A/N: Hey guys! Sorry it took so long gosh the internet here is really bad and I'm still trying my best to make it work hehe. As you can tell, it's a total of 13k words this time round and super duper long but you'll know why at the end and see the worth of sitting down and reading this through hehe. I hope you enjoy the chapter! I will be back on Inkitt uploading snippets starting Wednesday. 

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[Leroy]

"Someone's learning." He had a blue in his eyes that was pale. Like frost on the window. Crystal feathers. The kind that invited curious hands. "Risk-taking."

"Calculated risk-taking, mind you. Unlike yourself," he cleared his throat and there was red dusting his ears. "We're going to stand out as the team with the most dishes despite having the least resources. That, and the fact that authentic Amazon and Brazilian cuisine has never been about course meals. We won't be giving them plates to judge—we're giving them an experience to remember."

*

Didn't take long to figure I liked the way he'd put it. Sadly, I wasn't the only one since the rest of the team was looking at him weird. Half-excited, half-anxious. He on the other hand, stared in circles without proper direction, lost without glasses and probably registering the entire world in a blur.

"How the hell is your brain so sexy?" Someone stole my line and had everyone turn to him, laughing. "You need to stop."

Behind his shoulder, the reporters appeared to be done with interviewing our facilitator and surveying the rest of the camp, waiting around with cameras and recording devices. I recognized one of them as the photographer for my interview.

"Hi," some girl cut in with a hand. "I'm Sharla Reyes from the Culinary Chronicle. We're the ones covering your team's last couple of hours till show time and we need three individual interviews plus a statement from you as the team captain. If you could just include your plans for the course dinner and what position you're aiming for, that kind of stuff—"

"Everyone's here to win," I told her straight up. Both she and the people around her did a double take, blinking rapidly like people often did whenever they heard me speak for the first time. It's like people expect to hear nonsense. "We need some space. Pictures are fine as long as you don't get in the way. Don't speak to people when they're handling a knife or if they're near a fire."

I didn't bother waiting for a response. "Rosi, stream. Bring the flashlight cases. Raul, think of a drink. Bank, peppers. Nabila can join you. Si Yin—"

"Wait wait wait, can we swap?" She said suddenly. Nervous. "Don't leave me with the fish. Can I, uh... do the wrapping thing? Plus the bamboo steamers. I'll help fill them just give me the number of servings. Just, anything but fish. You do the fish because you're good."

Wasn't hard to figure out that she was genuinely asking for a swap. I gave it a thought, considering our remaining options and knowing that we were lacking in spices. In that span of time, she'd already shuffled to stand beside glasses without glasses, pointing in his direction to indicate where I should be assigning her to.

"Swapping is fine if you can us some ants."

"Got it," she seemed confident in anything new. "And your—I mean. Vanilla would know how to find them, right?" She said only after everyone had left the circle to start on their duties, voice lowered.

I nodded once, reminding her that he wouldn't exactly be able to spot their nests. "You have to describe everything. Don't waste time."

"Promise," she held up a finger and I looked at it. "Pinky? No? O-okay." She backed away and started off without her foraging partner; then a second later remembered and came back for him. Said partner tapped on my shoulder as he passed, as though I wasn't already looking at him.

"So I was wondering. Have you, maybe, I hope, had the chance to check out who our judges might be? This is important, especially for the risk we're about to take. Just knowing a couple of names is better than having no information about them at all. Some of our instructors might not be inclined to reward creativity. That, and if they happen to have any allergies. This is important regardless of the risk we're taking, so," he peered up, vaguely meeting my gaze. We were close enough. "Could you maybe ask them if you haven't?"

I dusted a speck of green that was caught in his hair. It was soft. "Didn't think of that. I'll ask now. You be careful." He nodded, reaching up to fix his hair but there was nothing to fix. Guess he doesn't have enough mirrors to see how cute he is.

I could hear multiple shutters going off in the distance but he didn't seem to notice, walking towards a waving Si Yin in the opposite direction after a brief nod my way. The tips of his ears were red.

"Hey man," Raul. "I know you have a lot of staring to do but can I distract you for a moment 'cause I have an idea for the drinks...? Or you want to wait before he gets too small and you can't see him?"

He got the finger in response and laughed, clapping my back. I glared, pulling on his ear. Cameras clicking to our left, the female journalist from before loitered around as if waiting for an opening to strike. When Italian finally stopped fooling around, I gave him the green to go off.

"So I looked through aaall the fruits we have so far and combine them in three different types: sweet, sour and maybe bitter, so I pick one from each and make up a few. Best one's the wild pineapple Rosi brought back 'cause she only using Cocoa flesh and husk. We got the coconut cream from yesterday too so bam! Piña colada."

His hands clapped at the bam and everyone turned to look at him for a second before thinking nothing of it. I gave his suggestion some thought.

"We might not have enough cream," was the first thing that came to mind. "What if you add milk?"

"Works," he snapped his fingers. He was pacing, gathering the wild pineapples into a basket and counting them before glancing at the amount of coconut milk and cream we'd collected. I told him that he needed to think of something for the cups too since we were out here and didn't have any.

"Easy. We use coconut husks and pineapples after I dig out the flesh inside. Sound good?"

It was starting to come together but I needed a second opinion and Vanilla wasn't here. Something was missing still; coconut cream for weight, milk for fragrance, pineapple juice for sweetness and possibly acidity but there wasn't enough dimension.

"You like virgin piña coladas?" I asked him. Raul made a face.

"No not really." I gave him a look. He had his answer.

This made him groan and put his basket down, staring at the fruits till I told him to catch up with the ant foraging team before they went too far. It was a tad embarrassing, knowing that I wasn't good enough to be identifying exactly what it was that we could add or replace to perfect the drink. There needed to be something rightfully deep. Something that could taste like rum.

"Wait," I stopped him. Raul turned and looked at me weird, probably thinking I wasn't taking him seriously. "Don't look for him. Look for cherries. Rosi's going to be back in five. Go with her then."

He gawked, then widened his eyes. "Cherries. Yeah! Why didn't I think of that? Thanks man you're amazing." He raised his hand for a five and I humoured him before sitting him down with the basket of fruits.

"Okay shut up and cut the pineapple."

*

I came up to the facilitator and dropped the question without wasting any time. No surprise. She claimed it wasn't relevant and an unnecessary question. I countered this by laying out the need to know about allergies. All she said was that they did not have any allergies. Yeah, good enough.

Then I got to cleaning the fish and checking on everyone at intervals. Time was tight and having eight dishes to prepare meant that we had to be assigned at least one each. That, or we could have two working together on two dishes at the same time. There wasn't the luxury of going slow.

Preparing the fish meant that I was on two dishes at once for now, sorting out which cut we would be using for the respective dish and placing them on separate banana leaves. Then there were the crabs.

Pan-fry or grill, was what he'd said. Without flour, those were the only reasonable ways to be serving soft-shell crabs. We'd discussed this after finishing the bamboo steamers, since he was never one who could hide his excitement. Yet, the concept wasn't strong enough to stand as a dish on its own. Pan-fried soft-shell crabs sounded as plain as it would taste without something additional.

"Hey," I went straight to Bank. "Let me see your basket again." He and Nabila were handling the paste for one of the fish dishes. It was unnecessary. "One person on the dip is enough."

"I'll do it," Nabila took over. "You go," she told the other guy. He led me to their basket and inside were the bell peppers they picked, along with some Baniwa chillies and three Persian limes. It wasn't a lot.

"What you need help with?" Bank gave the basket a shake and I looked up, taking the Persian limes.

