love is madness | kimetsu no yaiba (slow updates)

between °¦

seatmates au + Tanjirou x Kanao

Kanao has to deal with this red-head who kept falling asleep on her shoulder every time she rides the bus. Strange enough, she feels offended when he chooses a different seat the next morning.

Word count: 3.1k words
Warning: this is more of a filler chapter, will have to revise this some time in the future; SEE IMPORTANT NOTES AT THE END

*****

There's nothing more good in the morning than to get a sip from your cup of hot chocolate, land the most comfortable spot on the bus, and have Kamado Tanjirou sleeping on your shoulder. Kanao is one lucky girl.

The girl starts twirling her side ponytail absentmindedly with her finger, feeling her nervousness growing slowly. She looks at the boy beside her. His face remains calm, as if he's completely sucked into dreamland. She sighs and focuses her gaze on the seat in front of her instead to prevent her cheeks from burning up.

How can anyone be this lucky to sit with their crush on the first 30 minutes to school?

This scene is what keeps her awake in the morning.

Kanao lives with her two older sisters pampering her with so much love. From the clothes she wore, the food she brings with her to school, and the undying support to things she loved doing, her sisters never fail to give the best that they can to her. But when the eldest, Kanae, was relocated to another hospital in another prefecture, they were forced to be separated from her.

Although they made sure to call and meet at least once a month, Shinobu, the second eldest, had to do things at the house on her own while simultaneously managing their small business, which is a pharmacy. Because of this, Shinobu had to give up on sending Kanao to school and adviced the youngest to take the bus instead with the rest of her classmates. After all, high school is that one part of life where we meet the people whom we most likely treasure until we grow old. She believes Kanao can find those people by herself through making as many friends as she can.

Unfortunately, things don't go as planned as Kanao lives her high school life with that woman of few words image. Boys in her school turn their heart-filled gazes to her direction, and girls look up to her as if she's the goddess of beauty they have been praying at. Due to receiving too much attention, Kanao never spoke more than three lines in a conversation with anyone.

She's just socially awkward with everyone. So even when she started to commute her way to school, she couldn't find any chances to have a decent conversation with a potential friend, not when a special interest of hers sleeps on her shoulder every morning on the way to the campus, and every afternoon on the way home.

Kamado Tanjirou is that one kid known for his extreme politeness, unconditional kindness, and group of boisterous friends. He's outgoing, helpful to other, and exceptionally talented at building good relationships to people he just met, so it's naturally strange for Kanao to find him in his most comfortable sleeping position beside her on the bus. It was supposed to be an annoying thing to experience, but she strangely felt comfortable and got used to him waking up just before the bus comes to a stop.

The rest of the kids slowly got off the bus, and Kanao debated on waking up the poor boy beside her or wait for him to wake up all by himself.

"Kanao? Aren't you getting off?"

Her classmate, Makomo, calls out to her on the way to the exit.

"Uh, just a second."

Slowly, Kanao shakes the boy's arm, attempting to wake him up. Her face etched with horror, realizing the boy is no light sleeper and she has to do something else to get his butt off the seat.