There I was, at the school cafeteria, enjoying some peace and quiet, finally. Abby had been incessant in her pestering and I could now finally hear myself think for a moment.

  “Hey, what about that guy, Marcus?”

  “Marcus!? That two timer!? Screw him!”

  “Oh? But I thought you liked him!”

  That was girl talk, wasn’t it? Sounded awfully boring to me. And come to think of it, Abby and I never talked about that. In fact, most of the time, it was Abby pestering and teasing me with the occasional talk about a TV show or school, or whatever.

  “…”

  It was silent. I mean, there was a lot of ctter and crowd noise, but… it was quiet. One might say, it was too quiet.

  Have I… gotten used to her?

  No, of course not! It was that! You know, that? Like, when you spend a whole morning vacuuming, and then you turn the machine off and your ears kind of miss the noise? It’s that kind of feeling that I mean.

  Hold on Violet… isn’t that… getting used to something?

  I was being foolish. Of course not! I’ve been alone my whole life, why should I start feeling lonely all of a second? Just because someone was trying to be friends with me?

  …Yup, sure sounds like it.

  Again, such foolishness.

  “Hi there!” a voice chirped. “I’m gd I managed to find you.”

  Sitting in front of me was now Abby. She was smiling as she leaned over, hands on her face and elbow rudely on the table.

  I felt annoyed by my moment of quietude ending but at the same time… I felt kinda happy?

  …Violet, you’ve grown soft.

  Or maybe I just grew more aware of my own loneliness?

  Yeah, I’d go with that. It made me sound more of a grown up if I put it that way.

  “What about your parents?” I asked.

  She shrugged. “I told them I had to come back to study, so they let me off the hook for leaving early.”

  She was a bit of a liar, but somehow, she felt trustworthy.

  Yup, I’ve grown soft after all.

  Deciding which is which was more of a pain than her yapper. For me, the reason for feeling like that was whatever.

  ???

  The first week of csses went by faster than what I had expected. Faster even than the weekend, believe it or not.

  And as time always does, it was back to being Monday. Css had just started, and I was already restless. Just, who had been the genius who thought it was a good idea to make us have math as the first css of the week and morning? An absolute psychopath, that’s who. Maybe it was our dear teacher?

  A quick peek at Violet revealed what I had suspected was in actuality prophetic.

  She was barely holding her tiredness at bay, her eyes blinking slits as she prodded her head up by the chin. She didn’t even notice me staring at her, as was usual.

  The whole past week she had looked tired, but I had expected she’d look fresher after the weekend, but no. She looked even more drained, somehow.

  Surprisingly enough, she was still managing to take notes. Looking at her moving hand, I noticed she was using her left. That made her the first south paw I had ever come across.

  I almost made a joke about it to fight my boredom and to see if I could perk her up, but remembering whom our teacher was, I closed my mouth before saying anything.

  Doodles it is, then.

  I wanted to make a caricature of Mr Scrooge, but there was the issue that our notebooks were also evaluated. I just drew some flowers around the borders instead, but soon, I grew bored of it.

  Now what?

  Now, Violet moved, catching my attention. She was attempting to stretch discreetly, failing miserably with how her joints popped, and exposing her sides for poking one more time.

  Should I?

  I’d have loved to act upon my impulse, but again, we were in css, so I’d rather keep us out of trouble. Besides, we were still in an awkward phase. She’d most likely not appreciate my tease.

  She looked a bit more awake after settling back to her previous position, but she was still far from being alert.

  …I guess I’ll watch her.

  Today she had her hair on a ponytail that I thought suited her. It allowed me to better see her facial features. She really had a very well-made face, truly beautiful. Long eyeshes too. I imagined she’d act all flustered if I told her that. She’d probably be popur with the boys if she didn’t have such a cold demeanour. It would be fun, wouldn’t it? Her reaction if a boy asked her out.

  “Pfft.”

  She heard my snicker, and looked at me, her cheeks getting a bit of red when she realised I had been admiring her. Well, maybe not realising I was looking at her to that extend.

  “I’m bored,” I wrote in the corner of a page I showed her.

