Chapter 16: The Classmate
Touka flashes me the most endearing smile. Looking at her makes me a little sad—I never would’ve expected that she'd hate the idea of continuing this fake relationship so much.
“Oh, yeah! Senpai, have you had lunch yet?” Touka asks, interrupting my train of thought.
“Nope.”
She asked me to come here as soon as I could, so I didn’t have the chance to eat anything. I was actually just planning to grab something from the convenience store, to be honest.
Touka breathes a sigh of relief and places a hand over her chest.
“Nice. I didn’t say anything about eating together when I texted you, so I wasn't sure if it was possible for us to do it today.”
She retrieves some sort of wrapped package from her bag and hands it to me.
“What's this supposed to be?”
“A bento. I made it, by the way.”
“...Wait, really? Why?”
Out of all the things she could’ve handed me, I definitely wasn’t expecting a handmade lunch to be one of them.
“Yep, really. After all the trouble I got you into yesterday, I figured I should make this as an apology. Wouldn’t I make the best wifey material? What d'you think, huh? I mean, a girl making you a bento and all. Happy, ain't ya?”
“Yeah. I mean, I don't really get the whole 'wifey material' bit, but I'm definitely happy about it.”
Touka is taken aback by my response.
“W-well good! You're super lucky, Senpai! You get such a cute girl to make you your very own bento! I betcha couldn't find anyone else on this whole planet who's luckier than you are!” she sputters out quickly, her cheeks flushed.
“Yep, I am. Thanks.”
She blushes even more, and her complexion rapidly changes from rose to crimson. She’s probably not used to me being so upfront, so it's no wonder she’s so surprised.
“Hmph! All right, I'm heading back to class! As much as I'd love to stay so we could feed each other the lunch I made, I can't really bring myself to do that just yet. Too bad, huh?!”
She picks her bag up and sprints toward the door.
“Sure, Touka. Good luck with your studies.”
She stops just before the door and turns around.
“And you do your best with organizing the rest of the event, Senpai!”
She waves her hand at me with a big grin, then leaves the rooftop.
Once she leaves, I look for a good spot to sit down and eat the bento. I settle down in a comfortable spot, open the lid, and inspect the contents. There's a variety of colorful foods packed inside that catch the eye. It's really pretty. Man, just look at all this… maybe Touka wasn't off the mark with her “wifey material” comment.
My first choice is the karaage—the fried chicken she made. I take my chopsticks and dive in for it.
“Hmm… delicious.”
☆
I finish Touka’s bento and loiter on the roof for a while. I just need to kill some time until 1:00 p.m.; that's when I can head to the gym and help with the event.
As soon as the time arrives, I head to the gym. There are people from all sorts of sports clubs bustling around and helping tidy the place up. There’s a guy in front of the stage who's giving out orders to everyone else. He's probably the head guy from the volleyball club that Ike told me to talk to.
I don’t know why I need to be here, though—these people seem to be doing just fine without me already. Well, I’m here anyways, so I might as well help. I head over to the volleyball guy.
“Ike asked me to come help out, so here I am. If there’s anything you need me to help with, just lemme know.”
The guy's busy looking at some papers for the layout of the room, and so he answers without looking at me.
“Hm? Oh, cool, so you came to help out, too. Well, there’re people getting the chairs and tables out of the basement, but it looks like they need another hand. How about you go help them out? There’s another guy from the volleyball club over there who'll tell you what to do.”
“Sure.”
Once I answer, he finally raises his head and looks at me. He goes to reply, but the moment our eyes meet...
“Okay, thank- Agh! T-Tomoki… kun? Uh, err, well, the basement is, um…”
He starts stuttering like crazy, clearly nervous.
“What?”
“N-Nothing. Do your best, ahaha…”
“Oookay.”
