Second-Best Friend (Hanako)

[OfficialJab]

Quick read.
Got feedback? Yes, please.
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Hanako wasn't home when the knock came at her door. A female student on the other side asked if she was there, and after no response came, the girl left after an unheard invitation to join them at the park for games later. It was probably common knowledge to the other girls that she was usually in her room if not in class or the library. They were most likely offering her company because her friend Lilly was away visiting family, and they expected that she would be alone the whole time.

Twenty minutes later, the door opened and closed quickly, Hanako trying to draw absolutely no attention to her return. She silently put her bag of groceries against the wall by her desk, and sat with a sigh on the bed. Being in public had to be particularly stressful for her when she was alone, and paranoid of being confronted by someone. Lilly had encouraged her to try going to the store on her own once, since it would be good for her.

She rested a few minutes, then took a book from her shelf and laid out on her bed with it. She didn't read more than a minute at a time, though, without stealing glances at her chess baord that she'd gotten from Lilly at her birthday party. The two of them and Akira had some wine and cake, and enjoyed the time together before Hanako was left alone. Her and Lilly had used the antique chess board just once before Lilly left, and since then Hanako just used it with strategy books from the library.

After failing to complete two pages in her book over ten minutes, she marked it, stood up and took down her chess set. She sat it on the floor, and walked over to the shelf where her chess book always sat. This time though, she took me from the shelf.



We played before when she was a child, when she was avoiding other orphans instead of students, and didn't have a friend to spend time with. She chose me from some other stuffed toys in a way that seemed like an arbitrary choice, but when she started fiddling with the replaced stitching on my arm, I noticed the connection that she saw. Most of the children there were gentle with toys, but she treated me as if I would break again at any time. The first time that she played chess with me, I saw that she was trying to relate to her lost family life in some way, where she must have been learning the game.

She held her arms up to protect her face from the other kids, but didn't do it as often with Lilly, just reflexively sometimes. She hid from me, though, as if I was watching her as well. It just meant we were close, and that I was her friend. Maybe unblinking eyes of an object just look as though they're staring. My expression might be curiosity, which was the one she hid from the most in her time at the orphanage, and probably here as well. Something different is that she didn't talk to me like she did those years ago, hopefully because Lilly made her a little more comfortable. It looked as though I could still help a bit, though.

This was our first game since her childhood, and it was clearly taking place because she was uncomfortable without Lilly.

"Let's play..."

So she was still willing to talk to me. It was spoken timidly to the empty room, as though someone might be listening through the wall and ask her who she was talking to.

Hanako moved her pieces and mine, looking carefully and trying to see if she could outsmart herself somehow. Would she be upset if I won?



A smile grew on her face each time my turn came up and she looked at me expectantly for a few seconds, treating me like a regular, capable friend. The entire experience was nostalgic for her, but whenever I made a good move, she smiled a little bit wider. Eventually I won, maybe because she wanted me to. After a moment of looking at me and the board with a sweet look of satisfaction, she congratulated me for the first time in several years.

"Good game."

That night I was held tightly while she slept. I thought she'd cry because Lilly was away, but it looks like she'll be fine if I'm here when she needs me.

[random]

I'm assuming this is the Manly Picnic continuity

[OfficialJab]

I'm assuming this is the Manly Picnic continuity

Just a non-Lilly and non-Hanako of any kind, I guess. AltU where Hisao didn't go to Yamaku? Doesn't really matter, doesn't need to fit anywhere.

[Brogurt]

Bro I already told you in one of the previous KSGs that the title for your other thread wasn't very enticing, and then you make this one.

Anyway I was going to bitch at you for not making Hanako pathetic enough, but then I realized what a tard I was being.

But seriously, make better titles.

[crushinator]

Bro I already told you in one of the previous KSGs that the title for your other thread wasn't very enticing, and then you make this one.

Anyway I was going to bitch at you for not making Hanako pathetic enough, but then I realized what a tard I was being.

But seriously, make better titles.

To be fair, I think that having a purely descriptive title is better than having a boring one. Otherwise there's a chance a potential reader might be put off. This way you know exactly what you're getting.

[ThoughtLock]

There's a difference between a boring title and a thematic one. In your quest to avoid a boring title, you went to simple and ironically ended up making a more boring title.

