Amari's been acting all distant and shit. It's lunch break, and she asked us if we wanted to step out of class for a bit and get some air, but now that we're actually out on the grounds, she hasn't uttered a word. "Take a walk with me?" she'd asked, with a thin voice and a wan smile, making it a million times harder than it usually is to say no, which is no doubt why the nerd is out here too.

And after all of that, she's walking ten paces ahead of us, staring mutely into space. Nobody who saw us from afar would think we were here together.

Seeing her like this is fucking weird.

A feeling of growing uneasiness stirs in my stomach. I exchange a restless glance with the nerd. He's anxiously biting his lip, throwing pointed looks at Amari. Fuck, should I ask her what's up? Would this be a good time? How should I do it?

Hey. Amari. What's going on with you? What happened? Tell me what happened. Did something happen? Why did you cry?

Fuck it.

"Ama—"

"Blasty!"

My feet come to a sudden halt at the sound of that word, a chill tearing down my spine. I whirl, ignoring the nerd's questioning looks, and scan my surroundings until my eyes zero in on two figures waddling over to me—tousled hair and lousily put together uniforms, lips spread in equally wide smirks. Their faces register as vaguely familiar, but the crests on their shirts say they don't go here.

"It really is you, man! That face of yours really takes me back," the guy with the dark hair and narrow eyes exclaims, bringing his hand down on my shoulder. I feel myself go rigid under his sweaty palm. "Been wearing a tie these days? I won't lie, it's not a good look on you, dude," he jeers.

Amari is watching us now, her eyes wide with worry. She looks ready to head over at any second. Fuck. "I don't know you," I glower.

"Sure you do! We were buddies in middle school!" he says, not so much patting as whacking me over the arm, annoyingly bubbly. Like hell we were. I feel my nails grinding into my palm as I bite down on a barrage of curses. Don't. "I don't know you," I repeat through gritted teeth.

He releases me at that, his face distorting in a mild scowl. "You—"

"We have to get back to class," the nerd suddenly says, fingers circling my wrist, his voice clipped and even. "So if you'll excuse us—"

The guy laughs sharply, wrenching my arm out of the nerd's grip. "Whoa, not so fast, buddy; we're not done here." His lips twist in a foul smile. "This touching reunion is just beginning."

I don't know what the fuck this punk wants with me, but right now, it's taking everything, everything to hold myself back from letting my fist do all the talking.

"He said he doesn't know you." Amari is at my side now, fingers tightly clutching at the sleeve of my arm as she tries to stare him down. "L-Leave him alone."

The bubbly bastard scoffs before looking at me, seemingly impressed. "You...you actually have friends. How on earth did you manage that?"

"Shut up," I hiss, the words sliding down my tongue, escaping the rapidly loosening hold I have on my mouth.

"And what if I don't?" he goads, taking a step forward, his face nearing mine, tauntingly slow. "What will you do? Scream?" At that, his doe-eyed blonde companion sniggers, silently amused. My neck feels cold. Droplets of sweat start to collect in my palms, and I wipe them hard against my pants. "Ren," The nerd whispers, attempting to take my hand again. "Let's go." He's almost pleading. My feet don't move.

"Back in middle school, if things didn't go the way he wanted, this guy would just, like, scream," he tells Amari, even though no one fucking asked him for an explanation. "Right in our faces." He laughs and fixes me with that smug look again. "Been a while since I've heard that scream. Do it again, won't you? For old times' sake."

Rage builds in my chest—slow, steady, and solid. Brick by brick. I try to turn around and leave, but the prick just gets in my face again. "All that frowning leave a dent yet?" he sneers, prodding the space between my eyebrows. I slap his hand away. He grins. "Drop the composed act; I'm not buying it. You're still the same guy." He pokes at my cheek. "Brat." The other cheek. "Crybaby."

"Stop it," the nerd tries, growing increasingly agitated. "You don't even go to this school—"

The cocky fucker ignores him, continually probing at my face as I try to skewer him with my glare. "This ain't doing the trick?" I feel my heart drop into my stomach as his gaze shifts, fixating on Amari. No. "Then..."

The anger inside me flares, accelerated by a sliver of panic. I throw myself forward, grabbing him by the front of his shirt, just as a hand—lean and pale—catches his extending arm mid-air, stopping it before he can get within an inch of Amari's face.

I maintain my grip on him, holding him in place, while the braids girl, Irina, deals with him with a quick and precise flick of her hand. A childlike yelp escapes his lips as he leaps away from her, clutching tearfully at his wrist.

"Keep your distance," she warns callously, her depthless eyes filled with ire. Stepping protectively before Amari, she flashes her phone in his face.

"Bitch, what are you—"

"Try anything else, and I'll report you for trespassing." She eyes his uniform. "You go to Itami High, don't you? I wouldn't want to jeopardise my school's reputation if I were you," she adds coolly. I was right about her. This girl is a demon.

