Detached Glamour: A Classroom of the Elite fanfiction.

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Hiyori woke up with her forehead throbbing. There was something to be said about how her first thought was, Were books raining on my head?

Her eyelids fluttered like an old, creaky door gathering all its grit and strength to deny entry to all alike. In rhyme with the pounding of her heart she breathed slowly, then extended her fingers to whittle the numbness sunk into them. Her fingers found a soft but worn fabric laid beneath her. 

Freshly roused, Hiyori stayed unmoving but growing contemplative. The blood in her ears pulsed, its sound grew faint as moments passed. In the following quiet, the tick-tock of a clock, the dull whirr of a fan on low speed encroached upon her. The nurse's office, Hiyori realised with a start.

With the conclusion followed other memories, which she chewed on silently. Hiyori remained as she was: Free of motion and still.

Stillness was familiar to her; some said she draped it like a monk did. Once Ishizaki told her that a teacher he had liked in middle school quizzed him on what monks do, and he answered—'Sitting still like a statue'. Such images were very queer, Hiyori thought now, and perhaps rebelling gave joy to the monk steeped in queerness. A few authors she could name bore resemblance in that regard.

"Are you alright now, Hiyori?"

Her eyes snapped open at the voice. Like meeting clouds blocking the damaging light of the sun, she looked up to catch the caller—Brown pupils stared at her, as piercing light and bleached walls from behind the source of voice sought to fill her sight. Kiyotaka blocked it all, as naturally as mountains peering from above the clouds.

Slowly she turned to her left. White wrinkled cloth and the scent of rusted copper flakes. Words she heard were strong not because the speaker was loud. Oh, so that's how it is...

"I'm fine," she said. It was a bit delayed because her voice was lost like a key in some hole. I'm fine, I'm fine, — she repeated in her mind, as if the repetition would strengthen the veracity of the words, strengthen her wavering composure. It ought to be fine.

Swallowing down wasteful thoughts, and pushing away the heat in her face, Hiyori asked, "But really, what is with this—making yourself... a pillow? Is this another thing Ryūen-kun claimed you incapable of? I heard your pillow had exploded once but still... Aren't you tired of proving him wrong?"

"Ryūen never talked about such a thing."

"I see..." she muttered. "Ibuki-san would have more words to say to Ishizaki-kun again I suppose."

"He would feel hurt if he heard you just now," replied Kiyotaka.

Hiyori blinked in confusion. "I do not understand. And what exactly occurred while I blacked out?" What she left unsaid was: What sort of contiguous events led to this?

"After you fainted due to witnessing the blood in biology class—I guess picking dissection wasn't the best choice—I carried you here. It is nothing harmful, fortunately. Simply a case of vasovagal syncope, as you must have concluded yourself."

Hiyori stared at the underside of his chin as if it concealed the cure to all the world's diseases. The look was quite odd, which Kiyotaka blessedly missed as his gaze had shifted somewhere towards the door and the medicine cabinet.

What she heard confirmed some things, but they were things of little import. Restraining a sigh, in a few moments she pulled herself up but there was little need of that. Kiyotaka's hands grabbed her, then pressed herself back into the previous position.

"Ayanokōji-kun," she started in a whisper, "what are you doing?"

"You cannot get up."

She frowned. "I can."