The start of the battle of representation

The class teacher entered soon after that, with a big smile on his face.

“Now!”, he clapped his hands and got the attention of the entire class. “We all know what day it is!”, he exclaimed and kept smiling.

Everyone took their seats and looked with anticipation. This was way bigger of a deal than in my school. Even Mary looked at the teacher intently.

The teacher smirked, or at least it looked like he smirked, “We’re going to switch it up this time.”, he smiled and slammed both his hands on the desk, “Instead of nominating, we’re going to make it in-between the top two academic ranked students and the top two sports ranked students.”

That poor desk… and how do you even rank students based on sports. It almost feels like he’s going to nominate anyone he wishes for. I glanced towards Mary; it seemed she was smiling. All according to plan?

“Let me check…”, the teacher shuffled around some papers and pondered. The class was quiet, way too quiet. Is this how it goes in a manga… I usually don’t see that many background noises during times like these so maybe it’s that but they really are taking this way too seriously.

“Alright! For academics! Mary is ranked first, followed closely by Hinata!”, he exclaimed and started to shuffle even more papers. Mary was ranked first, wow, I knew she was good at studies, but this good? I’m honestly impressed. Mary huffed. Full of pride. Looks like she was impressed too. No wonder she was smiling before.

I wonder what the leads of the manga are doing. Oh, Kuroki’s smiling away at Hinata. I’m pretty sure everyone can see that right… Wait, does Hinata not see it or does she not want to see it.

“Staring away, aren’t you?”, said Mary. I turned towards her. She had her face on one of her hands and looked adorable. Wait, did she find out that I was looking at Kuroki? Can’t let her find that out…

“Looking… at who?”, I asked, with hopefully a poker face but I felt my face muscles betraying me.

She sighed, “Nevermind…”, crisis averted.

“Akari…”, the teacher looked at me. Did I just get caught talking in class?

“Yes?”, I almost stood up in my seat.

“You’re ranked first in sports…”, well, that’s to be expected. He turned towards Kuroki but faced me again, “Pay attention in class.”, he said with a disappointed look on his face.

“Kuroki’s second.”, he smiled. I feel like he might be slightly biased there. “So these are the four candidates for class representation!”

As soon as the teacher said that Kuroki put his hands up and spoke, “I don’t want to be the class representative!”, he exclaimed. Can we even do that?

The teacher smiled, “Fair enough. Three left.”

Alright, we can just do that.

I raised my hands up and hoped that the teacher would see it.

“Yes, Akari. Got anything to add?”, he saw me!

I got up, again and spoke, “I do not want to be the class representative either.”

“Alright. The sports category was popularity anyway so you probably would’ve won… now this makes it more interesting.”, he scoffed.

Does he have something against me? I feel like he has something against me. Wasn’t he extremely supportive back when he found out about my… amnesia? Is my secret out?

Kuroki stood up, “Yes! Besides, we all know there’s someone who deserves this more than anybody!”, he almost screamed. Is he not used to it?

He looked straight at Hinata, “We both do, right?”, he then looked at me. Can he not speak for me, I’m right here and I don’t remember making him my representative. This is getting annoying. Everyone looked at me. Now this is annoying.

I sighed and slumped my shoulders, “No… May the best person win!”, I try to smile after exclaiming that to the best of my abilities. Hinata looked at me with shock, as did Kuroki. Kuro let out an audible groan, which everyone ignored, I’ll be a part of thi,s everyone too. Just this once.

 But more importantly, Mary hasn’t even looked at me. I wish she did, but she preferred looking at the ground… wait, is she alright?

“Hey…”, I look towards Mary. “You alright?”

She looked up and smiled, “Yes.”

I smiled in return, “You can do it!”, I tried to cheer her on. She nodded and looked at the front. I really hope I didn’t mess that up.

“Alright, calm down all of you!”

The class was apparently in an uproar that I didn’t notice. It did quiet down after what the teacher said. “So…”, he smirked, “It’s in-between the top two academic students in the class!”, he added.

“I’ll let you both prepare and then we’ll continue this tomorrow!”, he smiled and took our attendance next.

The rest of the classes were the same old, made me feel right at home really. Same syllabus too, maybe I’d be the next number one rank in academics. I give myself a mental high five. Probably not, but I can dream. I look towards Mary, who was busy writing something.

“What are you writing?”, I asked.

“My speech…”, she replied instantly without missing a beat and still writing. I probably shouldn’t bother her… They really take this whole stuff seriously. I never really paid attention to it back when I was in their place. The teacher just selected two people and that was that. I think? Didn’t really have much with merit, just two people the teacher liked. Maybe it’s the same here, in a way.

I kept glancing towards Mary, her writing seemed full of cuts but she kept on writing. I wish I could help her somehow but I have absolutely no expertise in this matter. Maybe I should go and buy her an orange juice… maybe I’ll just do that.

I got up from my seat as soon as the break bell rang and walked towards the vending machine which I never used before. I should have some change. Thankfully, I did. The process was much more exciting when I watched it in videos. Now it just seems… convenient. I’m not going to complain. They only had one option for an orange juice, so I didn’t have to waste my whole break thinking about which one to get. How nice of them. I pressed the button and I got an orange juice can. Mission accomplished! Today wasn’t a waste, I smirked.

“Hey…”, Damn, that scared me. It’s Kuroki.

“Hi..”, I sigh a sense of relief.

“You alright?”, Yeah, no thanks to you. I nodded and replied, “What do you want?”

“Are you mad?”, he looked down and slumped his shoulders.

I chuckle, “I don’t remember about what I’d be mad at… remember?”

“No… dude…”, he slumped his shoulder even more. Is that even humanely possible?

“I mean just now… I’m sorry, I spoke in behalf of you…”, he added.

Oh… right… I forgot about that.

“It’s fine.”, I replied. “Just don’t do it again…”

As soon as I start to walk way, he put his hands on my shoulders before removing it as soon as he did it and mumbled a sorry before putting his hands up, “It’s just…”, he looked down and sighed, dropped his hands and looked up. “We kept talking about Hinata, you know?”

“Before our fight?”

“Before our fight…”, he slanted his body to a wall and looked sideways, “We were rather close…”

Do I sense a lore drop?

“So… I thought that you’d support her too!”

I sigh, “You know…”

“Lost your memories?”, he cut me off. Maybe we were best friends, look at us finishing our sentences. We aren’t best friends, or even friends for that matter.

“I know… I regretted it as soon as you said what you… said.”, he looked down. Not physically but emotionally.

So, no lore drop?

It’s fine, really. This was probably the manga plot. I’m pretty sure Hinata won it mainly because of that but I don’t want that. I want the best person to win… Hopefully the best person does win. I look towards the orange juice can.

“It’s fine! As long as you realize your mistakes!”, I smiled. “Now, I have a special delivery to make, so if you’ll excuse me.”

He did excuse me but it almost felt like he was going to call me again, but he didn’t. I didn’t want to look back and simply walked back to the class. It was probably better this way. Mary still seemed to be busy writing her script.

I put the orange juice can beside her notes and sat down in my seat. She looked up, almost frantically, before putting her eyes on me, “Oh…”

She picked the can up and smiled, “Is this for yesterday?”

“No… It’s for today. Good luck.”, I smiled in return.

“Thank you…”, She looked at me and smiled before opening the can and taking a sip. She started writing again and kept sipping randomly, too.

I smiled to myself and hoped that she really does win it.