On the next day, pretty much the same thing happened as yesterday. Again with the cultural festival discussion and again with the zero progress. I think the only reason neither Kazuki nor Murata shouted this time is because I have my good friend ol’ bucket filed with water at the ready.

   Kazuki lets out a deep sigh. ‘This isn’t going anywhere. We have to make decisions today, or we won’t make it in time for the festival.’

   ‘Say, Kazuki. I know this might be rude to the two of you but I have a suggestion.’ Masato raises up his hand and says.

   ‘Yes? What is it?’

   ‘Well, it’s actually Takuya’s suggestion, but I guess it doesn’t matter here. Yesterday, while the two of you left the classroom to get changed, he suggested to us to elect temporal class reps until the festival is over.’

   Murata and Kazuki look at each other instinctively, then they remembered that they’ve still not reconciled and look away with a bitter expression.

   ‘So, what do you think? I didn’t want to bring this up, but we’re really short on time.’ Kazuki continues.

   ‘I suppose you’re right. What do you think, Murata-san?’

   Murata nods grudgingly, as if she can’t believe that she’s agreeing with Kazuki on something.

   ‘Yes. We can’t let our petty squabbles delay our work any longer.’

   ‘So then, will you take up the job, Masato?’

   ‘Hey, don’t look at me! I just gave the suggestion. I didn’t exactly agree to do it!’

   This went on for quite some time, with one student nominating another, only for that student to decline and nominate a third one. After listening for a while, I close my eyes and lie down on my desk since I got tired of listening.

   Eventually, the whole class got quiet.

   ‘...I’ll say this upfront. If I open my eyes and find you guys staring at me, I’m going to poke your eyes out one by one.’ I tell them without opening my eyes.

   ‘But Takuya-’ Masato begins.

   ‘No buts. You know better than anyone that I hate this kind of thing with a passion.’ I interrupt.

   ‘Fine, I’ll do it!’ a voice says.

   I open my eyes to confirm who spoke. Sure enough, it’s Takeuchi, Masato’s ex-girlfriend.

   ‘Bandou-kun, I’ll handle the more head-aching stuff, so can I trust you to take care of the menu? You know, since you got experience in working at a restaurant?’

   I shrug. ‘Sure. I can handle that much.’

   ‘Great. Then let’s do this!’

   Takeuchi goes to the blackboard and resumes the discussion. There isn’t much time let until the homeroom ends, so she has to be quick about it.

   ‘Right. I say we do a eastern style café. I did a survey yesterday, and no one else is doing it. Everyone fine with it?’

   No one has any objection.

   ‘That’s a yes then.’

   Takeuchi then proceeds to divide up the work. For now, all she did was assigning people to design the costumes the waiters and waitresses will be wearing. She also tasked me to think up of a menu and present it to the class tomorrow. Finally, she promised that she will think up of a fair work schedule that’s negotiable. It wasn’t much of a discussion but everyone is glad that we’re finally going somewhere. Furthermore, no one pestered her about the schedule even before she began. This is because Takeuchi is quite a popular and well-liked girl that pretty much everyone trusts. She ain’t book smart like Kazuki and Murata, but she proved herself to be someone who can get things done. If Masato hadn’t break up with her, I’m pretty sure he would be rubbing her accomplishment on me even though he didn’t do a single thing.

   Nothing special happened until school’s over. I didn’t receive any message or call from Suzu, so I just leave the school and head home like I always do. As I had half-expected, I met her standing at the side of a road.

   ‘Evening, Takkun~.’ she greets me.

   ‘Hey there, Suzu.’ I greet back. ‘So, where are we going?’

   Instead of answering immediately, she reaches out both her arms like a zombie. Guess I’m piggybacking her again. I let her climb up to my back and hand both our bags to her.

   ‘To the riverside~.’ Suzu declares once she’s settled down on my back.

   I see. That’s how it is.

   The riverside she’s talking about is  quite close to where Kazuki is living. He would go there and just stare at the river every time he was sulking or feeling dejected. That habit of his never changed throughout his time as a small kid. Naturally, he went there right after his grandmother has passed away. It took us the whole day to convince him to go home then since he loved his grandmother so much.

   Sure enough, we find him sitting there doing nothing. As far as I know, he had been sitting there every day ever since he broke up with Murata.

   ‘So, what now?’ I ask Suzu after we got close enough, but not too close to prevent him from spotting us.

   ‘You pick a fight with him~.’ she answers nonchalantly.

   I shrug. ‘If that’s what you want me to do.’

   I put her down and walk towards Kazuki. As I’m figuring out how to do it without looking too suspicious, Kazuki notices me approaching and stands up.

   ‘Hey there, Takuya. Can I ask you a favor?’ he asks me.