"The grill and finding a way to make a large steamer. That, or straight up sticking the bamboo into the bonfire. Can I take these?" I held up the limes.

"Nabila need one but you can take the rest," he nodded, then glanced around our campsite. "What about I arrange dining hall style? Get table ready so we can put food easy. Give me ten minutes I make your steamer also. We can do half-half. Half steam, half barbecue. Good?"

Onboard. "Fucking."

"Too aggressive," Bank burst out laughing. "Playdate can't stand in the morning your fault." It was clear that he'd been hanging out with Raul. I gave him the green and he got to work, leaving me with the limes and a vague idea of something new. The general theme might just work—his voice. He's back with the ants then.

I turned, catching a glimpse of his blue tracksuit in the distance before someone blocked my view. I looked at it. Then pushed it aside.

"Hey! We're doing your team a favour you know that?" It snapped, following before finally standing in my way again. "Live coverage is what's going to win you guys the popular vote. If you don't bother giving us interviews or footage, you can forget about winning anything at all, especially at the rate you guys are going." It did something with its nose.

I looked down at the camera. "Taste wins. Not words or popularity." It seemed vaguely surprised, producing a voice recorder before calling another person over. It then scribbled something on the back of its hand.

"Hi," the other person said. It was the photographer from last time. "It's me, Jael. You remember I covered you a week ago on that exclusive intervi—"

"Yeah."

He seemed genuinely taken aback, smiling like I'd paid him a compliment. "Great. So, uh... I'm doubling up as a videographer this time too, so I was wondering if we could get a couple shots of you just... doing whatever you need to be doing. Sarah will interview you while you're at it. I promise they'll look as good as the ones from last time."

I nodded vaguely, transferring the racks of Tambaqui ribs to the banana leaf resting on the stone slab for slicing into portions. "The photos had quality."

"You think so?" He lit up. His name should be lightbulb. "Okay, so you trust my skills then. I won't disappoint, I promise. Sarah, hurry up." He got the other girl who was in my way earlier to stand beside him with her notepad and voice recorder. Meanwhile, he seemed to already have his camera rolling.

It wasn't hard; all she did was ask some basic questions about the team and I would answer if necessary. Questions about our menu, I didn't provide exact details since spoiling the surprise was the last thing we wanted to do. She then dropped the question I was waiting for.

"So you're the only captain with two first-years on your team. Why did you decide to take the risk and pick inexperienced students over others?" Both were looking at me expectantly, like this was the main question they'd been dying to ask and the rest were all bullshit to cover up their primary purpose.

"Your question has bad logic. If following what you say, people will always pick others with experience. Then those without experience will always have no experience because no one will pick them." The fifth and final rack sliced up, all I needed to do was season. Before that, check on the crabs—timing was essential on that one. It's been nearly two hours since they shed. "Then the experienced will snowball. And then you cause the skill gap.

"It's like education and money." Diamond Kosher. Nabila's paste. Taste. Needs Cayenne. Don't have it. "Money sends your kid to somewhere good, and education gets them higher pay. Easy. Unless..."

The girl was leaning in with her recorder, far too close to the fish. I stared at her hand. She retracted it at once, glancing at the photographer before turning back to me. "Sorry. Uh, you were saying? Unless what?"

"Unless you're him," I said, nodding in his direction and catching him wrapping maito inches away from his face as though he was about to kiss it. Don't laugh. Don't laugh don't fucking laugh fuck. "Strong mind. Good heart. Great tongue." Somewhere behind the tree, my lodge mate was choking. It added to the urge to laugh.

"So is that why you chose him?" Lightbulb asked, changing the angle of his camera for the fourth time for a low angle dolly. I glanced at his model. It was an expensive one.

"They both have potential," I admitted, wrapping up the seasoned ribs and leaving them by the burning bay leaves. They repelled insects. "A team needs diversity. Broaden our perspective and knowledge of different cuisines. Xu would be familiar with spice. We need that."

The journalist interviewing me nodded, exchanging looks with the photographer again and seemingly willing to move on to the next person. "Thank you. That's all we had in mind but, just out of curiosity and to confirm this rumour going around... you and White seem to have a very close relationship. Were the two of you acquaintances from—"

"He's very cute."

Cutting to the chase wasn't a bad idea but it conversely made the two of them slow down and further waste my time. There was little to figure out and zero clouds to part. I'd laid it out in simple fucking elementary words that a baby would understand. I raised a brow at the expressions on their faces. "What?"

"Uhhh," the girl continued to exchange looks with the photographer. "Are you referring to Xu?" Even the photographer pinched the bridge of his nose. I was about to advise her on listening to her own questions when the subject of our conversation neared us with a basket of maito ready to be grilled. Of which one seemed to be done already.

"Leroy, I need you taste this. I've added to the mushrooms chopped chillies and bits of minced wild garlic to cook but there's—o-oh. Oh, was I... sorry, are you..." He squinted at the two standing before the stone slab. "Jael! And Sarah. Good god, I didn't... I'll just leave this here and you can go on with the interview. Sorry for interrupting. I didn't mean to."

His club members shook their heads and moved aside, telling him we were just about done. I was already staring at the cooked maito he'd unwrapped, hit by the fragrance of garlic, spice and oils. The entire thing was packed with flavours from being cooked in the natural juices of its contents. Added to that the char-grilled scent of banana leaves infused into the mushroom mix, it turned heads.

"My hands are dirty," I said before leaving my mouth open. Close enough for him not to squint. His jaw dropped.

"I'm sorry Leroy, but as you can most probably tell with your twenty-twenty vision, we're in the middle of a rainforest without the luxury of utensils." He held the maito up in my direction. "If you think that I can somehow conjure for you a fork like your very own fairy godmother, you are terribly mistaken."

How glasses without glasses could solve calculus shit in his sleep and yet never get my subtext was the greatest fucking mystery of all time. I reached for his forehead and after flicking it, laid the words out in easy mode. "Feed me, dumbass."

This took him a moment to register and another moment to look around, freezing up when he noticed the two other journalists still hanging around. He turned back to me with what he must think was his stern face, whispering. "Absolutely not! Only a fool wouldn't learn from their mistakes and I'm clearly not one of them. Falling for the same trick of yours you pulled at the cafeteria would be an embarrassment. Goodness, the pictures... I shrivel up and die just thinking about it."

He pushed the maito in my face and I gave up, tearing a strip of the barbecued leaf and using it to pick up a couple of mushrooms and peppers. Ate the whole thing in one go.

"Camera-shy?" It was good. "This is done. Add half onion rings in there if you can. Or a bell pepper strip. But apart from that," I gave him the green. He nodded, taking a nibble of an oyster mushroom.

"The natural juices turned out well. Oh! And about the dining arrangement Bank just did... I was wondering if I could advise him otherwise? He hasn't started the bonfire just yet, or the smoke and wood grill for the fish. I'll help with the table setting and be done in less than ten. After which, I'll... um, either start cooking the bamboo dish or is there anything you...?" He left the question open, seeming to have read my mind.

"Help me taste the fish after you're done," I told him. "Let Si Yin do the bamboo solo. She knows what she's doing."

"So I'll leave Nabila with the maito too. Perhaps I'll simply make rounds tasting everything for now," he'd sorted things out on his own in the shortest time possible. "Alright, I should, um, go start the arrangement with Bank." He met my gaze briefly, then was about to leave with the half-finished maito when his fellow journalists started gathering around him.

"Do you mind if we taste this?" "For research. Research." "It smells so good." "Did you get the shot of the original?" "Yeah also part two of feeding boyf—uhh, yeah." "Wow, this tastes really good. How did you get the idea of..."

