“When you come home later, you’ll tell us about that girl, right?”
“It’s nothing special. I’ll be going!”
I fled to the garage, got in the driver’s seat, put the container with the roughly made sandwich on the passenger seat, and started the engine. Then I was about to go to where Liam’s trailer was, but on a whim I tried calling Virgil. He did answer the phone, but he was cold, saying that starting today he’d take the school bus so I didn’t need to come pick him up.
After finishing the unpleasant call, I turned my head to eat the sandwich. That sandwich didn’t look appetizing to begin with, but perhaps because of the call I just had, it looked even more unappetizing.
My mood, which had hit rock bottom, improved a little after meeting Liam, who was smiling brightly as if something good had happened.
“Hey.”
Liam, who was boarding the passenger seat radiating bright energy, discovered the sandwich that was already occupying that spot and looked confused. I asked for his understanding, then held out the plastic container to him and asked if he’d like to take a sandwich if he was up for it.
“However, I can’t guarantee the taste. Though it didn’t seem spoiled.”
“As long as it’s not spoiled, it’s fine.”
Liam sat in the passenger seat and took a bite of the sandwich. Then, the more he chewed the food, the more he showed an expression of sinking into a swamp.
“……It has a very interesting taste.”
Liam said cautiously, looking inside the sandwich. Interesting taste. That’s probably the most polite way to say it tastes bad.
“What’s this food called?”
“Rowan sandwich. Rowan burrito. Rowan dumpling. Whatever you like.”
“Aha.”
Liam, belatedly grasping the food’s identity, asked with a mischievous face how to make a ‘Rowan sandwich.’
“You take any leftover food and put it roughly into any cooked dough. And then you eat it however.”
“You’re even telling me how to eat it. How kind.”
I nodded toward Liam and ate the remaining sandwich. It really tasted bad, but there was one good thing about it.
“I think it tastes better than our school cafeteria food.”
“I agree with that opinion.”
Thanks to that, I ate breakfast for the first time in a while, Liam said, and then threw out an incredible question.
“You like Leda, right?”
“What?”
“She has so many good points, but I’m curious. What do you think is good about her?”
I was flustered by the sudden question, but it seemed like lying wouldn’t work on a guy who already seemed to know everything.
“……I saw her perform last year.”
Since that day, the image of Leda I saw on stage hadn’t been erased from my mind, and as I kept thinking about it, I naturally started watching her at school too. When I got that far, Liam quietly nodded.
“I think I liked how confident she was in any situation. Even when a big guy like Aiden came to threaten or intimidate her, even when kids gossiped with baseless rumors behind her back. Also……”
“Yeah.”
“Like you said, she seems like someone with a lot of good points. In fact, it’s ridiculous that someone like me likes her. Someone like you suits her, not someone like me.”
“……Is there really a set person who suits whom?”
Liam asked, looking out the window, in a voice that didn’t convey any particular emotion. I answered that I wasn’t sure.
“Still, you and Leda are…… I don’t know. At least kids don’t call you guys losers or pathetic.”
“That’s……!”
“I’m just eating food my grandfather liked when he was alive, but I get told I’m eating garbage…… No, wait. I went on too long. We might be late, so from now on I’ll focus on driving.”
The ‘from now on I’ll focus on driving’ was just an excuse, and in fact it meant I didn’t want to talk anymore. Liam seemed to have noticed my intention too, as he looked at the car floor with his spirits completely deflated.
“Sorry. If only I hadn’t asked weird questions.”
When the car arrived in front of the school, Liam hesitantly offered an apology. I told him it was okay and just as I got out of the car, I got hit in the head by a football that flew from somewhere. Who was it? Aiden? Blair? Hazel? Whoever it was, it must be one of those Rangers shitheads.
“Oh…… sorry! I was just trying to say hi.”
The guy who threw the ball at me was Rangers—that part was right—but not a shithead.
Nathan.
He seemed to have accidentally thrown the ball wrong and hit my head.
“Are you really a football player? How can someone not throw a ball properly?”
Charlotte, who was next to Nathan, poked his chubby side with her elbow and scolded him. Then she asked me if she could apologize on behalf of Nathan’s incompetence.
“Incompetence, really. That’s harsh! I’m a lineman so I don’t have to run with the ball!”
“Your tongue is long. Anyway, let’s just say hi, Cheick Rowan. I’m Charlotte Brinda.”
Charlotte Brinda. The school’s top genius and eccentric, she’s close with both Leda and Liam but is inseparable best friends with Nathan. Her resume is more impressive than anyone else’s at school—she’s a former spelling bee champion who’s been to the White House, and she’s also proficient in mathematics, having achieved impressive results at USAMO. So she almost got the opportunity to compete in the International Mathematical Olympiad as a national representative, but due to a simple whim—I don’t know the detailed reason—she kicked away the opportunity and left, showing remarkable behavior.
