"WHAT WERE YOU THINKING?! WHAT'S WRONG WITH ALL OF YOU?! I'M SO TIRED OF YOUR NONSENSE!" President Fujimoto-san's yelling at us—and she has the right to do it, considering what happened.
"But they started it," replies Izumi Natsumura. "And everything is Hanna-san's fault," and she may be right.
Everything started at:
2:30
The bell rang, and class was over.
I, as always, put my pens, pencils, erasers, etcetera, in my pencil box, and I put my pencil box in its respective place in my backpack; then I closed the book and notebook that I had on my desks and put them in their respective place in my backpack; and lastly I checked I wasn't forgetting anything in my desk.
No, I wasn't.
I zipped my backpack, then, put it over my shoulder and was about to go to the library when Izumi Natsumura got in my classroom. All my classmates glare at her and started to chit chat. Izumi Natsumura walked through our desks. She seemed agitated.
"Hi, Izumi Natsumura," I told her when she passed by my side and bowed correspondingly. But she kept going without even looking at me—and that had never happened to me before, so I figured out something strange was definitely going on—she then stopped in front of a girl called Yuri Okabe—a very popular girl, according to everyone.
"Yuri Okabe," said Izumi Natsumura, "can we talk a little bit?"
"Uhm… sure," Yuri Okabe said out of courtesy instead of desire.
"Izumi Natsumura, everything ok?" I approached Izumi Natsumura and put my hand by her shoulder. She then stared at me very confused. "What you doing here, Hanna-san?… Hanna-san?!" Now she seemed very scared. "What you doing here?! Did you followed me?! Go, go, go, go to the library, come on; I'll see you later," Izumi Natsumura started pushing me to the exit—and, considering I'm very thin and, that was an easy job.
"Uhm… this is my classroom," I replied.
"Really?" Izumi Natsumura looked a little surprised—even when I had told her already a couple hours ago. "Well, whatever, just go, go, go," she kept pushing me to the exit. And we were half way through already; "I gotta speak to Yuri Okabe."
"You want to recruit her?" I asked.
Izumi Natsumura immediately stopped pushing me and put her hand over my mouth.
"Shut up, shut up, shut up," she whispered at me, and then turned towards Yuri Okabe. "I'll be with you right away. Just a sec," and she turned towards me and pushed me so hard I backstepped a couple times. "Just go, Hanna-san."
"You sure?" I asked.
"Yeah, yeah, sure. Just go."
Everyone's watching us. Even there's some students watching trough the classroom's windows.
"Uhm… ok," I said and went to the library.
Everyone stopped watching me.
"Izumi Natsumura," I thought as I walked, "she was definitely acting weird. Why didn't she wanted me to help her recruit Yuri Okabe? It'd be easier to convince her between us two. But maybe she didn't want me to ruin it, considering she destroyed two of my three proposals. But why didn't she used the third one, then? Maybe because Yuri Okabe's not like me—I mean, she's popular. But the main thing here is that Yuri Okabe can be the member we need, and Izumi Natsumura may need some help to recruit her."
So now I ran tell everything to Ino Yamamoto and Hamano-san.
2:42
They were in a study room with another girl. She was small and quiet and was reading a book bigger than her head.
Normally I would have presented myself, but there was no time for that.
"Hey," I told them, "Izumi Natsumura's recruiting Yuri Okabe."
Hamano-san immediately got up from her seat.
"SHE'S DOING WHAT?!" she yelled—even though we were at a library—she got out od the study room and walked to the exit. "NO, NO, NO, NO, NO, WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU DOING, IZUMI-SAN?!"
Ino Yamamoto and I stared at each other confused and followed Hamano-san.
She was walking so fast we had to run a little in order to reach her.
"Stop, Sotoka-san," cried Ino Yamamoto more than once.
Hamano-san wasn't stopping, though, but the distance between us wasn't that big anymore, so we only had to keep up with her.
"Hey, why the rush?" asks Ino Yamamoto. "Yuri Okabe'll never want to be in our club.
"I hope so," says Hamano-san.
Ino Yamamoto and I stared at each other confused.
"So, why the rush?" Insisted Ino Yamamoto.
"Because if she gets in I get out," declared Hamano-san.
"WHAT?! WHY?!" Ino Yamamoto yelled. "You hate Yuri Okabe or what?"
"No, but if she gets in, so will everyone."
"Well, yeah, you got a point there. Follow the queen, right?" Ino Yamamoto said with a little disdain.
"Uhmmm… and what's wrong about that?" I dared to ask.
Hamano-san stopped—maybe I shouldn't have asked.
��Because I don't want all of them to bother me with their 'Hamano-san, can I sit next to you?', 'Hamano-san, can we walk home together?', 'Hamano-san, what you doing after?', 'Hamano-san, wanna study together?', 'Hamano-san, wanna grab some coffee or something?', 'Hamano-san, I'll hang out with some friends at my place. Wanna come?' I'm sick of it; that's why I left all the other clubs," Hamano-san started walking again, but even faster now. "God dammit, Izumi. Why you're doing this to me?"
Ino Yamamoto and I followed her.
"Ino Yamamoto," I said.
"Anju Khana," Ino Yamamoto said.
"Khanna-san's fine," I said.
"Ino Yamamoto's fine," she replied.
"Uhm… ok. What's happening?" I asked.
"What's happening of what?" she asks.
"Of this, I mean."
"Nothing."
"Nothing? Why are we running, then?"
