School Daze

Haru’s back creaked against a hard, wooden chair. His ears perked up at the sound of a familiar chime, signaling the end of a period. Immediately, idle chatter erupted around him, too jumbled to make any sense of it. Not like he cared.

His first instinct was to put his head down, a moment on the cool desk to rest, but the sudden skid of a chair brought his gaze sharply forward.

He would have ignored it as some nobody if tresses of pink hair hadn’t invaded his vision. The chair was purposefully jolted right into his desk before the owner plopped down with a smile atop her crossed arms.

“So, is this how your school feels?”

Haru’s gaze trailed away from Grace, her bubbliness almost overbearing.

“More or less…”

Playing through that dating sim right before bedtime had been exhausting, but it did the trick. His eyes glazed over at the tropey girls that pined for his attention, so instead, he stared at the backgrounds. The flat, uninspired environments that shrill voices and petty dialogue sought to mask.

Of course, his brain found a suitable middle ground, using his actual school. He couldn’t complain though. At least, he wouldn’t have to worry about where things were. It was comfortable. It was familiar.

Grace looked like she was enjoying herself, having appeared before him in their school uniform. It was the first time he gave it all that much thought, but the simple ensemble of white buttoned-up shirt, plaid skirt, and loose tie around the collar fitted Grace quite well… despite how pink on top stood out like a unicorn among horses.

She was literally dancing in place as if testing new shoes. Haru couldn’t fathom a skirt that could twirl any higher. The sight of it was difficult to tear himself away from, unsure if it was because she was causing a scene, or a secret hope of catching a glimpse.

Soon enough, the chime rang again, and the noisemakers shuffled to their assigned desks. At least, it looked like Grace knew how to behave herself. It wasn’t going to be one of those dreams where the peace of his everyday life was shattered. One where reality turned into a dumb joke.

Various equations magically appeared on the front board while his brain lacked the processing to render the teacher’s motions. It was spent instead on shifting the mood to the doldrums of study. Haru eased back in his chair, feeling rather comfortable amid the monotony of it.

“Grace, would you care to answer this equation?” The teacher’s request floated in the air.

“Let’s see… that would be the reverse fold of a crepe times the inner diameter of a donut. Sprinkle, sprinkle, carry the cinnamon sugar into the baker’s dozen.”

Haru snorted loudly while holding back his laughter at her deadpan serious answer. Grace had sweets on the brain ever since she passed by the chocolate fountain yesterday.

“Correct. You may be seated.”

“Seriously?! What the hell was that? A magic spell?” Haru couldn’t help but whisper a retort.

“But I tried my best!”

Haru’s sides hurt. He had fully expected that Dream Fairies wouldn’t know the first thing when it came to physics, but hearing her proclamation with utter confidence tickled him just a bit too much.

But then again, it was all a dream. And as Haru turned back to the board, he was met with drawings of pastries blowing across the clouds. Grace’s smug grin made the culprit obvious.

Truly, reality didn’t matter here. Grace’s magic filled in the gaps.

After school, Haru was surprised to see that the influence of the dating sim extended far past the school grounds.

Grace tagged along as he took the normal path home, passing by the nearby train station, a spacious park, and a shopping district – all crammed side-by-side. His mind had conveniently condensed the path between them, until the cityscape was a snow globe of its actual size.

Haru felt slightly disoriented at the discrepancy, like he was warping from screen to screen. He found a moment to compose himself on a bench near the shopping district. He wasn’t particularly tired, as if he would inside of a dream. Yet, looking at Grace bouncing all over the place contrasted his low energy. One wasn’t supposed to feel age like this.

She whizzed around, looking at every nook and cranny, eyes bright as if she found gold hidden just for her. Haru had always considered these places mundane, but perhaps, it was a little bit less so with company.

“Calm down, you’re going to give me a neck spasm trying to follow you!”

“Dream Fairies don’t get to go shopping.”

“And yes, they don’t go to school, or attend classes, or do homework, or have to deal with random questions from the teachers,” he said getting up and walking over to her.

Grace found everything to be fresh and new. All Haru could do was try to keep with her pace. But once again he was dragged. Apparently, it had become a habit, ever since she first pulled him toward the clouds.

Grace was enthusiasm personified. It was what he lacked in his day-to-day life. If he wanted the experience, he was stuck chasing it.

A turn of the heel brought Grace facing him, and her brightness infected him slightly. He relented to all the hints that she dropped.

“Alright, alright. How about I get you a treat or something?”

He hadn’t forgotten how much it was on her mind. Sweets were something that would cheer up any girl, wouldn’t it? A Dream Fairy aside, Haru felt like anything would do, given her childish personality.

He spotted a crepe stand and chose one filled with chocolate and cream. Grimacing at the overflowing mound of toppings threatening to form a mess all over, he quickly passed it to Grace. It floated on wires to her.

She accepted it with a glowing ‘thank you’, planting her face deep into it as it approached. Haru nodded to himself in satisfaction. Such an easy to please companion.

But then, Grace swatted the crepe down to the ground. Her cream-covered face was full of confusion. Her back was arched as if sulking. A set of eyes rolled up toward Haru, almost looking like she had been betrayed.

“W-Wha, What’s wrong?!”

The crepe was splattered on the ground, smashed with spite. Grace merely answered Haru with a bitter look, jabbing her finger toward the stand for him to sample the issue himself.

Haru did just that, thinking that a dream couldn’t hurt him anyways. To his surprise, the cream tasted like first-aid cotton and the chocolate could have very well been Styrofoam.

Ah right… I haven’t actually eaten one before… sweets aren’t my thing.

Grace’s pouting face hung in his vision as he realized that, even as the surroundings faded to black.

#####

“Yo, you look like someone snuck wasabi in your yakisoba bread, snorted, and now, the back of your throat is burning up the wazoo.”

“No, I’d say that is the face of a gamer trying to choose which waifus and husbandos to ship in Flame Insignia for his main playthrough.”

Haru looked up from his desk at Daichi and Koichi, obviously teasing his sullen state the entire day. He tried not to think about it, but the way that Grace lost her cheerfulness in an instant made him feel guilty as hell.

And his aversion to sweet things was to blame.

Of course, it would be fake if he never ate them. He just never expected them to taste of children’s play toys. His subconscious had once again taken a strangely logical turn to fill in the gaps.

“Seriously, what’s up with you? You were your normal self just yesterday.”

A bulky arm wrapped around Haru’s head, pulling him up from his seat. A ‘bro headlock’ typical of a worried Daichi. Next to him, Koichi swept back his long hair and smiled, acting like he figured it out.

“Something happened, didn’t it? Now, you’re all moody because it didn’t go your way. Tell us, what did you bomb now?”

“That’s not-”

Haru mentally kicked himself. It wasn’t like he could tell them that he was having a rendezvous with a girl in his dreams. That would blow over swell.

His eyes darted around the room, looking for some other excuse, but all he saw was a group of girls chatting as they left the classroom. But then, a flyer on a desk caught his attention, presumably left by them.

One look at it gave him the perfect excuse, for his friends, as well as for patching up with Grace.

“In fact, there has been something I’ve been wanting to do. Can you two join me? Please?” Haru put his hands together to beg extra hard.

Koichi and Daichi took one look at the flyer before double taking.

“Huh? Sweets Parade?” they both answered at once.