LonMair399

I would first like to apologize. It’s been over a year since I’ve last posted a chapter to Harem Protagonist’s Sidekick. I left without an explanation, but this story was the farthest thing from my mind after everything fell apart then. I am not going to delve into this–and I hope you all will respect my privacy–but I am back to it. I now have the time and (mostly) the financial means to keep writing. I have missed this story and all of you and am very excited that I am able to finally, finally work on something I love.

Unfortunately, everything I wrote previously has been lost, but over the past two months I have written a healthy backlog of chapters (some proof is on Patreon if my word isn’t enough). I feel like the story is drastically better now than it was before anyhow. But I will let all of you be the judge of that. 

Just some heads-up, I will be editing some of the older chapters. Hopefully all of this will be complete by next Wednesday. I’m not revising the plot or anything, I just want to rewrite a few sections (change playing the game on their phones to VR, etc.) that I found lackluster upon rereading them. Also, my release schedule will be on Saturday and Wednesday every week.

To anyone still following, it means the world to me, and I hope you’ll stick through this journey with me! Thanks, everyone and I'll see you all on Wednesday!

-Lon Mair

Guess it was up to me to voice what everybody else was thinking. "These cookies look worse than Rika's drawings."

The girls offered a grim nod and dared not approach the plate holding the charred cookies. I placed it on the counter and slipped off the oven mitts, then turned off the oven. Members of the club watched on with something akin to pity. They weren’t wrong, but this wasn’t a damn cooking show. Or, if it was, the contestants weren’t exactly up to the rigorous standards set by the culinary world. 

Even so, and maybe I was giving us too much credit, but for a first attempt, this batch could have been much worse. Granted, it also could have been a lot better. While they held a vague resemblance to what cookies should look like, they were oblong and had cracks running along the inside.

Rika nudged me forward. "You should taste them."

I hoped she'd lost her mind. Otherwise, there was no excuse for wishing to inflict that kind of torture upon me.

"Why should I have to? It was your guys' idea."

Rika seemed to ponder that thought. "You're right. That was pretty undemocratic of me. Let's hold a vote instead. All in favor of him being the official taste tester, raise their hand." Both the girls' hands shot into the air. "Alright, and all opposed."

I raised my hand. "Somehow this feels rigged."

"Alright," she said, not concerned with my opinion in the slightest. "Looks like it's two to one, so you're up."

God, was she being obnoxious. Deciding upon the cookie that was the least burnt, I grabbed it and brought it to my lips. Yet, I couldn’t force myself to take a bite. 

"You've got this!" Rika cheered.

Chloe gave me a small smile. "Good luck."

What the hell was this? Some kind of spectator sport to them? It sure was to those other girls, and I turned my back to them out of pettiness.

Gathering all my courage, I took a small nibble. I chewed once, twice, and swallowed it. Really it wasn't so bad. It was obviously dry, and by no means delicious, but with some small adjustments, they could easily be something Ethan would enjoy. Actually, who was I kidding? He would scarf these down as is without hesitation. I shared so with them.

"Really? You're not trying to trick us?" Rika asked.

"Like I'd stoop to your level."

With hesitation oozing from every pore, she grabbed a cookie, going for the least oddly-shaped one, and popped it into her mouth. "Wow, that's not the worst thing in the world."

This somehow encouraged Chloe to taste one as well. She chewed on it for a while, clearly nowhere near as enthused as Rika. "Let's try again tomorrow."

It was hard to say no to someone wanting to improve themselves, so I went along with her plan for now. Not like I had anything better to do anyway. Wonder if my mom still had that old recipe book lying around?

We continued practicing the next day. The night before, I managed to find the book and brought it for reference. Both of them perused through it, settling on a recipe that wasn’t part of the original publication. They removed the loose piece of paper from the book and went about gathering the ingredients listed. The leaning, cursive handwriting denoted the recipe as my grandma’s. While I had no idea such a thing was inside the cookbook, I had no complaints about using it since the cookies she made for the holidays were always delicious.

By the time Thursday rolled around, one would think we’d been members of the cooking club for quite a while. Had they seen us baking cookies that was. If our group were to attempt anything else, I was certain we would be useless. I couldn’t pretend it wasn’t fun though, and I even put some of the leftovers aside for my mom and sister.

Which brought us to today, Friday, and the end of science class. Josh and me were both frantically cleaning, despite his awful track record of breaking lab equipment. Our teacher was in a foul mood, however, and neither one of us wanted to be there any longer than necessary. I unplugged the microscope and caught Josh by the back of his arm, preventing him from spilling chemicals all over our station. We weren’t using anything dangerous, but I was more concerned about having to clean up a mess more than my health. Once we finished putting everything away, I bid farewell to Josh. I pulled my phone out and checked my messages, noticing it vibrated during class. 

Rika: SOS, come to the stairwell

That place still? We really needed to get a better meeting place, preferably somewhere with fewer cobwebs and less dust. Weaving in and out of the throngs of students, I reached the stairwell and walked in, offering them a small wave. "Hey, what's going..."

I fell silent upon noticing the two of them curled up on the stairwell. Chloe's head rested on Rika's chest, her shoulders twitching every so often. Rika ran her fingers through her hair, murmuring soothing things to her. 

"What happened?" 

Rika didn’t peel her gaze away from the top of the other girl’s head. "Some guy knocked into her and stepped on the cookies."

“Better clean that up unless you want the poor janitor to have to.”

I shuttered, unable to help comparing this incident to what happened last year. But me worrying about that wasn’t going to be of any use to Chloe. I needed to put that aside for now.  

"On purpose?" I asked for clarification.

She shook her head. "No, the guy's a klutz."

I accepted her answer for what it was and ventured over to the girls, sitting on the step below them. "I'm sorry, Chloe."

She sniffled but refrained from speaking, burrowing her face into the crook of Rika's neck and tightening her grip on the bag of cookies in her lap. It was a frustrating feeling, being so out of my depth. Wasn’t there anything I could do to cheer her up? Or even just make her smile for a little? If the cookies were part of the problem, then I supposed it could be worth a shot.

"Hey, Rika. Can you toss me that bag real quick?"

She blinked at me in confusion but passed it to me regardless. I undid the ribbon and grabbed a cookie. Actually, it'd be more accurate to say a piece of one. Whoever stepped on them crushed them pretty good, leaving them cookies flattened and cracked. Still, I popped it into my mouth. 

"These are a lot better than that first batch."

Rika reached out for the bag. "Let me try one." She ate one of them, chewing thoughtfully. Her smile gives her away. "Yeah, you're right. These are good, Chloe."

Chloe stopped sniffling. "Really?"

"Of course. You sure you don't want to give him these? I’m sure he’d understand if you explain what happened."

She pulled away from Rika, her nose red. "No, I'll make some more later and give them to him." She wrung her hands in her lap. "Sorry for getting so upset about it. I know it's not a big deal."

Rika bopped her on the nose. "Hey, don't sweat it. You've been working hard, so it's only natural you'd be upset it didn't work out the way you wanted."

The girl wiped her glasses on her sleeve. "Thank you."

"That's what friends are for!" RIka said. "And besides, it's not like there won't be plenty of opportunities for you to hang out with him at the amusement park tomorrow.”

Chloe looked to me for confirmation. How could I do anything but agree with Rika?

I gave her the biggest grin I could muster. "I'll even try to convince him you’ve got dibs on shotgun for the trip tomorrow."