*

With timing being one of the key factors to making this work, we banked on the facilitator giving us an accurate time frame before the judges arrived, deciding to only get to the actual cooking of the mains when they were seated. Since our team wasn't working with a three-course meal, there wouldn't be a separation between the appetiser, entrée and dessert. All eight dishes (save the dessert) had to be on the table at the same time or we'd risk having the judges eat something cold.

While waiting, the photographer from before came up to me. He asked if I wanted to look at his shots. I didn't say anything, but he began scrolling on his phone and showing me a couple of his best. They looked good. He let me have his phone to see the rest.

It kept vibrating and notifications popped up at the top of his screen non-stop, all social media platforms and all comments or likes on his post; whatever it was. He noticed and told me to ignore them. "I'm logged into the school press account and everyone's been keeping track of the teams, so." He turned off his connection and handed it back to me.

"So, uh... I'm super glad you like my work so I was, you know, just thinking... if you have any upcoming events or interesting stories you'd like someone to cover, I could, like, be your personal photographer or something. Exclusive rights, I'm saying," he cut to the chase. Business.

He could have a deal. "If you send me the ones from the other day," I told him, fore deciding to include those from today. He agreed and asked for my number.

"I'll send you a link to the whole Google drive. Got it all ready for you man," he retrieved his phone after I typed my number into it. "By the way, not sure if you already know this but posts with you and White get a whole lot of attention. Tenner and Chen's teams were done with the judging some time ago but the traffic's blowing up since the judges are headed here now. Tenner's capped at a hundred and... something watching the stream but you guys are about to hit double that. Not counting the ones waiting on Twitter for updates though. Facebook, Instagram and YouTube live streams for you guys might be approximately, like, five hundred in total."

I was listening but also looking out for drops in energy level across the team. Already, it had been a long day. We were standing in a row before our prep, delegated dishes assigned to each one of us and waiting for the six judges to show up. Behind, Bank had already got the fire going. Everyone was involved in some form of quiet conversation. Jael moved on after taking the hint.

Beside me was the only person trying to concentrate, staring at a spot on the ground that he probably couldn't even see. He was chewing on his bottom lip. Thinking.

Then suddenly, people were turning to look at something in the distance. "That's them." Movement. Glasses without glasses continued to squint. No one was quiet for a second. Slowly, several instructors came into view, accompanied by the dean and some other members of the student union. And bigger cameras.

They made their way downhill, coming towards us with clipboards and faces that did not look like they were ready to eat. It was part of the challenge; having to impress instructors who just had their fill of the other teams. Tenner would be first, then Chen. Birchwood, last. Some of them seemed to notice our set up from afar.

"Um, Leroy?" A tug on my sleeve.

I turned, waiting. He was looking at me blankly. "Would you be so kind as to provide me basic information of what's happening?" He rolled his eyes. I reached over to flick his forehead.

"They're here."

He groaned under his breath. "Any names? Who's judging?"

I named the first few starting towards us, noting that there were a couple of others lagging behind. "The dean. Marseille—"

"Which dean?" He had to ask with a second frown. "We have four. One for each major, if you aren't aware."

That was not a question I knew the answer to so I thought for a while before concluding that I didn't know his name either. "He's the only one I see around."

"Alright, Chef Allan, then. Associate dean of culinary arts." He was overestimating my ability to remember names again and it was cute. "And Chef Marseille. And then?"

"Romanov. Someone... two... someone's... don't know them." I felt him pinch my arm. It was mild. "A local and. Oh. Doña Brazi. And Lindy."

He registered this with a blink, pausing for a second before looking up at me with a startled expression. "Miss Doña Brazi's here, too? Perhaps acting as an unofficial judge. Or, well. I wouldn't be too sure—but, did you say Chef Lindy?"

I turned back, checking. Wasn't wrong. "Yeah."

He stared at me with wide eyes. "Chef Lindy?" He looked like he was waiting for me to get that something was wrong. And then he glanced at one of the baskets in front of us.

Oh.

"Fuck." I mapped backwards, knowing that we'd already used some of them in the rub for the fish. Then turned to him. "The maito too?"

He nodded, gaze resting elsewhere. "I told Nabila to put in a strip after consulting you. But, perhaps this isn't a species that she would react... good god what nonsense am I saying," he let slip a sound that I almost mistook for a squeak. "The maito should be fine. All we have to do is remove the strip from—"

"Heeey guys, what's with the scary faces?" Raul. He noticed only after ending his conversation with Rosi on the other side, alternating between glasses and me. "You look like we're gonna lose."

He received a good lecture. "That's ridiculous! We're not going to lose, Raul," he insisted under his breath. "Leroy and I were just, well, we were concerned how Chef Lindy's one of the judges and the facilitator must have... she must have missed her out or something, not knowing... good god, how unprofessional."

"Wha, but isn't that great?" Raul was high on nerves. He looked drunk. "She can see how good we are."

"No." "Absolutely not!"

It's not like we planned for this to happen, but he was perfectly in tune all of a sudden and it made it all very sexy. My lodge mate stared and already, the judges were less than fifty feet away and likely within earshot. "I, like, I don't understand." Glasses huffed, folding his arms and fingers tapping on the sides.

"Bell peppers." "She's allergic to bell peppers!" Guess we're pretty compatible.

======================

I wasted no time in confronting the facilitator about her mistake, asking if she'd be responsible for us not knowing about the allergy or how else we could resolve the issue. She, too, hadn't seemed to be expecting Lindy.

"I wasn't informed of a bell pepper allergy," she said.

I frowned. "You mean you didn't know there would be someone with a bell pepper allergy or you didn't know Lindy was going to come?" Her answer was vague and useless. It wasn't worth spending any time getting hung up on this instead of actually thinking of solutions. I turned to Nabila, telling her about the maito. The rest had moved up front to welcome the judges.

"What about the fish?" She hissed. "This is unfair."

"You just deal with the maito," I told her. "I'll think of something."

We had intended to serve whole smoked fishes on banana leaves before grilling it with peppers for flavour. Otherwise, river fish would taste bad on its own. There weren't enough ingredients for a garlic-only flavouring unless we covered the entire thing in ants. That wouldn't be appetising, even if the locals might like it. I wouldn't want to remove the smoked fish with peppers either. It was a good display of technique. So I looked at whatever we had left from the Tambaqui ribs.

"What's with the set up?" Lindy. She was looking around our campsite and pointing at the long table put together by Bank. They were made up of three stone slabs put together, elevated by bamboo stems he'd cut earlier on.

"It's to look local, Chef. We are going for Brazilian and Amazon Cuisine mix so we want you to feel the experience, sit like local, eat like local, taste like local. Okay I think I say too much I let him say," he shuffled aside for Vanilla before hiding behind his wood grill, where he would be helping Nabila.

"Mm, so we sit here?" Romanov pointed at the rocks we got over from the river. They were arranged in a row on one side of the stone table, facing the bonfire and grill. Live cooking.

"Yes," it had all been his idea. He also nearly tripped on some branch trying to sit everyone down. I grabbed his arm in time. "Please make yourselves comfortable and I'll explain everything in a minute. We'll be starting service in about five to seven minutes."

At my signal, everyone except our servers began working on their dishes at separate stations. I started with Lindy's, since it would've taken up some time. Doña Brazi had given up her seat to the other local beside her and was squatting. Her eyes went to the cone of saúva ants we'd left on the table. She was smiling.

"Hello everyone," he started, and I was surprised to see him bow. "I'm Julian White, your server for the evening."

