Rivalry (Ishigami Senku x Reader)

Chapter 9

That day went by as usual, except for...

"Have you already heard about the mysterious genius crushing on Ishigami Senku? I guess nerds attract nerds. That girl is arrogant anyway because of her cold attitude." You heard girls gossip from the distance and sighed. "I know right? She thinks so highly of herself. Seems like her cold image gets ruined now since Sachiko already is spreading that information." They snickered and you turned your head in their direction. "She's getting what she deserves for being arrogant. She's ugly anyway, I mean have you seen her?? She doesn't even use makeup! Is she even a girl?? Just because she's not Japanese all boys are crazy for her. She's not a girl if she's not styling herself." The girls scoffed and recognized the face. That was the girl that got rejected from Nishino Takino. You shook your head and walked off to the labs.

"Childish." You mumbled to yourself and threw your lab coat over your shoulders, wearing it. You put what you heard just now to the side and entered the laboratory, meeting the club mates. You greeted them quickly and already started preparing the experiments, instructing the others what to do. After 5 minutes, Senku also entered. His eyes immediately met yours and you saw he was bothered by something, trying to hide it.

"Hey, annoying lettuce boy" you greeted him but he didn't answer and joined the preparations without saying a word. You gave him a confused face but let him be until the experiments started, everyone focusing on them. "Hey, are you ok? You're even more annoying when being silent." You whispered and he didn't answer again, focusing on the experiment. You didn't like being ignored so you placed your hand on his cheek, pulling his head in your direction. "Speak." You demanded as you locked eyes with him and his widened. He sighed in defeat and finally spoke.

"I heard about the rumor." He whispered and you nodded, listening to him. "My class now tries to gain information from me. And if not, they insult me for not being interested in you since they are jealous and interested in you themselves. Everything get's on my nerves." He complained to you whispering and you giggled silently, nodding understandingly. You took the phenolphthalein and put three drops on the acid with an unknown concentration while Senku filled the sodium hydroxide in the burette.

"That rumor seems to affect you too, hm? Girls...gossip about me. They seem to hate me anyway and this rumor gets them to finally let all their hate towards me out. A girl who was jealous because the guy who came to the laboratory for me that day rejected her, spread this rumor so she could pay that back." You explained and he shook his head with a grin. "Childish." He noticed and you nodded in agreement, smiling with closed eyes. "That's what I thought too."

You took your documents and titrated the sodium hydroxide milliliter by milliliter into the acid you were analyzing and wrote the pH down. "She saw us two eating burgers and used this opportunity to do something against me." You continued and Senku nodded, already preparing the math for determining the concentration of the acid. "My bad luck again, hm?" He chuckled and you shook your head, also giggling. "Our bad luck this time. Where would you guess the equivalence point this time? My guess is 18 ml since the sodium hydroxide is 0.1 mol/l and the acid we are analyzing is hydrochloric acid."

He smirked and nodded. "Good guess. I will guess 17.5 ml." He guessed and you nodded with a determined smile, continuing the titration. The equivalence point, since you were very careful and accurate with your work, could be defined very easily. Soon the solution changed its color from colorless to light pink at exact 17.75 ml (phenolphthalein changes color when being in a basic solution. 0 to approx. 8,2 pH it remains colorless. If you surpass that point by putting in more of a basic solution it turns light pink), making you both look at the result in awe. "So who's guess was closer?" Senku asked and you smiled proudly. "If it would have been 17.74 ml it would have been your win. But this time the win is mine." You bragged and Senku showed you to the side to look at your documents.