I head down to the basement. It's pretty obvious why he got so nervous after he saw me— remember how my face is scary as shit? Yeah, that's still a thing. Apologies in advance to the poor souls I'm going to be helping in the basement. Well, I guess it's better to work down there with only a few people than to have everyone in the gym freak out and suffer. It's a small sacrifice for the greater good.
So anyway, I get to the basement. Asakura Yoshito is there. He's another guy from the volleyball club, and I guess he's the one the captain was telling me about earlier. Looks like he's all alone… Are they acting like he can carry all the chairs and tables alone? No wonder the guy said he needed help.
“Your captain told me to come and help, so just lemme know what to do.”
He continues working and speaks without facing me.
“Oh really?! Nice, always good to have an extra set of hands! Could you help me get these pipe chairs to the gym, then?”
He finally turns around and looks at me.
“Whoa! T-Tomoki-kun?!”
“Oh, so these chairs, right? I got it.”
I feel pretty bad for Asakura right now—my face is already scary enough as is, but the poor lighting and dark basement atmosphere makes things even worse. I’m sorry, dude. I really am.
I'll just shut up now, since I don't want him to misunderstand me somehow and get even more freaked out. I’ll just ignore him and get to work. I’m sure he’ll be scared at first, but hopefully, he understands that I’m just here to work, and nothing else. I don't have any bad intentions or anything like that.
He doesn’t say anything else, either; he also keeps working without saying a single word. I’m lucky, to be honest. I get to work down here without worrying about scaring anybody else, and this guy seems to be tolerating my presence okay.
Well done, volleyball captain—you did a good job choosing my task for me. Big thumbs up.
“Damn, Tomoki-kun, you sure are taking this seriously.”
A voice speaks up from behind me. I know for a fact that it isn’t Asakura’s voice, so I turn around to see whose it is. Lo and behold, it’s Tanaka-senpai… and Suzuki's here, too.
“Oh, it’s you two. What happened to those lectures you guys were supposed to give to the first years?"
“Well, Tanaka-senpai and I are just taking a break, y'know?” Suzuki replies.
Why the hell are they even here, then? Maybe they should actually be, you know, resting instead of coming all this way.
“Yup. That’s why we decided to come down here on our break and say hi to you since you’re helping around so much,” Tanaka says with a smile on his face.
“You wanted to come say hi to me?”
“Yeah. I think Ike-kun wanted to come, too, but he just didn’t have the time. That's why Tanaka-senpai and I came here, since we've got some free time now and all.”
“Well, I don’t exactly have free time, but yeah…” Tanaka-senpai interjects. He's still smiling, but he also looks a bit troubled. He continues, “Well, anyways, thanks to you and Asakura-kun, things are progressing pretty quickly at the gym, so thanks.”
Asakura flinches a bit at the mention of his name, and he gives a curt, “S-Sure.”
“I’m just helping around because I have the free time to. There's no need to thank me or anything like that.”
Tanaka-senpai and Suzuki answer with a smile.
“Actually, Ike said something similar—that we wouldn't need to thank you since you'd just brush it off.”
“Not gonna lie, it's pretty funny that you acted exactly the way he said you would.”
I'm trying to hide how embarrassed I am, so I keep working silently with my head down. I guess the reason for my silence is pretty obvious, though, because they start grinning after watching me for a bit.
“It’s not nice to interrupt others while they’re busy working, Tanaka-senpai,” Suzuki says jokingly.
“Right. We just came to check on things. Now that we know everything's going according to plan, I guess we should head back.”
He heads toward the exit, and Suzuki promptly follows.
I look at them as they’re leaving. I'd like to say something to them before they're gone, but I don't know what I should say. But before they leave, Tanaka-senpai suddenly turns around.
“Oh, right,” he says, “If you have some time later, let’s talk, okay?”
“See you around, guys!” Suzuki says with a wave.
Later on, I have some “business” I need to take care of with Kai, so I don’t know if I’ll be available to chat with Tanaka-senpai, to be honest.
