The Red Sea and the Redder Face

Exactly my type.

My brain, usually a high-speed processor, had just hit a 404 error.

"Eh?" I managed.

"You heard me, Prez."

I stared at him. He stared back at me.

So close.

His face was so close.

I stood up so fast my chair screeched. I needed to put space between us.

"Y-You cannot just say something like that!"

Calm now. I could handle a delinquent with a sudden weird interest.

"Sudō-kun, this is the student council office–"

"You got a lover?" He interrupted, his voice a gravelly rumble.

His eyes narrowed. He looked like a predator scenting the air for a kill. If I said 'yes,' whatever poor soul held that title was about to become a permanent fixture in the school's infirmary.

"A lover?" I squeaked. "T-that's not any of your–"

Koga's head snapped to the side, his gaze pinning Hikari to her chair. She froze, the half-broken pen still in her hand.

"You," Koga barked. "You the one he's seeing?"

"Me?!" Hikari's voice came out thin. She dropped the pen and held her hands up like she was being searched by the police. "No! God, no! Shun? He's single! He's, like, terminally single! He's married to his position! He spends his Friday nights sorting out the lost and found! He's all yours! Please don't kill me!"

"Hikari!" I hissed, feeling a heat crawl up my neck.

Koga turned back to me. The murderous tension in his shoulders had eased.

"Right." He straightened up, his towering height making the ceiling feel lower. "You're mine, then."

"That's… that's not a conclusion…"

"I'll see you in class, Prez."

"Wait, Sudō-kun–"

He strolled out the open door.

Without a word, I walked to the window. Pressed my forehead against the cool glass and stared out at the courtyard, where everything was normal and sane and nobody was declaring ownership of anyone else.

"Is the President… going to be okay?" Sota, the junior secretary whispered, finally coming out from behind the cabinet.

I felt Hikari's eyes on my back. "I think I just betrayed him to a gang leader."

"You did," I said. "You absolutely did. I will remember this."

"He asked if I was your lover! What was I supposed to say?!"

I peeled my forehead off the window. Turned around. Straightened my tie, and returned to my desk, like someone who was totally in control of the situation.

"No one is to speak of this," I said. "Koga Sudō is clearly confused. Or performing some kind of prank. Delinquents do that. I will resolve this through a proper conversation later."

Neither of them said anything.

I picked up my pen and began working.

My cheeks remained red till the first period bell.

***

I had convinced myself the early encounter was just an anomaly.

Koga Sudō had probably already forgotten about it. Delinquents had short attention spans, didn't they? They were too busy smoking behind the gym and terrorizing underclassmen to hold onto… whatever that had been.

I stepped out of the office, bracing the heavy stack against my chest.

Koga Sudō was leaning against the wall directly outside the door.

Arms crossed. Waiting.

I froze. "What are you–"

He pushed off the wall and didn't answer. Just fell into step beside me like this was normal. Like he hadn't been waiting outside my office like some kind of–

"What are you doing?" I demanded, walking faster.

He matched my pace easily. Annoyingly, his legs were longer than mine.

"Walking." He said.

"I can see that. Why are you walking?"

"Going to class."

"And that requires walking next to me specifically?"

He shrugged.

We reached the first corridor intersection. A group of second-years were clustered near the lockers having some kind of heated argument, and their eyes landed on me as we approached.

"President Aizawa!" One of them stepped forward. "Can you help us decide about the–"

He stopped because Koga was looking at him. He tilted his head slightly, nostrils flaring. A sharp, almost audible huff escaped him, like a dragon snorting before a strike.

The boy discovered he had urgent business elsewhere.

They all did. They scattered like leaves in a windstorm, and I watched them go, my mouth half-open, their question still unasked.

"I was handling that," I said, turning to Koga.

"Looked like they were bothering you."

"They were asking a question! That's my job! I am the Student Council President, people come to me with–"

Before I could finish, he reached out and snatched the entire stack of folders right out of my arms.

"Give those back!"

He tucked the massive pile under one arm as if it were a single comic book and just started walking, forcing me to trot along beside him to keep up. It was a nightmare. The student body parted like the Red Sea. People were literally pressing themselves against the walls to give us a wide berth.

"Sudō-kun. Those are official council documents. If you don't return them I will–"

"Stack was lopsided."

I blinked. "What?"