The dean blinked, glancing down at his clipboard. "I don't recall seeing any requirement for roles..." Here goes. I hadn't the luxury of looking at a nice nape all day while he had his back against me so I prepped while listening.

"You're right sir, there isn't one," he sounded very calm. "We've decided upon this ourselves. Will you let me explain?"

"Yes please do." Romanov. Gave me my first A-; also apparently the highest grade he's ever given.

"This is our attempt to present a recreation of a dinner table here at São Gabriel da Cachoeira, an experience we hope you will find authentic and homely on our last night of the camp. Of course, we understood that there were rules and regulations to the cross-year segment but it is in light of our passion and love for the local food here which we've come to learn about for the past couple of days that we decided to create a heartening meal in honour of people like Miss Doña Brazi."

I almost laughed. He really was a fucking dictionary.

"And so we have for you this evening, eight... dishes," he paused, seemingly waiting for some form of resistance or verbal fucking that we'd all braced ourselves for. It didn't come.

"Eight," the dean repeated, snorting. "Okay. Impress us if you're breaking the rules. Maybe you can give us a moment to discuss how we should be judging these... eight dishes then."

I assume he nodded, because when I looked up he was bowing and turning back to say something to Rosi. The judges began speaking quietly. They looked over at us and then back to their papers.

"Hey," I felt a tap on my back. Raul. "Okay so all this... this allergy thing. Can't she just eat the rest of the stuff that don't have peppers?"

I snorted. "She could. And miss out our best dishes and mark us down for that. You gotta think about what he said. It's an experience we're selling, not the points for individual dishes. Even if she liked the rest, it's a zero for two out of eight. That's twenty-five percent."

He slapped aside my middle finger. "Okay, okay, I know your math improved after those playdates, okay. So what do we do, make, what, a ninth, dish?" He narrowed his eyes.

I shrugged, dumping the remaining lantern tomatoes and onions into Rosi's skillet. "That's what I'm doing now." He watched for a while, then stopped me from throwing in the river fish I cleaned. It was the one I wanted to smoke.

"Wait. Wait—you're making... what?"

"Moqueca," I told him. "There's nothing we can do. I'll just give up on smoking the fish."

His eyes said he had an idea. "No. Do Bouillabaisse. Marseille loves your technique and it's from her hometown! Just use the leftover cuts from the ribs you made. I thought you brought the uh... the... what's it called. There was two of them. With the crabs."

"Clams."

"Yeah, those," his hands were doing the Italian thing. Funny, since he was talking about a traditional Mediterranean fisherman's stew from France. "Use that. Bouillabaisse doesn't need the best cuts. Moqueca you need... so?" He snapped his fingers in front of my face. "Hey, think. I need to get the drinks."

"So you actually have a brain," I told him and he was doing the hand thing again. "Go off. I'll do Bouillabaisse."

Raul did not sound very happy. "I'm telling playdate you used the middle finger and bullied me. It will be great."

======================

[Vanilla]

"So," Chef Allan, seated in the middle of the table and giving the spread before him a quick survey, seemed mildly surprised. There were nine in total, as per the menu we'd come up with and added to that the Bouillabaisse that Raul and Leroy had come up with. Each dish, piping hot and steaming on their platters of banana leaves each had their own unique flavour. Put together, they would, theoretically speaking, compliment one another; or at least according to my knowledge, they would. Either way, I was desperately hoping that none of these doubts were showing up on my face clear as day since, well, since I was the one who'd designed the meal. "Who made what?"

The logical thing first step to take would be to explain every dish while the judges dug in. Miss Doña Brazi and the chief of her village were looking rather pleased with what we'd presented, and it would be unwise to hold them back with lengthy descriptions. So I didn't.

"As mentioned earlier, our primary goal is to recreate an authentic experience of Brazilian and Amazonian Cuisine in what we consider a humble and homely environment. And so by doing away with a three-course, dish by dish meal, we decided to present nine at once—comparable to family reunions of the region.

"In the middle of the table, we have the grilled Tambaqui fish ribs with a mixed bell pepper, Baniwa chilli and wild onion rub, with a side of Miss Doña Brazi's secret dark sauce. Or, um, at least, my take on it. I'm hoping it's close," I glanced in her direction, and she winked, already halfway through a rib herself. The ants had been terrifyingly troubling without my glasses. "Lero—our captain was responsible for the ribs and the dish beside it."

Chef Allan turned to the whole smoked river fish in drowned in peppers, chillies, garlic and a squeeze of lime. He tore a section from its side. "It's smoked perfectly."

"Every dish is meant to taste great with fibre at its core, so if you would pair the fish, maito, or vegetables with the bamboo steamed rice..."

Everyone at the table reached for the cups of bamboo at once, undoing the dried bamboo leaves that we'd used to secure the banana leaf on the opening and uncovering a cup of steaming, fragrant rice.

"And so this is the ingredient, then." Chef Lindy used the pair of chopsticks we'd prepared (hard and thin branches we'd washed and smoothen the surface of) to send a portion into her mouth. She chewed, then nodded. "You picked rice. Simple but clever. Another team picked uni. And Chen's had caviar."

"There's fried garlic bits in there for fragrance. And chopped up wild scallions from the onions because we didn't want anything to go to waste too," Si Yin couldn't resist adding, understandably proud of her improvisation that certainly added to the flavour of the bamboo rice that I'd initially thought of.

"This one," Chef Romanov had his hands on a grilled soft shell crab, pulling it apart and handing the other half to Miss Doña Brazi seated beside him. "Lucky catch?"

"We caught the blue crabs in the middle of shedding just this morning," I explained, pointing in the general direction of the stream. "Under some rocks. Bank grilled it in brazil nut oil and wild garlic. The lime and chilli dip on the side was our captain's idea."

They each sent a portion of the crispy snack into their mouths before nodding away, noting the odd honey-like aftertaste of the dip. I turned to Leroy, blinking. Neither the Persian lime or the Baniwa chillies would have a sweet aftertaste in it, so he must have added something without telling me about it. He returned my questioning look with a teasing flicker in his eyes—which was my cue to look away.

"Try." Miss Doña Brazi held up the shallow bamboo cup we'd used to contain the dip, looking at me. Surprised by this, I looked around for signs of disapproval. In front, the judges seemed to be tasting and writing and reaching for the sweet sautéed vegetables (a mix of custard apple leaves and watercress) while behind, most of the team had watering mouths.

Tearing a square of an unused banana leaf, I dipped it into the cup and tasted the end. All throughout this, Leroy seemed to be waiting for my answer with the kind of expectations he had for... well, for me.

"Some kind of fruit," I said after thanking Miss Doña Brazi for the offer. Then looked over my shoulder for a clue. "Wild pineapple?"

He laughed shortly. Which probably meant I didn't—oh, it was right. Good god, why does he love teasing me so much?

And after confirming that our spicy mixed mushroom maito did well with all six judges including the chief of Miss Doña Brazi's village (who said it reminded him of his younger days after a good evening hunt and coming back to a night time snack), Rosi was finally able to serve up the dessert we'd taken the whole twenty-four hours of prep time perfecting.

"Custard apple puree in a cacao shell, topped with brazil nut milk and a saúva ant for your first spoonful," she described, handing out wooden scoopers we'd tried our best to make from the bamboo stems we had left over. She had reason to be nervous about this; I'd pressured her into actually serving a whole ant, in plain sight, on a dinner table for dessert. Which, naturally, wasn't the safest thing to be doing at any culinary competition but, well. The number of rules we'd already broken was near impossible to count anyway. Having a reddish brown ant standing on top of a white-capped, orange-yellow mountain of custard apple puree with a core of cacao beans that gave the sweet fragrance a rounded, bitter bite could in no way harm us anymore than what we'd already done.

