Having completed all the titrations we were ordered to do at the beginning of the lesson Claire went to Miss Verde to hand in our bundle of papers.

“Aren’t you happy you managed to do at least one titration by yourself?” Emma asked me while impatiently turning around on her stool chair.

“I didn’t really do it by myself, did I? You and Claire still had to help me with the calculations after all.”

“The only thing we did was check your result though.”

“Which was wrong.”

“Yeah, but that was just a stupid mistake, not really a problem with your method.”

“I guess.”

“At least you know how to do it now if Miss Verde asks for it on a test.”

“Hmm, if I don’t forget.”

“You won’t, I’m confident of that.” She rubbed me on the back, slowly, before hastily taking back her hand. “Ah… sorry…” Em started to blush.

“It’s… nothing…”

 

“Full marks!” Claire had come back and sat herself down between me and Emma before things got too awkward again.

“So what do we do now?” I asked her.

“She just said we could do whatever, as long as we were quiet and didn’t disturb the rest of the class.

I looked at the clock. “Still 15 minutes left.” I put my elbows down on the table and rested my head in my hands with a sigh.

“Want to play cards?” Emma mentioned, making me and Claire look at her in surprise.

“You have a deck with you, why?” Claire asked.

“The girls and I play cards when we are resting or waiting on someone during training.” She started fishing in her sports bag and quickly pulled out a box of cards.

“Oh, sure, why not.” I moved to the opposite side of the table with Emma going to sit at the head.

“Trente et un?” She asked while shaking the cards around.

Claire nodded. “Sounds good to me.”

I nodded along too. It had been a while since I last played it but I think I still remembered the rules.

Emma started dealing the cards amongst us and soon enough we were set to start.

I looked at my hand and was disappointed at what I saw.
-No luck of the draw for me it seems.-

 

But before we could really begin, Miss Verde came over and peaked over Claire’s shoulder.
“When I said to keep yourselves busy quietly I did mean to keep yourself busy with school business.”

“Didn’t you say whatever, Miss?”

Miss Verde sighed. “Claire, since when do you take things so literal…? Well… I guess it doesn’t really matter anyway, good luck with your game, but please do keep quiet.”

“Thank you Miss Verde.” Claire smiled as the teacher went back to sit behind her desk.

“You get your way with her way too much, Claire. But, I’m not complaining.” I shook my head with a smile.

“I can’t help it that she's also the supervising teacher for the drama club.” She smirked while Emma started the game.

“Still weird for a Natural Sciences teacher to be a supervisor for that kind of club.” Em took a card from the pile and put one back on the discard heap, which Claire swiftly plucked away and changed for a different one.

“Thank you very much. Anyway, the soul longs what the soul longs for.” She winked at me.

“Logic doesn’t dictate the flow of rivers.”

“But… isn’t the flow of rivers pretty logical…?” Emma looked incredibly confused, and to be completely fair, so did I.

“Shhh.” Claire put her finger on Emma’s mouth, making her pull an incredibly amusing face -and also kinda cute....-

“It’s your turn by the way, Aurora.”

“Ah, right…” I reply flusteredly and play my hand, and with that also start a new round. 

 

When the bell rings, signalling the end of the lesson period we had managed to get three games done, with each of us winning once.

“We need a tie-breaker.” Emma complained, clearly not amused that no one had really won the session.

“We can do one more game after the last lesson of today, before we all head home.” Claire grabbed her bag and moved towards me.

“Sounds good to me, I think Ria wouldn’t mind waiting for five minutes.” I nodded and grabbed my bag as well.

“Ok, then.” Emma looked at the two of us. “Are you planning something?”

Claire looked at me to give an explanation.

“Ah, yeah, I wanted to talk to Claire about something.”

“In private?” Emma tilted her head.

“In private.” I confirmed her statement. “Hope you don’t mind.”

She quickly shook her head. “Of course not, you are free to go wherever and with whomever you want. You can go ahead, I’ll tell Ria where you are.”

“Thanks Em.” I smiled.

“No problem.” She quietly replied as me and Claire walked out of the classroom. 

 

“Where do you want to go?” Claire swung her bag over her shoulder while walking out of the building.

“Somewhere quiet, if that’s okay with you.”

“Roof balcony of the English resto?” She proposed.

“Wait, you can get up there?”

“Yes, didn’t you know?”

“Not at all!”

Claire winked. “Well, I guess I do know a lot of quiet spots around the school grounds.”

-Huh, I wonder wh… wait…-

“W-why exactly do you know so many quiet spots?”

Claire just winked again with a grin on her face. “Let’s go.”

“A-alright.” 

 

The English resto was completely deserted when we got there, not a student or staff member in sight. Claire entered the resto before me and pushed open a door leading to a staircase.