"You were carrying it lopsided." He didn't look at me. He was navigating the corridor with the same unhurried ease he did everything. "By the stairs, you were gonna drop the whole thing."

It dawned on me all of a sudden.

The staircase to the faculty office did have a narrow landing. The stack had been slightly heavier on the left side from the attached exhibits.

I had not noticed that.

Koga Sudō had.

"That," I said, after a moment, "is still not–"

"You've picked papers up off those stairs before. More than once."

The image appeared in my head: myself, on the landing, chasing color-coded documents down the steps.

He'd noticed. Nobody else did. It was such a small thing, stupid even, but it lodged under my ribs anyway. Warm.

How long had he been watching me?

I pressed my lips together.

"Fine," I said. "You can carry them to the faculty office."

He grunted his agreement.

I walked beside him the rest of the way with my arms folded because they had nothing to do, and I did not know what to do with arms that had nothing to do.

At the faculty office door, Koga held the stack out to me. I took it. Our fingers touched briefly, his were warm and callused.

"Thank you," I said, because I had been raised with manners.

Koga leaned against the wall beside the door.

I went inside, submitted the folders, bowed to the faculty secretary, and walked back out.

By the time we reached the classroom, rumors were already trailing us like a loud current.

"Since when does the Crimson Fang carry things for people?"

"Is he running errands for the President?"

I marched to my seat, hoping the presence of a teacher would provide some cover.

I sat down. Koga, who usually occupied a desk in the back corner (on the rare days he actually showed up), didn't head for his seat. Instead, he loomed over the desk next to mine. The student currently sitting there, a boy named Suzuki, looked up and promptly turned the color of unbaked dough. Koga didn't say anything. He just stared at the chair, then back at Suzuki.

Suzuki grabbed his books and vanished so fast there was a literal breeze left in his wake.

Koga sat down, his large frame overflowing the cramped desk. He then turned his chair sideways, propped his chin on his hand, and stared directly at my profile.

That was the final straw. My calm mask exploded.

"Enough!"

"You cannot just… just intimidate everyone out of my vicinity!" My voice was loud but I didn't care. "Suzuki-kun has sat next to me since April! He doesn't deserve to be chased out of his own seat because you've decided to… to whatever this is!"

Koga's expression didn't change.

"And another thing!" I was on a roll now. The words were coming out faster than I could filter them, which was not how I operated. "You can't just declare someone 'yours'! People aren't possessions! You can't follow me around all day like a-a guard dog without asking! This is a school! There are rules! I am the person who enforces those rules, and I am telling you, as the Student Council!"

I was breathing hard.

The classroom was silent enough to hear a pin drop. Twenty-two students, not breathing. Mr. Takeda, not breathing. The clock on the wall, still ticking, because the clock was the only thing in this room that wasn't terrified of what might happen next.

And then, in the back corner of my brain that hadn't been consumed by righteous fury, a small voice whispered:

You just yelled at Koga Sudō.

The Crimson Fang.

Oh no!

Koga tilted his head.

Considering. Then he said, "You're real cute when you scold people, Prez."

I could hear the collective exhale of people who had been holding their breath.

My face went through several colors of red. It was probably glowing.

"That's-" I sputtered. "That's not a response! I was yelling at you!"

"Yeah." He didn't look sorry. He looked pleased. "Your face gets all red. You get real bossy about it. I like it."

"I am going to die."

I looked desperately toward the front of the room. "Takeda-sensei. Please instruct Sudō-kun to return to his assigned seat."

Takeda-sensei suddenly became very interested in a blank spot on the chalkboard. He adjusted his glasses.

"Ah... well, Aizawa-kun," Takeda-sensei stammered, refusing to meet my eyes. "It's... it's fine. If Sudō-kun feels more... focused... in that seat, let's just leave it for today. For everyone's safety. I mean, for productivity's sake."

I stared at him in pure betrayal. He was the teacher! He was supposed to be the authority! Takeda-sensei began scribbling frantically on the board, pretending he couldn't see my look of utter horror.

I turned. Koga was leaning back, looking as smug as a cat that had caught a canary.

"Looks like we're gonna be real close, Prez," he said.

I sat very still.

He wasn't going to forget about this. That much was clear. I had no framework for what came next, no system that covered this particular variable, and for the first time in recent memory I had absolutely no idea what I was going to do.

Takeda-sensei kept talking.

I picked up my pen.

My face did not fully cool down until second period.