Chapter 18. Midterms (3/7)
When I leaned back she mimicked me. The two of us laid side by side with our backs to the ground.
Several minutes passed by in silence where neither of us said anything.
I was the first to break the serene moment where a single boy and girl laid atop the school roof side by side.
“So, what exactly happened? Why weren’t you listed on the rankings for the midterms? When I saw you studying with Jass I thought you’d be fine and figured you didn’t need my help after all. But then you got called to Mr. Oz’s office for something. Is it my fault? The scrap paper I tossed over to you… did they catch you cheating and invalidate all your midterm scores with the reason of academic dishonesty because I did something unnecessary?”
I asked everything that had been on my mind all in one go.
She didn't respond immediately. It took a bit before she opened her mouth.
“Honestly… I don’t know what happened.”
“Huh? What do you mean you don’t know what happened?”
“My mind is a bit of a mess. I don’t understand what’s wrong with me.”
“Please elaborate. When did this start?”
“The start of it… probably the very first half day you missed.”
“What do you mean?”
“That day when you got up to leave for the first time during lunch I was a bit surprised but I didn’t immediately think too much about it. I thought you were just going to the washroom to take a leak or something and you’d be right back. But then… you didn’t return. You disappeared like nothing without a single word. I was a bit confused I guess.”
“Then?”
“The next day you didn’t appear at all. I felt a bit lost. My eyes darted about the class trying to pin your figure down. But you were nowhere to be found. It was a sick day. He must have just gotten sick and left early the day before and hadn’t gotten better yet. I thought that had to be the reason for your abrupt leave.”
“Over that weekend… I guess... I was thinking about you. I was looking forward to Monday when I'll see you next. I’d get even with you for taking up free lodging in my mind. That was what I thought.”
“Monday, you still didn’t appear. I felt an unpleasant sense of emptiness encroach upon me. A bunch of guys always surrounded me, but they weren’t you.”
“Tuesday came and went and you still weren’t there, I began to lose hope I’d ever see you again.”
“Wednesday the world around me started to appear monochrome, it was bleak and dreary.”
“Thursday it felt like there was rain constantly pouring down and battering my heart.”
“By Friday there was nothing left. Dazed, I was asked to meet someone behind the school. They confessed to me and asked me to go out with them. I listlessly agreed to their request for a date. I planned to use the opportunity to forget everything.”
Wow, that guy really confessed.
“On Saturday I went on a date with them. It looked like they had fun. What was fun like, I already couldn’t remember.”
“Sunday the guy I went on a date with called me up suggesting we could do some last-minute study sessions for the midterms together. I agreed to it. We met up and studied for the midterm on Monday. But anything he tried to teach me I couldn’t really remember. I just wasn’t interested. I blankly nodded along like I understood what he was talking about, but nothing ever stuck.”
“When Monday came and you finally walked in, I thought I’d feel happy, but it wasn’t happiness I felt at all. It was confusion. Pure confusion. I blanked out. In the middle of the midterm, a folded-up piece of paper landed on my desk. I read the message on it. The single word at the end stuck in my mind, ‘sorry.’ Everything after that turned to white. I ended up unable to answer a single question that day. My hand wouldn’t move to write.”
“I studied with that guy again for the midterm set for Tuesday as well. The same thing happened. On Tuesday I was still hung on the word in the note you left for me. I don’t even know why.”
“Every day I studied with that guy for the next midterm but nothing ever changed.”
“Wednesday I ended up replaying the last two months in my head.”
“Thursday I tried to figure things out.”
“Friday, I finally realized something. I’d never been staring at you because of something like love. I’d only been staring at you for selfish reasons and I’d done nothing but inconvenience you for my own fun. I thought about having a normal romance with a guy who fit a certain set of criteria just for the sake of having a normal romance. It’d last until the end of high school before we’d go our separate ways and never see each other again. It was a rather selfish thought of mine. Because of how nonchalant you were and immune to love you seemed to be, I thought it’d be fine if it was you. That was my reason in the beginning.”
“I ended up rushing in head first, forcing things along recklessly. I wanted to speed things up but I got needlessly impatient at some point and pushed you to the point where you took a large step back and created a rift between us.”
“During the weekend that followed I tried to think about a way I could fix things but I couldn’t think of anything much.”
“When Monday came I was called to Mr. Oz’s office as you already know. I’d gotten a zero on every midterm because I couldn’t so much as lift my pencil to write let alone think. Everything from the week of the midterm was blank in my mind. I just told them I’d been feeling sick the week before and they accepted it without any questions asked. They even thought I might have caught something from you since you’d been out sick for a week and I sat close to you. They plan to let me retake the midterms next week.”
“So… honestly… I could really use your help right now.”
“Well, I don’t really mind, but is that all you want for all the trouble you apparently went through because of me? I mean you’d surely be thinking of getting even with me, right?”
“Your help is enough.”
“I see. Well, I’m glad you’re asking for my help. I can at least make it up to you a bit. I’m also glad that I got to hear your real thoughts. This makes things easier.”
“Makes what easier?” I could see her turn her head toward me from the corner of my eye.
I took out my phone held it up in front of me and opened up my contact list. I edited her contact details and changed the contact name.
