𝐇𝐄𝐀𝐓𝐄𝐃 𝐑𝐈𝐕𝐀𝐋𝐑𝐘

FIVE.

You had sustained a third degree burn, but much to the school nurse's indignation, she noticed that apparently your skin was extremely not sensitive, and was already beginning to heal.

"It's like he has secret powers, or something..." you had heard her mutter not so subtly under her breath.

The news of the school lab burning whizzed around the school. To begin with, it wasn't like your reputation had been pristine thanks to it being sullied by Tanaka, but now you were known as an arsonist. Now people saw you as some deranged, crazed weirdo who had attempted to burn down the lab, or the entire school. You felt miffed mainly because you knew it wasn't your fault. Drat, if only you remembered your desk partner's name...

Your school life was already beginning to seem unfortunate, but nevertheless, still interesting. The teacher never quite looked at you in the eyes again; and neither did several students. Some went for therapy, you heard; but what was so bad about a fire? And did they not stick their hands into it? Your phone hadn't been saved, so you were also annoyed about that factor.

And as a bonus, the school called your parents about incurring damages.

"Yeah, no big deal." You told your mother, "I really don't understand why they're making such a huge fuss over all of this, honestly. It's just a burn—what? You also got burnt—oh, on a mission...you have to go for another surgery? Oh. You mean a nose job."

And there was that. Your mother sent over the accurate amount of money and because you were a scholarship student, you were let off rather easily. You suspected Daichi, or some other council member, had aided you in the process.

So in the past two days you had arrived, you had gotten a snake bite and had acquired a pet. Then the said pet had bitten your roommate and now you were roomies with a student council guy who seemed like he hated your guts; and another council member seemed to have framed you for burning the lab down.

Oh, but you would soon know who the desk partner sitting next to you was.

News said that some person called Rui recently was sent straight to the hospital for inhaling or drinking some sort of chemical—

And you briefly remembered the acetone you had dumped in his drink.

Sorry, not sorry.

"It's unbelievable," Daichi mumbled as he stood before you, "how did you manage to cause two large scale accidents in just a matter of two days? This can't be a daily thing, [Name]."

"Two different council members framed me," you said dryly. "Saito, and someone else."

His eyes widened at that, before the perfect facade that he always wore dawned on him again. Fixed smile, perfect degree of a loose, relaxed expression. The change had happened in a split second, the slightest of a moment, but you had caught it all.

"You met them?" Daichi inquired smoothly.

"I met Saito. But I'm well aware—or at least, it's a simple theory—that someone framed me and forced me into that forest. Looking back, it really seemed like a school garden. We used to have something like that in our house..." you trailed off, "point is, it wasn't my fault. I'm only paying for the damages because I seemed to have traumatized quite a few people."

"You stuck your hand into fire, [Name]." Daichi's voice was laced with exasperation.

"I feel like we see each other a lot now, don't we?" You drawled, "that's three times in two days. I suppose I'll be seeing Jun more, too. You know he's my roommate now, right?"

"So I've heard." Daichi said dryly, observing you. You didn't look like someone who had suffered greatly. Pain and misery were absent from your expression. Usually, students would be dismal even at the slightest bit of injury, but no. Even with the cuts on your face that were now patched up, even with the painful burn that had melted off layers of your skin, even with the itchy bandage on you—you looked completely unbothered.