False Paradise.

Chapter 23 - I must be insane.

I stood in front of the 1-A door, absorbed in the silence of the hall, remembering the first time I knocked.

Looking back on myself, I was immature. I rushed into things and I only ever acted for myself.

Back when I first met them, misunderstandings and anger marked our first impressions. I didn't know what they truly thought, what ailed them. Even now I still feel in the dark when it comes to that, but if there was one thing I knew for sure now, was that they cared for every person inside 1-A.

They had strange ways to show it, and could be conceited, but I knew it to be true. I should have realized it sooner, but those little moments we spent together that I dismissed as annoyances were their attempts at making us feel like a family.

Maybe to replace their own, I thought with a pang of guilt.

I looked up at those two characters on the door, the sign of where I belonged, and sighed. It didn't feel like me to get this emotional, I couldn't get used to it.

It wasn't my fault, either. I didn't choose to realize this so far in.

After I managed to dissuade Elora's line of questioning and convinced her I didn't know why I didn't have my memory, the remaining two members of 26-B made their appearance.

Dean, with his usually perfect silky hair, then dressed up in semi-formal clothes, and with him a boy who I later knew to be Bernard, dressed in what I could only describe as a nerd's getup. His hair was curly and he wore glasses over a square face. He also used suspenders, a white shirt with the sleeves rolled up, but with broad shoulders that clashed with the rest of him.

It seemed they had been held up with Christmas bustle, whatever that meant, and after a brief introduction for my sake, we sat like old friends would. Their proximity made it easy for me to not feel left out, and maybe that was what led to them speaking without reservation.

Conversation naturally turned to me, being the guest, and to my connection with Anya and Dean.

"At first, I had nothing but a bad impression of Sebastian," said Anya with a smile. "And he of me, I'm sure."

"Without a doubt," I said without missing a beat.

"But what I used to find a hindrance soon became, if I may be so bold, my favorite part of him: that genuineness to yourself—" she turned to me, putting a hand on my arm— "how you were so decisive and certain on your decisions, it always was a delight to have our ideas clash."

I felt my arm tighten before answering. "You were pretty straightforward yourself, asking a stranger to betray their team and throw the race like that."

Elora turned to Anya with surprise evident even with her hair covering half her face. "You cheated?" Then she looked at me, as if the answer to that question was on my face. "You truly are an impressive individual since you managed to win with that handicap."

"I didn't do it," I said hastily. "There was no handicap, and we won on accident."

Bernard, who had been silent up until this moment, watching me like I was a particularly hard math problem, spoke up with a deep voice:

"You didn't want to betray your team?"

His question took me off guard for reasons I didn't fully comprehend. That had been exactly why, if I recalled correctly, and yet...

Anya cleared her throat.

"Whatever his reason was, it's all in the past now. Tonight he's decided to spend Christmas with us rather than those two in 1-A."

"Sokolov, your bias is showing," said Dean, smiling faintly when Anya looked flustered by his comment. Even I snickered. It wasn't that I was entirely on board with her treating my roommates like that, but as long as the subject wouldn't go farther, then I wouldn't mind.