Micheal Urada
"That Fucking Bitch!"
I heard a loud familiar voice sound resound across the Flamingos as soon as I entered through its oak door. Flamingos was usually a place filled with etiquette, but there were times like these where some of the customers here acted out in a heated way. And one such customer here happened to belong to my group of friends.
I looked back to Sephtis, who walked in after me. We knew who that voice belonged to. There was no need for words to confirm anything. We just exchanged a silent look, and then I let him take the lead as we went towards the source of that voice, To the table where our group sat.
And just as we expected, there sat Karen, fuming as she spoke in a rapid incomparable manner to the three people who sat quietly around her. She seemed to be in the middle of a story, animatedly talking about events that made no sense to me. And I wondered if it did to the other three. Maria was sitting closest to Karen nodding her head at what she said. But I knew my sister well enough to know that she didn't like participating in any sort of heated conversation. She was probably just indulging Karen.
Then there was Siesta, stoic as usual, sitting on the other side of Karen. Opposite them sat Charles, clearly not interested in the conversation. In fact, as soon as he spotted Sephtis and me approaching the table, his face lit up as if he had just found his savior. Which, considering that Sephtis was there, he had.
The others also soon spotted us and had a similar reaction, except for Karen, who was still very much engrossed in her own venting.
"I was so nice to her, too! And then pulled that cocky attitude on me like I was some fucking nobody! Just cause she is Agustine! I was going to be even nicer to-"
"Agustine? Do I hear someone mention my Sister?" Sephtis spoke in a loud overly-dramatic voice.
That got Karen to stop abruptly. Her head snapped towards us, her eyes widening as she looked towards us. Or, more precisely, towards Sephtis. Right now, he was the only one in her eyes.
"Is it-Did your sister enroll here?" Karen stuttered as she spoke in a low voice, an apologetic look already crossing her face.
"Nopes. My sister is fine and dandy in the Clan Household." Sephtis spoke like it was the most obvious thing in the world.
Karen immediately looked relieved, and beside her, I could see the others also looking a bit happier.
"Well, what happened, Karen? What made you lose your Five-Day Streak?" Sephtis asked as he plopped himself down on his chair.
At the same time, I saw Charles quietly sneak away towards the counter. Siesta and Maria, also slipped away almost immediately, looking glad to be finally free. Usually, I would have followed them, but the mention of an Agustine made me stay. Cause lately I had started to know more about a female underclass Agustine. And judging by what Karen had said, it was most likely her that she was talking about.
And then she began pilling on all the information she knew about Mysa Agustine, which sounded nothing like the person I had met.
I should've expected that. Of course, Karen would exaggerate things. Arrogant, bitchy, and whatnot did Karen say negatively about her. I gradually grew less interested and just uncomfortable after listening to Karen. From the gist of it, though. They hadn't even interacted much, but of course, if anyone started talking logic to Karen in this state, they would just end up getting socked. That was a lesson that I had learned from watching Charles's painful example.
"Well, kudos to you for not starting up a fight!" Sephtis chirped after Karen paused in the middle of her rant.
"Damn right it is..." Karen grumbled back quietly.
"Yeah, that newfound level of maturity deserves a drink!" Sephtis spoke as he turned on his seat and shouted out to Charles, who was standing near the counter with Seista and my sister, for two strawberry shakes.
"Pffftttt!-" Karen immediately burst out laughing like she was releasing all the air out of her lungs. I was the same too. Almost choking on air with the sudden laughter overtaking my body. The weird antics of Seohtis were just too much, man. Plus, the sudden annoyed look that crossed Charles's face was just priceless!
I suppose seeing Karen like that must have reassured the girls that everything was fine now cause the next thing I knew, Maira and Siesta were walking back to their seats. Behind them, I saw Charles frowning as he turned his back towards us, probably going over to order the strawberry shakes.
When Maria came back and seated herself, she tactfully brought up another topic, and soon the topic of conversation strayed away from Mysa Agustine. Well, at least until Charles came back with two glasses of Strawberry milkshake, one he gave to Karen and the other he almost 'accidentally' dropped on Sephtis.
And then, as soon as he had also seated himself, he brought back the topic of Mysa."You know, it was very disrespectful what she did. If we had done such stuff to our seniors, we would've gotten set straight in under a minute. That's just.."
Charles went on, and Karen enthusiastically nodded along and then it quickly became awkward for me as the talk dissolved into back bitching about Mysa. I felt a queezy feeling from the bottom of my chest as Charles turned to me to see what I had to say about it and all I could manage was just a silent nod. Thankfully that was enough, and Charles and Karen continued their discussion while getting a bit of opinion from around the table.
I quietly listened and laughed as Sephtis gave weird answers to Charles's rhetorical questions, but all the while, I couldn't help but feel a slight weight on my chest as I kept thinking about her.
