CH 45

The day after playing around in Emepa.

Golden Week is over and school has finally started, but today is Friday, so Saturday and Sunday will come soon after I go to school for the day. I don’t know if I can call it a vacation since I have a part-time job on both days.

After the Saturday and Sunday, the school finally shifts to a period of voluntary suspension of club activities before the examinations, and the mid-term examinations begin the following week.

As I don’t have to spend time preparing for exams if I am not involved in club activities, I feel that this is the period when more students leave the school than usual.

“Then it will be hard to be a member of the sports festival committee. Does it coincide with the exam period?”

“Yes, that’s right~. Teachers don’t really recommend it, but if we take it easy, we’ll end up with a very dull gymnastic festival.”

It is now lunchtime.

So, the four of us were having lunch in the courtyard as usual.

It seems that Saejima’s class E quickly decided on a committee member for the P.E. festival during morning HR, and as I had expected, Saejima ran for that troublesome role.

I suppose it’s good in the sense that it will be memorable, but I’m not going to do it. I heard that they have to work on the weekends around the time of the festival, and it would interfere with my part-time job.

“I wonder who will be a member of the committee in our class? I don’t know anything about the girls, but the boys will be on the committee.”

It seemed that our C class was going to decide who would be on the committee during after-school HR, and the longer it took, the later we would have to go home. I was surprised to hear that the E class had decided to do it in the morning because it looked like it would be decided soon.

To my questioning words, Kohinata tilted her head and folded her arms. Kohinata looks distressed, but her face is as expressionless as usual.

And as for Keiichi

“Takada said he can’t make it because he has club activities. He’s a regular.”

“Oh, basketball, right. The gymnastic festival is after the exam period.”

“Oh yeah, that’s right. Well, Saejima is going to do it too, so I think it’s okay for me to be a part of it. The modeling part time job is also no problem if you tell them in advance.”

–So, it looks like he is going to be a member of the executive committee.

If Keiichi runs for the committee, not only the girls but also the boys are likely to agree with him. And the number of female committee members would immediately increase…or, on the contrary, the number of candidates would increase, making the process more difficult? I want them to make a quick decision so that I don’t have to come home too late.

“Eh!? You’ll do it too, Karakusa-kun? Let’s do it!”

“If only there were no one in my class who really wanted to do it. This kind of experience is not a bad thing.”

Keiichi seems to be chuckling as he sees Saejima almost jumping up and down with joy.

Oooooh, you’re so hot in the middle of the day. Hurry up and go out with each other, you guys.

Can we celebrate with a special meal? We could ask Akane san to make a special menu for us. Or an ultra-hyper deluxe special megaton parfait at my part-time job?

“Well, let’s leave that kind of fun stuff aside–“

I broke the joyful mood and looked at Kohinata, who was wriggling her mouth. She may have sensed something wasn’t right and slowly averted her gaze from me.

“Well,……, Asuka really could stay in school if she doesn’t prepare well for the exam,…….”

“I heard that last year she got a lot of red marks and had to take a bunch of retests.”

Saejima and Keiichi, perhaps aware of the gravity of the situation, say such things in a grave tone. Kohinata is really lucky to have been promoted to the second grade.

If I were to explain her academic performance in numerical terms, it would be easiest to show it in terms of her grade ranking.

There are a total of about 300 students in the second grade at Sakura Sei Gakuen, and among them, my ranking on the test is about in the top 50. Keiichi is behind me, but he is a regular double-digit scorer.

And according to what I hear, Saejima is in the middle of the pack, around 150th, while Kohinata, the student in question, is over 300th. Kohinata’s ranking is over 300. It is a ranking that can be counted from behind with just the fingers of one’s hand.

“Kohinata will definitely not be able to be a member of the executive committee, or rather, her homeroom teacher will probably stop her from being a member of the executive committee. You’re going to have to study like an adult, okay?”

When I said that, Kohinata turned her head away from me. Probably, or almost certainly, she doesn’t like to study. …… In the past, when I walked by Kohinata’s seat at the end of class, I saw a notebook full of drawings of bachemo-rabbit-like creatures bouncing around.

I looked at Kohinata with anxious eyes, wondering if she was really okay,

“If you study with Sugino-kun, you’ll be fine! I’m sure it will be better than me teaching you!”

Saejima replied with a happy expression, “Yeah, yeah!”

“…… together? I don’t mind, but–when did you start talking about it?”

I ask, tilting my head, and Keiichi gives me the answer instead of Saejima.

“Ah, I told Saejima that Tomoki has little time to prepare for exams, so he can at least afford to watch Kohinata’s studies. From there we were talking about having a study session at Tomoki’s house.”

Again, it seems that such a conversation was taking place without the landlord’s knowledge.

“But there might be a meeting of the committee members during the exam period, and I think I’ll leave it to you then. So, Sugino-kun! Please cooperate with us for Asuka’s promotion!

Saejima bowed her head as if in worship. Isn’t she overreacting?

I thought for a moment that even if she didn’t bow down so much, I could just watch her study, but then I thought about it and realized that being alone with Kohinata might not be a good situation for me. It’s a matter of my rationality.

As for the other party, Kohinata, she was chomping down on her bento as if to say, “I have nothing to do with it”. She is very cute and squirrelly, but this is not a good time to indulge her.

“We’re talking about Kohinata, remember?”

Saying this, I lightly patted Kohinata on the head. She immediately hit me back with a head butt. Why is that?

As an aside, I heard that several female students were taken to the nurse’s office during lunch break for anemia.