I’m happy that they care about me, though—I mean, they used the small break they had to come check up on me and see how I've been doing. Not counting Ike and Makiri-sensei, these two are the first people who've actually gone out of their way to do something like that for me. It makes me very happy, to be honest. Well, how else would I put it? I guess I’m just glad more people are starting to look past my scary appearance.
I nod to Suzuki, and they finally leave.
“...Hey, Tomoki-kun.”
Asakura breaks my train of thought.
“Hm? What?”
He thinks for a moment about how to choose his words before speaking.
“Um, Ike's told me that you’re not being forced to help around here or anything like that, and that you’ve actually been helping the student council for a while now. He also said something about you helping out a lot for today’s event, I think?”
“Well, yeah, more or less.”
“So, uh, don't take this the wrong way or anything, but I wanna ask you something.”
“Depends on the question, but go ahead.”
He tenses up at my words, but continues after a short moment of hesitation.
“So, are you actually a criminal like everyone says, or...?”
“...Not really, no.”
He lets out a huge sigh of relief, probably because I didn't get angry like he was expecting.
“Okay, so that’s how it is. I’ve always figured you were a criminal or something like that... But after hearing people from the student council talk about how you’re always helping out and that stuff, and seeing you helping out here, well, it makes me think that we were just freaking out over nothing, I guess.”
“So you’re not scared of me?”
“Very scared, actually. Dude, you could be the star of any horror movie.”
“Eh… can't say I'm surprised.”
“S-Sorry about that. Did I make you mad?”
“Not really.”
I’m not really surprised by his response, honestly.
“So, ummm… even with your creepy face and all that, at least now, I get that you’re not a bad guy or anything like that… Well, um, what I'm trying to say is, I guess I don't really need to be so scared, you know?”
At least he’s trying to soften the blow.
“You’re a good guy, Asakura.”
“Nah. I'd never be able to help the student council, since I'm not part of it. Wait, so… are you in the student council?”
He tilts his head in confusion. I'm about to tell him I'm not, but he cuts me off before I can answer.
“Hey, Tomoki-kun—I wanna ask you something.”
I nod to let him know he can continue.
“Are you actually going out with Ike’s sister?”
“...Yep.”
He asks me so seriously that it leaves me in a bit of shock. It takes me a few seconds before I can collect myself enough to nod. Even though we're not a real couple, it's still pretty embarrassing to confirm it.
“Tsk. Aaaah, man! So it’s actually true? Fuck, man! You know, I’d totally help the student council out if there was a super cute girl like her there! Duuude, I’m so fucking jealous of you! I wanna get me a super hot girlfriend, too! Like, imagine if she asked me to have lunch together! ‘Asakura-senpai, let’s have lunch♡!' Aaah, man!”
Damn, now he’s all fired up.
“So I'm guessing you don’t have a girlfriend?”
“Of course I fucking don’t!”
He looks depressed now. Oh, man.
“Really? You look like the kind of guy who'd have girls all over him.”
“Wait, for real?” he asks, hopeful yet confused.
“Yeah. I mean, you've got guts, and you seem pretty outgoing and cheerful. Plus, you do sports, so…”
I actually brought up that bit about him “having guts” because he's able to talk to me.
“Y-You’re a nice guy, Tomoki-kun. This is the first time anyone's told me all that,” he says, looking away and rubbing his nose in embarrassment.
“It's not exactly every day I get told I'm a nice guy, either. Call me Tomoki, by the way.”
He jerks his head back to me, clearly surprised. Oh... maybe I'm being overfamiliar with him here? He’s still too scared to act all chummy with me, isn’t he?
I definitely screwed up. Oh, man…
“Oh, right, Tomoki—I know it's kinda late now since we're already a month in, but since we’re in the same class, I hope we can get along!” he exclaims with a cheerful smile and a hand outstretched toward me.