“I honestly didn’t know this door was here.” I looked around in awe at the Victorian design of the wall decorations. A couple of paintings were also neatly hung against the wall, going up to the top.

“I guess people just assume it’s closed because it’s not marked anywhere you can get up here.”

“So how did you find out then?”

“Because I always try to open doors, an unopened door is like an adventure waiting to happen.”

My mind flashed back to the door at home before I pulled back my attention to the hear and now.
“Never got into trouble for doing that?”

“Ah, plenty of times.” Claire laughed. “But that’s part of the thrill, don’t you think so?”

“I guess…”

Claire opened the door leading to the roof, lighting up the entire hallway with bright sunlight.
“Here we are.” She put her hands on her hip and took a deep breath, breathing in the fresh autumn air. The tips of her hair gently waved in the breeze. “I really like this spot.”

“I can see why.” The rooftop balcony had an amazing view over the surrounding garden. It was honestly a miracle other students hadn’t discovered this place yet. The school had even placed a couple of benches here for students to sit.

 

My friend sat down on the one that was facing the larger ponds in the garden and beckoned me to sit beside her, brushing a couple of leaves from the top of it.
“What did you want to talk about? Does it have something to do with Ria and Emma?”

A bit surprised by how fast she had caught on, I nodded. “Yeah, kinda. Was it that obvious?”

Claire smiled. “You could say that. I could feel there’s something going on, but I can’t really tell what exactly.”

“Mhmm.” I nodded again.

“Did you do anything?”

“It’s not really that I did anything, but rather something I, uhh, found out.”

“You found out that they are your long lost sisters, placed with different families because of some sort of governmental cover up, maybe to hide the identity of the heirs of Jesus Christ?”

“Wha…?” I looked into Claire’s eyes, she seemingly looked completely serious before she started smirking.

“Sorry, that was a joke. How was my poker face?”

“Really good, I guess…?” I was still a bit perplexed by her randomness. -Isn’t she taking this serious at all?-  

However, Claire’s smirk turned into a gentle smile. “In all seriousness. You realised you are gay, didn’t you?”
Claire’s guess completely stunned me, I tried to say something but not a word came out of my mouth.
“I take it I hit the nail on the head?”

I shyly nodded.

Claire patted my shoulder. “Congratulations, I knew you’d be able to do it.”

“T-thanks…”

“And now you are being self-conscious around your friends.” Claire laid a clear emphasis on the last word.

“You can say that, yeah…”

“I think that’s pretty normal. I’ve not dealt with that myself but it was very much the same for Anna, at least from what she told me.”

“So… how do you tell if other people are…uhh...”

“Gay?” She tilted her head but soon confidently straightened it up again. “Ah, I see where you are going with this. The best way is to ask of course. But, as I’m pretty sure this is about Corelia, it’s not that simple.”

“How so?”

“If I had asked you straight up if you were gay, just two days ago, what would you have answered?”

I thought back for a second before replying. “Probably no….”

Claire nodded. “Corelia is pretty much in the same boat. The two of you have acted like the gayest couple I’ve ever seen, but you’re also just as dense. I’d be surprised if she isn’t a lesbian, but I wouldn’t try to force an answer out of her. Self-discovery is something a person has to do themselves. That said, you can still offer a guiding hand.”

“How do I do that?”

“Just continue doing as you were before I’d say. It worked for you, so it will probably ring a bell for her too, in time.”

“A-and should I tell them I’m gay?”

Claire shrugged. “Coming out is your choice and yours alone. But for what it’s worth, I don’t think anyone in our friend group would judge you, just as they don’t judge me either.”

“Yeah, you’re right…”

Claire smiled. “Was that everything?”

“Well, there’s one more thing...”

“Go ahead.” She gently pushed me on.

“What do you think about Emma?”

“Oh, okay, I probably should’ve seen that coming…” She rubbed her chin with her index finger and her thumb. “Hmmm. Personally I find Emma very hard to read, especially compared to Ria. How is she when you are alone with her? Does she act differently?”

“I guess…? But I’m her best friend, ...so... and… urgh… it’s just hard.”

“I can understand that. If everything were easy life wouldn’t be that interesting, would it?” She patted me on the shoulder again.

“Yeah… that sounds about right.”

“Anyway, I’d love to keep answering your questions but we need to head back now so we don’t get our heads yelled off.”

I looked at the time on my phone, the break was indeed almost over “Ah, that would be unfortunate… thanks, Claire.”

“Hey, no problem.” She got up and offered me her hand. “If you want another one of these chats, or if there’s something you are curious about, like sex for example, just let me know, okay?”

“A-a-a-lright, I will.” With my face flushed completely red, I took her hand and followed Claire to the next lesson.