2 Why Me?

"I can't believe this is happening to me." Arata, still reeling from that morning said to himself. He wished this was some bad dream he was going to awakening from soon, but this was no mere nightmare. This was now his reality.

"Whoa, you looks like you've seen a ghost." Yogi noticed his discomfort. While it would've been nice to have someone's support. He was the last person that he needed right now. "Anything that you need to talk about?"

"Oh no, really it's not big deal." He deflected. "Nothing that you need to worry about." He laughed.

"Oh okay, if that's what you want." He let off, "But if you do have a problem I think you should talk to someone about it."

"Oh I think I might have someone in mind." Of course, the person he was referring too wasn't exactly helping him to say the least. But with lunchtime about to start, he knew there was only one place he had to go. "Speaking of, I think I need to go see them right now."

"All right then. Sadly for me, I gotta help a teacher with some paperwork so I won't be eating lunch today."

"Shame for that. Hope that your friends don't mind." Odd though, it's not as if he couldn't eat in the teachers' room.

"I hope so too, except I think Erina said she had something else as well and couldn't make it either." So she's expecting him, he thought. Not a surprise given he imagined she was planning it for a while, but now it's his turn to get what he wants. The pair went their separate ways. Arata found himself out on the outside eating area. Being that he usually kept to himself at his desk, eating his own homemade food, going here was foreign for him.

"Yoohoo, over here." A voice called to him. It was her, the first and last person he wanted to see right now. He made his way over, a place that was relatively secluded, but there was still some students around. Enough to make him nervous.

"All right, I'm here." He said, enthusiastically. "I'm hoping this is the part where you tell me this is all some twisted joke you're pulling."

"Joke? Ha, the only joke here is your outfit."

"What? But I'm just wearing the school uniform." She burst out in laughter.

"Like I said, that's my joke here." Her jokes may not have been funny to him, but it did mean she was serious about the other deal. Even if that made him sadder.

"You know what I'm talking about" He sighed, sitting beside her. As he took his lunch out, he took note of her own food. Seemed as though she made it herself as well.

"Ah I see you make your own lunch as well." She commented on his own food.

"Huh? Oh right, yeah I just do that so I can get food I want to eat. I see you make yours as well there."

"Yep, I've gotten a lot of practice lately." She confidently answered. "That way I make sure Yogi can get a good meal everyday." She clasped her hands over her heart saying that.

"You make him lunch?"

"Of course I do silly." Well at least it explained what Yogi meant earlier. "Oh look over there." She pointed over to a pair of students, a girl and a boy to be precise. "You know who they are, right?"

"Of course I do." The two students were Akiba Shinshiro and Akaki Miyatani. Those two have been friends with Yogi since they were pretty young. Arata recalled their first day of school. When the trio were glad to be in the same class as each other. It made him a little jealous at the time. If only he had someone that he could've been friends with since they were kids.

"Well I guess it shouldn't be a surprise for you, but that girl over there is in love with Yogi." This was something he felt was true, but until this confirmation didn't know for sure.

"Really then. Well she is the type to try and keep her feelings hidden. But I've always had my suspicions, especially with the way Yogi's talked about her."

"He talks about her?" She asked, unlike her usual demeanor, she seems a bit more upset at this statement.

"Well he talks about all of you guys." He tried to ease the situation. "Sounds like you guys have had some fun times."

"Really, what's he's said about me." She asked with glee, doing a reversal on her prior mood.

"Um..." He paused to think about what he's heard over the last year. "I remember one time he told me you guys got stuck in some closet."

"Ah good times, I remember how happy I was then."

"I don't think he felt that way!" He was pretty certain that Yogi mentioned it being very uncomfortable.

"How could he not enjoy it. Oh it was so nice to be close that I could feel every part of his body." It seemed like she was on another planet with the way she was acting.

"I see you've made some friends." Another voice brought her back to earth. It was Misei Jingu, the school president.

"Oh, hello president, and hello to the vice president as well." He greet the other girl standing with her. Misao Shitara, the school's vice president, and close friend to Misei.

"Hey you guys, I see you're out and about checking on the students today." Erina responded in her carefree attitude.

"And I see you're busy as well." Said Mesei. She looked over at Arata. With her glare, he felt the anxiety building inside him. She was pretty scary, but she seemed to also be friends with Yogi, so she couldn't be that bad. Not that it gave him any comfort.

"H-hi. Um… I'm-"

"You're Arata Kashimura, correct?"

"Yea-yeah. I was in the same class as you last year." He struggled to find word to carry this conversation. Not only was she someone that he had some fear of, but he wasn't exactly good at talking to people who were mostly strangers.

"I see. Misao, we should get going."

"Right." The pair left as sudden as they came. Kind of odd, he thought.

"Well what you do you think?" Erina asked him, breaking his thoughts.

"Think, well she's the president, don't think I want to say anything bad about her."

"Really, nothing special?"

"Well I guess you can say she's a pretty mature lady, very serious… Unless you're about to..."

"Yep, it looks like little miss serious has a little crush." She said, in a sing-song tune.

"Wow, I never would've guess her of all people. Especially with him." He didn't want to be mean to Yogi, the boy had been nothing but nice to him, but he also didn't exude intelligence to say the least.

"Yeah I don't know why either, but that doesn't really matter to me." A fire grew in her eyes. "Because I love Yogi, and that's all that matters."

"It's always going to come back to that isn't it?" He facepalmed.

"Well we're not done yet. I'm sure you've heard of Yuriko, right?" She was referring to Yuriko Kikugawa, a girl that he had never personally met. From what Yogi had spoken of, it seems that she became friends with the others halfway through the school year, shortly after summer break.

"Let me guess, she's in love with him too." This was beginning to sound like a broken record to him at this point.

"Bingo."

"Well I knew that at least. From the way he talked about her, seems like she's a classic tsundere."

"Tsu-tsundere?" Erina looked at him, dumbfounded.

"I mean, she was someone that disliked him at first right? And it sounds like she hits him sometimes too." He quickly explained. If he had said that term to someone that didn't already know his secret, he would die of embarrassment.

"Well if that's what that word means, then it fits her to a T." She laughed, oblivious to what he was talking about. The bell being her only interruption. "Well well well, looks like lunch is over."

"Damn it." He said under his breath, he failed to get the information he was hoping for. This wasn't going to be easy on him at all.

"Tick tock, I hope you make up your mind by the end of school. I'll see you then. And don't think of trying to sneak off somewhere to avoid me. You wouldn't want something leaking out now, would you?" Her smug face upset him, but then he realized something.

"Actually I can't meet after school. I have something important to do."

"Something more important than this? I would've thought you'd do more to save your reputation."

"It really is, I promise, I'll tell you my decision in the morning tomorrow." While this sounded like a plan to buy some time, he wasn't being dishonest. His prior plans haven't changed despite this setback.

"Okay then. I'll see you then." She left in an upbeat manner. Leaving him to ponder this bizarre situation he found himself in.