Titles are difficult. You want to entice the reader to bring them in, and yes, you don't wanna just slap some title on there that isn't meaningful, but putting the entire plot summary of the story as the title is a bad mistake. It's up there with an untitled fic.

The story was fine for a short, little one-shot, but you seriously limited yourself by giving it a dumb title. The first few times I saw this post, I completely ignored it because the title invoked the image in my head of a poorly written and pointless story.

Not trying to crush your dreams or anything here, but this needs some work.

[Kayo12]

Instead of being a doucher like most of the people in the thread, I'll simply say that the story needs a title and offer a couple suggestions;

Perhaps you should call it simply, 'Let's Play'.

Or perhaps, 'View From The Shelf'?
Maybe 'Teddy Bears and Bishops'?
I like that last one the most.

[ThoughtLock]

Instead of being a doucher like most of the people in the thread, I'll simply say that the story needs a title and offer a couple suggestions;

Perhaps you should call it simply, 'Let's Play'.

Or perhaps, 'View From The Shelf'?
Maybe 'Teddy Bears and Bishops'?
I like that last one the most.

These are actually really good. I wasn't trying to be a dick or anything, so I'm sorry if I came across that way. I would take Kayo's advice here.

[Scissorlips]

I'm not sure if that story was cute or depressing, but I enjoyed it either way.
A couple things I noticed though, the first was that the realization that the narrative was from first person perspective and not third person omniscient was kind of jarring--it wasn't until the line "she took me from the shelf" that I realized it was a real person (per say) in the room that was talking, and not some unseen, godlike narrator. Maybe adding in a line or two earlier on, something like "I watch her pace around the room", would make it clearer who's talking. But that's up to you.
The second thing was that the line "I saw that she was trying to relate to her lost family life in some way" comes off as a little too obvious, does that make sense? Like, it flat out tells you why she's doing what she's doing, instead of something a little more subtle, like "She seems to be trying to recover something long lost". I don't know, maybe that's just me injecting my style into things and if so I apologize, but the line still struck me as a little off.
Other than that, I confess that I really like your short, bite sized stories because I'm lazy when it comes to reading (a horrible trait for a writer to possess), and I can easily digest them and give feedback.
Another enjoyable read, thanks for posting it.
Oh, and as for the title, usually a clever little line is fine. Just be sure, if the title doesn't suggest who the story is about, to include (story subject name here) at the end so people know what they're getting into. Or at least, that's the way I like to do it.

[OfficialJab]

it wasn't until the line "she took me from the shelf" that I realized it was a real person (per say) in the room that was talking

That was the idea, but I wasn't sure what the reader would think when it happened - that's what I was most curious about. I wanted it to seem like a normal narrative until you realized what was really going on.

comes off as a little too obvious, does that make sense?

Yeah, I wrestled with that line for awhile, and couldn't think of anything I liked, so I left it. When I think of something better, I'll change it. Maybe later today.


To everyone else, should I just make the story title the thread title? I thought the same thing as crushinator, that there's no way to know if a story can interest you unless you know what it's about, and especially in a sea of vague titles. Maybe that means it's the convention though, and it's best if I do it anyways. Don't want Brogurt to slit my throat.

[ThoughtLock]

Now that the whole title business is concluded, I gotta say I like this story. The use of an inanimate object as the narrator and in the way you've done it is really intriguing. Certainly it's something I've never seen before, at least in relation to KS and more specifically Hanako.

Keep up the good work man. This has a lot of potential.

[Brogurt]

Don't want Brogurt to slit my throat.

That's not something you can avoid without disappearing off the face of the internet forever
jk luv u bby

Aaaaaaanyway, it's definitely an improvement, and any attention it attracts now it likely to be more focused on the story itself rather than the title. As much as I dislike saying this, when someone does things differently, the only thing that anyone wants to talk about is whatever the aforementioned person did differently. In this case, I believe that since the story had a unorthodox title, attention was drawn there rather than the prose itself. On that note, I might get back to you on what I think about the writing, but I'm hungry right now.

[Mjolnir]

Just gonna throw this out there.
In her bad end there's a stuffed (emperor...?) penguin on her bed.