"Fuck—get away from me," he rasps, twisting out of my hold and shoving me hard. I fall to the ground with a grunt, grains of rock digging into my palm. Panic quickly seizes my chest, pumping my heart twice as fast. Shit. I hurriedly examine my hands for any trace of blood.

It's alright. Just a scratch.

"Ren?" Amari whimpers. "Are you okay? Here, take my hand." She looks terrible.

I give myself a moment to recover before accepting her help and hauling myself to my feet.

She gasps, her face pained. "Ren...you're hurt."

"This is nothing," I mutter, flexing my fingers. I feel fine.

"No, you..." She takes my arm. I scowl, confused, as she lifts it, folding back my forearm to position my elbow in front of her face. She winces. "What?" I ask impatiently. A slow pressure starts to build in my chest, constricting my breathing. "What is it?"

"Let's go to the infirmary; we have to cover it up quickly, disinfect it—"

The pain finally registers—a sharp burn in my elbows. Dread takes complete hold over my body, and I snatch my arm back, staring disbelievingly at the droplets of blood on my grazed skin. I whip my neck around until I catch sight of a smear of red, stark against the white of my shirt. Fuck, fuck, fuck, I was careless. In a frenzy, I swipe at the stain, spreading it further until the color seeps into the cloth.

"Is it bad?" I hear the nerd ask, his voice distant, as if coming from behind a lapping wave. Amari speaks next, but I only manage to catch a few wisps of her voice.

She'll find out.

"...a lot of blood...the wound itself isn't... just a scrape...some ointment and..."

Mother will find out I'm hurt, and she'll tell Father.

They might misunderstand. They might assume I got into a fight, and...shit. Cool the fuck down. It's just a stain; it'll wash out, right? It should. As for the scrape, I can hide it under a sweater or something. She won't find out. I won't have to explain anything.

I breathe, inhaling hard and forcing the air into my lungs. Nothing to worry about. It'll be fine.

The fucker who pushed me is speaking in a huddle with his friend, watching me with blatant spite. The fuck is he giving me that look for? If he hadn't waltzed into somebody else's school like he owned the damn place, I wouldn't have had to worry about any of this.

My feet finally decide that it's a good idea to move.

Piece of shit. It's all his fault.

My hand reaches for him, fingers fisting around his collar, my body responding to the malice in his eyes without my permission, like this is some sort of dream. Startled, the asshole attempts to pull away, but I fasten my hold on him, yanking him forward and looking into his eyes, daring him to try.

I won't let you. I won't let you do this to me.

I won't let you mess up my life. Not after how careful I've been.

"...stop that immediately..."

The scattered voices seem to be getting louder and louder. Fuck, it's so noisy. Everyone really needs to shut the hell up.

"...release him...Ichijou!"

I turn my head in time to see my homeroom teacher marching towards me, angry eyes unflinching. I look around, absorbing the sight of the small crowd that has started to form around us. Where did all these people come from? I follow their gazes, and they all seem to lead back to my hand on the bastard's collar.

"Ren Ichijou, do you not hear me!?" comes my teacher's enraged voice, now from no more than a foot away.

Realisation falls on me like a brick.

"He hit me!" the fucker suddenly screams, flailing in my grasp. "He hit me!"

"You..." I snarl, meaning to shake some sense into him, but my body isn't listening to me anymore. My hands are trembling too much, and he takes advantage of that to easily break free. "Don't lie, bastard—"

My homeroom teacher steps between us, an uncrossable wall. "Ren, I'll see you in my office. Now. I'm going to give your parents a call so that we can all sit down and sort this out calmly. You there, call over the security guard and tell him to escort those two out of campus," he instructs. The pounding in my head amplifies, cutting off whatever he says next.

I stagger backwards, and that's when my legs decide to fail me too. I crumple to the floor, bracing myself against the countless pairs of feet that only seem to be drawing closer and closer. My vision starts to swim, and my lungs feel like they're about to give in.

Picking fights in the middle of lunch break—is that the sort of reckless behaviour we spent all those years beating into him? I can picture my father saying. What good is a son like that? My mother doesn't respond; she only looks at me the way she does every time I fail her, lips in a thin line and face grim with disappointment.

I'm done for.

Minutes seem to tick by, and I don't move. Hands reach out to grab me, but I swat them away. I don't know where I am. I don't know who these people are.

I don't...my eyes latch on to something I do know. Stark against an endless line of white shirts and plaid pants, is a pale blue sweater, utterly hideous. I reach for it, only to have a pair of arms reach back, locking around me and hauling me up.