I suddenly remember what Makiri-sensei told me a while ago: that there are a lot of people who have their eye on me, even if I don't realize it. And before I know it, I’m smiling. I’m happy about this. I mean, how could I not be? I don't want him to see me like this, though. A creepy grin plastered on my face is the last thing I need right now—that'll just make him shit his pants and ruin the whole moment.
I try to suppress my happiness and the resulting smile as much as possible as I reach out for his hand. We shake hands, and I finally reply, “Sure, dude. Here's to hoping we get along.”
☆
It takes us around three hours to set up. Everything's ready to go, more or less. Most of the people who were working in the gym are now heading to the other building to fetch the food made by the cooking club. The people from the music club, hidden away behind the curtains on stage, check over their instruments one last time. Once they’re done, the first years start bustling noisily into the gym. I see Haruma follow behind them.
The party's finally started.
As for me, I’m on the second floor watching all the happenings from the balcony. This way, no one notices me. Asakura felt pretty bad about leaving me alone, but it'd be pretty rude of me to insist on sticking with him. He’s probably hanging out with his volleyball pals right now and enjoying the party he helped set up.
I see Ike get up on stage, and everyone immediately shuts up and turns to him. Man, Ike was born to grab people's attention—they're all focusing on him like someone's got a gun to their heads.
“Ladies and gentlemen, good work today! So, first years, how was the study meet? Your Senpais have been working hard to organize this event for you. If you guys think it's worth it, that's enough of a reward for us. Well, that’s all I wanted to say. No more formalities—let's enjoy the music club's concert, the cooking club's food, and each other's company. Why stop at classmates? Feel free to talk to people from the other years, as well. As long as we don’t get too crazy, we can basically do whatever we want, so break a leg!”
He didn’t even have to use a mic to be heard across the whole room. He's got a great set of lungs. Everyone's paying attention to him, anyway—there's a gaggle of freshmen girls who're absolutely entranced by Ike, and a lot of guys are looking at him with respect.
“Well then, guys, let's have a blast!”
Right on cue, the curtains behind him open and reveal the music club; Ike leaves the stage. They start playing, and the entire gym's enveloped by lively music. Things start picking up quickly, and it soon feels like a proper party.
Now that everything’s in place and going smoothly, I should probably head toward the roof. I don’t know if Kai's already there waiting for me, but I don't want to stick around here too long; I’ll only sour the mood. Suddenly, I hear someone calling my name.
“Good work today, Tomoki-kun.”
I turn around and see Makiri-sensei.
“Why are you even here?” I ask.
“Well, I'm still required to supervise the entire event and make sure everything goes fine. It's me and all the other young 'fresh meat' teachers,” she answers with a shrug.
I knew that much. What I want to know is, why'd she approach me of all people? I mean, I'm all the way up here, as far away from the action as possible.
“Here, this is for you. Take it.”
She reveals a can of black coffee, meant for me.
“What's this for, again?”
“It’s your reward for today. You like coffee, don’t you? I remember Ike-san buying some for you the last time I was in the printing room.”
I really admire and appreciate her attention to detail. She really cares about the little things, like this, for example. It’s something that I really appreciate about her. I take the coffee, and she bumps her plastic bottle of tea against my can in a mock cheer.
“Thanks for all the work you’ve done for this event. I’m really grateful, Tomoki-kun.”
“No need to thank me, really… and thanks for the coffee.”
Her smile gets me all embarrassed and forces me to look away from her. I'm the one who should be thanking her, right? I take a sip from my coffee before I say anything.
“It’s just like you said, Sensei.”
“What do you mean?” she asks with a gulp of her tea.
“That there're people around who actually have an eye on me and what I do. I just realized it today, so thanks.”
She's surprised at first, but she quickly replaces that expression with a smile.
“There’s no need to thank me for that. You should be proud of yourself.”