This was an analogy. An ant, small and seemingly insignificant in the world standing on top of a mountain after a long and arduous journey represented the team over the past twenty-four hours. Added to that the disadvantages and handicaps we'd received, it was an appropriate symbol.

And having come up with all this, I was, very naturally, fazed by the silence that followed suit and the rest of quiet tasting in the midst of an occasional scribble on paper. The entire thing had taken a total of thirty minutes and down to the very last five, blank expressions and unspoken opinions were simply frightening at this point.

"So, um," I began after noting that they were beginning to stand. Rosi herself looked entirely defeated, unsure if the judges had meant to convey words of disappointment or, well, had nothing pleasant to say. "Is there anything we could perhaps improve on—"

"An entire report will be issued to the team captain on our flight back to school tomorrow morning," said Chef Allan, holding up a hand to stop me from going on. "The results will be announced tonight after dinner, during the final briefing. So just pack up for now, go back to your lodgings and get yourselves ready for the campfire dance."

*

Good god, was all I could think, wondering just how anyone could expect us not to brood over the vague and misdirected answer that was all we were given. The ride back was plagued with a different kind of quiet—previously obligated but now, full of unspoken words that weren't necessarily easy to express or exchange in a single sentence.

But then again, I could be overthinking. Suppose this the nature of culinary competitions? After all, one would never quite know what the judges are thinking until the actual release of the results. I simply hadn't had the chance to participate in an official one; and now that I did, I should very well get used to this. Yet, the persistent nagging in a voice that resembled my uncle's recalled him being invited to judge many a time and not a comment could rival the sheer emptiness of that one-liner given to us at the end! Oh, the wait! Good god, this couldn't get any worse.

And as the facilitator dropped us off at our respective locations (Leroy first at the pier and then the fourth-years at their resort before turning down the road to the hotel for the second-years and finally the institute for Si Yin and I), I was spiralling down an abysmal list of what could have went wrong.

Naturally, the first thing that popped into my head was the entire plan of serving eight dishes on the table. Coming close behind was my idea for Rosi's custard apple dessert, which could have very well ruined their appetite. Then, it was the tragic mistake of first coming up with the dessert and then the rest of the menu, possibly neglecting each dish's relation to one another and hence marking ourselves down on the criteria that would have been crucial to every other three-course meal since course meals really depended on the sequence in which one ate their meal and this on the other hand was an all-at-one-go... God, I could pin it on myself all day. Well I have all night to do that, I suppose.

Clearly, I wasn't listening to Si Yin's excited rambles about the campfire dance, or the fact that she had to return to the girl's dormitory which was the other way. So when I finally noticed that I was alone and had passed my bunk, a new low was introduced. Instantly, I felt awful for appearing uninterested in what my friend had to say and was obviously dampening the mood with thunderstorm thoughts.

"Hey! White's back."

I heard it after showing up at the doorframe with the most neutral expression I could manage. The rest of my male classmates had their phones out, their attention previously fixed on the screen of a laptop placed in the middle of the room. They looked up at once.

"Hey man! How'd it go?" "They say anything yet?" "Still can't believe you did eight dishes though." "Eight fucking dishes, man. That's legendary stupid." "The soft-shell crabs looked crazy good." "How'dyou get the idea for bamboo rice?" "Are you guys disqualified yet?"

All at once, I was handling the pressure of questions—both absolutely ridiculous and unexpectedly kind at the same time—and the unusual amount of attention I was receiving from my male classmates or, well, anyone in general. All of a sudden, they seemed to like talking to me very much. Which, in my lifetime of fourteen years and eleven months, wasn't the most prevalent occurrence.

They soon sat me down in front of the laptop, which was playing live footage of the judges' going around. To the side, there was an entire comment section filled with a hundred and ninety-three users.

Birchwood was introducing her team's entrée. Roasted... something. A perfectly charred animal suspended over glowing coals, glistening with a coating of... wow, the hind legs of this animal. Judging by the muscle and the body that was by now brown with heat, this was a whole rabbit. So they really did use a hunter.

"You're not going to ask how the other teams did?" Ariq was seated cross-legged on his bed, phone in his hand and seemingly scrolling through something. "The press coverage this year is pretty good. They have a section and photo album for every team. You can look at everyone's comments too."

"Well you can't tell how good something is without actually tasting it, so," was all I said in response, lamely avoiding his question without really saying anything. Simply put, I was being annoying; and to prevent myself from going down this road of destruction, I excused myself at once by grabbing my towel and extra clothes for a shower. At least that wasn't a lie.

*

The night had long settled above by the time I was done with my shower, having taken my time without the rush of a line or self-conscious concerns about being male and taking more than fifteen minutes in there. I could tell from the look on the faces of my classmates that they were dying to exchange opinions, likely regarding the cross-year live footages they'd seen and were somehow able to compare among the participating teams. Ariq was the one who'd turn around with dirty looks to stop them from doing so in front of me, which I unknowingly began to appreciate.

The lot of us headed down to the assembly point where the teams for the segment were first announced, joining up with the girls where the topic quickly switched from the cross-year to whatever it was they were doing while we were away. Volunteer cooking programs for the local orphanage.

"Lucky you. Didn't have to go." "Yeah! The kids were hysterical, like." "Martina was terrible at designing the menu. She obviously didn't know what kids liked." "Birchwood's class did stupidly well 'cuz they had the easier class." "The kitchen though... really unhygienic."

I would be lying through my teeth if I concluded the cross-year more meaningful than volunteering at a local orphanage, so I tucked my arguments away and listened to them complain. About the kids. The menu. The place.

To my left was Si Yin, busy entertaining questions about our time away. Add to that the story of how I lost my glasses and rating how blind I was out of ten, she clearly had them wrapped around her finger. This went on throughout the feast that was our dinner, made by Miss Doña Brazi's village kitchen and headed by the legendary woman herself. Needless to say, it was extraordinary.

If an experience was what we'd intended to serve, Miss Doña Brazi had effortlessly taken that up a notch, cooking up a storm for the entire school, spread out over the open grassy fields under the night. Each class occupied a single, large picnic mat and sat around a combination of three short wooden tables from the classrooms of the institute. Joined together, they served as a long dinner table big enough to fit us all.

And with fifteen large-portioned dishes in total, well, no one could complain about there being not enough food. This, unfortunately, made for some stifling conversation.

Without a common ground for complaints, the class settled into conscious avoidance of the cross-year segment, steering clear every time the general conversation neared the topic.

"Fishing's the best. Can't see anything beating that and no one's gotten over how good they can taste. Plus, catching them with bare hands was a... yeah but the fruits—" "I like the tours they gave. They were surprisingly cool, I mean. Gave us a lot of knowledge about foraging and... Italy wouldn't have had all that so maybe I'm just glad—"

"Hey, um," I stopped them for a bit, surprised that the entire table decided to have supersonic hearing all of a sudden and turned in my direction almost at once. I'd barely raised my voice. "If you want to talk about the cross-year, go ahead. It's fine. Well, at least better than a stiff roundabout conversation where everyone's a little too conscious about what they're talking about."

Following this was an unbearable silence, proving that my words had little effect save the air of intimidation that had eventually settled over the rest of the dinner table. As usual, my words were the very bane of my social life and it called for a perpetual cycle of untethered, ruined relationships with the majority of the human race.

