One morning, assembling at a table near the counter, three airheads yell with pleasure, "Two birds in one stone!" Janet exclaimed raising her hand.
"A love letter and a bad boy!" Elissa joined.
"Time to start our game plans!?" Charissa chimed in.
Elissa arose from her seat to reach the other two's hand height, "The best action is to post this online!" She suggested, squinting her eyes with an extensive smile.
"And hand out pictures to the entire campus!" Janet added.
"And teach those bullies a lesson!" Charissa raised her other hand.
"Yeah!" Elissa and Janet raised theirs.
From a distance, this scene looks absolutely friendly and childish.
"What's wrong with them, so early in the morning?" A group of students from the table behind gossiped.
"Finally gone mad I guess."
"I think they're scheming again!"
"Ahh...Wish it was this friendly when they do it. Wonder who their prey is this time."
The Black Dirt is on the way to cleanse evil. Only, their target this time is a bit too evil. If anything, he's more of a psychopath. You won't know his next move until he does it. And no, this is not Charles we're talking about. It's Ethan. The two-faced senior. This fake sheep is going to do the most, freakish, illogical, illusionary thing anyone could ever do. Wait for that moment...
It is now lunchtime again; lunch is when everything begins. Ethan strolled towards the trio's table located at the leftmost corner of the canteen and slammed his food tray on their table.
"Eeek! It's Ethan! Our knight and shining armor!" Girls squealed.
From that slam, some of the food splattered on Janet's face. "Ah! Our prey just came to our feet!" She earnestly said, wiping the food with a blue handkerchief.
"Before we could scheme anything?" Elissa frowned thrusting Ethan's food tray.
Ethan was preoccupied with 'fake-smiling' to all the girls while giving the cold shoulder to the boys.
"I think you got the wrong idea," Ethan interrupted glaring back at the trio, still smiling. Charissa didn't even flinch.
"You mean the wrong video?" Charissa chuckled.
"Shall we talk?" Ethan said, signaling outside. "You two also," he grumbled with his smile.
The other students scrutinized the trio following Ethan. The sad part about this is, Charles wasn't there to watch this situation, or else he would've thought, 'Good for you. Now's my chance!' He could've acted like the hero of the day, saved Charissa from misfortune, and added the lines, 'Sign the contract and I'll protect you, it's a good chance for me to show off my 'future bride' that I'm willing to protect you so she'll get jealous and break off the engagement with the marriage...' blah, blah, blah. Auspiciously, those things only happen in comics.
Suppose Charissa may or may not have sent the videos to Ethan last night, threatening him to adjourn his acts --without updating Janet and Elissa--, occurred them this glorious moment.
Outdoors opposite the glass window hallways (other side of the building), Ethan pinned Charissa to the wall. Janet and Elissa were made to stand behind Ethan's lackeys who were whining in hunger.
"You b****es trying to threaten me?" He hissed.
"Where did the 'knight-and-shining-armor' go? I did some research and you were supposed to be nice to women?" Charissa collectively dodged his question.
"I don't do sh** for b****es!" he hissed again, tightly clutching Charissa's shoulder.
"B****es are female dogs." She ridiculed.
Watching this, Janet and Elissa were perspiring. "That must be painful," Elissa whispered to Janet, covering her mouth.
"Charissa is strong, we've been through worse..." Janet whispered back.
"We call meddlesome people like you b****es not women."
Charissa's expression transformed into a smug face, "Well, I tell you what," she grabbed him by his arm, "nosy people like us only tried preventing vandalization of property and bullying of innocent puppies." She twisted his arm.
Stiffening his muscles he snickered, "So, you call this justice? Are you the good guys?"
"Heh, I never said we were the good guys," she said, kicking his lower property. Ethan's face got red; his eyes got watering. He knelt on his knees holding his lower property while Charissa skipped towards Janet and Elissa like she was a pro who just bombed the enemy HQ. Once she met up with Janet and Elissa, she turned around and said, "Best beat the enemy by their weak spot! I just gave you a tiny bit of mercy you know..." She grabbed Janet and Elissa by their arms and sauntering away to the distance.
The sun had set when college lectures were over. The stars slowly peeked from the dark blue curtains of the sky, staging to dance with the snowy moon and soft clouds. Appreciating the natural beauty was a job Charissa adorned.
Walking out the gates of the campus, Janet paused to fix her glasses. She was concerned about their matters at hand and probed, "Being smug is alright, but was doing 'that' okay?"
"Sure, why not?! Best beat the enemy by their weak spot!" Elissa merrily repeated Charissa's words as she accelerated to catch up with the other two.
