

He stares at himself in the mirror after he showers. Even through the fogginess on the glass, he can see how disproportionate he is. A few of the other boys walk past him, one points at his back and someone scolds the boy. Shouto goes through the motions of going to his room, getting dressed and drying his hair off some more. He leaves the towel on his doorknob, takes the notebook Mr. Suzuki gave him and sits in front of his balcony door. It takes a little more effort to open it, snow falls into his room and he slides his finger through it.

On the first page, he writes down the word 'Nice.' He doesn't know what it means, doesn't know what nice is supposed to feel like. By definition, he knows it is much unlike bad. So maybe the same rule applies to feeling?

The thought of nice, of not knowing what it is, makes his chest tighten with a feeling close to fear.

Mr. Suzuki has told him before that when things are too hard to manage, he can leave them and come back later. Shouto leaves nice behind, and he looks out the balcony doorway. It's stopped snowing but the weatherman had said that it should start again tonight. Shouto can't wait.