I steady myself on my feet as his face finally slides into view, knocking into me like a breath of fresh air. His eyes are blown wide with worry, his lips moving in a rush. "Ren, can you hear me? Are you okay? What happened?" I say nothing. I just stare at him because, for the first time, I can tell what he's feeling. I can see it all—the concern, the slight panic, the distress—written plainly across his face.

And he's feeling all of that for me.

My thumping chest starts to slow down, falling into a rhythm with my breathing, and my eyes stay on his face, transfixed, because there's nowhere else they'd rather be.

✧･ﾟ: *✧･ﾟ:*✧･ﾟ: *✧･ﾟ:*✧･ﾟ: *✧･ﾟ:

"Fuck...do it slower!" I cry, wincing in pain as the braids girl winds a strip of bandage around my elbow with needlessly brisk movements.

"Just bear with it for a moment. It'll be over faster this way," she says calmly. This place stinks of sickness and medicine, so I do what she says and bear with it. Anything to get out quickly. When she's done, she neatly arranges the bottles of ointments and antiseptics back in clean rows in the first aid kit before carrying it over to a small shelf away from the freshly white bed. I stay seated.

"Thanks."

"Don't thank me. I wouldn't be here if Akito hadn't asked me to." She turns to face me, folding her arms over her chest. "Have you ever thanked him for anything?"

"Yes," I say, remembering the one time he brought me water after a race during PE.

She cocks her head. "Remember when you caught that fever? Akito stayed and took care of you even after the rest of us left; have you thanked him for that?" When I don't answer, she keeps going. "What about the lunches? He goes through the trouble of making them just for you, every day. Thanked him for that yet?"

No.

"He dropped by the staffroom earlier to explain the situation to your teacher, so you don't have to worry about your parents getting involved." She sighs, a soft sound, before heading over to the infirmary door and holding it open. "A thank you is the least you can do."

I'm out the door before she can say anything else.

✧･ﾟ: *✧･ﾟ:*✧･ﾟ: *✧･ﾟ:*✧･ﾟ: *✧･ﾟ:

I'm panting hard by the time I arrive at my classroom. I can see heads moving around through the glass windows, and by the looks of it, class just finished. Good. I make a move towards the door, but stop when I notice a hint of fuzzy blue at the corner of my vision.

I find him speaking with our physics teacher at the bend of the corridor, a book spread open in his hands, the air around him practical and composed.

For whatever reason, this idiot cares about me. Enough to bring me napkins when I'm sad, water when I'm thirsty, and a full meal when I'm hungry. Enough to skip school, risk catching my cold, and nurse me when I'm sick. Enough to stand up for me.

My life has been really fucking great lately, and a lot of it has been because of him, hasn't it?

"Akito."

The book in his hand crashes to the floor, forgotten, as his head flies in my direction, his expression struck with disbelief. He doesn't move, so I stomp over myself and grab his hand. "Come."

I steer him away, crushing his fingers in mine, and search for a place where we can talk without interruptions. Just us. Alone. He follows obediently, silently stepping over his fallen textbook. When we arrive at an empty stretch of the corridor, I drop his hand and turn to face him, clearing my throat. He's still wordlessly gaping at me, cheeks pink and eyes expectant.

"I just wanted to say...thanks," I mumble. The giant question mark on his face says that a simple thanks won't do the trick. I'm going to have to explain. Fuck. "For...for that day, and the food, and for today," I sputter, scrambling to find the right words. "Y-You know, for speaking to Sensei on my behalf, you didn't have to, I—"

"Oh, It's no problem. Really," he hastily reassures me, his cheeks brightening.

I press my lips together and watch him for a second, dissatisfied, before opening my mouth again. "Why are you doing all of this for me?" Why do you even care? It makes no sense.

He shrugs. "Because..." He looks away. "I was just being nice?" He sounds unsure.

"I don't think I would have done any of it for you," I confess.

"I don't mind," he says quietly.

"No," I say gruffly, and take a determined step towards him. "I know I'm shit at teaching, and if I'm being honest, I'm not good at much. But the next time you need anything, I want you to ask me." I run a restless hand through my hair. "So that I can...I don't know, do something. So that I can try. So that I can make it up to you."

"Ah...sure," he says dumbly.

"Promise me."

"W-What?"

"Promise me that you'll come to me the next time you need help. You just...always do everything by yourself, so I need you to promise me."

"Okay."

He raises his hand into the air between us, sticking out his pinky. I stare at it, confused. "I-I just thought...isn't this how promises are sealed?" When I don't say anything, he quickly starts to put his hand away. "N-Nevermind, I was..." Wait. I catch his pinky with mine, curling my little finger tightly around it.

"Like this?" I ask.

He nods. "Promise," he whispers.

"Mm."

He's been different lately. That cold exterior, it's crumbling. When he smiles, his face looks warm. And I kind of like it. These days, he's just...really, really...damn, what's the word? I can't seem to wrap my finger around it.

END OF CHAPTER