I am really happy that what Makiri-sensei said is coming true, that people are realizing I’m not actually a thug. But it wasn't just me—I wouldn’t have been able to pull this off alone; not by a longshot. It was thanks to those two that I was able to do anything. Ike's the one who gave me hope in others, to begin with, and Makiri-sensei always watched over me, making me feel secure enough to actually give it my all. That's why I'm having a hard time feeling proud of myself—like, what have I done to deserve it?
Anyway, that's why I feel obligated to thank her. Unfortunately, my awkwardness strikes again, and I can't manage to choke out what I really want to tell her.
“...’Kay,” I manage to mumble, “Well, I've got some stuff I gotta take care of, so please excuse me.”
Her smile, her gentle look… I want to run away from it all. I'm already embarrassed enough from her praises, and her kindness isn't helping. Plus, I feel terrible that I can't thank her properly, since she's so dead-set against it and all. All of it makes me feel restless.
“Okay, see you around then,” she says while I avert my gaze.
I bow my head a little bit to say goodbye and head straight out of the gym.
☆
I head toward the main building, where the access to the rooftop is. It's almost our time to meet—I’m sure Kai's already there waiting for me, or close to getting there.
“Yuuji!” someone calls out behind me.
“Hm?”
I already have a good guess of who it is, judging by the voice, but I turn around to see who it is anyway.
“The party just started, man. Where're you even going?” Ike asks with his usual friendly smile.
“I gotta take care of something, so I’m going home early.”
“...You’re holding back too much, man. You should try to ease up and have a little more fun, y'know?” he says with an exasperated sigh.
“Um, I’m not holding back. I actually need to take care of something.”
I’d totally kill the party's vibes if I went, so I wanna get out of there ASAP… even if that just means going to the rooftop to meet that guy. Obviously, I can't tell Ike about that, though.
“Oh, right—I was supposed to talk to Tanaka-senpai and Suzuki later, but it turns out I can't make it today. Could you tell them sorry for me?”
“Just do it yourself next time you see them,” he retorts. He's looking pretty tired... I guess he's getting pretty sick of me.
“Sure, will do. And, well… I couldn’t tell you this before, but thanks. I had fun doing this.”
“Huh? What're you thanking me for? I just asked for your help because we were short a few hands, and you were the first person I thought of. Since you're my friend and all, I knew you'd get the job done properly.” he says incredulously, as if it's the most obvious thing in the world.
I disagree, but I’m glad he worries and cares about me so much.
“Oh, yeah, you still owe me for helping you back then, right?” I ask.
Ike grins and answers, “Yep, right. I'd even go as far as saying your help with this event should be added to the tab. So the next time we hang out, I'll treat you big time. Though, to be totally honest, I can already picture Touka glaring daggers at me for daring to butt in between the two of you, so...”
“Would it be so bad if the three of us went together?”
He's a bit surprised by my suggestion, but he quickly laughs and returns to his usual grin.
“It's up to you to convince her, then,” he says.
“No promises, but I’ll try.”
“Sure thing, dude.”
I don't think that Touka would have any issues with having him around. I mean, she's back to normal now and looking for a way to “beat” him. Hopefully, they can actually get along and have a good time—that’s all it'd take to make me happy. And if I’m there with them, that’d be the cherry on top of the cake.
“Okay then, see you later man.”
I turn around and head toward the building.
“Sure, see ya," he replies to my retreating figure.
As I walk toward the building, I recall meeting Tanaka-senpai and Suzuki in the student council room and meeting Asakura today. Maybe if I just act sincerely, like I did with the others, I can get through to Kai. Maybe if I'm genuine, and I just tell him the truth, he'll understand that I'm not a danger to Touka.
I’m still optimistic about this.
☆
I arrive at the rooftop, where I’m greeted by Kai the moment I open the door.
“I’ve been waiting for you, Tomoki Yuuji!” he roars my name out and glares at me with bloodshot eyes.
Uh, on second thought, I’m not so optimistic about this anymore. It doesn't look like he'll even give me a chance to explain myself. Oh well.