I then turned my head to face her. Looking her in the eyes while turning my phone toward her I asked with a slight smile, “Would you be my girlfriend?” Before she could process what I’d asked her or what I’d shown her on my phone and respond to me, I raised my right hand, placed it on her left cheek, and leaned in closer to her. Closing my eyes, our lips came into contact.
Her lips were warm and moist. I tasted something rather sweet. Something I hadn’t tasted before. I couldn’t help but think it was a taste of youth. Something you could only experience when you were young and in love.
If you were too slow to act, it would be a taste you’d never be able to try.
Displayed on my contact list in front of her she was number one in the list of one. Her name was now listed as ‘♡♡♡MY GIRLFRIEND♡♡♡’.
Truly, it was quite the embarrassing name.
When I pulled my head back thinking to stop she moved forward and kept us connected as if afraid I’d disappear on her again.
Even without her saying it her action was enough of a confession. She’d reciprocated. Her hand slid up across my chest and she meekly hooked it around the back of my neck. Her nails dug into me a bit, but it didn’t bother me too much.
The bell suddenly rang signaling the end of lunch. When it did we snapped out of our trance. But she seemed a bit reluctant.
sorry i can´t understand the jump of the mind in the mc
feels like i was hit on the back of my head multiple times with everything in this chapter
This a surprisingly prefect for his character.
somehow MC isnt acting as himself. it feeels rushed and hardly belevable. But whatever nothing is perfect. lets put it on teenage hormones acting :)
thunderous thunderous applause, I honestly love it, 5 stars, a 10 out of 10 romance, now all relationship spice is missing, the drama and a bit of well resolved misunderstandings
HUH?
YOOOO I DID NOT SEE THAT COMING
Is Rosa okay? I don't think you'd typically have such intense feelings and reactions to what happened. And what's with Ran's 180 on having her as a gf?
People are saying she killed the mc. Did I miss something? Or is it because he concluded she was an assassin.
I get it now! She wanted to experience highschool love and met mc who fits the criteria but mc is a loner sooo yeah but why kill mc after years tho? Why not after highschool or smthing
Their interaction wouldn't have gone the same way on his first day in high school his first time through life so Rosa might not have necessarily taken an interest in him at all back then. He didn't even remember her being in home room together with him. As for why he died, that will be revealed in time.
What the hell. The MC didn't even have a proper character development and he begin to act like that? Lol.
If he tell himself the "he can change" I can understand that but if it's coming from the guy who didn't want to change then it's out of character.
There's a thing called meeting someone which leads to changing a person. A meeting is more than enough to change a person's actions.
Also, the whole 'I want to change myself' is just some cliche shounen garbage. Accepting who you are and the limitations of your capabilities is what an adult does. The whole you can do it if you try hard enough is what adults tell kids to avoid crushing their little dreams.
Change is something that will come naturally as you age and your mental state develops, it's not something you go around forcing unhealthily. There are things certain people are just better at. Making friends isn't something he's good at and he isn't particularly interested in changing that. But that doesn't mean he won't develop other types of relationships over time. Friendship is only one type of relationship.
Why he goes and asks Rosa out is because he doesn't give a sh*t if he actually gets rejected. If he gets rejected, oh well, he gets the experience of being rejected and can use that experience in his writing. If he gets together with her, then he gets the experience of a relationship which would also benefit his writing.
There are many other reasons he made a move here as well.
@KiraMinoru sensei~ please adopt me
@Yandere_god You'd never believe the nightmare I just had only to wake up to this comment lol.
Started off where I was at my old home on the second floor with a window to the side of the house. The window was open at first and I started to hear some catchy pop song I had never heard before(which is weird as hell since that shouldn't be possible for a dream since I'm certain I never heard it before).
It was one of those get back together with me or love song type songs. I looked out the window and saw a tall bald Asian man walking to the back door of the neighbors house with phone in hand playing that song out loud.
After a while without answer they walked past the window again. I ducked so they wouldn't see me. For some reason they were almost as tall as to see into the window if I was above window level. If they jumped they could probably see inside.
After they were gone I looked up and noticed the neighbor open the window in annoyance at first. She looked like a Karen for some reason. It wasn't the neighbor I remembered that actually lived in that house from my childhood.
I closed the window and acted like I didn't notice them.
I laid down on the bed and ignored them for a bit but then I eventually looked back over and noticed they waved. It felt like they waved at me but it felt off like they hadn't.
So I ignored them and laid down on the bed so they couldn't see me and shut my eyes.
When I opened my eyes next and looked over to the window, they were suddenly right outside the window looking inside. For some reason I didn't react to it much and didn't care. I just shut my eyes again.
When I opened my eyes next expecting to see them again, I didn't see them outside the window again. Rather… they were inside the room beside my bed looking at me.
Only… it wasn't the same lady. It was a girl. A very creepy eerie girl with a strange warped diamond shaped head. When I say warped, I mean the lines of her diamond head weren't straight, but rather wavy.
She said something like, "What do we do now? The mustache lady won" or " is free" in a creepy neutral girlish voice that hardly sounded worried.
That girl had a mustache.
It sent unsettling chills running down my back both in that dream and even when I woke up for some reason.
Literally feels like some creepypasta slenderman type stuff.