"I'll go first then," was all I came up with to dissipate the tension. "I personally think I made the grave mistake of advising my team to go with eight dishes, which could very well get us disqualified since, strictly speaking, this wouldn't be very far for the other teams. One could see the additional dishes as safety nets to fall back on and spread out the impact of possible mistakes."

"Or, it could be a greater risk because making more dishes precisely means you're prone to making more mistakes. It's not like you're given more time," Ariq cut in as soon as I paused, pointing out the other perspective I'd long considered but felt a tad too positive for the current circumstance.

Either way, I hadn't expected him to offer a word of comfort to Si Yin or myself in front of the entire class. The way he received several nodding heads in response, too, felt mildly encouraging. This, along with the fact that there was less than half-an-hour till the final briefing and the end of my awaited misery, made the rest of dinner slightly more manageable than before.

===============

"...enjoyed your time here and made meaningful memories of old and new friends alike. All appreciation and gratitude aside, I'd like to think that you aspiring chefs, bakers and patisseries have broadened your perspectives of the culinary world and will continue to nurture an open and malleable mind to new cuisines and cultures. That said, I'm sure we're all dying to know the results of... hm?"

It was half-past-eight. Which ultimately meant that the chief coordinator of SOY had been droning on for nearly an hour, courteously keeping the entire school on the edge of our seats for the one thing we all had in mind.

And with our heads finally raised at the semblance of an arrival, imagine the disappointment when all we received in return was a member of the student union whispering urgently in the speaker's ear. Naturally, waves of speculations began to sweep the floor and soon, predictions of a delay arrived. Ariq was quick to come up with one of his own.

"But why would they need more time to decide on who wins and who doesn't?" Si Yin was not comprehending a word. "It's so easy. Don't they already have points or something?"

"What would you know," he mumbled in return. "Maybe there's a tie and they're re-assessing it or something. I'm thinking tomorrow morning. That's when they'll announce the official results. Lame, but yeah. They delayed the results last year too, so. I won't be surprised."

Brilliant, was what came to my head almost at once. More nervous waiting and overthinking. I should really start distracting myself with something else soon or the rest of the evening would be filled with a single thought. The reluctance on the speaker's face said every unspoken word and with the echoing groans from the far corners of the open field, it didn't take a genius to figure out what it was that he had to be announcing.

"So, um," he began and was at once met with a booing front row. "Okay okay, I know we've been keeping you all waiting long enough and, uh, I understand this looks like bad news and—well yeah, it is, kind of. The results are being delayed for another couple of hours till, midnight. On Facebook."

A collective groan rose into the night sky and we were left empty-handed, some whipping out their phones for the time and heading to social media either to complain or look up reasons for the delay. Others just upped and left, heading back into the institute or down to the beach.

"Hey hey hey sit down, alright? I know it's not an ideal situation and no one asked for it, but the campfire dance is still on and we got fun activities for everyone on the last night. I'll be announcing the locations you'll be reporting to now so listen up. First years, institute's function hall. Second years, hotel ballroom. Third years, resort field. Seniors stay here, on the field. Get the mats folded and make space for the bonfire in the..."

"Campfire dance in a ballroom," one of my classmates muttered under her breath, laughing. I shook my head with a sigh, projecting an image of a heated bonfire on marble floors and replacing that with a half-hearted fan keeping a couple of red and orange strips of cloth flowing upwards, surrounded by fake wood that was really Styrofoam painted brown.

Lo and behold, I wasn't wrong. Only, this didn't just apply to the second years—us freshmen had a handheld fan doing the job and in place of red and orange strips of cloth was craft paper. Everyone had themselves plastered to the railings of the function hall, looking down at the seniors who were most probably the only ones privileged enough to see real flames.

"Not your man," Si Yin had to point out at once. "Nabila was saying that the top thirty-five get their own party at the beach near their river cruise. That's probably real fire too."

I listened to her complaints and the comebacks she'd come up with to counter said complaints, observing her surprising ability to argue with herself. Most importantly, she's pointed out Birchwood, who was seated on a chair in the corner of the room and sulking while the people around her appeared to complain as well.

Then, they turned to stare in my direction.

Needless to say, I looked away at once, hiding in the crowd that was my class and praying for further instructions to distract everyone else. Chef Palmer soon arrived with what appeared to be a tray of mocktails (mini-umbrellas and all) for the class. It was then that I realized how campfire dances actually worked and that there was really no need for instructions because all they had to do was turn off the lights and put some awfully loud, booming music through the speakers they'd brought over from the school's PA system. Add to that portable pulse lights of red, purple and blue, it looked oddly passable despite the craft paper bonfire in the middle.

I sipped on my mango mocktail. It was missing something.

"Vanilla!" Si Yin was shouting over the music. "I know you're still upset and probably doing the over-thinking thinking thing again but that's not going to change if you sit there all night!" She had with her several other girls by her side and one of them was tugging on her arm. One other was looking at me. "So go look for your man!"

I retreated deeper into the jacket of my tracksuit and sipped harder on my mango mocktail. Good god, Si Yin. I have no man! I'm just... just fond of observing at a distance. Plus, I've never read any books about dancing but no fool would be in the right mind to term jumping up and down with pointed fingers and raised arms dancing, would they? I mean, I wouldn't like to have my toes stepped on, so staying away would be most ideal.

That, and the fact that I needed space to think. Whether this was the exact reason for my standing and leaving the function hall in the next couple of seconds, no one would ever know. To deem this as sneaking off would as well be an overstatement as I was merely taking a walk to rid of my thunderstorm thoughts.

___________________

From: Emily Winter (Press)

Hey are you at the dance?

I know you're not in the mood but we need one last interview from one of the ranked students and I've done five already I'm heading over to the senior's place now so if you're still at the dance can you come down to the senior's place too?

_____________________

I didn't wish to lie, not when I knew how hard Emily had been working on the articles for the past couple of days and interviewing people left right centre. Returning her text before leaving the institute, I told her that it had been a long day and that I wasn't in the best condition to be conducting interviews at the moment. Add to that an apology... and that I'd make it up to her tomorrow. There.

The logical consequence was disappointing Emily—hence making myself out to be the next professional disappointer.

Admittedly, I hadn't been as upset about the delay as I should have been. While it certainly wouldn't have hurt to know the results of the cross-year earlier in the evening and feel whatever it was I was supposed to feel afterwards wasn't a bad idea, the other half did not wish to know at all.

My grave mistake was confidence. And displaying that for all to see, especially Leroy, who'd placed much of his faith in the inexperienced me and trusted my every decision which had ultimately led to our current state of uncertainty. I'd let him down; and not just him but everyone else.

How could I have been so ambitious about winning the entire competition when now, it seemed as though the most likely result would be our disqualification? And in the case of our team not winning—the equivalent of coming in second, third and then... god. The extent mattered as much as its title and here I was, fearing the prospect of coming in last.

I pulled on my jacket, wrapping it tighter around myself and looking up. Oh. Oh, I hear the river up ahead. So I continued on.

Last. Last was a humiliation worse than being disqualified. Having one's name associated with a non-existent number was something I couldn't seem to imagine Leroy having. The slow creeping in my chest seemed to agree, winding up inside and scrunching tight. Afraid.

Ask me out. Cook. Tease. Talk. Laugh. Frown. Was I of sufficient use? Worthy? Would he look for me tomorrow like he did yesterday?

Would he sit on the other side of the board in the autumn breeze?

