Chapter three, 2017, shards, segment four

“Did you get the last ones?”

Yukio grimaced and shook his head. Jeniferu had made collecting data about anything concerning the freshmen a breeze. With most of their friends juniors the second years were covered as well, but a lot of seniors still resented them.

“Can’t be helped then,” Kyoko said. “We’ve still got six of their classes and most of the clubs.”

“And?” Yukio looked at his girlfriend, but he already knew, or at least guessed the answer.

Kyoko smirked. “It’s as Urufu said. Traditional Japanese food. Displays about Japan and even a couple of old plays. Nothing foreign will be part of the cultural festival.”

Noriko’s hand grabbed his shoulder and Yukio felt Urufu’s girlfriend shaking with laughter. When he turned around he saw how her other hand grabbed Kyoko’s just as tightly.

“What is it?” he wondered when she wouldn’t stop.

Finger dug deeper into his shoulder. “Urufu, you wonderful moron!”

“Huh?”

Noriko’s laughter subsided into a wide grin. “Kareyoshi’s just as ignorant of history as Urufu said. Look here!” she said, let go of his shoulder and bent between him and Kyoko. When she reached the table she placed her hand on the section for food stalls.

Yukio looked at where Noriko pointed. “And?”

“Yukio, really!” Noriko giggled and stabbed her index finger at two stalls. “Ramen and tempura.”

That ramen was a rather recent introduction from the mainland was hardly unknown, but tempura? Still, it wasn’t exactly enough to warrant Noriko’s level of hilarity. “What else?”

Noriko squeezed herself between them, but when Kyoko shot her an angry glare she backed away and returned to the other side of the table. “Sorry,” she said.

Kyoko nodded consent and it was as if the girls had never clashed at all just moments earlier.

Noriko spread out the papers and showed entry after entry where Kareyoshi’s ideas of a pure Japan showcased something imported.

“He’s so clueless it’s funny.” Then Noriko’s face grew sombre. “And now for the not so funny part.” She opened her bag and dropped another paper onto the table.

Yukio read it and shook his head. “Morons!”

That outburst had James turn his head from behind the counter. Yukio used it as an opportunity to order another round. Something hot this time. Autumn came early this year and the asthmatic air-conditioner no longer had any problems keeping the temperature at check.

“Can’t say I’m surprised,” Kyoko noted when she was finished reading the single page Noriko had added. “Micromanagement is bound to fail, but I’m not surprised.”

“They really never took note of Urufu at all, did they?”

Yukio looked at Noriko. She might be starstruck but she wasn’t an idiot. “I don’t think they could understand. Took us long enough, and we see him almost every day.”

“But still. The student council assigning individual tasks?”

“That’s just Kareyoshi being so scared of losing control he’s shitting his pants.”

Around them club members laughed at the vulgar outburst – the freshmen not until Irishima High’s vice principal guffawed. Yukio wasn’t sure if that was a good sign or not.

Then the older man rose from his chair, pushed his spectacles up the bridge of his nose and walked to their table.

“May I inquire about what merited such an, eh, spirited remark earlier?” he said when he arrived at their table.

Yukio watched as Noriko wordlessly handed over a stack of pages. Vice Principal Noguchi, because in difference from Kareyoshi he did deserve both titles and honorifics, read them in silence and smirked when he came to the end.

“Funny,” he began, “I thought they called us uptight as Irishima High.” Then his eyes got a sharper touch to them when he met Yukio’s stare. “Your comment on this, young man?”

Yukio dared smiling a little. Closer to two years with Urufu had built confidence he didn’t know was there to begin with. “As long as the context merely stays complicated it should work just fine,” Yukio said.

Vice Principal Noguchi scowled, but Yukio wasn’t taken aback.

“That’s also the main danger, sensei. They’re likely to be lulled into an illusion of safety and for that reason becoming less able to handle what Urufu so fondly calls ‘incoming shit from the left’.”

“Incoming shit?”

“From the left, sensei.” Yukio smiled. “That’s when complicated becomes complex. In this case it’s likely to occur shortly after we open for the public.”

I would happen earlier. Small things. Unimportant things. Things on a scale the student council could handle by burning excess energy that would be needed later. Still it wasn’t the main problem.

“Sensei, we can handle a boring cultural festival, but I’m worried there are only shards left of the meaning behind having one.”

“To promote cooperation and initiative,” Noguchi-sensei said.

“Well, this year we’ll be doing what we’re ordered to do, and taking initiative most certainly isn’t that.”

“I wonder,” Noguchi-sensei said, “why you transferred back.”

“Couldn’t leave Urufu all alone, could I?” Yukio sipped some of his lukewarm tea. That wasn’t entirely true. “Because it’s so much fun being around him, even when it isn’t. Because he makes me grow.”

“Because they are our friends,” Kyoko said.

“Because we love them,” Noriko added.

In her case the word love held a slightly different meaning. The couple still hadn’t gone public with their relationship. Not after someone kicked Noriko down the stairs just after the new trimester started. As for his own relationship with Kyoko, well the armed guards were back. Urufu’s guardian just loved sticking a thumb into Kareyoshi’s eyes, and twist.

“Now this is funny,” Noriko said.

Yukio brought his mind out of his thoughts. “What is?”

“This. It specifically says every class is assigned logistics duties throughout the entire festival.”

Yukio shrugged. “We had to last year as well.”

“But it wasn’t made explicit like this.” Noriko looked at them. “Something stinks.”