Friendly Dating - Kira

Chapter 10 - Cosplay as a Girlfriend

It's a lovely morning, as mornings go. The breeze is fresh and the birds are going nuts in the trees lining our street. It's not quite as hot now as it is bound to be later today.

I wasn't really aware of the existence of lovely Saturday mornings, as my Saturdays usually start around noon... which is lovely enough for me. 

Delia and I make a right turn, walking into the street containing our school, and I can already see it a block away. I so don't want to go there... especially not dressed like a cast member from a Japanese high school anime. This skirt is too short; each time the wind picks up a little speed, I have to grab it and hang on for dear life.

I'm not surprised when Simon falls into step with us, smoothly removing Delia's backpack and giving her a kiss. He meets us around here every morning on our way to school.

"Hi," he says, and we greet him back.

I suddenly find myself imagining an Ethan and Kira version of what I've just witnessed. It involves a lot of tripping, dodging, and shoving each other into the puddles left from the rain we must've had somewhere during the night, as well as some light verbal abuse... mostly from me. 

And now I'm giggling, and the perfect couple is giving me weird looks, so I swallow it fast.

"I don't know about this, Dell," I say when we enter the school grounds and finally arrive at the rugby fields. There are many games being played today, but we're heading to the main field, with the fancy bleachers, where the first team, Corbin High's pride and joy, will be playing.

I can see Ethan hanging out with his teammates along the first row of seats. He is talking, and his mates are laughing at what he's saying, and there is a girl leaning up against him, hanging onto his shoulder. Dell was telling the truth; that girl, Wendy Dawson, and all the others over there are dressed just like us. I am 100% sure that Dell doesn't usually show up to her brother's matches dressed like this. I appreciate her solidarity with me in this humiliating venture.

I watch Wendy snuggling up to Ethan, and now I'm really losing my nerve. I have seen them hanging out together on occasion. They've never formally dated, but that's never stopped them from being touchy-feely in public. Ugh!

Oh, great! There goes rule number one already...

I'm about to turn tail and run. Perhaps Ethan changed his mind about all this craziness after he sent me a good morning message at about 5 am. 

Seriously! I know roosters who get up later than that!

I'm surprised to see him gently but firmly extract himself from Wendy's hold, stepping away from the group to create a little bit of distance between himself and the clingy girl. He's doing it so smoothly that if I weren't focused on it, I wouldn't have noticed. I doubt that she did. If she did, she's not showing it; she simply transfers herself to the next available shoulder.

"Come on; it's going to be fun, you'll see," Dell tells me, and now Simon is looking at me, frowning.

"Something wrong, Kira?"

Does he mean aside from the fact that I'm here, dressed like Apple Pie Annie, about to watch my man play rugby?

"She's just nervous meeting her boyfriend in public for the first time." Delia mercifully answers for me.

"You have a boyfriend?!" Simon is genuinely surprised, but I'm more surprised than he is. I thought Dell told him everything about two seconds after it happened. I give him a smile, but I can feel that it must look more like a snarl. If he doesn't know about the whole Ethan deal, he must be very confused about my presence this morning. He is just too much of a gentleman to question it.