𝗲𝗽𝗵𝗲𝗺𝗲𝗿𝗮𝗹 | 𝙨𝙚𝙢𝙞𝙨𝙝𝙞𝙧𝙖

𝗰𝗵𝗮𝗽𝘁𝗲𝗿 𝟮: 𝘂𝗻𝗶𝘃𝗲𝗿𝘀𝗶𝘁𝘆

[白布 賢二郎] Kenjirō Shirabu

I had a sort of weird feeling—pride, maybe, when I stood in front of the building.

Flashbacks happened. When I opened the letters and when my mom saw them, the way she was crying tears of happiness and burying me in her arms...

It was a great school. All of the people there were well educated, and the graduates never failed to impress people during job interviews.

That was all that I thought about the school when I went in.

...

So what? I did glance at the volleyball court. But I wasn't going to join. Nope. No way in hell. I made a promise to myself—

SLAM.

My heart immediately softened. Oh. It wasn't some easy promise I made.

Why did I vow what I did? Because of him, the official setter of some powerhouse school in Japan now. I don't know. Sometimes, I check the chat, but I don't care when that person comes on.

Suddenly, I was scolding myself. Why the hell was I stopping my favourite—my past favourite thing, just because he was there? At that moment, I didn't feel like stopping it. Volleyball could be my career. I could carry on.

"Fuck off."

My thoughts were interrupted by those very words. My eyebrows scrunched while I looked up and saw another boy slightly taller than me.

Well, shit, he was way taller than me.

The way he artistically manufactured that glance like saying, "You and I. We will not be friends."

Come on, just because I was standing in the middle of a hallway?

Oh. I was standing in the middle...

OF A GODDAMN HALLWAY?

I quickly scurried away. It was busy that day, so I guess a lot of people were annoyed. I tried to avoid contact throughout all my classes because one of them might have had to cross paths because I was standing in the flat middle with my legs wide apart. At least I could have stood up like a smart person. Why does life hate me so much?

It was the first day of university, and I had to pair up with someone. How wonderful. She looked at me and beamed, and I resisted the urge to chuck my pencil at her. That took so much of my energy that I couldn't even manage a feeble wave.

She went up to me and grinned super big like I didn't just turn my head at her greeting earlier.

"Ello! My name is Chiya. Nice to meet ya!"

Well, I guess she seemed nice. Maybe friends didn't have to be on the off mode.

"Nice to meet you." It was. She had a warm aura.

Chiya was talking about random stuff, like about how she already heard my name as she was passing the halls(which I flushed at because it was probably about me standing in the middle of an intersection,) and about places we could do the project at and what we should do it on.

"We can do constellations," I suggested, after hearing her massive list.

"Oh? You like the stars?" She leaned into me and smirked.

I pouted a bit and lifted my eyes.

"I mean, nothin' wrong with that. I like 'em too."

We passed by the cafeteria and just talked about her home life, like farming and things. She finally settled down at the cafeteria table.

The guy from earlier walked past us.

"Hey, who's that?" I asked, flicking my straw in his direction, but she didn't even look up from her hamburger.

"Taku Ito."

I guess she knew what she was saying because I heard a loud "TAKU!" and another guy, much shorter and friendlier looking, came up to him.

"What do you think of him?"

Even though I thought it might've come off weird, and it probably did, she didn't look up(again?)and just wiped her mouth with a napkin.

No hesitation in her voice, straightforward, and no happiness or her usual bubbly tone serving. "A big jerk. Dates one of my friends though, which means I have to be nice to him, well, when she's around, but he knows I despise him."

Wow, okay.

I didn't pry, but even so, she just kept ongoing.

"He isn't a womanizer, but he's a big jerk to a lot of people. He's nice to some, mean to some. He's a teacher that separates his test papers in uneven piles and picks random grades for each."

What an awesome comparison, I thought, but it fits him well.

"Oh, they're giving out chops-"

Chiya shot up so quickly that I flinched. She ran to get in line and returned with eleven pairs of chopsticks.

I stared in disbelief as she stuffed it in her bags. I just witnessed her get two pairs of chopsticks, because that was the limit, and beg practically everyone in line to get two and give her one.

"Sorry, my family's poor in utensils." She gave an even larger grin than before.

Well, I guess that was something.