   ‘Yeah?’

   ‘Is it alright if we spar for a bit? The type that’s no holds barred?’

   Wow. That was easy. I didn’t even have to say a thing.

   I nod without saying anything and crack my knuckles. Before we begin, Kazuki made sure to take off his jacket. I didn’t bother doing the same. I take my stance after he’s done. He too takes up a stance, although his looks much more amateurish.

   He then charges at me with both his hands spread out wide as if he wants to hug me. It totally defeats the purpose of his stance but whatever. It’s obvious as day that he’s planning to hug my waist and make me topple over, then give me a beat down while he’s on top of me. Before he could even go near me, I calmly raise up my knee and give him a front kick on his forehead. He flies backwards from the kick and lands on the ground loudly.

   ‘Try to drag the fight to four minutes~!’ Suzu shouts from the place she’s standing at.

   ‘You’re not making this easy!’ I complain while looking towards her.

   I shouldn’t have done that since while I was looking away, Kazuki has already close in on me. My training kicks in and makes me elbow the back of his neck without looking at him or holding back. His face lands on the ground in another loud noise.

   ‘Oh boy.’ I mumble after seeing what I have done.

   Kazuki slowly gets up. He nose starts to bleed after being in contact with the hard ground. I can see my shoe print on his forehead where I kicked him. He swings an extremely slow punch that I can dodge with my eyes closed. I respond by slapping it away. He tries to give me a headbutt, but I saw it coming from miles away and stops him by grabbing his head. This is the part where I give him multiple knee kicks, but my mission is to stall for time, so I just push him away instead.

   The next few minutes were positively the most agonizing times I ever spent. And that’s saying something considering what I’ve been through. I mean, he called it a sparring, but it’s more of a one-sided beat down with me thrashing him. The only reason he’s not down for the count is that I have to wait until four minutes have passed. I counted until 174 so far. Around one more minute to go. Even so, I didn’t let my guard done. Being a true martial artist means that you never let your guard down no matter who or how weak your opponent is. Kazuki might get lucky and somehow knocks me out. I would rather die than letting that happen.

   Finally, I manage to count to 240, a whole four minutes. As if on cue…

   ‘Bandou-kun, stop!’

   I look over where the voice comes from. It’s Murata. Besides her school bag, she’s also holding a bag of groceries.

   She goes right over to Kazuki, who’s lying down on the ground looking half-dead. I quickly raise up both my hands and walk two steps backwards.

   ‘Can you stand, Kazuki-kun?’ Murata asks Kazuki.

   ‘Yes. Thank you, Sayuri.’ Kazuki whispers between heavy pants.

   ‘Don’t worry about it. Let’s get you home and have your wounds treated.’

   Murata carries Kazuki’s arm over her shoulders so that he can stand.

   ‘Can you get our bags, Bandou-kun?’ Murata asks me.

   ‘Oh. Sure.’

   I put down my hands and bend down so that I can get both their bags and her plastic bag. I then hand them over directly to her free hand. She thanks me with a nod.

   As I watch, the two of them leave the riverside with Murata matching Kazuki’s slow pace. I wait until they disappeared from my sight before returning to Suzu.

   ‘Well done, Takkun~.’ she congratulates me.

   ‘It was nothing. Just don’t expect me to do it again. Do you know how difficult it is to hold back against a complete amateur?’

   ‘But you did it anyway, so good job~.’ she says while giving me a thumbs up.

   ‘From what I see, you did the better job here.’ I compliment her. ‘You even predicted how long it would take Murata to pass by this place.’

   ‘No big deal. She had to go get some eggs and some leek to cook sukiyaki tonight, so she went to the supermarket first before going home. That’s why she was coming back later than usual.’

   Now that Suzu mentioned it, I did saw a carton of eggs and a stalk of leeks when I was getting the plastic bag for Murata.

   ‘No no no, that’s way beyond nothing. How on earth did you even know she’s having sukiyaki?’

   ‘Cause her family’s having sukiyaki every Wednesday, and today’s a Wednesday?’

   ‘Again, how do you know that?’

   ‘Let’s not sweat the small stuff, shall we? More importantly, I’m hungry! I would kill to get some parfait right now!’

   ‘Parfait’s a dessert.’ I point out. ‘It’s not something you eat to fill your stomach.’

   ‘Geez, Takkun. Why are you such a killjoy? It’s rare that I could eat anything I want without Seriseri around, so indulge me, will you?’

   ‘Fine fine. Just remember to eat your meals properly. I don’t want Serizawa-san to get a heart attack when he found out that his ojou-sama is malnourished.’

   ‘Okay~.’