"We need to be careful. Beat his balls today, but who knows what he'll come up with tomorrow?" Janet gave her warning, returning to her pace.
"I only wanted to know how strong he is. Let's post that video online! No big deal! He won't bother us again." Charissa reassured in a low tone, gently patting Janet's back.
"No grand opening or ending like last time~?" Elissa whined.
"You're right! Absolutely correct! The next thing we know he'll kidnap you for testing him! Charles is okay, but this guy? We don't know him and he's a goody-two-face. You think anyone will trust us?" Janet queried, casually glancing at Charissa's arm.
"Don't be such a worry-wart... We always did this for fun, even though people gave us a cool name like 'Black Dirt'. What happened to all that 'two birds in one stone' deal?" Charissa frowned. Her hand was trembling a little. It's barely visible, but Janet noticed.
"Don't hide it! I know you got hurt. It's more painful than it seems am I right?" Janet finally spoke out.
Elissa stopped where she was, "Y-you got hurt? Show me your ar- I mean shoulder!" She stuttered rushing to Charissa. She stood on her toes and deliberately moved Charissa's collar to view her shoulder. There it was, Janet's guess. Her shoulder has gotten red and swollen.
Elissa's eyes widened, "just how hard did he--" she swallowed back her words. She clenched her fist and barely managed to smack Charissa's head, "idiot." she muttered.
"What?" Charissa said rubbing her head.
"Don't do things that put my height at a disadvantage for me!" she shouted in Charissa's ear. Her voice is high-pitched and tiny. She's only 156 cm tall, yet she looks like a tiny doll compared to Janet and Charissa, Cute.
It didn't end there of course. The next day, a video of Ethan's bullying went viral. He couldn't show his face anywhere; people would criticize him. A lot of the girls swarming over him began to give him the cold shoulder. And with every minute that passed by, his rage worsened. In the afternoon (after lunch), Ethan spotted Charissa rambling into her lecture room. He stomped his way after her and pinned her to the wall next to the door. Alas, the professor hadn't arrived yet. Students packed around the two for the big incident that was about to transpire.
Ethan was steaming with anger; his face as red as a tomato. You could even see his nerves ready to explode at a given instant. Charissa, on the other hand, was calm. She inhaled a deep breath and firmly inspected Ethan's face before she burst into laughter,
"Hahaha..." She cackled.
Ethan's heart skipped a beat while staring at her face, 'huh?' he pondered.
"Look at your face! You look like you'll blow up at any second now!" She giggled. "I didn't expect this kind of reaction. I was hoping for more frustration." She smiled, wiping the tears that welled in her eyes. His heart skipped a beat again.
'This isn't right,' he insisted to himself.
"Yo! You gonna speak?" Charissa tilted her head. She figured something was wrong with him. She lifted her hands and tried to push him. It worked. Ethan was spacing out.
"Did the shock kick in?" She scoffed, "Did you realize your misconduct?"
Everyone gaped at one another, "What's going on?"
"I thought he was going to punch her?"
"Date me!" Ethan's mouth moved on its own.
"Huh? What?" Charissa's eyes narrowed.
"I said, date me!" he shouted again. His brain trying to digest his words.
Suddenly, silence hit its peak. Charles advanced among the crowd, yelling, "Hold up!?"
Charissa immediately recognized his voice. The rest of the students gasped and prattled, "It was the first time Ethan asked a girl to date him!"
Charles felt doomed; he put his hand on his head, Charissa was confused and Ethan seemed dead serious.
He came closer to Charissa and held her face, squeezing it, "Date me and I'll let you go." he declared.
Charissa wanted to reject the idea, but she couldn't speak. He was squeezing her too tight.
"I'll take your silence as a yes." He interpreted on his own.
Charles quickly snuck out from the crowd. He saw Ethan squeezing Charissa, Part of him wanted to laugh, but at the moment he needed to secure his place. "No!" He bawled coming in between Charissa and Ethan, "Sorry I took so long, but she's my girlfriend!" He announced.
Ethan backed off; letting space enter. Charles faced Charissa and pinched her cheeks, mouthing 'You owe me one.' Charissa made a bitter expression.
"I-is he telling the truth?" Ethan asked peeking over Charles's shoulder.
"Yeah! You got a problem?" She affirmed confirmation.
All the students including Ethan were shaken.
"What are you students doing?" The professor asked, finally appearing at the scene while pushing the crowd aside.
"I'll let you go for now..." Ethan warned Charissa and took his leave before getting caught in trouble.
"You could've come a bit earlier and I wouldn't be in either of these messes," Charissa muttered revising the whole scenario in her head. She was talking about the professor.
She and Charles both let out a sigh. And took their leave for their lectures.