“But where did Alice go? She was just here.”
Alice Miller. A kid who goes to the same ballet academy as Leda, she was originally best friends with Olivia, but one day they suddenly fell to the state of being desperate to badmouth each other whenever they met.
“Alice? Didn’t she go somewhere because of him?”
The ‘him’ Charlotte pointed to was Liam.
“She’s kind of weird. Leda was the one who broke up with Liam, but she acts like she was the one who broke up. But Leda herself seems completely fine.”
“In this case, there are two interpretations. Either Alice is one heart and body with Leda, or she likes Liam.”
“I understand the former, but how did you come up with the latter interpretation?”
At Charlotte’s question, Nathan clicked his tongue, calling her a pseudo-genius.
“Your brain doesn’t work in this area, genius. Alice only reacted sensitively to him in front of Leda after he and Leda broke up.”
“So how is that related to your stupid interpretation?”
Just as Nathan and Charlotte started bickering, Liam tried to leave first with an awkward smile. In the middle of that, Leda appeared, bringing along Sophia and Alice.
“What are you all doing here?”
At Leda’s question, Nathan said they were looking for Alice, and Alice asked back why they were looking for her while glaring fiercely at Liam.
“We should at least say hi to the new member of our club.”
Nathan, who had no sense, looked at Alice and encouraged her to greet me. As soon as she saw me, she completely withdrew her cold expression and showed a friendly smile.
“I’m Alice Miller. I know about you, so there’s no need to explain. Quite a few of my friends talk about you.”
“Really?”
“You have gloomy aspects but you’re tolerable, they say that a lot. Why, you know how guys like you become cute when they’re in a relationship.”
The only one who laughed loudly saying “doctor’s here” at Alice’s remark was Leda. Alice also laughed with her, then glared at Liam and left, taking along the group—Leda and Sophia—who didn’t seem to have any intention of moving.
“She seems to like you. She doesn’t talk at all to kids she doesn’t like.”
Charlotte said to me, watching Alice moving away.
“Ah.”
“The club Nathan mentioned doesn’t even exist, but anyway, nice to meet you.”
Charlotte said that and disappeared with Nathan. Looking around the now empty surroundings, Liam apologized once more about what happened when we were in the car, and I told him not to worry about it and walked toward the campus.
With each step I took, the campus got closer, but somehow Liam’s presence seemed to be getting farther away, so I turned around. He was standing far away, just watching me blankly. So I wondered whether I should just go first, but thinking there was nothing to lose by asking once, I approached Liam.
“Class seems like it’s about to start.”
“Ah, right.”
Liam showed a slightly hesitant look, then walked beside me with a more relaxed appearance. Seeing that made me think it was good that I spoke to him.
And sometime later at lunch, trouble broke out. Was it because I went to the cafeteria to meet Virgil, leaving behind Nathan’s advice that if you’re a ‘club’ member, you should eat lunch on the lawn by the campus fountain?
Virgil couldn’t even be found in the cafeteria, which I visited after also rebuffing the goodwill of my new friends. Having no choice, I sat alone in an inconspicuous spot and ate lunch, when at some point round cheese balls started flying one by one and hitting my head.
At first, I tried to just ignore it. It was just cheese balls after all. It’s not like they stick to your hair. However, as what was thrown at my head changed to mashed potato or ragu sauce and the like, it became a level of pranking that was difficult to let slide anymore.
The guys pulling off this utterly childish prank were the football team idiots led by Aiden.
“…Is that a new style? Looks great.”
Mocking my hair with white and red food stuck here and there, Aiden said.
“Doing this won’t make Olivia your girlfriend again. If I were her, I’d be embarrassed to date someone who’s already a high schooler but still does food fights.”
As soon as Aiden heard my words, he approached threateningly as if he’d hit me, but I intentionally moved toward where Olivia and her friends were. Olivia pretended to talk with her friends while watching Aiden, and that was enough to make him hesitate.
Taking advantage of Aiden’s distraction, I grabbed my lunch box with most of its contents uneaten and left the cafeteria. And in the hallway lined with lockers, I ran into Liam eating a chocolate bar.
“Is that dessert? Or lunch?”
“Lunch. But what’s with your hair?”
Liam frowned slightly and asked, seeing my hair caked with food.
“I heard it’s a trendy style at thug salons these days.”
“…Aiden did that.”
Liam seemed ready to go confront Aiden right away, but I stopped him.
“Are you ending lunch with a chocolate bar because you lost your appetite from what you ate this morning?”
“No. Honestly, I eat everything except moldy food.”
Liam said, taking a big bite of his chocolate bar. Did he sell his meal ticket again? As that judgment occurred to me, I noticed the lunch box in my hand.
“Hey.”
“You know my name, don’t you.”
“Liam.”
