Mishiro and Tayoura

Into the failure

Akio was tapping his fingers on his desk. He was supposed to give presentation about the reign of the King Hinata. He never liked talking in front of a crowd and seriously, why would he? Everything he said would be analysed and criticised by his cruel classmates and teacher, creating waves of whisper in the whole classroom. Frankly, he only enjoyed the company of few people, Nakata Yoshiyuki and Maki Sora.

He gazed at his funny little friends, they were again in the middle of a ridiculous argument.

 Nakata was the charming, petite man of the school, due to his lack of height -he was the shortest among the boys-, he was using his jokes to make a good impression. He always had a special spot in teachers' hearts. Maki would say that it was because of his curly brown hair as if this rare hair type in Mishiro would save him all the trouble in social life. 

Maki, on the contrary didn't have many friends, for a 12-year-old girl she was quite ruthless to anyone who tried to approach her. She never stopped herself from using violence to others, kicking middle-schoolers' butts even before they could see it coming. Everybody knew that her mom disappeared before she was born, but probably, the saddest part was that her father couldn't handle her disapperance.  

So... he went a little... psychotic, to be exact.

Since her father was staying in the asylum, she was living with her grandparents. 

They stopped arguing and turned their attention to Akio, who was sweating like a pig at the moment. "Stop making this a big deal." said Nakata, laid-back on his chair. 

Akio rolled his eyes at his deskmate. "I'm not." 

Maki was trying to hide her smile, over her shoulder. "You, stop bullying him or he will pee in front of the class." This was a rare occasion that Maki made fun of Akio, she normally was pretty protective towards him. 

Akio was looking at the door anxiously, waiting for the teacher to come. Funny thing about time, it never passes when you want it to.

Nakata laughed, "Man, I'd kill to see that happening." 

"You know what... You'll give me 20 litas* if I can get him to pee!" betted Nakata, pointing his little finger to Maki. 

Maki rolled her eyes but smiled too, "Could you be any more childish?" 

Akio completely ignored them and jumped while sitting on his chair. "There she is!" 

She walked to her desk while the students started whispering between each other, everybody knew how strict this History teacher was. 

"Akio! Let's start." She placed her big black glasses on to her nose.

He went up  quickly with his trembling legs, his heart was racing, he just wanted all to go well but the reality never was on his side. 

"The K-King Hi-hinat-ta..."

***

"Don't worry, I mean... not everybody is going to be a politician. You don't have to be great at public speaking." said Maki with a compassionate smile. 

It was rare to see her like this but she always had a soft spot for Akio. They knew each other from the very beginning. Akio's mom -Yasuda- was good friends with Maki's dad -Takai-, so after the accident, she made sure that his family had all the help they needed. This way, they had sort of grown up together.

Akio was bummed, he hated all of this. He was supposed to be one of the best students of his class yet, he couldn't even handle talking in front of people without having his face turned into a huge, juicy tomato. I'm SO pathetic, he thought. As they were walking out of the school, the yard was under the soft orange light of the autumn sun. It was cold yet sunny.