After Story: Compassion

Chapter Six: The Needs of the Many

Ryou and I exchanged another look. "W-We are..." Ryou started, "...but..."

"Is something wrong?" she asked, crossing her arms.

"No, no... It' just that..." Ryou suddenly took hold of my arm. "P-Please talk to her about F-Furukawa-san."

"Oh, right," I said, snapping my fingers. "We haven't talked to her about this, but we wanted to suggest having her do a performance at the festival, to help with recruiting. Would that be all right? I know we're not in a very good bargaining position here, but..."

Sakagami drummed her fingers against her crossed arm as she sighed. "I'd have to talk to the rest of the council, but...I'll see what I can do." She flicked a gaze at Ryou before focusing on me again, and I suddenly felt that discomfort again. "You ready for me to tell you what I need?"

I smiled self-consciously. "G-Go for it."

***

"A performance? At the festival?!" Furukawa laid a hand on her chest as though she was trying to control her breathing. "I-I don't know..."

"You don't have to," I said, trying to comfort her. "I just asked Sakagami about it to see if it could be an option."

"W-Well, thank you," she said, seeming to calm down. "The girls have been wanting to do something since they joined, and I think they may like to do something like this."

"You might be able to get even more members this way," Ryou offered. "That's why Tomoya-kun talked to her about it."

I could see a look of determination in Furukawa's eyes as she gazed at me. "Of course! If Okazaki-san could talk to the Student Council president about this, then I should be able to do a performance!"

I raised a hand to stop her and I noticed that it was trembling; that look in her eyes... "Y-You don't have to, Furukawa; like I said, we're just trying to get you the choice."

"Thank you!" she cried as she grabbed onto my hands, sending a chill down my spine. "I-I'll go talk to the girls about it!" And with that, she hurried off to do who-knew-what.

I brushed my hands together to get rid of the lingering sensation of her touch. Something about our interaction... "W-Well, she's off, I guess. Well, shall we-"

My girlfriend stood beside me, holding her skirt in her clenched fists and trembling. "T-Tomoya...kun..."

"Ryou?" I said, removing her hands from her rumpled skirt to hold them in mine. "What's wrong?"

She looked up at me with what looked like panicked eyes. "N-Nothing! Nothing, really!"

"Hey, it's okay..." I said softly as I caressed the back of her hands with my thumbs. "If there's something wrong, you can tell me. I'm your boyfriend, right?"

"B-Boyfriend..." She pulled her hands from mine to step forward and wrap her arms around me. "Y-Yes, you're my boyf-friend. And I...I-I-I-I'm your girlfriend..."

I held her trembling form and wondered just what in the hell was going on.

***

"Fuuko needs to make seven-hundred starfish, but Fuuko can't do it alone," the first-year announced. "Fuuko needs Strange Guy to help."

"First, we really need to work on your pronouns," I quipped and Ryou, who had managed to recover from her earlier distress, giggled softly. "Seriously, we'd really like to help you but...seven-hundred is still a lot of work; you're going to need more than the two of us if you're going to succeed."

"Fuuko knows this!" she exclaimed. "But Tom...Okazaki-san is smart and reliable, and can help Fuuko help Onee-chan!"

I sighed, then looked over to my girl. "This is getting more and more complicated."

She gave me a cute smile. "Maybe we should have recruited for Fu-chan instead of Furukawa-san?"

"No, we couldn't do...wait a minute..." a smile slowly spread across my face. "I think you might be on to something, cutie."

"Wh-What?"

"Well, if we recruit for Furukawa, she'll probably feel indebted to us so we could ask her about helping with Fuuko's situation. If we had the whole Theater Club helping out, we could finish this in a week, maybe two."

"What about the Student Council president?"

I quirked my mouth to the side. "I'm not sure; she may consider letting Furukawa do her performance as repayment for our help...but we could still ask." I snorted. "If we could get Sakagami alone, she could probably carve all of them by herself; that girl's ridiculously strong." I looked back to Fuuko. "You let us handle this, okay? Just keep carving like you have been, and Ryou and I will see what we can do, okay?"

Our underclassman nodded once. "Okay!"

"And work on your pronouns," I added.

She hesitated, but finally nodded again with a light blush. "Okay!"

I raised a hand as she ran off to do who-knew-what before turning to my girl. "I was thinking that we could talk to...what's wrong?"

Ryou had taken hold of her skirt again as she trembled. "T-Tomoya-kun...she...she..."

I sighed as I took her into my arms again and hoped that, someday, she'd tell me what the problem was.