   We go to a family restaurant nearby. For the umpteenth time, I got weird looks when I piggybacked Suzu inside. The people inside are probably also surprised that someone from Kiseki High is actually having her meals at a place like a family restaurant.

   We got guided to a seat by a waitress. We then sit down opposite each other. Suzu picks up the menu and flips through it.

   ‘Let’s see, parfaits, parfaits…’

   ‘Remember what you just promised me?’

   ‘I do remember, don’t you worry~.’

   She got a hamburger steak set with rice and chocolate parfait. I got spaghetti napolitan and access to drink bar.

   ‘Are you going to mix up every drink they have?’ Suzu asks me excitedly when she heard that I was paying for the drink bar.

   ‘Sure am. I mean, what else will you be doing in a family restaurant?’

   ‘Awesome~!’

   I get my cup to the drink fountain and fill it up with literally every single drink they offer, even those I would never touch under normal circumstances like coffee. I go back to my seat with Suzu waiting in anticipation for my reaction when I drink the abomination. I take a sip and felt like the world is ending.

   ‘So, how does it taste?’ Suzu asks.

   Wordlessly, I hand her the cup. She takes the cup and takes a sip as well. She then made the funniest face I ever saw.

   ‘Eww, gross~!’

   ‘Guess the experience is not worth it.’ I conclude.

   ‘Definitely not.’ she agrees. ‘It was worth a try though.’

   It didn’t take long for our meal to arrive, and we eat in peace for some time.

   ‘This sure is nice.’ Suzu says all of a sudden.

   ‘What is?’

   ‘You know, hanging out with your friend and eating a meal together. Everyone is so on edge in Kiseki that it’s suffocating.’

   ‘I get you, but in a different manner. Ever since my only two friends got themselves girlfriends, I haven’t been hanging out with someone for a long time.’

   ‘Even after they broke up?’

   ‘Yeah, our relationship is complicated that way.’

   ‘At least you have someone to talk to.’

   ‘I guess.’

   ‘And you have Aiai.’

   ‘She definitely doesn’t count.’

   ‘Come on, don’t say that~. She may be a bit stupid, but she’s still a nice person.’

   ‘I know she’s nice, but she still gets on my nerves.’

   We finish our food and Suzu moves on to her parfait. Every bite is a pure bliss for her, and she shows it through her expression.

   ‘Is it that good?’ I couldn’t help but ask.

   ‘Sure is. Here, have some~.’

   She scoops up some ice-cream with her spoon and proceeds to feed me with it. I open my mouth and let her put her spoon inside. I then close it, thereby getting the ice cream inside.

   ‘It’s good, right?’ she asks after pulling out the spoon form my mouth.

   ‘I guess.’

   ‘Right? You can have some more~.’

   The next few minutes is Suzu feeding me and herself with the parfait. Huh? Indirect kiss? Who cares about that? What are you, seven?

   We ask for the bill after we finish eating the parfait. Each of us paid for our own meal, of course. This time, Suzu didn’t pull out her black credit card, so I guess she’s learned her lesson. We handed the waitress the exact change, so we could just leave.

   ‘How are you going back?’ I ask her while I finish my disgusting drink.

   ‘Seriseri is already outside waiting for me.’ she replies.

   Indeed he was. I don’t know how long was he here, but he was standing right next to his car when we got out.

   ‘Good evening, Serizawa-san.’ I greet him politely.

   ‘Good evening, sir. Thank you for accompanying ojou-sama.’

   ‘It’s fine. I had fun too.’

   The two of them get inside the car. Suzu lowers down the window before they leave.

   ‘Bye Takkun~. I’ll be seeing you tomorrow~.’ she tells me.

   I just wave at her like an idiot since I was wondering why will we be meeting again tomorrow. Oh, whatever. It’s probably her being friendly or something.

   Around two hours after I got back to my apartment, I receive a call from Kazuki.

   ‘Hey man, what’s up?’

   ‘Nothing much, just want to tell you that Sayuri and I are sort of getting back together. And I want to thank you and the girl you’re with.’ he says from the other side of the phone.

   ‘You’re actually thanking me for beating you up?’

   ‘You know what I mean. Somehow, the girl knows that Sayuri was going to pass by. That’s why she wanted you to stall time, right? It’s all so that we could have a chance to talk.’

   ‘Well, you were the one who asked me to give you a good thrashing.’

   ‘Don’t you mean sparring?’

   ‘Same thing.’

   ‘Anyway, she got me to my house and up my room. I apologized for my foolish behaviour, and she forgave me. End of story.’

   ‘Well, don’t make it happen again, or I’ll beat you up for real next time.’

   ‘Even worse than just now?’

   ‘Even worse than just now.’ I promise.