How frightening the prospect of being left behind was. The clenching of my chest was unimaginably long and tired, refusing to uncurl and shivering still. I was at a loss; not having understood what it meant to yearn to see a face and yet, wish to avoid it all at once and now, coming to terms with such an odd feeling.

The last thing I could afford to hear were empty words. Clipped and uninterested, a complete absence of attention—the worst of nightmares often had little to do with flaming ruins or frozen lands but a void. A losing of one's place in the world and left alone to an absence of identity in a cold, white room.

I don't often understand how one could be so afraid of criticism or words of anger and fury; they were directed, still, at a heart that they acknowledge the presence of. A connection, nevertheless. It may possibly be a fortune of theirs, having never had to entertain the thought or experience of being left behind and aside; ignored.

To be ignored was my disaster—the kind of thunderstorm that ruined every sort of umbrella and removed every form of shelter. To have many things to say and knowledge held within that piqued no interest or understanding was when people chose to participate in the narrated events of 'truth or dare' the night before than a discussion of why the moon was round.

In conclusion, I was boring.

A plain, unwelcomed boy with little ability to connect with people my age and perform what was supposedly the simplest act of making friends and even a name befitting of such. Vanilla; simple, plain, mundane, uninteresting, dull, monotonous, insipid, flat, bland, stiff, dry, tiresome, dull, dull, dull.

And in that instance, the thunderstorm thoughts began to rain, and the drowning mind began to recall how it was like to watch from a distance. The view of a back. What I'd once been content with and satisfied just doing was now much less than before. Somehow, being okay with watching his back from a distance was no longer the case and not even the back or the distance was wished for now it was beside.

Somewhere along the way, I'd began to selfishly yearn for more and the greed I knew not I was capable of had been taking root, spouting leaves of green and green and green was the colour I'd avoided the most. Of envy and want and need and—where... where is this?

I was looking at the vague outline of a cliff with the Rio Negro to my right and a forest on my left, only just realizing that I had been walking along the unbarricaded edge without much thought and could very well have slipped and taken a fatal fall onto the dark rocks below. GOOD GOD.

At once, I backed away from the edge and headed back in the way I'd come from, wondering exactly how long I'd been away and if I was in trouble for leaving the premises without permission. That, and if I actually knew the way back and of course, my phone wouldn't have the necessary internet connection I so needed n—what?

I'd caught a glimpse of town lights in the distance, somewhere along the pier, and wished to check the time when I noted the three missed calls and nine text messages I'd received before losing internet connection on my way out here. And just how did you not feel your phone vibrating in your pocket, Vanilla? I knew not the answer. And considering the extent of my thinking for the past hour or so, my attention had obviously been nowhere near the world that existed beyond my independent mind. I checked the texts.

________________

From: Just Let Me Impress You

I'm bored

________________

From: Just Let Me Impress You

With Si Yin?

________________

From: Just Let Me Impress You

Where u

________________

From: Just Let Me Impress You

Crying?

________________

From: Just Let Me Impress You

hey

________________

From: Just Let Me Impress You

Don't be mad

________________

From: Just Let Me Impress You

R u ok

________________

From: Just Let Me Impress You

Come to the pier by 9

________________

From: Just Let Me Impress You

or im calling the cops

________________

How incredibly weak I must have been to hear the waves of relief lap against the shores inside; unable to function otherwise and simply trembling in the wind as though it was the only thing I could do. What had been my instinct to pause and think soon translated into a flurry of everything else but thought: checking the time and realizing it was fifteen minutes to nine and that there was simply no way I could get back on time.

The brief illustration of an entire search team being sent out on my behalf was enough to get my feet moving despite the night and my glasses-less state. He wouldn't actually call the cops, would he? Nothing in my head seemed to be functioning in the right manner. I was hearing something else.

Something fearfully loud; louder than thunderstorm thoughts and louder than the crashing of the waves and had left no space for anything else. I was running towards something in the darkness, blind and cold.

The wind was in my face, hitting hard on my chest and whipping everything else around till the ground began to change for hard, solid stone and then, concrete ground. The lack of streetlights made the signs harder to decipher and with my terrible vision, all I could make out was the general direction of the pier—where the wind was going.

I followed, letting it propel me downhill and around a small ally of bright-lit stores where I was able to, with my meagre, guide-book-knowledge, ask for directions to the Rio Negro. They pointed me in the direction I was already headed for.

How odd it must be to trust the very wind that had the power to sweep one off their feet and take them away in an instant. And to be correct nevertheless, regardless of a faith that was blind... how irrational. How confusing for a mind otherwise straight like an arrow, organized like a map.

Then the lights of the pier came into view and I was back at square one, where we'd met on the very first night. There was a figure in the distance, leaning on the exact same section of the bannister and looking in the exact same direction. Out towards the river. Only now, he had something in his hand. Mine went instinctively for my arms, giving them a rub or two against the chilly evening air, biting as I approached the deck.

I called his name and he turned.

It was far too dark to make out the expression on his face.

"Where were you?" Was the first thing he had to say after throwing his windbreaker over my head, the flame in his eyes heated and flickering. It was the only thing I could somehow see. Not quite knowing how to respond, I let him do as he wished, actively staying still while he reached out to give my forehead the usual sentence. "Don't run off like that. Answer my texts. And my calls."

"Forgive my desire for peace and tranquillity. Space is necessary for complex thoughts and people with brains need time to think, Leroy," I told him, hearing the listless voice that was my own and feeling horrible at once. It wasn't what I'd meant to say.

"Where else do you need to cry except in my arms?" But then he had the gall to tease so I punched his arm. It unfortunately had no effect.

What an awfully harsh decision I was making—choosing between actively avoiding the imminent storm I knew was about to thunder and fall and running towards it before the clouds above began to weigh more than ever before. Being around him was only going to make the decision so much less like one because good god was it going to be eventual with the look in his eyes. It was nothing less than infuriating; how he tended to show up at times I had no control over the waves inside and bear witness to my drowning lows.

"I wasn't... crying."

"Really," he raised a brow, taking my hand so abruptly that I was caught off guard. "Can't hide behind your glasses anymore, you know?"

I managed to piece together some form of indistinctive response before finally slapping myself awake, noticing that we were making our way down pier. "Where are we going? Aren't you supposed to be at the campfire dance? And, isn't there some exclusive event for the ranked students that's being held down at the beach?"

He gave me a look, tugging me on board the river cruise. I obliged until I heard his response. "It's boring."

At this, I stopped. Then turned to him with a frown.

"W-well, I'm not in the mood to be correcting misused formulas and careless mistakes all evening either, Leroy," I managed to fire back, knowing that I wasn't necessarily in the best of conditions to be spending time with him, fearing that some treacherous sliver of extreme emotion might escape the vial I'd sealed shut and tucked away.

"Didn't say I was doing math tonight," Leroy snorted and that was all he had to say, confusing me with the hint of a smirk on his lips. The words were stuck in my throat and I swallowed them whole. Completely defeated, I let him lead me past the bar on the lower deck, the kitchen, and then up the stairs and down the hallway in silence. It took me a little more than three seconds to register that this was the way to his room.

"Oh," I laughed stiffly. "Well if it's tasting you need help with, I'm not the most useful person at the—"

"Get in," he held the door open and it felt like an accurate depiction of kidnapping; except the door wasn't to some other room but a shady van in the middle of the forest. I stood my ground.

"Are you sure you're not supposed to be somewhere else, Leroy? I mean, it's good that you're working hard at beating everyone and all but to conduct another tasting session right after a competition we just finished is... is that chamomile I smell?" It soothed the senses at once and I felt the knot in my chest unwind. That was before I recalled that letting my guard down at such a time was less than ideal. "I still don't think this is a good idea."