  She gave me a look that exhaled “and what am I supposed to do with that?” which almost made me ugh.

  She didn’t have to do a thing, she just had to react in her natural way.

  “Wanna py a game?”

  She raised an eyebrow and shifted her gaze between me and my notebook before putting her pencil to use.

  “No.”

  “Why?”

  “I’m tired and having a hard time understanding the css.”

  I could help her with the part of her not understanding, but why was she so tired?

  “I had a rough night at work.”

  She was still working? Was she that hard pressed for cash, then? It sounded like a terrible idea to be working that much while also being in high school. I wasn’t even sure if that was legal.

  And come to think of it, I never asked what her job was, nor where she worked.

  “Waitress. Not telling you where.”

  “Huh!? Why?” I hushed, feeling slighted.

  Her lips formed a wry smile, no doubt amused by my pouting.

  She wrote down her answer and I looked at the words formed with graphite.

  “I have the feeling you’ll go there to annoy me otherwise.”

  I moaned in frustration and her smile widened a bit more. She didn’t hold her punches, but I was feeling happy with our little interaction. It was the first I saw Violet smile to me ever since we became friends st week, and she was now teasing me too. It felt like we were starting to truly be friends.

  “Anyway, please let me pay attention to css,” she whispered.

  “If you don’t understand something, I can give you a hand,” I hushed back.

  She looked back at me with a raised eyebrow. I reminded her of the nineteen I had on the exam, but she wasn’t fully convinced. I had to resort to having her challenge me.

  She wrote down the number of the exercise she thought was the hardest, one that turned out to be a kitten disguised as a tiger once I started working on it.

  The face she made when she checked I was correct in the solutions page was priceless. It was always nice to take people by surprise when they thought I was merely a silly girl.

  “What game?” she wrote down in defeat.

  I knew many, but none that I was finding particurly interesting. Until I had the brilliant idea of turning it into a penalty game.

  We pyed battleship, and every time someone lost a ship, the other had to answer whatever the other asked.

  She was extremely suspicious of me, so I reeled in my curiosity and used that chance to get to know her a bit better. I still asked her if she wore a uniform and what it consisted of, but moved on to asking her if she had siblings, her favourite food and hobbies.

  She was an only-child, her favourite food was sandwiches and her hobby was reading.

  For the curious, my answers to her questions were, I have a sister, anything sweet, exercising and pestering her, and the colour yellow is my favourite.

  Yes, she sunk one more ship than me, which meant she technically won the game. We didn’t get to complete it because css ended.

  Csses after that were spent with us occasionally pying or writing notes to each other and taking notes. We didn’t py any other games because the other teachers taught in a way that wasn’t as dry as desert sand, unlike Mr. Scrooge.

  If this was to become our routine, then I might stop skipping csses altogether.

  Despite us always sitting together, walking together, and occasionally going to the bathroom together, there was still a moment in our day we spent apart, and that was lunch break. I had to lunch at home, in part because sometimes I had to eat with my family, but mostly because my mum wanted to make sure I was eating right. Meanwhile, Violet ate at the school cafeteria, alone.

  Today however, since my parents were going to eat at a restaurant, I was going to have the house all for myself, so I decided I’d try and invite her to my pce.

  “Violet? Have you already bought your meal ticket?” I asked when we got to the school entrance, the point where we’d go our separate ways.

  “I was about to.”

  “Well, I’ll be eating alone today, so…”

  “…I see.”

  I don’t think she was understanding I was inviting her, and the fact I had to spell it out was making me feel self-conscious about it.

  Maybe she’d prefer to eat alone?

  She still seemed to get annoyed at me most of the times, so giving her a small break was probably better.

  I thought that while telling her “see you in a bit”, but then she called out to my so abruptly, I got startled.

  “Erm… Like I said, erm… I haven’t bought it yet, so, erm… i-if you want to…”

  It took her some time, but she understood me after all.

  “Oh, you do care,” I joked, pulling her by her arm.

  “I-I’m only being polite!” she retorted, pulling her arm free.

  “My, such a nice girl,” I giggled.

  She protested some more, but she kept following me, walking by my side.