   He laughs at that. ‘I’ll keep that in mind. Well, see you tomorrow.’

   ‘Yeah.’

   Before I sleep, I made sure to think up a menu to be presented in front of the class tomorrow.

   On the homeroom next day, Murata and Kazuki announce to everyone that they got back together, earning them a huge round of applause. They are so happy for them that they are completely ignoring the wounds on Kazuki’s face. Takeuchi is extra glad since she doesn’t have to be the temporary class rep anymore. Just as the class rep couple is about the resume the discussion of the cultural festival, Shimada-sensei opens the door and comes inside, surprising everyone.

   ‘What are you doing here, sensei? Aren’t you still busy drowning in your sorrows?’ I ask her.

   She glares at me with her bag-covered eyes. ‘Thank you for your blunt question, Bandou-kun. Sensei would love to do that today as well. Unfortunately, we have a transfer student enrolled in this class today, so I have to act like a teacher after a long while.’

   This news causes a minor uproar among us. A transfer student? At this month of the year? I wonder who could it be?

   Shimada-sensei looks towards the door she just entered the classroom from.

   ‘Please come in.’ she tells her whoever that’s outside.

   The transfer student does as she says and comes in after opening the door. I couldn’t believe my eyes. Murata and Kazuki also gasps in recognition.

   The transfer student writes her name on the blackboard, then she turns around to face the rest of the class.

   ‘Heya, everybody~! My name is Yoshinaga Suzume, nice to meet you~!’ she tells us in her signature laid-back voice.

   ‘Yoshinaga-san here is a former student from Kiseki High. For reasons unknown, she decided to get transferred here.’ Shimada-sensei explains. ‘Everyone, please get along with her.’

   ‘I’ll be in your care~!’

   Hearing that Suzu is from Kiseki High makes everyone even more surprised.

   ‘From Kiseki? You mean that place for geniuses?’

   ‘Where else could it be, you idiot?’

   ‘Wow, wonder what she’s doing here, of all places?’

   There’s an empty seat two seats from the right away from mine, and that became her new seat.

   ‘Now then, sensei will be leaving. Do remember to discuss about the cultural festival.’ she tells us right before she leaves the classroom.

   Everyone is curious as heck about Suzu, but what Shimada-sensei said pull them back to reality. We’re already been left behind schedule as we are, so there’s not much time to waste.

   Kazuki looks at me. ‘Have you got the menu ready, Takuya?’

   ‘Yeah, I did.’

   He wants me to go to the blackboard and present what I thought up of. I didn’t think of anything too difficult and suggest Japanese sweets like dango, mochi, ohagi and dorayaki.

   ‘No main course?’ Kazuki asks me.

   ‘None. They can be quite a pain to make, and customers won’t really order them before or after meal time, so we might as well concentrate on sweets that are easier to make and can be eaten at any time of the day.’

   ‘Sounds good. Anyone has any objections?’

   Suzu raises up her hand. ‘What about parfaits? They’re sweets too.’

   ‘Suzu, you do realize that parfait is a western dessert, right?’

   ‘Yes, Takkun. What about it?’

   ‘We’re doing a Japanese café.’ I inform her.

   ‘Oh. But still, you can’t just abandon the idea of having parfait in the menu~! I mean, the one we ate together yesterday was delicious, wasn’t it?’

   ‘Yes it was, but it’s still not suitable to be added into our menu. End of story.’

   I ignore further protestation from her and return to my seat. I’m also ignoring the curious stares I’m getting from my classmates as to the reason Suzu and I are calling each other with nicknames and the fact that we ate parfaits together. After I’m done, the one who’s in charge of designing the costumes is up next. She shows us some drawings that look kind of nice which got everyone’s approval. Now that the menu and the costumes are settled, Kazuki moves onto talk about other things like budget and getting cutleries. The rest of the discussion went on smoothly with him and Murata in sync once more.

   During the break time before the lesson of the day, pretty much everyone is surrounding Suzu to ask her questions.

   ‘Are you close with Bandou-kun, Yoshinaga-san?’

   ‘Hmm? We’re friends, so I guess we’re close to a certain extent.’

   ‘Are you sure you’re just friends?’

   ‘I’m sure last I checked. Why do you ask?’

   ‘The two of you calls each other with nicknames, and you ate parfaits together! That’s totally what couples do!’

   ‘Nah, we’re just friends. Right, Takkun?’

   ‘Yes, yes we are.’ I confirm. ‘By the way, even if you want to get transferred here, why this class? You could go to the class where Nagano is.’

   ‘That’s because I prefer to hang out with you.’

   That statement made a lot of girls squeal in excitement. I groan loudly. Things are going to keep on getting worse for me, isn’t it?