"Come in" he emphasized, "and I'll show you why it will be." The gall of him to continue with the confidence! And with such bold diction. Clearly, Leroy was in need of lessons on manners.

"Fine," I gave in eventually. "But not more than fifteen minutes or you'll get yourself in trouble with whoever's in charge at the beach."

Leroy snorted, pouring me a cup of tea and cracking open a can of coke for himself. "It's Marseille and she doesn't care." I accepted it with both hands and a nod of thanks before pointing out the coke.

"You think I ordered chamomile for myself?" He reached over to flick my forehead for the second time in the span of fifteen minutes, causing me to flinch in the middle of tea-sipping. Hm. It's surprisingly enjoyable without my glasses.

I was about to lean on the full-length window that the beds were facing for comfortable support when Leroy proceeded to activate some sort of button his side of the wall and then all of a sudden, the glass was moving. Startled, I backed away at once.

"Leroy? Um. What's going on?" I squinted, feeling the night air on my skin. "How did you—you're not opening the... oh. It's a balcony?" I was finally able to look beyond my reflection and into the night that was nearly pitch black in comparison to the lights from the cruise. Specifically those in Leroy's room.

He laughed, nodding at the rattan lounger closest to me whilst filling the other. There was a bag of something between us on the tiniest coffee table I'd ever seen and upon closer inspection, I was able to confirm their identity. Lotus chips.

It was funny how Leroy whipped out a saltshaker next and opened the bag of chips. I soon realized that the saltshaker was a lie and that it was really cayenne pepper inside. Exactly how he liked his lotus chips back then.

And even now.

He held out the bag, shaking it in my face. Gingerly, I took one before going back to sipping my chamomile tea. The silence wasn't unbearable. Coupled with the floral fragrance of the warm beverage in my hands and the mellow notes in the air, resembling that of an autumn breeze, I felt almost at peace. Only the knowledge of a companion by my side remained at the forefront of my concerns. Not just any companion, I suppose.

Perhaps that was it, then. It was precisely because he mattered the most.

And as I reached for another lotus chip from the bag between us, the loudest crack, followed by a resounding boom erupted in the sky and lit up the entire darkness in a bright orange spark. It had, in that instance, illuminated the canopy of the forest across the river and reflected its light in the water below.

"Fireworks?" I turned to him at once, hearing the disapproval in my voice. "Was this... did you—I mean, the school must have... I suppose it's our last night."

"The student union said they were having a show at the beach," he glanced sideways, flashing a smile that I couldn't quite put my finger on. "Something about it looking nice over the river."

"So it's a display... well I hope it doesn't last too long," I watched the flowers burst into sparks at the peak of its trajectory, feeling the soundwave only moments after it did. Ah, the delay. "These things are harmful to the environment. They scare the animals in the forest nearby and create a lot of ash during prolonged shows. The school should look into this."

I could feel it hitting me straight in the chest; a loud, thunderous boom. And before I knew it, I was anticipating the next. That unworldly moment between the sparks and the boom. A sound; a feeling so oddly... oddly addictive.

"Really?" Leroy didn't seem to know, colours reflected in his eyes. They were blinding. A blur of lights going off against a dark canvas and falling off, disappearing into nothing. "Yeah. I guess they are loud."

"Very," I went on to explain. "Imagine you, a harmless hare, trying to live your life somewhere among the trees and your sensitive ears pick up a hundred-and-fifty decibels, much louder than a peaking thunderclap. Unimaginable! They must be so frightened."

My companion laughed.

"Are you?" He tilted his head, turning to stare at an angle that made the candle in his eyes brighter than the fireworks in the sky. "Scared."

It was in that moment that everything became oddly muted and dull; as though the night had decided to descend upon the world with a hush and it was very, very long.

Almost—forever.

"What an unusual question," I managed only after a while, unable to return his gaze. "Loud sounds... well, naturally, we, as human beings, react to it as well. It's instinct, isn't it? To be startled by a soundwave hitting you square in the chest. So maybe yes, I might be startled on instinct, but, mm... surely not after I get used to it."

I'd given my most rational and sound reasoning, put this forth as confidently as I could before noting that he'd returned to watching the sparks go off in the sky above. Quiet.

I followed his gaze, counting the number of seconds it took for us to hear the boom with the intention of calculating the distance between us and the average point of explosion but then realizing that I had been stuck on the last multiplying equation for the past minute of silence. Multiplication. I was stuck on multiplication.

Indignant, I attributed my lack of concentration to the soundwaves hitting me square in the chest, knocking the breath out of my lungs every now and then depending on the impact and the strange tremor that it seemed to be causing inside me. It resembled an earthquake. Only, it was happening within.

"Leroy?"

"Mm."

I turned. "Do you think I'm... that I'm... perhaps just a little," I ended up piecing together the worst sentence ever uttered. "Or very, well... boring?"

It was weird having to wait. And though it must have taken him about a second or two to respond, it felt to me like a good, long pause of everything. I waited still. And then he sat up from the lounger and turned to me.

"Come here."

He was smiling. The lights above were highlighting the tips of his hair an autumn red. I blinked twice, rising slowly. Confused.

"Well I don't really—"

Crack.

It was the fireworks again, in the distance. I was looking at it over his shoulder that was in my face, under my nose and breathing in something else that wasn't ash. Something oddly familiar.

Boom.

There it went, hitting the chest like a blow—it's impact spreading outwards and dissipating in the form of tremors. He must be feeling it too. But perhaps a little differently, then? How warm. How oddly warm it was to be in the arms of another human being. I was so sure that body temperatures tended to average at a good thirty-six point five degrees Celsius.

Crack.

"Loud enough?" He laughed, low and quiet. I'd felt it more than heard it in my ear; although he was most definitely resting his chin somewhere below my neck. It must be fairly uncomfortable. Surely. I mean, I wasn't too sure what to make of it either. After all, I'd never received a hug from anyone other than my godfather or Miss Julie. And Giselle.

Boom.

It was then that I noticed why everything had been so odd and why the multiplication equations never added up and the final calculation was so clearly a mistake and it was all because ­the beat was off.

The lights in the sky were going off at a different rate from the impact I'd been feeling square in the chest. The latter was erratic. Incredibly fast and fearfully hard and upon listening harder, so painfully loud.

I removed myself at once. Severely embarrassed. "I-it's not what you think. That's not... "

He stared. I turned away, slipping a hand onto the left side of my chest and privately testing my hypothesis. My companion flashed an unprecedented smile.

"It's not yours," was all he said.

But I knew he was lying. After all, he must be; because right now, the hand upon my chest, was the exact same beat I was feeling before. The loud, erratic, painful—

"It's easy to impress with new flavours," he leaned in with a smile. The kind that was him stating something as though it was an objective fact all over again. With the very same, candle-straight flame in his eyes and the crunch of fallen leaves under his feet.

I rolled my eyes, knowing exactly what he would be saying next. "But to make—"

"Me like a flavour I can find everywhere else," he turned the tables with a smirk and all of a sudden, it was a little hard to see the fireworks behind him. There was no sound. "That's when you know you're good."

He closed in.

I heard it, then—finally understanding what those things in my chest were. It was the fireworks. The moment before the fiery sparks and flaming colours; the moment before the burst of light in the middle of the dark. It was the moment before the boom.

Only, it didn't feel very much like an explosion. It felt, instead, like a creak. The creak of a warm autumn afternoon; the crunch of crisp leaves, red and fiery under one's feet.

It felt, to me, like the sound of company.