"Oh, you're talking about that," she replies—I mean, what else could I be talking about? "Do you think I know?"
"Um… yeah. That's why I'm asking you," Ino Yamamoto's so weird sometimes.
"Well, I don't know," she replied, "but nothing good will come out of this."
"Why you say so?" I ask.
"Because nothing good ever comes out of Izumi's ideas. Believe me," she replied.
Well, that's statistically impossible, but this day has been so weird I guess I have to believe you for now.
2:45
We arrived to 1-3. But no one was there.
Hamano-san immediately turned around and left. Ino Yamamoto and I followed her.
"Where we going?" I asked to Ino Yamamoto.
"To the soccer fields, maybe,"
"Why?" I asked, but honestly I was getting tired of asking and receiving no answers or unsatisfactory ones."
"Yuri Okabe's in the soccer team."
"That's like a club, right? Is she already in a club? Why does Izumi Natsumura wants her to join, then? And how is she going to recruit her if she's already in a club?"
Ino Yamamoto shrugged.
"What do I know? Nothing Izumi does makes any sense."
"No, it should have; everything has a reason, there's always a reason for everything."
Ino Yamamoto smiled.
"So you don't know Izumi for sure."
"Well, yeah, I don't, I just met her today, and we barely spoke, but why do you say so?"
Ino Yamamoto smiled at me and said nothing.
"Why don't you say something? Answer me; I'm so confused right now. Anything makes sense. Is this how the club is on a regular basis?"
"Yeah, a little bit. But don't worry. I'm confused to," Ino Yamamoto replied. "The only thing I know is, as I said, nothing good ever comes out of any of Izumi's ideas."
And that was it. Given the circumstances I just kept silent and hoped Ino Yamamoto was wrong.
But she wasn't.
She sure wasn't.
2:53
As Ino Yamamoto said, we went to the soccer fields. There was a lot of people there, but nobody was training. They all were gathered in little groups and they were apparently talking about something very serious.
"THERE THEY ARE!" Someone yelled, and everyone turned towards us and started running in our direction. We, obviously, turned back and ran away as fast as we could—even though that wouldn't be very helpful because 1) they were athletes in perfect shape, and 2) we (or me, at least) are far, far from that.
So they reached us immediately and surrounded us.
"What are you doing here?!" Yelled one of those girls. "Wanna steal someone else?!"
"WAIT, WHAT?!" Hamano-san asked/yelled. "IZUMI-SAN WAS HERE?! YURI OKABE…!"
"Left the team because of you? Yes, yes, she did. Thanks a lot, btw."
Wait, so Izumi Natsumura convinced Yuri Okabe to leave the soccer team to join us? Wow, it seems Izumi Natsumura's incredibly good at this recruiting thing—but, if that's true, then why hasn't she got any new members before? Or maybe she did, but rejected them throughout last week, and if that's so she can reject me too, so I need to do everything I can to not let this happen, I need to be 100% involved in every activity we do and support every decision we make, but I don't think that'll be hard to follow; I mean, we only need one new member, right, Hamano-san? Ino Yama—
They were already fighting.
"SHUT UP, SHUT UP, SHUT UP!" Hamano-san was yelling one of those girls while she scraped her and pulled her hair.
"LEAVE HER ALONE, YOU WHORE!" another girl took Hamano-san by the braid and pulled it as hard as she could.
Hamano turned to her and pounced on her.
"HEY, STOP IT, YOU FUCKING WHORE!" Yelled some other girls who started to kick her.
"HEY, LEAVE HER ALONE, YOU FUCKING BITCHES!" Ino Yamamoto clinged to someone's back and started pulling her hair and choking her.
And it was my fight, too—even though 1) I didn't understand why we were fighting; 2) there was no way we could win; 3) there were better ways to solve that conflict, and 4) getting involved will only end in pain. If I didn't, maybe Izumi Natsumura will kick me out of the club, and the chances of finding another club like this one are almost zero. And maybe everything was my fault; maybe if I hadn't talked with Izumi Natsumura when we went to my classroom, I wouldn't have found she wanted to recruit Yuri Okabe, and I wouldn't have said anything to Hamano-san and Ino Yamamoto, and Hamano-san wouldn't have looked for Izumi Natsumura and etcetera, etcetera, etcetera.
Maybe I needed to make amends; the ANIME LIFE club had been so nice to me—they let me join their club without even knowing me. But I had nothing to do with that fight; I didn't even know why they started fighting. Maybe the best thing I could do was to tell a teacher or—
And, out of nowhere, someone pushed me and I fell to the ground. Then a lot of people gathered around me and started kicking me and trampling me.
"HEY, GET AWAY FROM MY SOTOKA-CHAN!" Someone who I didn't recognize at first yelled, until she fell to the floor a few seconds later, and they started to kick her. She was Izumi Natsumura.
"I'VE TOLD YOU TO GO TO THE LIBRARY!" She yelled at me when she saw me.
She also yelled several times: "Kami-sama-chan, tasukete kudasai." But I don't know what that means.
"LEAVE THEM ALONE; IT'S NOT THEIR FAULT!" Yelled someone else, but I didn't know who.
"STOP PROTECTING THEM, YURI-CHAN!" Yelled another person.
"I SAID LEAVE THEM ALONE!"
"HEY, HEY, HEY, STOP IT!" Yelled a new person. Judging the sound of his voice and the fat the girls immediately stopped kicking me, I can assume this new person was the P.E. instructor, Kobayashi-sensei.