********
I lightly jogged across the pavement. Although I couldn't feel any improvement in my stamina, after a week of this evening run schedule, I had at least managed to find a pace I was comfortable at. That pace might be a tad bit too slow, but that doesn't matter. All that matters is that I don't end up in that pathetic state like last week.
Currently, according to my calculations, it was about 7 pm. So I was waiting in anticipation, almost slowing down to a walk, as I looked all over my surroundings.
There were lanterns lined alongside the pathways, each one situated about a few feet ahead of the other. But the thing was that some of them were out of commission, plus the lanterns weren't that bright either, leaving a person with just enough light on a moonless night to make out the path.
Very sloppy of the school. But honestly, it felt strangely comforting to me. Knowing that I was hidden away from the prying eyes. It somehow made me more calm and confident. That is one of the reasons I started my run routine across this path, cause I knew that in the evening, not many people passed by from here. Being seen by any other person was one of my pet peeves when I started to think of running.
How ironic.... that the reason I continued running past day one is just so that I can see another person. Life is just weird that way.
"Ahh, were you waiting for long?" A sweet voice suddenly crept up behind me, sending shivers down my spine.
"No!" I responded at once, quickly spinning on my heels to properly greet the fairy who had just shown up.
"Nah, I didn't wait. I mean, I was just running like usual. Nice to meet you!" I spoke internally cringing at every word that escaped my mouth. Oh god, I hate myself so much.
"It's good to see you too, Micheal." Mysa spoke with her trademark polite smile.
God, my name sounds so beautiful.
After running into Mysa every day for the past week, I think I had made some fortunate discoveries. Mysa always went for a run at about 7 pm and, unlike me who only covers the little area around the northeast side, she ran the whole length of the school campus grounds, so that meant in the one-hour running routine I had just two opportunities to encounter her. The first was at about 7pm when she has just started her first round across the school campus, and then the second opportunity came at about 7:30 when she was on her second round.
And in these two instances, we would often exchange snippets of conversation. Unfortunately, sometimes we just exchanged greetings in these time frames. And being the nervous mess that I am, I would never be able to initiate or lengthen the conversation. Heck, I don't even know the proper way of addressing her yet, so I have never even called her by her name.
But I can figure that out later, hopefully. Right now, I had a topic that I had been thinking to bring up this entire evening.
"Hey, Your class had their first combat class, right? Anything interesting happened?" I started off the topic in a vague tone.
"Not really. It was pretty normal. Oh yeah, there were also some seniors there, did you hear anything from them?" Mysa spoke casually.
"Yeah, Actually my friends also volunteered to teach in the combat class. They say it was pretty tense." I thought I had managed to keep my inquisitive look in check, but Mysa must have figured out that I wanted to know more about this. Cause the next moment, she sighed and began talking in a slightly troubled tone.
"They might be right. There was some trouble between some year 1 and year 2 students, thankfully, before matters escalated to more than just words, I managed to sort the situation out. I think everyone was a bit tense with each other after that."
"Ahhh, So that's what happened." I exclaimed in relief.
So the year 1 student felt stifled by the presence of the seniors and then Mysa stood up for them. Karen must have mistaken that protective nature for arrogance.
"Yeah, I figured something like that must have happened. I think one of my friends misunderstood you a bit, I do apologize for that." I said, trying my best to shine a polite smile. Although after remembering all the things Karen had said, I don't think just an apology would suffice.
" 'Misunderstood, me?' In what way exactly?" Mysa said those words with the same casual tone, but cold sweat broke on my back.
"Huh, just.. they thought you were the dictator of the year 1 or something?" I tried my best to recall and mentioned one of the nicer things Karen had mentioned about Mysa.
"I do lead my classmates, But I won't call myself a dictator." Thankfully Mysa took it in a good way and replied with a light chuckle.
"Yeah, Yeah of course. You look so nice after al-You look like such a good-natured person. There were just some rumors about some fight on the day of the Entrance ceremony." Since we had gotten talking I thought to drag it a bit longer.
"It wasn't a fight It was a duel. I felt like I had to prove myself, so I just dueled some students, fair and square." Mysa spoke with a determined gaze.
That much was to be expected, after all, she was someone from the Royal Family. I was even more impressed with seeing her prideful and determined nature.
"You know, people sometimes just take a glimpse and arrive at their own conclusion." I spoke, expressing my support.
"Sounds Smart." Mysa spoke. And after that, the conversation came to an end, and she went off to run.
As for me, I was very satisfied with the way the conversation had gone, I even started daydreaming about us just talking casually the next time we meet. I wonder if I could be considered her friend.
With those thoughts in my mind, I went and sat near a tree to wait until half an hour would pass and then I would 'run' into her once again.